How will Biden's offshore oil and gas drilling ban affect New Mexico?

Whether it was applause or condemnation, President Joe Biden grabbed attention Monday with his announcement of a 628 million-acre federal ban on offshore oil and gas drilling. Incoming President-elect Donald Trump kept the headlines moving as he vowed to “unban it immediately,” though how realistic that is remains to be seen.

In New Mexico, the second-largest oil-producing state in the nation, the decision doesn’t immediately have consequences. But energy advocates say there could be effects in the future, whether the ban stays in place or not.

Biden on Monday issued two presidential memoranda to bar future oil and gas leasing in all U.S. Outer Continental Shelf areas off the East and West coasts, the eastern Gulf of Mexico and parts of the Northern Bering Sea.

The ban affects about 628 million acres in total. It doesn’t affect large parts of the Gulf of Mexico, which is where most U.S. offshore drilling takes place.

“My decision reflects what coastal communities, businesses and beachgoers have known for a long time: that drilling off these coasts could cause irreversible damage to places we hold dear and is unnecessary to meet our nation’s energy needs,” Biden said in a statement. “It is not worth the risks.”

While the Permian Basin — New Mexico’s most prolific oil basin — doesn’t see an immediate, direct impact, it could be affected down the line, according to Larry Behrens, communications director for the national energy nonprofit Power the Future. Behrens told the Journal he could see producers trying to compensate for the offshoring ban in the future, as the ban will result in supply deficits. And that, he added, would drive up costs for oil and gas.

“But it all depends on how it’s going to shake out, both policy-wise and legally in the courts over the next six months,” he added.

His outrage over the ban aligns with other conservative leaders and organizations who have spoken out against Biden’s move, announced in the president’s final two weeks in office. Biden’s memoranda would also likely require an act from Congress to repeal, making it difficult for Trump to undo.

Behrens called it a scheme by Biden, so even if Trump tried to repeal the ban, environmental organizations would sue the Republican president in court.

“For him to take these waters off limits is nothing more than a punitive action in favor of his green agenda,” he said.

Not everyone agrees with that narrative.

The Center for Western Priorities highlighted that oil and gas production is at a record high under the Biden administration, which has been consistently approving drilling permits over the past four years.

The oil and gas industry has more than 10 million acres of unused drilling leases on public lands, including 4,401 approved and unused permits in New Mexico, according to data from the Bureau of Land Management.

The outrage over a ban in areas where offshore drilling isn’t majorly located doesn’t make sense when there’s land to drill on in the U.S. anyway, said Aaron Weiss, deputy director for the Center for Western Priorities.

“It really makes no sense when you look at the areas that are affected,” he told the Journal.

Additionally, Trump himself in 2020 put a decade long moratorium in place prohibiting drilling in waters off Florida, Georgia and South Carolina coasts, Weiss pointed out. Those bans are in place until 2032.

That was a reversal from earlier in his presidency when he initially moved to vastly expand offshore drilling, before retreating amid widespread opposition in Florida and other coastal states, according to the Associated Press.

“Offshore drilling anywhere up and down the eastern seaboard is a political third rail,” Weiss said.

However, the ban still helps provide “a level of certainty” for coastal communities that drilling and potential oil spills won’t occur, Weiss said.

“With today’s action President Biden continues to build a great conservation legacy,” said Jennifer Rokala, executive director of the Center on Western Priorities, in a statement. “This will protect hundreds of coastal communities from the dangers of oil and gas drilling.”

The Associated Press contributed to this article.