This Alabama national forest is ‘spectacularly diverse’—and Big Oil sees it as a target for new drilling

By Inside Climate News
Fast Company
January 29, 2025
Category: Forestry
Region: United States, US East

CONECUH COUNTY, Alabama —At the confluence of the Yellow River and Pond Creek in Alabama’s Conecuh National Forest, there’s a place of peace. …As the Biden administration came to a close earlier this month, officials with the U.S. Forest Service initiated the process of “scoping” the possibility of new oil and gas leases in Conecuh National Forest. On Jan. 6, USFS announced it would soon begin a 30-day comment period to solicit public opinion on the proposal, which includes the continued availability of tens of thousands of acres of federal land for oil and gas leasing and the possibility of leasing an additional, nearly 3,000 acres where the federal government owns mineral rights but not surface rights. Conecuh National Forest stretches along the Alabama-Florida border, spanning more than 85,000 acres across two counties in the Yellowhammer State.

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