(The Center Square) — The Department of the Interior said Friday it will rescind a 2024 rule that limits energy production in the National Petroleum Reserve in Alaska, the latest step announced by the Trump administration to increase oil and gas output in the 49th state.
The Bureau of Land Management will move forward with managing the reserve under new 2025 regulations that align with those originally established in 1977, according to the Department of the Interior website. The Biden administration in 2024 had begun to study and seek public input on the need for additional environmental protections for certain lands on Alaska’s North Slope.
“By rescinding the 2024 rule, we are following the direction set by President Trump to unlock Alaska’s energy potential, create jobs for North Slope communities and strengthen American energy security,” Interior Secretary Doug Burgum said in a statement. “This action restores common-sense management and ensures responsible development benefits both Alaska and the nation.”
The action is part of a broader effort by the Trump administration to “modernize resource policy in Alaska,” according to the Interior Department. In October, the department announced actions that include reopening the Coastal Plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge for oil and gas leasing and the completion of right-of-way permits for the Ambler Road project, which would provide access to an area rich in critical metals.
Other actions to increase Alaska energy production include a land exchange to facilitate the construction of a road between King Cove and the airport at Cold Bay which will convey approximately 490 acres within the Izembek National Wildlife Refuge to King Cove Corporation in exchange for 1,739 acres to be added to another part of the refuge. The King Cove Corporation was established under the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act for the Village of King Cove.
On Monday, the Interior Department’s Bureau of Ocean Energy Management released a plan for a December auction of 1 million acres of federal offshore territory located in Cook Inlet in the central Gulf of Alaska, which it calls the “Big Beautiful Cook Inlet Oil and Gas Lease Sale.”
The last auction of blocks in Cook Inlet occurred in 2022, when Hilcorp Alaska LLC bid $63,983 for a lease that was suspended in 2024 after a federal judge ruled that an environmental study was flawed, specifically citing the failure to consider impacts on endangered beluga whales.
