Oil and gas drilling in Alaska just got a whole lot easier, as the Trump administration is rolling back rules imposed under former President Joe Biden that restricted fossil fuel development in the nation’s largest tract of public land.
The Department of the Interior announced Thursday that it is rescinding a rule issued by the Bureau of Land Management in April 2024, which had blocked drilling on 13 million acres of the National Petroleum Reserve in Alaska.
The rule prohibited drilling on nearly half of the NPR-A, with the intention of conserving the environment, land, and habitats of wildlife in the region, such as caribou, migratory birds, and polar bears.
The final rule rescinding the Biden administration’s drilling curbs is set to be published in the Federal Register on Nov. 17.
The NPR-A, a roughly 23-million-acre area in Alaska’s North Slope Borough, was first set aside by President Warren Harding in 1923 as an emergency oil supply for the U.S. Navy. Jurisdiction of the land was ultimately transferred to the Interior Department in the 1970s, opening it up to oil and gas development.
President Donald Trump and his Cabinet have repeatedly blasted the Biden administration’s environmental rules curbing drilling as government overreach. The Trump administration has quickly taken steps to roll back these regulations and other management plans for the area to boost oil and gas development in the state.
“By rescinding the 2024 rule, we are following the direction set by President Trump to unlock Alaska’s energy potential, create jobs for North Slope communities and strengthen American energy security,” Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum said in a statement.
“This action restores common-sense management and ensures responsible development benefits both Alaska and the nation,” Burgum added.
In Thursday’s announcement, the Interior Department said its Bureau of Land Management would manage the NPR-A under new regulations that align with those originally established by the agency in 1977. The agency said rescinding the Biden-era environmental protections would reduce regulatory burdens and help “deliver full economic benefits” to the region.
Late last month, BLM published a call for nominations and comments on what areas in the NPR-A should be made available in an oil and gas lease sale scheduled to take place this coming winter. A lease sale has not been held in the 23-million-acre reserve since 2019.
Under the One Big Beautiful Bill Act passed this summer, BLM is now required to hold no fewer than five lease sales in the NPR-A by 2035. Each sale is required to make at least 4 million acres available, effectively making the entire reserve open for oil and gas exploration and drilling combined.
The Trump administration’s efforts to unleash Alaskan energy have the backing of the Republican-led Congress.
SENATE VOTES TO UNDO BIDEN-ERA PRODUCTON CURBS IN ALASKA’S NATIONAL PETROLEUM RESERVE
Also in October, the Senate voted to walk back environmental protections in the NPR-A put in place under Biden. These protections, included in BLM’s 2022 management plan for the reserve, blocked roughly 11 million acres onshore and offshore from oil and gas leasing.
A similar resolution has been introduced in the House by Rep. Nick Begich (R-AK), though there has been little movement in the lower chamber in part due to the since-ended government shutdown.
