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Biden approves an end-game carbon bomb. [1]

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Date: 2023-03-13

A young Indian man dangles from a power line after the Ganges River broke its banks near Allahabad in August 2013

What happens in the Arctic does not stay in the Arctic. What happens in the Amazon does not stay in Brazil.

And so it goes. President Biden approved a scaled-back version of the seven billion dollar Conoco-Phillips drilling oil and gas in Alaska's north slope today. GOP circles in Alaska as well as Democratic Rep Mary Peltola and the fossil fuel industry, cheered the decision to approve a project where energy will be needed to stabilize infrastructure by freezing the thawing permafrost in "the largest unspoiled natural area" in the United States. The United Nations slammed the decision stating the world needed to transition away from fossil fuels, not burn more.

The Interior Department project approved the Conoco Phillips Willow plan with a scaled-back project of three drilling pads rather than five. The agency argued the reduction would help protect some Arctic wildlife, such as Polar bears and waterfowl.

From The Guardian:

It will produce an estimated 576m barrels of oil over 30 years, with a peak of 180,000 barrels of crude a day. This extraction, which ConocoPhillips has said may, ironically, involve refreezing the rapidly thawing Arctic permafrost to stabilize drilling equipment, would create one of the largest “carbon bombs” on US soil, potentially producing more than twice as many emissions than all renewable energy projects on public lands by 2030 would cut combined. In its decision, the Department of the Interior’s Bureau of Land Management said that the approval “strikes a balance” by allowing ConocoPhillips to use its longstanding leases in the Arctic while also limiting drilling to three sites rather than five, which the company wanted. But the approval has been met with outrage among environmental campaigners and Native representatives who say it fatally undermines Joe Biden’s climate agenda. In all, the project is expected to create about 260m tons of greenhouse gases over its lifespan, the equivalent of creating about 70 new coal-fired power plants. “Approving the Willow Project is an unacceptable departure from President Biden’s promises to the American people on climate and environmental justice,” said Lena Moffitt, executive director of Evergreen Action, a climate group. “After all that this administration has done to advance climate action and environmental justice, it is heartbreaking to see a decision that we know will poison Arctic communities and lock in decades of climate pollution we simply cannot afford.”

Many in the Democratic base are disappointed and feel betrayed. Generation Z was particularly upset as they mounted a fierce effort to convince the President not to approve a project which negates the climate programs in the Build Back Better Act.

x My message to Biden on him approving the Willow Project: pic.twitter.com/Rx0Uvj6WA2 — Luke Mullen (@thelukemullen) March 13, 2023

Is the decision the last nail in the biospheres coffin? It is one of the previous few, but to approve this project at the tipping point is insanity.

In my estimation, this decision will have severe consequences for us in 2024. Green voters are livid, and young voters are betrayed. We will not convince them to forgive and forget. The rage is all over Twitter and other social media.

x .@POTUS on Feb. 9, 2020: “I’m completely, totally opposed to [drilling in the Arctic] … By the way, no more drilling on federal lands. Period, period, period, period. In the Arctic Circle it’s a disaster to do that.”



As of tonight, Biden plans to approve drilling in the Arctic. pic.twitter.com/hjW3tlq9ef — Path to Progress (@PathToProg) March 11, 2023

Legal challenges are likely. The US is no longer a climate leader. Instead, other nations will laugh in our faces when we pretend otherwise. They will point to the Alaska crisis like we have been doing to Brazil with the Amazon of our insincerity.

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[1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/3/13/2157896/-Biden-approves-an-end-game-carbon-bomb

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