SUBSCRIBE TO OUR FREE NEWSLETTER
Daily news & progressive opinion—funded by the people, not the corporations—delivered straight to your inbox.
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
offshore drilling
Green Groups Sue Trump to Stop 'Exceptionally Risky' Deep-Water Drilling Project in Gulf of Mexico
"Ultra-deep-water drilling is ultradangerous, full stop," said an attorney with the Center for Biological Diversity.
Apr 20, 2026
Determined to prevent a "sequel" to the worst oil spill in US history, BP's deadly Deepwater Horizon disaster in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010, six environmental protection groups on Monday sued the Trump administration over what they said was its illegal approval of the British fossil fuel giant's $5 billion plan to drill in the body of water's lowest depths off the coast of Louisiana.
BP has boasted that its planned Kaskida oil field is a "world-class project that reflects decades of technological innovation," but environmental legal firm Earthjustice argued that the company has failed to prove its has the "experience, expertise, and certified equipment to conduct safe drilling under extreme conditions" in waters deeper than 5,600 feet, where opponents of the plan say extreme pressure and temperatures will make a blowout and oil spill more likely than they'd be in a typical drilling project.
A "loss of well control" was blamed for the Deepwater Horizon explosion and spill that killed 11 people, harmed and killed more than 100,000 birds and marine animals as well as untold numbers of fish, and devastated local economies—and that type of accident is 6-7 times more likely in an ultra-deep drilling project like Kaskida, according to Earthjustice.
The organization wrote in a regulatory filing last year when it was trying to block the project that "deep-water and ultra-deep-water oil spills and accidents are also much more difficult to respond to and contain.”
"BP did not show in its proposals that it will have the necessary containment capabilities in case the company needs to stop a blown-out well from spilling 4.5 million barrels of oil or more across the Gulf."
The group is representing Healthy Gulf, Turtle Island Restoration Network, Habitat Recovery Project, Sierra Club, and Center for Biological Diversity in the lawsuit, which argues that President Donald Trump's Interior Department adopted in its environmental analysis of Kaskida a severe underestimation—by about half a million barrels of oil—of what a worst-case scenario oil spill would look like.
"BP did not show in its proposals that it will have the necessary containment capabilities in case the company needs to stop a blown-out well from spilling 4.5 million barrels of oil or more across the Gulf," said Earthjustice.
Rachel Mathews, a senior attorney with the Center for Biological Diversity, said it was "appalling that the Trump administration has authorized this deep-water drilling project without having information critical to preventing harm to marine life."
“This will put Rice’s whales, sea turtles, and other Gulf wildlife at terrible risk," said Mathews. "Ultra-deep-water drilling is ultradangerous, full stop.”
The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management's (BOEM) approval of the Kaskida project was preceded by several industry-friendly actions by the Trump administration, including a meeting last month of the federal Endangered Species Committee, which voted to exempt fossil fuel companies from following policies intended to protect endangered species in the Gulf. Advocates argued that the decision was made illegally because the panel is required to meet publicly.
The administration has also proposed weakening "well control" rules for offshore drilling operations, and the White House is consolidating the BOEM and the Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement—two agencies that were intentionally separated following the Deepwater Horizon disaster after an investigative commission found that conflicts of interest were created when they acted as one regulatory agency.
“Kaskida is emblematic of a new era in offshore oil extraction: corporate hoarding of risky, ultra-deep water leases in an attempt to monopolize the future of oil production, with little to no oversight from the Trump administration. We, as citizens of the Gulf South, are not standing for it,” said Martha Collins, executive director of Healthy Gulf. “BP has shown how they handle oil spills on this anniversary of the Deepwater Horizon disaster—their risky drilling and inexperience at this great depth will ensure their continued legacy of the Gulf never being the same again.”
Despite the fact that the Trump administration has taken numerous actions to ramp up oil and gas production—as the US already produces record amounts of fossil fuels—those measures are doing little to reduce oil prices, noted Earthjustice.
“Offshore drilling is one of the riskiest kinds of oil extraction, but the Trump administration is ignoring the law to allow Big Oil CEOs to endanger coastal communities for the sake of corporate profit,” said Devorah Ancel, senior attorney at Sierra Club’s Environmental Law Program. “This permit would allow BP to develop multiple ultra-deep high-pressure wells, which is already exceptionally risky, and with BP’s track record in the Gulf, coastal ecosystems face extraordinary danger. We’re suing the Trump administration to ensure the coastal communities that would suffer the consequences of BP’s actions get their day in court.”
Keep ReadingShow Less
Green Group Warns Trump's Offshore Drilling Plan Risks 4,000+ Additional Oil Spills
The Center for Biological Diversity estimates that Trump's new five-year offshore drilling plan could release over 12 million gallons of oil into ocean waters around the US.
Jan 06, 2026
President Donald Trump's plan to dramatically expand offshore drilling could result in thousands of additional oil spills and put dozens of endangered species at increased risk, according to a new analysis by a leading conservation group.
