The planned Liberty Project is an artificial gravel island to allow oil drilling in the Arctic. Hilcorp / BOEM
Conservation groups are suing the Trump administration to halt construction of a controversial oil production facility in Alaska's Beaufort Sea, the first offshore oil drilling development in federal Arctic waters.
Hilcorp Alaska received the green light from the Interior Department in October to build the Liberty Project, a nine-acre artificial drilling island and 5.6-mile underwater pipeline, which environmentalists warn could risk oil spills in the ecologically sensitive area, threaten Arctic communities and put local wildlife including polar bears at risk.
<p>
In the lawsuit filed Monday, the <a href="https://www.biologicaldiversity.org/" target="_blank">Center for Biological Diversity</a>, <a href="https://foe.org/" target="_blank">Friends of the Earth</a>, <a href="http://greenpeace.org" target="_blank">Greenpeace</a>, <a href="https://defenders.org/" target="_blank">Defenders of Wildlife</a> and <a href="https://www.pacificenvironment.org/" target="_blank">Pacific Environment</a>—all represented by the environmental law nonprofit <a href="https://earthjustice.org/" target="_blank">Earthjustice</a>—claim the administration's approval violated federal laws and ignores the causes and effects of <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/climate-change">climate change</a>.
</p><p>
"We can't let this reckless administration open the Arctic to offshore oil drilling. It threatens Arctic wildlife and communities and will only make climate chaos worse around the world," said Kristen Monsell, oceans legal director with the Center for Biological Diversity in a <a href="https://earthjustice.org/news/press/2018/lawsuit-challenges-approval-of-offshore-oil-drilling-project-in-the-arctic" target="_blank">press release</a>. "Liberty is the bad step down a very dangerous path. An oil spill in the Arctic would be impossible to clean up in a region already stressed by climate change."
</p><p>
The Arctic is warming at twice the rate of anywhere else on Earth, and the region's air temperatures in the past five years between 2014-2018 have exceeded all previous records since 1900, <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/arctic-report-card-2623081883.html" target="_blank">government scientists warned</a> in a report earlier this month.
</p><p>
<span></span>Ironically, <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/oil-arctic-offshore-drilling-2619918075.html" target="_self">the Liberty Project has already been delayed</a> because of the effects of climate change. The region's unusual warmth has resulted in unstable land-fast sea ice, meaning that the ice simply isn't thick enough to transport construction materials.
</p><p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-twitter_embed">
</p><div id="de69c" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="T1GBFG1576662599"><blockquote class="twitter-tweet twitter-custom-tweet" data-twitter-tweet-id="1056261349808988161" data-partner="rebelmouse"><div style="margin:1em 0">Arctic Oil Drilling Project Approved by Trump Administration @savethearctic #SaveTheArctic #BigOil https://t.co/M1F1xWZQKk</div> — EcoWatch (@EcoWatch)<a href="https://twitter.com/EcoWatch/statuses/1056261349808988161">1540667304.0</a></blockquote></div>
<p></p><p>
Furthermore, when the administration approved the Liberty Project, it did not "account for climate-change impacts already happening in the Arctic like permafrost melt, sea-ice melt and increasing storms that make this an exceedingly dangerous prospect and increase the potential for oil spills," said Rebecca Noblin, staff attorney with Earthjustice, in the release.
</p><p>
"This danger is even more worrisome given Hilcorp's appalling record of safety and environmental violations," Kevin Harun, Arctic program director at Pacific Environment, noted in the release.
</p><p>
Last year, Hilcorp struggled to fix a <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/pipeline-leak-alaska-cook-inlet-2318088552.html" target="_self">natural gas leak from its underwater pipeline in Alaska's Cook Inlet</a>. For nearly four months, the ruptured pipeline released roughly 200,000 cubic feet of methane a day into the inlet.
</p><p>
Additionally, Hilcorp has been the <a href="https://www.biologicaldiversity.org/news/press_releases/2017/offshore-drilling-02-15-2017.php" target="_blank">most heavily fined</a> oil company in Alaska in recent years, with state regulators writing "disregard for regulatory compliance is endemic to Hilcorp's approach to its Alaska operations."
</p><p>
The Trump administration is <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/alaska-oil-gas-lease-sale-2623304775.html" target="_self">aggressively pursuing</a> Arctic oil and gas development. In October, Interior Secretary <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/ryan-zinke" target="_self">Ryan Zinke</a> touted Hilcorp's oil and gas project as part of his plan for "<a href="https://www.doi.gov/pressreleases/interior-approves-long-awaited-first-oil-production-facility-federal-waters-offshore" target="_blank">American energy dominance</a>."
</p><p>
"In a rush to drill for oil in Alaska's pristine Arctic coastlines, Donald Trump is flouting the law and endangering some of the most delicate coastlines in the world," said Marcie Keever, legal director with Friends of the Earth, in the press release. "This project is just one in a series of giveaways to oil companies looking to enrich their CEOs and investors on America's public lands and waters. Drilling for new oil off our shorelines and on our public lands, especially in the Arctic, puts the health of our children and their future on this planet into jeopardy."
</p><p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-twitter_embed">
</p><div id="3599e" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="XN02EW1576662599"><blockquote class="twitter-tweet twitter-custom-tweet" data-twitter-tweet-id="1073628234959466496" data-partner="rebelmouse"><div style="margin:1em 0">Wednesday's oil and gas lease sale in the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska (NPR-A) yielded a "disappointing" retur… https://t.co/W0F7jvikZR</div> — EcoWatch (@EcoWatch)<a href="https://twitter.com/EcoWatch/statuses/1073628234959466496">1544807892.0</a></blockquote></div>
<p></p>
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EcoWatch Daily Newsletter
New Report Details Trump's Destructive War on Science—And How the New Congress Can Fight Back
16 November 2018
Science
Demonstrators at the Earth Day March for Science Rally on April 22, 2017 in Washington, DC. Paul Morigi / Getty Images
A coalition of watchdog and advocacy organizations on Thursday released a new report detailing the Trump administration's nearly two-year war on science and how Congress can fight back.
Produced by 16 groups including the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS), Defenders of Wildlife and Greenpeace, Protecting Science at Federal Agencies: How Congress Can Help argues that while "scientific integrity at federal agencies has eroded" under President Donald Trump, "Congress has the power to halt and repair damage from federal agencies' current disregard for scientific evidence."
