Biden administration suspends oil and gas leases in Arctic National Wildlife Refuge

Source: Washington Post

The Biden administration Tuesday suspended oil and gas leases in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, overturning one of President Donald Trump’s most significant environmental acts during his last days in office.

The move by the Interior Department, which could spark a major legal battle, aims to unwind nearly a dozen leases in the heart of a pristine expanse in Alaska that Republicans and Democrats have fought over for four decades. The Trump administration auctioned off the right to drill in the refuge’s coastal plain — home to hundreds of thousands of migrating caribou and waterfowl as well as the southern Beaufort Sea’s remaining polar bears — just two weeks before President Biden was inaugurated.

In Tuesday’s Interior Department order, Secretary Deb Haaland said that a review of the Trump administration’s leasing program in the wildlife refuge found “multiple legal deficiencies” including “insufficient analysis” required by environmental laws and a failure to assess other alternatives. Haaland’s order calls for a temporary moratorium on all activities related to those leases in order to conduct “a new, comprehensive analysis of the potential environmental impacts of the oil and gas program.”

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The Jan. 6 sale of 11 tracts in the refuge on just over 550,000 acres netted roughly $14 million, a tiny fraction of what Republicans initially predicted it would yield. Only two of the bids were competitive, so nearly all of the drilling rights on the land sold for the minimum price of $25 an acre.

Read more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2021/06/01/arctic-national-wildlife-refuge/