 |
| courtesy: USGS |
Struggling with the undeniable (except in Washington) effects of climate change six prominent conservation groups have sued the US Fish & Wildlife Service to protect Chukchi Sea walruses from damage by oil exploration. Royal Dutch Shell has conducted exploratory drilling at Hannah Shoal, a primary feeding area for the Chukchi Sea walrus colony that gathers in this area as ice receeds from the Arctic Sea in summer. Walruses
(Odobenus rosmarus divergens) use sea ice as a diving platform to reach food on the continental shelf, but now sea ice has receeded north beyond the continental shelf. Water depths exceed two miles making it impossible for the walruses to feed. Deprived of their usual habitat by warming sea temperatures, walruses are returning to shore to rest after swimming out to the feeding grounds about 75 miles off the Chukchi coast. Thirty-five thousand walruses gathered at Lay Point, Alaska this summer near where more drilling may take place.
{01.10.14} Shell's intial season in 2012 was marked by failure and near disaster as a drilling rig grounded on shore in a storm.
{17.04.13) The company intends to return to drill its "Chukchi Sea Burger" prospect near Hannah Shoal. During 2012 operations Shell crews reported 338 sightings of a total of 8,678 walruses, many in large groups.
Conservationists through their attorneys, Earthjustice, say that oil exploration activities will drive walruses away from the feeding area. The federal wildlife agency typically understates adverse impacts because of institutional bias. Walruses are protected under the Marine Mammal Protection Act, but the rule change being challenged allows "incidental" killings in conecting with oil and gas exploration. The groups say a finding of "no significant impact" is erroneous and arbitrary since the process failed to consider walrus travel corridors between the Shoal and coastal haulouts.
[more photos]
