President Barack Obama ’s call to restrict oil exploration on 12 million acres of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge probably won’t have much practical impact for an area already off-limits to drillers, though it’s created a new fault line with the Republican-led Congress. The White House on Sunday said it would ask Congress to designate “core areas” of the 19.8 million-acre refuge as wilderness, including its 1.5 million-acre coastal plain that geologists believe lies atop a rich oil reserve. “Designating vast areas in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge as wilderness reflects the significance this landscape holds for America and its wildlife,” Interior Secretary Sally Jewell said in the statement. The practical impact is slight because Republicans, who now control both chambers of Congress, voiced immediate opposition. And oil and gas production is already prohibited in the Arctic refuge. It does add to the list of energy issues that the […]