Exxon Valdez to Northstar: The Impacts of Oil Development in Alaska and the Arctic

The Day The Water Died: The Exxon Valdez Oil Spill

Shortly after midnight on March 24, 1989, the tanker Exxon Valdez ran aground on Bligh Reef, in Alaska's Prince William Sound, spilling 11 million gallons of Alaskan crude oil. Within days, approximately 700 miles of coastline were oiled; ultimately, detectable amounts of the spill were found 600 miles from the accident.
The spill killed an estimated 3,500-5,500 sea otters out of a total population in the region of approximately 35,000. Over 35,000 carcasses of oiled birds were recovered within the first four months of the spill; altogether, an estimated 300,000-675,000 seabirds perished. As of February 1999, only two species of wildlife - bald eagles and river otters - were considered to have recovered from the spill's effects. Harbor seals, three species of cormorants, harlequin ducks, pigeon guillemots and a family pod of killer whales are still listed as "not recovering." Recent studies have shown that some fish populations may still be being affected, even by relatively low concentrations of chemical compounds found in oil. Although Exxon claims that the Sound has been completely cleaned, pockets of oil remain beneath the surface in a number of areas.
The spill also had a number of sociological and economic impacts. Residents of some Alaska Native villages, such as Tatitlek and Chenega Bay, which were directly in the path of the spill, experienced high levels of stress in response to the threat posed to their subsistence way of life, and by the sudden influx of scientists, oil industry representatives and media into their isolated communities. Non-native fishing communities also suffered stress and disruption, not only because of their connection to the marine environment and concerns over the possible impact on fisheries resources, but also as a result of the influx of clean-up crews and other outsiders, many of whom benefited monetarily from the spill.

An Accident Waiting to Happen
Exxon tried to pass off the Exxon Valdez as a freak accident that only happened because Captain Joseph Hazelwood had been drinking before taking command of the ship. However, although Captain Hazelwood deserves - and has received - a fair share of the blame, a number of Exxon's policies also contributed to the tanker's grounding. These ranged from cutting back on personnel, to encouraging captains to get up to sea speed as soon as possible, to continuing to build single-hulled tankers even after promising double-hulled ones. (Indeed, not one of the companies operating in Prince William Sound has yet introduced more double-hulled tankers, despite promises to do so; only ten per cent of the fleet in the area has double hulls).
In fact, the Exxon Valdez was just one in a long and continuing line of major oil spills, in Alaska and around the world. It was not even one of the largest: according to the Oil Spill Information Center, there have been 39 larger tanker spills since 1960. If other forms of spills - such as those resulting from the Persian Gulf war, from a 1992 oil well blowout in Uzebekistan, or the rupture of a Komineft pipeline in Russia in 1994 - are included, it ranks only 53rd. Since March 1989, there have been at least seven tanker spills larger than the Exxon Valdez.
In Alaska, the Exxon Valdez is part of a pattern of spills and accidents that have bedeviled the state's oil industry. These accidents are not restricted to tankers. Alyeska Pipeline Co. records show 642 spills totaling 1.2 million gallons of oil since operation of the Trans-Alaska Pipeline began in 1977. The same year as the Exxon Valdez grounded, 1,314 oil spills were recorded during operations off Alaska's North Slope.
Plainly, contrary to assertions from the oil industry, spills are a frequent occurrence. But they are not the only form of environmental damage resulting from oil development. In few cases is this more apparent than Alaska and the Arctic.

Oil in the Arctic

The first commercial oil discovery in Alaska was made in 1902. But the modern age of oil development in the state truly began in 1968, with the discovery of the Prudhoe Bay field off the North Slope. The field's discovery led to the construction of the Trans-Alaska Pipeline, which transports North Slope crude to the tanker terminal at Valdez.
Today, more than 32 oil fields have been discovered on the North Slope and in adjacent offshore waters; there may additionally be more than 50 satellite fields.
Oil production in the region has left its mark on the North Slope. In addition to spills, there have been impacts from pollution, pipeline and roadway construction, seismic testing, and routine operation of oil facilities, among others. And the industry is continuing to expand its reach in Arctic Alaska, prompting increasing concern for future environmental impacts.
In August 1998, the Clinton Administration announced the opening up of nearly five million acres of Alaskan wilderness, in the northeast quadrant of the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska (NPR-A) - a 23 million-acre region that was set aside in 1923 for use only in cases of national emergency. A few days earlier, five oil companies laid out $6 million for leases in a nearby region of the Beaufort Sea. Additional lease sales are planned in the Cook Inlet April 1999, elsewhere in the Beaufort in 2000 and in the Chukchi Sea at some point after 2002.
The oil industry has also continued to lobby for access to the one part of Arctic Alaska that has been declared off-limits - the 1.5 million-acre coastal plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. Known as "America's Serengeti" for its biological richness, the Arctic Refuge is critical denning habitat for polar bears, calving grounds for caribou, and home to wolves, muskoxen and millions of migratory birds.
The Exxon Valdez disaster killed one bill before Congress to open up the Refuge, but the industry has continued to lobby for drilling to be allowed. In the meantime, the industry is pushing forward with the new oil development elsewhere. The latest, and most controversial, of these developments is British Petroleum (BP)'s Northstar Project.

