A group of Alaska Native towns, tribes and businesses on the North Slope is challenging new federal restrictions on oil production in the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska.

Voice of the Arctic Iñupiat filed a lawsuit last week in U.S. District Court in Anchorage challenging a Biden administration executive order passed in May that tightens environmental requirements for development in NPR-A, a federal area the size of Indiana.

The lawsuit alleges that the Bureau of Land Management's rule effectively gives 13.1 million acres previously protected wilderness status, the highest level of environmental protection, and prohibits the leasing of another large swath.

The advocacy group, funded largely by the Arctic Slope Regional Corporation and the North Slope Borough, has been protesting the rule for months. Its campaign may have received a boost from a U.S. Supreme Court ruling last week called Loper Bright, which takes away some of the latitude of government agencies to issue regulations on matters not covered by the law.

Voice of the Arctic Iñupiat says that people on the North Slope benefit from oil production primarily through local taxes on the industry.

“These tax revenues constitute the majority of the North Slope Borough's revenues, which are then used to fund a wide range of essential public services,” the lawsuit states, “including sewer, water, heating, sanitation, schools, clinics, hospitals, wildlife and fisheries management and research, infrastructure, and social and cultural programs.”

The group believes the Biden administration's environmental restrictions threaten to undo the progress that has improved their lives.

Many environmental groups welcomed the Biden administration's settlement for the preserve, saying it would protect birds, wildlife and other vital subsistence resources. The protections included in the settlement helped temper their anger at President Biden for allowing ConocoPhillips to proceed with Willow, a major oil development currently underway in NPR-A.

The Center for Biological Diversity, however, believes the regulation does not go far enough, as it still allows oil and gas production on about half of the reserve.

“This could potentially result in hundreds of millions of barrels of additional oil production, and hundreds of millions of tons of greenhouse gas emissions,” said Cooper Freeman, Alaska director of the Center for Biological Diversity. “The planet, the Arctic, Arctic wildlife and communities across Alaska simply cannot sustain this level of destruction from climate change.”