Arctic sea ice reading (red) shows 1 June well below the average (source NSICD)
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Ice free Arctic could occur this year, warns expert
Ice free Arctic could occur this year, warns expert
Sea ice in the Arctic could be a thing of the past, a leading scientist has warned. For the first time in 100,000 years the chilling landscape known for its snow-capped mountains and polar bears may be without its sea ice either this year or the next.
Ocean Physics Professor Peter Wadhams from Cambridge University based his prediction on projected data from the US National Snow and Ice Data Center showing that on 1 June this year there were estimated to be 11.1 million square kilometers of sea ice. This is below the average from the past 30 years of 12.7 million square kilometers, a difference of an area roughly the same size as the UK.
UK Govt Report: Oil Companies Drilling in the Arctic Will Find It’s Unprofitable
Major oil companies from the US, UK, Norway, Sweden, and Russia are all set to drill in the Arctic, but a report from the UK Ministry of Defence (MoD) suggests they may be setting themselves up for failure.
Drilling in the Arctic is “economically prohibitive,” according to the report, which was commissioned by the Swedish Armed Forces and finalized in January 2016.
In other words: The companies seeking riches from Arctic’s vast untapped oil and gas wealth are going to be disappointed.
“…It is becoming increasingly likely that low oil prices, and reducing dependence on fossil fuels, will mean that extracting much of the oil in the Arctic will be economically prohibitive,” the report says. “The strategic importance of these resources may well have been overplayed.”
If this analysis is accurate, then the Arctic scramble is doomed to backfire on the oil industry.
The report’s authors conclude that by 2035, fossil fuel extraction will be largely unprofitable
According to another MoD report published by the DCDC in December 2015, over the next 20 years, oil majors will be driven to explore expensive resources in search of new profits as reserves become more scarce, but will face increasingly prohibitive costs in extracting those resources.
By 2035, the report says, the world may face a situation of dramatic “fossil fuel scarcity” due to rising demand and production costs.
Titled Future Operating Environment 2035, the report does not represent official government policy, but will “inform UK defence and security policy makers and our armed forces more broadly.”
The report acknowledges input from US, Australian, Swedish and New Zealand defense agencies, as well as UK government departments, major defense contractors like Boeing and BAE Systems, and oil giant Shell.
Demand for a range of natural resources is likely to increase over the next two decades, the report says.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Arctic methane emissions persist in winter
Arctic methane emissions persist in winter
Summer and winter, wet and dry, high and low, the Arctic tundra continues to emit methane.
Image: Bureau of Land Management (Delta WSR) via Wikimedia Commons
Methane, a key greenhouse gas, is released from Arctic soils not only in the short summer period but during the bitterly cold winters too.
LONDON, 22 December, 2015 – The quantity of methane leaking from the frozen soil during the long Arctic winters is probably much greater than climate models estimate, scientists have found.
They say at least half of annual methane emissions occur in the cold months from September to May, and that drier, upland tundra can emit more methane than wetlands.
The multinational team, led by San Diego State University (SDSU) in the US and including colleagues from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and the University of Sheffield and the Open University in the UK, have published their conclusion, which challenges critical assumptions in current global climate models, in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
Methane, a potent greenhouse gas, is about 25 times more powerful per molecule than carbon dioxide over a century, but more than 84 times over 20 years. The methane in the Arctic tundra comes primarily from organic matter trapped in soil which thaws seasonally and is decomposed by microbes.
It seeps naturally from the soil over the course of the year, but climate change can warm the soil enough to release more methane from organic matter that is currently stable in the permafrost.
“Virtually all the climate models assume there’s no or very little emission of methane when the ground is frozen. That assumption is incorrect”
Scientists have for some years been accurately measuring Arctic methane emissions and incorporating the results into their climate models. But crucially, the SDSU team says, almost all of these measurements have been obtained during the Arctic’s short summer.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Militarizing the Arctic: Is Canada Ready for a Literal Cold War with Russia?
