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Legal Intervention Aims to Protect North Atlantic Right Whales From Deadly Ship Strikes
Conservation groups today filed a motion to intervene to help fight a lawsuit aimed at overturning a seasonal speed rule protecting North Atlantic right whales from deadly vessel strikes. The groups want to defend the rule against a lawsuit brought by a New York vessel owner fined for violating seasonal speed limits. The suit alleges that NOAA Fisheries lacked the statutory authority to issue the rule.
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Final Rescission of Public Lands Rule Reverses Modern Land Management, Threatens Wildlife Habitat
The Bureau of Land Management today announced a decision to roll back the Conservation and Landscape Health Rule, commonly referred to as the Public Lands Rule. The policy modernized how BLM manages our national public lands and represented the critical incorporation of ecological resilience into management alongside traditional resource extraction. The rule required science-based decision-making, conservation considerations within multiple land uses and a focus on sustaining public lands for the long-term benefit of wildlife and the American people.
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Trump Administration Cancels Critical Offshore Wind Projects and Increases Costs for Taxpayers
The Department of Interior this week announced that two offshore wind companies, Bluepoint Wind and Golden State Wind, have abandoned their developments. According to reports, the companies received some $900 million to walk away from the projects.
Press Releases
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Gulf of Maine Lobster Fishery Abandons Bid for Sustainable Certification
In a move welcomed by the conservation community, the Gulf of Maine lobster fishery will no longer seek recertification under the “blue fish tick” ecolabel, a program of the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) that purportedly assures consumers that products carrying the label come from “sustainable” fisheries.
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U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Announces Status Review of Grizzly Bears
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) announced that it will begin a comprehensive Endangered Species Act (ESA) status review of the grizzly bear in two specific regions of the lower 48 states. The announcement, in today’s Federal Register, follows the agency’s review of three petitions to delist the bear, two of which they say presented “substantial, credible information” that may warrant action.
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Biden Administration Can Still Uphold Climate Promises by Rejecting ConocoPhillips’ Proposed Massive Oil and Gas Expansion in the Western Arctic
The U.S. Bureau of Land Management (BLM) released a disappointing final supplemental environmental impact statement for the proposed Willow Master Development Plan oil and gas project today, relying again on hasty and deficient analysis to assess the impacts that the massive ConocoPhillips’ proposal would have on local communities, Arctic wilderness, water and animals and the global climate. If approved, this project would be the largest on public lands and would set back our national climate goals tremendously.
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EPA Determines Proposed Pebble Mine Poses Unacceptable Adverse Effects on Bristol Bay Wild Fishery, Denies Permit
Defenders of Wildlife applauds the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s proposal today to deny a mining permit that would adversely affect the unrivaled natural resources of the Bristol Bay region, the world’s largest wild salmon fishery and habitat for the critically endangered Cook Inlet beluga whale.
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Biden Administration Restores Roadless Area Protections to Tongass National Forest
Today, the U.S. Department of Agriculture reinstated the national Roadless Area Conservation Rule in the Tongass National Forest in Southeast Alaska. The move restricts development on roughly 9.3 million acres in North America’s largest temperate rainforest.
jcovey@defenders.org
