Conservation groups file for polar bear protection

Three international conservation and environmental groups are planning to take legal action “as early as next week” to have polar bears listed as “threatened” under the U.S. Endangered Species Act due to global warming.

Greenpeace, the Centre for Biological Diversity and the Natural Resources Defence Council first petitioned to have the polar bear listed as threatened last February. Under the Endangered Species Act, the Secretary of the Interior has 90 days to reply.

But having not received a reply to their petition by October, the three groups served a notice of intent to sue the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service for action.

“The United States has renounced the Kyoto Protocol and has yet to adopt any meaningful plan for reducing greenhouse gas emissions… Thus, the threat to polar bears from global warming has increased since the filing of the petition, and will continue to do so,” says the letter of intent sent in October.

Formal filing is expected “as early as next week, after 60 days have passed from the October 12 notice, if the agency does not comply with the law.”

If the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service lists the polar bear under the Endangered Species Act, this move would lead to a ban of polar bear trophy imports from Canada into the U.S.