Joe Biden announced a ban on new “offshore” drilling over a huge expanse of sea. A way of getting in the way of a major campaign promise from Donald Trump: boosting gas and oil production. The Democratic president had barely tabled the text when the one who would succeed him on January 20 reacted by announcing his intention to cancel it “immediately”.
The ban covers more than 2.5 million square kilometers. Without a deadline, it will apply along the Atlantic coast of the United States as well as the Pacific coast, in the eastern Gulf of Mexico and off the coast of Alaska, in the Bering Strait. “The time has come to protect these coasts for our children and grandchildren,” justified the Democratic president who will hand over on January 20. “The relatively minor fossil fuel potential of protected areas does not justify the risks to the environment, public health and the economy that new concessions and drilling would pose.”
Difficult turnaround for Donald Trump
“We do not have to choose between protecting the environment and growing our economy; or between preserving our oceans, our coasts and the food they produce, and keeping energy prices low. These are false alternatives,” he denounced. The message is clearly aimed at the Republican president-elect, who during the campaign promised to drill with all his might to lower the cost of gasoline, while the production of hydrocarbons in the United States is already at record levels.
Joe Biden is relying on a 1953 law giving authority to the federal government over the exploitation of seabed resources off the coast, the “Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act”. This text does not expressly provide for the right for the president to reverse, without going through Congress, a decision to ban new drilling.
Our file on natural resources
Environmental NGOs welcome this decision. On the other hand, the future spokesperson for the Trump administration, Karoline Leavitt, speaks of a “scandalous decision” and “political revenge”. Interviewed by radio host Hugh Hewitt, Donald Trump explained that he “will reverse the ban immediately.” […] What is he doing? Why is he doing this? », he asks.
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