United States Interior Secretary Gale Norton has signed off on a plan to open 8.8 million acres of Alaska's North Slope to oil and gas development. The plan includes some areas important for migratory birds, whales and wildlife. Environmentalists say that the management plan threatens the health of Arctic tundra, ponds and lakes that are home to wildlife and migratory birds and provide a vital subsistence hunting and fishing ground for native Alaskans.
The area is located within the National Petroleum Reserve in Alaska, which was set aside in the 1920s for potential energy development. It is also just west of the 1.5 million-acre Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, which President Bush wants to open to drilling as part of a massive energy bill stalled in the Senate.
Interior Secretary Norton say that oil and gas from the North Slope will help increase domestic energy production and stabilize prices in the long term. However, environmentalists argue that the management plan rewards Bush administration friends in the oil and gas industry and question the economics of the plan. "It makes no sense to industrialize this incomparable wilderness area when there's only about six month's worth of economically recoverable oil ... and it would take at least 10 years to get it to market," said Charles Clusen, director of the Alaska lands project for the Natural Resources Defense Council, an environmental group.
Source: Associated Press |
