The Guardian reports the US government is expected to give approval to Shell's plant to restart drilling for oil in the Arctic. The company observed a self-imposed moratorium since 2012 after repeated problems with equipment and legal challenges, including a near disaster when its "state-of-the-art" conical drilling platform Kulluk grounded near Kodiak Island after breaking away from a tow. Shell's contractor, Noble Drilling was official criticized for the incident and assessed $12 million in fines and payments. Shell's oil leases are in the Chukchi and Beaufort Seas. Secretary Jewel will rubber-stamp the go-ahead as soon as this week, since the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, which supposedly regulates offshore exploration, gave its approval last month despite a finding in the EIS that there is a 75% chance of more large oil spills. Russia already produces hydrocarbons in Arctic waters and about thirty Greenpeace protestors were held in Murmansk after their ship, Arctic Sunrise, was boarded in international waters by Russian paramilitary. {06.06.14}
No company has yet successfully demonstrated how it will cope with a major oil spill in frigid, ice-clogged water. Previous containment demonstrations have failed. Experts fear that the slump in oil prices will cause oil companies to cut costs and reduce safety precautions. One of the underlying causes of the Deepwater Horizon disaster was a lack of prudence on the part of the offshore lease owner, British Petroleum. The approval will come in advance of the Paris climate talks where nations are expected to reach an agreement on limiting greenhouse gas emissions. In light of the scientific consensus about catastrophic climate change, it makes little sense to drilling for more oil in an ecologically sensitive region of Earth under extreme weather conditions. But then, politicians do not operate using logic.