The Biden administration has announced it will suspend the Arctic oil drilling rights sold in the last days of Donald Trump’s presidency, reversing a signature policy of the previous White House and handing a victory to environmentalists.
In his first day as president, Joe Biden directed the interior department to review oil and gas activity in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, one of the largest areas of untouched wilderness in the US. On Tuesday, the department said the licences would be halted pending an environmental and legal review.
It said it had “identified defects in the underlying record of decision supporting the leases, including the lack of analysis of a reasonable range of alternatives” required under the National Environmental Policy Act, a decades-old law that is a marker of environmental standards.
The decision prevents the development of any of the leases until the review — which could add additional conditions or scrap them outright — can be carried out. The department did not say how long this would take.
Gina McCarthy, the White House national climate adviser, called the move “an important step forward” in fulfilling Biden’s campaign pledge to protect the refuge. “President Biden believes America’s national treasures are cultural and economic cornerstones of our country and he is grateful for the prompt action by the Department of the Interior,” she said.
To redress four years of inaction on climate change, the president has unveiled a series of measures to regain America’s status as a leader on environmental issues. These include rejoining the Paris climate accord and scrapping a permit for the controversial Keystone XL oil pipeline, announcing plans to halve greenhouse gas emissions by 2030 and integrating climate-related risk into the financial system.
The Biden administration has also frozen new oil and gas leasing on federal lands, a sharp departure from the Trump era when environmental regulations and restrictions on energy producers were rolled back.
Oil companies and Republicans have long sought to exploit the oil-rich ANWR, a more than 19m-acre swath of land that is home to endangered polar bears, caribou and other wildlife and considered sacred by the indigenous Gwich’in communities.
Auctions of the part of the refuge — about 1.5m acres along the coast — were mandated under a 2017 law. Trump sought to expedite the process, rushing leases through in his final days in office as part of a landmark plan to encourage greater fossil fuel production in the US.
But the sale, held in January, generated little industry interest, with just three bidders, including an Alaska state agency, putting forward offers.
Local officials have opposed the Biden move saying it deals a massive blow to the regional economy and an industry on which Alaska is hugely dependent.
“Our leases for oil and gas are valid and cannot be taken away by the federal government,” said Republican governor Mike Dunleavy. “I oppose this assault on Alaska’s economy and will use every means necessary to undo this egregious federal over-reach.”
Tuesday’s decision marked a victory for environmentalists and activists, a pillar of Biden’s support in last year’s election, who have begun to grow impatient with some of the White House’s climate actions. The administration recently opted not to intervene to force the closure of the controversial Dakota Access Pipeline and has supported a major Alaska oil project approved during Trump’s term in office.
“In general the Biden administration is acting vigorously on climate change,” said Michael Gerrard, founder of the Sabin Center for Climate Change Law at Columbia University. “This action on ANWR is quite consistent with that. The actions on the other two projects do not seem so consistent.”
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Biden suspends Arctic drilling rights sold in Trump's last days as president - Financial Times
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