ANALYSIS - Polar Bear Listing Could Slow Arctic Oil Drilling
Oil drilling in the Arctic may need to slow down, now that polar bears, iconic symbols of global warming, are headed for protection under the US Endangered Species Act, experts said. US Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne this week added polar bears to the list of threatened animals under the act because their sea ice habitat is rapidly melting -- a move that comes just as the oil industry is pushing into offshore Arctic Alaska frontiers.