On January 28, 2015, President Barack Obama, demonstrated why Alaskans do not support him by announcing his suggestion to congress to designate over 12 million acres in the Alaska National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) as wilderness. Designating this section of ANWR as Wilderness would cripple the states ability to develop major oil and natural gas fields for essential economic development. President Obama’s suggestion was a shock to Alaskan federal, state and local legislators and has been met with both vehement opposition and comical responses, which share the same level of ridiculousness as the President’s suggestion. The President clearly does not understand the state of Alaska, its people, and the proposed development plan. Furthermore, the President can be seen as hypocritical when days after suggesting an additional 12 million acres in ANWR be designated as wilderness, he announced his plan to open the Atlantic Coast to drilling, while increasing his ban on oil development in the Chuckchi Sea located off the coast of Alaska (on top of his suggestion to designate 12 million acres in ANWR as Wilderness). The President and his administration clearly do not understand Alaska and are in no-man’s-land when it comes to defining their land use policy. ANWR is one of the most breathtakingly beautiful undeveloped areas of our country. The President hopes to preserve this land so that future generations can enjoy it. According to the U.S. Fishing and Wildlife Service’s website, “most visitors may never visit ANWR because of its remoteness and the expense of getting there.” How are future generations to enjoy ANWR when they cannot visit? Wouldn’t the majority of American’s benefit more from ANWR through consumption of its’ natural resources? Regardless of that point, even if ANWR were accessible and hundreds of thousands of American’s visited it each year, the proposed drilling area in section 1002 of ANWR is only 7% of the entire refuge. Furthermore, of the 1.5 million acres in section 1002 only 2 thousand acres are being considered for drilling, which is only .0001% of section 1002 and even less of the entire refuge. There is still well over 97% of the refuge designated as wilderness that will remain untouched by human development if congress were to dismisses the President’s suggestions and opens section 1002 to oil and gas development. The President and environmentalist also share concern over the preservation of wildlife occupying ANWR. This is a legitimate concern, since section 1002 of the refuge does contain a common breeding ground for the Porcupine Creek Caribou Herd. One of the major opponents of development in section 1002 is the Gwich’in community that occupies Arctic Valley, which is located on the opposite end of section 1002 of ANWR and does not even fall within the boarders of the Refuge. The Gwich’in tribes are subsistence hunters spanning across northern Alaska and into Canada. The tribes rely heavily on Caribou that migrate throughout ANWR and are concerned that, if development is allowed in section 1002, then the caribou will be afraid and not have a place to raise their calves and as a result the caribou herd will decline and the Gwich’in tribe will suffer. The tribes concern would be a major cause for not allowing drilling in section 1002, but the vast area of the refuge and adaptability of caribou and other wildlife to foreign objects lowers the potential impact of resource development in the region. Caribou have the ability to travel up to 3,000 miles in a year. Alaska makes up about half of The Porcupine Creek Herd’s migration area while ANWR makes up about a quarter of the herd’s migration area. Common sense deduces that there is a lot of ANWR left that will be untouched, that the caribou will move into instead of the small portion being used for natural resource development. In response to this point, the Gwich’in tribes concern is that they will have to travel further to find caribou after they have adapted new migratory routes as a result of human drilling. However, the Gwich’in tribes past offers us examples of them putting fences up in order to heard the caribou into areas that were convenient for them to kill. The Gwich’in people have survived in the past when caribou diverted from their normal area for natural causes not caused by human development and in the event that human development in section 1002 actually did alter the behavior of the Porcupine Creek Herd, the Gwich’in people are survivors and their past offers them solutions to deal with that unlikely circumstance. In contrast to the Gwich’in tribe, native representatives have voiced their approval of developing section 1002 of ANWR. The most notable is Mayor Charlotte Brown of the North Slope Borough who identifies several benefits to remote native communities as a result of natural resource development in the Arctic. Furthermore the only town that is actually located in the coastal plain of ANWR is Kaktovik. The Villagers of Katovik strongly support natural resource development because of the benefits it has on their daily lives. 70-80% of Alaskans support drilling in ANWR and with the drop in oil prices the state needs to produce more revenue. On top of not understanding ANWR, President Barack Obama also does not understand the Alaskan people. This point as been reiterated multiple times by Alaska’s federal delegation Senators Lisa Murkowski and Dan Sullivan as well as Congressman Don Young. State legislators have been discussing ways of pushing back against the President’s suggestion and have so far sent him a letter justifying the reasons why development in ANWR should be allowed. The newly elected Governor Bill Walker even announced that he would be speeding up the process to increase production on non-protected federal lands. Furthermore, members of Congress have voiced their disapproval of the President’s desire to increase ANWR’s wilderness land designation. Alaska’s government receives 90% of its unrestricted budget from oil revenue. With the decline in oil prices recently, the states economic future looks dim. The President did not realize that by trying to take a part of the state that has the potential, according to the USGS, to produce 1.45 million barrels of oil a day, he was sealing Alaska’s miserable economic situation for years to come. Allowing drilling in section 1002 will create an estimated 55,000-130,000 jobs both in Alaska and the lower 48. Alaska has proven in the past that it can develop its resources responsibly with minimal harm to the environment. The President needs to take into account the will of the Alaskan people and the effect that his suggestion would have on them. At the moment the republican lead congress will be the safeguard for Alaskans future. However the president plans to visit Alaska in August of 2016 and the fear that he will attempt to declare some pieces of Alaska, as a National Monument is present.
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1 Comment
Maïca Pichler
3/18/2015 09:04:29 am
I found your piece very interesting. Although I believe we come from vastly different sides of the political spectrum and I disagree with your overall conclusions you did raise some points I had not previously considered.
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AuthorThis blog is written by members of the Northeastern University undergraduate environmental politics course Archives
April 2015
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