Feds record an ESA win with plant that once faced a pipeline

By Michael Doyle | 07/30/2024 01:17 PM EDT

Conservation and cultivation has helped revive the northeastern bulrush in states like Vermont, New York and Pennsylvania.

A close-up of a northeastern bulrush, a wetland plant.

A northeastern bulrush, a plant found in wetlands. Mary Ann Furedi/Western Pennsylvania Conservancy/Pennsylvania Natural Heritage Program/Fish and Wildlife Service

The endangered northeastern bulrush once complicated plans for a $1.2 billion natural gas pipeline. Now, that proposed pipeline project is defunct while the plant appears to thrive as an Endangered Species Act success story.

In a notable environmental turnaround, the Fish and Wildlife Service on Tuesday proposed taking the northeastern bulrush off of the list of endangered species. At the time of its initial ESA listing in 1991, only 13 populations of the species were known to exist. Now, the FWS has identified at least 148 populations across eight states spanning parts of both New England and Appalachia.

“At this time, oil and gas development in Pennsylvania is perhaps the most likely development threat,” the FWS stated, “however, we are not aware of any information, such as project proposals, that indicates any populations are under threat from oil and gas development.”

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The agency added that the threat of the destruction or modification of the northeastern bulrush’s wetlands habitat from development is “less than previously thought, and not a significant factor” in the continued viability of the species. About 60 percent of the populations are protected by virtue of being on publicly owned lands including national wildlife refuges, national park units and state game lands.

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