Summary Of Arctic National Wildlife Refuge By Jimmy Carter

Benedek Sandor

Arctic National Wildlife Refuge Essay Jimmy Carter, a former U.S. president, visited the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge with his wife where he decided that this natural beauty is something that he wanted to protect. He witnessed tens of thousands of caribou migrating across the tundra with their newborn calves. Carter became saddened to think what might happen if this beauty was destroyed so he signed the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act in 1980 to protect the wilderness. Carter uses reasoning and evidence to develop ideas and strengthen the logic and persuasiveness of his argument. Carter uses reasoning in order to add power to the argument that industrializing the area should never happen. He argues that adding roads, pipelines, drilling rigs, and industrial facilities would only destroy the natural beauty of the Arctic by saying “Such proposed developments would forever destroy the wilderness character of America’s only Arctic

He talks about the possible benefits of the drilling while showing how they do not compare to the downsides by saying “At best, the Arctic Refuge might provide 1 to 2 percent of the oil our country consumes each day. We can easily conserve more than that amount by driving more fuel-efficient vehicles. Instead of tearing open the heart of our greatest refuge, we should use our resources more wisely.” Carter explains that even though a small percentage of our daily use will be covered by drilling into the Arctic Refuge, there are much better ways to go about it that don’t involve destroying nature. More fuel-efficient vehicles are given as an example that could be seen as an alternative solution that doesn’t damage the wildlife. Facts and examples are provided by Carter in order to assist his claims that opening up the Arctic Refuge coastal plain to oil drilling should not