In November, the US Department of the Interior published a draft plan to expand drilling over the next five years, replacing a more restrictive one drawn up by the Biden administration.
The proposal includes as many as 34 potential offshore lease sales across American coasts, covering approximately 1.27 billion acres, far more than previous administrations have offered.
The new plan opens up drilling in 21 areas off the coast of Alaska, seven in the Gulf of Mexico, and six along the Pacific Coast. These are in addition to 36 new offshore oil lease sales mandated in last year's Republican budget reconciliation package.
An analysis published Tuesday by the Center for Biological Diversity found that the increase in drilling could lead to an additional 4,232 oil spills and dump an extra 12.1 million gallons of oil into ocean waters.
The calculation is based on average spill rates from pipelines and platforms from 1974 to 2015. However, it does not even include catastrophic events like the 2010 BP oil spill, which resulted in more than 210 million gallons of oil being released into the Gulf of Mexico.
"Trump’s ridiculously reckless drilling plan could cause thousands of new oil spills, threatening almost every US coast,” said Kristen Monsell, the oceans legal director at the Center for Biological Diversity.
The group estimates, based on prior figures, that 2,627 of those spills—more than half—will occur in the Gulf of Mexico, releasing about 7.5 million gallons of oil into the ecosystem.
The Gulf is home to several endangered species likely to be affected by the new drilling. The black-capped petrel's population is in rapid decline as pollution has destroyed its food source. Rice's whale has only about 50 individuals remaining and lost 20% of its population in the BP spill. Kemp's ridley sea turtle, which has experienced a population rebound after dropping to near extinction, would be imperiled by another spill.
In the Pacific, sea otters are uniquely vulnerable to oil spills because they coat their fur, which acts as insulation against the cold. Killer and blue whales, whose populations have been nearly wiped out, would also be in danger.
Meanwhile, Arctic animals already affected by climate change—like bowhead whales, Pacific walruses, and beluga whales—all face potential further damage to their habitats due to drilling off the coast of Alaska.
“Nobody wants beaches and marine life coated in crude, but that’ll be our future if Trump’s scheme goes forward," Monsell said. "Every new drilling project signs us up for decades of problems, and our wildlife and coastal economies will suffer the most.”
Keep ReadingShow Less
Parliamentarian Blocks 'Big, Ugly Bill' Public Lands Sale and Offshore Drilling Policies
While calling the public lands decision "an important victory," one campaigner also warned that "this threat is far from over."
Jun 24, 2025
Critics of Republican efforts to continue wrecking the planet celebrated some small victories after the U.S. Senate parliamentarian on Monday advised that multiple provisions cannot be passed as part of a megabill that only requires a simple majority.
Senate Parliamentarian Elizabeth MacDonough found that some GOP legislative proposals about offshore drilling and mandatory public land sales could not be included in the package due to the so-called Byrd Rule, which bars provisions considered "extraneous to the purpose of implementing budget resolution policies."
Specifically, MacDonough axed a provision that deems offshore oil and gas projects as automatically compliant with the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), nullifying their environmental review processes. She also ruled against a proposal requiring offshore fossil fuel leases to be issued to successful bidders within 90 days after the sale, and a separate mandate for the sale of millions of acres of public land.
"This wasn't just an obscure and damaging policy—it was an assault on the places where generations of Americans have hiked, hunted, fished, camped, and connected with the natural beauty of our country."
MacDonough also blocked provisions allowing natural gas exporters to pay to have their project deemed in the public interest; requiring a permit for the construction of Ambler Road, a controversial mining route in Alaska; directing the interior secretary to hold yearly geothermal lease sales; and revoking the secretary's discretion to reduce fees for solar and wind projects on Bureau of Land Management land.
Other provisions under the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee's jurisdiction that are still being reviewed include policies that would require that 90% of the revenue from lease sales in the Cook Inlet go to the state of Alaska, starting in 2035; mandate fossil fuel lease sales in the National Petroleum Reserve in Alaska; and force the interior secretary to approve new coal lease applications.
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) on Tuesday applauded MacDonough's decision on the "cruel" GOP policy that "would have gutted America's public lands and auctioned them off to the highest bidder, in yet another bid to benefit the wealthy."
"This wasn't just an obscure and damaging policy—it was an assault on the places where generations of Americans have hiked, hunted, fished, camped, and connected with the natural beauty of our country," Schumer said. "Republicans tried to rip away hundreds of millions of acres of public land—not to help families, not to solve real problems—but to hand yet another gift to the wealthy and well-connected. It was outrageous, it was shameless, and it would have forever changed the character of the country."
"Senate Democrats fought tooth and nail to keep public lands in public hands because these lands belong to everyone—not just the privileged few," Schumer said of Sen. Mike Lee's (R-Utah) proposal that put those lands at risk.
Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee Ranking Member Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.) also put out a statement welcoming MacDonough's latest moves against what critics are calling the "Big, Ugly Bill" and highlighting his party's opposition.
