The Obama administration has unveiled an environmental analysis that could pave the way for seismic testing for oil and gas in the Atlantic. The U.S. Interior Department’s Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, in releasing the review Thursday, specified in a statement that it does not authorize any geological and geophysical testing activities, “but rather it establishes a framework for additional mandatory environmental reviews for site-specific actions and identifies broadly-applicable measures governing any future” such activities. Interior says oil and gas industry contractors have already submitted nine applications to do seismic surveys covering hundreds of thousands of miles, the Wall Street Journal reports. While President Obama had said in early 2010 that he planned to open up the Outer Continental Shelf off Virginia and several Atlantic states to leasing by the energy sector, he postponed consideration of those plans after the massive BP oil spill […]