Trump officials visit Alaska oil field amid push to expand drilling

Deadhorse, Alaska (AP) — President Trump wants to double the amount of oil coursing through Alaska’s vast pipeline system and build a massive natural gas project as its “big, beautiful twin,” a top administration official said June 2 while touring a prolific oil field near the Arctic Ocean.

The remarks by U.S. Energy Secretary Chris Wright came as he and two other Trump Cabinet members – Interior Secretary Doug Burgum and Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lee Zeldin – visited Prudhoe Bay as part of a multi-day trip aimed at highlighting Trump’s push to expand oil and gas drilling, mining, and logging in the state that drew criticism from environmentalists.

During the trip, Burgum’s agency announced plans to repeal Biden-era restrictions on leasing and industrial development in portions of the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska that are designated as special for wildlife, subsistence, or other values.

The petroleum reserve is west of Prudhoe Bay and Deadhorse, the industrial encampment near the starting point of the trans-Alaska pipeline system. The pipeline, which runs for 800 miles, has been Alaska’s economic lifeline for nearly 50 years.

Government and industry representatives from several Asian countries, including Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, and the Philippines, joined a portion of the trip, as Trump has focused renewed attention on the gas project proposal, which in its current iteration would ship liquefied natural gas overseas.

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NEW YORK

Scientists Date Oldest Known Whale Bone Tools to 20,000 Years Ago

New York (AP) — Scientists have pinpointed the oldest known evidence of humans making tools from whale bone.

The bones, fashioned into narrow projectiles for hunting, had been uncovered in excavations dating back over a century in the Bay of Biscay near Spain and France. Scientists figured the tools were quite ancient, but many were small fragments so it was hard to determine their age.

Technological advancements in the past decade have now made it possible to date the oldest of the tools to about 20,000 years ago. Scientists found that the bones came from blue whales, fin whales, sperm whales, and other species.

“Humans and whales have clearly been encountering one another for a long time,” said Vicki Szabo, of Western Carolina University, who studies the history of whaling and was not involved with the latest research.

Scientists think that ancient humans were crafting whale bone instruments in places including the Arctic and South Pacific.

There’s been solid evidence of whale bone tools dating back to about 5,000 years ago, but the new research published in late May in the journal Nature Communications pushes the timeline back.

Ancient humans weren’t necessarily hunting whales, said study author Jean-Marc Petillon, of the French National Centre for Scientific Research. More likely, they were scavenging the bodies of beached whales and fashioning their dense, heavy bones into tools to hunt reindeer or bison.

SOUTH AFRICA

Cutting Off Rhinos’ Horns a Contentious Way to Stop Poaching. Does it Work?

Cape Town, South Africa (AP) — Cutting off the horns of sedated rhinos with a chainsaw has been viewed by wildlife conservationists in Africa for more than 30 years as a necessary evil to save the iconic endangered species from poaching.

They hoped the drastic action was working, but evidence was scarce. Now, a study published in the academic journal Science has found that dehorning rhinos has led to a large reduction in poaching in game reserves in and around the Kruger National Park in northern South Africa – an area that’s home to 25% of the world’s rhinos and is especially vulnerable to poaching.

The results of the seven-year study that ended in 2023 are seen as long-awaited evidence that removing rhinos’ horns – which needs to be done every one to two years because they grow back – helps them survive.

The study showed that dehorning consistently reduced poaching. It found that the dehorning of more than 2,000 rhinos resulted in a 78% reduction in poaching in eight reserves, providing some confirmation that such an invasive intervention was worth it.

MAINE

Lawmakers Try to Bolster Forest Protections

Augusta, Maine (AP) — Late last year a team of ecologists came to a dire conclusion: without new conservation and management initiatives, half of the oldest forests in Maine’s unorganized territory could be gone in the next 35 years.

A bipartisan bill introduced by state Sen. Rick Bennett (R-Oxford) aims to reverse that trend while also protecting Maine’s undeveloped lakes and ponds.

After overcoming initial opposition from state officials and forest industry groups through multiple compromises, the bill was unanimously voted out of committee and approved by the state Senate this week. Although the version of L.D. 1529 the full legislature received is drastically different from what Bennett originally proposed, it now has support from conservation and forestry groups.

Instead of reclassifying undeveloped Maine ponds and lakes in the near future, the new version now instructs the Maine Land Use Planning Commission to evaluate the decades-old Lake Management Program and determine whether reclassification is needed.

The end result is a bill that the Maine Forest Products Council and environmental nonprofit Natural Resources Council of Maine both support.