We didn't like the environment so we got rid of it

Interior Department OKs NPR-A drilling plan



THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

FAIRBANKS - The Interior Department has approved ConocoPhillips' plan to build two oil production pads in the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska, but the company has not yet decided to go forward with the drilling.

The two new pads would be developed on land leased by the company in 1999 on the eastern edge of NPR-A, southwest of the existing Alpine oil field. Oil was discovered at the sites in 2001.

If the sites are built, it would be the first commercial oil development in the NPR-A, according to the Bureau of Land Management.





Rebecca Watson, the assistant secretary for land and minerals management, has approved the plan for the two pads, along with the accompanying pipelines and power lines.

Ed Bovy, spokesman for the BLM's Anchorage office, said drilling could begin by next winter. Oil from the Alpine Satellites could reach the trans-Alaska pipeline by the summer of 2008.

Natalie Knox, spokeswoman for ConocoPhillips in Alaska, said the company has not yet made a decision to develop the two pads and other Alpine satellites. That decision depends on the outcome of another permit review by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers on all five pads, she said.

In the final approval document, BLM required ConocoPhillips to reroute a road to lessen the environmental impact. The new plan will allow the road to enter a three-mile setback from Fish Creek that is supposed to be free of disturbances.

The agency has been criticized by environmental groups during recent planning for oil leases elsewhere in the reserve because it has not made such setbacks ironclad.

Bovy said the new route will require less gravel and fewer road miles, while staying on ridges and away from more sensitive wetlands.

The BLM also required ConocoPhillips to raise pipeline clearances to seven feet off the ground. Existing North Slope Borough regulations require lines to be five feet off the ground, Knox said.

The BLM also required the company to attach power lines to pipeline supports instead of stringing them on separate poles.

The reserve covers about 23.5 million acres of public land west of Prudhoe Bay. Estimates of oil reserves in the NPR-A range from about 6 billion to 13 billion barrels of oil.

I wrote this a while ago but it deffinetly applies

Life’s End
By Mutex


The oceans sweat oil and tar
On the blackened shores a seabird lies
With broken wings he does cry
But no one hears
On the black shores I stand
I scream in vain

Lies after lies is all I hear
As faith and values enslave the whole
And ignorance is life’s opium
A few try in vain but know one hears
Their ignorance will suffocate us all

On the black shores I stand
I scream in vain but know one hears

The truth is there but know one want to see
With a complete lack of conservation
And truly ignorant of what they’re doing
They continue till all is left barren

On the black shores I stand
I scream in vain but know one hears

My hatred is just and my anger warranted
There is but one answer
And with a flash that turns night to day
The fire is ignited
The fire explodes
A blanket of death covers the whole
They deserve no less
Human waste and nothing more

On the black shores I stand
I scream in vain but know one hears

In the realm of the machines
On their black shores I stand
And being only a shadow I fade away
The body turns to dust
And the wind blows it away

[Edited on Nov 17, 2004 by Mutex]

I attended a lecture by Enrique Chagoya last night. His work is always politically charged but this image came to mind when I read an article ealier today on this same topic. The dinosaurs will devour us in the end.

Even if they could get 13 billion barrells out of there it would hardly be a profitable venture.
America uses, what, 180 million barrels per week? So that's enough oil for America for...one and a half years? And it will take 3 years just to prepare the damned site?

Even if you're not an environementalist, the idea is just lame.

Is the "know one hears" poetic license or do you simply just not KNOW how to spell "NO"? Because, if it's poetic license, I don't get it.

I simpilly dont no how to sppel. Some of us grew up on the streets and did not have the benifits of a formal education.

This issue has been around for so long, and I just don't understand it. The environmental impact won't be what people make it out to be. There isn't all that much on the north slope to get fucked up by the drilling. but the fact remains that there isn't enough oil there for it to be worth while, just as was pointed out earlier. Maybe we should tap it a few decades down the road when we've hopefully developed alternate fuels and 13 billion barrels of crude will go farther.

[Edited on Nov 17, 2004 by hopey]

Fuck, first they bitch if we want to drill in ANWR. Then when we want to drill in a region SET ASIDE FOR PETROLEUM EXPLORATION, and environmentalists still complain.

They're not going to hurt anything, and honestly, there isn't much there to hurt. I've been up there.

That's the stupidest thing I've ever heard. If it wasn't profitable, they wouldn't want to do it.

Look, the pipelines and the infrastructure have to be used while it's in operation. It'll rapidly fall apart if its not in use, and it's not worth the cost of maintaining it all if oil companies cant use the pipeline infrastructure to get oil from the North Slope to tankers in Valdez.

