In his comments in Hanoi, Biden talked about the importance of wealthier nations supporting less wealthy nations prepare and adapt to climate change.

What Biden has done is to cut the issuance of drilling leases to the minimum required by law, pass the Inflation Reduction Act, enact a regulation to force vehicle electrification, and similarly force fossil fuels out of most power plants.

What Biden has not done: stop issuing drilling permits or impose export restrictions on fossil fuels. The former has some serious limits because of how the courts treat the right to drill as a property right once you hold a drilling lease, and the latter is simply untested.

  • cobra89@beehaw.org
    4·
    10 months ago

    Even by your linked article’s admission, that was kind of inconsequential:

    The 2017 GOP tax bill opened a small part of the pristine wildlife refuge for drilling, a measure championed by Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski, a Republican. But it was never developed or drilled – or came close to doing so. Haaland suspended the leases in June 2021, and some major oil companies, including Chevron, canceled their leases in the area the following year.

    However, the 2017 tax law mandates leasing in ANWR, meaning the Biden administration will have to launch a new leasing process and hold another lease sale by the end of 2024, albeit likely with tighter environmental provisions.

    So the companies had the permits for 4 years and never did anything with them, to the point where Chevron cancelled their own leases. And the leases will be auctioned off again next year.

    Meanwhile the Biden administration is granting applications for permits to drill on public and trial lands at a pace faster than the Trump administration at the same point. From the start of their administrations through March 27, Biden approved 7,118 permits and Trump 7,051, The Washington Post reported.

    About the permit approvals, the Bureau of Land Management has said the bureau has taken a “balanced approach to energy development and management of our nation’s public lands.”

    So yeah, while I think Biden is the most progressive president since FDR, his record on oil drilling isn’t so great.

    Edit: fix the order of some quotes.