President Joe Biden’s administration said Monday it is taking steps to bar oil, gas and geothermal development for 20 years in northeastern Nevada’s Ruby Mountains.
The administration said it has submitted an application to withdraw about 264,000 acres of federal lands in the area from such leasing. That starts a 90-day public comment period on the 20-year prohibition and prevents oil, gas and geothermal development for two years during the process.
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The lands would remain open to mining.
Patrick Donnelly, Great Basin director at the Center for Biological Diversity, said in a statement that the move will stop speculative oil leasing in the area, but he still believes the protection of the Ruby Mountains is incomplete as long as mining is allowed.
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“The Ruby Mountains have no known oil reserves, and this withdrawal does nothing to ward off the truly urgent threat of gold mining,” Donnelly said.
The Biden administration said it moved to protect the lands at the request of Native American tribes, conservationists, hunters and anglers.
The move came three weeks before the inauguration of President-elect Donald Trump, who has vowed to ramp up oil and gas production and move away from Biden’s focus on climate change.
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In 2019, the U.S. Forest Service concluded oil and gas leasing wasn’t suitable in the Ruby Mountains. Opponents of oil and gas development saw it as victory against the Trump administration’s push for more energy exploration across the west.
