WASHINGTON, D.C.: Senator Cory Booker today introduced the Climate Stewardship Act. The legislation, endorsed by the Sierra Club, calls for the planting of billions of trees, improved conservation practices on working lands, grants for renewable energy and energy efficiency on our nation’s farms, and wetland preservation. It is sponsored in the House by Rep. Deb Haaland.
WASHINGTON, D.C. -- The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change today issued a special report detailing climate impacts already being seen on lands, and the importance of improving land management and land protection and restoration to address the climate crisis. Among the key findings of the report is the essential role for lands in drawing down and storing carbon dioxide pollution from the atmosphere. The report also drives home the urgency of action-- stressing that delay in greenhouse gas emissions reductions is closing the window to combat the effects of the climate crisis on lands, creating lasting harm to wild places, wildlife, food and water supplies.
Trump’s Interior Department today released a final management plan for Bears Ears National Monument. The plan leaves most of Bears Ears without protections and comes despite current legal challenges to the Trump administration’s illegal actions to shrink the monument.
Today, the U.S. House Committee on Natural Resources voted in support of three bills that would limit dirty fuels extraction in the areas surrounding the Grand Canyon and Chaco Canyon.
WASHINGTON, D.C. -- E&E broke news today that Secretary of the Interior David Bernhardt tomorrow will announce the agency is moving the headquarters of the Bureau of Land Management from its current base in the nation’s capital to Grand Junction, Colorado. The Department has failed to provide details of restructuring plans, leaving it unclear how this move fits into a larger scheme.
Salt Lake City, UT-- Earlier today, opponents of the Trump administration’s plan to auction off nearly 10,000 acres of public land for oil and gas drilling near the Great Salt Lake protested the lease sale outside of Gov. Gary Herbert’s office.
Today a House Natural Resources Subcommittee is holding a hearing on the Grand Canyon Centennial Protection Act. The bill would permanently protect 1 million acres of public lands around the Grand Canyon from new uranium mining claims. It follows the release late yesterday of recommendations from Trump’s Interior Department that clear the way for a vast expansion of dangerous mining on public lands.
Today, Sierra Club joined U.S. Representative RaĂşl Grijalva, Chair of the House Natural Resources Committee; leaders from Indigenous nations; local elected officials; veterans; and conservation groups in supporting H.R.1373 - Grand Canyon Centennial Protection Act. The Grand Canyon Centennial Protection Act, will make the 20-year mining moratorium established in 2012 permanent. All told, the legislation would protect approximately one million acres of public lands north and south of the Grand Canyon from toxic mining.
LAS VEGAS, NV -- On Wednesday June 5th, the Sierra Club will offer the community a look into the life of grassroots activism. Partnering with local non-profit Happy Earth Market, Sierra Club experts will raise awareness about issues affecting Nevada’s environment and ways to get involved.
Washington, DC-- Today, the U.S. Senate Subcommittee on Public Lands, Forests and Mining held a hearing on several public lands bills, including the Ruby Mountains Protection Act. Sen. Cortez Masto’s legislation would permanently prohibit oil and gas leasing anywhere within the Ruby Mountains’ Ranger District of the Humboldt-Toiyabe National Forest. The bill marks the first piece of federal legislation to safeguard the Rubies permanently-- a landscape that has been consistently under threat from the Trump administration’s oil and gas lease sales.
Tucson, AZ-- Late yesterday, Customs and Border Protection (CBP) released a proposal for 63 miles of new wall in Arizona-- bollard walls that would cut through Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument, the San Pedro River, the San Bernardino National Wildlife Refuge, and other public lands. The Department of Homeland Security’s power to waive bedrock environmental, cultural, and community public health safeguards means that wall construction through these ecologically-significant landscapes and waterways can happen without regard for the rule of law.
Las Vegas, NV-- Today, the US Forest Service issued a final decision on oil and gas drilling in Nevada’s Ruby Mountains-- denying the Bureau of Land Management’s (BLM) request to offer parcels for leasing in the landscape. The decision comes after an outpouring of public opposition and restricts BLM from offering the sale of parcels in the Ruby Mountains for oil and gas development.