The Business Genius

Opening the Arctic: Trump’s Greedy, Ignorant, and Self-Defeating Gamble

It begins with a bold declaration: the vast tundra of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) and the sprawling National Petroleum Reserve–Alaska (NPR-A) are once again being opened for oil and gas drilling—this time under the watch of Donald Trump. The move is pitched as an act of “energy independence” and “resource patriotism,” yet its motivations, consequences, and market logic paint a far less noble picture. What unfolds is not a visionary policy, but a short-sighted, donor-driven gambit masquerading as national security.

The Decision and What It Really Means

On January 20, 2025, President Trump signed an executive order titled “Unleashing Alaska’s Extraordinary Resource Potential,” declaring that the federal government would “fully avail itself” of Alaska’s abundant lands and expedite permitting and leasing of energy and natural-resource projects.¹
Within that mandate:

• The entire 1.56 million-acre Coastal Plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) was made available for oil and gas leasing.²

• Up to 80 % of the 23 million-acre National Petroleum Reserve–Alaska (NPR-A)—roughly 18.8–20 million acres—was designated for leasing and resource access.³

• The Interior Department, led by Secretary Doug Burgum, was instructed to roll back land withdrawals, convey tracts for industry use, and support new roads and pipelines across sensitive tundra.⁴

The plan also mandates at least five massive lease sales across NPR-A over the next decade (each covering about 4 million acres) and multiple lease sales in ANWR—far exceeding the two sales required under the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act.⁵

In short: an all-in bet on drilling one of Earth’s most fragile, remote frontiers.

The Market Doesn’t Want This Oil

If this were truly an economic win-win, oil majors would be racing north. Instead, a January 2025 ANWR lease sale drew zero bids.⁶ A previous Trump-era sale in 2021 fetched just $14.4 million — with the state of Alaska itself as the only bidder.⁷

The reason is simple economics: Arctic oil is slow, risky, and expensive. Harsh weather, lack of infrastructure, and reputational blowback make it one of the least attractive petroleum plays on Earth.⁸ Even if new production began, it would come online years after the clean-energy transition renders such investments obsolete.

The public is being sold “jobs and energy dominance,” but the private market is quietly saying, “No thanks.”

The Climate Math: Breaking the Carbon Budget

To keep global warming below 1.5 °C (≈ 2.7 °F), about 60 % of known fossil-fuel reserves must remain unextracted. Every new Arctic project makes that goal harder, not easier.⁹

Worse, Arctic extraction carries a double penalty: permafrost thaw triggered by warming releases massive stores of methane and carbon dioxide — amplifying emissions and undermining the very infrastructure meant to deliver profits. A recent study projects $37–$51 billion in Alaska infrastructure losses this century from thaw-related damage.¹⁰

Drilling here doesn’t secure the future; it sabotages it.

Spill Risk in the Frozen Dark

Picture an oil blowout in −40 °C (−40 °F) temperatures, under months of darkness, across ice-covered seas hundreds of miles from the nearest deep-water port. No fleet can get there fast enough, and no technology can mop up oil trapped beneath sea ice. The National Academies of Sciences and other reviews agree: Arctic spill response remains largely theoretical. Equipment fails; microbial degradation slows; tracking oil under ice is nearly impossible.¹¹

Every gallon spilled becomes the public’s problem. Yet the administration pretends this is just another Gulf of Mexico lease — ignoring the physics of cold, darkness, and distance.

Wildlife and Indigenous Impacts

The Coastal Plain of ANWR is the calving ground for the Porcupine caribou herd and home to polar bears, migratory birds, and tundra wolves. For the Gwich’in people, it is sacred land — the “Sacred Place Where Life Begins.” Industrial noise, seismic testing, and road building threaten those ecosystems and cultures alike.¹²

Some Inupiat villages support limited development for economic reasons, but that does not excuse the lack of genuine consultation and cultural safeguards. The result is a divide-and-conquer approach pitting Indigenous communities against one another — a pattern as old as colonial resource policy itself.¹³

Every road and pipeline carved through this tundra is a line drawn through a living culture.

The Economic Mirage

Alaska already derives over 90 % of its general fund revenue from oil and gas, a dependency that has left its budget volatile and its future uncertain.¹⁴ Trump’s expansion exacerbates that addiction just as global markets shift away from fossil fuels.

