November, 09 2017, 08:45am EDT
Senate Drill Bill Will Destroy The Arctic National Wildlife Refuge
Today, the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee released a bill to drill in the biological heart of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. The committee also scheduled its markup for Wednesday, November 15, 2017 at 9:00 a.m. in Room 366 of the Dirksen Senate Office Building.
Statement by Adam Kolton, Executive Director, Alaska Wilderness League:
WASHINGTON
Today, the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee released a bill to drill in the biological heart of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. The committee also scheduled its markup for Wednesday, November 15, 2017 at 9:00 a.m. in Room 366 of the Dirksen Senate Office Building.
Statement by Adam Kolton, Executive Director, Alaska Wilderness League:
"This bill would giveaway Arctic Refuge oil to China and other countries hungry for exports. It would allow roads, pipelines, gravel mines and well pads to be erected across the entire birthing grounds of the Coastal Plain, where caribou calve and where polar bear mothers den.
Nothing in this bill can magically make these fantastical revenue assumptions materialize .
What this bill would do is turn America's last great wilderness into a lost wilderness. Senator Lisa Murkowski had promised some kind of new and improved directional drilling, but that's just a talking point. What we got was simply misdirection and deception. The fact is that is that the entire 1.5 million acres could be offered up in two massive lease sales. It's deplorable that a backdoor budget maneuver is being used to ram Arctic drilling through without a full, fair and open debate. It's immoral that this bill would risk the subsistence culture of the Gwich'in for a fool's gold of exaggerated money and jobs. An d it's wrong to pretend to offer a tax cut with one hand and rob our children and grandchildren of their rightful heritage with the other."
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