Interior Secretary Deb Haaland on Aug. 27 finalized protections for 28 million acres of public lands across Alaska initially protected under the 1971 Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act (ANCSA), keeping them withdrawn from mineral entry and oil and gas development.
The decision came in response to action in the waning days of former President Donald Trump’s administration’s move to end longstanding withdrawals of lands identified under section D-1 of ANCSA. The Trump administration’s action would have opened millions of acres to extractive development, including mining and oil and gas drilling, and removed federal subsistence priority from millions of acres.
The Department of the Interior (DOI) said that the previous administration’s decision came without sufficient analysis of potential impacts on subsistence and other important resources, appropriate tribal consultation, and without compliance with other legal requirements.
“Continuing these essential protections, which have been in place for decades, will ensure continued access and use of these public lands now and in the future,” Haaland said.
The Record of Decision and associated public land order adopt and implement the Bureau of Land Management’s (BLM) preferred “no action” alternative in the final related environmental impact statement, which analyzed the environmental consequences of the previous administration’s decision. The BLM’s analysis found that revoking any of the protections would likely harm subsistence hunting and fishing in communities that would lose federal subsistence priority over certain lands, ranging from 44 to 117 communities, depending on the alternative. The analysis also found that lifting all or even some of the withdrawals could have lasting negative impacts on wildlife, vegetation and permafrost.
The decision conserves 13 million acres of special areas in the western Arctic, protecting 2.8 million acres of the Beaufort Sea to place the entire United States Arctic Ocean off limits to new oil and gas leasing, and prevent irrevocable harm to tribal subsistence uses and permafrost at the base of the Brooks Range by rejecting the Ambler Road proposal.
Alaska Gov. Mike Dunleavy criticized Haaland’s decision, saying “the announcement by the U.S. Department of the Interior locking up another 28 million acres of land is the latest sanction against Alaska by the Biden-Harris administration and the radical environmental organizations it relies on.”
The governor also claimed environmental entities are turning “Alaska into one big national park.”
“Alaska is still owed 5 million acres of land under the Statehood Act,” he said. “Every one of these sanctions harms Alaska’s ability to prosper.”
A statement issued by Joe Plesha, communications director for Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, said that public land orders have become “political land orders” during the Biden Administration. “Alaskans have been completely railroaded as the BLM goes back on their own recommendation and commitment to return Alaska’s lands to federal multiple-use status,” he said.
The decision “harms our jobs and economy, and our Alaska Native communities” by locking up acreage that the federal government owes to Alaskans, said Sen. Dan Sullivan, R-Alaska, in a separate statement.
Oil and gas entities had no immediate comment, but conservation and several Alaska Native entities were quick to praise the decision.
“DOI’s decision today reinforced what Tribes and others have known all along: these intact lands hold vital cultural, biological and ecological values,” said Charisse Arce, Earthjustice senior attorney. “We are grateful that a thorough reevaluation by BLM resulted in upholding these important protections.”
Earthjustice noted that the lands under reconsideration for development crisscross Northwest, Southwest, Southcentral and Southeast Alaska.
“They support significant salmon populations, large caribou herds, important migratory bird habitat for hundreds of migrating species, and many other fish and wildlife species,” the nonprofit public interest environmental law firm said.
Alannah Hurley, executive director of United Tribes of Bristol Bay (UTBB), said the Tribes are thankful that Haaland listened to the voices of the majority of federally recognized Tribes in Alaska.
“The final decision to protect these lands is a testament to the strength and unity of our tribal communities and safeguards our cultural and spiritual vitality that sustains our way of life,” she said. The UTBB statement also added that “these lands are vital to the health of our lands and waters that sustain the Yup’ik, Dena’ina and Alutiiq traditional subsistence ways of life for our tribal communities.”
SalmonState and the Wild Salmon Center hailed the DOI decision as an “enormous win for Alaska,” including wildlife and everyone who uses D-1 lands for hunting, fishing, recreation, job creation and the continuation of traditional ways of life.
“These places represent some of the nation’s largest remaining intact ecosystems, from high alpine tundra to the pristine estuaries and wetlands in places like Bristol Bay, home to the world’s most abundant wild sockeye salmon runs,” said Emily Anderson, Alaska director at the Wild Salmon Center. The Interior Department, said Anderson, is “demonstrating their commitment to maintaining our nation’s biodiversity, climate refugia, and to listening to the communities most impacted by this decision.”
SalmonState and the Wild Salmon Center noted that 74% of D-1 lands are designated as federal subsistence acreage — meaning they are vital to rural and Alaska Native food security — and that 209 Alaska Native villages are within 100 miles of D-1 lands. In addition, about half of all D-1 lands are within the range of the Western Arctic Caribou herd, a vital subsistence food source.
“BLM has recognized potential D-1 withdrawal lands that possess and serve as culturally significant subsistence and sacred areas for Tribes who live on or near these areas,” said Emily Murray, vice president of the Norton Bay Watershed Council, in Fritz Creek, on Alaska’s Kenai Peninsula.
“These vital tributary and ecosystems provide habitat and protection for moose, salmon and migratory birds our subsistence economy depends on … We are listed as ‘economically disadvantaged.’ Therefore ,we highly depend on our subsistence activities for the health and wellbeing of our Tribe as a whole.”
BLM’s decision will preserve some of the largest and most intact landscapes remaining in the nation by restoring protections for D-1 lands, said Meda DeWitt, interim Alaska director of The Wilderness Society.
“We are grateful to Secretary Haaland and pleased that the Biden administration is listening to the concerns of Indigenous peoples by making bold moves to protect Alaska Native communities’ subsistence areas and strengthen conservation across millions of acres in Alaska,” she said.
The Bering Sea-Interior Tribal Commission also applauded the Interior Department’s decision.
These D-1 lands include BLM-managed lands in five BLM planning areas: Kobuk-Seward, Bering Sea-Western Interior, Bay, East Alaska, and Ring of Fire, which together contain critical salmon-producing watersheds, caribou calving grounds, tundra landscapes, coastal estuaries, moose habitat, and marshes important to migratory birds, the tribal commission said.
During the environmental review process, BLM held 19 public hearings to allow the public to voice their opinions about whether protections should be maintained, modified or lifted. More than 400,000 written comments were received, of which more than 98% favored retention of D-1 protections.
