A draft supplemental Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) was released last Friday night by the Bureau of Land Management for the proposed ConocoPhillips oil-drilling project known as Willow. The report addresses key concerns put forth about the project’s impact on wildlife and habitat, as well as climate change. Those risks were first identified by tribes, environmental groups, and climate activists and later supported by U.S. District Judge Sharon Gleason, who ruled in 2021 that the Trump administration’s 2020 approval of the project neglected these key elements. Now that the draft EIS shows the considerable harm this project will cause, what more is there to do but publicly comment against it?
Organizations like the Sierra Club and EarthJustice have long been critical of the Biden administration even entertaining what could become the largest proposed oil extraction project in the country. Most recently, EarthJustice attorney Jeremy Lieb slammed the project he’s been litigating against and signaled his disappointment in the Bureau of Land Management itself. “ConocoPhillips is one of the major oil companies to experience windfall profits this year thanks to skyrocketing gas prices,” Lieb said in a statement. “Yet approving its oil-drilling plan would do nothing to bring down consumer prices at the pump, since production wouldn’t start for nearly a decade. We think a thorough assessment of the project’s impacts will demonstrate that Interior should not approve it.”
The Sierra Club reiterated those concerns and once again pointed to a joint letter sent by the group and others to Interior Department Secretary Deb Haaland, imploring her to consider her legacy and slow down on what feels like a fast-tracked process to more pollution. The letter cited ConocoPhillips’ atrocious safety record, which has led to the displacement of families who rightfully don’t trust the company. “ApprovingConocoPhillips’ Willow Project will define your legacy,” the letter noted. “As Secretary of the Interior and a strong advocate for climate reform and the protection of our nation’s treasured public lands, we hope that you will ensure that the public process and permitting decision are consistent with this administration’s commitments and objectives.”
There is absolutely no good reason for the Biden administration to undermine its climate goals and lock in a dangerous project for at least three more decades, sending up to 260 million metric tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere from Willow alone, per a Center for American Progress report. The draft supplemental EIS itself is similarly damning: Allowing the project to go through in any iteration puts everything from wetlands to caribou to subsistence hunters at risk. And for what—the profit of a company named the leakiest gas company by Scientific America in 2015? And it’s not as if they’ve made any substantial improvements since then.
The White House has been explicit in its net-zero goals, yet Willow would eliminate any emissions reduction goals the country has actually reached and set up the U.S.—and the entire planet—for failure. The public comment period for the draft supplemental EIS ends on Aug. 29 at midnight Alaska time. The Bureau of Land Management will also soon announce “public meetings, subsistence-related hearings, and any other public participation activities” related to this project. There is more than enough time to continue putting on the pressure and—hopefully—compelling the administration to do the right thing.
