Drill, Baby, Drill: AK Governor Calls on Trump to Roll Back Drilling Restrictions
By Ward ClarkOne of the major issues that got Donald Trump reelected and the GOP a sweep of the Senate was energy policy. People feel the consequences of energy policy every day when they fill up their cars and trucks or pay their home heating and electric bills — it affects everything we do and every economic transaction we engage in.
You can't talk about energy policy in the United States without talking about Alaska. Governor Mike Dunleavy (R) knows this, and he is calling on the incoming Trump administration to roll back the Biden/Harris restrictions on Alaska's oil and gas development.
Alaska Gov. Mike Dunleavy’s wish list for the incoming Trump administration includes oil and gas exploration in the pristine Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and reversing restrictions on logging and road-building in a temperate rainforest that provides habitat for wolves, bears and salmon.
OK, there's just a little bit of typical AP bias in that statement. The proposed drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) takes up only a small portion of the overall area of the Refuge. And yes, the area is "pristine" — pristine coastal tundra, for the most part. The road-building, we should add, will not just benefit the oil companies; projects like the proposed West Susitna Access Road would also open up vast tracts of land for recreational use — I wouldn't mind being able to drive across the Susitna into the lands west of there, although I can see why some of the folks who live in that remote region may prefer to keep things as they are. That's understandable — and those lands are already accessible by boat and air.
Dunleavy has asked President-elect Donald Trump to issue a state-specific executive order that would set in motion “critical agency actions that would restore opportunity to Alaska” in line with Trump’s first administration. Dunleavy and other Republican political leaders in the state have expressed excitement about Trump’s return to the White House and believe he will be more friendly to oil and gas, mineral and other resource development than President Joe Biden.
Granted, it would take some effort for the incoming administration to be less friendly to oil and gas.
Here's the thing about Alaskan energy development.
Plenty of people object to development on environmental grounds — including some Alaskans, even among the Native groups that live in the area where drilling would take place and who, presumably, would benefit from the jobs created. But Alaska is almost inconceivably vast. You can drop Texas, California, and Montana into Alaska and have room left over for a Delaware or two. Alaska, from east to west, stretches as far as the distance between Boston and San Francisco. We have more coastline than the rest of the United States combined. And while Minnesotans brag about their 10,000 lakes, we have over three million lakes. Alaska is big — really big. Plenty of people, especially environmentalists from Outside, have a hard time comprehending how small a percentage of Alaskan land will be involved in these projects.
President-elect Donald Trump also campaigned on America's energy independence. America cannot achieve energy independence without gas and oil. Alaska has a lot of gas and oil. Ergo, a successful energy policy that results in American energy independence requires exploiting Alaska's energy resources. The incoming president should add this to his First 100 Days list. Drill, baby, drill!
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