Policy Alert: Development of Alaska

Action: Executive Order “Unleashing Alaska’s Extraordinary Resource Potential” 

What it does: The Order rescinds a large number Biden Administration actions on resource development in Alaska, including relating to oil and gas drilling, especially in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR), restoring policies of the first Trump Administration. It establishes a policy to expedite permitting and leasing for natural resource projects and prioritize liquefied natural gas (LNG), including LNG transportation to other US states and allied nations in the Pacific. 

Key Insights 

• In early 2021, the first Trump Administration held a sale for leasing rights on the coastal plain of ANWR. A state corporation, the Alaska Industrial Development and Export Authority, won the leases, which the Biden Administration cancelled. Those cancellations have now been revoked.  

• A second lease sale, supposed to have been conducted in 2024, will likely now occur. 

• The Order intends to advance development of the Alaska LNG project 800-mile pipeline from the North Slope to its terminal and liquefication facility at Nikiski, southwest of Anchorage. 

• Despite the Order, environmentalists and Native communities are likely to continue or begin lawsuits alleging violations of permitting rules and other arguments (including a possible First Amendment challenge on revocation of a Native sacred site designation in ANWR). 

• The Order advances the process, but litigation will likely continue to delay actual leasing, drilling, and construction of the pipeline. This applies as well to the Willow Project, which the Biden Administration approved, which is also subject to litigation.