Consortium Statement on Administration’s Pause on LNG Exports

A Win for Health, Climate, and Communities

On January 26, the Biden Administration announced that it would pause federal approval of new liquified natural gas (LNG) exports while the Department of Energy reviews its criteria for determining if an application is in the public interest. We applaud the Biden Administration’s decision to listen to the voices of a broad coalition of advocates, including a letter that the Medical Society Consortium joined with 30 other health professional organizations detailing the health harms of LNG exports. These harms include risks of congenital heart defects, childhood leukemia, asthma, kidney disease, heart failure hospitalizations, and premature death for the 18 million individuals that live within one mile of these polluting industries.

We hope this will ultimately be seen as a decisive moment when the U.S. pivoted away from allowing the fossil fuel industry to embed itself into our energy future. The decision protects the future health of everyone, today and into future generations, and ensures we do not continue overburdening frontline climate communities where these facilities would have been located. It also demonstrates how we act upon our commitment to 200 nations made at COP28 to phase out fossil fuels as an essential step to meeting our climate goals. Together, with a growing legion of advocates around the country, health voices for climate action are ensuring a safe, just, and sustainable world for all.