Militarizing the Arctic: Is Canada Ready for a Literal Cold War with Russia?
Over the past decade, Moscow has been projecting its power, and boldly testing the cohesion and determination of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), the European Union (EU), and their closest allies in many different regions either considered unstable or contested for their strategic value. Some of these clashes took place immediately after the Soviet Union dissolved while others occurred during the turn of the century and closer to (even up to) the present day. Violent political and ethnic conflict has occurred in the former Soviet republics but also well beyond the borders of the Russian Federation as it exists today. Not all of those conflicts have proven decisive; many remain in stalemate or are simply “frozen.” A non-exhaustive list of those conflicts includes: Moldova, Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Transnistria, Abkhazia, South Ossetia, Crimea, Novorossiya, and Syria.
The Arctic attracted headlines more than half a decade ago when Russia planted a flag at the bottom of the Arctic Ocean. Russia has also been intensifying its military flights that violate European and North American airspace in addition to sending ships to the Caribbean, South Asia, and testing United States (US) coastal security. Much of the world’s attention has been focusing on the EU’s ongoing migrant crisis, the “Arab Awakening,” the rise of ISIS in the Middle East, and the current multifaceted conflict in Syria and Iraq. But Moscow’s interest in the Arctic has remained in place. Many analysts argue that war is brewing. Others maintain that while he is willing to test his adversaries, Putin clearly recognizes which issues would be suicide for Russia.
Will Russia and Canada come to blows over the Arctic? If so, what are the stakes, and is Canada ready?
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Obama Slams The Door On Future U.S. Arctic Drilling
Obama Slams The Door On Future U.S. Arctic Drilling
The Obama administration officially shut the door on Arctic drilling, a move that could prevent any new drilling for years to come.
The U.S. Department of Interior announced on October 16 that it would cancel two lease sales for offshore acreage, which had been scheduled to take place in 2016 and 2017. Environmental groups have been doggedly criticizing the Obama administration for allowing Royal Dutch Shell to drill in the Arctic to begin with, citing the potential catastrophe if an oil spilled occurred. They had called upon the President to deny any permits to Shell.
But it wasn’t environmental protest that killed off Shell’s drilling campaign. What really forced the Anglo-Dutch company to retreat was low oil prices and disappointing drilling results.
Similarly, the Obama administration is now shutting the door on future lease sales not because of concerns over the environment, but “In light of current market conditions and low industry interest,” as Interior put it in a statement.
Related: Airstrikes Have Yet To Stop ISIS Oil Industry
On its face, the move is a logical one. Few other companies were interested in drilling in the Chukchi or Beaufort Seas, despite several having purchased leases years ago. Statoil and ConocoPhillips, two other large oil companies interested in the Arctic, had previously put their Arctic ambitions on ice because of the difficulty and high costs associated with drilling in the region. With Shell announcing that it would suspend U.S. Arctic exploration for the “foreseeable future” there are now zero companies that are viably interested in drilling anytime soon.
Remarkably, however, the interest in new leases had dried up even before the downturn in oil prices. Interior said that it put a “Call for Information and Nominations” in September 2013, which is essentially a way for the government to solicit interest from the industry on which areas to auction off based on their interest.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
More Evidence We’ve Reached a “Peak Water” Tipping Point in California
More Evidence We’ve Reached a “Peak Water” Tipping Point in California
March in Yosemite, four years running (source; click to enlarge)
It may be a see-saw course, but it’s riding an uphill train.
A bit ago I wrote, regarding climate and tipping points:
The concept of “tipping point” — a change beyond which there’s no turning back — comes up a lot in climate discussions. An obvious tipping point involves polar ice. If the earth keeps warming — both in the atmosphere and in the ocean — at some point a full and permanent melt of Arctic and Antarctic ice is inevitable. Permanent ice first started forming in the Antarctic about 35 million years ago, thanks to global cooling which crossed a tipping point for ice formation. That’s not very long ago. During the 200 million years before that, the earth was too warm for permanent ice to form, at least as far as we know.
