The Biden administration is expected to deny permission for a mining company to build a 211-mile industrial road through fragile Alaskan wilderness, handing a victory to environmentalists in an election year when the president wants to underscore his credentials as a climate leader and conservationist.
The Interior Department intends to announce as early as this week that there should be “no action” on the federal land where the road known as the Ambler Access Project would be built, according to two people familiar with the decision who asked not to be named because they were not authorized to discuss the decision. A formal denial of the project would come later this year, they said.
The road was essential to reach what is estimated to be a $7.5 billion copper deposit buried under ecologically sensitive land. There are currently no mines in the area and no requests for permits have been filed with the government; the road was a first step.
Blocking the industrial road would be an enormous victory for opponents who have argued for years that it would threaten wildlife as well as Alaska Native tribes that rely on hunting and fishing.
Environmentalists, including many young climate activists, were infuriated last year by President Biden’s decision to approve Willow, an $8 billion oil drilling project on pristine federal land in Alaska. The proposed road would be several hundred miles south of the Willow project.
The move comes as the Biden administration tries to find a balance between two different and sometimes opposing goals.