President Joe Biden speaks at a reception for brand new Democratic members of Congress within the State Eating Room of the White Home, Sunday, Jan. 5, 2025, in Washington.
Manuel Balce Ceneta/AP
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Manuel Balce Ceneta/AP
WASHINGTON — President Joe Biden is transferring to ban new offshore oil and gasoline drilling in most U.S. coastal waters, a last-minute effort to dam attainable motion by the incoming Trump administration to develop offshore drilling.
Biden, whose time period expires in two weeks, mentioned he’s utilizing authority beneath the federal Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act to guard offshore areas alongside the East and West coasts, the jap Gulf of Mexico and parts of Alaska’s Northern Bering Sea from future oil and pure gasoline leasing.
“My choice displays what coastal communities, companies and beachgoers have recognized for a very long time: that drilling off these coasts might trigger irreversible harm to locations we maintain pricey and is pointless to fulfill our nation’s vitality wants,” Biden mentioned in a press release.
“Because the local weather disaster continues to threaten communities throughout the nation and we’re transitioning to a clear vitality financial system, now’s the time to guard these coasts for our kids and grandchildren,” he mentioned.
Biden’s orders wouldn’t have an effect on massive swaths of the Gulf of Mexico, the place most U.S. offshore drilling happens, however it might shield coastlines alongside California, Florida and different states from future drilling.
Biden’s actions, which shield greater than 625 million acres of federal waters, might be tough for President-elect Donald Trump to unwind, since they’d doubtless require an act of Congress to repeal. Trump himself has a sophisticated historical past on offshore drilling. He signed a memorandum in 2020 directing the Inside secretary to ban drilling within the waters off each Florida coasts, and off the coasts of Georgia and South Carolina till 2032.
The motion got here after Trump initially moved to vastly develop offshore drilling, earlier than retreating amid widespread opposition in Florida and different coastal states.
Trump has vowed to ascertain what he calls American “vitality dominance” world wide as he seeks to spice up U.S. oil and gasoline drilling and transfer away from Biden’s give attention to local weather change.
Environmental advocates hailed Biden’s motion, saying new oil and gasoline drilling have to be sharply curtailed to scale back greenhouse gasoline emissions that contribute to world warming. 2024 was the hottest in recorded historical past.
“That is an epic ocean victory!” mentioned Joseph Gordon, marketing campaign director for the environmental group Oceana.
Gordon thanked Biden “for listening to the voices from coastal communities” that oppose drilling and “contributing to the bipartisan custom of defending our coasts.”
Biden’s actions construct on the legacy of Democratic and Republican presidents to guard coastal water from offshore drilling, Gordon mentioned, including that U.S. coastlines are house to tens of tens of millions of People and help billions of {dollars} of financial exercise that depend upon a clear setting, considerable wildlife and thriving fisheries.
In balancing a number of makes use of of America’s oceans, Biden mentioned it was clear that the areas he’s withdrawing from fossil gasoline use present “comparatively minimal potential” that doesn’t justify attainable environmental, public well being and financial dangers that may come from new leasing and drilling.
A spokeswoman for Trump mocked Biden, saying, “Joe Biden clearly desires excessive gasoline costs to be his legacy.”
The spokeswoman, Karoline Leavitt, referred to as Biden’s motion “a disgraceful choice designed to actual political revenge on the American individuals who gave President Trump a mandate to extend drilling and decrease gasoline costs. Relaxation assured, Joe Biden will fail, and we’ll drill, child, drill.”
Biden has proposed as much as three oil and gasoline lease gross sales within the Gulf of Mexico, however none in Alaska, as he tries to navigate between vitality corporations in search of better oil and gasoline manufacturing and environmental activists who need him to close down new offshore drilling within the struggle in opposition to local weather change.
A five-year drilling plan accepted in 2023 consists of proposed offshore gross sales in 2025, 2027 and 2029. The three lease gross sales are the minimal quantity the Democratic administration might legally provide if it desires to proceed increasing offshore wind growth.
Beneath the phrases of a 2022 local weather legislation, the federal government should provide not less than 60 million acres (24.2 million hectares) of offshore oil and gasoline leases in any one-year interval earlier than it will probably provide offshore wind leases.
Biden, whose choice to approve the large Willow oil venture in Alaska drew robust condemnation from environmental teams, has beforehand restricted offshore drilling in different areas of Alaska and the Arctic Ocean.