"Democrats continue to show up and fight every provision of this Big, Beautiful Betrayal of a bill, because this bill is an attack on workers and families everywhere," Merkley said Monday. "Democrats will not stand idly by while Republicans attempt to circumvent the rules of reconciliation in order to sell off public lands to fund tax breaks for billionaires. We will make sure the Byrd Rule is followed and review any changes Republicans attempt to make to the bill."
Like the Democratic leaders, Trust for Public Land CEO and president Carrie Besnette Hauser on Tuesday called MacDonough's latest decisions "an important victory in the fight to protect America's public lands from short-sighted proposals that would have undermined decades of bipartisan work to protect, steward, and expand access to the places we all share."
"Across the country and across party lines, Americans have made it overwhelmingly clear: They do not want to see their public lands sold off to the highest bidder. Land sell-off proposals are deeply out of step with the will of a vast majority of Americans," she noted. "But make no mistake—this threat is far from over. Efforts to dismantle our public lands continue, and we must remain vigilant as proposals now under consideration including a proposal to roll back the landmark, bipartisan Great American Outdoors Act and threaten full, dedicated funding for conservation through the Land and Water Conservation Fund (LWCF)."
"Public lands are not political bargaining chips, but national treasures that power local economies, strengthen public health, and connect millions of people to the outdoors every day," she added. "Trust for Public Land will continue to stand with communities, tribal nations, and bipartisan champions in Congress to defend public lands and ensure they remain protected, accessible, and thriving—for all people, for all future generations."
Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) has suggested that Republicans will not overrule the parliamentarian. According to Reuters, he told reporters on Monday that the review process is "something we have to go through," and "they're working through it. And in some cases, as things are flagged, we're making counteroffers."
Although MacDonough dealt a blow to the GOP agenda, the Trump administration on Monday continued its assault on the planet, announcing plans to end a rule that protects tens of millions of acres in the National Forest System, which would enable road development and timber production on those lands.
Keep ReadingShow Less
On Earth Day, Dems Push Bills to Ban Offshore Drilling 'Once and for All'
"Earth Day is an important reminder that every coastal community deserves healthy oceans and oil-free beaches," said one campaigner.
Apr 22, 2025
On Tuesday, to coincide with Earth Day, multiple Democratic senators renewed their effort to pass bills to protect the Pacific and Atlantic oceans from offshore oil and gas drilling—part of a broader legislative push by Democrats to safeguard U.S. coastal waters.
Sen. Alex Padilla of California has reintroduced the West Coast Ocean Protection Act, which would permanently end new oil and gas leases for offshore drilling off the coast of California, Oregon, and Washington.
"We must end offshore oil drilling in coastal waters once and for all," said Padilla in a statement on Tuesday.
Meanwhile, Sen. Cory Booker of New Jersey has reintroduced the Clean Ocean and Safe Tourism (COAST) Anti-Drilling Act, which would permanently prohibit the federal government from issuing leases for the exploration, development, or production of offshore oil and gas in the North Atlantic, Mid-Atlantic, South Atlantic, and Straits of Florida planning areas of the U.S. Outer Continental Shelf.
Reps. Jared Huffman (D-Calif.) and Frank Pallone Jr. (D-N.J.) are leading companion legislation for the two bills in the U.S. House of Representatives.
"California's spectacular marine life—including complex kelp forests and charismatic sea otters—and vibrant coastal economies rely on healthy ecosystems," said Pamela Flick, Defenders of Wildlife California program director, in a statement on Tuesday.
The West Coast Ocean Protection Act "could, once and for all, block offshore drilling activities along the continental shelf, and protect critical marine habitats along California's iconic Pacific Coast," she said.
The legislation comes as environmental leaders warn that this Earth Day puts a focus on the need to resist the Trump administration's attacks on environmental regulation and programs.
On President Donald Trump's first day in office, he initiated plans to make federal land and waters open for oil drilling and mining, including in fragile wilderness in Alaska. Trump also declared a national energy emergency.
Beyond the West Coast Ocean Protection Act and the COAST Anti-Drilling Act, Democratic lawmakers in Congress have reintroduced several other bills in recent weeks aimed at safeguarding coasts.
Those bills include the Florida Coastal Protection Act, which would protect the coast of Florida and eastern Gulf of Mexico from offshore drilling, exploration, and production, and the New England Coastal Protection Act, which would protect the coasts of Maine, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Connecticut, in addition to portions of the North Atlantic Outer Continental Shelf, from offshore drilling.
Conservation groups said they welcome the suite of legislation.
"The path of so-called 'energy dominance' is paved with threats to American coasts," said Sierra Weaver, senior attorney for Defenders of Wildlife, in a statement on Tuesday. "This set of bills offers real protections for coastal communities and wildlife against unwanted, unreasonable, and unsafe offshore oil drilling."
Weaver added that the bills are the kind of leadership and action that's needed on the anniversary of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, the largest marine oil spill in history.
