64A_23L_SupportingStatementA_08_2025
64A_23L_SupportingStatementA_08_2025.docx
Oil and Gas Reserves System
OMB: 1905-0057
Supporting
Statement for Oil and Gas Reserves System Surveys
Part
A:Justifications Form
EIA-23L, Annual Report of Domestic Oil and Gas Reserves Form
EIA-23S, Annual Survey of Domestic Oil and Gas
Reserves Form
EIA-64A, Annual Report of the Origin of Natural Gas Liquids
Production
August
2025
www.eia.gov
U.S.
Department of Energy
Washington,
DC 20585
OMB
No. 1905-0057
Extension
of Collection with changes
Continuation of suspension
Extension of Collection with changes
The U.S. Energy Information
Administration (EIA), the statistical and analytical agency within
the
U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), prepared this report. By
law, our data, analyses, and forecasts are independent of approval
by any other officer or employee of the U.S. Government. The views
in this report do not represent those of DOE or any other federal
agencies.
Table of Contents
A.4. Efforts to Identify Duplication 5
A.5. Provisions for Reducing Burden on Small Businesses 5
A.6. Consequences of Less-Frequent Reporting 6
A.7. Compliance with 5 CFR 1320.5 6
A.8. Summary of Consultations Outside of the Agency 6
A.9. Payments or Gifts to Respondents 6
A.10. Provisions for Protection of Information 6
A.11. Justification for Sensitive Questions 7
A.12. Estimate of Respondent Burden Hours and Cost 8
A.13. Annual Cost to the Federal Government 8
A.15. Reasons for Changes in Burden 10
A.16. Collection, Tabulation, and Publication Plans 10
Introduction
The U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) is the statistical and analytical agency within the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE). It collects, analyzes, and disseminates independent and impartial energy information to promote sound policymaking, efficient markets, and public understanding regarding energy and its interaction with the economy and the environment.
EIA requests a three-year extension of collection authority for the three surveys that comprise the Oil and Gas Reserves System Surveys (OMB No. 1905-0057). These surveys are:
• EIA-23L, Annual Report of Domestic Oil and Gas Reserves
• EIA-23S, Annual Survey of Domestic Oil and Gas Reserves (Summary Version)
• EIA-64A, Annual Report of the Origin of Natural Gas Liquids Production
EIA requests a three-year extension with changes for Form EIA-23L, Annual Survey of Domestic Oil and Gas Reserves. Form EIA-23L collects data on domestic production and reserves of crude oil, condensate, and natural gas. Each respondent reports proved reserves and production for crude oil and lease condensate, and natural gas, by state/state subdivision in which it operates, as well as the reservoir type associated with the reserves. Shale and conventional are the reservoir types reported by operators in sections 4 and 5 of Form EIA-23L. EIA proposes a minor modification to Form EIA-23L instructions to align the disclosure language with other EIA surveys, without substantially changing the intention of the disclosure language.
EIA suspended Form EIA-23S, Annual Survey of Domestic Oil and Gas Reserves (Summary Version) in 2013 and requests a continued suspension of this data collection. Form EIA-23S collects data on domestic production and reserves of crude oil, condensate, and natural gas at a summary level from a sample of small operators (those that produce less than 400,000 barrels of crude oil or 2 billion cubic feet of natural gas each year).
EIA requests a three-year extension with changes for Form EIA-64A, Annual Report of the Origin of Natural Gas Liquids Production. Form EIA-64A, complementary to Form EIA-23L, collects data on the production of natural gas liquids. The EIA-64A is a census of natural gas processing plants. All natural gas processing plant operators must file a Form EIA-64A for each plant that they own. Natural gas processing plants report natural gas liquids production by the area of origin of the natural gas processed. EIA proposes six minor modifications to Form EIA-64A instructions to clarify the data requested:
Page 1 of the instructions describing who must file the form indicates that “facilities” refers to natural gas processing plants. EIA proposes adding “including sweeteners” to clarify the respondent frame.
Page 4 of the instructions includes a diagram to assist respondents when filling out Section 2 of the form. EIA proposes defining residue gas as “dry natural gas after liquids extraction” in the text describing the diagram. This is the first place EIA uses the term residue gas other than in the Section title.
