Friday I put up a diary on this issue with links to facilitate citizen action about Arctic drilling in the continental shelf of northwest Alaska by giving comments ("Public Submissions") to BOEM (Bureau of Ocean Energy Management) about keeping Shell from extending a 2008 original lease to drill in Arctic seas for another 5 years.
Yesterday I put up another diary that cut the issue differently.
Here is a thoughtful Public Submission on behalf of 2, 400, 000 persons that was received by the U.S. Department of the Interior, agency Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM), via Office of the Federal register (Regulations.gov) regarding the Chukchi Sea Outer Continental Shelf Oil and Gas Lease Sale 193, a lease that Shell wants to extend for another five (5) years.
Comment from Dan Ritzman, Sierra Club; ID: BOEM-2014-0078-0166 Attachments: 267
On behalf of the 2.4 million members and supporters of the Sierra Club I respectfully submit the attached files that represent the 221,932 actions taken by our members and activists this year requesting that you do not allow drilling activities associated with Lease Sale 193 in the Chukchi Sea.
According to the administration's own report about the environmental impacts of gas and oil drilling in the Chukchi Sea there is a 75% chance of an oil spill disaster.
In 2012, Shell's oil drilling season failed dramatically when one of its drilling rigs ran aground off of Kodiak Island, Alaska. The drilling rig's critical oil spill containment dome was crushed like a "beer can" during testing and both of its drilling rigs came under federal investigation.
Based on Shell Oil's disastrous track record and according to the government's own report -- it's not if an oil spill will happen, but when. If we want to protect our iconic wildlife and our sensitive ecosystems, we should not to drill in America's Arctic.
The administration cannot continue to push an outdated and dangerous 'all of the above' energy strategy, encouraging mega oil companies to take ever increasing risks to capture the last of the oil, hastening dangerous global climate change and putting the Arctic and the iconic wildlife that call it home in peril.
If we are serious about addressing climate change safeguarding America's Arctic Ocean from oil and gas drilling would be a tremendous step forward.
We urging you to take a big step toward a clean energy future and declare Arctic drilling 'off limits' forever. Lease 193 cannot, in the face of all the evidence about the dangers of Arctic drilling and climate change, be allowed to go forward.
The attached files contain a spreadsheets of all action takes and all of the individual letters where people modified our actions.
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Defend the Northwest Alaskan continental shelf from merciless (very cruel) business and governmental intrusion. Tell BOEM "NO Shell Drilling"!
Here is an individual “comment” or “Public Submission” statement that Mr. Ritzman's Sierra Club Public Submission attached:
Feb 4, 2014
Comment Delivery
Subject: Cancel all Arctic drilling leases and place a moratorium on all future lease sales!
Dear Comment Delivery,
The Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit has ruled that the Department of the Interior failed to conduct an adequate environmental impact assessment before selling large areas in the Arctic Ocean for oil and gas exploration. Now Shell has announced that it cannot drill in 2014.
The Court concluded that the Department's estimate of one billion barrels of recoverable oil under the frozen Arctic Ocean was "chosen arbitrarily" and that the Department of the Interior "based its decision on inadequate information about the amount of oil to be produced pursuant to the lease sale 193."
You cannot keep in place a lease that examined only the best case scenario for environmental harm. By choosing a low figure that only reflects the best case scenario, data in the EIS (and other assessments that relied on that figure) were skewed toward fewer environmental impacts, which the court said impeded a full and fair discussion of the potential effects of the project.
I am urging you to cancel the current lease under which several oil companies want to drill in the Chukchi Sea and to stop the process to sell new leases in the Arctic Ocean.
Sincerely, ....... (from someone in Greenbank, WA 98253)
I like this individual “comment” or “Public Submission” statement that Mr. Ritzman's Sierra Club Public Submission attached
because it expresses concern for the Web of Life. It takes a village to raise a child; all these are members of the village, much greater than just Mom, Pop, Buddy, Sis and Rover. The village here characterized includes polar bears, bowhead and beluga whales, stores of carbon pollution and climate:
Feb 4, 2014
Comment Delivery
Subject: Terminate current Chukchi drilling leases and cancel on all future Arctic Ocean lease sales!