It'll only supply fuel for 1.5 years, so it's not worth it?

1. You dont know. I doubt you're a petroleum engineer or energy expert about petroleum resources under the North Slope.

2. Lets say it only supplies the West Coast for 1.5 years, and thus isn't worth the effort of developing. That's like saying it isn't worth expending the effort of picking $800 off the street because it'll only cover a year and a half of your gas bills. It's there, the infrastructure is in place, the iron is hot, oil prices are high, why not get it?


[Edited on Nov 17, 2004 by stockula]

That's not true. The cost of exploiting these further, smaller fields are very cheap because the major pecuniary costs on investment have already been spent. The big expenses of building the pipeline and the big fields and support companies at Prudhoe Bay and Kuparuk have already been spent. But all that infrastructure is still in place and needs only slight additions to tap very rewarding deposits. Which is why ANWR has to be developed now as Prudhoe and Kuparuk production declines. The owners of all that stuff wont pay to maintain the pipeline if nothing's flowing through it.


[Edited on Nov 17, 2004 by stockula]

the future is now
garbage to electricity
now if ted danson would quit hogging all the electric cars

No, it's more like laughing at the idea of owning a regular car, you'll hold out for those flying cars that you saw on The Jetsons as a kid.

just because its "set aside" doesnt mean it right
we've set aside land before: internment camps and reservations

Whatever, reactionary.
I just have a couple questions for you- A
re you actively opposed to 'green' fuel sources?
Do you honestly think oil is so great?
What sort of world would you like to live in?

im not holding out on the flying car.. im holding out on the US goverment to allow imports of the WV car that gets 99mpg on regular gas... no green technology needed, or special infustructer.. just a bit of paperwork...

the maintenance guy at my job takes our fryer oil refines it, and uses it to run his truck. it's a big truck too.

just think about how much fatty food we consume. we could be using the oil, used to cook our fast food, to drive us around and get more fast food.

also (and stock's going to call me a hippy, but fuck 'im) you can get methanol from marijuana. methanol is the stuff that most racecars use.

So we have two solutions grow more pot and eat more fast food...

Stop Paying For Forest Destruction In Alaska

on Nov 17, 2004 - 06:56 PM

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------



'Over the past twenty years, more than $750 million of YOUR tax money has gone to subsidize timber sales in the Tongass, the largest remaining block of the rarest forest type on Earth. These sales are not economically viable, and they’re ecologically destructive. This senseless waste of rare and priceless natural resources and the public's funds must end.

'Sometime between now and its holiday recess, Congress will vote on the Interior Appropriations bill for 2005 – a bill that sets the federal budget for the agencies in charge of public lands. Senator John McCain (R-AZ) has offered an amendment to this bill which would prohibit use of taxpayer funds to build new logging roads in the Tongass. Passing this amendment would give our beleaguered forests and our pocketbooks a break, and stop the industrial-scale destruction in the land of the eagle, the wolf and the brown bear. (Greenpeace article).


_____________________________________________________________________

My guess is we'll keep giving money to these guys.

[Edited on Nov 18, 2004 by HellboundLiberal]

Hmmm thats interestring, though unfortunetly Diesal has high levels of particulates in its exhaust fuems, that have been linked to the cause of Asthma in children and generally destroying over time the respiratory system.
I guess then if your prediction is accurate, I would say buy stocks in pharmaceutical companies that manufacture asthma inhalers and medication and watch their stock go through the roof at around 2012.............
Oh yes and as a note since we should be you know REDUCING the amount of carbon based fuels humans consume, isnt it kinda silly to be using a fuel that cannot be restored in the time that forcast (Though most likely current consumption) human consumption will overtake the supply?
Hence the price of such a fuel would become to expensive quite quickly and would keep it from becoming widely used, which is you know the point, for if this fuel became widely accessible and affordeable to the population, that would mean that human consumption of carbon based fuels would be in balance with natural absorption of the CO2 bi products.
But from what is suggested is that this fuel will be in COMPETITION with Crude Oil based fuels, meaning that the CO2 being absorbed naturally will be added to the atmosphere that much more quickly ON TOP of what is being produced through fossil fuel burning compounding the actual problem!
Again this just highlights capitalisms inability to address the environmental crisis it has created, from the government organisations it elects into office (Does GWB have a "cough" plan to phase out fossil fuel burning cars Bwahahahaha whooo) to their dogmatic followers who cant apparently work out the inherent contradictions themselves in which they give free advertisement exposure to money making schemes that will only make things worse in the current economic/environmental reality.
Time to leave bourgoise environmental lala land, beofore the environment kicks you out for you.