Action Alerts

Defend the Arctic Refuge from oil and gas drilling 

What's At Stake

The Arctic faces unprecedented threats from aggressive oil and gas drilling proposals. These risky ventures endanger fragile ecosystems, Indigenous communities, and accelerate the climate crisis.    

As part of a larger effort to relegate Alaska’s vast irreplaceable landscapes to drilling, mining, and logging, the Trump administration has prioritized fossil fuel industry wishes by recklessly moving to open the entire 1.56 million acre of the Coastal Plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil and gas development.  

The administration is now asking for comments on which areas of the Arctic Refuge should lease to fossil fuel companies for drilling. We need to officially register our overwhelming opposition and say: the Arctic should be protected, not drilled for oil and gas.  

Read More

The Arctic National Wildlife Refuge covers about 19.3 million acres in northeast Alaska and is the largest national refuge in the United States. It supports a broad range of species including caribou, brown, black, and polar bears, Dall sheep, moose, foxes, muskoxen, marine mammals including whales and seals, and numerous birds. Within the coastal plain of the Refuge are the calving grounds of the Porcupine Caribou herd, which have sustained Gwich’in people for generations. 

Proposals to open the Arctic Refuge are only the beginning. This is an early step in the Trump administration’s unprecedented push to maximize oil and gas drilling in Alaska by leasing even more ecologically sensitive lands and waters to the highest-bidding fossil fuel company.    

People have worked together for decades to defend the Arctic Refuge, because this unique landscape is too special to be sacrificed to the oil industry for profit.  That’s why we need to speak up at every opportunity. We must defend the Arctic, advocate for protections, and prevent destruction.  

Two polar bears, a mother and cub, walk on a frozen field.
Polar bears on the coast of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. (Florian Schulz / protectthearctic.org)

22 Days Remain

Delivery to Bureau of Land Management

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Your Actions Matter

Your messages make a difference, even if we have leaders who don't want to listen. Here's why.

You level the playing field.

Elected officials pay attention when they see that we are paying attention. Read more.

They may be hearing from industry lobbyists left and right, but hearing the stories of their constituents — that’s your power.

Our legislators serve at the pleasure of the people who gave them their job — you.

Make sure your elected officials know whose community and whose values they represent. When you contact your elected official, you’re putting a face and a name on an issue.

Whether or not you voted for them, they work for you, for the duration of their term.

Make sure your elected officials know whose community and whose values they represent. (Find your local, state, and federal elected officials.)

Your action is with us in court.

If a federal agency finalizes a harmful action, the record of public comments provides a basis for bringing them into court. Read more.

Throughout each of the public comment periods we alert you to, Earthjustice’s attorneys are researching and writing in-depth, technical comments to submit — detailing how the regulation could and should be stronger to protect the environment, our communities, and our planet.

We need you to join us — your specific experiences, knowledge, and voice are crucial to add to the Administrative Record through the comment periods.

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Your actions aid our litigation. Taking action and submitting comments during a comment period is substantively important.

It’s the law.

Federal agencies must pause what they’re doing and ask for — and consider — your comment. Read more.

Many of us may have never heard of the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) and the Administrative Procedure Act (APA), but laws like these require our government to ask the public to weigh in before agencies adopt or change regulations.

Regulations essentially describe how federal agencies will carry out laws — including decisions that could undermine science, or weaken safeguards on public health.

Public comments are collected at various points throughout the federal government’s rulemaking process, including when a regulation is proposed and finalized. (Learn about the rulemaking process.) These comments become part of the official, legal public record — the “Administrative Record.”

When the public responds with a huge outpouring of support for environmental protections, these individual messages collectively undercut politicians' attempts to claim otherwise.

What this means is each of us can take a role in shaping the rules our government creates — and ensuring those rules are fair and effective.