Polar Bear Supporters Lose Court Case

Another story from last week, but worth mentioning. From KTUU in Anchorage...

A federal appeals court made a final decision Wednesday on whether Fish and Wildlife could allow oil companies to interfere with polar bears.

The complaint is that the government isn't doing enough to protect marine animals from the effects of oil and gas development...

The Center for Biological Diversity filed a lawsuit because it felt the U.S. Fish and Wildlife service wrongfully issued authorization for oil companies to work in areas that could potentially hurt the bears.

They claimed Fish and Wildlife failed to consider effects of climate change and had a false idea of how many polar bears would be affected.

But the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a lower court's decision allowing the Fish and Wildlife Service to issue its own regulations on incidental take.

Incidental take, in this case, is the killing or harassing of polar bears resulting from oil and gas operations on the Beaufort Sea coast.