Trump-era oil and gas leases in Montana and the Dakotas could be invalidated, thanks to settlement

[cbabe]

https://m.dailykos.com/stories/2022/9/7/2121312/-Trump-era-oil-and-gas-leases-in-Montana-and-the-Dakotas-could-be-invalidated-thanks-to-settlement?detail=emaildkre&pm_source=DKRE&pm_medium=email

Trump-era oil and gas leases in Montana and the Dakotas could be invalidated, thanks to settlement

Every single time the American Petroleum Institute (API) is mad about something, it’s a great thing for anyone standing up to the oil and gas companies it represents. The latest victory against the API is a settlement that was reached on Tuesday between the Bureau of Land Management and environmental groups like the Center for Biological Diversity, WildEarth Guardians, and the Sierra Club. The settlement concerns Trump-era leasing decisions pertaining to 113 oil and gas leases in Montana, North Dakota, and South Dakota.

Under the settlement, those sales, which make up 58,617 acres of public land, will undergo additional National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) review to consider all the environmental concerns the Trump administration missed in issuing those leases. The API and the state of Wyoming, where the decision was reached, stand firmly against the move, and both argue that it could financially harm the companies doing business on those public lands, according to the Associated Press. That concern is comical considering all the harm the many companies behind API cause to the planet.

The Bureau of Land Management’s willingness to block drilling as it reassesses those leases is a welcomed sign to the environmental groups fighting this battle. For Taylor McKinnon with the Center for Biological Diversity, it shows “that the Biden administration has wide latitude to rein in federal fossil fuels” and that the administration could very well invalidate the sales themselves.

“Allowing any new fossil fuel projects, including oil and gas leasing, is incompatible with avoiding catastrophic climate change,” McKinnon said in a press release. “The administration still has much work to do to bring federal fossil fuel production to a swift and orderly end.”

The work isn’t done, as WildEarth Guardians, notes: groups will continue to hold the Bureau of Land Management accountable using mechanisms like lawsuits to ensure that the agency takes climate concerns seriously instead of rolling over and letting fossil fuel companies do as they please.

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In their own backyard:

https://flatheadbeacon.com › 2022 › 09 › 07 › extremely-critical-fire-risk-in-montana-as-heat-sears-west

'Extremely Critical' Fire Risk in Montana as Heat Sears West

1 day agoThe National Weather Service warned of "extremely critical" fire conditions across 22,600-square-miles (59,000 square kilometers) in northern Montana including the cities of Great Falls and Havre....

[2naSalit]

1. I suspect that they will be invalidated.

I can tell you that, though I am quite a distance from any active fires at the moment, I awoke at 2am with the cat alerting me to the plume of smoke that had arrived and was filling my house with stale campfire stench. It looked outside, we have no light pollution here, and I could not see the stars. The moon has been orange all night since last week and haze during the day with nearby mountains becoming silhouettes of themselves.

Today, it has cooled considerably and is supposed to be only 60s - 80s for daytime highs for a while, sigh. It has been well into the 90s and 100s since the June flood. And it even rained some since last evening but the wind shift has brought smoke from a hundred fires to my world and the sunshine is orange. We have clouds passing through, can hardly see them, you can tell they are there because they make a darker area in the sky. It's eerie and stinky.

Ugh. At least it isn't going to be hot, if I have to keep the windows closed I might not have to run the AC the whole time and trash the filters.

The fires are inevitable every year, we were lucky they didn't start early this season.

So the more that can be done to get rid of the development of the natural lands the better.