Arco's Oil Exploration and Development Aactivitiesin the Arctic

In Camden Bay, on the north slope of Alaska just offshore from the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and in the path of grinding sheets of polar ice, the Atlantic Richfield oil company (ARCO) is planning to drill an exploratory off-shore oil well. ARCO intends to begin drilling during the fall of 1997. They plan to move the drill platform into place in mid-August.

The well is called Warthog 1 - named for the U.S. Air Force's A-10 attack jet. The name is appropriate, for the well site represents an attack on the ecosystem integrity of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, a frontal attack on arctic waters where offshore drilling presents the potential of catastrophic environmental damage, and a further attack on the rapidly warming Arctic climate via the company's contribution to greenhouse gas emissions.

The shallow waters of Camden Bay support a rich and diverse ocean community. The area is a vital feeding and migration route for endangered bowhead whales. Beluga whales, bearded and ringed seals are plentiful, as are Arctic fish species such as Dolly Varden char. Bird life abounds on the nearby shorelines, with dense concentrations of nesting tundra swans and snow geese staging areas, while offshore waters support seabirds and waterfowl. Here, polar bear biologists find the greatest concentration of polar bear denning sites in the Alaskan Arctic. The bears build snow dens along the coast where females give birth to and rear their cubs. The Porcupine Caribou herd, a mainstay of Native subsistence hunting, depends on the Refuge's coastal plain as its primary calving grounds. Musk-ox forage on the seasonal greens during the short arctic summers.

Within the rich waters of Camden Bay and only 3 miles from the Refuge coastline, ARCO intends to undertake exploratory drilling and, if the well proves viable, begin oil production. ARCO then plans to transport the oil through a subsea pipeline through tidelands adjacent to the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. Building subsea pipelines through unstable subsea permafrost is an extremely risky proposition that will use completely new and unproven technology. Camden Bay is covered by ice for nine months of the year, making any spill or mishap - particularly in fractured or broken ice - virtually impossible to address. The frozen Arctic environment is much more vulnerable to stress than temperate ecosystems and is no place to be experimenting with this technology.

On or about August 15, 1997, ARCO will attempt to move to the Camden Bay drill site the Glomar Beaufort Sea 1 - a Concrete Island Drilling System or CIDS. The CIDS is a massive floating artificial island. Consisting of six structural modules the combined drilling unit has 79,000 square feet of deck space and is over 300 feet square and roughly 300 feet high. The CIDS can drill to depths of 25,000 feet. ARCO plans to use the CIDS unit to drill from it's anchored location in federal waters on an angle into state waters off the Refuge.

The Arctic National Wildlife Refuge has long been on the oil industry's wish list for development. But time and again, strong public opposition has prevented industry from gaining access to it. Many see ARCO's plans to drill for oil directly offshore of the Refuge as a way to circumvent the current ban on on-shore development in the Refuge. If ARCO is successful in developing its Warthog site, then it will be drilling for oil just a few miles from the shore of the Refuge, exposing this irreplaceable wildlife reserve to all the risks associated with oil exploration and extraction. Sea ice conditions greatly exacerbate the risk of catastrophic spills. Oil exploration and development in such close proximity to the Arctic Refuge would destroy the wilderness and wildlife that the Refuge was designed to protect.

To date, drilling in the Arctic Outer Continental Shelf (OCS) has been limited to exploratory wells only. Both the federal and state governments have plans to lease large areas on-shore and offshore along the Beaufort and Chukchi Sea coasts. BP's Northstar development and ARCO's Warthog project represent significant encroachments of the transnational oil companies into the offshore waters of the Arctic Ocean. These wells, if successfully brought into production, will pave the way for massive oil development across the Arctic Ocean, linked by a web of pipelines. As Ken Boyd, Director of the Alaska Oil and Gas Division, stated: "We're moving the frontiers in both directions. This is how the string of pearls is linked together. You make your discoveries and then you put all the pieces together with pipelines." BP plans to conduct seismic testing in the summer of 1997 and hopes to bring their Northstar site into production by 1999. The Beaufort Sea well site is expected to yield 145 million barrels of oil. Drilling will take place offshore of Gwyder Bay.

