The Trump Administration is working to roll back the severe restrictions on oil and gas drilling in Alaska imposed by the Biden administration, Interior Secretary Doug Burgum has said.
The Biden administration suspended in 2021 oil leases in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska, months after former President Joe Biden took over from Trump’s first term in office.
Biden also finalized a strategy to help protect federal lands, which includes restricting access to drilling and mining in a large part of the National Petroleum Reserve in Alaska (NPR-A). In 2024, the rule restricted access to drilling and mining on more than 13 million acres in the NPR-A.
Now the Trump Administration is looking to open up areas for drilling again, to follow up on President Donald Trump’s executive order from Day One to “unleash Alaska’s extraordinary resource potential.”
In March, Interior Secretary Doug Burgum took immediate steps to unleash Alaska’s untapped resources. The Interior said the Bureau of Land Management would pursue steps to expand opportunities for exploration and development in the National Petroleum Reserve in Alaska and the Coastal Plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. The BLM will also work towards partial revocation of public land withdrawals that will help solidify the path forward for the proposed Ambler Road and Alaska LNG pipeline projects, the Interior said in March.
At a meeting with industry executives and elected Alaska officials on Sunday, Secretary Burgum said “We’re unlocking Alaska’s energy, putting American workers first, and empowering our nation with innovation — not regulation.”
“Alaska has an opportunity to allow us to do one of the mandates of the Trump administration, which is to sell energy to our friends and allies, so they don’t have to buy it from our adversaries,” Burgum said, as carried by the Anchorage Daily News.
This week, the top U.S. energy officials will also host an event in Alaska with officials from South Korea, Japan, and Taiwan to tout the $44-billion Alaska LNG project for which the United States is seeking Asian investors.
By Charles Kennedy for Oilprice.com
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