According to a story by Reuters, The Biden administration this past Friday unveiled an environmental analysis for ConocoPhillips' planned $6 billion Willow oil and gas project in Alaska.
The analysis outlined several options for the development - one of which included not building it at all - and comes as President Joe Biden has sought to balance his goals of fighting climate all while dealing with calls to increase fuel supplies in the face of record energy prices.
The release of the document has been highly anticipated by the oil and gas industry and environmental groups since last year, when a federal judge in Alaska reversed the Trump administration's approval of the massive project.
It said federal agencies must reconsider their environmental analysis.
From an economic and job creation standpoint, a release by the IBEW suggests the project could create about 1,000 skilled construction jobs.
Dave Reaves, who was Local 1547's business manager for nearly four years before being appointed a Ninth District international representative in April of 2021, said the project is vital not just for jobs in Alaska, but for the entire state.
"We rely on oil and gas revenue," Reaves said. "It's one of the major drivers of the state's economy and we've been in one of the longest recessions [dating back to 2014] in our history. We were starting to come out of that before COVID-19 set us back."
The Willow project area holds an estimated 600 million barrels of oil - translating roughly to more than the amount currently held in the U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve, the country's emergency supply stored in caverns along the Gulf Coast.
