Over the past few years, we’ve seen a definite increase in the attention paid to the environment, thanks in large part to Democratic politicians who are constantly going on and on about climate change and the like. And to some degree, that’s a good thing. After all, we only have one planet, and we’ll need to take care of her if we plan on our future generations being able to live full and capable lives here.
However, while making environmentally friendly choices can most definitely be a benefit, it does us no good if it sends us down a path of self-destruction.
Such is the case when discussing a recent ruling by an Obama-appointed federal judge in Alaska.
As you well know, Alaska has been blessed to hold some of our nation’s largest and most productive fossil fuel reserves. This includes the National Petroleum Reserve in Alaska or NPR-A, which is home to 23 million of the Bureau of Land Management’s 25 million acres of federal mineral land. To say the land is pivotal in America’s energy sources and needs is a massive understatement.
And yet, according to US District Court Judge Sharon Gleason, who works out of Anchorage, no one should be allowed to access the fuel hidden underground there.
According to The Associated Press, ConocoPhillips’ Willow Project was to begin this year, approved under former President Donald Trump’s administration in late 2020. But, as usual, climate change environmentalists and the like have tried to fight the project off, bringing the matter to court. In defense of the project stood none other than the Biden administration, if you can believe it.
In large part, this is because the project, if allowed to be seen through, would have provided more than 160,000 barrels of crude oil to the US a day – some 560 million barrels over the course of 30 years and thousands of energy industry jobs. And all in a place isolated from dense human or wildlife populations.
But apparently, Judge Gleason doesn’t care about the benefits it may bring to the American people or her home state of Alaska.
Instead, she only cares about the polar bears the project might endanger – with the keyword being ‘might.’
That’s right. While the land is home to the nation’s largest oil reserves by far and at a time when fossil fuel shortages are causing skyrocketing gas prices and inflation, the likes of which haven’t been seen in decades, this land isn’t to be touched. All in the name of supposedly saving a few polar bears.
According to Gleason, the Bureau of Land Management’s decision to exclude foreign greenhouse gas emissions from their environmental review of the project was “arbitrary and capricious.” Furthermore, she said that the bureau broke the law by an “alternatives analysis based on the view that ConocoPhillips has the right to extract all possible oil and gas on its leases.”
Now, to be clear, should the project be in direct violation of environmental laws or be actually placing polar bears or other wildlife at risk, it may indeed be a problem.
However, as a report from the Fish and Wildlife Service noted, the project “was not likely to jeopardize the continued existence of polar bears and not likely to result in the adverse modification of polar bear critical habitat.
Of course, Gleason found the report rather problematic, calling it vague and not having enough specifics. And so she had it thrown out.
This coming from a woman who couldn’t offer any real proof that the project indeed would harm polar bear existence. Talk about using your position of power for your own goals…
But I digress.
Naturally, environmentalists like Defenders of the Wildlife Alaska program and its director Nicole Whittington-Evans call the recent ruling “a win for our climate, for imperiled species like polar bears, and for the local residents whose concerns have been ignored.”
However, the governor of Alaska, Republican Mike Dunleavy, has other ideas. According to Dunleavy, the decision is “horrible,” allowing our nation to be sold off to “our enemies piece by piece.”
With the cancelation of yet another major oil and gas project, and one that could significantly benefit the American people, we are being forced to rely on outside and international sources, including those now controlled by “dictatorships & terrorist organizations,” as Dunleavy says.
And yet, those on the political left still fail to understand why our economy is being drained and why the American people are no longer confident in our leaders…