{"id":10439,"date":"2015-07-27T07:57:25","date_gmt":"2015-07-27T12:57:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=10439"},"modified":"2015-07-27T07:57:25","modified_gmt":"2015-07-27T12:57:25","slug":"senators-call-for-end-to-arctic-drilling-as-shell-gets-permits-to-begin-work-in-chukchi-sea","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=10439","title":{"rendered":"Senators Call For End To Arctic Drilling As Shell Gets Permits To Begin Work In Chukchi Sea"},"content":{"rendered":"<h3 id=\"page-title\" class=\"page__title title\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.desmogblog.com\/2015\/07\/26\/shell-gets-final-permits-begin-drilling-arctic\" target=\"_blank\">Senators Call For End To Arctic Drilling As Shell Gets Permits To Begin Work In Chukchi Sea<\/a><\/h3>\n<p>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&#8217;s Jeff Merkley is calling for a ban on Arctic drilling altogether.<\/p>\n<p>According to the\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.seattletimes.com\/business\/shell-receives-permits-necessary-for-oil-drilling-in-arctic\/?utm_source=twitter&amp;utm_medium=social&amp;utm_campaign=article_left\" target=\"_blank\">Associated Press<\/a>, 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\u00a0future.<\/p>\n<p>The capping stack and other emergency gear is on board the\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.desmogblog.com\/2015\/07\/16\/shell-proceed-arctic-drilling-ship-carrying-critical-emergency-gear-heads-portland-repairs\" target=\"_blank\"><span class=\"caps\">MSV<\/span>\u00a0Fennica, which is in Portland, Oregon<\/a>\u00a0for 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.<\/p>\n<p>The Fennica is an icebreaker \u2014 a ship literally designed to break through ice, one of two such ships in Shell\u2019s Arctic fleet meant to protect its drill rigs from unsafe ice conditions. But the Fennica somehow suffered\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.desmogblog.com\/2015\/07\/08\/shell-s-renewed-arctic-drilling-campaign-faces-yet-another-setback-key-ship-forced-back-port\" target=\"_blank\">a gash in its hull more than 3 feet long<\/a>\u00a0before even leaving the harbor and was forced to head immediately back to port.<\/p>\n<p>There is no word on how long the repairs will take. When the capping stack is available to be deployed within 24 hours, a<span class=\"caps\">DOI<\/span>\u00a0spokesperson\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.seattletimes.com\/business\/shell-receives-permits-necessary-for-oil-drilling-in-arctic\/?utm_source=twitter&amp;utm_medium=social&amp;utm_campaign=article_left\" target=\"_blank\">told the Associated Press<\/a>, Shell can apply for an amended permit that would allow the company to drill deeper.<\/p>\n<p>&#8230;click on the above link to read the rest of the article&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>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&#8217;s Jeff Merkley is calling for a ban on Arctic drilling altogether. According [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,4],"tags":[2037,1018,2667,7565,5365,5317,7233],"class_list":["post-10439","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-energy-2","category-environment","tag-alaska","tag-arctic","tag-arctic-oil","tag-arctic-oil-drilling","tag-chukchi-sea","tag-desmog-blog","tag-shell-oil"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10439","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=10439"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10439\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10440,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10439\/revisions\/10440"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=10439"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=10439"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=10439"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}