Officials Go North to Alaska to Advance Trump Plan to ‘Unleash’ Its Energy Potential

WASHINGTON — Three of the nation’s top officials overseeing U.S. energy policy traveled to Alaska last week to advance President Trump’s goal of “unleashing” Alaska’s potential in the oil and gas space.

During the trip, Energy Secretary Chris Wright, Interior Secretary Doug Burgum and EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin, met with state, local and tribal leaders as well as energy workers and foreign energy ministers.

While in the state they also participated in a keynote fireside chat at the Alaska Sustainable Energy Conference.

“Alaska has always been a big bold place, a big bold idea, full of big bold people. Unfortunately, the last administration especially and many before them sought to shut down Alaska in the name of climate nonsense,” Wright said upon his return to Washington.

“Those days are over,” he said, adding, “The Trump administration is fully committed to restoring the rights and liberties of Alaskans, because when Alaska is unleashed, the entire country and world benefits.”

To reaffirm that point, the three officials used one of the first stops on their trip, a town hall in Utqiagvik (Barrow), Alaska, to announce the administration’s plans to lift environmental protections on about half of the National Petroleum Reserve on Alaska’s North Slope, reopening the area to possible oil and gas exploration and drilling.

That action is a reversal of a Biden-era policy restricting energy development in the 23 million acre reserve.

On the heels of the announcement, the Department of Interior opened a public comment period on the proposal, with final action slated to occur sometime later this year.

Among those publicly embracing the plan is Sen. Dan Sullivan, R-Alaska, who also appeared at the town hall.

Sullivan called Biden’s effort to restrict development in the National Petroleum Reserve one of the most “egregious” steps the former administration took in order to restrict oil and gas development in the region.

He went on to say that reopening the area to fossil fuel-based energy development is a “huge priority” for the current, Republican-controlled Congress.

Oil and gas multinationals have expressed little interest in drilling within the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, which lies to the east of the Prudhoe Bay oil field, the largest field in North America and the 18th largest field ever discovered worldwide.

They have, however, expressed an interest in drilling within the reserve, which lies directly west of the Prudhoe Bay field.

After the town hall meeting the officials toured Pump Station No. 1 of the trans-Alaska Pipeline System before returning to Anchorage on Tuesday to participate in the energy conference.

The latter event, which ran for about two hours, was largely closed to the press.

As they left attendees noted the official did not remark on the potential construction of a trans-Alaska natural gas pipeline, and officials did not address the Trump administration’s decision to freeze or rescind grants awarded to renewable energy projects in Alaska.

The overriding message of the session was, as Burgum told the crowd, “got to get the federal government out of your way.”

This did not please environmentalists, who planned protests in Anchorage last Monday and Tuesday.

Among them was Grandmothers Growing Goodness, an Inupiat group dedicated to elevating the understanding and protection of the tribe’s culture and people in the face of “rampant oil and gas development and climate change.”

The group’s members contend the roll-back of the Biden-era protections would significantly impact the caribou herd on which they partially rely for subsistence.

They also fear it would have a detrimental impact on other Inupiat activities including hunting, fishing and gathering.

But EPA administrator Lee Zeldin insisted the administration wants to balance protecting the environment with growing the nation’s economy.

“We don’t have to pick one or the other. We choose both,” Zeldin said Sunday. “It is my three favorite words — they were spoken about in different ways over the course of this morning’s roundtable — approved, primacy and durability.”

Burgum agreed.

“When you take a look at the water, the mineral resources, all those things here, this is a huge thing,” Burgum said during the town hall. “The Secretary of Interior should be here all the time, every day, because it’s such a big part of the portfolio.”

All three officials said during their visit that the administration sees Alaska as key to the nation’s ability to produce energy and provide it to international partners.

Among the projects they were most bullish on is Alaska LNG, a long-stymied 800-mile pipeline that would extend from the North Slope south to the Cook Inlet, where the gas would be shipped to U.S. allies in Asia.

In recent weeks Trump has leaned on Japan and South Korea in particular, to pick up some of the $40 billion price tag for the project, rolling the projects into discussions of higher tariffs should the countries fail to reach new trade deals with the U.S.

Despite its astronomical cost, Alaska LNG does have one compelling feature that could finally help the project become a reality – time.

If completed, the project would deliver natural gas from Alaska to Japan in about eight days, compared to the 24 days it currently takes Gulf Coast exports that have to transit the Panama Canal.

“Alaska is ready to lead,” the state’s Republican governor, Mike Dunleavy, said in a post on Facebook.

He went on to say the visit by Wright and the other officials, “reinforced what so many of us already knew: Alaska is key to America’s future.”

“President Trump has always put Alaska first, and his team is following through,” Dunleavy said.