Because Arctic projects take decades to develop, any oil produced would likely enter a market in decline. Add thaw-related repairs, spill liability, and climate litigation risk — and the balance sheet flips negative.¹⁵ It’s not economic development; it’s publicly subsidized asset stranding.

The Donor Trail: Trump’s Industry Ties

Follow the money and the picture snaps into focus. A 2024 report from Climate Power found that Big Oil spent roughly $450 million in the 2023-24 election cycle to influence Trump and Republican lawmakers — including nearly $100 million directly to Trump-aligned PACs.¹⁶

That same spring, Trump hosted a Mar-a-Lago dinner where he asked oil executives for $1 billion in campaign donations in exchange for rolling back climate rules and green-lighting drilling.¹⁷

His Interior Secretary, Doug Burgum, was a former oil-state governor with direct industry ties; his family held leases with companies he now regulates.¹⁸ These aren’t conflicts of interest — they’re the point.

The Legal and Political Maneuvering

The playbook is brazenly familiar. Trump’s January 2025 order revived his first-term push for “energy dominance,” undoing Biden-era protections and revoking conservation designations across NPR-A.¹⁹ His Interior Department then fast-tracked rule changes to re-issue leases in ANWR and strip “special areas” of protected status — even as lawsuits from environmental and Indigenous coalitions stack up.²⁰

The objective is speed: get leases signed before courts can intervene, creating property-like interests that future administrations can’t easily revoke.²¹ By the time litigation catches up, the damage — political and ecological — is done.

The Verdict

In the courtroom of reality, the verdict is damning:

• Short-sighted: Locks America into fossil dependency just as the world moves on.

• Greedy: Caters to donors and corporations at the expense of citizens.

• Ignorant: Denies climate science and economic facts alike.

• Stupid: Turns one of Earth’s last untouched frontiers into a political piggy bank.

This is not energy policy — it’s an act of ecological vandalism funded by campaign cash.

If democracy means choosing citizens over corporations, this decision fails every test. On behalf of future generations, the jury is us — and the verdict must be “No More.”

Call to Action

• Policy: Codify permanent protections for ANWR and NPR-A; require full-cost bonding for frontier leases including climate liability.

• Finance: Urge pension and sovereign funds to divest from new frontier fossil projects.

• Legal: Support Indigenous and environmental litigation; demand robust Environmental Impact Statements.

• Civic: Amplify Arctic voices — the Gwich’in, Inupiat, and future generations who stand to pay the price.

The truth is simple: the Arctic is melting, not for lack of data but for lack of honesty. And once again, greed has chosen ignorance over intelligence.

References – Opening the Arctic: Trump’s Greedy, Ignorant, and Self-Defeating Gamble

¹ White House. Unleashing Alaska’s Extraordinary Resource Potential. Executive Order of January 20, 2025. Washington, DC: Office of the President. https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/01/unleashing-alaskas-extraordinary-resource-potential/?utm_source=chatgpt.com.

² Alaska’s News Source. “Trump Administration to Open ANWR and NPR-A for Oil and Gas Leases.” Alaska’s News Source. March 20, 2025. https://www.alaskasnewssource.com/2025/03/20/trump-administration-open-anwr-npr-a-oil-gas-leases/?utm_source=chatgpt.com.

³ Alaska’s News Source. “Trump Administration to Open ANWR and NPR-A for Oil and Gas Leases.” Alaska’s News Source. March 20, 2025. https://www.alaskasnewssource.com/2025/03/20/trump-administration-open-anwr-npr-a-oil-gas-leases/?utm_source=chatgpt.com.

⁴ U.S. Department of the Interior. “Interior Secretary Takes Steps to Unleash Alaska’s Extraordinary Resource Potential.” DOI Press Release. January 2025. https://www.doi.gov/pressreleases/interior-secretary-takes-steps-unleash-alaskas-extraordinary-resource-potential?utm_source=chatgpt.com.

⁵ Protect the Arctic Coalition. “I Can Help Protect the Arctic.” Protect the Arctic. 2025. https://www.protectthearctic.org/i-can-help?utm_source=chatgpt.com.

