Trump administration to open 13 million Alaska acres to mining, drilling

Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum declares ‘American energy independence has never been more critical’

Greg Norman / FOXBusiness

 

The Trump administration is planning to open millions of acres in Alaska for new oil and gas development by rolling back a Biden-era rule that Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum says prioritized "obstruction over production." 

The announcement comes after the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) in 2024 "significantly expanded procedural requirements and created a presumption against oil and gas activity in approximately 13 million acres" of the National Petroleum Reserve in Alaska that were "designated as ‘Special Areas,’ unless operators could prove minimal or no adverse effects on surface resources," according to the Department of the Interior. 

The BLM has described the reserve as a "vast, approximately 23-million-acre area on Alaska's North Slope" that was set aside by President Harding in 1923 as an "emergency oil supply for the U.S. Navy" before its administration...Read more and see video here.