US News Article | Reuters.com
By Yereth Rosen
ANCHORAGE, Alaska (Reuters) – The U.S. government
paved the way on Wednesday for oil drilling in an Alaskan region used by migrating caribou and birds, three weeks after Congress blocked
energy development in the nearby Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
The Interior Department gave final approval to develop the
Teshekpuk Lake region, setting up an oil-lease sale in September. The decision came a year after the Bureau of Land Management
recommended drilling in the region, which lies west of the wildlife refuge on Alaska’s North Slope.
Teshekpuk’s 389,000 acres
had been protected from oil exploration since the Reagan Administration. In 1998, when former President Bill Clinton opened some areas of
the North Slope to the oil industry, the Teshekpuk Lake area was kept off-limits.