Today is Endangered Species Day in the U.S., and the timing couldn’t be more sadly appropriate.
On the same day designated as Endangered Species Day by U.S. Senators Susan Collins (Maine) and Dianne Feinstein (California) comes news from the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) that Earth has lost nearly a third of its biodiversity over the past 37 years.
This morning on NPR, President Bush tried to blame congress for the nation’s high gas, food, and electricity prices. Apparently, Congress has been thwarting the President’s attempts to fix the economy:
“I’ve repeatedly submitted proposals to help address these problems,” the president said. “Yet time after time, Congress chose to block them.”
“We’re not antidevelopment. We’re not antigrowth. But this is just stupid.”
How many times has that been muttered over the past few years, in an attempt to bring a semblance of common sense to the world?
The answer is, obviously, far too many. But nevertheless it has once again been spoken by Margaret Williams of the World Wildlife Fund in Alaska in response to the leasing of millions of offshore acres for petroleum development in the Chukchi Sea, off Alaska.
I haven’t always been the liberal nutjob that I am now. There was a time when I was right behind Bush for trundling in to Iraq, and found the idea of protecting animals very much the picture of “hippie” idiocy.
But, with age came wisdom, and with wisdom came a shift in my view of the world.
I say that, because in an MSNBC article entitled ‘Yukon Flats wildlife refuge eyed for its oil,’ this sentence appears; “A controversial land swap proposal could open portions of an Alaska wildlife refuge to oil drilling, dividing Alaska natives and stoking opposition from environmentalists seeking to protect the bears, moose and birds that live there.”
The moment I read “moose,” I knew that my perspective on the world had changed. A part of my mind, long since dormant, by instinct reared up and said “It’s a moose! Who cares?!” But it was immediately overridden by the new me which realized the overall importance of sustaining various ecosystems and species.
The plan is a land trade, which would give 110,000 acres of hydrocarbon-prone uplands within the Yukon Flats National Wildlife Refuge, plus mineral rights to another 97,000 acres, to Fairbanks-based Doyon Ltd. The Refuge lies just south of the ‘always-in-the-news’ Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
In exchange, and definitely a plus to the deal, the Refuge would acquire 150,000 acres of bird-friendly wetlands, currently owned by Doyon, as well as 56,500 acres on which Doyon currently has pending land claims.
It was just over a month ago that I last wrote about the fate of the polar bears. The US Fish and Wildlife Service had just announced that they needed more time to determine whether the beautiful creatures should be put on the endangered species list. Conservationists were up in arms, and many were pointing to Bush’s desire to sell off parts of the Alaskan coast for oil and gas exploration […]
The Pacific Northwest has a reputation for being progressive when it comes to green building, with Washington and Oregon setting the pace. But where does Alaska fit into the picture, and how do its green building efforts measure up?
With regard to the LEED program, Washington and Oregon each have certified or registered projects numbering in the hundreds. By comparison, Alaska has only three LEED certified buildings (A National Weather Service facility, a visitor’s center at Denali Park, and the Homer City Library) and less than 20 projects currently registered.
There is, at least in my humble and possibly pessimistic opinion, very little to be excited about in this day and age when it comes to reversing global warming. Lakes are dying, ice sheets are melting, and a number of leaders in the developed world are like the kids seven steps behind the rest of their friends.
But then we get little nuggets of gold like this one, featuring the Ecuadorans who are now
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