"Oceana applauds these congressional leaders for reintroducing pivotal legislation that would establish permanent protections from offshore oil and gas drilling for millions of acres of ocean," said Oceana campaign director Joseph Gordon in a statement on Tuesday.
"Earth Day is an important reminder that every coastal community deserves healthy oceans and oil-free beaches," he added.
Keep ReadingShow Less
In First Major Climate Challenge to Trump 2.0, Groups Work to Block Offshore Drilling Once Again
Climate campaigners defeated the president's offshore drilling push during his first term, and they are pledging to do so again.
Feb 21, 2025
Climate advocates are expressing confidence as they file the first major environmental legal challenges to U.S. President Donald Trump's administration, with the legal group Earthjustice noting that campaigners were victorious during Trump's first term when they sued to stop him from gutting protections from offshore oil drilling.
"We defeated Trump the first time he tried to roll back protections and sacrifice more of our waters to the oil industry," said Earthjustice managing attorney Steve Mashuda on Wednesday as the organization filed a challenge against an executive order Trump signed on his first day of his new White House term. "We're bringing this abuse of the law to the courts again."
Trump urged oil and gas companies—which poured nearly $450 million into efforts to get him and other anti-climate Republicans elected last year—to "drill, baby, drill" as he signed the order hours into his second term.
The order rolled back former Democratic President Joe Biden's ban on offshore drilling over more than 625 million acres of coastal territory, including parts of the Gulf of Mexico that were impacted by BP's Deepwater Horizon oil spill in 2010, which killed 11 people and devastated local ecosystems and businesses.
"Trump tried this illegal move to undo protections during his first administration, and he failed. We will keep working to ensure he won't be any more successful this time around."
As Common Dreams reported in January, Biden invoked the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act to protect areas of the U.S. coasts from future oil and gas leasing, and a federal judge ruled in 2019 that withdrawals under the law cannot be revoked without an act of Congress.
"When nearly 40% of Americans live in coastal counties that rely on a healthy ocean to thrive, removing critical protections shows how little care Trump has for these communities," said Devorah Ancel, senior attorney at Sierra Club, which joined the lawsuit along with climate groups Oceana, Greenpeace, the Northern Alaska Environmental Center, and other organizations. "Trump tried this illegal move to undo protections during his first administration, and he failed. We will keep working to ensure he won't be any more successful this time around."
Earthjustice noted that a poll conducted by Ipsos last year on behalf of Oceana found that 64% of Americans want elected officials to keep offshore areas off-limits for new oil and gas leasing. Climate scientists have consistently warned that new fossil fuel projects have no place on a pathway to limiting planetary heating to 1.5°C or as close to it as possible.
The majority of Americans support ocean protections from offshore drilling. Trump's executive order to rescind protections from offshore drilling is not just illegal – it's deeply unpopular. We're in court to protect coastal communities, public health, regional economies, and marine ecosystems.
— Earthjustice (@earthjustice.bsky.social) February 21, 2025 at 11:28 AM
The possibility of fossil fuel drilling near coastal communities threatens "the health and economic resilience of millions of people who rely on clean and healthy oceans for everything from tourism to commercial fishing," said Earthjustice.
Trump is pushing to open up new areas for offshore drilling even as fossil fuel production in the U.S. has surged to record highs in recent years. He has claimed the country faces an "energy emergency" even as the oil industry has not yet begun drilling in 80% of the millions of public acres of water where it already holds leases.
"Trump's putting our oceans, marine wildlife, and coastal communities at risk of devastating oil spills and we need the courts to rein in his utter contempt for the law," said Kristen Monsell, oceans legal director at the Center for Biological Diversity, which is also involved in the legal action. "Offshore oil drilling is destructive from start to finish. Opening up more public waters to the oil industry for short-term gain and political points is a reprehensible and irresponsible way to manage our precious ocean ecosystems."
In a separate legal challenge, several climate action groups are asking the U.S. District Court for the District of Alaska to reinstate a 2021 federal ruling that blocked Trump from rolling back offshore protections that had been introduced by the Obama administration in the Atlantic and Arctic Oceans.
"The Arctic Ocean has been protected from U.S. drilling for nearly a decade, and those protections have been affirmed by the federal courts," said Sierra Weaver, senior attorney at Defenders of Wildlife. "Though these coastlines have been protected, the administration is showing no restraint in seeking to hand off some of our most fragile and pristine landscapes for the oil industry's profit."
Keep ReadingShow Less
Biden Tried to Protect the Vulnerable Bering Sea; Will It Work?
The climate emergency has led to dramatic changes for Alaska fish and wildlife and for the subsistence-based communities of the Arctic who depend on these creatures for their survival.
Jan 22, 2025
In early January, as one of his last acts in office, former U.S. President Joe Biden banned future offshore oil and gas drilling on more than 625 million acres of U.S. coastal waters including the entire East Coast, West Coast, and the eastern Gulf of Mexico as well as the northern Bering Sea.
