In its final days, Biden administration pitches sweeping subsistence protections in National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska

Sean Maguire, Anchorage Daily News on Jan 16, 2025

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ANCHORAGE, Alaska — The Biden administration on Thursday rolled out last-minute plans to add protections for more than 3 million acres of the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska for subsistence resources.

A portion of the areas chosen for additional protections is close to Nuiqsut, an Iñupiaq village in the northeastern area of the reserve, and ConocoPhillips’ massive Willow oil project and Nuna project, which produced first oil last month.

The Interior Department said it was outlining steps to help protect valuable subsistence resources in the region, such as caribou. The department said interim measures would be enacted immediately to help protect those resources.

Interior officials said that valid, existing rights for development would be respected. They said that the new protections would follow federal law that requires the department to administer an oil and gas program in the reserve.

Interior’s announcement comes just four days before President-elect Donald Trump is set to take office. Trump, and his Republican allies in Congress, have said they plan to reverse the Biden administration’s restrictions on resource development.

The Biden administration in April had already announced significant restrictions on development in the NPR-A. The department then said it would solicit comments on whether to expand protections in the reserve through new “special areas.”

Conservation groups applauded those new restrictions. But ConocoPhillips sued the administration in July. The oil giant argued the new regulations would effectively create a wilderness area in a reserve that was originally set aside for oil development.

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