<p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-twitter_embed">
</p><div id="d61b4" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="SPDV9X1576661970"><blockquote class="twitter-tweet twitter-custom-tweet" data-twitter-tweet-id="1063140593684090880" data-partner="rebelmouse"><div style="margin:1em 0">Greenpeace is thrilled to be a part of this must-read report released by #MarchForScience partners that calls on Co… https://t.co/8zGJdZRDpe</div> — Greenpeace USA (@Greenpeace USA)<a href="https://twitter.com/greenpeaceusa/statuses/1063140593684090880">1542307444.0</a></blockquote></div>
<p></p><p>"It's so impressive," UCS's Michael Halpern <a href="https://blog.ucsusa.org/michael-halpern/as-congress-revives-its-oversight-responsibilities-science-should-be-on-the-agenda?_ga=2.142624053.1243991522.1542322377-1811211419.1542322377" target="_blank">wrote in a blog post</a> on Thursday, "that all of these organizations with desperate interests have come together because they recognize the harm Trump administration actions have had on topics as diverse as workplace injuries, reproductive health, the Census, chemical contamination, tipped workers, <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/endangered-species">endangered species</a>, <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/climate-change">climate change</a>, and <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/air-pollution">air pollution</a>."<br></p><p>As the report notes, "Federally sponsored scientific research and technology development have brought us the ability to explore outer space, convert sunlight into electricity, build super-computers, predict weather patterns, manufacture self-driving vehicles and use assisted reproductive technologies to give birth."</p><p>However, it continues, "when political interference occurs—such as politically motivated censorship, misrepresentation of scientific findings, or the suppression of the free flow of information from the government to the public—public health and well-being suffer."</p><p>To battle the administration's attacks on <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/science/">science</a>, the report calls on federal legislators to pass protective laws as well as reveal abuses of scientific integrity and increase accountability for political appointees by holding hearings, requesting investigations and utilizing congressional subpoena authority.</p><p>From the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (<a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/epa">EPA</a>) and Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) to the National Park Service (NPS) and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), the report points to examples of bad behavior across the federal government to identify six broad issues, and offers suggestions for tackling them.</p><p><strong>1. Politicization of Science Within Agencies</strong></p><p>"In several recent proposed rules, agencies have failed to uphold their responsibilities to consider relevant evidence and provide the public with necessary information," the report points out. To combat this, it suggests not only hearings, probes and subpoenas, but also using the appropriations process to ensure that funds are spent as intended, and considering whether political appointees have a history of undermining science.</p><p><strong>2. Threats to Science Advisory Committees and Science Advice</strong></p><p>Acknowledging the administration's efforts to hamstring the president's science adviser, the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, the President's Council on Science and Technology and advisory committees across federal agencies, the report calls for hearings and probes as well as legislation to close loopholes in the Federal Advisory Committee Act.</p><p><strong>3. Installing Unqualified and Conflicted Government Leaders</strong></p><p>Considering that "the current administration has filled several key cabinet positions with individuals who lack the bare minimum of relevant and appropriate qualifications," the report demands that senators use their constitutional advise and consent power to block unqualified candidates. It also recommends various pieces of legislation that aim to improve the hiring processes for civil servants.</p><p><strong>4. Reduced Communications from Scientific Agencies</strong></p><p>"Political appointees are increasingly censoring and suppressing scientific information, as well as deterring federal scientists from communicating openly with the public and the press," the report warns, imploring members of Congress to strengthen and pass the Science Integrity Act and improve protections for whistleblowers.</p><p><strong>5. Whistleblowing and Scientific Integrity</strong></p><p>The chapter dedicated to whistleblowers explains that "reprisal for whistleblowing unfortunately is real, despite the fact that whistleblowers are often the best, and sometimes the only, pathway toward holding government institutions accountable, ensuring regulatory compliance, and protecting the public's interest." Warning against "whistleblower witch hunts," it outlines ways in which lawmakers can enhance protections.</p><p><strong>6. A Low-Information Approach to Enforcement</strong></p><p>Although federal agencies are charged with enforcing laws enacted by Congress, the report notes that some "appear to be taking a low-information approach to enforcement: They are both weakening measures that would allow them to collect appropriate information about compliance and ignoring information they have, adopting seemingly willful blindness to violations."</p><p>The report urges lawmakers to "hold oversight hearings and initiate inquiries when a regulatory agency rolls back reporting requirements that advance transparency or displays a substantial drop in penalties or enforcement units."</p><p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-twitter_embed">
</p><div id="b1b28" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="P871901576661970"><blockquote class="twitter-tweet twitter-custom-tweet" data-twitter-tweet-id="1063138894085009409" data-partner="rebelmouse"><div style="margin:1em 0">In a report released today, 16 organizations including EPN, @UCSUSA, @Defenders, @EnviroIntegrity, @DemocracyFwd,… https://t.co/58V2iMrhPH</div> — Environmental Protection Network (@Environmental Protection Network)<a href="https://twitter.com/EnvProtectioNet/statuses/1063138894085009409">1542307039.0</a></blockquote></div>
<p></p><p><em>Reposted with permission from our media associate <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/2018/11/15/new-report-details-trumps-devastating-war-science-and-how-new-congress-can-fight" target="_blank">Common Dreams</a>.</em></p>
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NPS Photo / Kevyn Jalone
On World Animal Day, we celebrate all the furry, scaly, winged and finned creatures that inhabit our planet.
On this international day of action, participants aim to "raise the status of animals in order to improve welfare standards around the globe," according to organizers at the UK-based charity Naturewatch Foundation. The occasion was first celebrated in 1925 and is observed annually on Oct. 4.
<p>
Roughly 1,000 World Animal Day
<a href="https://www.worldanimalday.org.uk/events" target="_blank">events</a>, including educational workshops, adoptions, marches and fundraisers, will be held across 100 countries. Folks around the world are also making <a href="https://www.worldanimalday.org.uk/pledges" target="_blank">pledges</a>, such as using cruelty-free products or going <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/vegetarian">vegetarian</a> or <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/vegan">vegan</a> to help make a positive difference.
</p><p>
At EcoWatch, animal
<a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/conservation">conservation</a> is a major priority. Animals not only inspire wonder and awe, but as important parts to the ecosystems they inhabit, <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/biodiversity-climate-change-2547433920.html" target="_self">biodiversity loss</a> puts the environment and <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/biodiversity-human-well-being-2553170130.html">human well-being at risk</a>.
</p><p>
The following list shows some of our most popular animal-related content in the past year. These five stories highlight the threats faced by creatures great and small, from
<a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/pollinators">pollinator</a> deaths to "trophy" hunting. On a positive note, the list features conservation success stories, brave feats of activism and includes ways you can help protect animals in your everyday life.
</p><p>
<strong>1. </strong><strong><a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/syngenta-neonicotinoids-2518688773.html" target="_blank">EPA Considers Allowing Bee-Killing Pesticide to Be Sprayed on 165 Million Acres of U.S. Farmland</a>. </strong>This Dec. 2017 article by the <a href="https://www.biologicaldiversity.org/" target="_blank">Center for Biological Diversity</a> reported that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) had considered allowing the bee-killing <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/pesticides">pesticide</a> thiamethoxam to be sprayed on the most widely grown crops in the U.S. This harmful <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/neonicotinoids">neonicotinoid</a> pesticide has long been known to pose serious harm to bee populations, as well as birds of all sizes and aquatic invertebrates.
</p><ul class="ee-ul">
<li><strong>What you can do to help: </strong>The <a href="https://xerces.org/recommendations-to-protect-pollinators-from-neonicotinoids/" target="_blank">Xerces Society</a>, a non-profit invertebrate conservation society you should <a href="https://xerces.org/donate/" target="_blank">consider supporting</a>, has a number of recommendations to protect pollinators from neonicotinoids, from avoiding pesticide use around your home and asking your local nursery to stop selling the products. </li>
</ul><p>
<strong>2. </strong><strong><a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/mountain-gorilla-numbers-on-the-rise-2582376835.html" target="_blank">Against All Odds, Mountain Gorilla Numbers Are on the Rise</a>. </strong>A census of mountain gorillas showed that their population rose from 480 animals in 2010 to 604 as of June 2016, thanks to dedicated conservation efforts. The mountain gorilla subspecies is the only great ape known to be increasing in number.
</p><ul class="ee-ul">
<li><strong>What you can do to help: </strong>The <a href="https://gorillafund.org/" target="_blank">Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund</a> <a href="https://gorillafund.org/5-ways-to-help-save-gorillas/" target="_blank">recommends</a> asking your lawmakers to continue to support the <a href="http://www.fws.gov/international/wildlife-without-borders/great-ape-conservation-fund.html" target="_blank">Great Ape Conservation Fund</a>, as well as recycling cell phones and electronics, as they contain metals that are mined from gorilla habitat in the Democratic Republic of Congo. The fund also suggests looking for sustainable palm oil, wood and other eco-friendly products, as gorilla forest habitats in Asia are being deforested for their resources. </li>
</ul><p>
<strong>3. </strong><strong><a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/alaska-hunters-charged-with-killing-bears-2594586783.html" target="_blank">Father and Son Charged With Killing Mother Bear and 'Shrieking' Cubs in Den</a>.</strong> In April, a father and son from Palmer, Alaska shot and killed a mother black <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/bears" target="_self">bear</a> and her two "shrieking" newborn cubs in their den. The hunt took place on state land but the topic of trophy hunting has reignited under the <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/trump" target="_self">Trump</a> administration, which is <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/trump-hunting-alaska-conservation-2571000532.html" target="_self">proposing</a> to overturn an Obama-era rule that protects iconic predators in Alaska's <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/public-lands" target="_self">national preserves</a>. The plan would allow hunters to go to den sites to shoot bear cubs and wolf pups, lure and kill bears over bait, hunt bears with dogs and use motor boats to shoot swimming caribou.
</p><ul class="ee-ul">
<li><strong>What you can do to help:</strong> The proposed rule, which is <a href="https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2018/09/06/2018-19293/alaska-hunting-and-trapping-in-national-preserves-extension-of-public-comment-period" target="_blank">posted</a> in the federal register, is still accepting comments until 11:59 p.m. EST on Nov. 5, 2018. <a href="https://www.regulations.gov/comment?D=NPS-2018-0005-0001" target="_blank">Make your voice heard</a>!</li>
</ul><p>
<strong>4. <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/sea-shepherd-poaching-arrests-2550858029.html" target="_blank">Notorious Toothfish Poacher Arrested by Liberian Coast Guard, Assisted by Sea Shepherd</a>.</strong> In March, an infamous Antarctic and Patagonian toothfish <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/poaching" target="_self">poaching</a> vessel was arrested in Liberia with the assistance of Sea Shepherd, a marine conservation group.
