Posted on 11/01/2013 9:13:22 AM PDT by jazusamo
(CNSNews.com) – Interior Secretary Sally Jewell on Thursday announced a “mitigation strategy” for development projects, including natural gas and oil production, on public lands.
It was her first formal “secretarial order” since taking the job.
“Today we have an unprecedented opportunity – using science and technology to create a better understanding of landscapes than ever before – to advance important conservation goals and achieve our development objectives together,” Jewell said in a speech at the National Press Club.
She said it’s a question of striking the “right balance” between development and conservation and helping businesses to be “good partners and good stewards” of public lands.
The five-page document, posted on the DOI website, creates a task force that will issue new rules and protocols for developing infrastructure and energy resources on public lands.
Among other things, the order talks about "landscape-level planning," which identifies areas suitable for development because of "low natural and cultural resource conflicts."
“So part of this is encouraging development in the right ways and in the right places,” Jewell said, pointing to the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge as one of the places that is “too special to develop.” As an example of a “smart, balanced approach to development,”
Jewell pointed to the National Petroleum Reserve, which is more than 22 million acres on Alaska’s North Slope that was set aside by President Warren Harding as a protected source of oil for the nation.
She said the government has decided to “protect more than 13 million acres” of the National Petroleum Reserve, including a key caribou habitat – “while making available for development more than 72 percent of the estimated economically recoverable oil.”
Jewell said that’s the approach that will be used “as we explore new frontiers in the Arctic, as we implement onshore leasing reforms, or as we experience an energy boom in the Bakken Region in North Dakota.”
The secretarial order also mentions the "dramatic effects" of climate change and calls for the development of "landscape-level strategies for understanding and responding to climate change impacts."
Jewell also laid out a plan to “engage” young people in conservation by developing outdoor recreation areas in 55 U.S. cities and creating “classrooms without walls” on public lands for education programs. And she said DOI will ramp up efforts to recruit volunteers to work on public lands.
It’s all about ‘the right balance’. Insane or not.
Exactly and that ‘right balance’ will be insane.
Right balance? I’m guessing that means no development at all.
Hussein or not.
So even this brain-dead secretary of the worthless Interior Dept. knows that our bankrupt government missed a golden opportunity to cash in on all the oil and gas development going on because they were in bed with the tree-huggers.
Sorry. The private landowners have made very lucrative deals with the drillers, and the government can go sell a windmill somewhere for a little extra cash. Taxpayers have been cheated once again by the bureaucrats.
To Commie leftists, there is no right or wrong. There is only what promotes the cause.
This plus the new excutive order that barry just signed looks like a coordinated move to nationalize our resources. While the nation focuses on zer0care we need to keep an eye on what is happening outside the public scandals.
Good point. I just saw the below post on the threat of executive orders if Congress won’t act, typical 0bama. Haven’t read it yet.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3086442/posts
There is a dispute going on over the federal leases of tribal land for the mining of sub-bituminous coal. The tribes have been prevented from developing their own resources by the corrupt crony lease system that has been run by the dept of the interior for years. The Crowe Indians, in particular have been petitioning the government to be made a full partner in the coal operations on their land for years. For a long time, they were trying to get a coal gassification plant built, but the government said no. The system was so corrupt that it passed rules that new leases could only be purchased by companies who owned the contiguous leases.
Now, that the Obama administration, the unions and their crony partners are pushing to build coal terminal in Oregon and WA, the Democrats have a sudden interest in protecting the rights of the Indians in the Powder River Basin. Of course, the tribes along the WA coast have all signed an agreement to formally oppose the construction of the coal terminals.
It’s too bad that the Obama administration waited until the Chinese market for sub-bituminous coal collapsed to invite the Powder River Basin tribes to participate. The sub-bituminous coal is selling for less than $10/short ton.
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