Why both climate activists and the oil industry are unhappy with Biden’s new drilling leases

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• Judy Woodruff:

  The Biden administration is forging ahead with its plan to sell new leases for oil and gas drilling on federal land. The move comes as President Biden seeks new ways to lower gas prices.

  But some environmental groups say he is breaking his campaign promise to end the nation's dependence on fossil fuels.

  Stephanie Sy has our report.

• Stephanie Sy:

  Judy, these are the first fossil fuel leases to be offered on public land since Biden took office. They cover 145,000 acres of government land across nine states. And the Interior Department will raise the royalty rate oil and gas companies pay the federal government from 12.5 percent to 18.75 percent.

  Joining us to discuss the implications, Coral Davenport. She covers energy and environmental policy for The New York Times.

  Coral, thank you so much for joining the "NewsHour."

  In the grand scheme of nationwide oil and gas extraction, how much is 145,000 acres? Could it substantially increase oil and gas production? And could it substantially shift the U.S. away from its goals to lower carbon emissions?

• Coral Davenport, The New York Times:

  In the grand scheme of things, 144,000 acres is a small portion of the many hundreds and hundreds of thousands of acres that the U.S. already has open for drilling on public lands.

  It's a very small portion. And it's not expected to make a difference in overall U.S. gasoline production or the price of gasoline. That said, one thing that scientists are telling us right now about carbon emissions is that, with the amount of carbon emissions now in the atmosphere, and the rate of global warming that we're experiencing globally, global economies really do need to put the brakes right now on any new oil, gas and coal production if we want to avoid the most severe impacts of climate catastrophe.

• Stephanie Sy:

  And we know that Joe Biden promised not to lease federal land out for oil and gas drilling when he was on the campaign trail in 2020.

  How is his administration justifying what appears to be a policy reversal, especially for those who voted for him based on his climate change promises?

• Coral Davenport:

  Yes, that was one of President Biden's — candidate Biden signature promises on the campaign trail. He said very explicitly, if I'm elected, there will be no new drilling, no new publicly leasing — drilling or leasing on public lands. He said that very clearly in public forums.

  And so, soon after Biden came into office, he announced publicly that there would be a pause on all new oil and gas leasing on public lands. Soon after that, a federal judge essentially put a halt to that, called an injunction and said that that pause was not legal.

  And so, essentially, that put the ball back in the administration's court. What the administration is saying is, look, we are compelled to comply with this federal injunction. This is not in keeping what we want — with what we want to do. But we have to go ahead and hold these leases because we have been told to do so by this federal court.

  On the other hand, climate activists are saying, look, there are plenty of ways that the administration could make a case, could use the environmental impacts of this leasing to go to court and say, no, this really isn't in keeping with what we need to do. Climate activists are furious. They're saying this is an absolute violation of that promise and they're — and the administration really doesn't need to go ahead with these leases, despite that legal injunction.

• Stephanie Sy:

  And you said that this is not likely to have any impact on people, especially working-class people and people with lower incomes that are facing extremely high gas prices right now.

  As gas prices spiked following Russia's invasion of Ukraine, Coral, you know that Biden pointed the finger at the industry for sitting on thousands of already approved drilling leases. So now he's opening up more leases, but expecting the industry to pay more to the federal government to do that. I wonder, how is the industry responding?

• Coral Davenport:

  The industry is unhappy with this.

  The increase in rates that the industry would have to pay, in keeping with this decision that went on Friday, is huge. Right now, industry pays 12.5 percent on their revenues for drilling on public lands. In opening up these leases, the administration is raising that 50 percent to 18.75 percent in total. That's a huge increase. That could easily amount to tens of billions more dollars in revenue.

  The industry is furious about it. But, actually, that's the first increase in those royalty rates that the oil industry has had to face in over a century. So they're very unhappy about it, but a lot of taxpayer advocacy groups say, look, the oil industry has really been getting a really easy ride.

  They have been paying these royalty rates that were set in place over 100 years ago. They haven't had an increase in what they have had to pay since the 1920s. So this increase in what they have to pay is really overdue. Again, naturally, the companies are quite unhappy about it.

• Stephanie Sy:

  So many players in this policy change.

  Coral Davenport covers energy and environmental policy for The New York Times.

  Thank you so much for joining the "NewsHour."

• Coral Davenport:

  Great to be with you.