</p><ul class="ee-ul">
<li><strong>What you can do to help:</strong> <a href="https://seashepherd.org/support-us/" target="_blank">Donate</a> to Sea Shepherd, which has been patrolling the high seas and enforcing conservation law worldwide for more than 40 years. There are countless other non-profits such as <a href="https://oceanconservancy.org/" target="_blank">Ocean Conservancy</a>, <a href="https://oceana.org/" target="_blank">Oceana</a> and <a href="https://www.surfrider.org/" target="_blank">Surfrider Foundation</a> that help protect our oceans and save the lives of aquatic life, dolphins, seals, whales and fish. </li>
</ul><p>
<strong>5. <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/endangered-species-act-republicans-2586332924.html" target="_blank">House Republicans Launch Extinction Bills to Cripple Endangered Species Act</a>. </strong>Republicans in the U.S. House of Representatives initiated yet another attack on the <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/endangered-species-act-republicans-2586332924.html" target="_blank">Endangered Species Act</a>. The Center for Biological Diversity reported that the move was among the <a href="https://www.biologicaldiversity.org/campaigns/esa_attacks/trumptable.html" target="_blank">75-plus legislative attacks</a> that have been launched against the Endangered Species Act ever since Trump took office—and more than 300 since 2011, when Republicans took over the U.S. House of Representatives. <strong></strong>
</p><ul class="ee-ul">
<li><strong>What you can do to help: </strong>The Endangered Species Act, signed into law by President Nixon in 1973, is one of the most successful wildlife conservation laws in the world. More than 99 percent of species covered under the law have been saved from extinction. Protect the law from becoming extinct itself by telling Congress that you support the law and oppose any efforts to weaken it. You can also sign these petitions from <a href="https://defenders.org/content/help-protect-endangered-species-act" target="_blank">Defenders of Wildlife</a> and the <a href="https://www.nrdc.org/save-endangered-species-act" target="_blank">Natural Resources Defense Council</a>. </li>
</ul>
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Support Ecowatch
A Virginia farm along the proposed path of the controversial Atlantic Coast Pipeline. Norm Shafer / Washington Post / Getty Images
August is off to a good start for environmental groups and communities in Virginia and West Virginia who oppose two pipelines that would carry fracked natural gas through the region.
<p>Three days after the U.S. Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/mountain-valley-pipeline-construction-halted-2593256634.html" target="_self">ordered work to pause</a> on the <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/mountain-valley-pipeline" target="_self">Mountain Valley Pipeline</a>, its sister pipeline also ran into legal trouble. </p><p>A federal appeals court on Monday vacated two permits required by the <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/atlantic-coast-pipeline" target="_self">Atlantic Coast Pipeline</a> to complete its 600 mile project beginning in West Virginia and traveling through Virginia to North Carolina, <a href="http://www.startribune.com/appeals-court-tosses-key-permits-for-atlantic-coast-pipeline/490185031/" target="_blank">The Associated Press reported</a>. </p><p>"There is no right way to build these dirty, dangerous fossil fuel projects, and people in Virginia and across the country will continue to come together to fight them until they are permanently halted," <a href="https://www.sierraclub.org/" target="_blank">Sierra Club</a> Executive Director Michael Brune told The Associated Press. </p><p>The Sierra Club was one of the groups, along with <a href="https://defenders.org/" target="_blank">Defenders of Wildlife</a> and the <a href="http://www.vawilderness.org/" target="_blank">Virginia Wilderness Committee</a>, that brought the case that led to the ruling by the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. The case was argued by the <a href="https://www.southernenvironment.org/" target="_blank">Southern Environmental Law Center</a>. </p><p>The court ruled that the a National Park Service (NPS) permit allowing the pipeline to pass under the Blue Ridge Parkway was invalid because it did not explain how the pipeline's construction would not contradict the scenic purpose of the parkway, which connects Virginia's Shenandoah National Park to North Carolina's Great Smoky Mountains National Park. </p><p>Construction would require cutting enough trees that a gap in the forest would be visible from at least one parkway observation point. </p><p>Chief Judge Roger Gregory called the permit "arbitrary and capricious" in his ruling. </p><p>"Arbitrary and capricious" were also the words used by the court to justify vacating a second permit granted by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service because it didn't specify any limits to the pipeline's impact on five threatened or <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/endangered-species" target="_self">endangered species</a>. </p><p>The revoking of the second permit built on a <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/atlantic-coast-pipeline-endangered-species-2569372543.html" target="_self">ruling in May</a>, in which the court initially found that the "incidental take statement," which is the statement that sets limits on the impact of projects on vulnerable species, was not sufficiently clear.</p><p>Following that initial ruling, the pipeline's builders <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/atlantic-coast-pipeline-endangered-species-2571382531.html" target="_self">said they would suspend</a> construction along 21 miles in West Virginia and 79 miles in Virginia until a new "incidental take statement" was completed.</p><p>In a footnote to Monday's ruling, the court said that revoking the permits meant that FERC's approval of the pipeline was invalid until new permits were issued, since that approval was contingent on satisfactory permits. </p><p>"Absent such authorizations, ACP, should it continue to proceed with construction, would violate FERC'S certificate of public convenience and necessity," the footnote said, according to The Associated Press.</p><p>Environmental Law Center senior attorney D.J. Gerken thought the ruling would be a huge stumbling block for the project.</p><p>"Today's decision means Atlantic has to go back to the drawing board," he told The Associated Press. </p><p>Dominion Energy, the company leading development on the project, disagreed.</p><p>"We believe the Court's concerns can be promptly addressed through additional review by the agencies without causing unnecessary delay to the project," the company said in a written statement reported by The Associated Press.</p>
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Trump Admin Reverses Ban on 'Bee-Killing' Pesticides in National Wildlife Refuges
06 August 2018
Animals
Bees like this one could be harmed by the lifting of a ban on neonicotinoids in national wildlife refuges. Mark Winterbourne / CC BY 2.0
The Trump administration has lifted an Obama-era ban on the use of genetically modified crops and pesticides linked to bee decline in certain national wildlife refuges where farming is allowed, Reuters reported Saturday.
<p>In a <a href="https://www.biologicaldiversity.org/campaigns/pesticides_reduction/pdfs/2018-8-2-FWS-memo-GMO-Neonics-on-wildlife-refuges.pdf" target="_blank">memo</a> signed Aug. 2, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Principal Deputy Director Gregory J. Sheehan said the move was necessary to provide adequate food for waterfowl. </p><p>"There may be situations, however, where use of GMO crop seeds is essential to best fulfill the purposes of the refuge and the needs of birds and other <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/wildlife" target="_self">wildlife</a>," Sheehan wrote. </p><p>Boosting waterfowl populations dovetails with the interests of sportspeople who hunt ducks and other birds, and Interior Secretary <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/ryan-zinke" target="_self">Ryan Zinke</a> has made expanding hunting on national lands a priority, Reuters reported. </p><p>But environmental groups argue the decision comes at the expense of other species.</p><p>"Industrial agriculture has no place on public lands dedicated to conservation of biological diversity and the protection of our most vulnerable species, including pollinators like bumble bees and monarch butterflies. The Trump administration's approval to use toxic pesticides and genetically modified crops is an insult to our national wildlife refuges and the wildlife that rely on them," President and CEO of <a href="https://defenders.org/" target="_blank">Defenders of Wildlife</a> <a href="https://defenders.org/staff/jamie-rappaport-clark" target="_blank">J</a>amie Rappaport Clark said in a <a href="https://newsroom.defenders.org/trump-administration-opens-national-wildlife-refuges-to-pollinator-poisons-and-harmful-gmos/" target="_blank">statement</a>. </p><p>The pesticides in question, <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/neonicotinoids" target="_self">neonicotinoids</a>, have been <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/bees-neonicotinoids-ban-europe-2563782231.html" target="_self">banned in the EU</a> after research linked them to the decline in the populations of bees and other pollinators. </p><p>Jim Kurth, head of the refuge system under Obama, announced the ban in 2014, arguing that the use of neonicotinoids led to plants whose tissues harmed "non-target" species. Moreover, he said that "refuges throughout the country successfully meet wildlife management objectives without" genetically modified crops or the pesticides they are engineered to withstand, Reuters reported.</p><p>Defenders of Wildlife further noted that the populations of game birds like geese and ducks are currently doing fine without the help of genetically modified crops. </p><p>Sheehan, however, has reversed the blanket ban and said that the use of genetically modified crops and neonicotinoids would be considered in the more than 50 farming-friendly refuges on a case-by-case basis. </p><p>The move came a day after California's Department of Pesticide Regulation released a <a href="https://www.cdpr.ca.gov/docs/registration/reevaluation/chemicals/neonicotinoid_risk_determination.pdf" target="_blank">risk assessment</a> finding that the use of four neonicotinoids on certain crops, including the corn and sorghum often grown in refuges, could cause more harm to pollinators than previously thought, <a href="https://www.biologicaldiversity.org/news/press_releases/2018/pesticides-gmos-national-wildlife-refuges-08-04-2018.php" target="_blank">The Center for Biological Diversity reported</a>. </p><p>"Agricultural pesticides, especially bee-killing neonics, have no place on our national wildlife refuges," senior <a href="https://www.biologicaldiversity.org/" target="_blank">Center for Biological Diversity</a> attorney Hannah Connor said. "This huge backward step will harm bees and other pollinators already in steep decline simply to appease pesticide-makers and promote mono-culture farming techniques that trigger increased pesticide use. It's senseless and shameful."</p><p><br><br></p>
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Neal Herbert / Yellowstone National Park
The Wyoming Game and Fish Commission approved an expanded wolf hunting season Wednesday, with a goal of reducing the population to the bare minimum required to keep it off the endangered species list, Defenders of Wildlife reported.
