EPA responds to Alaska's Shell complaints (Shell Abandons Plans for 2011 Drilling Off Alaska Coast)

[The Straight Story]

EPA responds to Alaska's Shell complaints
Alaska Dispatch

The Environmental Protection Agency has responded to some harsh words from Alaska's Congressional delegation and Gov. Sean Parnell, The Arctic Sounder reported Friday. U.S. Sens. Mark Begich and Lisa Murkowski and U.S. Rep. Don Young joined Parnell Thursday in lambasting the EPA for holding up Shell from drilling an exploratory offshore well in the Beaufort Sea. Parnell found a way to promote Alaska as a potential alternative to Middle East instability. "It's unfathomable that a company buys federal leases and can't get on them in four to five years' time," he said. "Egypt is burning right now and we're dependent on Middle East oil." Begich complained that the EPA and Obama administration "have taken virtually every opportunity to block responsible development of Alaska's resources. Their foot dragging means the loss of another exploration season in Alaska, the loss of nearly 800 direct jobs and many more indirect jobs. That doesn't count the millions of dollars in contracting that won't happen ..."

Said Murkowski: "The EPA's refusal, or simple inability, to issue key permits in a timely fashion is indefensible." Young's was colorful and concluded that federal foot-dragging on the Shell permits would take America back to the times of "dirt roads and covered wagons." The EPA, in its response, passed the buck to groups that have sued to stop Shell's Arctic exploration, essentially saying the government's hands had been tied: "EPA issued Shell a permit for this project on March 31, 2010. That permit was appealed by outside groups and overturned by the independent Environmental Appeals Board. EPA immediately appealed for reconsideration and we have worked with Shell to address the concerns raised by the EAB. We will continue to do so if they choose to pursue this permit in the future."

http://www.alaskadispatch.com/dispatches/alaska-beat/88-alaska-beat/8638-epa-responds-to-alaskas-shell-complaints


Shell Abandons Plans for Summer 2011 Drilling Off Alaska Coast

ANCHORAGE, Alaska, February 4, 2011 (ENS) - Due to a complex permitting situation that is still unresolved, Shell Oil has abandoned its plan to drill in Alaska's Beaufort Sea in the summer of 2011, deferring any drilling there to the summer of 2012.

"This is not an environmental issue," said Pete Slaiby, vice president for Shell Alaska, in media briefing about Shell's drilling decision on Thursday. "We have made significant and voluntary capital improvements in the air emissions technology we have applied to the entire program that will allow us to have almost no material impact on the Arctic air shed."

"It is an issue of processing a permit application in a timely way," said Slaiby. "We have been in this process, trying to achieve an air permit, now for five years."

But environmental and indigenous groups who have been fighting Shell's drilling plan in the courts since 2007 contend that Shell's drilling is an environmental issue.
Polar bear mother and cubs on the shore of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge overlooking the Beaufort Sea. (Photo by P. Burns)

The drilling was planned for waters just offshore the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and directly in areas used by endangered bowhead whale for migration, feeding and resting. The proposed drilling threatened to harm wildlife and coastal Alaska Native communities that depend on the ocean to sustain their unique subsistence culture, said attorney Erik Grafe with the nonprofit law firm Earthjustice.

http://www.ens-newswire.com/ens/feb2011/2011-02-04-091.html