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Oil and Gas Lease Auction Deferred Over Inadequate Tribal Consultation, Failure to Address Impacts of Fracking
Contact: Tim Ream (541) 531-8541 tream@wildearthguardians.org

Farmington, N.M–WildEarth Guardians applauded the ObamaAdministration’s decisiontoday to cancel plans to auction off more than 2,000 acres of publiclyowned oil and gas leases for fracking near Chaco Canyon National HistoricalPark.

“When it comes to drilling near Chaco Canyon, WildEarthGuardians has for years been telling the government in every way we can thinkof that they are not listening to local Navajo residents and that they havebeen ignoring threats of fracking to air, water, and our climate,” said TimReam, Climate and Energy Campaign Director. “We think it is obvious that oncethey listen to the Navajo community and honestly look at the problems offracking, they will cancel these public lands oil and gas auctions for good.”

In canceling an oil and gas lease sale planned for October19, the U.S. Bureau of Land Management pointed to its failure to consult withTribal authorities and to prepare an adequate environmental analysis of theimpacts of more fracking. WildEarth Guardians joined a broad coalition ofgroups earlier this year in callingon the agency to abandon its plans.

The Bureau of Land Management itself has acknowledged thatit has no plan in place to protect the Greater Chaco Region from fracking.Spanning 4,600 square miles, the region was once the heart of the AncestralPuebloan civilization and today is the home of Navajo, modern-day Pueblo, andmany other indigenous communities.

Today’s announcement follows a pattern of oil and gas leasesale cancellations in response to Keep It in the Ground movement protests.Since protests began in November 2015, public lands oil and gas auctions havebeen canceled or postponed in Colorado, Montana, New Mexico, Utah, Wyoming, andWashington D.C.

Photos of hundreds protesting the April 20, 2016 oil and gaslease sale in Santa Fe, NM are available here.

The KeepIt in the Ground movement seeks to confrontthe fact that 10% of all U.S. greenhouse gas emissions come from oil and gasproduced from public lands and waters. The movement seeks to put a halt to newleasing to stem the release of carbon.

While today’s news is welcome, the Greater Chaco regionremains at risk. WildEarth Guardians and its allies have suedto stop fracking in the Greater Chaco region. That lawsuit is awaitingdecision from a federal appeals court. A similarlawsuit to stop oil and gas leases in the Santa Fe National Forest wasrecently filed in federal court in New Mexico.

In January, WildEarth Guardians calledon President Obama to cancel all oil and gas lease sales until climatechange and other environmental issues of the federal oil and gas program havebeen adequately studied.