Romney, Lee vote against Deb Haaland’s historic confirmation as green groups, energy interests weigh in
As first Native American in a presidential Cabinet, new Interior boss is expected to chart a new course favoring conservation over extraction. Bears Ears and Grand Staircase are top issues.
(Graeme Jennings/Pool via AP) Rep. Deb Haaland, D-N.M., speaks during a Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources hearing on her nomination to be Interior secretary, Tuesday, Feb. 23, 2021 on Capitol Hill in Washington. The Senate voted Monday to confirm her in a 51-40 tally.
| March 16, 2021, 1:06 a.m.
Utah’s two senators voted against confirming Rep. Deb. Haaland, D-N.M., as secretary of Interior, citing her past support for what they and other Republican critics contend is a “radical” agenda aimed at heavy-handed federal oversight of public lands and their resources.
Governors Wind Energy Coalition
How far will Biden go to fix the climate crisis? Pay attention to this gas project Source: By Sammy Roth, Los Angeles Times • Posted: Thursday, February 25, 2021
A few days after Joe Biden claimed victory in the presidential election, a San Diego company quietly asked federal officials for permission to send 5 million tons of natural gas each year across the U.S.-Mexico border to an export terminal the company hopes to build along the Gulf of California.
The facility would be Sempra Energy’s second fossil fuel export plant in Mexico. The Biden administration’s decision could offer an early preview of how aggressively it will confront the climate crisis.
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A few days after Joe Biden claimed victory in the presidential election, San Diego-based Sempra Energy quietly asked federal officials for permission to send 5 million tons of natural gas each year across the U.S.-Mexico border to an export terminal the company hopes to build along the Gulf of California.
The facility would be Sempra’s second fossil fuel export plant in Mexico. The Biden administration’s decision could offer an early preview of how aggressively it will confront the climate crisis.
Biden campaigned on a promise to transition the electric grid to 100% clean power by 2035 and to put the entire economy on a path to net zero carbon emissions by 2050. Some of his first executive actions were a moratorium on new oil and gas leasing on federal lands and a commitment to minimize pollution in communities of color.
SALT LAKE CITY With climate change a cornerstone of his campaign and central to his proposed Cabinet picks, President-elect Joe Biden has vowed to put an end to any new oil and gas development on federal lands and federal waters.
That promise, if enacted, would severely impact Utah and seven other western states with huge chunks of federal land, with a new study predicting staggering economic losses and extreme costs to human lives.
Conducted by University of Wyoming professor Tim Considine at the request of the Wyoming Energy Authority, the study lays out these dire predictions of losses to those states over four years under a Biden administration: