This Week at Interior April 7, 2023

Transcript:

This Week at Interior

Secretary Haaland traveled to Houston, Texas as part of the Administration’s Investing in America tour to highlight investments being made through the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law to create jobs and address legacy pollution. While there, the Secretary hosted a roundtable with labor leaders, environmental justice advocates and community members to discuss progress on implementation of the Law. She then visited two sites in the Houston area where funding is being used to plug orphaned oil and gas wells.  

Deputy Secretary Beaudreau continued the Investing in America tour with travel to Alaska. He announced more than $16 million in new funding from the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law to enhance the resilience of ecosystems and salmon in Alaska’s Yukon Kuskokwim and Norton Sound Region through co-stewardship with Alaska Native Tribes. Known as the “gravel-to-gravel" initiative, this effort will support locally led management and restoration in partnership with the more than 117 federally recognized Alaska Native Tribes that rely on the salmon, migratory birds and other subsistence resources provided by these watersheds. 

Deputy Secretary Beaudreau was joined by Bureau of Reclamation Commissioner Camille Calimlim Touton and Senior Advisor to the President and White House Infrastructure Implementation Coordinator Mitch Landrieu in the Colorado River Basin to announce a nearly $585 million investment from President Biden’s Bipartisan Infrastructure Law for infrastructure repairs on water delivery systems throughout the West. Funding will go to 83 projects in 11 states to improve water conveyance and storage, increase safety, improve hydro power generation and provide water treatment.  

During a visit to the Gila River Indian Community as part of the Investing in America tour, Deputy Secretary Beaudreau and Senior Advisor Landrieu were joined by Deputy Bureau of Reclamation Commissioner David Palumbo to announce $133 million in historic funding and conservation agreements. The funding will help the Gila River Indian Community and water users across the Colorado River Basin protect the stability and sustainability of the System.

Reclamation also announced a $22 million investment from the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law for four small surface and groundwater storage projects in California and Utah. The four projects will help stretch the limited water supplies in the Western United States and are located in Imperial Valley, Kern County, and San Joaquin Valley, California, and Toquerville, Utah. 

In a major milestone towards meeting the Biden-Harris administration’s goal to deploy 30 gigawatts of offshore wind energy by 2030, the Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement has completed its review of critical design and installation reports for the South Fork Wind project offshore Rhode Island and New York. This clears the way for the construction of the first commercial-scale offshore wind turbines in federal waters in the United States. 

Interior announced it will hold nation-to-nation consultations with Tribes, and listening sessions with Indian artists and craftspeople, on draft amendments to regulations that implement the Indian Arts and Crafts Act. This is a truth-in-advertising law that makes it illegal to sell any art or craft product in a manner that falsely suggests it is “Indian-made.” The updates are aimed to help ensure that Native people can receive fair compensation for their work and further protect the authenticity of Indian-made products. 

Assistant Secretary for Water and Science Tanya Trujillo participated in a Nihimá Nahasdzáán Gallery Event this week to showcase Landsat imagery of the Navajo Nation. The gallery event, which translates as “Our Mother Earth,” was a partnership between the U.S. Geological Survey, NASA, the Navajo Nation and Museum and others. It provided a chance to reflect on the images, tools and data provided by the Landsat program, which has used satellites to collect Earth imagery for 50 years. 

This week, Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary for Land and Minerals Management Laura Daniel-Davis and Bureau of Land Management Director Tracy Stone-Manning, celebrated the conveyance of five acres of public land in Clark County to the state of Nevada for affordable housing. The site will be used for the construction of 195 one- and two-bedroom units for low-income seniors and will include amenities like wellness centers, swimming pools, hair salons and conference rooms. Funding for the projects was generated through the sale of public lands under the Southern Nevada Public Land Management Act   

The National Park Service announced the addition of 963 acres to the preserve portion of New River Gorge National Park and Preserve near Sandstone, West Virginia. The land was transferred to NPS with funding from the Land and Water Conservation Fund and will increase outdoor recreation activities to the public. Commonly known as Irish Mountain, this historically significant swath of land is known for its links to Irish immigrants who settled locally in the late 1800s.  

And our social media Picture of Week is the Berryessa Snow Mountain National Monument, which includes some of the most scenic and biologically diverse landscapes in northern California. The views range from rolling, oak-studded hillsides to steep creek canyons and expansive ridge lines.  

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That's This Week, at Interior. 

