Interior Secretary Deb Haaland announced today that federal protections against mining, oil and gas development on 28 million acres of federal land in Alaska will stay in place.
The protections were part of the 1971 Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act, but the Trump administration targeted them for erasure in the waning days of the administration with the backing of GOP Gov. Mike Dunleavy and U.S. Sens. Lisa Murkowski and Dan Sullivan.
As was the case with the Trump-era efforts to open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil drilling, the Biden administration reversed the effort based on what it said were legal failures that made the change unlawful. That sparked a new round of environmental analysis on the proposed rollback, which yielded today’s announcement.
The announcement also highlighted the Biden administration’s efforts to consult with Alaska Native tribes and groups, arguing the previous administration had overlooked the impact on the environment and subsistence resources. The U.S. Department of the Interior received about 15,000 comments on the new review.
“Tribal consultation must be treated as a requirement, not an option, when the federal government is making decisions that could irrevocably affect Tribal communities,” Haaland said in a prepared statement. “I am grateful to the team at the Bureau of Land Management for taking the time to ensure that we approached this decision with the benefit of feedback from Alaska Native communities and to the tribal leaders who shared with us the impact that a potential revocation of the withdrawals would have on their people.”
The affected lands are a patchwork of parcels, mostly in western and southern Alaska. An interactive map of the land is available here.
The effort was also linked to other efforts by the Biden administration to limit the development of extractive industries in Alaska, such as additional protections for 13 million acres in the western Arctic, the placing of 2.8 million acres of the Beaufort Sea off limits to oil and gas development and the rejection of the state’s Ambler Road project.
Some Alaska Native groups and environmental organizations praised the decision. That includes the 38-member Bering Sea Interior Tribal Commission, which said in a statement that many Alaska communities already face declining subsistence hunting and fishing opportunities due to climate change and the kind of industrial development that would be allowed if the protections expired threatens them further.
“These lands currently sustain our communities and have supported our people for generations,” said Eugene Paul, Chairman of the Bering Sea Interior Tribal Commission. “It is our obligation to do what is in our power to protect them. I want to thank the Bureau of Land Management for protecting our traditional lands and our way of life for our children, grandchildren, and those still to come.”
One of the big projects potentially affected by the rollback is the proposed Donlin gold mine, which has raised concerns about its impact on fish and caribou. Mother Kuskokwim Tribal Coalition, a group that opposes the mine, lauded today’s news but said that additional protections against the project should be approved.
“Our Yukon-Kuskokwim region’s wetlands are vital to our people’s way of life,” said the group’s executive director, Anaan’arar Sophie Swop. “We are grateful to Secretary Haaland for these protections and hope for further BLM action to include and reign in the dangerous and destructive Donlin Gold project’s 315-mile pipeline. These actions would ensure future generations’ ability to safely live on the land while carrying our customary and traditional knowledge.”
Gov. Dunleavy and Alaska’s congressional delegation have not publicly commented on the news. Under Dunleavy, the state has been quick to challenge federal decisions seen as harmful to the oil, gas and mining industries in court.
Matt Acuña Buxton is a long-time political reporter who has written for the Fairbanks Daily News-Miner and The Midnight Sun political blog. He also authors the daily politics newsletter, The Alaska Memo, and can frequently be found live-tweeting public meetings on Twitter.
