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Trump Signs Executive Order to Expand Offshore Drilling
In a move the oil and gas industry, enormous donors to (owners of) Trump and the GOP, is ecstatic about, an executive order was signed Friday to expand offshore drilling for oil and gas.
The order directs Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke to review a five-year plan in which President Obama banned drilling in parts of the Pacific, Arctic, and Atlantic Oceans. The Obama administration's drilling bans will remain in place for now. But even if they are eventually rolled back, there are questions about how effective the executive order will be in spurring new drilling. The price of oil is relatively low, hovering at about $50 a barrel, and offshore drilling is an expensive endeavor...
The order faces legal and political challenges and seeks to undo a plan by President Obama that sought to limit fossil fuel development and fight climate change by not including new off-shore drilling during the current five-year federal offshore plan, which extends through 2022.
Along the Atlantic coast, though, more than 100 cities and towns have passed resolutions against offshore drilling.
The order also aims to undo designated sanctuary areas, removing existing protects. It instructs the Commerce Department not to: "create or expand national marine sanctuaries and to review designations and expansions of marine sanctuaries created in the past decade...to determine whether there is energy or mineral resource potential within monument areas."
Sources:
http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-na-trump-offshore-drilling-20170427-story.html