It’s May 16th, I’m Gina Telaroli and this is TakePart.com’s look at the week in social action…

The Interior Department has decided today to protect the polar bear population under the Endangered Species Act. Secretary of the Interior Dirk Kempthorne says that polar bears are threatened because the Arctic ice is melting. And faster than we imagined.

This is the first time that the Endangered Species Act has been used to protect a species threatened by the impacts of climate change. But the New York Times reports, this ruling may not have the impact many are hoping for:

But the long-delayed decision to list the bear as a threatened species may prove less of an impediment to industries along the Alaskan coast than many environmentalists had hoped. While further protecting the polar bear from direct or immediate threats — like hunting — the Interior Department added stipulations, seldom invoked under the act, that will make it relatively easy for oil and gas exploration and development activities to proceed.

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Will walruses be the next poster critter for global warming? They may not be quite as cute as polar bears, but they’re equally endangered, according to an environmental group that’s filed a petition seeking protection for the whiskery marine mammal. From Reuters:

The Center for Biological Diversity filed the petition with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, citing the impact of global warming to the icy habitat used by walrus especially nursing mothers and calves that need ice shelves to rest and nurse.

The walruses are being forced onto land where they’re at greater risk from predators. And their natural habitat is facing disruption from new oil development as well, according to Reuters.

But the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is a little backed up when it comes to deciding which species are endangered. Required by law to make a decision on the polar bear’s status by January 9th, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service recently announced that it needed more time.

No such delays, though, on opening up huge swaths of critical polar bear habitat for oil and gas exploration; while the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service stalls, the petroleum industry’s charging full speed ahead. On Wednesday, Shell Oil shelled out billons for leases to drill in the Chukchi Sea off Alaska’s northwest shore.

Learn more about the Center for Biological Diversity’s efforts to save endangered species here.