He did this using presidential powers granted under the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act of 1953, which in 2019 a federal judge in Alaska ruled cannot be rescinded by a future president. This means, despite his day one executive order reversing Biden’s order, President Donald Trump will likely have to get Congress to pass legislation negating this drilling ban. Three Republican congressmen from Louisiana and Texas have already introduced legislation to do that, but may have a hard time getting fellow Republicans from states like South Carolina and Florida—where anti-drilling sentiment is strong—to go along.
It’s pretty clear why Biden did what he did, first to thwart Trump’s “Drill Baby Drill” energy plan and to burnish his own environmental legacy. What is less clear to most people is why he included 44 million acres of the Northern Bering Sea off of Alaska in the drilling ban.
“Everything’s declining, even our (summer) moss berries, cloud berries, everything.”
As a Biden White House fact-sheet explained it: “The Northern Bering Sea Climate Resilience Area was established in 2016 and includes one of the largest marine mammal migrations in the world—beluga and bowhead whales, walruses, and seals… the health of these waters is critically important to food security and to the culture of more than 70 coastal Tribes, including the Yup’ik, Cup’ik, and Inupiaq people who have relied on these resources for millennia.”
So, what’s the Northern Bering Sea Climate Resilience Area? Established by President Barack Obama in December of 2016, it was an attempt to meet the concerns of both Alaska Natives and environmental scientists studying the rapidly changing conditions they were witnessing. Alaska and its waters are today warming two to three times faster than the rest of the world due to a climate phenomenon known as “Arctic amplification,” linked to vanishing sea ice. As the Arctic Ocean ice cover that reflects solar radiation back into space has retreated, the dark ocean waters exposed absorb ever greater amounts of heat leading to 2024 being listed as the hottest year on record going back to 1850. 2023 was the previous hottest year. The 10 warmest years have all occurred in the last decade.
This has led to dramatic changes for the fish and wildlife and for the subsistence-based communities of the Arctic who depend on these creatures for their survival. For example, a study published last month found that 4 million common murres, a seabird that frequents the area, recently died as the result of a marine heatwave. This was about half the state of Alaska’s population, and may be the largest documented die-off of a single species of wild bird.
The Bering Sea’s Alaska Native communities—some 70 federally recognized tribes—first requested action under Obama and got both a ban on destructive bottom trawl fishing in the 113,000-square-mile resilience area and a ban on oil drilling in about half the area (rescinded by Trump during his first term and now fully protected by Biden under the Lands Act), also a commitment for the Coast Guard to restrict shipping channels in areas where native communities are involved in fishing, hunting, and whaling (still not finalized by the Coast Guard) and a pledge to consult with these same communities moving forward. Three leading Alaska Native organizations—Kawerak, Inc., the Association of Village Council Presidents, and the Bering Sea Elders Group—released a joint statement on the day Biden acted expressing their “deepest appreciation and gratitude” to him for protecting waters that President Trump hopes to reopen to oil drilling.
I recently interviewed two women from St. Paul Island in the Pribilof Islands, about 300 miles off the Alaskan mainland in the Bering Sea. Destiny Bristol Kushin is a 20-year-old college student working toward an associate degree in environmental sciences, and her grandmother Zinaida Melovidov is an elder who has lived on the island, with a population of just under 400 people, most of her life. They both talked about the decline of the murres that were hunted for meat and whose eggs were collected on a nearby island where they’ve all but disappeared since the die-off.
“Everything’s declining, even our (summer) moss berries, cloud berries, everything,” Melovidov worries.
“Even in the last 20 years since I was born, you can see the differences in the environment, especially with the seasons. Our summers will be later and foggy where they used to be sunny,” Kushin notes. “Our winters aren’t as snowy. It’s mostly wet now, like rain and snow all during the winter time.”
I’ve heard similar concerns about climate impacts on lives and livelihoods from Alaska Natives in the Aleutians and Southwest Alaska whose villages are also at risk from erosion, flooding, and thawing permafrost.
Even if Biden’s drilling ban in the Bering Sea stands the test of Trump, other threats will remain including oil spills from Russian tankers passing through the 55-mile-wide Bering Strait between Alaska and Russia delivering oil to China via Russia’s Northern Sea Route of retreating Arctic ice. Russia’s oil trade with China has increased since Western sanctions were imposed following its 2022 invasion of Ukraine. Reflecting these tensions around oil, in 2023 the Russians refused to participate with the U.S. Coast Guard in a joint oil spill response exercise.
Even with drilling protections for coastal America, the U.S. will remain the world’s leading oil and gas producer, including the 14% of national production that comes from the western Gulf of Mexico where the 2010 BP Deepwater Horizon oil spill disaster took place.
And, with President Trump’s commitment to produce ever more fossil fuels that drive climate disruption and contribute to extreme weather events from heatwaves in the Arctic to the Los Angeles’ firestorms, our problems with oil and gas remain far from over.
