ALBUQUERQUE — The New Mexico Wildlife Federation strongly supports President Joe Biden’s executive order placing a 60-day moratorium on new oil and gas leasing and drilling permits on federal lands pending a comprehensive review.
Jesse Deubel, NMWF executive director, said Friday the federation is aware of the importance of the oil and gas industry to New Mexico’s economy and appreciates the undeniable contributions that oil and gas has made to the state’s quality of life.
However, Deubel said NMWF agrees with President Biden that it’s time for the nation to pause and assess its current and future energy posture.
“The United States has seen unbridled energy leasing and permitting over the past four years,” Deubel said. “Even areas that clearly should have been placed off-limits due to unique natural or cultural values have faced the threat of development — including the Chaco Canyon region and the National Arctic Wildlife Refuge.”
Deubel said the federation looks forward to a science-based approach under President Biden that considers not only the nation’s energy needs, but the consequences of continuing on its present course. “This issue goes beyond politics,” he said. “The question comes down to what kind of world we’re leaving for our children and our wildlife.”
Deubel noted that the energy industry has gotten far ahead of itself in nominating federal lands for the energy-leasing program. “Leases have been so easy to obtain that it’s been common practice for companies to bid on them merely to tie them up so competitors can’t have them,” he said.
The oil and gas industry in New Mexico has shut in thousands of oil and gas wells voluntarily over the last year as a result of overproduction and global market conditions. Thousands more federal oil and gas well permits have been approved but remain unused. The moratorium won’t prevent industry from renewing production from existing wells or using existing permits to drill new wells.
The current practice of allowing the oil and gas industry to tie up federal lands with unused permits has an effect on wildlife and environmental protections in general, Deubel said. “While federal lands are under permit, even if no wells are ever drilled, the land can’t be considered for other purposes such as wilderness protections,” he said. “This is public land that belongs to all of us. It’s not right to allow the energy industry to tie it up indefinitely.”