The lease sales will not cover Republicans’ proposed tax cuts as promised. By
Story at a glance
In mid-November, the Trump administration launched the formal process of selling oil drilling leases in Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
Every major bank in the U.S. has ruled out financing oil and gas exploration in the Arctic.
With few bids from oil companies, the state of Alaska was forced to lease the lands itself.
It was a grand plan proposed by the Trump administration: auction off drilling rights in the coastal plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR), using the money from the leases to pay for proposed tax cuts for corporations.
Major Oil Companies Take A Pass On Controversial Lease Sale In Arctic Refuge By Tegan Hanlon, Nat Herz | APTI
Wednesday, January 6, 2021
Caribou graze on the coastal plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. The Trump administration has held the first oil lease sale in the refuge. / U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
Updated at 7:54 pm ET
One of the Trump administration s biggest environmental rollbacks suffered a stunning setback Wednesday, as a decades-long push to drill for oil in Alaska s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge ended with a lease sale that attracted just three bidders one of which was the state of Alaska itself.
By Alex DeMarban
Anchorage Daily News/TNS
ANCHORAGE, Alaska - A federal judge on Tuesday declined a request by conservation groups to prevent the Trump administration from issuing leases for drilling rights in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, though the broader case that seeks to stop the federal government’s oil and gas program in the refuge has not been decided.
The decision came hours before the federal government was set to hold its first-ever oil lease sale for land in the refuge’s coastal plain, at 10 a.m. Wednesday.
U.S. District Court Judge Sharon Gleason in Anchorage denied the motion in the case brought by National Audubon Society and three other conservation groups. They had argued that the judge should halt leases from being given out until the case is fully resolved.
2020 tests limits of Arctic adaptation December 31st, 2020 |
1. Arctic struggles with pandemic and its impacts to education, health
Across the Arctic, as well as the state, nation and globe, the dominant story of 2020 was the COVID-19 pandemic. For rural Alaska, however, the pandemic brought back memories of the Spanish flu, which decimated many in Alaska s Native villages, in some cases leaving only a handful of survivors.
While the state braced for impact shortly after spring break, closing schools, restaurants and many service industries and limiting travel between communities, rural Alaska did not see immediate outbreaks, despite fears that prompted many communities to restrict travel and require testing and quarantines for all people arriving via air.
Print article Alaska’s state-owned economic development corporation on Wednesday agreed to spend up to $20 million to buy leases in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge’s coastal plain in an effort to support future oil exploration and drilling there. The seven-member board of the Alaska Industrial Development and Export Authority unanimously granted the corporation’s director permission to bid following 90 minutes of public comments, a two-hour private meeting and a final 30-minute public session. The proposal faced broad public opposition, including complaints that the measure was being rushed through with little public review two days before Christmas. But several board members, in describing their support for the measure, said money from oil that flows from the refuge can support much-needed jobs in Alaska and pay for renewable energy projects that opponents of the investment have said they preferred.