Economics
OPEC to the Rescue for Mating Dance of Prairie Chicken
- Drilling has fallen by two-thirds in some states they inhabit
- Interior Department declines to classify it as endangered
Greater Sage Grouse in Craig, Colorado.
Photographer: Joe Amon/The Denver Post via Getty ImagesThis article is for subscribers only.
The greater sage grouse may have found an unlikely ally: OPEC.
The fowl at the center of one of the nation’s biggest conservation battles had already received good news before the Interior Department declined to classify it as endangered. With Saudi Arabia and other OPEC members pumping oil with no respite despite crude prices below $50 a barrel, drillers in the U.S. have idled more than half their rigs over the past year in western states where the grouse lives, like Colorado and Wyoming.