Interior to open millions of acres in Alaska to drilling and mining

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1. The Interior Department on Thursday announced that it aims to open up millions of acres of near-pristine land in Alaska to oil drilling and allow for a new pipeline to be built across the state.

   Interior Secretary Doug Burgum said the department would allow oil and gas leases on 82 percent of the 23 million-acre National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska, overturning protections that President Joe Biden [finalized last year](https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2024/04/19/drilling-alaska-national-petroleum-reserve/), and will reinstate a program to permit drilling in the 1.56 million-acre Coastal Plain of the [Arctic National Wildlife Refuge](https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/interactive/2024/arctic-national-wildlife-refuge-oil/), the country’s largest preserve of its kind.

   The department also will work to transfer federal land to the state to help construct a pipeline to transport liquefied natural gas for export to Asia and a road that is critical in operating a planned copper and zinc mine in northern Alaska. Nearly a year ago Biden administration officials [blocked](https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2024/04/16/ambler-road-alaska-biden/) the land transfer for [Ambler Road](https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2023/07/19/alaska-ambler-road-critical-minerals-climate/), which was slated to traverse Gates of the Arctic National Park and Preserve, on grounds that it would harm the region’s Indigenous communities and wildlife habitat.

   Read more here: [https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2025/03/20/alaska-drilling-trump-anwr/?utm_campaign=wp_main&utm_medium=social&utm_source=reddit.com](https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2025/03/20/alaska-drilling-trump-anwr/?utm_campaign=wp_main&utm_medium=social&utm_source=reddit.com)

2. This is just sad. Can anywhere just be pristine?

3. By the Russians probably

4. This is devastating for so many reasons.

5. Did anyone ask Alaskans how they feel?

6. I was a NPS helicopter pilot for a couple years and they wouldn’t even let us fly through Gates due to noise concerns more than once a year. Building a road through and mining near the park would be a real tragedy.

7. This is disgusting and very sad. Hopefully solar, wind, and EVs accelerate to the point that the cost isn’t worth it.

8. Do these absolute fuckstains understand their money will not save them from going extinct with the rest of us?

   I fucking hate any and all billionaires. Murdering them should not carry penalty. Amassing that much wealth is immoral.

9. Guess these guys don’t watch Ice Road truckers. They can only haul to these sites in the dead of winter when the ground is solid. And in a lot of cases, when the ice is strong enough to hold the weight of the crossing. With climate change occurring, this is going to get a lot more difficult.

   And you would think in AK that would be a long season, but they rapidly gain sunlight (they have to bounce from basically zero to nearly all day, depending on how far north.)

   Still, horrible news. Just have to hope the oil companies won’t find this financially feasible.

   And shipping to Asia? I thought all this oil and gas was for domestic consumption.

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