Page 4 of the instructions for Section 2.1 requests the total outlet of residue natural gas. EIA proposes clarifying the current definition of residue natural gas from “dry gas” to “dry natural gas after liquids extraction”.
Page 4 of the instructions for Section 2.2 requests the total natural gas used on site as plant fuel. EIA proposes modifying the current instruction to clarify that this data should include natural gas that is used to generate electricity consumed by the plant.
EIA proposes changing all instances of "residue gas" to "residue natural gas" for consistency within the instructions.
Pages 6 and 7 of the instructions include a form glossary. EIA proposes adding a definition to this glossary for gas sweetening plants: "A type of natural gas processing plant designed for removal of impurities such as hydrogen sulfide, carbon dioxide, sulfur, etc. from sour gas to make it suitable for transport and use."
A.1. Legal Justification
The following provisions provide authority for this data collection:
Title 15 U.S.C. §772(b), which establishes the mandatory reporting requirement of owners and operators of businesses in the U.S. to make available energy supply and consumption data to the EIA Administrator.
Title 15 U.S.C. §764(a, b) which establishes the EIA Administrator’s powers to plan, direct, and conduct mandatory and voluntary energy programs that are designed and implemented in a fair and efficient manner. These powers include duties to collect, evaluate, assemble, and analyze energy information on U.S. reserves, production, demand, and related economic data, while obtaining the cooperation of business, labor, consumer, and other interests.
Title 15 U.S.C. §790(a), which establishes a National Energy Information System that is the enclave containing the energy data collected by EIA, which allows EIA to describe and analyze energy supply and consumption in the U.S. This enclave allows EIA to perform statistical and forecasting activities to meet the needs of the Department of Energy, Congress, and the States.
Title 42 Section 6274, which continues Title 15 Section 772 in the context of transmitting data to the International Energy Agency, subject to limitations on the disclosure of identifiable information.
A.2. Needs and Uses of Data
The information provided by the Oil and Gas Reserves System (OGRS) data collections is used by the Department of Energy as input into the following web products issued by EIA:
Form EIA-23L provides credible, verifiable national and regional data on the proved reserves of crude oil and natural gas. These data include proved reserves and production for crude oil and lease condensate, and natural gas by state/state sub-division and federal offshore regions.
Form EIA-64A provides data that are used to estimate natural gas plant liquids production and reserves by state and federal offshore regions. Data collected are plant and respondent identification, origin of natural gas received, dry natural gas produced, natural gas liquids produced, plant fuel use, and electricity purchased.
EIA uses this data in many reports
and analysis that discuss crude oil and natural gas reserves and
production. EIA uses Form EIA-64A data to generate estimates of EIA's
dry natural gas production (natural gas that remains after extraction
of natural gas liquids). EIA uses the estimate for production of
total natural gas plant liquids (NGPL) generated from Form EIA-64A
data to calculate the extraction loss from wet natural gas production
so that EIA may accurately estimate dry natural gas production. All
EIA publications are available on EIA’s
Internet site.
Every year the Oil
and Gas Journal copies and publishes the EIA’s proved
reserves estimates as the official reserve estimates for the U.S. as
part of their coverage of international crude oil reserves. EIA’s
proved reserves data series is widely used in the petroleum industry
by consultants and the trade press.
The data series from these surveys provides additional benefits, such as:
Fulfilling EIA's mission to provide credible, reliable, and timely energy information
Providing a database for forecasting, policy making, planning and analysis activities
Serving as an official data bank available to Congress, other government agencies, and the public on the proved reserves of crude oil, natural gas, and natural gas liquids in the United States
Providing a source of data for other government agencies, business firms, trade associations, financial institutions, academia, and private research and consulting organizations for analysis, projections, and monitoring purposes.
A.3. Use of Technology
To reduce respondent burden, EIA requires that respondents use our Secure File Transfer system to submit their data for Forms EIA-23L and EIA-64A. With this Internet-based option, EIA uses security protocols to protect the information against unauthorized access during transmission. EIA provides a spreadsheet version of Forms EIA-23L and EIA-64A on its website. Respondents may complete the forms using their own automated system or manually and submit the form using EIA’s Secure File Transfer website. EIA does not accept email, fax, or paper forms.
