Feds approve drilling in sensitive wildlife area
The U.S. Department of Interior on Wednesday approved oil and gas drilling on Alaska land considered such sensitive wildlife habitat that it first was protected by former Interior Secretary James Watt under President Reagan, and by four Interior secretaries since.
The decision – decried by American Indian, hunting and environmental groups – comes just weeks after the U.S. Senate rejected drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, 110 miles to the east.
U.S. Bureau of Land Management staff said the decision was made after three years of study and in response to requests by Vice President Dick Cheney’s energy task force.
The plan, signed by Deputy Assistant Interior Secretary Chad Calvert, will open up more than 500,000 acres in and around Teshekpuk Lake on Alaska’s oil-rich North Slope. BLM officials estimate the Northeast National Petroleum Reserve, including the lake area, might contain as many as 2 billion barrels of what is deemed “economically recoverable” oil.
The area is a critical stop for molting geese on the Pacific flyway, with as many as 90,000 birds resting in flat wetlands in the summer. As many as 46,000 caribou also use areas near the lake for calving and migration paths.
While many Alaskans welcome drilling as an economic boon, some Native leaders in the state blasted the decision Wednesday.
“There are a lot of frustrated people in our community, right now,” said Dora Nukapigak, who lives in the small Inupiat Eskimo village of Nuiqsut, at the eastern edge of the reserve, where many people depend on caribou as an important food source.
“It’s a very sensitive area. It seems like regardless of what we say or do with BLM, they’ll do what they’re going to do anyways, and that’s drill.”
No surface drilling will be allowed on 242,000 acres considered vital for molting geese, or on another 244,000 acres used by caribou. Slant drilling will be allowed under those surfaces from adjoining lands.
Pipelines will have to be 7 feet high, at least initially, to allow caribou and hunters to pass underneath.