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Natural Resources Defense Council
Website
www.nrdc.org/land/wilderness/arctic.asp
The Arctic Refuge, known as “America’s
Serengeti,” is among the world’s last truly pristine
wild places and one of the largest sanctuaries for Arctic
animals on the planet. The coastal plain of the refuge
is traversed by a dozen rivers and framed by the jagged
peaks of spectacular mountains. This spectacular wilderness
is a vital birthing ground for polar bears, grizzlies,
Arctic wolves, the vast Porcupine herd of 130,000 caribou
and the highly endangered shaggy musk ox…
What would America gain by opening
the refuge to oil activities? Very little. Oil from
the Arctic Refuge will not mitigate the crisis in California,
bring down gasoline or natural gas prices, or reduce
America’s dependence on foreign oil.
To see what oil activities bode for
this pristine sanctuary, just look 60 miles west of
the Arctic Refuge to Prudhoe Bay – a gargantuan oil
complex that has turned 1,000 square miles of fragile
tundra into a sprawling industrial zone containing 1,500
miles of roads and pipelines, 1400 producing wells and
3 jetports.
“Artic National Wildlife Refuge”
Sierra Club
Website
www.sierraclub.org/wildlands/arctic/oil.asp
Today, oil industry lobbyists persistently
press awmakers to open the coastal plain to oil and
gas drilling – despite indisputable proof that oil drilling
irreparably damages the fragile tundra and its wildlife.
At Prudhoe Bay, home to one of the world’s largest industrial
complexes, 43,000 tons of nitrogen oxides pollute the
air each year. Hundreds of spills involving tens of
thousands of gallons of crude oil and other petroleum
products occur annually.
The most optimistic estimates of commercially
recoverable oil from the coastal plain would yield only
about six months’ worth of oil for the US. We wouldn’t
flood the Grand Canyon to build a hydroelectric dam.
We wouldn’t plug Yellowstone’s Old Faithful to tap its
geothermal energy. Why should we permanently destroy
this unique wilderness for an unnecessary and uncertain
amount of oil?
Protect the Arctic from Oil Drilling
Audubon Society
Website
www.protectthearctic.com/history.asp
The coastal plain of the Arctic Refuge
lies on Alaska’s north coast between the Beaufort Sea,
the Brooks Range and the Prudhoe Bay oil fields. Already,
95 percent of Alaska’s North Slope is open to drilling.
The 110-mile coastal plain – the most biologically productive
area and the center of wildlife activity on the Refuge
– represents the last remnant of the North Slope closed
to development, for now.
Despite impressive technological advances,
even “responsible” drilling cannot mitigate the noise
from traffic and facilities, the extraction of gravel,
water loss, and the blockage of water flow, snow laced
with metals such as zinc and lead, and air pollution.
Yearly emissions of air pollutants on
the North Slope include at least 4,000 tons of hydrocarbons,
more than 600 tons of methane gas, and 6,000 to 27,000
tons of nitrogen oxide – as much as in Washington D.C
The United States consumes 26 percent
of the world’s oil. Considering that by the most optimistic
figures, the Arctic Refuge will yield only 0.4 percent
of the world’s known oil reserves, Arctic oil will not
significantly decrease our dependence on foreign oil.
Simply raising the corporate average
fuel economy (CAFÉ) standard for new cars by ten miles
per gallon would save more oil in one year than all
the commercially recoverable oil estimated to be found
in the fragile coastal plain. Instead of feeding our
national addiction to oil, a strong national energy
policy must work towards energy efficiency and conservation.
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The Heritage Foundation
“Time To Permit
Oil Drilling In The Arctic Refuge”
By John Shanahan
Website
www.heritage.org/library/categories/enviro/em432.html
Contrary to the image evoked by opponents
of oil production, that ANWR is the last small pristine
area left in Alaska, the state has an abundance of hardy
ecosystems. In addition to the healthy ecosystems existing
on millions of acres of private and state land, the
Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act of 1980
set aside 100 million acres of land as parks, refuges
and preserves, including 57 million acres of wilderness.
…only a tiny fraction – far less
than one percent – of the Coastal Plain area would be
affected. Advancing technology over the last 20 years
has reduced the necessary “footprint” of drilling operations
to less than one-fifth of what was required say, at
Prudhoe Bay. So exploration and production would affect
only about 2,000 acres. To put this in perspective,
that is an area about one-sixth the size of Dulles Airport
near Washington, D.C., and about 0.01 percent of the
total area of ANWR.
Expanded oil production is badly
needed. The United States currently imports more than
half its oil consumption, and reliance on foreign oil
is growing. That raises national security concerns
and is an unwelcome factor in foreign policy considerations.
This reliance caused a $51 billion oil trade deficit
last year – roughly equivalent to the U.S. trade deficit
with Japan.
Not only will Alaskans and the federal
treasury benefit from increased oil production, but
an estimated 222,000-732,000 jobs will be created throughout
the country. There will be new hires in the oil industry
and manufacturers, suppliers, and transporters of oil-related
equipment will increase hiring dramatically, with fully
98 percent of these in the lower 48 states.
As Inupiat Mayor George Ahmagak of
the North slope Borough wrote last June, “Our whalers
and hunters make maximum use of our few resources, always
taking care not to harm the land so their grandchildren
may in turn carry on their culture…As mayor, I can state
unequivocally that the people of the North Slope Borough
enthusiastically support the presence of the oil industry
in our land.”
The facts are clear. Permitting
oil production in ANWR would spur economic growth, cut
the trade deficit, and ease national security concerns.
ANWR Information Brief “Myths
of ANWR “
Arctic Power
Website
www.anwr.org
With the exception of the area between
the Colville and Canning Rivers (which is owned by the
state of Alaska) none of the more than 1,000 mile Arctic
Alaska coastline is open to oil and gas leasing, not
one mile of it.
A 200 day supply of oil is almost
4 billion barrels. The coastal plain probably contains
much more oil, but it can be produced at a maximum rate
of 2 million barrels per day (capacity of the trans-Alaska
oil pipeline). There it could last for 25 years and
probably much longer.
Myth: The Coastal Plain is unspoiled
wilderness, and Arctic Serengeti.
Reality: This in no Serengeti. The
coastal plain is a frozen, barren land for 9 months
of the year. The Inupiat people have lived and hunted
there for centuries: 19th century whalers
hunted extensively for food; military and defense contractors
build DEWline radar sites; recreation groups use it
for rafting and hiking. Other areas of the North Slope
are more biologically sensitive than the Coastal Plain.
The Caribou and Alaskan Oil
Deborah Jacobs
PERC REPORTS Vol.19
Number 2 June 2001
Website
www.PERC.ORG
Oil exploration since 1968 around
Prudhoe Bay on the North Slope does not seem to have
negatively affected the Central Arctic caribou hear.
In terms of overall health, the Central
Arctic herd has prospered. In 1972, according to the
Alaska Department of Fish and Game, the herd numbered
3,000 animals. Since then it has increased to between
25,000 and 27,000.
The weight of evidence suggests that
the oil facilities built in the 1960s have not visibly
harmed the caribou that migrate through the Prudhoe
Bay area.
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