Keep ReadingShow Less
'Epic Ocean Victory': Biden Permanently Bans Offshore Drilling Across 625 Million Acres
The authority President Joe Biden used could make it difficult for the incoming Trump administration to reverse the sweeping drilling ban.
Jan 06, 2025
Outgoing President Joe Biden on Monday moved to permanently ban offshore oil and gas drilling across more than 625 million acres of U.S. coastal territory, protecting swaths of the East Coast, the eastern Gulf of Mexico, the Pacific, and Alaska's Northern Bering Sea from fossil fuel exploitation just before President-elect Donald Trump is set to retake power.
Biden said in a statement that his decision "reflects what coastal communities, businesses, and beachgoers have known for a long time: that drilling off these coasts could cause irreversible damage to places we hold dear and is unnecessary to meet our nation's energy needs."
Invoking the 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill—the largest in U.S. history—Biden said future drilling off the coasts he's seeking to protect "is not worth the risks." Recent polling indicates that a majority of the American public agrees: 64% support action to shield U.S. coastlines from new offshore drilling, according to a 2024 survey conducted by Ipsos on behalf of the advocacy group Oceana.
"As the climate crisis continues to threaten communities across the country and we are transitioning to a clean energy economy," the president said Monday, "now is the time to protect these coasts for our children and grandchildren."
Biden's move comes just two weeks before Trump, a fervent champion of fossil fuel drilling, is set to be sworn in as the nation's 47th president. During his first term in office, Trump moved to expand offshore drilling to nearly all U.S. coastal waters before temporarily banning drilling off the coasts of Florida, Georgia, and South Carolina in 2020.
The far-right Project 2025 agenda crafted by members of Trump's first administration calls for a major increase in offshore fossil fuel drilling.
"Our treasured coastal communities are now safeguarded for future generations."
While Trump and his proposed Cabinet—which is stacked with allies of the oil and gas industry—are expected to aggressively roll back climate protections put in place by the Biden administration, the outgoing president's new executive action could have staying power.
In a fact sheet, the White House said Biden is using his authority under Section 12(a) of the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act to "protect all U.S. Outer Continental Shelf areas off the East and West coasts, the eastern Gulf of Mexico, and additional portions of the Northern Bering Sea in Alaska from future oil and natural gas leasing." The withdrawals, according to the White House, "have no expiration date, and prohibit all future oil and natural gas leasing in the areas withdrawn."
As The Washington Post observed, "A federal judge ruled in 2019 that such withdrawals cannot be undone without an act of Congress."
"Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah), the new chairman of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, suggested that he would seek to overturn the decision using the Congressional Review Act, which allows lawmakers to nullify an executive action within 60 days of enactment with a simple majority vote," the Post added.
A spokesperson for Trump's transition team called Biden's action "disgraceful," adding, "Rest assured, Joe Biden will fail, and we will drill, baby, drill."
Predictably, the fossil fuel lobby also denounced Biden's executive action and implored lawmakers to "use every tool at their disposal to reverse this politically motivated decision."
While Biden has faced criticism from environmentalists throughout his four-year term for approving drilling permits in the face of intensifying climate chaos in the U.S. and around the world, advocates celebrated the president's latest executive action as a critical win.
"This is an epic ocean victory!" said Joseph Gordon, campaign director at Oceana. "Thank you, President Biden, for listening to the voices from coastal communities and contributing to the bipartisan tradition of protecting our coasts."
"Our coastlines are home to millions of Americans and support billions of dollars of economic activity that depend on a clean coast, abundant wildlife, and thriving fisheries," Gordon added. "Our treasured coastal communities are now safeguarded for future generations."
Keep ReadingShow Less
Sunday Was Earth's Hottest Day on Record
"We are now in truly uncharted territory and as the climate keeps warming, we are bound to see new records being broken in future months and years," one expert said.
Jul 23, 2024
July 21 was Earth's hottest day on record, overtaking the record set last July during the
hottest year in millennia.
The European Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S) found that Sunday's average air surface temperature soared to 17.09°C , or 62.76°F, according to preliminary data. While that is only 0.1°C warmer than the previous record—set on July 6, 2023—it was nearly 0.3°C higher than the pre-2023 record, set at 16.8°C on August 13, 2016.
"What is truly staggering is how large the difference is between the temperature of the last 13 months and the previous temperature records," C3S Director Carlo Buontempo said in a statement. "We are now in truly uncharted territory and as the climate keeps warming, we are bound to see new records being broken in future months and years."
The news follows a year of shattered temperature records as El Niño combined with the climate emergency to heat air and ocean to levels well above average. While El Niño conditions ended in April, scientists still predict that 2024 could overtake 2023 as the hottest year on record.
As of June 2024, the past 13 months have all been the hottest of their kind on record. June 2024 was also the 12th month in a row to see its average temperature meet or surpass 1.5°C above preindustrial levels—the most ambitious temperature goal enshrined in the Paris agreement.
