As if tribes, Earth Defenders, and Climate Activists weren’t already working around the clock to save the planet, the Biden Administration announced Monday the approval of the Willow Project, a massive eight billion dollar oil drilling project of ConocoPhillips on the country’s largest expanse of pristine and untouched land. If the project goes through, the site would produce 600 million barrels of crude oil over 30 years, 280 million metric tons of carbon emissions, and in an era when the federal government promised to divest in fossil fuels, the operation of the oil drilling site would be the equivalent of adding 2 million vehicles to the roads each year. In a pledge to Climate Justice advocates and communities during his candidacy for president, Biden promised “no more subsidies for the fossil fuel industry, no more drilling on federal lands, no more drilling, including offshore, no ability for the oil industry to continue to drill, period,” but Sleepy Joe is backing out on that promise. And while he sleeps, tribes and Indigenous communities anticipate the inevitable oil pipelines that will carry that oil through Indigenous lands, the destruction of ecosystems and habitats, and the ripple effect this will have on marginalized populations the world over.

In a September 22nd, 2022 seven page statement by former mayor, Nuiqsut, Alaska council member, and Arctic Indigenous Scholar, Dr. Rosemary Ahtuangaruak discusses the profound impact the Willow Project would have on tribal communities in Nuiqsut, and the loss of traditional life ways as a result of hundreds of existing oil wells in and around her homelands. In it she states that, “The Willow project would expand the existing development around our community by an additional 250 oil wells, 37 miles of gravel roads, 386 miles of pipelines, multiple airstrips, a massive processing facility, and a roughly 120-acre gravel mine.” After decades of work, where Dr. Rosemary Ahtuangaruak and other climate activists have pushed for legislation to address the longterm effects of climate change, the approval of the Willow Project comes as a major betrayal to her community and to populations across the globe. We know that stopping fossil fuel drilling now is crucial to ensuring a habitable planet for future generations, and that any additional oil drilling sites are not in alignment with international efforts to avoid the most catastrophic climate harm.

At the Glasgow Climate Summit in late 2021, President Biden declared, “We can keep the goal of limiting global warming to just 1.5 degrees Celsius within our reach if we come together, if we commit to doing our part of each of our nations with determination and with ambition,” and proponents of his earlier commitment to the climate crisis are in shock with his approval of the Willow Project. In the coming months, as activists and organizers come together to stop the project, we want to remind you that there is no ownership of Indigenous lands, and that we have more right to protect it than ConocoPhillips has to destroy it. As the fossil fuel industry and Alaskan lawmakers urged the president to approve the project for it’s energy production potential and its ability to create jobs, the cost on the environment and on those in vulnerable places around the world is far too great to bear. If you’re not ready to pay the price for the mistakes of the fossil fuel industry and our government, we encourage you to prepare for the fight ahead. Our planet cannot afford more pipelines or another oil drilling operation. NOT. ONE. MORE…

Nic Sanford Belgard

Indigenous Peoples Power Project

Read Dr. Rosemary Ahtuangaruak’s statement here: https://democrats-naturalresources.house.gov/imo/media/doc/2022%2009%2019%20R%20Ahtuangaruak%20Testimony%20FINAL%20w%20Maps.pdf