More than a dozen environmental groups lambasted the Biden administration’s announcement that it would restart the federal oil and gas leasing program.
The Center for Biological Diversity, Sierra Club, Earthjustice, and at least 12 other leading organizations expressed their disappointment, arguing the action suggested the administration wasn’t serious about tackling climate change. [bold, links added]
The groups said the oil and gas leasing program should be permanently ended.
“The Biden administration’s claim that it must hold these lease sales is pure fiction and a reckless failure of climate leadership,” Randi Spivak, the Center for Biological Diversity’s public lands director, said in a statement.
“These so-called reforms are 20 years too late and will only continue to fuel the climate emergency. These lease sales should be shelved and the climate-destroying federal fossil-fuel programs brought to an end.”
The Department of the Interior unveiled the reformed oil and gas leasing program Friday, signaling that it would soon hold lease sales for drilling companies.
The announcement was criticized by fossil fuel industry groups that noted the program reduced the amount of land available for drilling by 80% and hiked royalty rates.
President Joe Biden initially tried to ban all new leasing on federal lands and waters after assuming office in January 2021, but a federal judge halted the moratorium months later.
The administration, though, still hasn’t held a single onshore lease sale since taking office and hasn’t awarded an offshore lease.
“The best available science already shows that we cannot continue leasing on our public lands and meet President Biden’s stated climate goals,” Earthjustice president Abigail Dillen said. “If the Biden administration is serious about addressing climate change, its actions need to start matching its words.”
Fossil Free Media, Citizens for a Healthy Community, Citizens Caring for the Future, the Western Environmental Law Center, and Friends of the Earth were among the other groups to issue disapproving statements.
“It is unconscionable that the [Bureau of Land Management] will go forward with these oil and gas lease sales as we continue to see the devastating effects of climate change, particularly in the Southwestern United States,” said Deborah McNamara, the campaigns director at 350 Colorado.
“Continuing business as usual at the BLM with ongoing oil and gas lease sales will not get us where we need to be.”
Kyle Tisdel, the director of the climate and energy program at the Western Environmental Law Center, added that the issue wasn’t about politics but “life and death.”
“We have heard a lot of rhetoric from President Biden and his administration about the need to take action on climate,” he said in a statement. “But not only is the administration not doing everything it could — it is not really doing anything.”
An Interior spokesperson blamed the federal court’s ruling for the policy reversal in a statement to the Daily Caller News Foundation.
Read rest at Daily Caller
So, the Biden Administration was forced to resume a completely LAWFUL leasing process authorized under the Mineral Leasing Act, congressionally approved, no less. A long standing statute that allowed for oil & gas companies to risk their shareholders money to generate (literally) several hundreds of $BILLIONS of revenue for the federal treasury. All the while, being required to follow a myriad of State & federal environmental laws to protect habitat and engage in the BLM’s long standing core principle of “multiple use & sustained yield.” All this as part of providing ESSENTIAL products that support every Americans modern lifestyle & directly impacts our national security. None of this appears noteworthy to the Sierra Club, et al who offer NO constructive alternatives to replace our energy system, base their climate crisis claims on unproven data & modeling and most likely, have taken large amounts of Russian money to fund anti-fracing campaigns. And the oil & gas industry is the BAD ACTOR in this little unfolding drama? .
Hey Eco-Freaks want t o know the meaning of A Sucker Born Every Minute? well guess what?! Your the Suckers who fell Hook,Line and Sinker! for Biden’s little game of the Cheat so stop whining
Being as China and India, just to name two, are planning on building more coal fired power plants maybe the Greenies should go to those countries and get them on the right path.