The Department of Interior moratorium on processing the more routine oil and gas permits on federal land will expire on Sunday. The moratorium was issued Jan. 20 at the secretarial level by the interim secretary, Scott de la Vega, who has since been replaced by Deb Haaland.
The order put at least one Alaska company in a bind for a couple of weeks, but that company was eventually able to get its permit signed off on by one of the political appointees in the department; career staff had been sidelined from signing drilling permits.
The Biden Administration thought the Trump Administration was too liberal in issuing permits.
Separately, President Biden still has an executive order pausing new oil and gas leasing.
