Remember that long contentious battle over Shell drilling in the Arctic? At least for now, you can put away your signs for another day,
reports Ben Geman.
Royal Dutch Shell said Monday that it’s abandoning oil-and-gas exploration off Alaska’s northern coast after an expensive well came up essentially dry. [...]
Shell began full-scale drilling of a well in what’s called the Burger prospect last summer after years of seeking Obama administration permission, but said Monday that “indications” of oil-and-gas weren’t enough to “warrant further exploration.”
“Shell will now cease further exploration activity in offshore Alaska for the foreseeable future,” Shell said in a statement Monday.
Shell reportedly spent over $7 billion on planning and development to drill and obviously decided further exploration wasn't worth the cost. The company also complained about unpredictable federal regulation for drilling off the shores of Alaska, but nonetheless the move could deter other oil companies from moving forward.
Other companies with leases in the Beaufort and Chukchi Seas off Alaska’s coast, including ConocoPhillips and Statoil, had been watching Shell’s expensive attempt to find what could be huge resources there. [...]
But other fights and decisions remain, such as whether Interior Department regulators will extend the duration of leases in the region that expire over the next several years, and whether Interior will auction off new tracts as soon as next year.
President Obama took a lot of heat over his
decision this summer to let Shell drill. Hillary Clinton came out
against Arctic drilling in mid-August, following the lead of Bernie Sanders.
What's the GOP gonna do without a rousing round of "drill, baby, drill" in 2016?