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The US Department of the Interior (DOI), citing concerns about
GHG releases from oil and natural gas operations, decided to appeal
a court decision that blocked President Joe Biden from pausing new
leasing on federally managed lands and waters
DOI said it is both "important and
necessary" to appeal the preliminary injunction the US District
Court for the Western District of Louisiana issued in mid-June against the
pause Biden ordered.
The pause was imposed to enable the agency to assess GHG
contributions from all new oil and gas leases. The court's ruling
had the effect of restarting the leasing process, which had been on
hold since January.
The department said it would resume the leasing process,
adhering to the court's injunction during the appeal, while it
continues to review new oil and gas leases in light of what the
agency argues are "the program's noted shortcomings," which include
a failure to account for climate impacts and protect biodiversity
and habitat.
"Together, federal onshore and offshore oil and gas leasing
programs are responsible for significant greenhouse gas emissions
and growing climate and community impacts. Yet the current programs
fail to adequately incorporate consideration of climate impacts
into leasing decisions or reflect the social costs of greenhouse
gas emissions including, for example, in royalty rates," DOI wrote
in a 16 August statement.
Separately from its review of new leases, the department also
will undertake a "programmatic analysis" to meet Biden's goal of halving GHGs by 2030
and achieving net-zero emissions by midcentury.
According to DOI, the oil and gas industry currently has leases
on more than 26 million acres of federal lands, and more than 12
million acres of public waters.
The pause affected new oil and gas leases on federal lands and
in federal waters, as well as leading to the cancellation of Lease
Sale 257 in the Gulf of Mexico, the stoppage of Lease Sale 258 in
Cook Inlet in Alaska, and the cancellation or postponements of
"eligible lands" under the Mineral Leasing Act.
API-led challenge
DOI's decision to appeal the court's ruling was announced the
same day an American Petroleum Institute (API)-led coalition of 11
energy industry trade groups filed a separate challenge to
Biden's 27 January executive order on the climate crisis that
called for "an indefinite pause" on new oil and gas lease
sales.
In a 16 August statement
accompanying the lawsuit, API Chief Legal Officer Paul Alfonso said
the law is clear that the department must hold lease sales and
provide a justification for significant policy changes. "They have
yet to meet these requirements in the eight months since
instituting a federal leasing pause, which continues to create
uncertainty for US natural gas and oil producers," he added.
Although the 16 August lawsuit is aimed at the same "indefinite
pause" for new oil and gas leases, API spokeswoman Jessica
Szymanski confirmed that it is separate from a 13-state coalition
challenge that resulted in the preliminary injunction.
The states' suit argued the Biden-imposed pause violated the
United States Constitution and the Administrative Procedures Act
(APA), which governs federal agency rulemaking. It also said the
pause violated two laws that govern oil and gas exploration on
public lands and offshore waters—the Outer Continental Shelf
Lands Act (OCSLA) and the MLA.
The court was persuaded by the states' argument that Biden's
pause under the MLA was a final agency action that was reviewable
under the APA.
Looming question
The trade groups' lawsuit also argues DOI circumvented
congressional intent by halting leases sales indefinitely. Their
lawsuit also said the MLA and the OCSLA prohibit an indefinite
pause on onshore and offshore lease sales.
According to the API, DOI has provided no timeline or details
for resuming lease sales pending its appeal and a looming question
remains when those sales would occur and what they would look
like.
Meanwhile, the Center for Biological Diversity, which intervened
on behalf of DOI in the states' lawsuit, remained hopeful that "the
administration's forthcoming analysis, if done correctly, will show
what President Biden has already promised. We need to end new
federal oil and gas leasing and production to have any chance at a
livable planet."
In a 6 August report, the New York University
School of Law's Institute for Policy Integrity (IPI) said the
federal oil and gas leasing program is in need of much-needed
reform because, under previous administrations spanning decades,
both the Bureau of Land Management and the Bureau of Ocean Energy
Management prepared analyses that did not fully capture the
environmental impacts of fossil fuel extraction.
The same study also found that fossil companies have stockpiled
thousands of leases, which allows them to maintain control of the
land and prevent DOI from setting aside parcels for other uses. Of
the 26 million acres currently under lease on federal lands, the
IPI said only 12.7 million acres are being used to produce
hydrocarbons.
Using GHG emissions data from a 2018 US Geological Survey study,
the IPI calculated that fossil fuel extraction—oil and gas as
well as coal—and combustion from federal lands in 2014 caused
$57 billion in climate damage.
Posted 17 August 2021 by Amena Saiyid, Senior Climate and Energy Research Analyst
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