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A Ban on Arctic Drilling Remains in Democrats’ New Reconciliation Framework While Gas Prices Soar

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House Democrats unveiled a revamped version of the “Build Back Better” plan on Thursday, watered down to a still-colossal $1.75 trillion price tag from the $3.5 trillion that failed to pass earlier last month.

The sweeping social spending bill with $550 billion allocated to climate change alone was released hours ahead of President Joe Biden’s trip to Europe for a global summit on emissions. . .

Local indigenous groups within the refuge have lobbied for decades to open up their backyard for drilling, only to be stopped by D.C. Democrats who demand the flat-tundra surface of Alaska’s north slope remain a museum they would maybe one day like to visit. Opposition from a rival tribe hundreds of miles south has been exploited to cloak Arctic protections under the left’s moral imperative of social justice, even though drilling in the adjacent Prudhoe Bay has shown no harm to the region’s major wildlife such as caribou. (Read more from “A Ban on Arctic Drilling Remains in Democrats’ New Reconciliation Framework While Gas Prices Soar” HERE)

Delete Facebook, Delete Twitter, Follow Restoring Liberty and Joe Miller at gab HERE.

Oil Drilling on US Arctic Coast Put On Ice

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Photo Credit: Alastair Grant / AP

Photo Credit: Alastair Grant / AP

By Toby Sterling.

Oil companies’ rush to find reserves off Alaska’s Arctic shores suffered a setback on Thursday after Shell said it would suspend its operations in the region — and possibly withdraw for good.

Royal Dutch Shell PLC is the main company to have purchased leases for oilfields off Alaska’s Arctic shores, but its attempts to drill have been halting due to technical and legal hurdles.

While other companies are still seeking to exploit deep-water Arctic fields nearby in Canada, Shell’s troubles may indicate that the difficulties outweigh the potential economic benefits.

“We will not drill in Alaska in 2014, and we are reviewing our options there,” Shell CEO Ben van Beurden told reporters in London.

Shell received a negative Federal court decision last week. Environmentalists are still challenging whether the government’s 2008 decision to open the area to exploration was correctly granted in the first place: it is covered by sea ice for much of the year.

Read more from this story HERE.

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Photo Credit: Newscast

Photo Credit: Newscast

Shell halts Alaska exploration to focus on performance

By Alistair Osborne.

Royal Dutch Shell will stop its exploration programme in Alaska this year as part of a refocusing of strategic priorities under new chief executive Ben van Beurden.

The oil giant, which stunned the market a fortnight ago with its first profits warning in 10 years, said its new boss was setting “an agenda for sharper performance and rigorous capital discipline”.

One immediate decision is that Mr van Beurden, who took over at the start of the year from predecessor Peter Voser, has called a halt to Shell’s controversial exploration in Alaska – a move that will be seen as a victory for environmental campaigners.

Mr van Beurden said he was responding to a US federal court ruling last week that the full range of environmental risks had not been assessed by the American government.

Shell said the ruling “raises substantial obstacles to Shell’s plans for drilling in offshore Alaska”.

Read more from this story HERE.

U.S. Appeals Court Throws Arctic Drilling Into Further Doubt

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Photo Credit: Paxson Woelber

Photo Credit: Paxson Woelber

A federal appeals court ruled Wednesday that the U.S. Interior Department wrongly awarded offshore oil leases in the Chukchi Sea near Alaska in 2008 without considering the full range of environmental risks posed by drilling in the Arctic.

A three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals sent the on-going dispute – pitting environmental groups and Native Alaska tribes against the federal government and energy companies – back to U.S. District in Anchorage, Alaska.

It was not immediately clear what the decision would mean for the oil company Royal Dutch Shell Plc and its plans, revealed in December, to resume exploratory drilling this coming summer in the Chukchi.

Shell is the major lease holder from the sale six years ago. Company spokeswoman Megan Baldino said in an email statement: “We are reviewing the opinion.”

A spokeswoman for the Interior Department declined to comment, saying the agency does not discuss pending legal matters.

Read more from this story HERE.

Former Clinton, Obama Officials Call For Halt to Arctic Drilling

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Former Clinton chief of staff John Podesta and former EPA administrator and Obama climate policy director Carol Browner officials have changed their tune and are now opposed to oil and gas drilling in the arctic. They argue that a “series of mishaps and errors” have them convinced it can’t be done safely and responsibly.

“We were open to offshore oil and gas development in the Arctic provided oil companies and the government could impose adequate safeguards, ensure sufficient response capacity and develop a deeper understanding of how oil behaves in ice and freezing water,” write Podesta and Browner, both now working at the liberal Center for American Progress.

“Now, following a series of mishaps and errors, as well as overwhelming weather conditions, it has become clear that there is no safe and responsible way to drill for oil and gas in the Arctic Ocean,” they added.

Podesta and Browner argue that despite reports warning about potential hazards of arctic drilling and advances in technology and expertise, Royal Dutch Shell has shown it is ill-prepared for arctic drilling. The two go farther to argue that arctic drilling should be stopped altogether.

“The Obama administration shouldn’t issue any new permits to Shell this year and should suspend all action on other companies’ applications to drill in this remote and unpredictable region,” write Podesta and Browner.

Read more from this story HERE.