Administration Approves Shell's Arctic Drilling Project:

[amborin]

Shell's Arctic Drilling Plan: Another Disaster Waiting to Happen

by Tim Dickinson

The Interior Department has greenlighted Royal Dutch Shell's exploration plans for offshore drilling in the Arctic Ocean after finding "no evidence" that a potential spill larger than the Exxon Valdez will "significantly affect the quality of the human environment." The decision is premised on the oil company's fantastical claims that it will be capable of recovering 90 percent of any oil that hits the water after a Gulf-style blowout.


Shell is telling the government it can recapture 90 percent of any oil that hits the water. Based on past experience, that claim is "absolutely ridiculous," says Rebecca Noblin, Alaska Director for the Center for Biological Diversity. Only 5 percent of oil from the BP disaster was recovered; Exxon Valdez was marginally better: 8 percent. (Harry Gerwin/Getty Images) Shell is now on track to begin Arctic drilling by next July, pending final permitting and (most likely) fierce litigation.

When BP's DeepWater Horizon rig exploded in the Gulf of Mexico last spring, Royal Dutch Shell had been poised to begin drilling in the Arctic. But the dangers of extreme oil exploration laid bare by the catastrophe made the plan politically untenable, at least in the short term. Interior suspended the issuance of Arctic drilling permits at the same time as it placed a moratorium on deepwater permitting for the Gulf.

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There's no proven technology for cleaning up oil in icy water.......

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Even so, Shell admits that a massive amount of oil would be released into the environment: 400,000 barrels into the Beaufort Sea, or one-and-a-half times the amount of crude spilled by the Exxon Valdez, in 1989.....

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http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2011/08/10-10

[dgibby]

1. Republicans are dancing in the streets tonight,

and they'll still be trashing Obama in the morning.