A.4. Efforts to Identify Duplication
The OGRS data collections do not unnecessarily duplicate other information collected by EIA. Also, EIA staff is very familiar with U.S. oil and natural gas proved reserves data, and there are not any independent, reliable, and accurate data that can serve as a substitute for the information collected on Forms EIA-23L and EIA-64A.
Several sources collect production of natural gas and oil from the same respondents, but this data cannot replace the collection of production on the EIA-23L because it is critical that the production numbers collected reflect production from the reported reserves (See Supporting Statement Part B). Matching reserves numbers reported on the EIA-23L to production numbers collected from another source would be invalid because of changes in operator holdings and estimates over time.
Information from state, federal, or commercial listings of oil and gas well operators has failed to provide the information that the OGRS data collections provide. Currently, state agencies do not collect proved reserves information from oil and gas well operators.
The Department of the Interior (DOI) and Bureau of Land Management (BLM) do not collect proved reserves information – their data collection is on acreage of land leased, drilling permits issued, and production from leases on federal land. The DOI Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) collects proved reserves and water depth information on developments in the Federal Offshore region but publishes its own reports one year later than EIA. Because of the limited geographic coverage and the delay in releasing reserves data, the DOI information is not an acceptable alternative to the Form EIA-23L report.
Oil and gas well operators who are publicly owned companies are required to file their estimate of proved reserves with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). However, these SEC estimates of proved reserves are not sufficient to replace EIA’s estimates for the entire country, because only publicly held companies file with the SEC (though many operators in the U.S. are privately owned), and the companies report to the SEC only the percentage of the reserves they own, which can be an amount significantly less than the total volume of reserves within a field.
EIA has determined that other sources of proved oil and gas reserve data cannot replace or approximate the information provided by the OGRS data collections, because of differences in classifying the data, inconsistent data quality, incomplete and infrequent reporting, and data unavailability. Form EIA-64A is the only source of natural gas liquids production data by area of origin known to EIA.
A.5. Provisions for Reducing Burden on Small Businesses
The largest respondents to the Form EIA-23L will have wells in more than half a dozen states across the country, while the smallest respondents will have wells in only one state. EIA selects the largest producers to report in the sample frame for Form EIA-23L and minimizes the reporting burden for small operators.
A.6. Consequences of Less-Frequent Reporting
Less frequent reporting from survey respondents would not permit EIA to meet its mandate of providing timely, reliable information on oil and gas reserves.
A.7. Compliance with 5 CFR 1320.5
The data being collected is consistent with the guidelines in 5 C.F.R. 1320.5, to reduce the public’s paperwork burden.
A.8. Summary of Consultations Outside of the Agency
On May 30, 2025, EIA published a Federal Register Notice (Volume 90, Number 103, page 23046) inviting public comments on the proposed extension of the survey forms. In addition, EIA placed a copy of the notice on EIA’s website. EIA did not receive any public comments in response to the 60 Day FRN.
EIA performed cognitive testing for the Form EIA-64A to evaluate the addition of two questions from the suspended Form EIA-757A (part of EIA’s Natural Gas data collection package OMB No. 1905-0175) regarding total capacity and average heat content, the addition of a new question about ethane content, and associated burden changes. EIA also performed sensitivity testing for Form EIA-64A to evaluate potential disclosure of data at a plant-level instead of an aggregated state-level. However, given current resource constraints, EIA is not proposing any changes in the data collections at this time.
The cognitive testing performed on Form EIA-64A respondents revealed some uncertainty about the current instructions and definitions. EIA is proposing minor instruction clarifications for both Forms EIA-23L and EIA-64A.
A.9. Payments or Gifts to Respondents
EIA will not provide payments or gifts to respondents as incentives to report data to EIA.
A.10. Provisions for Protection of Information
A.10.1. Form EIA-23L
The annual data on the production of crude oil, lease condensate, and natural gas reported on Form EIA-23L are considered public information. EIA may release these data elements in company-identifiable form and not protect them from disclosure in identifiable form when releasing statistical aggregate information. EIA will protect and not disclose to the public all other information reported on Form EIA-23L, to the extent that the information satisfies the criteria for exemption under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), 5 U.S.C. §552, the DOE regulations, 10 C.F.R. §1004.11, implementing the FOIA, and the Trade Secrets Act, 18 U.S.C. §1905.