Scientists have warned that the only way to keep global temperatures from rising further is to rapidly phase out the use of oil, gas, and coal and transition to renewable energy.
"These recurring record-breaking temperatures are a scorching red flag, but it's not too late to reverse course."
Before Sunday, the last hottest day on record was July 6, 2023, which was also the fourth consecutive day to break that record. The previous record was set at 17.08°C, or 62.74°F, according to Copernicus. However, since the 2016 temperature record was first broken on July 3, 2023, 57 days in the past year have also surpassed it.
What's more, C3S found that the last 10 years have been the 10 years on record with the highest average daily temperatures.
"The difference in the highest daily average temperature between the lowest ranked of those 10 years (2015) and the previous record before 2023 (13 August 2016) was 0.2°C. The jump from the 2016 record to 2023/2024 is about 0.3°C, highlighting how substantial the warmth of 2023 and 2024," C3S said.
Record-breaking temperatures have also brought extreme weather.
On Sunday, Florida meteorologist Jeff Berardelli wrote on social media that "the most anomalously warm places were Antarctica and Western Canada where several hundred wildfires blaze, many out of control."
C3S also said that Sunday's record was in part driven by "much-above-average temperatures over large parts of Antarctica."
The warmest day on record also coincided with heatwaves in Russia, Europe, and the U.S., Reuters reported.
C3S predicted that temperatures would continue to rise in the short term.
"In the coming days, we are expecting the daily global average temperature to further increase and peak around 22 or 23 July 2024 and then go down, but with possible further fluctuations in the coming weeks," the agency said.
In the longer term, temperature trends will depend on whether policymakers can take ambitious action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and halt the destruction of natural carbon sinks.
"These recurring record-breaking temperatures are a scorching red flag, but it's not too late to reverse course," Oceana Campaign director Joseph Gordon said in a statement. "When you're on the path to destruction, the best thing you can do is turn around."
Gordon recommended one thing U.S. President Joe Biden in particular could do to stop runaway climate change.
"One of the most immediate and impactful ways to address greenhouse gas emissions is to prevent new offshore drilling in the United States," Gordon said. "Offshore drilling drives climate change throughout its entire process. President Biden must permanently protect our coasts from offshore drilling and move us toward a clean energy future."
An earlier version of this article misstated the difference between the new temperature record and the pre-2023 record.
Keep ReadingShow Less
Trump Would Sell Anything for Personal Gain—Even Planet Earth
Trump told oil and gas executives to raise $1 billion to return him to the White House and he’d reverse dozens of Biden’s environmental rules and policies and stop new ones from being enacted.
May 10, 2024
Trump is selling everything to raise money for himself and his campaign.
The Trump Bible (which also includes a copy of the U.S. Constitution, Pledge of Allegiance, Declaration of Independence, and Bill of Rights).
Trump shoes (ranging from the nearly all-gold “Never Surrender” high tops priced at $399 to the lower-cut “Red Wave” and “POTUS 45”).
Shares in Truth Social, Trump’s social media platform.
You might think that the world can’t be bought and sold, but apparently there are no bounds to the promises Trump will make to get back into the White House.
Digital trading cards (of which the most recent set, “The Mugshot edition,” offers collectors a chance to own a swatch of the suit the former president wore for his Fulton County, Georgia, mugshot, priced at $99 a piece or $4,653 for the full set, which includes an invitation to a dinner at Mar-a-Lago).
Trump cologne and perfume stamped with the former president’s name (the “Victory47” bottles are each listed for $99 respectively. The cologne bottle’s image, subject to change, has a Trump head topper).
But now, Trump is selling something far, far bigger. In fact, you can’t get any bigger.
He’s selling the entire world.
You might think that the world can’t be bought and sold, but apparently there are no bounds to the promises Trump will make to get back into the White House.
Everything’s for sale.
When Trump sat down with some of America’s top oil executives last month at Mar-a-Lago, according to the The Washington Post, they complained of burdensome environmental regulations, despite spending $400 million to lobby the Biden administration in the last year.
Trump’s response? He would offer them a better deal.
He told them to raise $1 billion to return him to the White House and he’d reverse dozens of Biden’s environmental rules and policies and stop new ones from being enacted (according to people with knowledge of the meeting, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe a private conversation).
The $1 billion “deal” would more than pay for itself, Trump told the oil executives, because of the taxes and regulations they would avoid thanks to him.
Biden has called global warming an “existential threat,” and over the last three years, his administration has finalized 100 new environmental regulations aimed at cutting air pollution and greenhouse gas emissions, restricting toxic chemicals, and conserving public lands and waters.
Trump has called climate change a “hoax.” His administration weakened or wiped out more than 125 environmental rules over four years.
Now, he’s making an even bigger offer. At that Mar-a-Lago dinner, the former president told Big Oil executives that they’ll have an even greater windfall in a second Trump administration — including new offshore drilling, speedier permits, and other relaxed regulations — if they sink a billion into his campaign.
