| WASHINGTON/ANCHORAGE
- February 28 - In a bid to protect the
climate from the continued production and burning of fossil fuels, eight Greenpeace
activists have parachuted and snowmobiled their way onto the frozen Arctic
Ocean to monitor and protest the construction of BP Amoco's controversial
Northstar project, the first offshore oil project to be built in the Beaufort
Sea off Alaska's north coast.
Using a DC-3 cargo plane to fly supplies out to the ice, the activists set up
Ice Camp Sirius one mile from the construction site. Equipped with polar survival
gear and state of the art communications equipment, the activists lived in tents
for 15 days while they prepared a runway and waited for a DC-3 cargo plane to
bring them supplies to construct their camp, which consists of two huts to be
powered by five wind generators. (1)
"This is 'ground zero' for global warming-the Arctic is warming faster than anywhere
else on the planet," said Greenpeace climate campaigner Dan Ritzman from the Greenpeace
camp. "BP Amoco promotes itself as a green oil company concerned about global warming,
yet continues to drill in new oil frontiers with projects like Northstar. It's time for
BP Amoco to put its money where its mouth is and shift away from fossil fuels towards
climate-friendly forms of energy such as solar power."
Should Northstar proceed, the door will open for several other offshore drilling
projects in the Beaufort Sea. Greenpeace opposes opening up new oil frontiers
because climate scientists warn the world cannot burn even one-quarter of all
known fossil fuels without risking dangerous levels of global warming.
In polar regions, global warming has already taken a significant toll as the
ice pack melts and marine mammals like polar bears lose their habitat and
hunting grounds.
From their camp near the Northstar site, eight Greenpeace activists will keep close
watch on Northstar, which will use a dangerous, untested sub-sea pipeline that exposes
the fragile Arctic environment to a one in four chance of a major oil spill. (2) Based
on its findings Greenpeace will send messages and images to the world using satellite
communication equipment.
"Greenpeace is campaigning against Northstar to protect the Arctic from
irresponsible oil drilling and stop global warming at its source," said climate
change campaigner Melanie Duchin from Anchorage. Greenpeace will also use the ice
camp as a platform to gather support for a BP-Amoco shareholder resolution,
which calls on the company to switch away from high risk, environmentally harmful
ventures like Northstar, towards solar and other clean renewable sources of energy.
Although BP Amoco has aggressively promoted its solar division as proof it is
concerned about global warming, but the company actually spends over 100 times
more on oil exploration and production. Shareholders will vote on the resolution
on April 13th at the company's annual general meeting.
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Editors’ Notes
1) The Greenpeace ice camp is located about six miles north of Point Storkersen in the Beaufort Sea.
On February 12, eight Greenpeace activists used snowmobiles to get to a site near Reindeer Island, approximately seven miles east of the current “Ice Camp Sirius” and 10 miles north of Prudhoe Bay.
On February 26, a DC-3 cargo plane arrived with survival and telecommunications equipment. While the plane circled the airstrip, a parachutist jumped from the plane. The parachutist was necessary to help guide the DC-3 on its approach and landing on the airstrip. Once on the ground, the DC-3’s cargo was unloaded in 25 minutes, and departed after a total of 60 minutes on the ice.
It took approximately two days to shuttle both planeloads of gear by snowmobile and sledges to the Ice Camp Sirius location, seven miles to the west of the airstrip at Reindeer Island. The camp was fully operational by late evening on February 27, Alaska Standard Time.
(2) The US Army Corps of Engineers made the one in four estimate of a major oil spill in a 1998 draft environmental impact study. The six mile subsea pipeline, which will carry the oil, will be buried only six to nine feet beneath the sea bed, making it extremely prone to shifting ice. In such extreme climatic temperatures and months of darkness, oil from a spill would be practically impossible to clean up.
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