Imminent Alaska Oil Drilling Halted

Great & Important News: a federal court just prevented oil and gas drilling operations from moving ahead in millions of acres spanning Alaska’s Chukchi Sea — one of our nation’s two "Polar Bear Seas." The ruling is a huge victory – it will forestall a potential disaster that would make the Gulf look like child’s play and will immediately protect sensitive Arctic habitat for endangered polar bears, walruses and bowhead whales, already besieged by melting ice from climate change. One of the last things the Bush Administration did in its final days was initiate a massive fire sale of drilling rights in the Chukchi Sea. Very unfortunately, the Obama Administration has adopted this reckless "drill everywhere" policy, including the Arctic, where BP is a main player. In a successful federal lawsuit, NRDC, Earthjustice, Alaska Native groups and others charged the government failed to analyze the potential impact on the Arctic from an oil spill and in handing out the permits, broke US environmental law. The judge ordered the drilling rights be revoked until a science-based environmental analysis is conducted. The fight continues to stop Shell from drilling off the coast of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in the Beaufort Sea […]

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