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The Biden administration has announced new protections for 1.3 million acres on Alaska’s North Slope, the latest effort to protect it from oil companies eager to gobble up the ecologically sensitive Arctic environment. .
President-elect Donald J. Trump returned to the White House on Monday, pledging to give fossil fuel companies free rein on American land and federal waters. The new protections, which take effect immediately, create legal hurdles that could slow, if not stop, the Trump administration’s efforts to expand drilling in parts of the Slope. North known as National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska.
The reserve is the largest area of undisturbed land in the United States. It is an important habitat for migratory birds, home to caribou, grizzly bears and wolves and is an important habitat for polar bears. It also contains large oil and gas reserves and was created in 1923 as a source of fuel for the Navy. Some excavations have been in place for decades but have not been touched since the late 1990s.
Laura Daniel-Davis, deputy assistant secretary of the Department of the Interior, said that, under the new policy, the Bureau of Land Management must explain the impact of drilling in the areas protected from hunting and fishing in the vast wilderness.
The agency is also proposing about three million acres of new or expanded “special areas,” areas of ecological importance or used for hunting and gathering by Alaska Natives. The decision was based on 88,000 comments from people in the North Slope community, he said.
“I can’t speculate on what the future holds for the new team,” Ms. Daniel-Davis said of the Trump administration. But he said the Home Department had to act after careful deliberation.
Some of the newly protected and proposed areas are close to the Willow oil project, led by ConocoPhillips.
Environmental groups applauded the move. Erik Grafe, an attorney for Earthjustice, said the new measure “follows science that clearly shows the irreplaceable values of these areas require maximum protection from damage from oil drilling.”
Republican lawmakers said they would try to reverse the Biden administration’s actions. They accused the Interior Department of laying the groundwork for environmental groups to oppose the Trump administration’s plans to increase drilling.
The Biden administration has already banned this drilling in the 13 million hectares of the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska. This is about half of the total stock.
It also blocked a proposed industrial route to mine copper in the middle of the state, and banned drilling in Alaskan waters, including the northern Bering Sea.
“I don’t think that’s what Alaska wants,” said Representative Bruce Westerman, Republican of Arkansas and chairman of the House Natural Resources Committee. He said Republicans are seeking to mandate drilling leases in Alaskan waters and on the North Slope when lawmakers write a budget bill next week.
Sen. Dan Sullivan, R-Alaska, called the move “the latest in a failed administration that has tried to crush Alaska and silence the voices of the Inupiat people who live on the Slopes.” Northern mountain.”
