The Biden administration was heavily criticized by all sides Friday after it proposed historic restrictions on future offshore oil and gas leasing.
The Department of the Interior published its proposed five-year plan for future oil and gas leasing in federal waters through 2029. Under the plan, the federal government would hold just three fossil fuel lease sales in the Gulf of Mexico in 2025, 2027 and 2029, and would opt against holding any off the Alaskan coast, and in the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans in a significant departure from precedent.
"The Biden administration’s announcement today of the smallest offshore oil plan in our nation’s history all but guarantees the United States will become increasingly dependent on authoritarian dictators for our energy needs in the years to come," Republican Alaska Sen. Dan Sullivan said in a statement shared with Fox News Digital. "This is national security suicide."
"It’s also an affront to working Americans who are struggling to pay their bills as this administration continues its dangerous crusade to appease radical activists and shut down American energy," he continued. "Throughout this presidency, Alaskans have been hit the hardest by these failed policies and today’s news is no different: Alaska, one of the most resource-rich places on the planet, may well have to import natural gas from foreign countries because of this administration’s policies and plans for shutting down Alaska’s Cook Inlet. This is insanity."
Under the 1953 Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act, the federal government is required to issue plans every five years laying out prospective offshore oil and gas lease sales. The most recent plan, which was implemented in 2017, expired in June 2022.
On July 1, 2022, the DOI published the draft proposal for its replacement five-year plan, which laid out multiple options for leasing between 2024 and 2029. The plan included an option with no lease sales during the time span and a maximum option of 11 lease sales.
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DOI's proposal Friday represents a middle ground option which Interior Secretary Deb Haaland said was the "smallest number of oil and gas lease sales in history" and would help the administration achieve its clean energy goals.
"With the release of today’s five-year offshore leasing schedule, Biden is surrendering our nation’s energy independence," Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee Ranking Member John Barrasso, R-Wyo., said. "America is one of the cleanest, most responsible, and most efficient producers of oil and natural gas in the world. It’s a disgrace that the Biden Administration refuses to acknowledge that simple truth."
"To be clear — three lease sales is more than the zero we would have gotten had it not been for the IRA. But it makes no sense at all to actively be limiting our energy production while our adversaries are weaponizing energy around the world," added Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., who chairs the Energy Committee. "This is a failure of leadership, and I will continue to do everything in my power to hold this Administration accountable."
Manchin noted that the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act, which he co-authored, likely prevented the DOI from proposing to hold zero lease sales through 2029.
In addition to reinstating lease sales the administration canceled, the legislation tethers new offshore wind energy leases to new oil and gas leases, meaning the former could be threatened without consistent fossil fuel leasing. That DOI acknowledged that "compliance with the terms of the IRA" was the reason it was forced to move forward with some lease sales in the proposal Friday.
"The release of the U.S. offshore leasing program, mandated by law and long overdue, is an utter failure for the country," Erik Milito, the president of the National Ocean Industries Association, which represents both traditional and renewable offshore energy producers, said in a statement Friday.
"President Biden’s approach significantly curtails access to a critical national asset at a time when energy inflation is rampant, the likelihood of a national recession looms, and global efforts are intensifying to curb greenhouse gas emissions," Milito said. "The White House simply ignores our energy realities in once again limiting U.S. energy production opportunities."
But the proposal additionally received criticism from both climate activists and left-wing Democrats who said the administration shouldn't hold any future lease sales.
"As we speak, my district and city are experiencing yet another instance of catastrophic flooding, and let’s be clear: these rising sea levels and climate disasters are inextricably linked to the profits that line the pockets of fossil fuel executives," Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., the ranking member on the House Natural Resources Energy and Mineral Resources Subcommittee, said in a statement.
"This past month, we saw the largest demonstration pressuring Biden since he took office and the largest climate mobilization since the start of the pandemic," she added. "While I am encouraged to see the Biden Administration holding the minimal number of fossil fuel leases, the time is NOW to phase off of fossil fuels entirely."
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And Natural Resources Committee Ranking Member Raul Grijalva, D-Ariz., said "more fossil fuel development off our shores means more climate change."
Environmental groups further blasted the proposal, saying it represented a broken promise.
"I feel disgusted and incredibly let down by Biden’s offshore drilling plan. It piles more harm on already-struggling ecosystems, endangered species and the global climate," Brady Bradshaw, senior oceans campaigner at the Center for Biological Diversity, said. "We need Biden to commit to a fossil fuel phaseout, but actions like this condemn us to oil spills, climate disasters and decades of toxic harm to communities and wildlife."
"We're disappointed the Biden administration did not follow through on a promise of no new leasing, and instead, the residents of the Gulf of Mexico are having their resources sold off for bargain prices once again," added Christian Wagley, the coastal organizer at the group Healthy Gulf.
