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ANCHORAGE - Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin said she's disappointed by a federal decision to list polar bears as a threatened species but relieved by the conclusion that the cause was not petroleum development, the mainstay of Alaska's economy.

Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne called Palin before his press conference Wednesday announcing the decision.

"It was reassuring to hear Secretary Kempthorne remind me also that he'll be acknowledging to all of America that it is not oil and gas developments that have such an adverse effect as to have led this decision for the threatened listing."

Nearly 90 percent of Alaska's unrestricted revenue for next year is projected to come from the oil industry. Though crude oil prices are at record prices, production has fallen and the trans-Alaska oil pipeline has been running at less than half its capacity since 2000.

Palin has made construction of a natural gas pipeline to Canadian or Lower 48 markets a priority and has pushed for other petroleum development, including offshore sources in polar bear habitat.

The governor also aggressively lobbied against a polar bear listing, rejecting science used to justify it, including climate models that predict a complete summer meltdown of the polar ice cap by 2030 or sooner and a U.S. Geological Survey study that predicted polar bears in Alaska could be wiped out by 2050.

Palin said her attorney general, Talis Colberg, will review the listing decision and the accompanying administrative record to determine whether there were significant defects. She did not rule out challenging the listing in court.

"We'll keep that kind of in the hopper there, that possibility of litigation," she said.

The listing decision was condemned by Alaska's all-Republican congressional delegation.

"This decision represents an assault on sound science and common sense," Rep. Don Young said.

The decision threatens the economy and freedoms of Alaskans and all Americans, he said.

Radical environmental groups, he said, likely will file numerous frivolous lawsuits to stop development and traditional Alaska Native activities.

Sen. Lisa Murkowski said the listing was "grossly premature" and based on highly variable climate change models.

"A listing decision based purely on speculation about the future, lack of existing data, and in the absence of better research on bear prey species populations, sets a truly dangerous precedent for listings of a host of wildlife species," she said.

Murkowski and U.S. Sen. Ted Stevens both claim polar bear populations are increasing, a claim disputed by conservation groups.

Stevens said the decision was made without research demonstrating dangerously low population levels in polar bears but instead on speculation regarding how ice levels will affect Arctic wildlife.

"Worse yet, today's decision cannot and will not do anything to reverse sea ice decline," he said.