From The NY Times today. Lisa Friedman reports on this climate/energy news. (Sorry, no link through the paywall.)
A new plan to sell offshore drilling rights will be limited to three spots, all in the Gulf of Mexico.
The Biden administration announced Friday it would lease a handful of spots in the Gulf of Mexico to oil companies for drilling over the next five years, a move that is likely to anger both climate activists and the fossil fuel industry.
The administration said oil and gas companies would be able to drill in just three new areas in the Gulf between 2024 and 2029, the smallest number of lease sales offered since the federal drilling program began decades ago.
Under a new law, the government must offer leases for oil drilling before it can invite developers to build wind farms in federal waters. Producing clean electricity from wind turbines is one of President Biden’s top priorities as he tries to reduce the fossil fuel pollution that is dangerously heating the planet.
emphasis added
The article, (which has a decent headline for once — framing is crucial), quotes reactions from both drilling advocates and clean energy supporters. Before anyone gets upset with Biden for offering any new fossil fuel leases at all, the government can’t offer leases for wind turbine farms offshore without doing so.
Here’s why:
Still, the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 does require oil and gas lease sales as a condition of leasing waters for wind farms. Before it can allow wind farms to be built in federal waters, the government must first offer at least 60 million acres offshore in the previous year for oil and gas leasing. The provision was included in the law by Senator Joe Manchin III of West Virginia, a fossil-fuel-friendly Democrat.
The article puts this key paragraph almost all the way down the page. While the article focuses on all the controversy for Biden on this from both sides, you’d think starting out with the details of why it’s happening this way would deserve to be right up top. It would also be interesting if The NY Times could quote any environmental groups accepting the trade-off as the only way to currently get that clean energy. Still, the initial framing could have been a lot worse.
The real story is that Joe Manchin has forced the U.S. to keep allowing drilling for fossil fuels even as Biden is trying to build out more clean energy. Anyone angry at Biden for this needs to redirect their ire to the real culprit. This was likely one of Manchin’s demands for not blocking the Inflation Reduction Act in the Senate.
As it is, Republicans are planning to challenge in court the 5 year plan this is part of, although it may (hopefully) be an uphill fight for them. Gulf Coast environmentalists are not happy either — but this is the only way those wind farms can get built under the law as it is — and this would never happen under a Republican administration.
While the oil and gas leases may be up for sale, that doesn’t mean they’ll actually be taken up — but it does open up the area for offshore wind development. It’s not a clean win, but it’s still a win.
The long term answer is, as always, more Democrats - better Democrats.