Federal Obstruction
2-21-12 - President Usurps Congressional Authority and Seeks to Zone and Restrict Ocean Use Before Election Day!
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Another Critical Deadline for Comment; Please Do. Here's Why:
Dear Readers:
The Obama administration threatens
 to approve and implement a "Zoning of The Oceans" -- by this Spring, well before the presidential election -- and further hinder our freedom and ability to create jobs and achieve energy independence by developing our own fossil and renewable energy, commercial fishing, recreational and other resources and activities (i.e. like ocean transportation). See our earlier comments on this Obama initiative taken by Executive Order without Congressional authorization and which places an additional regulatory overlay across our (i.e. already highly regulated) oceans and water systems flowing into them. It is truly a case of, "Freedom Supressed and Government Gone Wild", 1, 2, 3. While the White House says, "Need for Congressional Authorization is a Myth", the President and his chicken house full of crafty, activist foxes are truly annexing Congressional authority by calling his zoning initiative a restructuring of government services. It is like a belligerent, passive-aggressive teenager who says, "I was home by midnight. Technically, I didn't disobey you when I drove with my friends to Chicago. I didn't tell you we wouldn't go there and, remember, I was home by midnight."
The National Ocean Policy Draft Implementation Plan proposes more than 53 federal actions and nearly 300 milestones that call for, among other things:
The National Ocean Council, which spends many millions of dollars of agencies Obama has ordered to participate is currently accepting comments on the Draft Implementation Plan. The National Ocean Policy has already been cited as justification in part for not allowing any Outer Continental Shelf oil and gas leasing to take place outside the Gulf of Mexico and limited areas in Alaska until at least 2017. Implementation of the National Ocean Policy, as currently proposed, will limit domestic energy development and other valid and responsible use of the oceans -- including wind energy projects -- and will further harm our nation’s economy.
IS THE CONGRESS SLEEPING AS ITS AUTHORITY IS BEING USURPED BY AN OVERREACHING EXECUTIVE?
Make sure the National Ocean Council hears from you before its comment deadline, next Monday, February 27. Copy Members of Congress. Put your comment in the comment space below or send it to us for later publication. Feel free to edit the Consumer Energy Alliance letter here as you see fit. For more information on how these policies may affect you, listen to the National Ocean Policy Coalition.
Never give up.
Dave Harbour
Publisher
Northern Gas Pipelines
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Canadian Natural Gas Declines as Mild US Weather Pares Demand, Bloomberg - Pipeline Flows Gas was flowing at a daily rate of 2.53 billion cubic feet at Empress, Alberta, where the fuel is transferred to TransCanada's main line. At McNeil, Saskatchewan, where gas is transferred to the Northern Border Pipeline for shipment to ...
ADN. BP says it's working to meet customer demand as its Cherry Point refinery in Washington state remains idle following a fire.
Bloomberg: Oil profits slide fastest since Lehman collapse on gas - Profits for the biggest U.S. energy producers including Exxon Mobil Corp. (XOM) are poised to decline the most since the financial meltdown of 2008-09 as the drilling technique known as fracking collapses natural gas prices. Exxon and Chesapeake Energy Corp. (CHK), which today reports 2011 earnings, will see net income in 2012 slide about 8 percent and 10 percent, respectively, according to the mean of analyst estimates compiled by Bloomberg.
2-15-12
Alaska State Senator Cathy Giessel (NGP Photo) says to the US House of Representatives Rules Committee, "STOP! Please do not strip the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) provision from HR 7. We must open a small portion of the ANWR to responsible oil and gas development." See video of Washington DC visit of House Speaker Mike Chenault, below.
Vancouver Sun by Dina O'Meara. TransCanada Corp. has set back the launch of the Keystone XL bitumen pipeline until early 2015, saying it expects to receive approval for the controversial line by early 2013.