<p>The 2018 season expands on 2017's season, which was the first in Wyoming since a 2017 appeals court removed Wyoming wolves from protections under the Endangered Species Act and allowed the state to take control of the population, <a href="https://www.seattletimes.com/nation-world/apxwyoming-game-commission-oks-increased-wolf-hunting-season/" target="_blank">The Associated Press (AP) reported</a>.</p><p>"The Wyoming Game and Fish Department and Commission continue to focus on reducing the wolf population toward the bare minimum. Wolves are an important component of Wyoming's natural heritage, and should be managed toward achieving healthy and abundant populations across large landscapes so that they may perform their important natural role," Rockies & Plains Director at Defenders of Wildlife Jonathan Proctor said in a statement.</p><p>The 2018 season will allow hunters to kill a total of 58 wolves, a 14 wolf increase from the 2017 allowance of 44. It will also start one month earlier, in September, and allow individual hunters to kill up to two wolves, AP reported. </p><p>There are currently around 350 wolves in Wyoming, 210 of which live in areas of the state where hunting is permitted. The remaining wolves live in Yellowstone and Grand Teton <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/national-parks" target="_self">national parks</a>, the National Elk Refuge and the Wind River Indian Reservation, where hunting is prohibited.</p><p>State officials want to reduce the 210 wolves in their jurisdiction down to 160, citing concerns about wolves preying on livestock. </p><p>Game and Fish wolf biologist Ken Mills said that bringing the number down to 160 would be consistent with the state's commitment to maintain at least 100 wolves and 10 breeding pairs, according to AP.</p><p>But Defenders of Wildlife argued that culling wolf populations is not a scientifically sound strategy for limiting livestock killings. It also disrupts pack structure and is more expensive than other, non-lethal means of protecting livestock. </p><p>"Rather than increase the number of wolves to be killed, Wyoming should improve outreach on the important role of wolves in the state and further promote the use of coexistence techniques that prevent conflicts," Proctor said.</p><p>Defenders of Wildlife also pointed out that Wyoming has created no buffer zones around the national parks, meaning some wolf packs wonder between protected and unprotected areas. </p><p>Wolves were originally reintroduced to the Northern Rockies in the 1990s. Neighboring states of Idaho and Montana also allow wolf hunts, according to AP. </p>
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Sen. John Barrasso, Republican of Wyoming, released draft legislation Monday to significantly overhaul the Endangered Species Act (ESA).
Under Barrasso's proposal, individual states would be given key authority over the federal program to conserve threatened and endangered species.
<p style="">"When it comes to the Endangered Species Act, the status quo is not good enough," the Environment and Public Works Committee Chairman said in a <a href="https://www.epw.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/press-releases-republican?ID=D10FBBBD-8886-4E0F-950B-A24DE5726CE4" target="_blank">press release</a>. "We must do more than just keep listed species on life support—we need to see them recovered. This draft legislation will increase state and local input and improve transparency in the listing process."
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The Endangered Species Act, passed by Congress four decades ago, is the nation's safety net for fish, plants and <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/wildlife">wildlife</a> on the brink of extinction. More than 99 percent of species that have been designated for federal protection continue to exist in the wild today, including the bald eagle, grizzly bear, the leatherback sea turtle and the Florida manatee.
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Many Republicans have long sought to weaken the landmark conservation law, as it can block energy production or other developments on critical habitat for endangered species. The current GOP-controlled 115th Congress has introduced dozens of bills that would strip federal protections for specific threatened species or undermine the ESA, according an <a href="http://www.biologicaldiversity.org/news/press_releases/2017/endangered-species-12-21-2017.php" target="_blank">analysis</a> from the <a href="http://www.biologicaldiversity.org/" target="_blank">Center for Biological Diversity</a>. That's one such bill every six days in 2017 alone.
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<a href="https://earthjustice.org/" target="_blank">Earthjustice</a> anticipated Barrasso's legislative proposal more than <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/endangered-species-act-2462536171.html" target="_blank">a year ago</a>. The environmental law nonprofit said that Barrasso has received substantial campaign contributions from extractive industries that wish to mine or drill land that overlaps with wildlife habitat. Citing <a href="https://www.opensecrets.org/" target="_blank">campaign finance records</a>, from 2011 until 2016, <a href="https://www.opensecrets.org/politicians/summary.php?cid=N00006236&cycle=2016#fundraising" target="_blank">Barrasso received $458,466</a> in total campaign contributions from the oil and gas industry, plus <a href="https://www.opensecrets.org/politicians/industries.php?cycle=2016&cid=N00006236&type=I&newmem=N" target="_blank">$241,706 from the mining industry</a>.
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Conservation organization <a href="https://defenders.org/" target="_blank">Defenders of Wildlife</a> criticized Barrasso's plan, contending that states may lack the legal authority, the resources and sometimes the political resolve to implement the ESA.
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<span></span>"This partisan bill is all about politics, at the expense of sound science and the species that depend on it for survival," said Defenders president and CEO Jamie Rappaport Clark in a press release provided to EcoWatch. "It is a reckless power grab designed to wrest away authority from scientists and wildlife experts and give it to states that lack the resources—and sometimes the political will—needed to save wildlife from extinction."
</p><p style="">
<a href="https://defenders.org/" target="_blank">Defenders of Wildlife</a> has multiple objections to the provisions in Barrasso's draft bill. For instance, a team overseeing the recovery of a certain species would not be allowed to have more federal members than state and local officials, who would be nominated by state governors.
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It also "relegates scientists, the heart of any science-based recovery effort, to an afterthought requiring majority approval by the State-dominated team," the group said.
</p><p>
The <a href="https://www.sierraclub.org/" target="_blank">Sierra Club</a> similarly criticized Barrasso's bill.
</p><p style="">
<span></span>"Shifting from a basis in science to one blown by political whims leaves wildlife exposed, threatening to reverse decades of work to bring animals back from the brink of extinction," Jordan Giaconia, Sierra Club federal policy associate, said in a <a href="https://www.sierraclub.org/press-releases/2018/07/sen-barrasso-introduces-bill-gut-endangered-species-act" target="_blank">press release</a>. </p><p>"You need to look no further than Sen. Barrasso's home state of Wyoming, where <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/grizzly-bear-hunt-wyoming-2571671329.html">grizzly bears</a> prematurely stripped of endangered species protections are about to be trophy hunted, to see the risks legislation like this poses," Giaconia added.
</p><p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-twitter_embed">
</p><div id="3e9be" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="H0SFLC1576662233"><blockquote class="twitter-tweet twitter-custom-tweet" data-twitter-tweet-id="999773326343049216" data-partner="rebelmouse"><div style="margin:1em 0">Wyoming Votes to Allow First Grizzly Bear Hunt in 40 Years https://t.co/49Bzq6sneM @ConservationOrg @WWF</div> — EcoWatch (@EcoWatch)<a href="https://twitter.com/EcoWatch/statuses/999773326343049216">1527199510.0</a></blockquote></div>
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Further, the <a href="https://trib.com/business/energy/wyoming-senator-proposes-revision-of-endangered-species-act/article_f2942007-4fd4-57e8-9c86-cb433e26d75e.html#tracking-source=home-the-latest" target="_blank">Casper Star-Tribune</a> reported that the proposal will "prohibit scientific data from being disclosed in a public records request—if it includes a business or private landowner's proprietary information. Otherwise, the scientific basis of decisions with a species is to be public information."</p><p style=""><span></span>Barrasso's proposed legislation reflects recommendations from the Republican-dominated Western Governors' Association.
</p><p style="">
"The Western Governors' Association appreciates the Chairman's willingness to productively engage with Governors, and that the Chairman has approached this polarizing topic in an inclusive, thoughtful manner," a February letter <a href="https://www.epw.senate.gov/public/_cache/files/7/2/7261a345-fb78-4f0b-952c-3bd58db49dfa/819EF25AB8B396F1DE94FE6E7ACE4382.wga-letter-esa-bill.pdf" target="_blank">from the WGA</a> states. "The proposed bill reflects this fact and offers meaningful, bipartisan solutions to challenging species conservation issues."
