HOUSTON -- Four environmental organizations are suing the federal government over its plans to move forward with another sale of leases to explore for energy in the Gulf of Mexico.

The lawsuit, filed yesterday in federal Washington, D.C., court, alleges that the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management's sale planned for tomorrow doesn't fully take into account the lingering impacts of the 2010 Gulf of Mexico oil spill.

BOEM is auctioning 7,434 blocks covering about 39 million acres in the Central Planning Area at an event in New Orleans tomorrow. The event at the Superdome is inviting oil and gas firms to explore in deeper waters in zones targeting oil and gas off the coasts of Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama.

The plaintiffs in the suit include the Natural Resources Defense Council, Center for Biological Diversity, Defenders of Wildlife and Oceana. The groups informed BOEM yesterday of their filing against the lease sale.

Catherine Wannamaker, a senior attorney at the Southern Environmental Law Center, which is representing the plaintiffs, said the groups are not seeking an injunction to prevent the sale but would like the court to strike down the environmental impact statement used to justify proceeding with a sale of new exploration leases.

The environmental groups are asking the court to deem BOEM's current environmental review process insufficient and order that agency to conduct further studies on how the 2010 Macondo well blowout and spill have affected species in the Gulf of Mexico.

"There's a lot of information that they acknowledge is missing which we think is critical to making a decision here," Wannamaker said. "We would be asking that they consider delaying moving forward until they get that information."

She added that so far, no hearings on the lawsuit had been scheduled.

Wannamaker said that, although the coalition pursing the lawsuit is not seeking to halt tomorrow's sale, it hopes that BOEM will take its concerns over environmental risks to heart and wait until the conditions of species affected by the 2010 spill are better understood.

BOEM released the final terms of the Central Gulf of Mexico Planning Area lease sale a month ago. Then the Obama administration announced that the minimum bid for 1 acre of offshore exploration and production rights would go up dramatically, from $37.50 to $100 per acre.

BOEM representatives said the 167 percent increase in the minimum acreage price was necessary "to ensure that taxpayers receive fair market value for offshore resources and to provide leaseholders with additional impetus to invest in leases that they are more likely to develop."

The release posted by BOEM in May regarding this week's sale suggests the government believes all necessary environmental studies concerning the 2010 oil spill have been conducted.

BOEM says its terms of sale reflect environmentalists' concerns and provide a balance among economic interests, wildlife, and coastal and marine environments and communities.

"These include stipulations to protect biologically sensitive resources, mitigate potential adverse effects on protected species, and avoid potential conflicts associated with oil and gas development in the region," BOEM representatives said.