This week, the White House remained silent when asked about increasing U.S. crude oil production levels, even as President Biden continues to push for aggressive green energy policies.
Local crude oil production reached 13.3 million barrels per day in late December, the highest level on record, according to the latest data released by the Energy Information Administration. However, the White House did not respond to multiple inquiries from FOX News Digital and could not discuss the numbers due to climate change concerns.
“From day one, my administration has taken unprecedented climate action,” Biden said in a speech on climate change in November. “We work with everyone, from people to people,” he said. “We focus on all regions of America: cities, suburbs, small towns, rural areas, and tribal nations.”
“We're just getting started, and we're just getting started. And we really are. We're just getting started,” he added. “Taken together, my investment plans for America and their bold climate legislation are the most ambitious in American history.”
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The photo illustration depicts President Biden next to an oil rig. The administration is seeking to limit oil and gas drilling on federal lands. (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images | Sergio Flores/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
Prior to December, the previous oil production level of 13.1 million barrels per day was set in March 2020 during the Trump administration and just before drilling was drastically reduced due to the COVID-19 pandemic. was. The Trump administration promoted various policies to promote fossil fuel development.
But shortly after taking office, Biden took steps to curb oil and gas production on federal lands and issued a moratorium on all new fossil fuel leases, a promise he made as part of his climate-focused campaign platform. It is a measure. But in June 2021, a federal court invalidated the moratorium after the administration was sued by a group of state attorneys general. Permanently abolished in August 2022.
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Following the court ruling, Interior Secretary Deb Haaland announced that the agency would move forward with fossil fuel leasing again. DOI then amended the federal oil and gas lease program in April 2022 and ultimately conducted the administration's first onshore lease sale several months later. Then the agency sued by environmental groups To put sales on hold due to ongoing cases.
But the administration has pushed to cut the oil and gas leasing program, despite the legal requirement to conduct quarterly lease sales. DOI was sued for energy industry association Despite holding a sale in 2022, led by the Western Energy Alliance and the Wyoming Petroleum Association, it did not regularly hold sales in accordance with the Mineral Lease Act.
The Department of the Interior's five-year offshore oil and gas leasing plan projects only three Gulf of Mexico lease sales through 2029, and the sales included in the plan, which the Department of the Interior is required to publish periodically This is the lowest number of cases ever. (Gary Tramontina/Corbis via Getty Images)
Additionally, the administration last month finalized the most restrictive offshore oil drilling program in U.S. history. The final five-year offshore oil and gas leasing program would see the federal government hold only three Gulf of Mexico lease sales by 2029, a sharp departure from plans finalized under both Democratic and Republican administrations. ing.
Biden also signed into law a bill that dedicates billions of dollars to green energy development and announced various goals to replace fossil fuels with alternatives in all sectors as part of efforts to curb global warming.
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“President Biden is working overtime to accelerate the transition to clean energy,” Josh Axelrod, senior advocate for nature programs at the Natural Resources Defense Council, told Fox News Digital. “His administration has sparked a heartland manufacturing renaissance with clean energy at its core, creating jobs, increasing the nation's energy security, and strengthening the domestic supply chains that are the building blocks of our modern economy. ”
“Meanwhile, Big Oil is exploiting the deck stacked in their favor to rack up short-term profits by locking us all into the fuel of the past,” he continued. “That business model has to change. The current administration's focus on clean energy policy can help bend the curve in the right direction. There is clearly a lot of work to do to make that happen. there is.”
Secretary of the Interior Deb Haaland speaks at an event celebrating the designation of Avi Kwa Ame National Monument in Las Vegas on April 14, 2023. (AP Photo/John Locher, File)
He added that the United Nations recently agreed to phase out fossil fuel production over the next few decades, while the United States, Saudi Arabia, China, Russia and 16 other top energy producers have doubled He pointed out that there are plans to mine oil, gas and coal. By 2030, “to the extent that a climate-secure world can tolerate.”
Axelrod called on Big Oil to “recognize that the sun is setting on fossil fuels and find a place in a fossil-free, clean energy future.”
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“Oil drilling is one of the reasons we lose two football fields worth of wild land every minute,” Lisa Frank, executive director of Environment America's Washington Legislative Division, told Fox News Digital. “Various areas of the United States, including the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and the Grand Canyon, are too unique for drilling and mining.”
“Environment America applauds President Biden's actions to protect these unique places for wildlife and for generations to come,” Frank said. “At the same time, we continue to drill more oil on land and in the oceans of the United States. When we drill, we spill oil, so the sooner we can switch to clean renewable energy, the better.”