</p><p style="">
As <a href="http://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/395135-senate-gop-seeks-overhaul-of-endangered-species-act" target="_blank">The Hill</a> noted, the governors' process was bipartisan, with Hawaii Gov. David Ige (D) signing on to the recommendations. However, other Democratic governors, including California Gov. Jerry Brown and Washington Gov. Jay Inslee objected to its legislative proposals.</p><p>The <a href="https://www.nwf.org/" target="_blank">National Wildlife Federation</a>—which supports the <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-congress/house-bill/4647" target="_blank">Recovering America's Wildlife Act</a> introduced in the House by Rep. Jeff Fortenberry (R-Neb.) and Rep. Debbie Dingell (D-Mich.) in December—is pushing congressional leaders to prioritize a bipartisan effort.<br></p><p>"The truth is that we, as a nation, could save the vast majority of species through proactive and collaborative conservation efforts on-the-ground, just as we have recovered species like deer, bighorn sheep, bald eagles, ducks, and wild turkeys," said Collin O'Mara, president and CEO of the National Wildlife Federation in a <a href="https://www.nwf.org/Our-Work/Wildlife-Conservation/Policy/Recovering-Americas-Wildlife-Act" target="_blank">press release</a>. </p><p> O'Mara continued, "Specifically, we urge the Senate to prioritize bipartisan recommendations which bolster science-based decision-making, foster collaboration among conservation partners, and accelerate on-the-ground habitat restoration projects—and to reject recommendations that erode the scientific integrity that is the bedrock of the Endangered Species Act."</p><p>Cathy Liss, president of the <a href="https://awionline.org/" target="_blank">Animal Welfare Institute</a>, said in a provided statement that the Endangered Species Act "does not need to be reformed, streamlined, or modernized—it simply needs to be fully funded and given the opportunity to help species achieve recovery."</p><p>She added, "Congress must stop meddling with this critically important law and focus instead on ensuring it is fully implemented and enforced."</p><p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-twitter_embed">
</p><div id="14c8f" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="HMGV7X1576662233"><blockquote class="twitter-tweet twitter-custom-tweet" data-twitter-tweet-id="1012344134307319809" data-partner="rebelmouse"><div style="margin:1em 0">The Environmental Consequences of Justice Kennedy’s Retirement https://t.co/rJ5qBr0ttz @ClimateReality @SierraClub @NRDC @UCSUSA</div> — EcoWatch (@EcoWatch)<a href="https://twitter.com/EcoWatch/statuses/1012344134307319809">1530196624.0</a></blockquote></div>
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A grizzly bear at Montana Grizzly Encounter in Bozeman, MT, a rescue and educational sanctuary. jerseygal2009 / CC BY-ND 2.0
The Wyoming Game and Fish Commission voted unanimously Wednesday to approve the largest grizzly bear hunt in the lower 48 states, despite opposition from environmental groups, tribal nations and wildlife photographers, The Washington Post reported.
<p>The vote comes less than a month after the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/yellowstone-grizzly-bears-2564657776.html" target="_self">affirmed</a> its June 2017 decision to delist grizzly bears in the Greater Yellowstone Area (GYE) from protections under the <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/endangered-species" target="_self">Endangered Species</a> Act and pass management of the bears' population off to the states of Wyoming, Montana and Idaho. This will be the first grizzly bear hunt in Wyoming since 1974. </p><p>"Allowing a trophy hunt of these majestic animals—the second-slowest mammal to reproduce in North America—so soon after they lost Endangered Species protections does nothing to build public confidence in state management of grizzly bears," <a href="https://www.sierraclub.org" target="_blank">Sierra Club</a> representative Bonnie Rice said in a statement reported by The Washington Post. </p><p>There is still a chance the hunt will not take place. A U.S. District Court judge will decide several lawsuits challenging the delisting of the GYE bears this summer.</p><p>If the bears remain delisted, the hunt will occur this fall and will allow hunters to kill one female or 10 male bears in a "demographic monitoring area" of prime habitat and an additional 12 male or female bears in a more "human dominated landscape," for a potential kill of 22 bears. Montana decided not to allow a bear hunt in February and Idaho has permitted a hunt of one male bear, also this fall.</p><p>More than 200 tribal nations opposed the hunt, saying the bears are sacred to their culture, and want to move the bears to tribal lands. One-hundred and seven <a href="https://files.acrobat.com/a/preview/8d4727cd-fc49-4672-a784-91305626ac5a" target="_blank">wildlife photographers</a> and 75 scientists also wrote letters condemning the hunt to Wyoming's Republican Governor Matt Mead.</p><p>"To be in the presence of a bear for the first time or the hundredth, is something to be savored for a lifetime. Allowing a bear hunt will change their numbers and their demeanor, making them skittish and much harder to see. It will take away that experience from countless people and Wyoming will lose a part of the wildness that is its hallmark," filmmaker and photographer Trip Jennings said in a <a href="https://www.sierraclub.org/press-releases/2018/05/107-photographers-call-wyoming-reject-proposed-grizzly-bear-trophy-hunt" target="_blank">statement</a> about the photographers' letter.</p><p>"Yellowstone's bears are national treasures. Hunting them is like defacing the Statue of Liberty or filling in the Grand Canyon," Endangered Species Director at the <a href="http://www.biologicaldiversity.org" target="_blank">Center for Biological Diversity</a> (CBD) Noah Greenwald agreed in a <a href="http://www.biologicaldiversity.org/news/press_releases/2018/yellowstone-grizzly-bear-05-23-2018.php" target="_blank">press release</a>. "Millions of people come to see these bears every year. It's so disturbing that Wyoming thinks they're more valuable dead than alive."</p><p>According to the CBD, 125,000 people sent comments opposing the hunt.</p><p>No hunting will be allowed in <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/yellowstone-national-park" target="_blank">Yellowstone National Park</a> itself, or in the nearby Grand Teton National Park or the road between them. A bear-favored region east of Grand Teton will also be off limits to hunters.</p><p>According to The Washington Post, federal biologists say the population has recovered enough to support a hunt, a view shared by Mead.</p><p>"The question is not whether you hunt grizzly bears or not," Mead told C-SPAN, according to The Washington Post. "The question is whether grizzly bears have grown enough in terms of population and in habitat that they can be a sustainable species. And clearly they have." </p><p>However, the scientists who opposed the hunt expressed concerns that it could prevent Yellowstone grizzlies from connecting to a still-protected population in northwest Montana. Further, they said that the population, which has rebounded in GYE from 136 when it was first classified as endangered in 1975 to around 700 today, is still vulnerable due to <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/climate-change" target="_self">climate change</a>, which is threatening food sources like white bark pine.</p><p>The CBD pointed out that the bears still occupy less than four percent of their historic U.S. range.</p><p><a href="https://defenders.org" target="_blank">Defenders of Wildlife</a> also issued a statement arguing that too many grizzly bears in the GYE already die due to human activity to justify a hunt. These deaths occur when bears are killed when they get into garbage or attack livestock, are run over by cars or trains or are poached illegally. </p><p>"This hunt will add unnecessary mortality to a population already experiencing high human-related grizzly bear deaths. [The Wyoming Game and Fish Department] should instead focus on minimizing human caused mortality through proactive conflict prevention, outreach and education while allowing the Yellowstone grizzly bear population to expand into historic habitat," Rockies & Plains director at Defenders of Wildlife Jonathan Proctor said in a statement. </p>
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Trump Admin. Wants to Reinstate 'Cruel' Hunting Tactics in Alaska, Conservation Groups Say
22 May 2018
Animals
Brown bears in Katmai National Park and Preserve in Alaska. NPS Photo / B. Plog
The Trump administration has proposed new regulations to overturn an Obama-era rule that protects iconic predators in Alaska's national preserves.
Wildlife protection organizations condemned the move, as it would allow hunters to go to den sites to shoot wolf pups and bear cubs, lure and kill bears over bait, hunt bears with dogs and use motor boats to shoot swimming caribou. Such hunting methods were banned on federal lands in 2015 that are otherwise permitted by the state.
<p>
<span></span>The proposed rule, <a href="https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2018/05/22/2018-10735/alaska-hunting-and-trapping-in-national-preserves" target="_blank">posted</a> Tuesday in the federal register and pushed by <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/department-of-interior">Interior</a> Secretary <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/trump">Ryan Zinke</a>, "would remove a regulatory provision issued by the National Park Service (NPS) in 2015 that prohibited certain sport hunting practices that are otherwise permitted by the State of Alaska."
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Members of the public are invited to post comments on the proposed rule by 11:59 p.m. EST on July 23, 2018.