New Report: Institute for Energy Research: In 1980, official estimates of proved oil reserves in the United States stood at roughly 30 billion barrels. Yet over the past 30 years, more than 77 billion barrels of oil have been produced here. In other words, over the last 30 years, the United States produced more than two and a half times the proved reserves we thought we had available in 1980. Thanks to new and continuing innovations in exploration and production technology, there’s every reason to believe that today’s estimates of reserves are only a fraction of what will be produced and delivered tomorrow—not only here in the United States, but across the entire North American continent.
of Alaska’s interest in challenging.JPG)
federal authority over state-owned navigable rivers and submerged lands. The state is now a party to a lawsuit by plaintiff, John Sturgeon (NGP Photo-R), an Anchorage resident challenging the authority of the National Park Service to regulate activities on state-owned waters within national parks and preserves in Alaska. “My administration will continue to aggressively push back on federal overreach, and efforts to control Alaskans’ ability to travel on rivers and waterways,” Governor Sean Parnell (NGP Photo) said. “I am pleased the court recognized Alaska’s strong interest in this issue over the objections of the federal government to our participation in the case.”SEE THIS WEEK'S VIDEO AS members of the Alaska House of Representatives visit Washington, .jpg)
D.C. to advocate for H.R. 7, the
American Energy and Infrastructure Jobs Act. The House will consider the bill this week, which among other provisions, would open less than 3% of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) in the North Slope to responsible energy production. This small portion of ANWR was specifically set aside by President Jimmy Carter and Congress in 1980 for oil and natural gas development. During an interview with Natural Resources Committee staff, Alaska House Speaker Mike Chenault (NGP Photo-L) and Representative Reggie Joule (NGP Photo) discussed the bipartisan, majority support in Alaska for opening this area to American energy production.
ADN by Lisa Demer. Battle lines are hardening in the Legislature over oil taxes, with Gov. Sean Parnell saying Tuesday that he remains firmly committed to his legislation rolling back taxes, and state senators just as sure that they are right to reject his strategy.
2-14-12 - Feds Descended On Anchorage Yesterday For Noon and Evening Meetings As The Legislature Tackles Tax Issues
CBC News: Most Albertans rate the oil and gas industry — and the provincial government — highly when it comes to creating jobs, according to a poll done for CBC News. But almost a third of Albertans think both government and the oil and gas industry could do a better job communicating with the public.
Commentary by Dave Harbour. At noon in Anchorage, yesterday, citizens were asked for testimony 
regarding a draft environmental impact statement (DEIS) published by the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS).
NMFS Chief Michael Payne and DEIS Project Manager Candice Nachman (NGP Photos) briefed the audience on the DEIS and how it addresses the "Effects of Oil and Gas Activities in the Arctic Ocean". NMFS is the lead agency for this EIS. The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) and the North Slope Borough (NSB) are cooperating agencies on the EIS (In answer to a question from the author, Nachman said the State of Alaska was not a "Cooperating Agency").
An 
official 45-day comment period on the document has been extended to Tuesday, February 28. Public meetings were held through February 9 on the North Slope, and yesterday in Anchorage. Go to the Resource Development Council for Alaska (RDC) Website for information on how citizens can file comments to assist in building a good record. During the noon hour, yesterday, witnesses favoring Arctic OCS development and opposing the 'federal overreaching jurisdiction of NMFS' represented by this DEIS outnumbered environmental activist witnesses by about 2 to 1 but one might expect Lower 48 environmental networks to generate thousands of 'seminar' comments urging a stop to Arctic energy exploration.
Snipets from several presentations included: Peter Macksey (NGP Photo-r) observing that, "We seem to put in place roadblocks to any development, mostly by creating arbitrary and unclear mitigation measures that are not clearly defined...." Consumer Energy Alliance-Alaska president Steve Pratt (NGP Photo-l) CEA-Alaska said he believes that Alaska’s contributions to a .jpg)
balanced energy policy cannot be overstated, but that, "the Draft Environmental Impact Statement at issue here may act against accomplishment of a balanced energy policy." He complimented President Obama's State of the Union message that, “Tonight, I’m directing my administration to open more than 75 percent of our potential offshore oil-and-gas resources.” Pratt went on to observe that, "As we understand it, the Draft Environmental Impact Statement under consideration has the potential to close off the very resources it is in the national interest to open for exploration and development." John Stugeon (NGP Photo-r) said adoption of the restrictions contained in the DEIS would "severely compromise" the economics of Arctic energy exploration.
