The move will slow the approval of hundreds of drilling permit applications and is part of the Biden administration’s broader efforts to hit the ground running on as many fronts as possible on his sweeping plan to get the United States to net-zero emissions by the middle of the century.
One of the biggest pieces of Biden’s climate plan is halting new oil and gas drilling on federal lands and waters.
For now, under a secretarial order dated Jan. 20, only the acting secretary and a handful of other high-level officials can approve new oil and gas leases. The order also prohibits agency staff from approving new land transfers or resource management plans.
The order doesn’t stop companies from drilling or other “existing ongoing operations” under leases the government has already sold, the Interior Department said.
The move prompted an immediate outcry from Western Republicans.
Winding down that drilling is one of the most politically and legally fraught parts of Biden’s climate agenda. Lawmakers of both parties in Western states such as Colorado, Montana and Haaland’s home state of New Mexico view drilling on federal lands as a source of jobs and revenue for schools and other local programs.
Sen. John Barrasso (R-Wyo,), who is set to be the top Republican on the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, said when “it comes to energy policy, the Biden administration is off to a divisive and disastrous start.”
Complicating matters for Biden, existing laws mandating periodic auctions of drilling rights may prove difficult to circumvent, too, especially if the administration is challenged in court by drillers and Republican attorneys general.
Already the oil and gas industry is questioning the legality of the new administration’s two-month reprieve on leasing.
“Blocking American companies from accessing our country’s natural resources is bad for American jobs, bad for state budgets, and bad for national security. It also raises serious legal concerns,” said Anne Bradbury, head of the American Exploration & Production Council, a trade organization that represents oil and gas producers.
ClearView Energy Partners, a nonpartisan research group, said the order “could mark the first step in a multiphase initiative to end federal oil and gas leasing.” Such a sweeping change, it added, would be “an early test” for the hundreds of federal judges President Donald Trump appointed over the past four years.
Recognizing the tightrope the new administration has to walk, White House press secretary Jen Psaki told reporters the existing leasing program “will be reviewed by our team.”
Carrying out a federal leasing ban would help Biden hit his 2050 goal of ending U.S. contributions to climate change.
Oil, gas and coal extracted from federal areas and burned to generate electricity and power automobiles account for almost a quarter of U.S. carbon dioxide emissions, according to a 2018 study by the U.S. Geological Survey. Curtailing those emissions could go some way toward restoring U.S. credibility on climate change.
Biden’s pledge is a big change from the previous administration. Under Trump, the federal government didn’t hesitate to open acreage to drilling, offering more than 100 million acres in onshore and offshore leases.
Environmentalists praised Biden for the about-face, saying the previous administration cut legal corners when leasing.
“Now the Biden administration is rightfully attempting to take stock of the damage and make sure the agency is following the law, instead of rubber-stamping destructive projects that were in the pipeline,” said Jesse Prentice-Dunn, policy director at the Center for Western Priorities.
In addition, Biden also halted oil- and natural-gas-leasing activities in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge with an executive order he signed Wednesday, one of his first actions in the Oval Office.
Trump’s decision to open that pristine stretch of Alaska to drilling was especially controversial among Democrats. But ultimately stopping drilling there will be challenging because leasing in the refuge is required under a law passed by the GOP-led Congress and signed by Trump in 2017.
Power plays
Here’s how we’re tracking Biden’s environmental actions.
So far, Biden checked two items off the list: Reentering the Paris Climate aAccord and nixing the Keystone XL pipeline, according to our tracker. And he began the process of overturning 58 more, while another 144 have not yet been targeted.
John F. Kerry lamented “wasted years” in fighting climate change.
In his first remarks as U.S. climate envoy, the former secretary of state warned that no country was doing enough to avoid catastrophic damage and called for a “wholesale transformation of the global economy,” according to Associated Press.
“We need to all move together, because today very few are on a trajectory of the steep reductions needed to meet even current goals, let alone the targets we need to avert catastrophic damage,” Kerry said in remarks to Italian business leaders.
Kerry added that the United States would return to the Paris agreement with “humility because we know that the federal government of the United States, until yesterday, walked away from the table for four wasted years when we could’ve been helping to meet the challenge.”
Construction was halted on the Keystone XL pipeline after Biden revoked a permit for the project.
