Tim DeChristopher was exhausted before he went to bed Friday night.

And things didn't slow down Saturday. The in-box to his e-mail account was overflowing when he woke up. The calls from news reporters and supporters started at 7:30 a.m. — and continued throughout the day.

DeChristopher was thrust into the public spotlight Friday for wreaking havoc during an auction for oil and gas drilling leases in Utah.

At the event at the Bureau of Land Management building in downtown Salt Lake City, DeChristopher saw an opportunity to become the critical activist he and others in the environmental movement had been waiting for.

"I started by running up other people's prices," said DeChristopher, 27, a senior in economics at the University of Utah. "Then I realized I could have a bigger impact."

During an interview Saturday with the Deseret News, DeChristopher explained that his activism and involvement in environmental issues had been building for years after he first realized the need for a more critical stance from the public and their officials.

DeChristopher moved to Utah three years ago for a job in wilderness therapy, but he has maintained an interest in environmental issues his whole life, he said.

He remembers from his childhood the times his mother dragged him along to court for cases she was fighting against coal companies in West Virginia. DeChristopher said it was his parents who taught him the value of the environment and the need to preserve it well beyond his or anyone else's lifetime.

He started like many activists: writing letters, creating signs, protesting, writing speeches and meeting with public officials.

Yet he continually felt that his voice was falling on deaf ears.

"I waited and waited and waited for results," DeChristopher said. "And I had to deal with the fact I might be the person, I might be the hope for a better future for myself. It was a scary thought, but I believed in my ability to make a difference."

It was this development in thought that DeChristopher said prepared him to take advantage of the opportunity presented to him during the bidding.

During the process he "won" the bidding on 13 parcels of land, effectively delaying the development of 22,500 acres, DeChristopher said. He also drove up the prices for several other pieces of land.

At the time he made the bids, DeChristopher said, he had no intention of paying the $1.7 million price tag tied to the land.

He has no way of paying that amount, he said.

At auction, the BLM eventually sold 116 parcels of the 131 lots that were offered.