We’re now going the other direction, rewarming the earth, and permanent ice is increasingly disappearing, as you’d expect. At some point, permanent ice will be gone. At some point before that, its loss will be inevitable. Like the passengers in the car above, its end may not have come — yet — but there’s no turning back….
I think the American Southwest is beyond a tipping point for available fresh water. I’ve written several times — for example, here — that California and the Southwest have passed “peak water,” that the most water available to the region is what’s available now. We can mitigate the severity of decline in supply (i.e., arrest the decline at a less-bad place by arresting its cause), and we can adapt to whatever consequences can’t be mitigated.
But we can no longer go back to plentiful fresh water from the Colorado River watershed. That day is gone, and in fact, I suspect most in the region know it, even though it’s not yet reflected in real estate prices.
– See more at: http://downwithtyranny.blogspot.co.uk/2015/10/more-evidence-weve-reached-peak-water.html#sthash.Ou6zIx2b.dpuf
With Shell’s Failure, U.S. Arctic Drilling Is Dead
With Shell’s Failure, U.S. Arctic Drilling Is Dead
Arctic Drilling in the U.S. is dead.
After more than eight years of planning and drilling, costing more than $7 billion, Royal Dutch Shell announced that it is shutting down its plans to drill for oil in the Arctic. The bombshell announcement dooms any chance of offshore oil development in the U.S. Arctic for years.
Shell said that it had completed its exploration well that it was drilling this summer, a well drilled at 6,800 feet of depth called the Burger J. Shell was focusing on the Burger prospect, located off the northwest coast of Alaska in the Chukchi Sea, which it thought could hold a massive volume of oil.
On September 28, the company announced that it had “found indications of oil and gas in the Burger J well, but these are not sufficient to warrant further exploration in the Burger prospect. The well will be sealed and abandoned in accordance with U.S. regulations.”
After the disappointing results, Shell will not try again. “Shell will now cease further exploration activity in offshore Alaska for the foreseeable future.” The company cited both the poor results from its highly touted Burger J well, but also the extraordinarily high costs of Arctic drilling, as well as the “unpredictable federal regulatory environment in offshore Alaska.”
Shell will have to take a big write-down, with charges of at least $3 billion, plus another $1.1 billion in contracts it had with rigs and supplies.
Shell’s Arctic campaign was an utter failure. It spent $7 billion over the better part of a decade, including an initial $2.1 billion just to purchase the leases from the U.S. government back in 2008. The campaign was riddled with mishaps, equipment failures, permit violations, and stiff opposition from environmental groups, including the blockading of their icebreaker in a port in Portland, OR this past summer. The FT reports that Shell executives privately admit that the environmental protests damaged the company’s reputation and had a larger impact than they had anticipated.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Shell ends exploration in Arctic near Alaska ‘for the foreseeable future’
Shell spent upward of $7 billion US on offshore development in Chukchi, Beaufort seas
Royal Dutch Shell will cease exploration in Arctic waters off Alaska’s coast following disappointing results from an exploratory well it just completed.
Shell found indications of oil and gas in the well in the Chukchi Sea about 120 kilometres off Alaska’s northwest coast, the company said Monday in a release from The Hague, Netherlands. However, the petroleum was not in quantities sufficient to warrant additional exploration in that portion of the basin, the company said.
“Shell continues to see important exploration potential in the basin, and the area is likely to ultimately be of strategic importance to Alaska and the U.S.,” said Marvin Odum, president of Shell USA, in the announcement. “However, this is a clearly disappointing exploration outcome for this part of the basin.”
Shell will end exploration off Alaska “for the foreseeable future,” the company said.
