ANCHORAGE, Alaska — Two lawsuits filed Friday claim the federal government conducted petroleum lease sales without proper environmental review in a part of northern Alaska known for its wildlife.
The Bureau of Land Management on Dec. 14 conducted the largest-ever lease offering within the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska, putting out for bid 900 tracts covering 16,100 square miles, roughly the size of New Hampshire and Massachusetts combined.
In the first lawsuit, five environmental groups said the BLM relied on an environmental review preceding a 2013 NPR-A management plan for the lease sale. Federal law for lease sales, the lawsuit said, required an updated environmental review of the specific land to be offered in a sale, and how wildlife and habitat would be affected.
In the second lawsuit, filed by environmental law firm Earthjustice, four other environmental groups claimed 2016 and 2017 lease sales in the reserve were illegal because the Interior Department failed to take a hard look at their effects on greenhouse gas emissions and climate change.
Email requests for comment from the Interior Department and the U.S. Department of Justice were not returned Friday.
The reserve was created in 1923 by President Warren Harding as an emergency oil supply for the Navy. The reserve is south of the country’s northernmost city, Utqiagvik, formerly Barrow.
The reserve covers 35,625 square miles, about the size of Indiana. There are 189 authorized petroleum leases in the NPR-A.
A management plan for the reserve adopted in 2013 splits it roughly in half between conservation areas and land for petroleum development. Former Interior Secretary Ken Salazar said at the time that oil companies would have access to nearly three-fourths of the estimated economically recoverable oil in the reserve.
Salazar called the reserve an “iconic place on our Earth,” home to two caribou herds that are hunted by 40 northern and western Alaska Native villages to support a subsistence life. Polar bears roam the coast. The reserve includes renowned habitat for migratory waterfowl, including black brant, Canada geese and greater white-fronted geese.
In May, Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke signed an order to review the Obama administration management plan.
