WASHINGTON — The Biden administration has taken a major step toward approving a massive oil-drilling project in Alaska’s North Slope, angering environmentalists who said its progress would be a mockery of President Biden’s climate change promise to to terminate oil leases.
The ConocoPhillips project, known as Willow and located in the National Petroleum Reserve in Alaska, was initially approved under the Trump administration and later supported by the Biden administration, but then became blocked by a judge who said the environmental analysis had not sufficiently considered its effects on climate change and wildlife.
On Friday, the Biden administration released a new environmental analysis.
In that analysis, the Department of the Interior said that at its peak, the multi-billion dollar plan would produce more than 180,000 barrels of crude oil per day and emit at least 278 million tons of carbon dioxide emissions over its lifetime from the combustion of the oil produced. , as well as construction and drilling activities at the site.
The oil company’s plan calls for five drilling sites, a processing facility, hundreds of miles of pipeline, nearly 65 miles of new gravel roads, seven bridges, an airstrip and a gravel mine in a region home to polar bears, caribou and migratory birds. birds. Opponents of the project have argued that the development would harm wildlife and produce dangerous new levels of greenhouse gases.
In a statement, the interior ministry said the new analysis included several options, including a reduction in the number of drilling sites and a “no action” option — or no drilling at all — and did not constitute a final decision on the Willow Project. The agency will be recording comments from the public for 45 days and is likely to make a final decision later this year.
The Biden Administration’s Environmental Agenda
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But just by issuing the analysis, the Biden administration was demonstrating its support for the project, opponents said. Willow is a priority for Senator Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, a moderate Republican who is often the most likely senator to break with her party and support Democratic nominees and some policy compromises.
Ms Murkowski welcomed the move in a statement, calling it an “important announcement” and adding that she intended to hold the government “accountable for their commitment to carry out this additional environmental assessment so that construction can begin this winter. “
In a statement, ConocoPhillips said the Willow project would “create employment opportunities for union workers and contribute local tax revenues that benefit communities on the North Slope, as well as significant state and federal tax revenues over many years.”
The announcement comes as Mr Biden wants to show voters that he is working to increase domestic oil supplies as prices soar in the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Just last week, the administration opened the door to more offshore oil and gas leasing in coastal waters over the next five years, all but significant new fossil fuel extraction.
But as a candidate, President Biden promised to end the new federal oil and gas lease as he wanted to assure younger voters and others concerned about climate change that he would steer the country away from fossil fuels.
The combustion of coal, oil and gas is responsible for releasing huge amounts of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, leading to dangerous increases in global temperatures.
“Completely furious that @DOI is one pro forma step from approving the ConocoPhillips Willow project,” said Christy Goldfuss, senior vice president for energy and environmental policy at the Center for American Progress, a liberal think tank that strongly supports the Biden administration. supports. , wrote on Twitter at the end of Friday with the initials of the Ministry of the Interior.
“This oil and gas project will be a hub for development for DECADES in a place where climate change is MELTING rapidly,” she wrote.
In the past 60 years, Alaska has warmed more than twice as fast as the rest of the United States† Arctic ecosystems are in disarray, sea ice is disappearing, sea levels are rising and the ground is thawing. At one point, ConocoPhillips announced plans to install “chillers” in the permafrost — which is melting because of climate change — to keep it sturdy enough to support the equipment to drill for oil.
The federal judge who blocked the project last year, Sharon L. Gleason of the United States District Court for Alaska, had sent the decision back to the government to run it again. There was no deadline for the Biden administration to reissue a new analysis.
The Willow Project is located in the northeastern portion of the Alaska National Petroleum Reserve, an area the federal government has set aside for oil and gas development. The first discovery of oil in the Willow area was made by ConocoPhillips Alaska in 2017, and the company has said the project is expected to create more than 1,000 jobs during peak construction and more than 400 permanent jobs.
The new analysis includes a new alternative that interior ministry officials said would reduce the potential size of the project by excluding two of the five proposed drilling sites, including the elimination of the northernmost proposed drilling site and associated infrastructure. in the Teshekpuk Lake Special Area. , important calving areas for the caribou herd of Lake Teshekpuk.
That alternative produces only slightly fewer emissions – 278 million tons of CO2 emissions equivalent over the project’s 30-year life – than ConocoPhillips’ preferred plan. According to the analysis, the oil company’s plan would cause 284 million tons of emissions.