U.S. Interior Secretary David Bernhardt is set to approve oil drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR). Liberals and journalists lost their minds.
The Wall Street Journal reported that “[t]he Trump administration approved an oil leasing program for the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge Monday, opening up the pristine 19-million-acre wilderness to drilling for the first time.”
The Journal said that it would be “difficult to unwind the decision should Democrats recapture the White House in November.”
Perhaps that’s why Twitter users like NBC News’s Mary Murray called President Donald Trump’s administration’s latest move an “environmental atrocity” on Twitter.
According to The Journal’s summarization, Bernhardt said that “[a]pproving the program clears the way to auction oil leases ‘right around the end of the year.’”
Also, The Journal noted that “[t]he decision caps more than 30 years of efforts by oil companies and Alaskan leaders to drill in the refuge.”
Woke Twitter erupted.
Wall Street Journal platform editor Brian Fitzgerald tried to pull on the heartstrings of animal rights supporters by making a veiled reference to the disastrous effects of the notorious 1989 Exxon Valdez Oil Spill in Alaska’s Prince William Sound:
Every time this comes up, I vividly remember birds from the Sound getting oil wiped off them.
Univision Radio Host Fernando Espuelas chimed in: “We’re now at the looting stage of the Trump Administration.”
HuffPost environment reporter Chris D’Angelo tried to play gotcha against Trump, grumbling: “[R]emember like 2 weeks ago when Trump was telling us how he’s a conservationist in the mold of late President Theodore Roosevelt? good times.”
Leftist Daily Kos Trending News Manager Jennifer Hayden tweeted the news, screeching: “Meanwhile, they are intentionally looting America’s resources before the end of the year.”
She continued her meltdown: “I repeat: They are robbing the American people because Big Oil knows their only shot to destroy the Arctic is right now before the door closes.”
Italian newspaper La Stampa financial journalist Fabrizio Goria’s contribution included a brief quip on Twitter on the news: “Just insane.”
The U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA), reported in 2018 that “the total technically recoverable crude oil resource for federal lands, state waters, and native lands in the coastal plain has a mean estimate of 10.4 billion barrels.”
The price of oil is currently at a relatively low $42 a barrel, but that would still mean that ANWR could potentially yield at least roughly $436.8 billion worth of oil.
According to OilPrice.com August 17:
In terms of demand, U.S. demand reached 19.37 million bbl/d [last week], the highest number since the outbreak of the COVID-19 crisis last March. Our forecast for US crude oil demand stands at 18.79 million bbl/d in Q3 and 19.19 million bbl/d in Q4, supported by encouraging EIA data. [Emphasis added.]
N3L Capital Partners Co-founder Thomas Landstreet wrote in 2018 that “Drilling in the ANWR poses less risk to the environment than fracking. It would also be cheaper.
Fracking was invented in response to drilling restrictions, as a way to produce oil from shale formations on private land, where government restrictions don’t apply.” [Emphasis added.]
The left has made it clear there is more of a concern for wildlife than the millions of Americans who are suffering from an economy that has been forced into a pandemic-induced coma for months.
Read more at NewsBusters
The Birds are smarter then those freaking Eco-Wackos after all they wil never donate to Greenpeace or the NRDC
Screw your stupid birds.I want my AC running and cheap gas on my truck.
OK, perhaps we should just look at a few FACTS, something that is glaringly MISSING in most mainstream media reports. I hate to be long winded, but there is a LOT of nuance & factors involved (here). Let’s take a look at a few items in order:
1.) The final EIS and Record of Decision issued by Secretary Bernhardt is to allow for a minimum of TWO lease auctions per a 2017 Congressional resolution. That SAME resolution limits the total surface disturbance to 2,000 acres. Remember, ANWR is something like 19.6 MILLION acres, total.
2.) This debate about opening ANWR has been ongoing for about 40 years. The Alaskan congressional delegation, the State, most local & indigenous communities actually SUPPORT responsible development. That (conveniently) is absent from the discussion.
3.) This Record of Decision is a PRELIMINARY environmental assessment. It is based off a final Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) that if I remember correctly is over 2,000 pages, including all the exhibits & appendices. If effect, it is a programmatic analysis that sets the basic “ground rules” for stipulations & conditions to be attached to any lease (ultimately) issued. Nothing more, nothing less. Phase 1. It authorizes NO SURFACE ACTIVITY. This initial step will surely be litigated, ad nauseum.
4.) Even if you get to the second phase, then the REAL process begins. Any oil & gas operator (proponent) will then file an APD & plan of development, which more than likely will necessitate a supplemental EIS or extensively mitigated Environmental Assessment (EA). That second phase will receive additional agency scrutiny, probable negative media coverage, full public comment and almost CERTAIN litigation. Beginning to see a pattern?
5.) I am dubious most financial institutions will be eager to bank roll much activity given the relentless pressure campaign from the environmental NGO’s. Those same activist organizations will (also) use another wave of FEAR as a fund raising juggernaut.
So, my conclusion is three fold. If Biden is elected, ANWR will be either scratched by executive order or legislated back out of existence. Even IF a lease auction is ever held, I’ll predict the industry interest will be “tepid” given current market conditions & associated risks from negative publicity, lack of financing, potential litigation and an uncertain regulatory framework. Lastly, even if you could make it through this “minefield,” first oil & gas production (realistically) in ANWR would not occur within the next 10-15 years. Most likely, this is nothing to melt down about as the better likelihood is it will turn out to be a NOTHING BURGER..
Screw Fernando Espuelas and all of the members of Greenpeace in their Fossil foels ships screw the Sierra Club in fact just screw all the Eco-Freaks especialy Robert Redford who opposes Drilling and Fracking while doing ads for United Airlines and selling land to developers
If those stupid Eco-Freaks and the leave i the Ground Nit-Wits gave up all their stuff that had to do with Fossil Fuels they would be left without a home total’y naked and without anything to eat or drink and unprepared for the coming winter