The Federal Energy Administration Act requires EIA to provide company-specific data to other federal agencies when requested for official use. EIA may also make the information reported on Form EIA-23L available, upon request, to another component of the Department of Energy (DOE); to any Committee of Congress, to the Government Accountability Office, or to other federal agencies authorized by law to receive such information. A court of competent jurisdiction may obtain this information in response to an order. The information may be used for any non-statistical purposes such as administrative, regulatory, law enforcement, or adjudicatory purposes.
EIA applies disclosure limitation procedures to the protected statistical data published from Form EIA-23L survey information to ensure that the risk of disclosure of identifiable information is very small.
EIA may provide confidential information collected on Form EIA-23L to United States Department of the Interior offices (BOEM and the United States Geological Survey [USGS]) for statistical purposes, only, in conducting their resource estimation activities.
A.10.2. Form EIA-64A
The data reported on this form will be protected and not disclosed to the public to the extent that it satisfies the criteria for exemption under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), 5 U.S.C. §552, the DOE regulations, 10 C.F.R. §1004.11, implementing the FOIA, and the Trade Secrets Act, 18 U.S.C. §1905.
The Federal Energy Administration Act requires EIA to provide company-specific data to other federal agencies when requested for official use. EIA may also make the information reported on Form EIA-64A available, upon request, to another component of the Department of Energy (DOE); to any Committee of Congress, the Government Accountability Office, or to other federal agencies authorized by law to receive such information. A court of competent jurisdiction may obtain this information in response to an order. The information may be used for any non-statistical purposes such as administrative, regulatory, law enforcement, or adjudicatory purposes.
EIA applies disclosure limitation procedures to the protected statistical data published from Form EIA-64A survey information to ensure that the risk of disclosure of identifiable information is very small.
EIA may provide confidential information collected on Form EIA-64A to United States Department of the Interior offices (BOEM and the United States Geological Survey [USGS]) for statistical purposes, only, in conducting their resource estimation activities.
A.11. Justification for Sensitive Questions
There are not any questions of a sensitive nature in the OGRS data collections.
A.12. Estimate of Respondent Burden Hours and Cost
Table A.1. below shows the burden hours calculated for the proposed OGRS surveys package.
A.13. Annual Cost to the Federal Government
The annual costs of the OGRS data collections to EIA, including personnel, for development and maintenance, collection, processing, analysis, and publication, are estimated to be $2,006,165.
A.14. Changes in Burden
Table A2 below shows that the number of the total requested annual burden hours need to be decreased by 3,332 as the number of respondents to EIA-23L has decreased from 500 to 420 operators, while the number of respondents to EIA-64A has decreased from 600 to 458.
Table
A2. Changes in Burden
A.15. Reasons for Changes in Burden
EIA does not expect any changes in burden hours per response for this data collection. However, the annual number of respondents has decreased in EIA-23L because we are able to cover more than 90% of total production for both crude oil and natural gas from a sample of 420 respondents. The EIA-64A is a census, where the number of natural gas processing plants has decreased to 458 from 600 because of divestitures and mergers and acquisitions.
A.16. Collection, Tabulation, and Publication Plans
Plans to tabulate and publish data collected by the OGRS surveys are as follows:
Approximate Time Survey Forms are Initially Made Available:
Item Date:
EIA 64A February
EIA 23L (State/state subdivision-level version) February
Due Date for Response:
Item Date:
EIA 64A April
EIA 23L (State/state subdivision-level version) April
Final data for tabulation (EIA-64A) June
Final data for tabulation (EIA-23) September
Publication Schedule:
Item Date:
Reserves Report November 30
Supporting materials December
A.17. OMB Number and Expiration Date
EIA will display the OMB approval expiration date and OMB number on all the Oil and Gas Reserves System survey forms (Forms EIA-23L and EIA-64A).
A.18. Certification Statement
There are no exceptions to the certification statement identified in Item 19 of OMB Form 83-I.
| File Type | application/vnd.openxmlformats-officedocument.wordprocessingml.document |
| File Title | Supporting Statement for |