MEMO: Sierra Club Calls for an End to Fossil Fuel Leasing on Public Lands

*** Senior Sierra Club policy staff and spokespeople are available to discuss the need to end fossil fuel leasing. ***

Right now, fossil fuel extraction on public lands and waters make up a quarter of our greenhouse gas emissions -- at a time scientists are saying we must move urgently to cut emissions by at least half. To slow the climate crisis -- temperature rise, extreme weather events, and its toll on our health, economy and livelihoods -- we must improve the way we manage public lands and waters. The Sierra Club calls for the administration to put an end to fossil fuel leasing and permitting, so we can improve the health of our communities, our climate, nature and biodiversity. 

In order to fight the climate crisis, it is essential that we end leasing on public lands. 

• Fossil fuel production on public lands is the source of about a quarter of U.S. greenhouse gas pollution, making it the ideal target for effective action: scientific reporting shows that ceasing new leases would reduce carbon emissions by 280 million tons per year

• Federal fossil fuels that have not been leased contain as much as 450 billion tons of potential climate pollution. Those that have already been leased contain up to 43 billion tons. 

• Scientists warn that known reserves of fossil fuels need to remain in the ground if global warming is to stay below 2°C by 2050 and avoid climate disaster. 

• Protecting public lands can both reduce existing carbon pollution and help decarbonize our economy, and studies have shown that smart land conservation and management practices could offset 21% of US greenhouse gas emissions.

The Department of the Interior can play a vital role in assisting communities during the inevitable shift away from fossil fuels.

• For decades, federal policies, subsidies and incentives encouraged a dependence on fossil fuels.

• More than 100,000 jobs could be created for former fossil fuel workers for example, by holding coal, oil and gas companies accountable for cleaning up public lands. 

• According to a recent report by the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA), unsubsidized renewable energy is the cheapest source of energy generation, with onshore wind and solar PV power less expensive than any fossil fuel option, even without financial assistance

Phasing out new fossil fuel leasing and permitting will mean cleaner air, cleaner water, and healthier families.

• The social costs of emissions from burning oil and gas include more frequent and extreme natural disasters, public health problems due to both climate change and the harmful effects of extraction, wildlife habitat destruction, and waterway pollution.

• Pollution is the largest environmental cause of disease and death today. Drilling, mining, and fracking bring air and water pollution that have been linked to illnesses ranging from asthma to cancer -- a toxic legacy that plagues too many communities in this country.

• Safe greenspace also provides opportunities for people to enjoy the outdoors together and to restore mental health.

The oil and gas program fails to provide a fair return to taxpayers. Not only does fossil fuel extraction devastate our planet, it’s a handout to Big Oil at the expense of average Americans. 

• For decades, federal policies, subsidies and incentives encouraged a dependence on fossil fuels.

• Oil and gas and mining  companies  aren’t paying their fair share. Loopholes in federal leasing policies allow for public land to be auctioned off to fossil fuel companies for pennies on the dollar - often $2 an acre or less.

• Beyond this, fossil fuel companies pay nothing for the climate harms that they inflict on the rest of us and the environmental damage they cause, all with the use of taxpayer owned minerals.

• According to a recent report by the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA), unsubsidized renewable energy is the cheapest source of energy generation, with onshore wind and solar PV power less expensive than any fossil fuel option, even without financial assistance.

The Biden Administration has explicitly stated the importance of fighting climate change and has made campaign promises to address oil and gas leasing on public lands.

• During the 2020 presidential election, candidate Joe Biden promised “no more drilling on federal lands. No more drilling, including offshore. No ability for the oil industry to continue to drill, period, ends, number one.”

• In his bold plan to tackle the climate crisis, President Biden pledged that the Administration would “take action against fossil fuel companies and other polluters who put profit over people and knowingly harm our environment and poison our communities’ air, land, and water” and do so by “banning new oil and gas permitting on public lands and waters.”

• Continuing to lease publicly owned lands to fossil fuel companies is incompatible to US climate objectives, as President Biden noted when pausing on oil and gas leasing in January 2020, stating, “there is little time left to avoid setting the world on a dangerous, potentially catastrophic, climate trajectory. Responding to the climate crisis will require both significant short-term global reductions in greenhouse gas emissions and net-zero global emissions by mid-century or before.”

• President Biden committed to a fast, equitable transition to renewable energy in order to reduce greenhouse gas emissions to 50% below 2005 by 2030 and net zero emissions by 2050, stating “it is the policy of my Administration to organize and deploy the full capacity of its agencies to combat the climate crisis to implement a Government-wide approach that reduces climate pollution in every sector of the economy.” We cannot effectively “combat the climate crisis” while continuing to fuel that crisis by leasing publicly owned lands and waters to fossil fuel companies.