The Coast Guard Cutter Healy escorts the Russian-flagged tanker Renda 250 miles south of Nome on January 6. (Photo: AP/US Coast Guard, Petty Officer 1st Class Sara Francis)
President Obama has outraged left-wing environmental activists with the recent decision to open up drilling in Arctic Ocean territories on a limited and conditional basis. The Interior Department decision, which will allow Shell to start drilling for oil off the Alaskan coast this summer, will apply only to the icy waters of the Chukchi Sea.
Left-wing environmentalists say that a drilling accident in the treacherous Arctic Ocean, particularly in the remote waters of the Chukchi Sea, could have grave consequences exceeding the BP spill in the Gulf of Mexico back in 2010. That accident occurred when the Deepwater Horizon rig exploded due to human error, killing 11 men and dumping millions of barrels of oil into the Gulf. The waters of the Chukchi Sea, which are subjected to waves up to 50 feet high, are widely believed to be one of the most dangerous locations to drill in the world
“Once again, our government has rushed to approve risky and ill-conceived exploration in one of the most remote and important places on Earth,” Susan Murray, a vice president of Oceana, an environmental group told The New York Times. “Shell has not shown that it is prepared to operate responsibly in the Arctic Ocean, and neither the company nor our government has been willing to fully and fairly evaluate the risks of Shell’s proposal.”
However, the administration argues that the reaction has been overblown, as is often the case with unbending environmental groups known for their lack of compromise. Officials are quick to point out that they had originally approved drilling in the region for Shell in the summer of 2012, but pulled back when a series of safety concerns involving the vessel Kulluk led to it running aground. Further, one Interior Department official said regulations were not met with “satisfactory responses.”
“We have taken a thoughtful approach to carefully considering potential exploration in the Chukchi Sea,” Abigail Ross Hopper, director of the Interior Department’s Bureau of Ocean Energy Management said in a statement.
Thomas Lorenzen, a former employee at the Justice Department who spent more than a decade as assistant chief in the environment and natural resources division, sided with the Obama administration.
“It recognizes both the economic and energy potential of the Arctic seas, but also the environmental sensitivity of the area and the challenges of responding to spills and other incidents in such a harsh climate,” said Lorenzen, who is now a partner at the law firm of Dorsey & Whitney. “Notably, the proposed exploration is in very shallow waters — only 140 feet deep — and thus it will not present the kinds of challenges that the Deepwater Horizon spill posed. That well was in water about 5,000 feet deep.”
Still, because the general area is a major migration route and feeding area for marine mammals such as the bowhead whale and walruses, and because the closest Coast Guard station equipped to respond to a spill is over 1,000 miles away, Oceana and other groups are unyielding in their opposition.
