The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) will conduct Gulf of Mexico (GoM) Western Planning Area Lease Sale 246 in New Orleans on Aug. 19, a press release from Aug. 18 said.

Bidding closed Aug. 18 with five companies submitting 33 bids on 33 tracts. There are 21.9 million acres offshore Texas being sold.

Michael Celata, BOEM’s acting regional director for the GoM, will announce the results of the sale to media.

Lease Sale 246 is the eighth offshore sale under the Obama administration’s Outer Continental Shelf oil and gas leasing program for 2012 to 2017, known as the five-year program. The first seven sales in the program offered more than 60 million acres for development and garnered more than $2.9 billion in bid revenues.

Lease Sale 248 offers all unleased and non-protected areas in the Western Gulf of Mexico Planning Area, including 4,083 tracts ranging nine to more than 250 miles off the coast, in water depths ranging from 16 feet (ft) to more than 10,975 ft.