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This week, the President’s Interior Department moved forward with a plan to allow oil and gas drilling in one of the most pristine areas remaining on the planet — the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. The Refuge is home to numerous iconic wildlife species such as caribou, polar bears, waterbirds, arctic foxes, black and brown bears, […]
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The Secretary of Energy stunningly accused the major financial institutions that refuse to now invest in Arctic oil and gas exploration of discrimination against the oil and gas industry and likened the decision to the banks’ refusal in the past to make loans to minorities.
Why This Matters: Arctic drilling has been fought due to its environmental toll since the 1960s, In 1980, Congress decreed that no exploratory drilling or production could occur without further congressional action — and it stayed that way until President Trump demanded authority to lease the land for drilling, despite the ample domestic supply of oil and gas.
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This week there was a momentous piece of good news for conservation — one of the largest and most powerful and influential U.S. banks, Goldman Sachs, said it will not fund projects that drill for oil and gas in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. This is huge — between 2016 and 2018, Goldman Sachs invested […]
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In a move that drew praise from leading environmental organizations, the investment bank Goldman Sachs announced a sweeping new “environmental policy framework” on Sunday, with major commitments to fund climate change resilience and adaptation projects, clean energy development, and to more thoroughly analyze fracking projects before funding them (though it does not rule them out entirely).
Why This Matters: This puts Goldman Sachs well in the lead among U.S. banks for making a commitment to both climate change and environmental protection generally.
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E&E News reported on Monday that the Trump administration states it its Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) in favor of oil and gas leasing in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge that the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) – the agency responsible for EIS – “does not agree that the proposed development is inconsistent with maintaining a livable planet (i.e., there is not a climate crisis).”
Why This Matters: This is yet another sign that the Trump Administration is ignoring the overwhelming opinion of expert scientists — the U.N. IPCC Oceans and Cryosphere report from last week is full of examples of how the Arctic region is being severely impacted by climate change caused by fossil fuel use.
Cacti and succulents have rapidly grown in popularity in the past few years and it turns out that the insatiable demand to have the trendy plants adorn homes is driving poachers to dig them up from the wild and increasingly on public lands. The Guardian recently reported in its in-depth piece that “in the US […]
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