Wednesday, December 21, 2016
Obama Prohibits Offshore Oil Drilling in Most U.S. Arctic Waters
President Barack Obama ordered the closure Tuesday of 125 million acres of the Arctic Ocean and its estimated 27 billion barrels of oil, indefinitely. The executive action bars new leases in the vast majority of U.S. Arctic offshore waters.
The Obama administration announcement, decried by Alaska's congressional delegation, came in conjunction with one from the Canadian government that it would bar future oil and gas licensing for all its offshore Arctic waters. The Canadian decision will be reviewed every five years. There will be no such built-in review of the Obama decision, however, and officials said the incoming Trump administration won't be able to easily undo it. Obama used the authority granted to the president by the 1953 Outer Continental Shelf Land Act, to "withdraw" all of the Chukchi Sea and the majority of the Beaufort Sea from future oil and gas leasing...more
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2 comments:
It withdraws areas that for the most part
1) no company was ever interested in leasing in the Beaufort Sea because of extremely deep water beyond the shelf break and outside the area thought to have the highest hydrocarbon potential. Large areas of the Beaufort Sea that have the highest potential remain available for future leasing, if and when the area is included in the Five-year program. In the proposed Final OCS Oil and Gas Leasing Program for 2017 to 2022, no lease sales were scheduled in the Beaufort Sea. So for at least five years, nothing was going to be leased anyway.
2) company interest in the Chukchi has largely episodic, with the first episode occurring from 1988-1991 and the second episode occurring from 2008 to 2015.
No company expressed interest when the area came up for consideration in 2013 and all leases were surrendered before expiration when the Shell exploration well came up dry in 2015. In the proposed Final OCS Oil and Gas Leasing Program for 2017 to 2022, no lease sales were scheduled in the Chukchi Sea. So for at least five years, nothing was going to be leased anyway.
As a practical matter, the withdrawals have no real consequence except for the question of their permanence, which makes the decision symbolic and emblematic of most everything the administration has done for the last eight years. think of this of Obamacare applied to the environment.
"think of this of Obamacare applied to the environment"
The first good chuckle I've had today.
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