Sen. Lisa Murkowski said Monday that she plans to use every tool available to fight President Obama’s intention to close 12 million acres of Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil and gas development.
“We will not stand it, we will not tolerate it and we will do everything that we can to push back against an administration that has taken a look at Alaska and decided it’s a nice little snow globe out there and we’re going to keep it that way. That’s not what you do to a state,” the Alaska Republican, flanked by Alaska GOP Rep. Don Young and Sen. Dan Sullivan, said at a press conference in the Capitol.
Murkowski is in an advantageous position for carrying out her threats. She is chairwoman of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee and the Interior and Environment Appropriations Subcommittee, both of which oversee the Interior Department.
Murkowski said she would try to limit the administration’s moves through the budget process and legislation. She also said the Obama administration told her its draft five-year offshore drilling plan that runs from 2017 through 2022 will take some Arctic waters off the table for energy production, and that the White House is considering new restrictions on drilling in the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska.
“What it says is their sole priority when it comes to the Arctic is climate. I have said that climate is very important … I think that what we’re seeing coming out now is they’re saying that this is all that matters when it comes to the Arctic. I think they need to talk to the individuals,” Murkowski said.
Alaska relies on oil and gas development to fund about 90 percent of its budget, and Murkowski said the state is facing about a $3.5 billion budget shortfall this year. While there’s currently no drilling in ANWR, Republicans for more than three decades have pressed to permit energy production there and say that drilling can be done safely without harming the area’s wildlife.
“I think the debate has not kept up with the technology,” Sullivan said, touting advances in geologic imaging that can reduce environmental damage by locating deposits buried under ground and boosting drillers’ precision.
Democrats and environmental groups cheered Obama’s plan, though the details are scarce. They said it would protect a delicate ecosystem and wildlife, while keeping oil and gas they said would contribute to greenhouse gas emissions in the ground.
“The Arctic Refuge has been denied the full protection it deserves by oil interests hopeful that they could drill for oil there at some distant day in the future,” said Sen. Ed Markey, D-Mass. “Now that the oil industry and their allies in Congress are advocating for the elimination of the ban on exporting American oil abroad, I see no reason to withhold wilderness protection for the coastal plain of the Arctic Refuge.”
