The Interior Department published its final plan to open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil and gas leasing and development on Sept. 12—the same day the House voted to block drilling there.
The Bureau of Land Management’s final environmental review and plan for drilling in the refuge calls for opening 1.56 million acres on the Arctic Coastal Plain to fossil fuel development. Environmental groups say drilling harms a biologically diverse region that is already at risk from climate change.
The BLM will finalize the plan 30 days after it is published in the Federal Register, and the bureau will ...