Dear Audubon Advocate,

In recent days, we’ve asked you to take action to protect Alaska’s Izembek National Wildlife Refuge. We also need your help to stop a threat to another vitally important habitat. We have one final opportunity to stop an ecologically devastating oil development on Alaska's North Slope. Significant portions of the proposed project would be located within the irreplaceable Teshekpuk Lake Special Area, which has been protected for decades due to its significance for nesting Yellow-billed Loons, molting geese, polar bears, and caribou. 

The project would have devastating impacts to the entire western Arctic region, posing serious health, environmental, and food security threats to Alaska Native communities.

Please take action today and tell the Department of the Interior to protect the globally important Teshekpuk Lake Special Area. The agency could issue its final decision within days.

If approved, the development would be the largest oil extraction project on federal lands in the United States. It would drive massive carbon emissions, adding more than 287 million metric tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere—equivalent to running 76 coal plants for a year. 

Arctic Alaska's climate has already warmed four times faster than in other parts of the world, leading to catastrophic wildfires, melting sea ice, and rising sea levels causing coastal communities to relocate inland to higher ground. The project will also further disrupt the traditional way of life for Indigenous people living in communities like Nuiqsut, who have been continuously affected by oil development projects.

Time is of the essence. Urge the Department of the Interior to reject the destructive project and protect an irreplaceable and fragile area.