Guerrilla Tactics at Oil-Lease Auction

"It was more just based on me watching one parcel after another end up in the hands of developers, watching all those parcels go by and knowing that I could have stopped it," he said. In fact, the whole notion of registering as a bidder was something that DeChristopher said more or less popped into his head.

"I used to work for a company that one of its mottos was 'plan with spontaneity,' and that's how I approached this," he said.

By chance, the auction was held the same day as DeChristopher's final exam in his Current Economic Problems course; the test happened to include a question referring to the sale. It asked whether the final bids paid by oil and gas companies would reflect the "true cost" of the leases.

"And the answer they were looking for was 'No,' " DeChristopher said, listing a string of other costs that would flow from petroleum extraction, including the costs of health care and global-warming mitigation.

"That question was just something already in the back of my mind when I was driving up those oil prices, to reflect a little more of the true costs," he said.

Shea said the BLM appears divided on how to deal with DeChristopher. "If the hawks prevail, it will flow into a prosecution," he said. "If the doves prevail, it will be some kind of community service, I would hope."

DeChristopher, meanwhile, said he plans to hold on to the 22,000 acres as long as possible, if only to register impatience with what he sees as compromises that accommodate continued reliance on petroleum.

"I'd say the forces out to destroy the planet on the Bush-Cheney side have been fighting a lot harder than those out to protect it," he said.