Trump prepares to gut Federal land protections
By
Daniel de Vries
28 April 2017
President Trump issued an executive order Wednesday to review dozens of national monument designations, preparing the way for expanded drilling, mining and other development on large tracts of public land. The order directs the Department of Interior to assess two-dozen sites created since 1996, of more than 100,000 acres each, and potentially many other smaller sites.
Wednesday’s directive is part of a broad effort to dismantle public health and environment-related restrictions on oil and gas producers, mining companies and other resource intensive industry. It adds to a March 28 executive order, which in addition to unraveling Obama’s climate change regulations, orders a far-reaching review of all existing regulations that “burden” energy producers. Trump has also proposed a budget that would effectively paralyze the Federal government’s chief environmental regulator and enforcer, the Environmental Protection Agency.
Through these orders and other antiregulatory initiatives underway by administration officials, Trump has sought in his first hundred days to rally support from a powerful section of the corporate elite, in this instance the energy industry. Removing regulatory impediments and geographical restrictions for drilling could greatly strengthen the profitability of the sector, which rapidly expanded during much of the Obama era. Despite recent cutbacks, production levels today remain well above those just a decade ago, nearly 80 and 50 percent higher than in 2005 for oil and natural gas respectively. However, as energy prices have fallen over the past few years, profits have suffered greatly.
In the text of the executive order and during his remarks Wednesday, Trump singled…