Biden Set To Approve Alaska Oil Project Over Objections of Environmentalist Allies

In the coming weeks, President Biden’s administration is set to make a final ruling on an oil project in northern Alaska, a marquee battle for oil and environmental groups and a topic on which the president has been conspicuously quiet.Approval by the administration over the objections of his environmentalist allies would be the final step in what has been a years-long saga between the federal government, ConocoPhillips, natives of the area, and environmental groups over the $8 billion Willow project.The state’s political representatives are uniformly in support of the project, with the Alaska house voting unanimously in favor of a resolution supporting it last week. The congressional delegation, consisting of Senators Murkowski and Sullivan, both Republicans, as well as the Democratic representative at large, Mary Peltola, also are backers.“In the short term, this project will provide thousands of good-paying union jobs and help jump-start Alaska’s economy,” Ms. Peltola said. “In the long term, the revenues from Willow will pay for essential state services like public safety and investments in our education system.”The community closest to the project site, the Native Village of Nuiqsut, has expressed opposition. In a letter from late January, leaders of the native community said the Department of the Interior’s “engagement with us is consistently focused on how to allow projects to go forward; how to permit the continuous expansion and concentration of oil and gas activity on our traditional land.”It’s unclear where the president stands on the issue, with members of his party advocating for the project even though it runs counter to his campaign promises to help wean America off oil.When President Biden took office, he suspended new gas and oil leases on public land for 60 days with an executive order that was later upheld by the courts. The Inflation Reduction Act, though, included mandates requiring the federal government to sell gas and oil leases as part of a deal cut with Senator Manchin.The law also specifically requires that several leases be sold in the Gulf of Mexico and at least one lease in Alaska before October 2023.Earlier this month, a scaled-back version of the project passed an environmental assessment by the Department of the Interior. A five-drill site version was previously approved under President Trump but that was thrown out in court following the finding of a flawed environmental assessment.According to a statement from ConocoPhillips, the new plan with “three core drill sites” will “provide a viable path forward for development of our leasehold.”“Willow will produce much-needed domestic energy while generating substantial public benefits,” the president of the company’s Alaska branch, Erec Isaacson, said.Ms. Murkowski has suggested that the administration may try to “have it both ways” and approve a two-drill site project that “satisfies the environmental community.”If approved, the project would produce about 600 million barrels of oil over 30 years from the largest tract of undisturbed public land in America, the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska.The administration looks poised to grant approval, which could happen as soon as early March, and it would be among the largest new projects that Mr. Biden has approved. Although Mr. Biden has drawn flak from Republicans for efforts to promote renewable energy and electric vehicles, he is also drawing criticism from an array of environmental groups.One of the reasons is that the current administration has approved more permits for oil and gas drilling on federal lands than President Trump’s administration had two years into his presidency. According to the Department of the Interior, Mr. Biden approved 6,430 new drilling permits in his first two years compared to Mr. Trump’s approval of 6,172 permits.One such environmentalist is the Alaska senior regional director for the Wilderness Society, Karlin Itchoak, who is urging opponents to “remember that BLM’s recommendation is not final.”“No other oil and gas project has greater potential to undermine the Biden administration’s climate goals, so moving forward with it would be unconscionable,” Mr. Itchoak said. “If this project were to move forward, it would result in the production and burning of at least 30 years of oil.”Others have raised concerns about the effects on wildlife in the area, such as polar bears, yellow-billed loons, and caribou.

Biden Set To Approve Alaska Oil Project Over Objections of Environmentalist Allies

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