Alaska’s Arctic national wildlife refuge now has a $1bn price tag on it | Kim Heacox

Alaska senator Lisa Murkowski believes this refuge could generate vast sums of money once it's opened to oil leasing. That would be a tragedy

Years ago, camping in Alaska's Arctic national wildlife refuge, I watched a herd of caribou - 100,000 bulls, cows and their three-week-old calves - braid over the tundra, moving to a rhythm as old as the wind.

"Not many places like this left today," said my friend Jeff, sitting next to me above an ice-fringed river.