[L]ike scores of other species-protection cases won by the Center for Biological Diversity in the past, this is but the first step in a long, arduous process to translate the listing into action.
The center petitioned for the polar bear's listing back in 2005. It later sued along with Greenpeace and the Natural Resources Defense Council to force the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to list it.
The center's blueprint for saving the polar bear is ambitious and complex. It includes:
? Challenging offshore oil and gas leasing in Alaska within six months.
? Launching a large-scale challenge to the licensing of coal-fired power plants around the country sometime after that.
? Finally, challenging large-scale, local government development plans in major cities.
These efforts would be in the name of reducing greenhouse gases that many scientists are now linked to the breakup of the Arctic-area sea ice on which polar bears live.
"We are trying to change national and international policy," said Tucsonan Kieran Suckling, the center's director.