Dear Comment Delivery,
The Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit has ruled that the Department of the Interior failed to conduct an adequate environmental impact assessment before selling large areas in the Arctic Ocean for oil and gas exploration. Now Shell has announced that it cannot drill in 2014.
Drilling in the Arctic is a dangerous and risky business—for companies' bottom lines, for the environment, and for our climate. Downplaying those risks does not make them go away, as Shell's disastrous experience in 2012 demonstrated.
It's clear that the Arctic Ocean is the last place we should be drilling for oil. The Arctic seas are home to a unique plethora of wildlife, including the entire US population of polar bears and serve as an important migration route for bowhead and beluga whales. They are also home to some of the most extreme and dangerous conditions on the planet, and to stores of carbon pollution that could dramatically alter our climate if released, negating positive steps to fight the climate crisis.
I am urging you to terminate the current leases in the Chukchi Sea and to cancel the process to offer new leases in the Arctic Ocean.
Sincerely, ....... (from someone in "The Loop", downtown at 70 E Lake St, Chicago, IL 60601)
I digress to point out that Bowhead whales are mammals, like Mom & Me.
How poverty stricken we will be if this life form becomes extinct; if it can no longer live at the southern edges of the Arctic ice during winters, move into leads through broken & melting ice during summers! Bowhead whales have been an important subsistence item for arctic native hunters for centuries, with the blubber (muktuk in Alaskan Inuit), muscle, & certain internal organs as valuable energy-rich food; the baleen used to make implements, baskets (from the hairy fringes), & works of art; and the bone used for housing construction, handles of tools, etc. It eats phytoplankton (plant plankton) that happens to produce most of the oxygen (O2) that we and the whales breathe. As whale population has recently increased, phytoplankton biomass has plummeted, perhaps due to ocean acidification as elevated CO2 could directly reduce calcification and/or more warming waters that change ocean currents, intensify or weaken local nutrient upwelling, increase heavy precipitation, bring on storm events causing changes in land runoff and micronutrient availability, and other factors such as enhanced stratification. The historic worldwide abundance of bowhead whales prior to commercial exploitation is estimated at about 30,000-50,000. Commercial exploitation drove the worldwide abundance down to about 3,000 by the 1920's. Current abundance is estimated between 7,000 and 10,000 animals. The Bering-Chukchi-Beaufort stock (also known as the Western Arctic stock) consisted of about 10,400 to 23,000 whales prior to commercial exploitation. This stock is currently estimated at 6,400 to 9,200 and is increasing at a rate of 3.2% per year. Current threats include ship strikes, entanglement in fishing gear, contaminants, anthropogenic noise (especially from offshore oil drilling) all of which will be worse as the Arctic Ocean becomes warmer and more ravaged by humans chasing unregulated profit schemes. Learn more about this endangered species in 100 seconds (video)!
God Forbid this is could just be a ploy by BOEM and/or Shell to go after recklessly freeing vast stores of methane hydrate or faking a move in that regard just to manipulate Financial-Investment-Real Estate players in pursuit of obscene profits.
In any event, there is no way that allowing more and longer-term ocean drilling leases in the Arctic Ocean Lease Sale 193 sites will improve either quality or quantity of biodiversity and welfare of native peoples' nations in that region.
Tell BOEM "NO Shell Drilling" Via Office of the Federal register (Regulations.gov) Fill the required fields and then preview and/or before Monday, December 22 submit your comment to the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management for review. All comments are considered public and will be posted online once the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management has reviewed them. Alternatively, via CREDO Action, Submit a public comment opposing now, today, before the Monday, December 22 deadline.
Thank You (all) for doing all this work to close Shell drillers out of a 5 year extension of the Chukchi Sea Outer Continental Shelf Oil and Gas Lease Sale 193 !