ARCO's Alpine discovery in the Colville River Delta is expected to bring oil to market by the year 2000. Production is slated at a rate of 60,000 barrels per day, with total reserves of approximately 365 million barrels. The company plans construction of a pipeline under the Colville River.

ARCO's Stinson I site is offshore of the western boundary of the Wildlife Refuge between the Staines and Canning Rivers. To date, ARCO has not released the results of its exploratory drilling program, conducted in 1989-90.

BP's Liberty project will involve offshore drilling on the continental shelf in waters northwest of Alaska's Mikkelson Bay. BP is projecting 120 million barrels of recoverable oil from the development.

Canada is also promoting Arctic oil and gas development. The Canadian government has identified 19 significant fossil fuel discoveries in Canada's Arctic Islands, and is aggressively promoting the Mackenzie Delta/Beaufort Sea region with discovered resources of 1.4 billion barrels of oil to date.

The hazards of drilling in Arctic waters are substantial. Shallow pockets of gas in sediments could promote blowouts if hit during drilling. Gas-charged sediments are very common in the Beaufort Sea and in the Camden Bay area. Camden Bay is prone to earthquakes, with numerous active faults in the region. In addition, most nearshore areas of the Beaufort have subsea permafrost extending some distance into the seabed. Unstable sea floor sediments are common. These could stress pipelines laid on top of, or in, the sea floor. Subsea pipelines in the Arctic are also at risk of ice gouging damage, especially in shallow water, as the pack ice buckles under pressure. Alternatively, if pipelines are deeply buried to avoid ice gouging, the heat of the oil could instead melt unstable subsea permafrost and cause compaction that results in pipeline breaks. The increase in winter storms, associated with global warming, combined with the movement of pack ice could subject offshore platforms and pipelines to unprecedented stress.

The Company:

ARCO reported 1996 revenues of USD$18.6 billion. ARCO's primary businesses are petroleum, natural gas liquids, natural gas, coal, and petrochemicals. Its principal subsidiaries are ARCO Chemical, Vastar Resources (which engages in natural gas and some oil exploration and production in the lower 48 states of the U.S.), ARCO Alaska, and ARCO Transportation Alaska (which is an investor in the Alyeska oil pipeline). ARCO also owns 49% of Lyondell Petrochemicals Co. ARCO Alaska Inc. is the top oil-field leaseholder in Alaska, controlling 862,609 acres (349,012 hectares).

U.K.: ARCO operates the Blenheim oil field and the Gawain natural gas field in the U.K. sector of the North Sea. 45% of ARCO's non-U.S. natural gas production comes from the North Sea.

ARCO is actively involved in oil, gas and/or coal production in Indonesia, China, Algeria, Dubai, Qatar, Venezuela and Australia.

ARCO, along with entities like Exxon, Shell, and the Rev. Sung Myung Moon, has backed the Science and Environmental Policy Project, which specializes in generating scepticism about climate issues. (Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Sept. 25, 1995) ARCO is also a member of the Global Climate Coalition, an industry lobby group set up to thwart efforts to protect the climate.

Greenpeace position:

On August 4, 1997 during a White House Press Briefing, President Bill Clinton stated "We believe that the science makes it clear that the climate is changing." Clinton continued "...I think the scientific evidence for the fact of climate change is pretty compelling. ... the climate is changing and could be changing substantially."

In the face of mounting evidence and political acceptance of rapid climate change, ARCO's decision to proceed with new oil exploration in the fragile Arctic ecosystem is totally irresponsible.

• Greenpeace demands an immediate halt to all new oil exploration and development in the Arctic and around the globe.

• Greenpeace demands an immediate process to begin the smooth and rapid phase out of fossil fuels and the conversion to safe energy alternatives such as solar and wind power.

• Greenpeace demands the parties to the Third Conference of the Framework Convention on Climate Change in Kyoto, Japan in December, 1997 agree to require all industrialized nations to reduce carbon dioxide emissions 20 per cent on 1990 levels by the year 2005.