This week: Secretary Haaland traveled to Houston to highlight Bipartisan Infrastructure Law investments to address legacy pollution; Deputy Secretary Beaudreau announced co-stewardship efforts in the Arctic, Kuskokwim and Norton Sound Region; Interior leadership visited the Colorado River Basin to announce a nearly $585 million investment in aging infrastructure; the Gila River Indian Community will receive $233 million in historic funding and conservation agreements; four small surface and groundwater storage projects in California and Utah will receive a $20 million investment; the Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement has completed its review of critical design and installation reports for the South Fork Wind project; Native artists and crafters will help shape new rules to ensure the authenticity of Indian-made products; Assistant Secretary for Water and Science Tanya Trujillo participated in a Nihimá Nahasdzáán Gallery Event to showcase Landsat imagery of the Navajo Nation; the Bureau of Land Management celebrated the conveyance of five acres of public land in Nevada for affordable housing; the National Park Service announced the addition of 963 acres to New River Gorge National Park and Preserve in West Virginia; and our social media picture of the week the Berryessa Snow Mountain National Monument. 

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    04/11/2025

    This Week at Interior April 11, 2025

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    This Week at Interior

    President Trump this week signed Executive Orders aimed at achieving the Administration's goal of American Energy Dominance with a renewed focus on coal. One of the orders directs Interior to identify untapped coal resources on federal lands, while removing barriers to mining and leasing.

    The value of untapped coal in our country is one hundred times greater than the value of all the gold at Fort Knox, and we're going to unleash it and make America rich and powerful again.

    To advance the President Trump's order, Interior will implement a series of policy moves and regulatory reforms to position coal as a cornerstone of the nation’s energy strategy by ensuring federally managed lands remain open and accessible for responsible energy development. Secretary Burgum likened the actions to creating a new Golden Age of "Mine, Baby, Mine," saying that  

    Interior is unlocking America’s full potential in energy dominance and economic development to make life more affordable for every American family while showing the world the power of America’s natural resources and innovation.  

    Among the actions are ending the moratorium on federal coal leasing, reopening federal lands in Montana and Wyoming to coal leasing, removing regulatory burdens for coal mines, and providing royalty rate relief.  

    Interior this week announced the disbursement of more than $13 million in grants to support the reclamation of abandoned mine lands, furthering the Trump administration’s commitment to American Energy Dominance, environmental stewardship and economic renewal in coal communities. The funding is administered through the Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement, and it will support job creation and economic revitalization efforts in North Dakota, Tennessee and Texas.  

    Interior this week announced the release of updated oil and gas reserve estimates for the Gulf of America's Outer Continental Shelf. The new data and analysis over the last couple of years reveal an additional 1.3 billion barrels of oil equivalent since 2021, bringing the total reserve estimate to 7.04 billion barrels of oil equivalent. That figure includes 5.77 billion barrels of oil and 7.15 trillion cubic feet of natural gas. Earlier this year, the Trump administration announced plans to significantly increase oil and gas leasing on the Outer Continental Shelf, and just last week Secretary Burgum directed the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management to hold the first Gulf of America oil and gas lease sale since its renaming in February.

    Secretary Burgum held his first All Hands meeting this week at Interior's historic Yates Auditorium. The Secretary saluted the notable accomplishments the Department has achieved in making the transition from the previous administration, and expanded on his vision that innovation, rather than regulation, is the cornerstone of American prosperity.

    The thing that has led our country for 250 years is innovation, doesn't matter whether it's the Agricultural Revolution, the Industrial Revolution our ability to innovate in a way that allowed us to win World War One and World War II and lead the world and become the world leader, all of it was innovation based, and we have to get back to those roots. That's how we win. That's how America wins in this world, that's how we win again for our children and our children's children, is we win with innovation.

    U.S. Geological Survey crews were deployed late last week and this week to monitor flood impacts after storms dumped heavy rain across portions of the southeast and Midwest. Crews are still hard at work gathering flood measurements in Indiana, Kentucky, Illinois and Ohio, as well as West Virginia, Arkansas, Tennessee and Mississippi, where as much as ten inches of rain fell causing massive flooding. The gages provide information for the National Weather Service to predict when dangerous flooding might occur and allow for warnings to vulnerable residents, as flood crests will continue into early May.

    And our social media Picture of the Week, California's Battery Point Lighthouse. Perched on California's rugged northern coast, this historic beacon stands among the rocky outcrops of the California Coastal National Monument and has guided mariners since its first lighting in 1856.

    Make sure you follow us on Facebook, Instagram, YouTube and X! That's This Week at Interior!


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    News and headlines from Interior April 11, 2025

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