Sierra Club Notice of Intent to Sue Flags Agency Failures to Protect Arctic Polar Bears from Oil & Gas Activities - CleanTechnica

The Sierra Club, along with allied organizations represented by Trustees for Alaska, has filed a notice of intent to sue the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) for violations of the Endangered Species Act (ESA). The lawsuit challenges the agencies’ approval of expanded oil and gas exploration, drilling, and development in the Coastal Plain of the Arctic Refuge, a critical maternal denning habitat for the highly vulnerable Southern Beaufort Sea polar bear population. The Sierra Club contends that the FWS’s September 2025 biological opinion, which underpins the BLM’s leasing program, contains significant legal flaws and underestimates the detrimental impacts of these activities on polar bears and their habitat. The Coastal Plain is particularly important because it has a higher density of maternal denning sites than most other northern Alaska regions, and polar bear cubs under two months old are extremely vulnerable, unable to survive outside their dens. The Sierra Club’s Oil and Gas Campaign