| Tyrone Slothrop |
01-18-2006 06:32 PM |
The bottom line on ANWAR
Quote:
Originally posted by Spanky
Unless George Will is lying, then if your definition of a wilderness is that it has no roads, then ANWAR is no longer a wilderness.
George Will said: "although there are active oil and gas wells in at least 36 U.S. wildlife refuges"
George Will said: "Those who have and who think it is "pristine" must have visited during the 56 days a year when it is without sunlight. They missed the roads, stores, houses, military installations, airstrip and school. They did not miss seeing the trees in area 1002. There are no trees.
George Will said: Ice roads and helicopter pads, which will melt each spring, will minimize man's footprint, which will be on a 2,000-acre plot about one-fifth the size of Dulles Airport.
I actually laughed out loud when I read this. Of all the people on this board, in my humble opion, your "cites" are the least reliable. So for you to want us to take your opinion on unammed information on the net is just a little ripe. As we have tried to explain to you before, opinions from blogs do not qualify as evidence.
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Sorry to disappear for a while, but my neighbor must have moved his WiFi router.
Here's what the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service has said about the impact of development:
Quote:
Newer technologies that are applied today in Alaska's expanding North Slope oil fields include directional drilling that allows for multiple well heads on smaller drill pads; the re-injection of drilling wastes into the ground, which replaces surface reserve pits; better delineation of oil reserves using 3-dimensional seismic surveys, which has reduced the number of dry holes; and use of temporary ice pads and ice roads for conducting exploratory drilling and construction in the winter. As the oil fields expand east and west, additional oil reserves are consequently being tapped from smaller satellite fields that rely on the existing infrastructure at Prudhoe Bay and Kuparuk.
Although technological advances in oil and gas exploration and development have reduced some of the harmful environmental effects associated with those activities, oil and gas development remains an intrusive industrial process. The physical "footprint" of the existing North Slope oil facilities and roads covers about 10,000 acres, but the current industrial complex extends across an 800 square mile region, nearly 100 miles from east to west. It continues to grow as new oil fields are developed.
The 100-mile wide 1002 Area is located more than 30 miles from the end of the nearest pipeline and more than 50 miles from the nearest gravel road and oil support facilities. According to the U.S. Geological Survey, possible oil reserves may be located in many small accumulations in complex geological formations, rather than in one giant field as was discovered at Prudhoe Bay. Consequently, development in the 1002 Area could likely require a large number of small production sites spread across the Refuge landscape, connected by an infrastructure of roads, pipelines, power plants, processing facilities, loading docks, dormitories, airstrips, gravel pits, utility lines and landfills.
A substantial amount of water is needed for oil drilling, development, and construction of ice roads. Water needed for oil development ranges from eight to 15 million gallons over a 5-month period, according to the Bureau of Land Management. If water is not available to build ice roads, gravel is generally used. Water resources are limited in the 1002 Area. In winter, only about nine million gallons of liquid water may be available in the entire 1002 Area, which is enough to freeze into and maintain only 10 miles of ice roads. Therefore, full development may likely require a network of permanent gravel pads and roads.
Cumulative biological consequences of oil field development that may be expected in the Arctic Refuge include:
- blocking, deflecting or disturbing wildlife
- loss of subsistence hunting opportunities
- increased predation by arctic fox, gulls and ravens on nesting birds due to introduction of garbage as a consistent food source
alteration of natural drainage patterns, causing changes in vegetation
- deposition of alkaline dust on tundra along roads, altering vegetation over a much larger area than the actual width of the road
- local pollutant haze and acid rain from nitrogen oxides, methane and particulate matter emissions
- contamination of soil and water from fuel and oil spills
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Sorry if that's overkill to counteract the crap that Will was peddling in his op-ed column, but Spanky says my cites are unreliable -- frankly, I suspect he can't be bothered to read them, but whatever -- so I figured he'd be happier with the block-quote.
I don't understand why Spanky and Will are working so hard to avoid the obvious issues here. Lots of people oppose development of ANWR because they want the land to remain (relatively) undeveloped. Arguing, a la Will, that people who oppose developing ANWR are all a bunch of pinko collectivists is true in the same way that one might say that conservatives who support Bush's wire-tapping are fascists who want to turn America into a police state, which is to say that it's unbridled nonsense.
Why can't Will and Spanky just accept that a lot of people see a lot of benefit from leaving the land as it is? |
