Arctic oil bonanza worries Alaska natives

[RedEarth]

Source: Reuters

ANCHORAGE, Alaska (Reuters) - Modern technology and surging oil prices have suddenly made the prospect of drilling in the remote, icy Chukchi Sea irresistible to the world's oil giants -- and that is worrying the Inupiat people who have lived at the sea's edge for centuries.

With drilling opportunities dwindling elsewhere, oil companies earlier this month bid an astonishing $2.66 billion for drilling rights in the Chukchi, a stretch of water off Alaska's northwest coast that is frozen half the year and is a major polar bear habitat.

The Inupiat, relatives of the Inuit who inhabit other parts of the Arctic, fear oil spills or drilling activity will disrupt the endangered bowhead whales and other marine animals that they have hunted for generations. "We want to continue to survive. Our lives are tied to subsistence. So is our culture and our religion with all the animals," said Jack Schaefer, president of the Inupiat village of Point Hope, a settlement on the Chukchi that is one of the oldest continuously inhabited places in North America.

"We don't have anything to replace that with. The high unemployment rate here will continue even if there is offshore oil and gas development since there will only be a few jobs that will be available."

Shell and ConocoPhillips, the two biggest bidders in the U.S. government's sale of drilling rights in the Chukchi, insist they will take the concerns of local communities into account as they search for the 12 billion barrels of oil the government believes lie under the sea floor.



Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/rbssEnergyNews/idUSN2522945120080225

[GOPBasher]

1. 12 billion barrels? The world consumes some 30 billion barrels per year.

Is 12 billion barrels worth that destruction? Absolutlely, as long as some oil giants make some money!!!!

[lynnertic]

2. $2.26 B to drill for 12B barrels w/ price currently at about $100/barrel

The locals will get point two percent (.2%) of the current market value of the oil that would be consumed in less than half a year.

.2% = two dollars out of every thousand dollars.

[Arctic Dave]

3. 12 billion?

How do they know this? I don't recall any seismic work in this area to let them think there is that much oil out there. This is the oil companies way to get us to allow them to drill. When ever they say "we beleive" they are pulling numbers out of their butts. Not only that but they haven't even developed the fields they have under lease already, so why give them more.

I was going to post a picture I took a couple of minutes ago of the Prudhoe Bay oilfield, which is about 200 miles from were they want to drill (a stones throw in Alaska), but I can't figure out how to do it. It's -35F today. Brrrrrr.