Senate passes measure to remove protections in National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska

Alex DeMarban, Anchorage Daily News, Alaska on Oct 30, 2025

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ANCHORAGE, Alaska — The U.S. Senate on Thursday voted to cancel a Biden-era land-use plan that had boosted environmental protections for the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska, a region that has drawn new interest from the oil industry in recent years.

A companion measure from Alaska Republican Rep. Nick Begich has yet to be considered in the U.S. House.

The joint resolution in the Senate was sponsored by Alaska GOP Sens. Dan Sullivan and Lisa Murkowski, who argue that the restrictions hurt prospects for future oil development in the Indiana-sized reserve.

The 52-45 vote on Thursday removed the protections using the Congressional Review Act.

The act gives Congress a path to block rules issued by federal agencies. Federal law prevents the plan from being "reissued in substantially the same form."

Conservation groups argue that using the act to undo a land-use plan is unprecedented.

They say it's part of a larger move by the Republican-led House and Senate halting certain land-use plans that apply to federally managed areas in Alaska, Montana and North Dakota, using the Congressional Review Act.

Critics of the joint resolution say the 2022 plan for the reserve was developed after an extensive public review process and is designed to help balance industrial development with protecting subsistence hunters and wildlife, including migratory birds and polar bears.

Two Alaska groups said in a statement Thursday that the rollback of the plan would leave more than 13 million acres of protected Special Areas vulnerable. Those lands consist of the Utukok River Uplands, Colville River, Kasegaluk Lagoon, Peard Bay and the Teshekpuk Lake area that's considered vital for caribou needed for subsistence hunts.

Rosemary Ahtuangaruak, from the village of Nuiqsut in the region and head of Grandmothers Growing Goodness, said in the statement that Congress and the Trump administration are giving away lands in the Western Arctic for unchecked oil and gas development, even during a government shutdown.

"We rely on these lands, and the precious life that dwells in them, for subsistence, tradition, and culture," Ahtuangaruak said. "Attempts to revoke these protections, which were carefully crafted with our input, are an affront to our right to live safely and healthily in the home we've known for generations upon generations."

Alaska's congressional delegation praised the Senate's passage in a statement.

"The Biden administration's 2022 NPR-A Integrated Activity Plan was one of the most blatant examples of federal overreach we've seen in Alaska in decades," Sullivan said. "This plan effectively locked up about half of the National Petroleum Reserve — an area Congress explicitly set aside for energy production, ignored Alaska Native voices, violated clear congressional intent, and undermined our state's ability to responsibly develop the resources that support our communities and strengthen our nation."

In September, the Senate also joined the House in repealing Biden-era protections for the Central Yukon region, using the Congressional Review Act. The action is designed in part to support development of the proposed 211-mile Ambler Road through Alaska wilderness to support mining. Alaska's congressional delegation sponsored that joint resolution.

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