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The Alaska Department of Fish and Game was "pleased to see the National Park Service working to better align federal regulations with State of Alaska hunting and trapping regulations," Maria Gladziszewski, the state agency's deputy director of the Division of Wildlife Conservation, said in an email to <a href="https://www.apnews.com/b6f958ae02dc4eb19741927a1a56ed85/Interior-moves-to-lift-restrictions-on-hunting-bears,-wolves" target="_blank">The Associated Press</a>.
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She added that the proposal is "progress in that direction, and we appreciate those efforts. Alaskans benefit when state and federal regulations are consistent."
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NPS said lifting the prohibitions would increase hunting opportunities on national preserve land, which follow Sec. Zinke's <a href="https://www.doi.gov/sites/doi.gov/files/uploads/signed_so_3356.pdf" target="_blank">two</a> <a href="https://www.doi.gov/sites/doi.gov/files/uploads/revised_so_3447.pdf" target="_blank">orders</a> last year.
</p><p>
Safari Club International, a hunting advocacy group, backed the Interior's new proposal. Zinke, an avid hunter himself, created his <a href="https://www.doi.gov/pressreleases/secretary-zinke-announces-creation-international-wildlife-conservation-council" target="_blank">International Wildlife Conservation Council</a> that is mainly comprised of <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/trophy-hunting-committee-trump-2548409021.html" target="_blank">trophy hunters</a> and members of the Safari Club, who <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/trophy-hunting-committee-trump-2548409021.html">advocate for</a> federal programs that support hunting.
</p><p>
Conservation groups expressed outrage over the Trump administration's proposal. They <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/senate-wildlife-hunting-alaska-2324764417.html" target="_blank">contend</a> Alaska's predator-control activities are intended solely to artificially inflate game populations, such as moose, for human hunting.
</p><p>
"The Trump administration has somehow reached a new low in protecting wildlife," said Jamie Rappaport Clark, president and CEO at <a href="https://defenders.org/" target="_blank">Defenders of Wildlife</a>, in a statement issued to EcoWatch. "Allowing the killing of bear cubs and wolf pups in their dens is barbaric and inhumane. The proposed regulations cast aside the very purpose of national parks to protect wildlife and wild places."
</p><p>
She added, "The National Park Service should not accept Alaska's extreme predator control program as a suitable method of managing wildlife and their habitat."
</p><p>"The proposed rule sounds nothing like the Park Service I know," said Phil Francis, chair of the <a href="https://protectnps.org/" target="_blank">Coalition to Protect America's National Parks</a> and a retired NPS veteran with more than 40 years of experience with the agency. "Under the Organic Act of 1916, the National Park Service is mandated to conserve wildlife, not exploit it through these despicable hunting practices. You don't have to be an avid hunter to know that killing bears with cubs in their dens or shooting swimming caribou from a moving motorboat are simply wrong."</p><p><span></span>The <a href="https://blog.humanesociety.org/2018/05/trump-administration-wants-reinstate-cruel-hunting-practices-alaska-like-killing-hibernating-bears-shooting-wolf-pups-dens.html?credit=blog_post_052118_id9758" target="_blank">Humane Society</a> blasted the Trump administration for reinstating "cruel" hunting practices in Alaska and is urging the public to help keep the prohibitions in place.
</p><p>
"Last year, when the state of Alaska and Safari Club International sued NPS to invalidate this crucial rule, the Humane Society of the United States <a href="https://wildernesswatch.org/images/wild-issues/2017/02-08-2017-NPS-Predator-Regs-Suit-Intervention.pdf" target="_blank">intervened in the lawsuit</a> to defend the rule and <a href="http://www.humanesociety.org/news/magazines/2016/11-12/alaska-predator-control.html?credit=blog_post_052118_id9758" target="_blank">similar rules</a> issued by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service," the group said.
</p><p>
"Now, in a new ploy, the NPS is claiming that due to secretarial orders issued by Department of the Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke to expand hunting opportunities on federal lands and improve coordination with states, the agency is required to rescind these protections. In reality, the agency and Zinke have no authority to override Congressional protections for these federal lands."</p>
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The Atlantic Coast Pipeline proposes to cross 15 miles of the George Washington National Forest. USDA Forest Service
Opponents of the controversial Atlantic Coast Pipeline, which would carry fracked natural gas from West Virginia through Virginia's Highland Country and into North Carolina, won a reprieve Tuesday when a federal appeals court invalidated a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) review of the pipeline, The Richmond Times-Dispatch reported.
The ruling was issued by the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals based in Richmond, VA and agreed with environmental groups and their lawyers that the incidental take statement made by the FWS, which limits the number of endangered species that can be killed during construction and operation of a project, was not clear enough in the case of the pipeline.
<p style="">"We conclude, for reasons to be more fully explained in a forthcoming opinion, that the limits set by the agency are so indeterminate that they undermine the incidental take statement's enforcement and monitoring function under the Endangered Species Act," the judges wrote, according to the Richmond Times-Dispatch. </p><p style="">The case was argued by the <a href="https://www.southernenvironment.org/" target="_blank">Southern Environmental Law Center</a> on behalf of the <a href="https://www.sierraclub.org/" target="_blank">Sierra Club</a>, <a href="https://defenders.org/" target="_blank">Defenders of Wildlife</a> and <a href="http://www.vawilderness.org/" target="_blank">Virginia Wilderness Committee</a>. The pipeline opponents argued that the ruling meant the pipeline had to halt construction.</p><p style="">"This fracked gas project has been proven to be perilous to our health, our communities, and wildlife, and now, thanks to tonight's ruling, must be stopped," Sierra Club attorney Nathan Matthews said in a <a href="https://www.sierraclub.org/press-releases/2018/05/court-invalidates-incidental-take-statement-halting-construction-atlantic" target="_blank">press release</a>. </p><p style="">But Dominion Energy, the company leading pipeline construction, disagreed with that interpretation of the ruling. "[W]e will continue to move forward with construction as scheduled," Dominion Energy director of communications Jen Kostyniuk said in an email obtained by <a href="https://www.usnews.com/news/best-states/north-carolina/articles/2018-05-15/the-latest-court-vacates-key-atlantic-coast-pipeline-permit" target="_blank">U.S. News and World Report</a>.</p><p style="">The pipeline could harm eight threatened or endangered species, including the Roanoke logperch and Indiana and Northern long-eared bats, The Richmond Times-Dispatch reported. </p><p style="">Southern Environmental Law Center attorney D.J. Gerken explained the decision in more detail. According to Gerken, the FWS had said a "small percent" of threatened or endangered species could be killed during the pipeline's construction without ever defining what that percent was. </p><p style="">"A small percent would never get triggered because nobody knows what it is," he told The Richmond Times-Dispatch "This is an unnecessary and destructive project. And sending them back to the drawing board is a necessary step to asking those fundamental questions about whether we need it," he said.</p><p style="">According to the Richmond Times-Dispatch, the Atlantic Coast Pipeline is one of two <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/pipelines" target="_self">pipelines</a> in the region that has sparked opposition in the past year due to concerns about their impact on mountain streams and springs, the use of <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/fracking/" target="_self">fracking</a> to obtain the gas, the need for more fossil fuel infrastructure given the threat of <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/climate-change" target="_self">climate change</a> and the use of eminent domain to force the hand of landowners who didn't want the pipeline traversing their property.</p>Opponents of the other pipeline, <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/pipelines-approved-ferc-2497173092.html" target="_self">the Mountain Valley Pipeline</a>, resorted to <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/mountain-valley-pipeline-protest-2562562334.html" target="_self">tree-sitting</a> in April to try and stop its progress.
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Polar Bear sow and two cubs in the Arctic Refuge's 1002 area targeted for oil drilling. Wikimedia Commons
The Interior Department has launched the process of holding lease sales for oil and gas drilling in the 1.6-million-acre coastal plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR).
Despite decades of fierce resistance from Democrats and conservation groups, pro-drilling Republicans were able to realize their goal of opening the refuge after quietly including the measure in last year's Tax Cuts and Jobs Act.
<p>
A notice published Friday in the Federal Register starts the 60-day public scoping period to assist in the preparation of an environmental impact statement for the
<a href="https://www.blm.gov/programs/planning-and-nepa/plans-in-development/alaska/coastal-plain-eis">leasing program</a>.
</p><p>
The sale targets the 1002 area on the Prudhoe Bay in Northern Alaska, which has an estimated 12 billion barrels of recoverable crude. The area is described by the
<a href="https://www.sierraclub.org/press-releases/2018/04/threatening-indigenous-rights-and-arctic-ecosystem-interior-launches-process" target="_blank">Sierra Club</a> as "the biological heart" of the Arctic Refuge—home to polar bears, caribou, migratory birds and other species—as well as vital lands and wildlife for the subsistence way of life of the <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/how-drilling-in-anwr-would-threaten-the-gwichin-peoples-way-of-life-1882011846.html">Gwich'in Nation</a>.
