The Last Frontier: The Last True Wilderness Is Increasingly at Risk in the Current Political Climate, with Calls for Less Dependency on Foreign Oil Focusing Attention on the Alaskan Preserves

This last American living wilderness must remain sacrosanct. (1) --Supreme Court Justice William O. Douglas In the far northeastern corner of Alaska remains the last great wilderness in the United States. Calling this area the last great wilderness is a statement not made lightly; people have been calling it that for almost 50 years. The name of the place is so often mentioned that even the most ardent sociophobe has probably heard of it: the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. First created as the Arctic National Wildlife Range in 1960 by order of President Eisenhower's Secretary of the Interior, Fred Seaton, it subsequently doubled in size during the waning days of the Carter administration, through arm-twisting over the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act (ANILCA). Most of the original Arctic National Wildlife Range was subsequently designated wilderness, but under ANILCA, part of it was placed in a sort of legal limbo, to further study its oil and gas potential. The land that was set aside for further study was the infamous 1.5-million-acre coastal plain, also known as the area, after section 1002 of ANILCA, which calls for an assessment of the area. This coastal plain has endured over 20 years of pushing and shoving between oil and conservation interests, and the battle has come to a head once again. After the events of September 11, 2001, the call to decrease the United States' dependency on foreign oil is focusing enormous attention on Alaska's coastal plai n. Pristine Refuge Today, the Arctic Refuge is one of the finest remaining pristine areas on the planet, along with its two adjacent parks in Canada: Ivvavik and Vuntut National Parks. The Arctic Refuge is, of course, dwarfed by Antarctica and Greenland, but those two areas are almost entirely covered with ice. By contrast, the Arctic Refuge has a full complement of subarctic and arctic ecosystems without any introduced species. It is, for all practical purposes, just as it was thousands of years ago. Only 8 million acres (3.2 million hectares) are officially designated wilderness, but almost the entire place is de facto wilderness. The refuge is a very remote place, but in this age of airplanes, not as remote as you might think. From anywhere in the United States, you could be comfortably within its wilderness in two or three days, limited only by the weather and the schedule of your bush pilot. Still, few go there. The backcountry of the refuge sees fewer annual visitors than Curry Village in Yosemite Valley sees in a single summer Saturday. Unlike Yosemite Valley in the interior of the refuge you will see no ATM machines, banks, bars, stores, hotels, employee housing, paved trails, or horseback riders. There are no facilities or buildings at all that I know of, except for the tiny village of Kaktovik at the northern edge of the refuge on Barter Island, a few cabins down along the southern edge of the refuge, and a couple of small, abandoned, ballistic missile warning radar sites on the coast. There are no trail signs or even manmade trails. For all practical purposes, the refuge is utterly pristine. It also encompasses an area 26 times larger than Yosemite National Park, almost nine times the size of Yellowstone. I would trade either Yellowstone or Yosemite for the refuge in a heartbeat, and I have been to both many times in many seasons. The Wildest Place An odd champion of the Arctic Refuge, I am a petroleum geologist by trade. All of my income comes from oil and gas production. Perhaps what sets me apart from some of my colleagues is an intense love of wild places. Since my youth, I have traveled further and further into such places. My wandering eye eventually settled on Alaska, particularly the Brooks Range in the Alaskan Arctic. A 19-day paddle down the Noatak River through part of Gates of the Arctic National Park and the length of Noatak National Preserve clenched it. …

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