The decision reflects the results of the exploratory well in the Burger J lease, the high costs associated with Alaska offshore drilling and the challenging and unpredictable federal regulatory environment in offshore Alaska, the company said.
Shell Oil Co. President Marvin Odum, seen on Sept. 2 in Anchorage, said it was “a clearly disappointing exploration outcome for this part of the basin.” (Mark Thiessen/The Associated Press)
Shell has spent upward of $7 billion US on Arctic offshore development in the Chukchi and Beaufort seas.
Monday was Shell’s final day to drill this year in petroleum-bearing rock under its federal permit. Regulators required Shell to stop a month before sea ice is expected to re-form in the lease area.
The company reached a depth of nearly 2,075 metres with the exploratory well drilling in about 45 metres of water.
Environmental groups oppose Arctic offshore drilling and say industrial activity and more greenhouse gases will harm polar bears, walrus and ice seals.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Arctic thaw would cost half of world’s annual earnings
Arctic thaw would cost half of world’s annual earnings
LONDON, 22 September, 2015 – The melting permafrost in the Arctic could cost the world dearly. New research calculates that the economic damage that would flow from loss of permafrost and the increased emissions of greenhouse gases (GHGs) would add up to US$43 trillion.
This is very nearly the estimated combined gross domestic product last year of the US, China, Japan, Germany, the UK, France, and Brazil.
And, British and US scientists say, this would be in addition to at least $300 tn of economic damage linked to other consequences of climate change.
The attempt to put a cumulative economic value on natural changes in climate that have yet to happen is part of the bid to get governments to take climate change seriously. In the latest attempt to cost the impact of rising carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere, and the continuous rise in global average temperatures, all as a consequence of fossil fuel combustion and other human action, the economist Chris Hope of the University of Cambridge and the polar expert Kevin Schaefer of the University of Colorado have turned their sights on the Arctic.
The Arctic is the fastest-warming region of the planet. It was once much warmer, and its now-frozen soils are home to huge quantities of vegetation that never had a chance to decompose.
Increased risk
The two scientists report in Nature Climate Change that if emissions of greenhouse gases continue to rise as they are doing now, the thaw of the permafrost and the loss of the ice caps could release 1,700 billion metric tons of carbon now locked in as frozen organic matter.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Hundreds Rally in Alaska to Tell Obama ‘Climate Leaders Don’t Drill the Arctic’
Hundreds Rally in Alaska to Tell Obama ‘Climate Leaders Don’t Drill the Arctic’
Climate groups rallied in Anchorage, Alaska yesterday to demand that the U.S. government, President Obama and Alaskan leaders take the urgent action needed to stop climate change. The “Rally to Confront the Glacial Pace of Political Action” took place as President Obama met with ministers from around the world for the “GLACIER” conference.
More than 300 people participated in yesterday’s rally. The groups four “demands” for political leaders include:
- Support an immediate shift to the development and widespread implementation ofrenewable energy sources
- Support the call by global scientists to keep 80 percent of the world’s fossil fuel reserves in the ground
- Protect and champion the rights of communities of color on the front lines of climate change
- Commit the U.S. to legally binding commitments at the 2015 UN Climate Change Conference
In response to the President’s visit, Faith Gemmill of RedOil said, “Indigenous peoples of Alaska have seen alarming impacts from climate change already, and Shell’s drilling will only make them worse. We’ve seen over 300 wildfires this past summer which burned throughout the state and forced communities to evacuate, as well as the very real threat of actual forced relocation of coastal communities due to coastal sea ice loss and erosion.”
The President has said again and again that climate change poses a serious threat to humanity and in going to Alaska, he is highlighting how the state is on the front lines of the fight against climate change.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Does Arctic Drilling Have A Future With Sub $50 Oil?
Does Arctic Drilling Have A Future With Sub $50 Oil?
Italian oil group ENI is expected to begin production from the Goliat Field off Norway in a few short weeks. The project, which has cost $5.6 billion, is expected to produce 34 million barrels of oil per year by the second year of production.
