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 ig Oil has revamped its bid to industrialize a thriving ocean sanctuary for polar bears, whales and other Arctic wildlife. Earlier this year, legal action by NRDC and Earthjustice -- along with a coalition of Alaskan Native organizations and conservation groups -- helped force Shell Oil to abandon a multiyear plan for exploratory drilling in the Beaufort Sea, including an area just off the coast of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. Despite that setback, Shell has hatched an even more destructive scheme to deploy its armada of drill ships and icebreakers across both the Beaufort Sea and the neighboring Chukchi Sea, an important migratory corridor for endangered bowhead whales. "Even as global warming shakes this fragile Arctic ecosystem to its core," said Chuck Clusen, director of NRDC's Alaska Project, "Shell is hell-bent on transforming it into an industrial zone."
NRDC is now building pressure on the Obama Administration to reject Shell's proposed assault on the Beaufort and Chukchi -- also called the Polar Bear Seas. In an official protest letter to the Minerals Management Service -- the agency that regulates oil and gas exploration in federal waters -- we condemned Shell and the MMS for failing to study the full potential impacts of this "massive industrial undertaking" on the region's wildlife and Native people. Exploratory drilling would generate a barrage of deafening underwater noise and release tons of toxic pollution into the air and water. In addition, there is no proven method for cleaning up oil spills in the icebound Beaufort and Chukchi, where a spill would pose a lethal threat to polar bears and to the coast of the Arctic Refuge itself. On a separate front, we are mobilizing public pressure on the EPA to reject Shell's request for a pair of key air-quality permits. Obama Administration officials have said that they will not advance the approval process until Shell clears these important hurdles.
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“Even as global warming shakes this fragile Arctic ecosystem to its core, Shell is hell-bent on transforming it into an industrial zone.”
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