Group hosts walk to save Alaskan lands

Hoping to raise money and awareness in support of the preservation of a 1.5 million acre-coastal plain in the Alaskan wilderness, more than 50 students participated in the Walk for the Wild at Nichols Arboretum on Saturday.

SNRE senior Jenny Kerekes, an organizer of the event, said that oil industry lobbyists keen on developing the tract of land in remote northeast Alaska could endanger life for the more than 165 species living there.

"Area in tundra is a very fragile ecosystem that has been developing for a very long time," Kerekes said. "Even a small presence (of oil drilling) could disrupt the system."

British Petroleum Amoco and other oil giants are lobbying Congress to open up the coastal plain for oil drilling, claiming that new oil developments are necessary to meet the world's energy demands and advanced technology makes it possible to drill without harming the habitat.

DAVID KATZ/Daily Engineering sophomore Jessica Ryu and Engineering first-year student Adam Forney lead runners in the Walk for the Wild in Nichols Arboretum on Saturday.

But groups such as the Sierra Club and the Alaska Wilderness League warn that oil companies have a track record of environmental wreckage.

According to the Alaska Wilderness League, hundreds of spills involving thousands of gallons of crude oil, other petroleum products and hazardous waste occur annually on Alaska's north slope.

SNRE junior Brianne Haven, an organizer of Saturday's walk, said that the use of sub-ocean pipelines makes the oil drilling especially tenuous.

"There's a much higher chance of spills with this kind of drilling," Haven said. "It's easy for these pipelines to crack or burst with ice."

Former President Dwight Eisenhower first set aside Alaskan land for preservation in 1960 and Congress expanded the Arctic Refuge to 19 million acres in 1980 as part of the National Wilderness Preservation System.

But the coastal plain currently under dispute was left out of the expanded Arctic Refuge.

Two bills before Congress would give the 1.5 million acre coastal plain in Alaska permanent protection, the Morris K. Udall Wilderness Act in the House and the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge Wilderness Act in the Senate.

The coastal plain is home to a vast array of wildlife such as musk oxen, polar bears, wolverines and snow geese.

Each spring, a 129,000-member herd of Porcupine river caribou trek hundreds of miles from Canada to give birth in the Alaskan coastal plain. Newborn caribou have a higher chance of surviving in this area because it is virtually predator-free and also has lush plant life and few mosquitoes.

In addition to raising awareness about the threatened Alaskan wilderness, organizers of Saturday's walk said they wanted to promote Nichols Arboretum, the University's own wilderness reserve area.

"We need to respect nature before it's all gone," Haven said.

LSA first-year student Alan Mardegian, a participant in the walk, said he was concerned that the world's wilderness could disappear.

"When I get older I want to have some place to go by myself and be with nature," Mardegian said.

Participants in the five kilometer walk, organized by the Michigan Student Assembly's Environmental Issues Commission and EnAct, raised more than $1,400. The proceeds will support the Alaska Wilderness League and Nichols Arboretum.

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