Yet ENI seems to be bucking the global trend, as would-be Arctic drillers in other parts of the region hand back leases or allow them to expire, citing high risks and high costs as major contributing factors. Successful environmental campaigns as well as an increased global awareness – and political will – to address climate change have also been influential.
All this against a backdrop of global oil prices below $50 a barrel and an outlook of continued oil market volatility.
With Arctic exploration and production being so expensive, the risks so great, and the current market conditions relatively unfavorable, one might ask why Shell, ENI, and others would continue.
Related: Low Oil Prices: Assessing The Damage So Far In 2015
The main reason is resource potential. The Arctic holds the last, great, untapped oil and gas reserves. The U.S. Geological Survey in 2008 estimated that the Arctic contains 22 percent of the world’s undiscovered hydrocarbon resources, totaling 90 billion barrels of oil, 1,670 trillion cubic feet of natural gas, and 44 billion barrels of natural gas liquids.
But those resrources come at a significant cost. One estimate put project costs in the Alaskan Arctic at 50 – 100 percent greater than an equivalent project in Texas.
Shell has discovered this first hand. The company has sunk $6 billion into its arctic ambitions, and experienced several high-profile setbacks, including the abandonment of its drilling campaign in the Beaufort Sea after its oil rig ran aground in 2012.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Senators Call For End To Arctic Drilling As Shell Gets Permits To Begin Work In Chukchi Sea
Senators Call For End To Arctic Drilling As Shell Gets Permits To Begin Work In Chukchi Sea
Shell received the final permits it needed to begin drilling exploratory wells in the Chukchi Sea last Wednesday, but a group of Senators led by Oregon’s Jeff Merkley is calling for a ban on Arctic drilling altogether.
According to the Associated Press, the permits are somewhat conditional: In granting the company the green light, the Department of the Interior said Shell can only drill the top sections of wells, or to about a depth of 1,300 feet, because critical emergency response gear, including a well-capping device in the event of a blowout or leak, will not be present for the foreseeable future.
The capping stack and other emergency gear is on board the MSV Fennica, which is in Portland, Oregon for repairs after Shell opted to send the ship out of Dutch Harbor, Alaska on July 3 via a shallow and evidently treacherous route, choosing speed over safety.
The Fennica is an icebreaker — a ship literally designed to break through ice, one of two such ships in Shell’s Arctic fleet meant to protect its drill rigs from unsafe ice conditions. But the Fennica somehow suffered a gash in its hull more than 3 feet long before even leaving the harbor and was forced to head immediately back to port.
There is no word on how long the repairs will take. When the capping stack is available to be deployed within 24 hours, aDOI spokesperson told the Associated Press, Shell can apply for an amended permit that would allow the company to drill deeper.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
We May Have Already Committed Ourselves to 6-Meter Sea-Level Rise
We May Have Already Committed Ourselves to 6-Meter Sea-Level Rise
Even if humanity were to stop throwing carbon dioxide and methane into the atmosphere today, a catastrophic rise in sea levels of six meters may be inevitable. Two previous prehistoric interglacial periods, in which the carbon dioxide content of the atmosphere was believed to be about what it is today, resulted in dramatic rising of the oceans.
High-latitude ice sheets are melting, and given that global warming is most pronounced in the Arctic, it may already be too late stop a rise in sea levels that would flood out hundreds of millions around the world. Two new papers, the latest in a series of scientific studies, paint a picture considerably less rosy than conventional ideas that major damage can still be avoided.
One of these papers, a nine-scientist report led by geologist Andrea Dutton at the University of Florida published in the journal Science, found that modest rises in global temperatures in the past led to sea levels rising at least six meters. She summarized the findings this way to Climate Central:
“Even if we meet that 2°C target, in the past with those types of temperatures, we may be committing ourselves to this level of sea level rise in the long term. The decisions we make now about where we want to be in 2100 commit us on a pathway where we can’t go back. Once these ice sheets start to melt, the changes become irreversible.”
