Threatened?: a decision by the US Fish and Wildlife Service to protect the polar bear would limit development off Alaska's coast
MMS sets Chukchi sale date
The US Minerals Management Service (MMS) said it will offer oil and gas exploration rights to 29.7 million acres in the remote Chukchi Sea off north-western Alaska in an auction next month.
The decision to hold the 6 February lease sale, the first in the Chukchi since 1991, comes days before the US Fish and Wildlife Service will decide whether to list the polar bear as threatened and has drawn fire from environmentalists seeking to limit oil development in the area.
"We believe our decision is a good balance, and will allow companies to explore this intriguing frontier area while still protecting the resources important to the coastal residents," MMS Director Randall Luthi said in a statement yesterday, Reuters reported.
The Chukchi Sea separates north-western Alaska from north-eastern Siberia. The US portion of the ice-choked sea is believed to hold 15 billion barrels of recoverable oil and 76 trillion cubic feet of recoverable natural gas, according to the Interior Department.
In the past, companies seeking to drill Alaska's offshore regions have concentrated on areas as close to shore as possible, minimising distances from infrastructure and potential costs.
It is unclear whether companies will want to venture into such distant waters, said MMS spokeswoman Robin Cacy. "We won't really know until we have the sale."
Environmentalists say the Chukchi area, already hard-hit by rapid warming, should not be opened to more oil and gas development.
"We've seen all of these studies and reports coming out concerning significant impacts to marine mammals from global warming," said Betsey Beardsley of the Alaska Wilderness League. "If you couple that with increased oil and gas development, there's no telling what impact that would have to marine life."
US Senator John Kerry, a Massachusetts Democrat, criticised the lease sale plan and said the MMS should wait at least three years to investigate potential impacts to polar bears, being considered for Endangered Species Act protections because of habitat loss.
"It's the height of irresponsibility and short-sightedness for the Bush Administration to schedule lease sales in the Chukchi Sea, which represents critical habitat for polar bears, whales, walrus and threatened wildlife," he said.
A decision on listing the polar bear is due next week.
Alaska Wilderness League's Beardley predicted several companies will bid on Chukchi leases, including Shell - which is already active off Alaska - ExxonMobil and Norway's Statoil.
Shell had acquired seismic datat in surveys conducted in the Chukchi over the summer, company spokesman Curtis Smith said.