Defenders of Wildlife Blog

The Supreme Court decision not to hear an appeal of the 10th Circuit Court decision upholding the Clinton administration’s Roadless Area Conservation Rule is a huge victory for wildlife.  As a part of the team who helped establish the rule, I can say that the 11-year battle was well worth it.

The “roadless rule” was a directive from President Clinton to protect all remaining roadless areas on our national forests.  Of the 192 million acres of national forests in the U.S., 58.5 million acres — or nearly 30% — are without roads.  These areas are important places for wildlife and the anchors for biodiversity across large areas of the western and eastern states.  Roadless areas provide critical habitat for many threatened and endangered species, and include many watershed areas that are a critical source of drinkable water for major metropolitan areas across the West.

Tongass National Forest, Alaska

President Clinton signed the roadless rule in January, 2001, to resounding criticism from Members of Congress who saw this as usurping Congressional authority to create new wilderness areas. At the time, I was a member of the Clinton Administration, and along with General Counsel at the President’s Council on Environmental Quality Dinah Bear (now a Defenders Board member), we argued that the President was not creating new wilderness, but simply using his executive authority to protect these essential public lands.  Other critics of the policy argued that this was done at the end of the administration with little opportunity for public input, despite the fact that the President’s action was the culmination of more than two years of work, an extensive outreach effort, and the most public comments ever received in history on any administration proposal. Legal challenges ensued, but a three-judge panel gave a unanimous ruling that the Clinton roadless rule was legal, and last week the Supreme Court allowed that decision to stand.

What does this mean for wildlife? It means that they can continue to count on the safety of some of their most important habitats. In the northern Rockies, for instance, road development is a clear detriment to the recovery of grizzly bears. It fragments their habitat and increases their chances of a run-in with humans. Protecting roadless areas will give grizzly bears an anchor to build their populations and will aid in their recovery. You can find another example in the Pacific Northwest, where maintaining the headwaters of rivers and waterways is critical to the recovery of many threatened and endangered salmon species. While dams are one clear impediment to their migration upstream, roads in their nesting areas can create erosion, which pollutes the water and interferes with salmon spawning and development. Since existing roads in many national forests are already creating erosion problems, new roads would only make matters worse. Protecting these remaining roadless areas is an important part of the effort to restore iconic salmon runs in the region.

The battle to protect wildlife can be a long and winding road – pun intended.  In this case, the outcome is a vindication of the hard-fought work of President Clinton, Forest Service Chief Mike Dombeck, and all of us who believed it was the right thing to do.  And wildlife will be better off as a result.

Turbines like these produce clean electricity by catching the wind.

In releasing its new report, “21^st Century Government:  A Simpler, Smarter Regulatory System,” the Obama administration highlighted its “smart from the start” approach to large-scale renewable energy development on public lands.

While the Obama administration has made progress – more than any previous administration – in advancing clean energy development, it is essential that lessons learned from initial efforts to develop renewable energy be used to develop a smarter approach moving forward.

In reality, the administration’s efforts to promote clean energy development have not been as smart as they could and should be. And they have been slow to start. In all fairness, the oil spill

disaster in the Gulf of Mexico last year diverted enough energy and expertise among key agencies in the federal government, including the White House, to slow progress on the clean energy front. You can see the irony here, of course, since building a clean energy economy is essential to reducing our oil dependency. But that excuse is gone now, and the Obama administration is focused on accelerating responsible renewable energy development.

Related: Learn more about Defenders’ work to make renewable energy wildlife-friendly.

But the slow progress in clean energy development can’t be blamed solely on the Obama administration. A real roadblock to clean energy development has been the lack of certainty that Congress will commit essential funding for renewable energy projects. For years, Congress has shown consistent support for oil and gas companies. Last year, for example, it gave nearly $4 billion to the oil industry in tax breaks and incentives. In contrast, there’s never been this same long-term commitment to renewable energy.

The Obama administration’s efforts to promote clean energy development have not been as smart as they could and should be.

Short-term stimulus funding provided a needed boost for clean energy research and development. But compared to the permanent “incentives” for oil and gas development, the time-limited, support for renewable energy projects is totally inadequate.  Grants and loan guarantees for renewable energy projects will run out again the end of this year. And this is bound to bring about another rush to get projects done, which leads to hurried planning and analysis of impacts on water, wildlife and the environment.  Only the Congress can fix this problem — as the administration has encouraged them to do.

A Solar Energy Strategy

For its part, the U.S. Department of the Interior is working to put in place a process for solar development that would get good projects done faster and more cost effectively. We’re urging

A solar power plant like the one above can cover several thousand acres with fields of mirrors.

the Interior Department to make the program truly Smart from the Start. That means starting with good planning and project siting. Developing projects in areas where conflicts with wildlife, wild lands, and other important natural and cultural resources are minimal — making the probability of success that much higher — is clearly smart.  Even better, these projects should be close to transmission lines (or places where transmission lines are likely to be) so that the power generated can be delivered without having to build new, expensive transmission corridors. This is smart, too. And even better would be to recycle landscapes that have already been damaged like old mines or worn-out farm lands – that way a solar power plant can give new life to already degraded lands and minimize impacts on pristine places and wildlife habitats.

Of course, not all impacts can be avoided in all places, so a means to mitigate unavoidable impacts is needed as well. BLM policy is to protect sensitive wildlife and improve habitats for threatened and endangered species. Smart planning, especially if done at a larger, landscape level, instead of on a project-by-project basis, can improve the likelihood that impacts will be avoided, minimized and mitigated where necessary.

Up Front Environmental Studies Needed

Finally, if a means can be found to do much of the environmental review and analysis ahead of time for the places best suited for clean energy projects, it would help speed up planning,

Some of the best places for the threatened desert tortoise habitat are also prime for solar energy.

permitting and construction. This isn’t complicated either. It simply requires coordination between government agencies, developers and other stakeholders. That way we can ensure that any unanticipated and unintended impacts of a project are identified early and minimized and mitigated.

The Obama administration is on the right track in proposing to be Smart from the Start as it encourages clean energy development and promotes a clean energy economy. But to be successful and smart, it needs to keep things simple. Put projects in the right places, mitigate any unavoidable impacts, and streamline the processes required to ensure that clean energy gets permitted and built in an environmentally sound and efficient way. That’s a 21^st century strategy based on old-fashioned common sense.