The U.S. Interior Department on Wednesday said no bids were submitted for this week's oil and gas lease sale in Alaska's Arctic National Wildlife Refuge — a sale the state has challenged as too restrictive and at odds with a 2017 law aimed at opening the refuge's sweeping coastal plan to exploration and development.

A sale to drill on the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge yielded no bids this week, the Interior Department announced — capping off decades of debate over the drilling in the vast wildlife refuge. The White House drew ire from environmental groups when it announced last month that it would proceed with a congressionally mandated oil sale on the Alaska refuge.