Protecting Polar Bears

The U.S. Department of the Interior is asking for public comments on its plan to give the polar bear some protected land

Now is the time of year when polar cubs are born.

But the effects of global warming have destroyed much of the polar bear habitat.

And Big Oil has been looking to open up an important part of polar bear habitat -- the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) -- for drilling.

According to "Global Climate Change Impacts in the United States," a report issued in June by the Obama administration, "It is projected that there will be no wild polar bears left in Alaska in 75 years."

In response to this critical situation, the United States Department of Interior has announced a plan to designate more than 200,000 square miles of Arctic land as protected polar bear territory -- including the critical ANWR coastal plain which the polar bears use for denning and raising their young.

The Interior Department has asked to receive public comments on this proposal by the end of the year.

"Protecting this important denning habitat should help safeguard polar bear homes from destructive oil and gas exploration and drilling," according to the non-profit conservation group Defenders of Wildlife.

GET INVOLVED

• Sign a Defenders of Wildlife public comment letter giving your support of the Department of Interior proposal to protect the polar bear onshore denning habitats (due December 28, 2009)
  
• Sign a Center for Biological Diversity letter urging Secretary Salazar to designate all areas used by polar bears on land and ice as critical habitat, and permanently protect these important areas rather than sacrificing them to oil companies (due January 1, 2010)
  
• Adopt a polar bear for $15 from Defenders of Wildlife
  
• Sign the Polar Bear Central petition to curb global warming
  

RELATED POSTS

• Slipping Away: The Polar Bear (November 17, 2009)
• Closing Off the Arctic (July 23, 2009)
• Gone in 75 Years: Polar Bears (June 29, 2009)
• Salazar to Decide Polar Bear Fate Today (May 8, 2009)
• Fate of Polar Bears in Salazar's Hands (April 22, 2009)
• Farewell to the Polar Bears (January 14, 2009)
• Using Art to Tell the Sad Tale of Polar Bears (September 29, 2008)
• Polar Bears Swimming Miles from Coast Cause Concern (August 23, 2008)
• EDITORIAL: Polar Transcendentalism (May 11, 2009)
• Selling the Arctic's Future to the Oil Industry (March 6, 2009)
• North Pole May Be Ice-Free in Five Years (August 12, 2008)

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