[This post is an update as we missed posting the document in July] In July of this year, SCB, along with the Wildlife Society, the Ecological Society of America, and the American Statistical Association, sent a letter to the House of Representatives urging representatives to support an amendment by Norm Dicks blocking efforts to suspend listings of endangered species. The House subsequently did vote to strip the Endangered Listing Ban from the Interior Appropriations Bill. 37 Republicans bucked their leadership and voted with all but two Democrats to allow new listings of endangered species to continue. SCB continues to explore additional opportunities to collaborate with other scientific societies on similar policy issues.
Keystone XL Pipeline Would Threaten Highly Endangered Whooping Cranes
WASHINGTON DC — As climate scientists, farmers, conservation groups and concerned citizens continue two weeks of protests at the White House in opposition to permitting a large new pipeline to carry partially refined tar from Alberta to the Gulf Coast, the world’s largest international conservation science society reminded the Obama Administration of the hazards the pipeline poses to the environment, particularly the highly endangered whooping crane.
“In addition to its well known climate change impact, the Keystone XL pipeline would threaten the whooping crane — one of the most highly endangered birds in the world — from one end of its migration route and habitat to the other,” said Dominick DellaSala, an ecologist and president of the North American Section of the Society for Conservation Biology.
Last year, the Society for Conservation Biology (SCB) sent detailed comments to the State Department and other federal agencies explaining that the proposed pipeline and those it would connect to follows the migration of the endangered whooping crane for nearly its entire route. The risk of highly toxic oil spills and the dramatic expansion of tailing ponds could jeopardize the survival of the bird that the Fish and Wildlife Service calls one of the most famous symbols of America’s dedication to saving its wild national heritage.
Read more…
SCB’s North America section today submitted comments on proposed changes to wolf recovery policy in the US, including development of a ‘National Wolf Strategy’.
SCBNA suggested that the FWS:
1) Ensure that the National Wolf Strategy, proposed delisting of the western Great Lakes distinct population segment of the gray wolf (Canis lupus), proposed revision of the historic range of the gray wolf (Canis lupus), rangewide review of Canis lycaon in the United States and Canada, and status reviews for the gray wolf (Canis lupus) in the Pacific Northwest and Mexican wolves (Canis lupus baileyi) in the southwest United States and Mexico meets the standards of use of “best scientific and commercial data” as required under the ESA, in part by subjecting each to independent scientific peer review;
2) Consider both the intent of the ESA and relevant ecology and conservation science when defining the concepts of ‘range’ and ‘significant portion of range’;
3) Consider recent genetic research in evaluating the significance of potential listing units;
4) Resolve taxonomic issues more fully before removing protections from (delisting) wolf-like canids in the northeastern United States, and separate the taxonomic reclassification issues in the proposed rule from other proposed actions;
5) Consider the relevance of wolf metapopulation ecology and historic genetic population structure when applying DPS concept; and
6) Use current population viability analysis (PVA) methodologies to support recovery planning at both the national and regional level.
You can download the full comments here.
The National Forest Management Act (NFMA) and regulations based on it provide the framework for the management of 155 National Forests and 20 Grasslands, and are the key guidelines for ensuring that these lands help safeguard biodiversity. NFMA regulations are currently under revision, after a set of regulations enacted under the Bush administration was invalidated by the courts. A panel of scientists convened by SCB reviewed the new draft regulations. The scientists reviewed each of five focus areas in the agencies’ draft Environmental Impact Statement on the service’s proposed rule. While reviewers noted that the planning rule was in certain respects a marked improvement over the 1982 forest rule that is currently in effect, they called on the Forest Service to make improvements in order to reach the agencies’ stated goal of protecting water and wildlife in a changing climate and to meet the requirements of the law in today’s world. Read more…
Expansion of renewable energy infrastructure is an important goal but creates complex questions regarding how the renewable footprint can be expanded while minimizng adverse impacts on biodiversity. SCB recently submitted comments to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service suggesting how conservation science can best inform their current process of developing Land-Based Wind Energy Guidelines.
In December 2010, peer reviewers from three scientific societies (SCB, AOU, and TWS) reviewed the recovery plan for the threatened Northern Spotted Owl (see earlier blog post here). The reviewers found the plan was still inadequate in several major aspects. In particular, the reviews noted that the draft plan was released before completion of the habitat modeling that would be used to design the network of habitat reserves. Recently, the FWS has released Appendix C to the recovery plan, which describes in more detail those modeling methods. Despite a short comment timeline, SCB was able to recruit some of the same peer reviewers to review the Appendix. The reviewers generally found the methodology appropriate, but criticized the fact that there was still no information on the actual reserve scenarios that would be evaluated. Read more…
The following column by SCB Policy Director John Fitzgerald is adapted from an article that will appear in the upcoming issue of SCB’s newsletter, available here later this quarter.
From Nagoya to Nuclear Catastrophe and from Organic Shade Grown Fair Trade Coffee to the Tea Party – in One Season
At the end of 2010 we reported in the Policy Insider and the Newsletter on the considerable progress that SCB’s delegation had made in the meeting in Nagoya, Japan, contributing to and improving the strategic plan and other elements of the Convention on Biological Diversity’s next ten years of implementation.
We also reported on initial attempts in the US Congress to curtail the application of the Endangered Species Act and other bedrock environmental laws, initially by removing gray wolves in two or more states from the endangered and threatened lists. (For more details on these and other issues see the Policy Insider at www.conbio.org/resources/policy.)
Read more…
SCB, along with The Wildlife Society and the Ecological Society of America, this week asked Congressional leaders and the President to reject legislative riders added to the Continuing Resolution that would undermine the Endangered Species Act and other important environmental laws and regulations. The three organizations urged in their letter (link) that lawmakers actively oppose, and if passed, that the President veto, any legislation that would undercut the use of the best available science as the basis for implementing our conservation, environmental and public health laws. Many of the proposed provisions in the House Continuing Resolution, H.R. 1, and scores of amendments offered to it, would not reform the regulatory process to improve the use of science, but rather would halt the public comment and judicial review processes, defund state, private and federal cooperative conservation programs based on science, and replace them with directives supported by particular interests.
Scientific integrity is one of five priority policy areas for SCB. It is important to all of us as citizens that decisions by federal and state agencies are informed by unbiased science, and that SCB members and other scientists who work within government are free to do science and speak about their results without political pressure. On March 9, 2009, President Obama issued a Presidential Memorandum on Scientific Integrity, and asked Federal officials to craft recommendations for ensuring scientific integrity throughout the executive branch. SCB submitted comments on this process in May of 2009, both on its own (link), and as part of a group of seven scientific societies (link). Over 21 months later, on December 17th, 2010, the White House issuing a Memorandum (link) to the heads of Departments and Agencies that provides guidance on implementing the new policies on scientific integrity. The new memorandum describes the minimum standards expected as departments and agencies craft scientific integrity rules, including a prohibition on political interference in scientific processes and expanded assurances of transparency. It requires that department and agency heads report on their progress toward completing those rules within 120 days. While SCB has not yet had time to fully review the new memorandum, the Society will continue to track this priority issue as the new policy is implemented.
Each quarter, John Fitzgerald, SCB’s Policy Director, prepares a newsletter describing conservation policy news and SCB’s policy activities. It often provides more depth on an issue than we can post on the blog.
December’s issue can be found here.
