Kanye West’s plans to build a Yeezy utopia in Wyoming run headlong into an endangered species, the Greater Sage-Grouse, whose protection must trump other development activities.

We protect species or hasten their extinctions. We protect the environment or destroy it. We slow down the climate crisis or ignore it and hit a point where Earth cannot remain a viable planet. The Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) is supposed to protect wild species (over 5,800 animal and 30,000 plant species) from overexploitation and trade. However, it does not seem like CITES protections work. Despite capture and trade bans several species remain endangered and some are critically endangered or at risk of extinction. When humans decide which species to protect or not, corruption (and poaching) often follows. Examples of highly poached and endangered species are provided throughout the chapter including sharks (fins), elephants (tusks), rhinoceros (horns), tigers (bones), giraffes (skins), pangolins (scales), bears (bile), turtles (eggs), and totoabas (bladders) and the incidentally nearly extinct Vaquita. It is predicted we will lose 99.9% of critically endangered and 67% of endangered species within the next 100 years leaving cows as the largest land species on Earth. To retain biological and genetic diversity on Earth, we must stop the trade and exploitation of wildlife now.

Oil and gas extraction and infrastructure compete with economic activities on public and private lands, and thanks to the Trump administration, the industry secured even more privileges for its operations. The administration reoriented federal agencies with oil and gas insiders at their helm to open more public lands to drilling, despite companies not drilling on half of the 23 million acres already leased and despite the sizable financial and ecosystem benefits from conservation. It facilitated the buildout of interstate gas pipelines by promulgating regulations that narrowed states’ powers to protect their water resources from proposed pipelines and by narrowing federal agencies’ assessment of the environmental impacts of infrastructure projects. It weakened the legal oversight of oil and gas operations that already enjoyed exemptions from a number of provisions under federal environmental laws. Despite professed concerns for private property rights, congressional Republicans failed to take steps to improve protections for landowners whose lands were traversed by pipeline projects. Despite Congress’s pervasive failures to keep the administration in check, the rare bipartisan legislation that provided conservation protections to segments of public lands offers some hope that voters’ strong support for public lands, as evidenced in polls, can still compel Congress to take critical action.

Many nations have developed policies and enforced legal approaches for addressing the needs of species at risk of extinction. Generally, however, conservation reliance is not acknowledged legally and is therefore ignored. Increasingly, legal approaches reflect the importance of (1) values in addition to hunting and fishing, (2) wildlife as a shared resource, (3) intrinsic rather than instrumental value, (4) helping species to become self-sustaining, and (5) long-term support for imperiled species. The International Union for the Conservation of Naturehas provided an international standard for recognizing species status. In the United States, the Endangered Species Act and National Environmental Policy Act provide a legal framework for species conservation that has been effective (although these acts have also spawned many legal challenges that have consumed the time and resources of stakeholders). The effectiveness of imperiled species laws depends on funding that can vary, leading to varying implementation and enforcement. Conservation reliance is seldom addressed explicitly. Responsibility for implementation may be spread across national, state or province, and more local entities.

Conservation reliance exists along a spectrum from species extinction to species recovery; from requiring intensive to minimal management. This chapter provides case studies of full or partial recovery and explores what made this possible using the Oregon chub, Aleutian cackling goose, southern white rhinoceros, black-capped vireo, and Robbins’ cinquefoil. Toward the other end of the spectrum, continued translocations or releases are required to maintain Oregon silverspot butterflies and Chatham Island black robins. Management is not always successful, however, as seen for Australian woylies. Some species, such as the Guam kingfisher, are extinct in the wild but maintained in zoos. Finally, there are lessons to be learned from species such as the po’ouli, dusky seaside sparrow, and Christmas Island pipistrelle, for which investments were too little or too late. Management of imperiled species is a societal investment and people’s attitudes play an important role in successful recovery. Participation by citizens and non-governmental organizations is particularly important when species are conservation reliant, as the long-term investment required can rarely be sustained otherwise.

Solar geoengineering is presently being researched through indoor work and outdoor experiments without potential transboundary impacts. Existing national and subnational legislation and common law govern such activities, including for their environmental risks, and is an essential component of the existing governance framework within which solar geoengineering is developing. To offer a case study, this chapter reviews applicable American law. The United States was chosen because its environmental legal regime is among the most elaborate and influential, and because solar geoengineering research is presently moving forward most rapidly there. The text considers three major pieces of federal environmental legislation: the Clean Air Act, the National Environmental Policy Act, and the Endangered Species Act. Liability for harm, which is found in the common law of torts, is briefly introduced. Thereafter, the chapter describes relevant laws regarding weather modification and marine pollution, as well as a federal geoengineering bill. A salient question throughout this concerns the extraterritorial application of US law.