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Alaska Oil & Gas Association v. Ross
Alaska Oil & Gas Association v. National Marine Fisheries Service ↗
4:14-cv-00029United States District of Alaska (D. Alaska)1 entry
Filing Date
Type
Action Taken
Document
Summary
03/17/2016
Other
Listing vacated.
The federal district court for the District of Alaska struck down the listing of the Arctic subspecies of ringed seal as threatened under the Endangered Species Act. The court said that the listing was not reasonable because the subspecies population was currently strong and healthy and the listing was grounded primarily in “speculation as to what circumstances may or may not exist 80 to 100 years from now.” The court said that the National Marine Fisheries Service had acknowledged that it lacked reliable data regarding the impacts of loss of sea-ice due to climate change in that extended timeframe.
Alaska Oil & Gas Association v. Ross ↗
16-35380, 16-35382United States Ninth Circuit (9th Cir.)7 entries
Filing Date
Type
Action Taken
Document
Summary
02/12/2018
Decision
Decision issued reinstating listing.
The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals reversed a district court decision that vacated the listing of the Arctic ringed seal as threatened under the Endangered Species Act (ESA). In an unpublished decision, the Ninth Circuit said its 2016 opinion reversing a district court’s striking down of the listing of the bearded seal adjudicated the same issues and was the controlling law of the circuit. As in that case, the Ninth Circuit found that the National Marine Fisheries Service’s finding that the Arctic ringed seal was likely to become endangered within the foreseeable future due to their reliance on sea ice was reasonable and supported by the record. The court said it was not arbitrary or capricious to rely on climate change models that projected through 2100. The Ninth Circuit also said the district court had misapplied Section 4 of the ESA by requiring quantitative data that was not available to pinpoint an extinction threshold.