Feds should protect Big Cypress National Preserve from future oil exploration, advocates urge

National park advocates are publicly urging federal atmosphere officers to invoke a hardly ever used veto to protect Florida’s Big Cypress National Preserve from future oil exploration.

It’s an possibility the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has used solely 14 instances in 5 many years — together with most lately the Jan. 31 decision to protect Alaska’s Bristol Bay from mining — however the National Parks Conservation Association says Big Cypress is the right candidate for the federal authorities to make use of its veto authority and defend wetlands from the specter of future oil drilling.

The affiliation’s reasoning: Big Cypress is dwelling to a number of endangered species, together with the Florida panther, and is an important ingredient to sustaining the well being of Florida’s Everglades; it’s susceptible to the seismic testing oil corporations have used on the protect up to now to seek for oil; and one of many few instances the Environmental Protection Agency has used its uncommon authority was to protect the Everglades from a rock-plowing mission in 1988, which means the precedent already exists.

“Future oil exploration poses a substantial and clear threat to the sensitive wetland habitats and habitats for endangered and threatened species like ghost orchids, Florida panthers and others,” Melissa Abdo, a regional director for the National Parks Conservation Association, informed the Tampa Bay Times in an interview Tuesday evening.

The affiliation, which advocates on behalf of the nationwide parks system, publicly known as on the Environmental Protection Agency Wednesday morning to make use of its veto authority under the Clean Water Act, known as Section 404(c). The enchantment adopted a letter from the affiliation’s lawyer to the Environmental Protection Agency’s head, Michael Regan, Jan. 25.

“It is clear to us that oil activities would have an adverse impact on these wetlands and on wildlife. And thus it’s very clear to us that 404(c) is warranted here,” Abdo mentioned.

In 2017 and 2018, Texas-based Burnett Oil surveyed for potential oil deposits within the protect, and finally received a lawsuit in opposition to a coalition of environmental teams. After Burnett Oil accomplished seismic testing, federal regulators with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers first decided heavy equipment had gouged Big Cypress’ wetlands, however then walked back that assessment.

In February 2022, Burnett Oil withdrew its software for a development allow for an oil and gasoline nicely pad within the protect, however in a letter to the state hinted it might submit a brand new allow quickly. The firm has but to reapply for a brand new allow, Florida Department of Environmental Protection spokesperson Alexandra Kuchta mentioned Tuesday evening.

Despite many Florida environmentalists’ opposition, Florida took management of wetlands allowing from the feds in 2020, changing into solely the third state within the nation to take action. But if the Environmental Protection Agency had been to finally invoke the Clean Water Act, it might supersede the state’s authority, in accordance with Jaclyn Lopez, an environmental legislation professor at Stetson University and former Florida director for the Center for Biological Diversity.

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“I certainly think this is a compelling case for the EPA to exercise its authority,” Lopez informed the Times. “This isn’t just a run of-the-mill project. This is oil drilling in a untouched area of a national park system.”

Not solely is the ecosystem vital for transferring water into the thirsty Everglades, it’s additionally vital to the Miccosukee and Seminole tribes of Florida, Lopez mentioned.

“These are really special wetlands,” she mentioned. “If the EPA was ever going to exercise its retained authority to revoke certain types of dredge and fill permits, this would be the exact type of situation that it should be doing that.”

The Environmental Protection Agency’s ruling would seemingly be extra slim, like refusing an organization’s request to construct oil infrastructure, as a substitute of a broad ban on oil drilling within the protect, in accordance with Lopez. Environmental Protection Agency officers didn’t reply to requests for remark.

The protect is overseen by the National Park Service, however rights to some assets underneath the floor are privately owned. The Collier household conveyed greater than 76,000 acres of land to the National Park Service within the Seventies, however saved the mineral rights. Mineral rights are for supplies like gasoline and oil which are beneath the land’s floor.

The National Parks Conservation Association says its request for the Environmental Protection Agency to make use of its veto authority doesn’t apply to legacy oil fields already within the protect, like Raccoon Point within the southeast nook of the protect, and the Bear Island oilfield within the northwest. Any oil and gasoline exercise in a nationwide park website “is of deep concern” to the affiliation, however the veto would solely forestall new exploratory and oil improvement work, in accordance with the group.

Meanwhile, efforts are ongoing to have the federal authorities buy the mineral rights and finish the prospect of drilling in Big Cypress for good.

“I still think that a buyout is going to have to be the ultimate solution. Even if the EPA does this, there’s still going to have to be some kind of buyout” to finish drilling totally, mentioned Matthew Schwartz, govt director of the South Florida Wildlands Association. Schwartz efficiently fought to cut back the variety of off-road automobile trails in elements of Big Cypress.

Still, he mentioned, he’d be “delighted” if the Environmental Protection Agency went by with the choice.

“There’s no question that all oil drilling activities have been damaging to Big Cypress,” Schwartz mentioned. “Big Cypress is unique. It’s not only one of the most biodiverse places in Florida, it’s one of the most biodiverse pieces of land in North America.”