Biden Freezes U.S. Arctic Oil Interior Secretary Deb Haaland relies on ‘Indigenous Knowledge’ as a legal justification to block drilling. No joke.
Oil prices have climbed this week after Saudi Arabia and Russia extended their production cuts. The Biden Administration’s response? Restrict U.S. oil and gas development.
The Interior Department on Wednesday canceled seven oil and gas leases in Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) and moved to limit development on 13 million acres in the state’s National Petroleum Reserve. “President Biden is delivering on the most ambitious climate and conservation agenda in history,” Secretary Deb Haaland boasted.
Its climate agenda is also the most lawless and economically destructive in history. The 2017 GOP tax reform mandated two lease sales within the Coastal Plain of ANWR. The first occurred in January 2021, and the second is required to be held before Dec. 22, 2024.
Mr. Biden on his first day in office imposed a leasing moratorium in ANWR. Now Ms. Haaland is revoking seven ANWR leases issued by the Trump Administration in January 2021. She claims to have “the authority to cancel or suspend oil and gas leases issued in violation of a statute or regulation,” and that the ANWR leases include “fundamental legal deficiencies.”
She points to “insufficient analysis under the National Environmental Policy Act, including failure to adequately analyze a reasonable range of alternatives and properly quantify downstream greenhouse gas emissions.” NEPA doesn’t require a climate analysis. The Administration has written new requirements into NEPA to scotch fossil-fuel projects.
Speaking of deficiencies, Ms. Haaland says the Administration’s actions are “based on the best available science and in recognition of the Indigenous Knowledge.” Last year the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy issued a memo directing agencies to “include Indigenous Knowledge as an aspect of the best available science.” No joke.
The memo encouraged agencies to consult “spiritual leaders” and condemned “methodological dogma.” The “best available science” is whatever the climate lobby’s high priests declare. Alaska Industrial Development and Export Authority plans to challenge Interior’s cancellation of its ANWR leases, and its religious climate dogma may not hold up in court.
Interior also claims that its proposed restrictions on oil and gas development in Alaska’s National Petroleum Reserve will ensure that the “entire United States Arctic Ocean is off limits to new oil and gas leasing” to protect “habitat for wildlife.” But developing America’s fossil-fuel resources and protecting the environment aren’t incompatible.
In any case, Vladimir Putin couldn’t care less about the caribou. Russia is drilling in the Arctic and using it as a shipping route to deliver oil to China. The Administration’s restrictions on U.S. Arctic oil and gas development amount to unilateral energy disarmament.
The Biden re-election campaign ran an ad during Thursday’s NFL kickoff touting the President’s economic agenda, including his supposed success in making the U.S. more “energy independent.” Yet his Administration’s relentless war on fossil fuels has left Americans more vulnerable to Mr. Putin’s tender mercies and dependent on China for green energy.
U.S. gasoline prices have risen 60 cents a gallon this year as Saudi Arabia and Russia command the oil market. The Administration flogs jobs created by its green-energy subsidies, but how many more are its climate policies destroying? Employment in oil and gas extraction is 15% lower than before the pandemic.
Sorry, Mr. President, unemployed roustabouts in Alaska aren’t going to be installing solar panels in the tundra.
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