⁶ Reuters. “Arctic Wildlife Refuge Oil Drilling Auction Yields No Bids, U.S. Says.” Reuters. January 8, 2025. https://www.reuters.com/world/us/alaska-wildlife-refuge-drilling-auction-yields-no-bids-us-says-2025-01-08/?utm_source=chatgpt.com.

⁷ E&E News. “Alaska Readies for Trump’s Oil and Gas Surge — Will It Happen?” E&E News. December 2024. https://www.eenews.net/articles/alaska-readies-for-trumps-oil-and-gas-surge-will-it-happen/?utm_source=chatgpt.com.

⁸ E&E News. “Alaska Readies for Trump’s Oil and Gas Surge — Will It Happen?” E&E News. December 2024. https://www.eenews.net/articles/alaska-readies-for-trumps-oil-and-gas-surge-will-it-happen/?utm_source=chatgpt.com.

⁹ Rogelj, Joeri, et al. “Mitigation Pathways Compatible with 1.5 °C in the Context of Sustainable Development.” In IPCC Special Report on Global Warming of 1.5 °C, edited by Valérie Masson-Delmotte et al. Geneva: Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, 2018. https://www.ipcc.ch/sr15/.

¹⁰ Hinzman, Larry D., et al. “Permafrost Thaw and Infrastructure Risk in Alaska.” Environmental Research Letters 17, no. 4 (2022): 045006. https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/ac5d7f.

¹¹ National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. Responding to Oil Spills in the U.S. Arctic Marine Environment. Washington, DC: National Academies Press, 2014. https://doi.org/10.17226/18625.

¹² Politico. “Trump Preparing to Reopen Alaska Wildlife Refuge for Oil Drilling.” Politico. October 17, 2025. https://www.politico.com/news/2025/10/17/trump-preparing-to-reopen-alaska-wildlife-refuge-for-oil-drilling-00612938?utm_source=chatgpt.com.

¹³ The Guardian. “Oil and Gas Drilling in Alaska Wildlife Refuge Condemned by Conservationists.” The Guardian. October 23, 2025. https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/oct/23/oil-gas-drilling-alaska-national-wildlife-refuge?utm_source=chatgpt.com.

¹⁴ The Guardian. “Trump Administration Pushes Massive Expansion of Drilling and Mining in Alaska.” The Guardian. June 2, 2025. https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/jun/02/trump-administration-alaska-drilling-mining?utm_source=chatgpt.com.

¹⁵ Protect the Arctic Coalition. “I Can Help Protect the Arctic.” Protect the Arctic. 2025. https://www.protectthearctic.org/i-can-help?utm_source=chatgpt.com.

¹⁶ Climate Power. Big Oil’s $450 Million Campaign: How Fossil Fuel Money Bought Trump and the 119th Congress. Washington, DC: Climate Power, 2024. https://climatepower.us/news/new-report-oil-and-gas-industry-spent-450-million-to-influence-trump-and-the-119th-congress/?utm_source=chatgpt.com.

¹⁷ Politico. “Trump Asks Oil Executives for $1 Billion in Campaign Donations.” Politico. May 9, 2024. https://www.politico.com/news/2024/05/09/trump-asks-oil-executives-campaign-finance-00157131?utm_source=chatgpt.com.

¹⁸ Associated Press. “Interior Secretary Doug Burgum’s Business Ties to Oil Companies Raise Ethics Questions.” AP News. February 7, 2025. https://apnews.com/article/3ebe90d0207c99866365d72e74eda371?utm_source=chatgpt.com.

¹⁹ White House. Unleashing Alaska’s Extraordinary Resource Potential. Executive Order of January 20, 2025. Washington, DC: Office of the President. https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/01/unleashing-alaskas-extraordinary-resource-potential/?utm_source=chatgpt.com.

²⁰ Governing Magazine. “Trump Administration to Reverse Ban on Alaska North Slope Drilling.” Governing. February 2025. https://www.governing.com/resilience/trump-administration-to-reverse-ban-on-alaska-north-slope-drilling?utm_source=chatgpt.com.

²¹ Politico. “Trump Preparing to Reopen Alaska Wildlife Refuge for Oil Drilling.” Politico. October 17, 2025. https://www.politico.com/news/2025/10/17/trump-preparing-to-reopen-alaska-wildlife-refuge-for-oil-drilling-00612938?utm_source=chatgpt.com.