Alaska industrial authority sues Interior over ANWR lease cancellation
A public corporation in Alaska followed through this week on its promise to sue the Interior Department over the agency’s decision early last month to ax oil and gas leases in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
The Alaska Industrial Development and Export Authority alleged Interior’s cancellation of the corporation’s seven leases violated a congressional mandate to develop fossil fuel resources within the refuge’s coastal plain.
Related Knowledge Center: Arctic energy development
The Arctic region of the United States has been both an important source of crude oil and the subject of unending political debate because of that oil.
The Prudhoe Bay oil field, along Alaska’s northern coast, for years accounted for about 20 percent of the nation’s oil production. Because of that production, the industry and its allies long have advocated exploration in the coastal plain of Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, about 65 miles east of Prudhoe.