This Week at Interior November 1, 2024

Transcript:

This Week at Interior  

Interior this week announced a nearly $82 million investment from President Biden’s Investing in America agenda to bring clean, safe drinking water to Tribal communities in the West. That will fund 23 projects through a new program at the Bureau of Reclamation established by the Inflation Reduction Act, the largest climate investment ever.  

The Department this week announced more than $74 million for Kentucky to address dangerous and polluting abandoned mine lands, while creating good-paying, family-sustaining jobs and catalyzing economic opportunity in coal communities. Millions of Americans nationwide live less than a mile from an abandoned coal mine -- the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law provides nearly $11.3 billion to address this legacy pollution over 15 years, facilitated by the Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement.

Interior this week announced that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, together with international partners Parks Canada, the Canada Department of Environment and Climate Change, and the Ministry of Environment and Natural Resources of the United Mexican States, signed a Letter of Intent strengthening cooperation and coordinating conservation of the American bison across its range. Secretary Haaland called the collaboration “an important step forward as we work to restore this majestic species and facilitate the return of bison to Tribally owned and ancestral lands.” Saturday November 2nd is National Bison Day.

Interior this week announced nearly $46 million in investments for ecosystem restoration activities that address high-priority Klamath Basin water-related challenges in southern Oregon and northern California. Through the President's Investing in America Agenda, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is devoting a total of $162 million over five years to the effort, including repairing local economies under agreements signed with local Tribes and landowners, along with state agencies and conservation partners.  

Assistant Secretary for Fish and Wildlife and Parks Shannon Estenoz traveled to Arizona and Tennessee this week, where the Land and Water Conservation Fund's Outdoor Recreation Legacy Partnership Program is helping expand and rehabilitate urban parks in Tucson and Memphis. These investments will increase access to the outdoors, create safer spaces, enhance the visitor experience, improve accessibility and boost climate resilience.  

The Provo River Delta Restoration Project is now complete. The nearly 260-acre project, supported by a $10 million investment through the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, is located a half-mile north of Utah Lake State Park. The restored delta provides an improved ecosystem for threatened June suckers, and the project expands recreational opportunities with trails, trailhead parking areas, nonmotorized boat launches, fishing platforms, and a wildlife-viewing observation tower.

The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management this week completed the sixth offshore wind lease sale of the Biden-Harris administration, and the first in the Gulf of Maine. This also marked the first commercial sale for floating offshore wind on the Atlantic Coast, in yet another significant milestone in the Biden-Harris administration’s work to meet the President’s goal of deploying 30 gigawatts of offshore wind energy capacity by 2030 and 15 gigawatts of floating offshore wind energy by 2035.  

The U.S. Geological Survey this week awarded $4.8 million to 36 state geological surveys to preserve vital geologic and geophysical data and samples. Funding for the agency’s National Geological and Geophysical Data Preservation Program from the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law will expand capacity to safeguard physical samples like drill cores and geochemical samples, along with earth-science assets, all of which are crucial to future scientific discovery, critical mineral characterization, climate resilience and more.

And our social media Picture of the Week, some say it's haunted by spirits of the past, but there's no denying that the Great Dismal Swamp National Wildlife Refuge contains some of the most important wildlife habitat in the mid-Atlantic region. It's almost 113,000 acres straddling Virgina and North Carolina are also a haven for history, as the Great Dismal Swamp served as an invaluable hiding place for enslaved African Americans escaping to freedom before and during the Civil War.

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That's This Week at Interior!

 

This Week: Interior announces a nearly $82 million investment to bring clean, safe drinking water to Tribal communities in the West; more than $74 million is on the way for Kentucky to address dangerous and polluting abandoned mine lands; Interior announces an international effort for conservation of the American bison; Interior invests nearly $46 million for ecosystem restoration activities in the Klamath Basin; Assistant Secretary for Fish and Wildlife and Parks Shannon Estenoz visits Arizona and Tennessee to highlight efforts to expand and rehabilitate urban parks; the Provo River Delta Restoration Project in Utah is now complete, providing an improved ecosystem and better recreational opportunities; the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management completes the sixth offshore wind lease sale of the Biden-Harris administration, and the first in the Gulf of Maine; the U.S. Geological Survey awards $4.8 million to preserve vital geologic and geophysical data and samples; and we summon up a haunted and historic landscape for our social media Picture of the Week!

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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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