----- Original Message ----- 
From: Peggy Willis 
To: [log in to unmask];[log in to unmask]
Sent: 4/21/2007 8:27:56 AM 
Subject: [ACW2] Shell Oil 

Drilling Permit Challenged


ACW,
FYI.  Earthjustice has filed a lawsuit on behalf of five environmental
groups and native people in Alaska challenging the government's decision
to allow offshore drilling by Shell Oil in the Beaufort Sea.  The Alaska
Wilderness Le ague and The Sierra Club are two of the environmental
groups challenging the decision.
Peggy Willis, Co-Chair ACW
 
Shell's Arctic Ocean Oil Drilling Permit Challenged 
FAIRBANKS, Alaska, April 20, 2007 (ENS) - An indigenous group and five
conservation organizations filed challenges Monday to a federal agency's
recent decision allowing Shell Offshore Inc. to drill oil wells in the
Beaufort Sea near the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge beginning in June. 
The challenges were filed with the Interior Board of Land Appeals and the
Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals by the nonprofit law firm Earthjustice on
behalf of the group Resisting Environmental Destruction on Indigenous
Lands, REDOIL, the Sierra Club, the Center for Biological Diversity, the
Natural Resources Defense Council, the Alaska Wilderness League, and
Pacific Environment. 
The complainants say the federal Minerals Management Service, MMS,
approved the plan through a rushed process without fully analyzing the
potential impacts, and without conducting a public process under the
National Environmental Policy Act. 
The agency refused to consider the potential for an accidental spill of
crude oil, despite the potential for damage to the sensitive Arctic
ecosystem, the groups say. 
The groups say there was no analysis of the impact of two drill ships
accompanied by ice breakers, support vessels, and air support. This level
of industrial activity in the Beaufort Sea threatens the endangered
bowhead whale, polar bears and birds, including threatened Steller's and
spectacled eiders, they say. The constant air traffic associated with
drilling can disturb caribou and interfere with the subsistence hunt. 
"Given the resources at stake and the potentially devastating effects
this drilling could have on bowhead whales, seals, birds and fish, it is
unacceptable for the government to rush this through without a thorough
public review of the impacts," said Faith Gemmill of REDOIL. 
"The subsistence rights of the communities are being ignored and Shell's
plans will violate their rights," she said. 
"REDOIL members living in the villages of Nuiqsut, Kaktovik, and Barrow
depend on the Beaufort Sea for their livelihood. Why did MMS disregard
this?" Gemmill asked. 
Doreen Simmonds, an Inupiat resident of Barrow and REDOIL member, said,
"As a mother and a grandmother, I am concerned that the Arctic Inupiat
whaling culture is at risk because the MMS insists rushing ahead with
offshore oil plans." 
"The government of the people, in helping the industry drill for oil at
all costs, is disregarding the future of the Arctic people. They are
doing this with an outdated Environmental Impact Statement and without
proper input from the public," Simmonds said. 
Robert Thompson, an Inupiat hunter, whaler and REDOIL member who lives in
Kaktovik, said, "There is a great lack of adequate spill response
strategies in Shell's proposed plans, as well as the fact that no tests
have been done in Arctic ice to provide data about toxic spills in our
ocean and no answers provided when we ask how long would the toxins
remain if spilled." 
"All of our subsistence resources will be impacted from land to sea -
from the caribou to the whale. Why are we given less voice than other
peoples in the lower 48 - where offshore plans have been cancelled due to
the public outcry?" Thompson asked. 
The groups fear the impacts drilling will have on the nearby coastal
plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. 
"Clearly some folks in Washington fail to realize that what happens in
the Beaufort Sea - where the government says Shell can drill - is 100
percent interdependent with what happens in the Arctic National Wildlife
Refuge," said Chuck Clusen, senior policy analyst at the Natural
Resources Defense Council. "If oil gets into the Beaufort Sea, animals in
the refuge will suffer. That's not acceptable, and it defeats the purpose
of having a wildlife refuge at all." 

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