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<img type="lazy-image" data-runner-src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8xNzU4MDQwOC9vcmlnaW4uanBnIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTYyNDMzODI1Mn0.v3dPAwkAsAhPAsRgp53fpZXpGDgrwJC5Qm77KIlICmg/img.jpg?width=980" id="437a9" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="00ec840a36c6a4d5476dbe0c89e00e6d" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image">
</p><p>
Environmental groups condemned the plan, calling it "shameful" that it would be published just before the eighth anniversary of the
<a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/deepwater-horizon">Deepwater Horizon oil spill</a> in the Gulf of Mexico, the worst environmental disaster in U.S. history.
</p><p>
"The
<a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/trump-watch/">Trump</a> administration's reckless dash to expedite drilling and destroy the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge will only hasten a trip to the courthouse," Jamie Rappaport Clark, president of <a href="https://defenders.org/" target="_blank">Defenders of Wildlife</a>, said in a statement. "We will not stand by and watch them desecrate this fragile landscape."
</p><p>
In a statement, Assistant Interior Secretary Joe Balash called the drilling plan "an important facet for meeting our nation's energy demands and achieving energy dominance."
</p><p>
"This scoping process begins the first step in developing a responsible path forward. I look forward to personally visiting the communities most affected by this process and hearing their concerns," Balash added.
</p><p>
Republican Senator Lisa Murkowski, who has long fought to open the refuge, said in a joint statement with other Alaskan lawmakers that drilling would "help ensure the energy and economic security of our nation."
</p><p>
In February,
President Trump spoke
<a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/trump-anwr-oil-drilling-2530771183.html">about his indifference</a> on the matter until an oil industry friend told him that past presidents, including conservative icon Ronald Reagan, couldn't get drilling done. He then directed lawmakers to put the provision in the tax bill.
</p><p>
"I never appreciated ANWR so much," Trump said during a speech at a Republican retreat in West Virginia. "A friend of mine called up who is in that world and in that business. He said, 'Is it true that you're thinking about ANWR?' I said 'Yeah, I think we're going to get it but you know …' He said, 'Are you kidding? That's the biggest thing by itself. Ronald Reagan and every president has wanted to get ANWR approved.' And after that I said 'Oh, make sure that is in the bill. It was amazing how that had an impact."
</p><p>
He made similar remarks a month later at the National Republican Congressional Committee dinner.
</p><p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-youtube">
<span style="display:block;position:relative;padding-top:56.25%;" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="282b21e44d7271e6571a737524ee5496"><iframe type="lazy-iframe" data-runner-src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/F_LB-XTBKXI?rel=0" width="100%" height="auto" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" style="position:absolute;top:0;left:0;width:100%;height:100%;"></iframe></span>
</p><p>
The purpose of the public scoping process is to assist the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) in identifying relevant issues that will influence the scope of the environmental impact statement and guide its development. It may also inform post-lease activities, including seismic and drilling exploration, development, and transportation of oil and gas in and from the coastal plain. </p><p>
The bureau has invited the public to provide comments on scoping issues and will hold public scoping meetings in Anchorage, Arctic Village, Fairbanks, Kaktovik and Utqiaġvik at times and locations to be announced in local media, newspapers and on the BLM website.
</p><p>
Comments will be accepted through June 19, 2018, and can be sent by any of the following methods:
</p><p>
Website:
<a href="https://www.blm.gov/alaska/coastal-plain-eis" target="_blank">www.blm.gov/alaska/coastal-plain-eis</a><br>
Email:
<a href="mailto:blm_ak_coastalplain_EIS@blm.gov" target="_blank">blm_ak_coastalplain_EIS@blm.gov</a><br>
Mail: Attn: Coastal Plain Oil and Gas Leasing Program EIS
<br>
222 West 7th Avenue, Stop #13
<br>
Anchorage, Alaska 99513
</p>
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Caribou graze on the coastal plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
The Trump administration is initiating the regulatory process of opening the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) to oil and natural gas leasing.
Top Interior Department officials recently visited the Kaktovik and Utgiagvik communities in northern Alaska to let them know that the agency will publish in the coming weeks a notice in the Federal Register of its intent to move toward an environmental impact statement on planned leasing, the Anchorage Daily News reported.
<p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-twitter_embed">
</p><div id="1d3c7" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="2X0PCV1576683841"><blockquote class="twitter-tweet twitter-custom-tweet" data-twitter-tweet-id="971426844745412608" data-partner="rebelmouse"><div style="margin:1em 0">The North Slope Borough Assembly meeting in Utqiaġvik had a special visitor yesterday. Deputy Secretary of the Inte… https://t.co/XYmLj9JJsM</div> — Ravenna Koenig (@Ravenna Koenig)<a href="https://twitter.com/vennkoenig/statuses/971426844745412608">1520441182.0</a></blockquote></div>
<p></p><p style="">
Interior Deputy Secretary David Bernhardt relayed similar details at an industry gathering in Anchorage later in the week, where he
<a href="https://www.ktoo.org/2018/03/08/trump-official-says-interior-aims-move-pretty-quickly-arctic-refuge-oil-development/" target="_blank">said</a>, "We expect to move pretty quickly on that project."
</p><p style="">
<span></span>Additionally, Sen. <a href="http://thehill.com/people/daniel-sullivan" target="_blank">Dan Sullivan</a> (R-Alaska) <a href="http://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/376810-alaska-senator-arctic-refuge-drilling-sale-could-start-next-year">said</a> at the CERAWeek oil industry conference in Houston that lease sales could start as early as next year, which would beat the 2021 deadline set in last year's Republican tax bill.
</p><p style="">
"It's my hope, and this is a very aggressive timeline, that we would have the first lease sale ... to be sometime in 2019," Sullivan told the audience.
</p><p style="">
Despite the majority of Americans
<a href="http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/general_politics/december_2017/most_oppose_anwr_drilling" target="_blank">opposing</a> ANWR drilling, Congress and President Trump lifted a 40-year drilling ban on the refuge after the GOP tax bill was approved in December.
</p><p style="">
This "<a href="http://wilderness.org/blog/how-did-your-senators-vote-arctic-refuge-drilling" target="_blank">backdoor drilling provision</a>," as environmentalists have dubbed it, was added to the tax reform package to secure the key vote of Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski, who introduced the measure and has <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/arctic-drilling-alaska-murkowski-2508047461.html" target="_blank">long backed</a> the cause.
</p><p style="">
Pro-drilling Republicans have targeted the 1002 area on the Prudhoe Bay in Northern Alaska, which has an estimated 12 billion barrels of recoverable crude. <a href="https://earthjustice.org/news/press/2017/senate-vote-threatens-to-advance-oil-drilling-in-america-s-arctic" target="_blank">However</a>, the targeted coastal plain hosts migratory bird species and endangered <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/wildlife" target="_blank">wildlife</a> and is considered to be sacred to the indigenous Gwich'in people, who sustain themselves from the caribou that migrate there.
</p><p style="">
Environmental organizations responded to the latest news with harsh criticism and condemned the administration for failing to meet with the Gwich'in nation.
</p><p style="">
"Not only is this administration doing the unconscionable by attempting to drill in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, but it is moving forward in the most reckless, irresponsible way," <a href="https://defenders.org/" target="_blank">Defenders of Wildlife</a> president and CEO Jamie Rappaport Clark said in a statement. "This headlong rush toward leasing is an egregious sellout to the oil industry that would desecrate the irreplaceable wildlife habitat of the Arctic refuge's coastal plain."
</p><p style="">
"Drilling and associated industrial activity would put polar bears, caribou, migratory birds and hundreds of other species that live on the coastal plain at incredible risk, while also threatening the livelihood of the native Gwich'in people, whose culture and way of life depends on these resources," she continued. "By now, no one should be fooled by the Alaska delegation's false promises that leasing will follow a robust, lawful public engagement process. Two out of three Americans agree: the Arctic refuge is no place for oil drilling. We will fight this appalling proposal at every turn."
</p><p style="">
The <a href="https://www.sierraclub.org/" target="_blank">Sierra Club</a> said the action would give the area over to the oil industry, while ignoring the place's importance to the Gwich'in Nation, create permanent drilling damage to one of the country's last wild places, and cause irreversible <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/climate-change">climate</a> impacts in a state already warming at twice the rate of the rest of the country.
</p><p>
"We stand with the Gwich'in Nation in defense of this sacred place. The Arctic National Wildlife Refuge is unique in its wildness and in the connection it offers to the unspoiled natural world, even for those who may never set foot there," Sierra Club executive director Michael Brune said in a statement.
