News-Miner Editorial
Exploration approved
Shell’s offshore drilling plan addresses risks adequately
Published Thursday, October 22, 2009
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Stumble It!Federal officials have approved Shell’s plan to drill oil exploration wells in the Beaufort Sea; they could hardly have done otherwise.
Shell bought the leases in 2005 and 2007. That gives it a right to explore for oil in those areas. The federal government cannot simply say “oops” and refuse to allow the drilling to proceed.
That seems to be the only policy that would satisfy critics of the Minerals Management Service’s decision this week, though. Their arguments against the granting of a drilling permit raise issues that no permit conditions could address. They assert that oil spills are guaranteed, that they cannot be cleaned up and that such oil spills would devastate polar bear and other wildlife populations.
These are not arguments seeking modifications to the exploration drilling plan. These are arguments designed to prevent the drilling entirely. But that’s not an option, and the arguments are too weak to justify that result.
Some oil might be spilled. Statistical analysis of the probability indicates it will at some point if oil is eventually produced, but the permit allows only exploration at this stage.
Even if later production resulted in spills, though, the spills wouldn’t necessarily be calamitous events.
Mother Nature herself spills oil regularly into the water off northern Alaska, through natural seeps. She also cleans it up, which is why wildlife thrives in the Beaufort and Chukchi seas. It’s also why wildlife continues to thrive in the Prudhoe Bay oil field, despite the fact that, as oil industry critics regularly note, “there are hundreds of oil spills per year” there.
The environmental damage from oil spills depends entirely on their volume. The volume spilled in the planned Beaufort Sea exploration drilling is likely to be negligible. Therefore, so, too, is the environmental impact.
The federal agency made the right call when it approved Shell’s permit to explore its leases, with conditions designed to minimize any disruption of whale migrations and hunting.
A reasonable assessment of the risks cannot justify a denial of rights the company has purchased.
Community Discussion
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How could the writer of this editorial be any more obsequious to Big Oil? "Mother Nature herself spills oil regularly..." Yeah, just like the 11 million gallons of crude that Exxon dumped into the calm waters of Prince William Sound (PWS). Oil that Exxon never fully cleaned up.
Just yesterday you had an editorial that mentioned that there is still, incredibly, a single hulled tanker moving oil out of PWS, 20 years after the Exxon Valdez disaster.
Have you not listened to any of the scientists that describe in detail how a blow out in the arctic ocean could entrap crude oil beneath the ice pack where it could be distributed throughout the Arctic? The toxic mess would contaminate the ocean and the wildlife up there for generations. Even in Valdez, 20 years after the massive oil spill there is STILL crude causing damage.
Your reckless, irresponsible advocacy for this kind of oil development is appalling.
There is no technology to clean up an oil spill in the Arctic Ocean. There is an oil spill a day at Prudhoe Bay. The entire North Slope speaks to the oil spills and hazardous waste just left to kill all who live nearby and wildlife as well. This editorial is indeed reckless.
This approval is long over due. Mineral exploration both on & off shore
is this State's long term future source of revenue. This can be done safely, one can look at northern Europe as a model, it has been going
on for years there. So, let's get going!
Northern Europe is ice free for most part.
MMS who by the way is part of the Department of the Interior IS NOT doing its job. If you look at the Mission and duties for DOI.
Let it be noted that if there is an oil spill in the Arctic Ocean, the Government is at fault and have failed once again.
We cannot build alternatives to petro-chemical without using petro-chemicals. The argument is logical. We have to produce billions of barrels of oil and mine billions of tons of ore to produce wind turbines, photo-voltaic cells, fuel cells, hydro-electric dams, and geo-thermal plants to replace our fossil-fuel society.
Some of you simply cannot comprehend this fact. Therefore, you remain irrelevant to the solution.
Face it they can run the oil from the platform directly into Siberia. Most of the leases were over fifty miles out. Between Cape Prince of Wales, Alaska and Cape Dezhnev, Siberia is a whopping 55 miles. Ten to one the oil Shell pumps will never hit the Alaskan shores, but will be sent directly into Russian pipelines to feed the orient.
This area has been leased and drilled before and discoveries have been made. Shell thinks they can make a buck off them. The others did not. I admire their pererverance and wish them luck with their plans.