Trump promised to immediately end the Biden administration’s freeze on permits for new liquefied natural gas exports — a top priority for the executives. “You’ll get it on the first day,” Trump said.
Trump told the executives that he would start auctioning off more leases for oil drilling in the Gulf of Mexico, another priority for several of the executives. He railed against wind power. And he said he would reverse the restrictions on drilling in the Alaskan Arctic.
Trump also promised that he would scrap Biden’s rules for electric vehicles. The rules require automakers to reduce emissions from car tailpipes but don’t mandate a particular technology such as EVs. Trump called the rules “ridiculous” in the meeting with donors.
Will Big Oil put up $1 billion for all of this? Maybe.
Keep ReadingShow Less
Big Oil, Green Groups Sue Over Biden's Offshore Drilling Plan for the Gulf
"Our lawsuit is another stand for the Gulf ecosystem, its nearby communities, and all wildlife that continue to suffer at the hands of Big Oil," said Friends of the Earth's legal director.
Feb 13, 2024
Faced with a rapidly warming world that is hurtling toward terrifying tipping points, climate groups on Monday filed a lawsuit over the Biden administration's five-year plan for offshore drilling in the Gulf of Mexico—and so did the fossil fuel industry.
Both suits target the 2024-29 National Outer Continental Shelf Oil and Gas Leasing Program. When the plan was finalized in December, the U.S. Department of the Interior highlighted that it features the fewest lease sales in history—just three—and the Inflation Reduction Act ties offshore wind development to continued oil and gas leasing.
Despite scientists' warnings about continued fossil fuel extraction and use, the American Petroleum Institute, an industry trade group, is fighting for more lease sales. API senior vice president and general counsel Ryan Meyers on Monday claimed that the Biden administration "has used every tool at its disposal to restrict access to vast energy resources in federal waters."
Meanwhile, green groups argue that the administration hasn't gone far enough in terms of tackling the fossil fuel-driven climate emergency and delivering on the campaign promises of Democratic President Joe Biden, who is seeking reelection in November.
"It is time for us to transition away from these industries, not enable further drilling in the years to come."
“Fossil fuel development is untenable if we want a livable future," declared Brettny Hardy, an attorney with Earthjustice, which is representing the climate groups. "The oil and gas industry is already sitting on 9 million acres of undeveloped leases. They certainly are not entitled to more."
"Although we acknowledge the government's focus on climate impacts with the release of this five-year offshore leasing plan, we are taking legal action today because we are concerned about how it will jeopardize the health of overburdened communities," Hardy explained.
Kristen Schlemmer of Bayou City Waterkeeper in Houston stressed that in her city and "along the Texas Gulf Coast, the stakes are high."
"More fossil fuels means more carbon emissions, which means more intense hurricanes hitting the inadequately guarded petrochemical infrastructure that is already in place," she said. "It is time for us to transition away from these industries, not enable further drilling in the years to come."
In addition to emphasizing the dangers of what Oceana campaign director Joseph Gordon called a "deadly cycle of drilling and spilling," the climate and Gulf groups represented by Earthjustice also slammed the API suit, which Brad Sewell of the Natural Resources Defense Council described as "unfounded and unwarranted."
Pete Stauffer, ocean protection manager at the Surfrider Foundation, argued that the industry suit "belies the fact that new offshore drilling is broadly unpopular and is not needed to meet our nation's energy needs," noting that the administration's plan "was informed by nearly a million public comments" against new extraction in U.S. waters.
Friends of the Earth legal director Hallie Templeton said that "we are not surprised by this industry challenge, given its track record of suing every time the Biden administration makes any attempt to break free from fossil fuels."
"Our lawsuit is another stand for the Gulf ecosystem, its nearby communities, and all wildlife that continue to suffer at the hands of Big Oil," Templeton added.
The other groups joining the green groups' challenge to the five-year plan are Healthy Gulf, Sierra Club, and Turtle Island Restoration Network. According to Reuters, both lawsuits were filed in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia.
The competing legal battles were launched as 21 protesters with the youth-led Sunrise Movement were arrested on Monday for blockading Biden's reelection campaign headquarters in Delaware and demanding that he declare a climate emergency.
The president has faced criticism for not only declining to declare a climate emergency and continuing fossil fuel lease sales but also skipping the United Nations summit late last year and supporting the Willow oil project and Mountain Valley Pipeline.
Biden has also come under fire for backing the expansion of the liquefied natural gas industry, though his administration won praise from green groups last month for halting approvals for LNG exports to non-Fair Trade Agreement countries—a move that former President Donald Trump, the Republican front-runner, has vowed to reverse if he is elected later this year.
Keep ReadingShow Less
See More
Most Popular
To inform. To inspire. To ignite change for the common good.
News & Opinion
Trending
Common Dreams, Inc. Founded 1997. Registered 501(c3) Non-Profit
Privacy Policy