Professor Dutton was referencing the widely held belief that catastrophic damage can be avoided if global warming is held to no more than 2 degrees C. from pre-industrial levels. The “permissible” level may be less than that, however. More sophisticated “sea-level reconstructions” through interdisciplinary studies of geological evidence and better understanding of the behavior of ice sheets enabled the paper’s authors to infer that temperatures only slightly higher than what we are experiencing today upset the climatic balance. A summary of the paper concludes:
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Greenwash: Shell May Remove “Oil” From Name as it Moves to Tap Arctic, Gulf of Mexico
Shell Oil has announced it may take a page out of the BP “Beyond Petroleum” greenwashing book, rebranding itself as something other than an oil company for its United States-based unit.
Marvin Odum, director of Shell Oil’s upstream subsidiary companies in the Americas, told Bloomberg the name Shell Oil “is a little old-fashioned, I’d say, and at one point we’ll probably do something about that” during a luncheon interview with Bloomberg News co-founder Matt Winkler (beginning at 8:22) at the recently-completed Shell-sponsored Toronto Global Forum.
“Oil,” said Odum, could at some point in the near future be removed from the name.
Odum’s comments come as Shell has moved aggressively to drill for offshore oil in the Arctic and deep offshore in the Gulf of Mexico, while also maintaining a heavy footprint in Alberta’s tar sands oil patch.
Image Credit: Bloomberg News Screenshot
Shell also recently acquired BG (British Gas) Group, a company that owns numerous assets in the global liquefied natural gas (LNG) industry, transforming the company into what Forbes hailed as a “world LNG giant.”
Winkler quipped in Toronto that due to this major asset purchase, it might be more accurate to call Shell Oil, “Shell Gas.”
In October 2011, BG Group signed a major contract with the U.S.-based LNG giant Cheniere to ship its gas product obtained via hydraulic fracturing (“fracking”) to the global market. That LNG will begin to flow by the end of the year.
Just a week before Odum told Winkler that Shell may take “oil” out its company name, he appeared on Bloomberg News on the sidelines of the Aspen Ideas Festival to boast about his company’s big plans — plans to drill for oil in the deep offshore Gulf of Mexico Appomattox field. At Aspen, Odum called Appomattox a “world class oil and gas project.”
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Shell’s Renewed Arctic Drilling Campaign Faces Yet Another Setback As Key Ship Forced Back To Port
Is Shell finally “Arctic Ready” after its doomed 2012 campaign? The company is set to begin drilling in the Arctic within the week, and it’s already not looking good.
The MSV Fennica, an icebreaker vessel bound for the Chukchi Sea, had barely left its berth in Dutch Harbor, Alaska last Friday when it had to immediately turn around. The crew discovered a 39-inch long, half-inch-wide breach in the Fennica’s hull, FuelFix reports.
There is no word yet from Shell on how long the repairs are expected to take, or how the company intends to proceed in the event that the Fennica is taken out of service for a long period of time. Any significant change to Shell’s Arctic drilling plans could force a new review by the US Department of the Interior.
The Fennica was not only tasked with keeping ice from collecting around the company’s drill site, but also carrying the capping stack to be used in case of a well blowout or other emergency, in addition to the equipment for deploying it.
A Shell spokesperson told FuelFix that the incident does not “characterize the preparations we have made to operate exceptionally well.”
But that’s not going to stop comparisons to the company’s accident-prone and ultimately aborted attempt to drill in the Arctic three years ago.
“Shell’s terrible safety history around the world makes today’s news no surprise, but is nonetheless disturbing,” David Turnbull, campaigns director for Oil Change International, told DeSmog.
“For the sake of the Arctic and for our climate, the President should put a stop to Shell’s dangerous experiment today, before an even greater mishap inevitably comes.”
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