If only there were an abundant cheap clean source of energy???? oh wait, sorry i forgot about Nuclear. while we are addicted to petroleum, the opposition from uninformed "conservationists" have made a viable solution (such as Nuclear energy) impossible to happen.
obviously none of you have spent much time in the "pristine arctic" if you had you would realize 3 things.
1) its a wasteland 10 months out of the year
2)wildlife take refuge behind manmade shelter to avoid the elements
3)all drilling companies in AK have environmental concerns at the top of there priorities, second only to safety.
If you want to stop drilling, shut off your cars, heat and lights. live in a tent and ride a bike. and buy only cotton and hemp no more plastic for you
Wool? Can I wear wool? And some nice snake skin boots to look good for the ladies?
Sorry, robir8, but the snake skin boots ain't going to work in the e-mentalists utopia. You'd have to walk to where there are snakes (can't use roads or trails built with fossil fuel powered mechanical devices), kill them with a stick, skin'em with your teeth or a chipped stone, and then walk back.
The wool's okay, as long as it's Dall Sheep wool and you shear it with your flint knife and knit with sticks or shin bones.
We simply MUST drill for oil anywhere and everywhere that it exists! Same for gold deposits. Same for coal. It doesn't matter how we get it out, or the collateral damage we do to the planet, we simply must have it all, RIGHT NOW! We must power our 400 hp cars and 10 cylinder trucks so we can drive to the post office and get the mail or to the supermarket to get a sack of groceries (separate trips of course). There is no room for compromise, no shades of gray. No attempt to conserve and use products more efficiently. Either you are with us or you stop all use of petroleum products, minerals etc immediately and go back to the stone age.
(A)GREED?
akbearable -- keep enjoying your petro-chemical-metallic comforts.
Say Prospector, you seem to be one of the more knowledgeable posters on here, I have a question for you.. Is there any place on the globe where if say oil, gold, or coal were discovered in profitable quantities would you be against those minerals being extracted? Any place sacred? Not trying to play gotcha here, just searching for common ground.
akbearable -- There is no place on the globe where desperately needed resources like fossil fuels or minerals should be placed into an artifical, feely-goody, political pen. Eventually, they will be extracted, profitably or not (USSR, PRC, Venezuela, Iran, etc.). I prefer to do it in a measured and regulated fashion (now) rather than in a desperate, pell-mell race during wartime or famine (later).
Then reclaim and restore the lands for more productive habitat. Call it a "Park".
I don't believe in "sacred ground". That is an artificial human construct, that serves only a privileged few at the detriment to the rest. It would make far more sense to me to simply declare everything sacred.
Better find out how Obama's setting aside 200,000 squre miles is going
to effect this drilling!!
Interesting answer Prospector. You mentioned a "measured and regulated fashion" of resource extraction. Does that mean you are in favor of some regulation of resources? Maybe we are not completely 180 degrees apart after all..
Prospector- There are a few places I would not drill for oil. Arlington National cemetary for one. Gettysburg, the Punch Bowl and the Cemetary at Normandy, Valley Forge of course. There may be a few more. But these are reletively small and with that big boy BP's got that can reach out 8 miles we can drill under them without being on them. Keep em' turning to the right.
So now the answer to why the polar bears now have a federal deed to 200,000 square miles of our state becomes clear.
It is a disgraceful breach of trust to have permitted this legal wrangling to go on for so long. Shell was destined to win the legal side no matter what based on contractual agreement. I'm glad to see that reason finally won out.
Congrats on the jobs to the drillers and best of luck for a gusher!
akbearable -- "Does that mean you are in favor of some regulation of resources?"
No, you misunderstand me. I don't believe we can regulate the resources, we can only regulate resource development.
robir8 - not just wool, but silk too! Lovely stuff, and very warm, esp in combo with wool or muskox kvuit[sp??], or dog underfuzz. I hear there's 'gator hides available from down south, where protection has allowed some 'monsters' to mature again. Nice 'gator soled boots would probably REALLY speed your progress down a nice slippery, icy slope! [Might need ski poles for stability, though].
Prospector - my bone knitting needles have worked great for over 90 yrs. I got them from my grandmother, a complete set of sizes, everything from tiny glovier needles, to big bulky sweater sizes. I've never had to replace one.
What's the rush? If we wait 10-20-30yrs to develope, the oil will still be there, the price will be higher, and the technology to protect the rest of our resources *much* more advanced.
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