U.S. Government Halts Arctic Drilling, Approves Willow Project

The Biden-Harris Administration announced Sunday that they would make the Arctic Ocean off limits for drilling, on Monday they approved the Willow Project

Image: Reimar, Adobe Stock

On Sunday, March 12, the Biden-Harris Administration announced that they will take action to designate approximately 2.8 million acres in the Arctic Ocean as indefinitely off limits for future oil and gas leasing. They also promised to limit future industrial development in the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska (NPR-A), which may include additional protections for the more than 13 million acres.

On Monday, March 13, the Department of Interior announced that they will green light the controversial MDP or Willow Master Development Plan a.k.a. the Willow Project, albeit at a reduced project size of three instead of five drilling pads.

According to Protect Our Winters, the Willow Project (at its original scope) is “estimated to add more than 250 million metric tons of CO2 to the atmosphere over the next 30 years — equivalent to the emissions from 66 coal fired power plants (roughly 1/3 of all U.S. coal plants) or from 56 million vehicles over an entire year — more Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emissions than any other proposed project on America’s public lands.” These numbers will presumably decrease with the reduction of scope, but the project will still have a significant environmental and cultural impact.

Environmentalists and indigenous groups have been calling for Biden to oppose the Willow Project. Native Movement, an Alaska based grassroots organization, says, “this project is massive — it disregards human rights & will intensify the climate crisis.” Both the City of Nuiqsut and the Native Village of Nuiqsit, the indigenous communities closest to the drilling sites, oppose the project. Community leaders penned a 10 page letter to BLM outlining their concerns.