Fighting a Shell Game in the Arctic
A legal challenge by environmental and indigenous Alaskan groups may dampen Shell Oil's chances of drilling for billions of barrels of oil in the U.S. portion of the Arctic's Chukchi Sea. It's feared the controversial plan could spell disaster for endangered species as well as increase global warming.
A legal challenge by environmental and indigenous Alaskan groups may dampen Shell Oil’s chances of drilling for billions of barrels of oil in the U.S. portion of the Arctic’s Chukchi Sea. It’s feared the controversial plan could spell disaster for endangered species as well as increase global warming. –JCL
Your support matters…The Guardian:
Royal Dutch Shell’s controversial plans to drill for billions of barrels of oil in the Arctic’s environmentally sensitive frozen waters face a potentially damaging legal challenge.
An alliance of conservation and Alaskan indigenous groups has filed a legal claim to prevent Shell drilling for oil this year in the Arctic Ocean’s Chukchi Sea. Two years ago, Shell paid $2.1bn (£1.3bn) to the US government for 275 oil leases there.
The legal claim accuses the US’s minerals management service, part of the federal interior department, of waving through permission to allow Shell to drill wells on the basis of an “abbreviated and internal review” of the environmental dangers of exploration.
The US portion of the Chukchi Sea, which separates north-western Alaska from north-eastern Siberia, is believed to hold 15bn barrels of recoverable oil and 76tn cubic feet of recoverable natural gas, according to the interior department.
Independent journalism is under threat and overshadowed by heavily funded mainstream media.
You can help level the playing field. Become a member.
Your tax-deductible contribution keeps us digging beneath the headlines to give you thought-provoking, investigative reporting and analysis that unearths what's really happening- without compromise.
Give today to support our courageous, independent journalists.
Environment
As waters warm, Alaska Native families confront a world without the fish that fed them for generations.
Environment
The Tongass National Forest in Alaska is the largest national forest in the United States. We must preserve it.
Environment
Active and proposed mines threaten key salmon watersheds in Alaska and British Columbia.
Scientists say they see no end to the way human-caused climate change is adversely affecting the planet.
Columbus Day is increasingly being replaced by a celebration of indigenous peoples and their central role in our history and in our future.
As long as the U.S. and other nations cling to neoliberal economics, their citizens will continue to drift toward far-right authoritarians.
You need to be a supporter to comment.
There are currently no responses to this article.
Be the first to respond.