Shell has announced plans to seek permission from the U.S. government to drill wells seeking crude in the Arctic.

Called risky by some, Shell stated in a recent guardian.co.uk article: “As in years past, Shell remains committed to employing world-class technology and experience to ensure a safe, environmentally responsible Arctic exploration program in 2012.” This will surely lead to future battles between the oil giant and environmentalists.


Shell Asks to Drill Off Alaska’s North Coast

 

The drilling would take place off Alaska’s north coast in the Beaufort and Chukchi sea regions during 2012 and 2013. And while plans to start in the summer were halted due to the moratorium imposed after the Gulf Oil Spill last April, followed by a ruling by the EPA, Shell said that it could offer regulators reassurances that would enable it to proceed with a program estimated to have cost $2 billion to lease the land necessary, in addition to $4 billion in planning.


Greenpeace Responds to Shell Drill Ships

 

With two drilling ships on the way to the region, Greenpeace has already boarded Ocean Rig Corcovado off the coast of Turkey. Greenpeace stated it remains totally opposed to what Cairn Energy and Shell plan to do in the Arctic.

With claims of the high north becoming the new frontline of the global environmental battleground, Greenpeace senior oil campaigner Ben Ayliffe recently said that Shell is gambling with the fragile Alaskan environment — this only a year after the Gulf Oil Spill, from which that region is still recovering.


Ice Melt, the US Geological Survey, and BP Oil

 

Ayliffe further went on to state that oil companies are rushing in to extract the fossil fuels as climate change causes the ice to retreat. The fact that these fossil fuels are what caused the ice to melt in the first place is madness. Ayliffe claimed that we should be trying to force the car industry to increase the efficiency of their vehicles, as well as using new, clean technology.


With oil over $100 a barrel, it is no wonder that recent ice melt has driven the oil industry to seek crude in a region that the US Geological Survey concludes could hold almost a quarter of the world’s undiscovered oil and gas reserves.


This after Cairn reported it had found indications of oil with a well-off Greenland. Meanwhile, BP, culprits in the Gulf Oil Spill, has signed a controversial deal with the Russian group Rosneft to explore for oil in the far north of Siberia.

Image Source: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:CromartyOilPlatform.JPG