As climate crisis worsens, Trump admin opens millions of acres to oil and gas
America’s public lands are home to a spectacular array of wildlife. They are places of astounding beauty. But massive tracts of these special lands — lands we all own — are being mined and drilled for oil, gas, and coal that fuels the climate crisis.1
America’s public lands shouldn’t fuel the climate crisis. Urge congressional leaders to support a moratorium on new fossil fuel development on our federal lands.
Public Lands and the Climate Crisis
From 2005 to 2014, nearly a quarter of U.S. emissions that contribute to climate change came from oil, coal, and other fossil fuels developed on the public lands we all own.2
Since then, the Trump administration has offered more than 13.6 million acres of publicly owned lands and 81.3 million acres of U.S. waters off our coasts to oil and gas companies.3
Climate Change Demands Action
The climate crisis is urgent.
2018 saw record temperatures, extreme weather events and devastating wildfires made worse by warmer, drier air.4 The United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change warned that even more catastrophic climate effects, including droughts and famine, floods and mass wildlife extinctions, may come sooner than we thought.5
At Environmental Action, we’re optimists. We know that we can — and must — address the climate crisis and believe that working together, we can create a greener, more sustainable world.
But we’re also realistic.
We know that every day we wait to transition from fossil fuels means more climate change, more environmental disruption, and more human suffering. We know we need to flip the script on the Trump administration’s energy policy right now if we’re going to avoid worst-case climate change scenarios.
How You can Help
Environmental Action is sending a powerful message to lawmakers in Congress: America’s public lands shouldn’t fuel the climate crisis.
1. Staff, “Trump’s land grab–in 7 maps,” The Wilderness Society, retrieved online December 6, 2018.
2. Miranda Green, “Public land drilling contributes a quarter of all greenhouse gas emissions in US: report,” The Hill, November 26, 2018.
3. Staff, “Trump’s land grab–in 7 maps,” The Wilderness Society, retrieved online December 6, 2018.
4. Brady Dennis and Chris Mooney, “‘We are in trouble.’ Global carbon emissions reached a record high in 2018,” The Washington Post, December 5, 2018.
5. Katherine J. Wu, “The World Was Just Issued 12-Year Ultimatum On Climate Change,” Smithsonian.com, October 8, 2018.