Killing Earth: The Willow Project
Glacier Bay is a homeland, a living laboratory, a national park, a designated wilderness, a biosphere reserve, and a world heritage site. It’s a marine park, where great adventure awaits by boating into inlets, coves and hideaway harbors is located 861 miles away from the Willow Project.
April 25, 2023
After years of legal battles over permitting, and despite Biden’s previous promises to phase out drilling, on March 13, 2023, the Biden Administration approved the largest oil drilling project on federal lands called the Willow Project. Proponents of the project argue that Willow will provide jobs and aid the U.S. in becoming less reliant on foreign oil; however, opponents claim that the benefits will be at the expense of the planet. The Earth is on life support, and the Willow Project is set to pull the plug.
ConocoPhillips’ Willow oil drilling Project on Alaska’s North Slope in the National Petroleum Reserve is the largest oil exploration in the United States. The project is estimated to produce roughly 600 million barrels of oil over Willow’s 30-year lifetime. Additionally, the project is estimated to cost between eight billion and ten billion; however, it plans to provide $8 billion to $17 billion in new revenue for the federal government with the potential to be critical to the U.S. economy and America’s energy security. ConocoPhillips states that the project will produce approximately 2500 construction jobs and 300 permanent jobs.
However, the inevitable damages subsequent to Willow vastly outweigh the purported benefits of the project. Willow plans to drill up to 199 wells for oil and gas in the reservoir. As stated by the Biden Administration, Willow will produce over 260 million metric tons of planet-warming carbon pollution over the next 30 years, causing at least $19 billion in damages, as estimated by EarthJustice. Furthermore, the project will disrupt and harm wildlife habitats in the Arctic, endangering thousands of protected animals. The magnitude of the Willow Project creates a carbon time bomb that future generations must brace themselves for.
Many proponents of the project argue that drilling is the only short-term and practical solution to spikes in gas and fuel prices because of the United States’ dependency on foreign oil, the war in Ukraine, and the sanctions placed on Russia. However, the United States is by far the largest oil producer, and prices remain high because fuel companies do not want to lower them. Although fuel companies project significant profits by virtue of the Willow Project, they have yet to guarantee any decrease in profit– only an obvious increase in their net worth. When an administration approves a project purely for profit and at the expense of the public; one must ask, where is the outrage? Who will protect the planet? The copious amounts of evidence insinuate that the Administration approved Willow purely out of greed, as the federal government and fuel companies will be the central beneficiaries. Furthermore, the Willow Project will not produce oil for years within its beginning stages and therefore would not lower fuel prices immediately, as proponents state it would. Drilling is not the solution to high fuel prices, a conversion to clean energy is.
During Joe Biden’s candidacy, he stated that drilling for oil in the Arctic would be a “big disaster” and that there would be “no more drilling on federal lands, period.” Biden’s promises to stop drilling gave countless people hope for the future and played a crucial role in his election. Yet, the Biden administration flip-flopped on their false promise and approved Willow.
The unfortunate reality is that Joe Biden and many of the current political leaders will not live long enough to witness the detrimental effects of their continued greedy policies. The decision to approve Willow shows a blatant disregard for the planet and future generations who continue to look toward the negative impacts of corporate greed and duplicitous politicians. Moreover, the approval of Willow appeals to the GOP and Republicans, which helps Biden create a “Biden-to-center” narrative, which would be beneficial to his candidacy leading into the 2024 Presidential election, further proving that the approval relies on politics and greed rather than the well being of the planet, and of the people.
Biden’s approval is disappointing, yet it is not surprising that the U.S. government would lie to its people, as it has for many years. The fight for justice for the Earth takes courage and is an imperative battle, regardless of how painfully arduous it is to abstain from resigning out of hopelessness. As the second largest contributor to carbon emissions, the U.S. has a responsibility to prevent damages before it is too late and is culpable for the prospective damages done by Willow. By approving the project, not only is the U.S. government speeding up the process of killing the planet, it is failing its people, and it is failing the entire world. If Willow continues, there will eventually not be a world to fail.
If we want a planet, we as a people must make a peaceful yet forceful attempt at stopping Willow from progressing. There is no other option. There is not another habitable planet in our solar system.
