Environmental groups challenge F&WS rule

Petroleum News

Environmental groups have challenged regulations from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service allowing unintentional minor disturbance of polar bears and walruses during oil industry activities in the Beaufort Sea and the adjacent northern coast of Alaska.

In a suit filed Sept. 16 in U.S. District Court for the District of Alaska, Alaska Wildlife Alliance, Alaska Wilderness League, Defenders of Wildlife, Environment America, Sierra Club, Center for Biological Diversity and Friends of the Earth filed a complaint for declaratory and injunctive relief against the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the U.S. Department of the Interior for the decision to issue a five-year incidental take regulation under the Marine Mammal Protection Act.

In issuing the regulations, which took effect Aug. 5, Fish and Wildlife Service said the Alaska Oil and Gas Association, on behalf of its members and other participating companies, had requested preparation and issuance of the new regulations.

The regulations, effective for five years, are a continuation, with modifications, of regulations applied starting Aug. 5, 2016.

The incidental take regulations do not authorize any lethal takes.

- Petroleum News