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Biden’s Offshore Drilling “Ban” Won’t Protect Gulf of Mexico From Oil Spills

4 0
07.01.2025

Democrats in Congress cheered as President Joe Biden moved on January 6 to withdraw 625 million acres federal ocean waters off United States coastlines from consideration for future offshore oil and gas drilling. Democratic lawmakers say the waters are “permanently” protected, although Republicans could use their majority in Congress to force the government to lease underwater drilling rights to the industry.

However, Biden’s last-minute effort to secure his climate legacy before Donald Trump takes office does nothing to prevent offshore drilling in the central and western Gulf of Mexico, where intense fossil fuel exploitation already causes pollution and oil spills as climate change brings intensifying floods and storms to coastal communities.

In a statement, Biden called the massive BP oil spill that devastated the Gulf of Mexico in 2010 a “solemn reminder” of the risks offshore drilling poses to fisheries and coastal communities — but the area of the Gulf where the spill occurred is not protected under Biden’s executive action.

According to a White House fact sheet, Biden is using his authority under federal law to withdraw from future oil and gas lease sales all federal ocean waters off the East and West coasts, the eastern Gulf of Mexico, and additional portions of the Northern Bering Sea in Alaska. The Interior Department regularly leases vast swaths of public lands and waters to private companies for oil and gas production, including in the Gulf of Mexico, where the industry has left hundreds of out-of-use wells and drilling platforms to rust in the open sea.

Under Biden’s current executive action,........

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