A Bush administration decision on listing polar bears as endangered species and victims of global warming has erupted into a separate battle on Capitol Hill to block oil and gas exploration in order to protect the animals’ arctic hunting grounds.
The administration delayed its January deadline on whether to list the bears, but is moving ahead with a separate move Feb. 6 to issue new permits for oil drilling in the Chukchi Sea, which Democrats and environmentalists say they oppose.
Rep. Edward J. Markey, Massachusetts Democrat and chairman of the Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming, is pushing legislation to halt the drilling-rights sales, saying the area may be needed as critical habitat for the bears’ survival.
“Robert Frost wrote about two roads diverging in the wood, and here we have the Bush administration looking down two roads with regard to the polar bear,” Mr. Markey said. “Down one road lies the survival of the polar bear and the orderly consideration of oil drilling and global warming and common sense. Down the other road, too often traveled by this administration, lies regulatory lunacy and a blatant disregard for moral responsibility.”
Mr. Markey said the drilling-lease sales should be stopped to “protect the polar bear, and the rest of us, from global warming.”
Bush administration officials said the issues are separate and that the delay on whether to list the polar bears is the result of a new government study that requires further public input. The lease sale is the culmination of a five-year study that was approved by Congress last year.
“The leasing plan was delivered to Congress last year. They knew we were looking at polar bears the same time it was delivered,” said an Interior Department official. “They had the opportunity then to submit legislation saying we can’t do this. And, we heard nothing from Congress when we submitted the leasing drill plan five years ago.”
“At this point, we have no intention of stopping that lease sale,” the official said.
The polar bear has no natural predator, and there has been no significant loss in population, but this precedent-setting decision on federal protection will say whether the Endangered Species Act allows the government to determine that global warming poses a threat to an animal’s habitat that could lead to a decrease in numbers or extinction.
“We have never done this before. That is why there is a lot of care being taken on this decision,” the Interior Department official said.
One House Republican leadership aide said environmentalists want the polar-bear listing to stop oil drilling in Alaska, “just like they used the spotted owl in the Pacific Northwest to shut down the timber industry.”
Republicans said Mr. Markey’s bill would block production of 15 billion barrels of oil and 77 trillion cubic feet of natural gas.
Rep. Don Young, Alaska Republican and ranking member of the House Natural Resources Committee, said Mr. Markey’s bill would allow the federal government to use the Endangered Species Act to regulate coal plants and other industries that emit so-called greenhouse gases nationwide.
“This could be a severe threat to our domestic energy production efforts and national energy security,” Mr. Young said. “This is alarming.”
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