[For the full record of Bush Administration actions on our public lands, please visit:
http://www.wilderness.org/Library/Documents/BushRecord.cfm]
The Rhetoric Sounds Good
"We must fulfill our promise to the next generation, that's what we must do, and leave behind a world as blessed and beautiful as the one our parents left us."
--President Bush, Healthy Forest Initiative Speech at the White House, 5/20/03
The Administration's Record Does Not
The Administration has tried to have the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge opened to oil and gas drilling.
- The amount of oil that the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) estimates could be recovered from the Arctic Refuge would amount to less than a six-month supply for American consumers. Even less natural gas occurs under the Refuge relative to U.S. demand. At no time would oil from the refuge be expected to amount to more than 2 percent of U.S. demand. It will take 7 to 10 years for any oil to make it to market. 95% of the Alaska's North Slope is already available for oil and gas exploration, as well as other development. (www.wilderness.org/OurIssues/Arctic/development.cfm)
- Using U.S. Energy Information Administration forecast prices, the USGS estimate of economically recoverable oil from the arctic refuge coastal plain is less than 5 billion barrels. EIA predicts that by 2020, the United States will consume about 27 million barrels of oil daily; at that rate, 5 billion barrels of oil would last the nation six months. (Anchorage Daily News, 4/3/03)
The Administration is attempting to remove protections for 58 million acres of our National Forests that are not yet damaged by roads.
- Immediately upon taking office, the Bush Administration suspended the Roadless Rule, and it appeared that it might try to do away with it entirely. However, under pressure from Congress and the American public, in May 2001 the Bush Administration promised to uphold the Roadless Rule with only minor changes.
- Then, on June 9, 2003, the Bush Administration proposed major changes to the Roadless Rule, claiming that the changes would not drastically alter the "Roadless Rule." In truth, they amount to a devastating one-two punch to National Forest roadless area conservation, completely eliminating the Roadless Rule's protection for our two largest National Forests - Alaska's Tongass and Chugach - and severely weakening the Rule everywhere else in the National Forest System. (Anchorage Daily News, 6/10/03)
- In fact, the proposed changes would target 300,000 acres of the Tongass National Forest's old-growth forests to new road development, and allow governors to exempt National Forests in their states from the Roadless Area Conservation Rule. At the present time, there are approximately 50 timber sales scheduled in areas of the Tongass National Forest that were previously protected by the Roadless Rule. (Anchorage Daily News, 6/10/03; Statesman Journal, 7/25/03)
In the Rocky Mountain West, where the government's own studies have shown that there is very little oil and gas that companies can't already access, the Administration has made drilling the top priority for places like Wyoming's Green River Valley.
- With a lease area covering an area of over 59,000 acres of BLM lands, the Jonah II Gas Field in Wyoming's Green River Basin has quickly grown over the last several years from a few dozen wells to more than 300 wells.
- In March 2003, several energy companies asked the U.S. Bureau of Land Management for permission to drill some 1,250 new gas wells in southwest Wyoming. Approval of their request would expand upon a modified drilling project approved by the BLM in 2000. The Modified Jonah Field II Natural Gas Project Environmental Assessment would allow for 450 new wells in addition to the 47 existing wells in the area. (Associated Press, 3/15/03)
- There are now more than 94,000 producing oil and gas wells on our public lands, with many thousands more in the permitting process and tens of thousands more planned by the Bush Administration.
The Administration has decided not to even consider wilderness protection for 180 million acres of wild land in the West. It has even thrown out temporary protection for nearly a quarter of a million acres of Wilderness Study Areas in the West, overturning decades of work by on-the-ground land managers in nine Western states.
Contact:
* Chris Mehl, Communications Director, 406-586-1600
* Michael Francis, Nat'l Forest Program Dir., 202-429-2662
