On January 8, 2024, the U.S. Department of the Interior announced that the second congressionally mandated oil and gas lease sale on the Coastal Plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge received zero bids. The first lease sale (held under President Trump in 2021) failed to generate even 1% of the approximately $2 billion in revenue promised to taxpayers.
In the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, President Trump and Congressional Republicans required two lease sales in the Arctic Refuge be held by 2024 to help pay for tax cuts. Of the nine leases sold in 2021, the only two held by oil companies were cancelled and refunded at the companies’ request and the remaining seven were held by a State of Alaska-owned corporation. Those seven leases were ultimately cancelled by the Biden administration due to the multiple legal deficiencies in the previous administration’s analysis. There are currently no existing leases that remain in the Arctic Refuge.
These two failed lease sales show that Big Oil knows that drilling in the Arctic Refuge is bad for business. While we must continue our fight to defend America’s Arctic, this is a victory for our climate and the people and wildlife that depend on this irreplaceable landscape!
Learn more: https://www.nytimes.com/2025/01/08/climate/arctic-wildlife-refuge-drilling-leases.html