One Step Forward:
To the delight of environmental groups, the Bush administration reversed its position on Friday, concerning oil drilling in ecologically sensitive wetlands in Alaska.
The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) proposed a 10-year leasing moratorium for 430,000 acres in the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska, north and east of Teshekpuk Lake, which is the biggest freshwater lake on Alaska’s North Slope and a critical habitat for migrating birds and caribou.
The administration was prepared to sell drilling leases on the land two years ago, but a lawsuit by environmentalists and native groups temporarily stopped the plan.
Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne said the BLM’s new plan provides a balanced approach that take into consideration wildlife protection and energy development.
Jim Ducker, an environmental program analyst for the BLM said it’s "pretty darn unlikely" that there will be oil drilling in that area in the near future.
Having agreed to set this land aside, the BLM hopes to be able to move forward with other lease sales this fall, encompassing an area that was initially offered for lease by the Clinton Administration in 1999.
Stan Senner, executive director of Audubon Alaska is one of numerous environmental leaders pleased with the decision.
"It is a win," he said. "I think they’ve responded to public interest in seeing that the area’s protected, and it gives people who care about the place time to work on a permanent solution."
One Step Back:
The White House is preparing to implement new air quality rules that will make it easier to build power plants near national parks and wilderness areas, the Washington Post reported.
New regulations, opposed by park managers and Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) scientists, would rewrite a provision of the Clean Air Act giving the highest level of protection to Class 1 federal lands, such as Virginia’s Shenandoah, Colorado’s Mesa Verde and North Dakota’s Theodore Roosevelt national parks.
The EPA’s justification is that the nation needs a more uniform way of regulating emissions near protected areas.
he National Parks Conservation Association, an advocacy group, issued a report estimating that the changes would ease the way for the construction of 28 new coal-fired power plants within 186 miles of 10 national parks.
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