The pipeline would have carried 800,000 barrels of oil a day from Alberta to the Texas Gulf Coast. Keystone XL President Richard Prior said that more than 1,000 jobs will be eliminated in coming weeks as it shuts down construction, the Associated Press reports. Biden’s executive order revoking the permit cited his administration’s “economic and climate imperatives.”
The new president’s move to nix the planned 1,700-mile pipeline rankled Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who Biden is set to speak with today in his first call with a foreign leader.
A group of Republican senators says it plans to introduce a bill aimed at authorizing the continued construction of the pipeline. But with Democrats controlling both chambers of Congress, it’s unlikely the legislation will succeed. Sen. Steve Daines (R-Mont.) and GOP allies have also called on the Biden administration to submit the Paris agreement to the Senate for consideration, the Hill reports.
The American Petroleum Institute changed its tune on methane as Biden enters office.
The oil and gas lobbying group is endorsing direct federal regulation of methane, the Washington Examiner reports. The new position is a notable shift for a group that sued the Obama administration over its regulation of methane, a potent greenhouse gas, and backed Trump’s rollback of the regulations.
“This is a new position for API, but we think given where the industry is at this time and the continued importance of reducing methane, it was critical we update this position as the administration changes,” API CEO Mike Sommers told the paper.
The organization may also be under pressure from some of its largest members. Last week, the French oil giant Total announced it was leaving the lobbying group over its lack of support for policies to combat climate change.
The Senate has set the date for Jennifer Granholm’s nomination hearing.
The Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee hearing for Biden’s energy secretary pick will be Jan 27. Members of the committee can participate in person or virtually.
Granholm, a two-term governor from Michigan, is a clean-energy advocate with extensive experience working with the U.S. auto industry, which may signal the administration’s intention to make a nationwide shift to electric vehicles a key focus of the department. The Energy Department is the main funder of research into the battery technology that supports electric vehicles. If confirmed, Granholm will also be charged with overseeing the nation’s nuclear weapons arsenal and managing radioactive waste.
Biden named Richard Glick as chair of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission.
Glick, a former general counsel for Democrats on the Senate Energy committee, has been a consistent advocate for clean energy. He replaces James Danly, a commissioner elevated to the head of the regulatory body after Trump demoted longtime Republican chairman Neil Chatterjee, Green Tech Media reports. The commission remains majority Republican, with three Republican commissioners and two Democrats, including Glick, a fact that could limit the new chair’s policy options.
Correction: The original version of this newsletter incorrectly referred to this agency at the Federal Energy Reserve Commission. It is the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission.
The company behind Alaska’s controversial Pebble Mine is attempting to revive the project.
The Pebble Limited Partnership said that it was appealing a decision made by the Army Corps of Engineers last year to reject a key permit for the project, a huge gold and copper mine near Alaska’s Bristol Bay. The company argues that the government failed to properly consider its mitigation plan aimed at reducing environmental impact from the project. Opponents, including some prominent Republicans, argue that the project would have catastrophic effects for the world’s largest sockeye salmon fishery, a claim the company disputes.
Thermometer
Southern Ocean waters are warming faster than previously known and threatening Antarctic ice.
A study published Wednesday in the journal Nature Communications finds that the waters swirling under the sea surface around Antarctica are warming more rapidly than scientists knew and could destabilize parts of the Antarctic Ice Sheet, our colleague Andrew Freedman reports. The study also was based on 10,000 vertical temperature profiles taken over 25 years.
“The Southern Ocean is one of the most important yet least explored and understood regions of the planet when it comes to determining how global warming may affect the future of humanity, thanks to its capacity to absorb huge quantities of heat and carbon dioxide, and melt swaths of the Antarctic ice sheet,” Freedman writes.
Extra mileage
Catnip may protect felines from insect bites.
A little bit of catnip can send a feline into a state of apparent bliss. Cats will rub their heads against the plant and roll around in it, purring. And it’s not just house cats — leopards, jaguars and other big cats have shown similar behavior.
Now scientists think they know why. A study published in the journal Science Advances found that iridoids — a type of chemical cats seem to find immensely pleasurable — also drive away pesky mosquitoes and prevent cats from getting bitten.
