Inslee: Polar Bears Need Protections, not Just Threatened Title

Statement

Inslee: Polar bears need protections, not just threatened title

U.S. Rep. Jay Inslee (D-Wash.) released the following statement in response to the Interior Department's decision to list the polar bear as a threatened species under the Endangered Species Act (ESA):

"This is a fraud," said Inslee, a member of the House Natural Resources Committee and Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming who has led efforts in Congress to get the polar bear listed. "While this is a long overdue recognition of scientific reality, the administration included a poison pill.

"The administration effectively decided to make a listing, but said it wouldn't make a difference in government action. That's not a listing, it's a cop out.

"The administration ruled out the one thing that would make the listing meaningful, an effective policy on stopping global warming."

After Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne's announced this afternoon that "this listing will not stop global climate change or prevent any sea ice from melting," Inslee and U.S. Rep. Maurice Hinchey (D-N.Y.) filed the Polar Bear Seas Protection Act in the House.

The legislation would direct the National Research Council to study impacts of climate change on species in Alaska's Chukchi and Beaufort seas and effects of oil and gas exploration there. The bill also would direct the Interior Department to designate critical habitat areas for the polar bear and would require vastly improved oil spill response technologies prior to allowing massive new oil and gas operations in the pristine waters of the so-called Polar Bear Seas.

Prompted by legal action, the Interior Department started the process of considering the polar bear for threatened status under ESA in January 2007. The federal agency missed the legally mandated deadline to make a listing decision on January 9, 2008. Just weeks later in February, the Interior Department opened up nearly 30 million acres of prime polar-bear habitat in the Polar Bear Seas to oil company leases.

The Interior Department's Minerals Management Service estimated that the chance of a major oil spill in these ecologically sensitive waters is as high as 50 percent. A 2003 National Research Council report found that current technologies could not effectively clean up oil spilled in the broken sea ice and harsh weather conditions of the Chukchi and Beaufort seas.

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