Drilling plan may restrict sensitive Arctic Ocean areas (AP) The federal Department of the Interior will make additional areas of Arctic Ocean waters off-limits to drilling when it announces a new five-year offshore drilling plan, a member of the Alaska congressional delegation said Monday. U.S. Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, said she was briefed last week by federal officials who told her the Obama administration will permanently remove from consideration some areas that had previously been deferred from the federal leasing program. Alaska’s all-Republican congressional delegation has been harshly critical of the administration’s policies to limit development of oil-rich land in the state. News of the off-shore drilling policy comes a day after President Barack Obama’s recommendation to declare the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge a wilderness. Murkowski said the administration also intends to put conditions on development in the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska that could make drilling uneconomical. Sen. Lisa Murkowski said the decision on off-shore drilling is part of frontal assault on Alaska by the federal government. “It is a one-two-three kick to the gut of Alaska’s economy,” Murkowski said. Murkowski said she was briefed on the off-shore drilling policy last week by Tommy Beaudreau, Interior Secretary Sally Jewell’s chief of staff, and she was told the administration will [...] newsinfl/drilling-plan-may-restrict-sensitive-arctic-ocean-areas/
Posted on: Tue, 27 Jan 2015 04:15:19 +0000
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