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Endangered Polar Bear

Could the Endangered Species Act influence the way permits are issued for coal-fired power plants?

This tricky political question may be answered in the years to come, if the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service moves forward with plans to place polar bears on the Endangered Species List. Unlike most endangered animals, the polar bear’s biggest threat doesn’t come from hunters or invasive industries – it comes from global warming. Rising temperatures in the Arctic are literally melting the bears’ habitat, as sea ice disappears at an accelerating pace.

The polar bear would be the first animal to be listed as endangered as a result of global warming, if the federal government decides to do so. The issue is under study and a decision is expected within a year. Environmentalists say that if the decision goes through, it should force the government to consider the impact on polar bears when issuing permits for coal-fired power plants and other large emitters of greenhouse gases.

But saving the polar bears would require global cooperation. Carbon dioxide emissions from around the planet are responsible for the melting sea ice, where polar bears find their primary source of food, the ice seal. Scientists report the bears are already resorting to cannibalism in some areas where the ice is receding and that, if substantial steps aren’t taken soon to stop the melting, all of the ice could disappear within 40 years.

That wouldn’t just cause problems for the polar bears. A planet without polar ice caps would have difficulty deflecting the sun’s rays and would heat up at an even faster rate – causing problems for all of us.

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To learn more about what you can do to slow global warming, go to www.fightglobalwarming.com.

To read more about this and other environmental health issues, go to: www.environmentalhealthnews.org, www.ourstolenfuture.org, or www.healthandenvironment.org