API: Alaska needs permitting exemption

In suit against Department of Interior, API says ‘Alaska gap’ in Interior’s interim rule requires permitting of greenhouse gases

Alan Bailey

Petroleum News

Before anyone in Alaska fires up their furnace this winter they might want to consider that under the U.S. Department of Interior’s interim rule listing the polar bear as a threatened species under the Endangered Species Act, any activity in Alaska that creates greenhouse gases will likely require an incidental take permit from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

That’s the issue at the center of a lawsuit filed Aug. 27 in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia by the American Petroleum Institute, the Chamber of Commerce of the United States of America, the National Mining Association and the National Association of Manufacturers.

Although DOI has cited the shrinking area of Arctic ice as a primary factor threatening the future of the polar bear population, the department has also determined that the Endangered Species Act is not an appropriate tool for setting U.S. climate policy.

Consequently, in its interim polar bear rule DOI exempted permitting requirements for the incidental take of the bears for all parts of the United States except Alaska.

But that exclusion of Alaska from the permitting exemption has created an “Alaska gap,” in which greenhouse gas emissions in Alaska would have to be permitted, API and the other trade organizations say in their complaint to the district court.

“FWS’s own determination and all known science establish that an emission in Anchorage has no more effect on climate change or polar ice that does an emission in Ankara,” the complaint says. “Because there is no requisite causal connection between the emissions from certain activities — regardless of location — … there could be no basis for distinguishing between emissions from activities in all other states and emissions from activities in Alaska.”

And in a press release issued Aug. 28 API said that the oil and gas industry is committed to the conservation of the polar bear and other marine mammals.

“The interim final rule issued by the Department (of Interior) needs to be expanded to include Alaska as the Act is implemented,” API said. “API member companies are not challenging the listing of the polar bear as a threatened species.”