In response to the five year anniversary of the Deepwater Horizon disaster in the Gulf of Mexico which killed 11 people and spilled five million barrels of oil, Ian Duff, Arctic campaigner, said:
“The Deepwater Horizon disaster was a truly shocking episode. People everywhere were stunned by the carnage the oil industry had wrought, and how incompetent it was at dealing with the disaster. There was a huge amount of anger.
“BP has suffered financially as a result, but sadly little else seems to have changed. The oil industry is continuing to push into ever more extreme and inhospitable environments, like Shell’s plans to drill in the icy waters of the Arctic, where stemming and cleaning up a disaster like this would be impossible. The impact of a spill on the Arctic’s fragile ecosystem would be devastating.
“It was President Obama’s Administration that consented to deep water drilling in the Gulf of Mexico, in the face of credible warnings that a blow-out would be catastrophic. Well they’re being warned again, this time about allowing drilling in the Arctic. And it seems like history is repeating itself, as just last month the US Administration approved Shell’s lease to drill in the Arctic Ocean this summer.”
The extreme Arctic conditions, including giant floating ice-bergs and stormy seas, make offshore drilling extremely risky. In its Environmental Impact statement, the US Administration acknowledged a 75% chance of a large oil spill in the Chukchi Sea if the area is commercially developed. And scientists say that in the Arctic, an oil spill would be impossible to clean up meaning devastation for the Arctic’s unique wildlife.
Shell’s past attempt to drill in the Arctic in 2012 was plagued with multiple operational failings culminating in the running aground of its drilling rig, the Kulluk. Shell will return to the remote Chukchi Sea this summer with the same contractor, Noble Drilling, which pled guilty to eight felonies following its last Arctic venture.
