So if you're a big enough company that you can basically assume that a lease will be available whenever you want (which makes sense for a large number of leases

So if you're a big enough company that you can basically assume that a lease will be available whenever you want (which makes sense for a large number of leases, turnover must exist), you just bid enough to justify it once something looks worth the risk. And until it's worth the risk, leasing it is just a donation since no one would be trying to extract things from it anyway. It does start to sound like a corporate giveaway where only big companies ever really win. On a per-parcel basis it seems like it is beneficial (i.e. a local group maybe can keep a particular area protected), but on aggregate it doesn't seem likely to do much. The companies that want to extract resources have many options and lots of time to wait.