Northstar

BP's Alaska subsidiary, British Petroleum Exploration (Alaska) Inc. (BPXA), plans to drill for oil by building an offshore platform on an artificial island, and then to transport that oil to shore through a pipeline buried beneath the Arctic Ocean. This proposal is known as the Northstar Project.
Northstar would be the first true offshore oil and gas facility in the Arctic; unlike previous such developments, there would be no causeway linking the drilling island to shore, just the undersea pipeline. It would be using new and untested technology in a harsh, unpredictable environment. Sea ice in the region continually gouges and scours the sea floor, raising concerns about the safety of the pipeline. The US Army Corps of Engineers notes that "the calculated total probability of one or more large spills (greater than 1,000 barrels [42,000 gallons]) from any source is approximately 11% to 24% over the 15-year project life."
Additionally, there are concerns about the likelihood of chronic spills even being detected. Although pipeline are normally monitored once a week, Northstar requires monitoring only once a month; given the immense difficulties of detecting any leak, however frequent the monitoring, by drilling randomly through ice in conditions of near-total darkness, it is likely that any leak which occurred in winter would go unnoticed until spring, if even then. Those same conditions would make it extremely difficult to undertake any spill response in time.
A major spill from Northstar could prove disastrous for the biologically-rich arctic ecosystem. It would imperil endangered bowhead whale populations and threaten subsistence hunting by Inupiat Eskimo communities. It could also kill large numbers of polar bears, ringed seals and sea ducks.

Oil Development and Climate Change

Although most of the concern associated with the impact of oil development on the environment has concentrated on the effect of spills, in the long term the more serious and widespread consequences may result from climate change. The burning of fossil fuels, particularly coal, oil and gas, is adding large amounts of so-called "greenhouse gases' to the atmosphere, resulting in an overall warming of the Earth's climate. Some of the earliest effects of this change are already being felt in Alaska.
. In South-central Alaska, two insect pests -- the black-headed budworm and the spruce bark beetle -- have between them destroyed almost five million acres of spruce forests; scientists believe that the infestation has been nurtured by warm summers which have stressed the trees, making them more vulnerable, and which have simultaneously allowed the insects to halve their breeding cycles, effectively doubling the population.
On Cooper Island, off Alaska's North Slope, the state's only breeding colony of black guillemots is in decline, as a result of decreasing and retreating sea ice. Black guillemots feed on the Arctic cod that live beneath the floes; ice-free areas harbor fewer fish, forcing the birds to fly farther in search of food.
Several studies have pointed to melting and sinking of permafrost in Alaska as a result of warming temperatures; recent research suggests that climate change is resulting in major changes in the Arctic sea ice ecosystem.
The most dramatic evidence that climate change is already affecting Alaska and the Arctic, however, comes from observations by Alaska Native communities. In 1997 and 1998, the Greenpeace ship MV Arctic Sunrise visited a series of Yup'ik, Siberian Yup'ik, and Inupiat communities along the Bering and Chukchi Sea coasts of Alaska, gathering testimonies from villagers about changes they have seen in the climate, and impacts those changes have had on their traditional, subsistence way of life. In village after village, Alaska Natives told similar stories: of ice forming later in the fall, breaking up sooner in the spring and being thinner and less stable than usual; of changes in the migration patterns of some species and the appearance of other species totally new to the area; and of landslides and erosion. Almost without exception, these observations matched predictions from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change - a body of approximately 2,000 scientists from around the world, which is considered the single most authoritative source of information on global climate change - on the kinds of impacts and changes which should begin to occur in the Arctic as a result of global warming.
For Alaska Natives, such changes are of more than passing or academic interest. Thinning and retreating sea-ice and fiercer storms make hunting and food gathering more dangerous and uncertain, as do changes in wildlife populations and the availability of plants and berries. Storm-induced erosion threatens several coastal villages; the inhabitants of Shismaref have decided to move to a new location after the village has been devastated by storms, while on remote Little Diomede Island, melting permafrost is prompting landslides that threaten to obliterate their village. For a culture that is already under assault from the intrusions of the industrialized world, a changing climate as a result of fossil fuel burning could prove to be the final nail in the coffin.

Conclusion

The Exxon Valdez disaster was not an isolated event. It was just one in a series of ongoing major oil spills, from tankers and other sources, that have wreaked environmental havoc across the world. Such spills are, in turn, one source - among many -- of pollution and environmental damage resulting from oil exploration and development. After years of concern over the impacts of oil pollution on marine and coastal environments, and on the migration routes of such animals as caribou, attention is turning increasingly to the fact that the burning of fossil fuels such as oil and gas is now affecting the climate of the entire planet.
The story of the Exxon Valdez did not begin on the evening of March 23, and it didn't end with the tanker running aground on Bligh Reef. Solutions to the issues it raised will not be found by asking whether or not Joseph Hazelwood was drunk, or even solely be introducing more double-hulled tankers - although such a move is an essential step. The only way truly to insure that tragedies such as the Exxon Valdez are not repeated is for the industrialized world to wean itself from its dependence on fossil fuels.
A good way to start would be for the US government to address the issue of subsidies to the oil industry. At present, the federal government provides between about $5 billion and $12 billion a year in subsidies to the oil industry in the form of tax breaks, maintenance of coastal and inland shipping routes and taxpayer underwriting of oil companies' insurance and liability policies. Add in the cost of defending supplies from the Persian Gulf, and the total rises by about $20 billion.
Greenpeace is calling on the US Administration shift current oil subsidies into the development of alternative energy technologies - and, in the meantime, bring about a freeze on all new exploration and drilling.
Such a step would not only go a long way toward reducing the risk of future disasters like the Exxon Valdez. It would also begin to address the dangers an addiction to fossil fuels poses to the Earth's climate.