The Wild American Dream

By Joe Roman, a conservation biologist and author.

Last month, Alaska solicited proposals to quantify the costs of protecting polar bears under the Endangered Species Act. The bear had been listed as threatened in 2008, the first species to be federally protected because of global warming.  Some Alaskans objected, afraid that listing would restrict drilling in the Beaufort and Chukchi Seas, where the bears have critical habitat. At first, the state bankrolled a public relations effort to overturn the listing, but when that effort failed, they looked to alternatives. Could they show that listing the polar bear came at too high a price?

In my book, Listed: Dispatches from America’s Endangered Species Act, I discuss the tradeoffs involved in protecting rare and threatened species. Alaska’s solicitation is part of an unfortunate tradition that focuses solely on the costs of protecting species, rather than including the many benefits that can come from conservation. In the polar bear’s case, this may include ecotourism, of value to the state; the dependence of the Inuit on the bear for spiritual and physical sustenance; and the preservation of sea-ice habitat, which can benefit us all.

Beyond these services is the value of conservation itself, whether it’s stewardship, the many people who are employed, or volunteer, to protect the bears, or the value of bequesting the bear to our grand children. And finally there’s the value we put on the very existence of the polar bear -- how much would we pay to keep the bear on earth, whether we or our offspring ever had a chance to see it or not?

Rarely, I suspect, do legal scholars think in geological time periods. But species extinctions are the great tragedies of our lifetime. Earlier this year, the US Fish and Wildlife Service acknowledged that it was giving up the eastern cougar, South Florida rainbow snake, and Florida fairy shrimp among others. By some estimates, Earth is losing three species an hour. Such changes will be seen in the fossil and the geological record for as long as anyone is around to observe them.

The Endangered Species Act of 1973 was intended to put an end to human-caused extinctions: a zero-tolerance law. Earlier legislation had been more flexible, employing the term “when practicable,” so that if there was a conflict with another federal agency, whether it was the US Army or the Tennessee Valley Authority, the Interior Department could modify the law. Not the Endangered Species Act. The diagnosis was intended to be as clear as a visit to the doctor’s office. A species was endangered or it wasn’t, regardless of the projected costs. (In contrast, protection of an endangered species habitat was subject to economic analyses.)

Here’s the thing. Endangered species protection works. The American alligator, bald eagle, and peregrine falcon have all been rescued from near extinction and taken off the list. Even species that came so close to disappearing that every individual had to be captured from the wild are now being restored. There are more than 180 California condors at large, from Big Sur to the Grand Canyon. The black-footed ferret, once thought extinct, was rescued from its last holdout on a ranch in Wyoming. It is now hunting prairie dogs in eight states and Mexico. Based on estimates of extinction risk, 262 U.S. species would probably have gone extinct between 1973 and 2003 had the act not been passed. At the time, 35 listed species were declared or presumed extinct. That’s 35 too many, but the Endangered Species Act has rescued hundreds of species. And by preserving rare animals and plants, we are also protecting their habitat, our habitat.

In the 1990s, the Endangered Species Act became more effective in its ability to protect ecosystems, in part because of a landmark court decision, Babbitt v. Sweet Home, which confirmed that “take,” or harm as it was presented in the Act, included habitat destruction. Policy decisions by Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt also provided more flexibility to landowners, helping to reduce the “scorched-earth” technique, in which landowners destroyed habitat to escape regulations.

Recent economic studies that focus on the tradeoffs of endangered species protection show that -- while there may be winners and losers, as in any policy decision -- the costs are rarely as high as the Act’s critics claim. Lost jobs in agriculture or logging, when they occur, are typically offset by outdoor recreation and the service industries, increasing the diversity of employment in many communities.

The Department of the Interior, Commerce Department, and Census Bureau have been gathering economic data on outdoor activities since 1955. In 2006, Americans spent more than $120 billion on hunting, fishing, and wildlife watching. That’s more than we spent on the Super Bowl. More than professional football. It’s more than we spent on all spectator sports, amusement parks, and ski slopes combined. About one in twenty people are employed directly and indirectly by such outdoor activities. Conservation supports millions of jobs.

The polar bear is the first species to be officially acknowledged as being threatened by global warming. Humans, too, will be a cost for a melting world. By protecting polar bears, and reducing emissions, we could avoid impacts such as hurricane damage, real estate losses, energy costs, and escalating water costs--a projected price tag of almost $1.9 trillion annually by 2100 in the US alone.

The next time Alaska puts out a call for research, it should examine the costs and benefits of protecting polar bears, or walruses, or belugas. The state just might find that it makes good economic sense to protect endangered species. In protecting the nation’s endangered species -- our natural capital -- we can live the wild American dream.