PRESIDENT BUSH has enraged environmentalists by opening protected millions of acres of national forest lands to logging, mining and energy interests.

The wilderness, which covers an area bigger than the whole of Great Britain, was placed beyond the reach of developers or any mechanical vehicle by one of President Clinton’s final acts in office.

But Mr Bush has taken the potentially far-reaching decision to allow roadbuilding in the huge tracts of land, which account for a third of America’s national forests.

The Administration argues that giving greater access to the untouched land will allow the US Forest Service to reduce the risk of wildfires by better maintaining the woodlands. Roads into the remote areas would also provide access for firefighters to fight blazes.

The Administration was committed to “protecting and restoring the health and beauty of our national forests”, Mike Johanns, the US Agriculture Secretary, said. But environmental groups said that the decision, like the US rejection of the Kyoto treaty and Mr Bush’s plans to drill for oil in the Alaskan wildlife refuge, relegated the environment below energy interests. They said that habitats and water sources would be threatened.

They also said that the move, which they dubbed the “no tree left behind” policy, marked an irreversible move to open unspoilt lands to mining and logging. Energy companies welcomed the decision, and analysts said that the first moves into the forests were likely to be by groups drilling for natural gas rather than by loggers.

The Independent Petroleum Association of America, which represents energy companies, said that up to 11 trillion cubic feet of natural gas could be developed in areas that had previously been off-limits.

The fate of the country’s national forests has simmered for decades in the American West and other parts of smalltown rural America. Small communities, especially those struggling economically, often want to exploit lands that they regard as a natural resource. They deride environmentalists as representing suburbanites rather than rural folk.

Mr Clinton’s sweeping measure to place national forests beyond the reach of developers was bitterly opposed by some Western governors, who argued that the lands should be open to a variety of uses. The abrupt manner in which Mr Clinton acted, in the dying days of his Administration, also irked many in the West. The law has become the subject of a number of lawsuits that are still going through the courts.

Mr Bush’s move concerns 58.5 million acres, most of it in the West. States most affected include Alaska, with 14.8 million acres of roadless forest, Idaho, with 9.3 million, and Montana, with 6.4 million. Colorado, California and Utah all have more than 4 million acres. Wyoming and Nevada have more than 3 million. The total area involved, is 91,406 square miles.

Under the administration plan, 34.3 million forest acres will become open to road-building. New management plans will have to be written for the other 24.2 million acres before roads can be build on them.

One effect will be to place decision-making over federal land in the hands of local state authorities. Robert Vandermark, director of the Heritage Forests Campaign, said that millions of acres of America’s last wild forests were “immediately at risk”. He added: “National forests deserve national protection and should not be subject to the whims of local politics.”

The group said that 386,000 miles of roads already existed in US forest lands and that the Forest Service had a backlog of maintenance work on them totalling $10 billion.

Niel Lawrence, of the Natural Resources Defence Council, said that Mr Bush had replaced the roadless rule with a “treeless” rule, so depriving “future generations of their birthright and national heritage”.

Environmental groups claim to have the public on their side. Four million people voiced support for Mr Clinton’s act, according to the League of Conservation Voters.

Bill Richardson, the Democratic Governor of New Mexico, said the move was anti- environment and a wholesale assault to drill more oil or gas and cut more timber. “It’s going to start a war in the West.”

PRESIDENTIAL RECORD

• Withdrew from Kyoto accord, designed to cut greenhouse gases
  
• “Clear Skies” initiative aims to reduce sulphur dioxide, nitrogen oxide, and mercury emissions by 70 per cent. But is voluntary and does nothing about carbon dioxide
  
• Is pushing $1.7 billion, five-year plan to develop hydrogen technologies as alternative to oil and petroleum fuel
  
• Won Senate approval to drill for oil in Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge
  
• Loosened pollution controls on coal-fired power plants and abandoned more than 50 investigations into possible breaches of the Clean Air Act.

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