Reported by: Anza CRWE Newswire Middle East Correspondent.
The Obama Administration is setting aside 187,000 square miles in Alaska as a “critical habitat” for polar bears, which could potentially severely curtail and add unanticipated limitations to anticipated offshore drilling for oil and gas off the Alaska coast.

The total is less than originally planned for in a preliminary plan released last year and includes large areas of sea ice off the Alaska coast. It is about 13,000 square miles or 8.3 million acres.

Tom Strickland, Assistant Secretary for Fish, Wildlife and Parks at the Interior Department, indicated that the designation is aimed at preventing polar bear extinction in recognition that the greatest danger currently facing polar bears is the melting of Arctic sea ice caused by climate change.

This critical territory designation enables the government to limit actions within these critical designations to prevent damage to the polar bear populations, according to Strickland. He intended to persist to work toward comprehensive strategies for the long term survival of this iconic species.

Designation of critical habitat does not in itself obstruct economic activity or other advancement, but federal officials need to consider whether the proposed action would negatively affect the nation’s economic recovery.

In the Beaufort and Chukchi seas off Alaska’s northern coast, almost 95% of the designated territory is sea ice. Polar bears spend most of their lives on the frozen ocean where they hunt seals, breed and travel.

Attorney, Kassie Siegel, for the Center for Biological Diversity, an environmental group, that has filed a lawsuit to augment fortifications for the polar bear, hailed the designation of critical habitat.

Siegel found it mandatory for the administration to entail a moratorium on oil and gas drilling in bear habitat areas. An oil spill there would be a disaster, according to her.

Kara Moriarty, Deputy Director of the Alaska Oil and Gas Association, expressed that the action would harm oil and gas investigation in Alaska because of creating more delays and added costs to projects in what already is a high cost environment.
The companies and the industry will be required to go through more permitting and create alleviation measures without a direct advantage to the polar bear or oil and gas development, as said by Moriarty. The Fish and Wildlife Service has found time and again, their activities pretense no menace to the polar bear.

________________________________________________________

The Views and Opinions Expressed by the author are his or her opinions only and do not necessarily reflect those of this Web-Site or its agents, affiliates, officers, directors, staff, or contractors. The author at the time of this article did not own any shares or receive any consideration financial or otherwise from any company or person mentioned or referred to in the article.