</p><p style="">
"We have a moral obligation to safeguard the Arctic Refuge from destructive drilling, and we will fight this plan every step of the way. We will not stand idly by as
<a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/ryan-zinke">Ryan Zinke</a>'s Department of the Interior runs roughshod over human rights and climate justice in their zeal to give away this special place to the dirty fuels industry."</p><p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-twitter_embed" style="">
</p><div id="a7613" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="5VO4VY1576683841"><blockquote class="twitter-tweet twitter-custom-tweet" data-twitter-tweet-id="938077604812349441" data-partner="rebelmouse"><div style="margin:1em 0">Majority of U.S. Public Against Drilling ANWR; Oil Experts Think Economics Are 'Suspect' https://t.co/odRE3mDKsN… https://t.co/LclQUBsjFx</div> — EcoWatch (@EcoWatch)<a href="https://twitter.com/EcoWatch/statuses/938077604812349441">1512490104.0</a></blockquote></div>
<p></p>
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A gloved hand pulls a lobster from a tank. WoodysPhotos
By Sam Schipani
Last year was not a good one for the North Atlantic right whale. Seventeen of them were discovered to have died, about 4 percent of a total population of 455. Numbers have been low for decades—the species was declared endangered in 1973—but if the current trend continues, the North Atlantic right whale, one of the most endangered marine mammals in the world, could go extinct by 2040.
<p>In response, the <a href="http://www.biologicaldiversity.org/" target="_blank">Center for Biological Diversity</a>, <a href="https://defenders.org/" target="_blank">Defenders of Wildlife</a> and the <a href="https://www.americanhumane.org/" target="_blank">American Humane Society</a> are suing the <a href="https://www.commerce.gov/" target="_blank">U.S. Department of Commerce</a>, the <a href="http://www.noaa.gov/https://www.fisheries.noaa.gov/welcome" target="_blank">National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association (NOAA) Fisheries</a> and the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS). According to the <a href="https://www.courthousenews.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/whales-complaint.pdf" target="_blank">complaint</a> filed on Jan. 18, entanglements from lobster trap lines and other commercial fishing gear unduly jeopardize the dwindling whale populations and breach the species' right to protection under the Endangered Species Act and the Marine Mammal Protection Act.</p><p>The lobster industry has long been implicated in North Atlantic right whale mortality. Passing whales can easily become <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/north-atlantic-right-whale-2520326598.html">entangled in lobster fishing gear</a>—and when they do, their deaths can be slow, painful and gruesome. The heavy fishing line, which is often still connected to the clunky lobster traps, can wrap around a whale's head, mouth, flippers, or tail. Entangled whales either drown, unable to surface for air, or the remaining line impedes their feeding and reproduction while causing festering infections. Entanglements have been responsible for <a href="https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fmars.2016.00137/full" target="_blank">85 percent</a> of all North Atlantic right whale deaths since 2010. Now, climate change is making matters worse.</p><p style="">The Gulf of Maine is <a href="http://www.seascapemodeling.org/seascape_projects/2014/01/the-gulf-of-maine-is-warming-fast.html" target="_blank">one of the fastest warming bodies of water on the planet</a>. Lobster populations have migrated north to warmer waters, resulting in catches that are more lucrative in Maine than in other areas of the Atlantic. Maine's lobster industry is booming—the state currently catches more than 80 percent of all lobsters caught in the U.S. This means that lobstermen are setting more traps just as more North Atlantic right whales are showing up, following the warmer waters north to feed. The shifting habitats and increase in fishing has led to a "perfect storm of mortalities of right whales," said Richard Pace, a large-whale researcher at NOAA's Northeast Fisheries Science Center. In 2016, Maine set a record when the state harvested more than 130 million pounds of crustaceans. With the <a href="http://www.fao.org/in-action/globefish/market-reports/resource-detail/en/c/1052669/" target="_blank">global appetite for lobster steadily increasing</a>, the question of how the lobster industry can help prevent whale deaths is ever more pressing.</p><p>"The right whale situation has really become a crisis," said Kristen Monsell, a senior attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity. "Entanglement in commercial fishing gear is now the number one cause of the species' critically endangered status, and the federal government needs to do everything in its power if we're going to save these amazing animals from going extinct."</p><p>North Atlantic right whales are not just majestic; they also play an important role in marine ecosystems. They help to support the production of plankton, which is the very base of the food web and gives us half the oxygen we breathe. Whales also help sustain fish stock and cycle nutrients throughout the marine food web.</p><p>"[The North Atlantic right whale] is a unique species. It is only found along the East Coast of the U.S. and Canada. It doesn't live anywhere else in the world," commented Regina Asmutis-Silvia, executive director of <a href="http://us.whales.org/" target="_blank">Whale and Dolphin Conservation</a>. "If we not only have an obligation to protect them, we should selfishly want to protect them because we need them."</p><p>Historically, Maine's lobster industry has managed lobster populations sustainably. That, plus lobster populations scuttling northward, has likely contributed to its success compared to other American lobster fisheries. A report by the Gulf of Maine Research Institute details how Maine lobstermen achieved record hauls with a decades-old conservation strategy. They only use traps—no dragging or diving allowed—and the traps must have slats for juvenile lobsters and biodegradable hatches to release lobsters if the trap is lost. Large, egg-carrying females are returned to the sea marked with a "v notch" in their tail to signal to other lobstermen that the lobster is off limits.</p><p>But when it comes to whales, Maine's lobster industry is subject to less regulation than other parts of the northeastern coast. About 71 percent of Maine's waters are exempt from NOAA Fisheries' <a href="https://www.greateratlantic.fisheries.noaa.gov/protected/whaletrp/docs/Outreach%20Guides%20Updated%20May%202015/northeast_trap_pot___2017.pdf" target="_blank">Atlantic Large Whale Take Reduction Plan</a>—which requires modifications like marking gear and sink rope to reduce the industry's impact on whales—under the rationale that whales are not present in the exempted areas, such as bays, harbors and inlets.</p><p>The federal government has been grappling with how to regulate the industry to prevent whale deaths for almost a decade. In 2009, legislation required lobstermen to replace all floating rope on groundlines with sinking rope, which is less likely to entangle whales. In 2015, <a href="https://www.greateratlantic.fisheries.noaa.gov/protected/whaletrp/14alwtrpfr.pdf" target="_blank">a new federal rule went into effect</a> requiring lobstermen to use up to 15 traps with each buoy when fishing beyond designated exemption lines off Maine's coast. The legislation was designed to reduce the number of vertical lines in the water column and, thus, reduce the chance that whales would get entangled.</p><p>The regulations immediately drew ire from lobstermen across the state. "The prohibition on float rope has increased the cost of business for Maine's lobster industry, which is already subject to increasing costs of fuel and bait," said Jeff Nichols, communications director at the Maine Department of Marine Resources. "Sink rope has been shown to wear out much faster than float rope, which results in the need to replace the rope more often and has led to more gear loss because sink rope has been shown to get caught on the rocky bottom and break."</p><p>Worse still, the sinking rope and vertical line legislation didn't prevent whale deaths. In 2016, researchers from the New England Aquarium, Woods Hole and other institutions <a href="https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fmars.2016.00137/full" target="_blank">released a paper</a> concluding that there is no evidence that current fishing regulations have been effective at reducing mortality in whales. Becky Bartovics, executive committee member at the Sierra Club's Maine Chapter, cited a lack of both proper science and consultation of local knowledge as the cause of the legislative blunder. "I'm sure the intention was to reduce the number of lines going to the bottom, but 15 traps weigh a lot." That weight, if entangled with a whale, will certainly kill the animal—and it puts stress on the fishermen, too.</p><p>In light of these ineffective attempts to address whale mortality, local lobstermen and conservationists alike are wary of new legislation. "Many times the scientists have come up with a solution without working with the lobstermen," Bartovics said. "That's why the lobstermen are frustrated." The lobster community in Maine has been open to other solutions. A <a href="https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/d9b6/49a937a562d010c2a9ab6aad0332d4b1f4aa.pdf" target="_blank">2014 study</a> showed that red and orange ropes are more visible to right whales and could reduce entanglements; according to Bartovics, some lobstermen have started spraying red paint on their ropes to do just that.</p><p>The lawsuit filed in January aims to hold fisheries accountable for North Atlantic right whales' deaths and, ultimately, put more mitigation efforts in place</p><p style="">"The long-term goal is to figure this out across fisheries and across species. The goal is not to shut down fisheries," Asmutis-Silvia said. "There are no bad guys here. We need to work together to figure out a solution."</p><p style=""><em>Reposted with permission from our media associate <a href="https://www.sierraclub.org/sierra/lobster-industry-ensnared-north-atlantic-right-whale-deaths" target="_blank">SIERRA Magazine</a>.</em> </p>
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