This is the first time climate change has been a factor in proposing a threatened status for any U.S. species, and was spurred on by environmentalists who claimed a limited victory in Kempthorne's announcement.
'MAJOR STEP FORWARD' WITH 'LOOPHOLES'
"Protecting the polar bear under the Endangered Species Act is a major step forward, but the Bush administration has proposed using loopholes in the law to allow the greatest threat to the polar bear - global warming pollution - to continue unabated," Andrew Wetzler of the Natural Resources Defense Council said in a statement.
John Kostyack of the National Wildlife Federation, while gratified at the listing, saw little practical effect given the limits of Kempthorne's regulations.
"By denying a direct link between the sources of global warming pollution and the loss of the polar bears' sea ice habitat, and by denying that the polar bear will be protected from oil and gas development, they're willing to sit by and let the polar bear go extinct," Kostyack said by telephone.
The Endangered Species Act requires that decisions to protect wildlife be based solely on science, not on economic factors.
Bill Kovacs of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce praised the decision and its accompanying regulations, calling it a "common sense balancing" between environmental and business concerns.
Without the limiting regulations, Kovacs said, all carbon-emitters in the contiguous United States would have to go through a consultation process, which he said would have literally shut down federal activity overnight.
Canada, home to two-thirds of the world's polar bears, will not for now follow the U.S. lead in listing the animals as threatened, Environment Minister John Baird indicated.
The government of Nunavut, a territory home to most of Canada's Inuit people and which manages or co-manages some 15,000 polar bears, expressed disappointment in the U.S. decision.
"It is unfortunate the (U.S. government) has decided to disregard facts collected by those who have the greatest contact and longest history with polar bears," Nunavut Premier Paul Okalik said in a statement. "The truth is that polar bear populations are at near record levels."
