Shell has already spent $3.7 billion on the 10-year offshore leases and preparations for exploration, even though they haven’t drilled a single well. This effort represents the oil industry’s latest effort to tap new offshore wells in the region, as production in Alaska’s North Slope is in decline.
President Obama is going to have to make a decision regarding the proposal, and he is bound to receive flak regardless of his choice. Opposition to the project has come from both environmentalists and Native Alaskans, while Republicans feel that drilling is essential to our energy needs.
In the aftermath of the Deepwater Horizon rig disaster in the Gulf, the biggest obstacle to Shell’s plan are concerns about a devastating spill. An Interior Department agency estimated that a hypothetical blowout of an oil well in the Chukchi Sea could release 1.4 million barrels of crude oil over a 39-day period before a relief well could be drilled.
Environmentalists contend that hurricane-force winds, high seas and frigid cold and ice in the proposed area would make it even more difficult to clean up a spill. Another issue is that oil operations may disturb migration and reproduction of marine mammals, including the walruses which local hunters depend upon for food.
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