US President Joe Biden has halted a major pipeline project and curbed leasing and permitting on federal lands. The US oil and gas sector now faces a waiting game to see how the administration’s energy policy will evolve, writes Jordan Blum. As a Democratic presidential candidate, Joe Biden pledged to cancel the decade-in-the-making Keystone XL Pipeline and, not so shockingly, he followed through on his first day as US president by revoking the Canadian heavy oil pipeline’s permitting. That was just the beginning. Since then, he’s imposed a broad moratorium on leases for federal lands and waters, indefinitely delaying scheduled lease sales in March and April for the deepwater Gulf of Mexico, New Mexico and a number of western states. And his Interior Department has a 60-day pause on most permits for oil and gas wells, only allowing approvals from senior-level staffers. Some believed Biden’s campaign pledges were just trying to satiate his party’s base and he would move toward the center after taking office. But Biden is following through with what he promised over and over again during his campaign. In fact, his campaign pledge of banning new oil and gas permitting on public lands and waters goes […]
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