Willow Oil Project Must Be Paused Pending Appeal, Groups Urge

Environmental and Indigenous American groups on Wednesday asked for construction on the Willow oil project to be put on hold pending their appeal to the Ninth Circuit.

“There’s a lot at stake for climate and the health of the Arctic region,” Bridget Psarianos, senior staff attorney with Trustees for Alaska, said in a statement. “We join our clients in holding agencies accountable to the law and trying to protect this place from further industrialization.”

ConocoPhillips’ $7.5 billion project in the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska, which could yield 180,000 barrels of oil per day, has provoked legal challenges from multiple organizations concerned ...