Shell Exploration and Production representative, Lucas Frances (NGP Photo) summarized the concern lessees have for the NMFS environmental analysis: "There are a variety of elements in the current Draft EIS," Frances said, "that, if carried forward through the Record of Decision, would significantly constrain—and possibly preclude—future offshore oil and gas exploration." Frances asked that the NMFS withdraw the DEIS, initiate a new DEIS process and conduct a workshop with lessees to jointly prepare exploration alternatives.
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CEA's Steve Pratt wrote after the meeting: About 100 people filed into the Wilda Marsten theatre at the Loussac library in Anchorage on Monday to learn more about and comment on plans of the National Marine Fisheries Service.... At least a dozen speakers told the agency it needs to abandon its current effort to issue an Environmental Impact Statement that lacks scientific justification and represents an overreach of the agency’s jurisdiction. They said |
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the agency needs to go back to the drawing board and work with those who have knowledge of the area to come up with a plan that works and is based on sound science. Ben Moore (NGPAs an observer, I was struck by the early tenor of the meeting established when NMFS Chief Payne said that the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), "is there to allow us to make a decision on the way we want to proceed." This citizen might have been more comforted had the agency head said, "NEPA allows us to make a balanced decision that both protects critical environmental values while allowing critical energy exploration to proceed." If stated accurately, Payne's statement leaves one with a clear conclusion that the agency will do whatever it wants to do...without regard to balancing important values."
Also not lost on this listener was the constant reference in the meeting by staff and environmentalists to subsistence values: as if summer exploration activitiy and the lifesaving jobs it produces somehow prevent subsistence hunters from harvesting marine mammals.
Alaska's North Slope industry experience has shown that: 1) industry prevents poaching and other hunting abuses, 2) protected animals increase in numbers for the benefit of subsistence hunters, 3) the presence of industry provides safety and lifesaving resources for subsistence hunters, and 4) many subsistence hunters make a living by working for the industry that provides these many other benefits.
If agencies like NMFS are to better reach 'balanced' decisions, they should be fully considering the practical local benefits of exploration as noted above, as well as the overal benefit to American employment, affordable domestic fuel supplies, national security and financial deficits now threatening the economic survival of our republic.
Last night in Anchorage, citizens gave opinions to FERC regarding an "Environmental review public meeting for the Alaska Pipeline Project". The Federal Coordinator's office produced a video of the event here, which includes an updated briefing on the project by David Swearington of FERC. An expensive (from a taxpayer perspective) bevy of other officials accompanied the road show, including some representatives from cooperating agencies: the Department of Transportation, Corps of Engineers, Bureau of Land Management, Office of the Federal Coordinator, Fish & Wildlife Service, Environmental Protection Agency, Alaska Pipeline Coordinator's Office, Geological Survey, Eilson Air Force Base. Supporting the FERC were consultants from Argonne National Labs and a Court reporter.
ADN by Lisa Demer. Gov. Sean Parnell's goal of once again seeing a million barrels of oil course 
through the trans-Alaska pipeline each day would require an investment of $7.5 billion a year, the Legislature's oil and gas consultant Pedro van Meurs (NGP Photo) told two state Senate committees Monday. Here is Dr. van Meurs' slide presentation with all the facts and figures.
Fairbanks News Miner/AP by Becky Bohrer. Gov. Sean Parnell's goal of nearly doubling the flow of oil through the trans-Alaska pipeline could be achieved over the next 10 to 15 years - but not without major fiscal and policy changes, a consultant said Monday. Pedro van Meurs, an oil and gas consultant, told a joint hearing of the Senate Resources and Finance committees that Parnell's tax-cut bill "does not even come close" to going far enough to hit the Republican governor's goal of 1 million barrels a day. He said "more elaborate" legislation is needed if Alaska wants significant increases in production.
2-10-12
ADN by Becky Bohrer, AP. A state House resolution calls on the federal government to properly plug and reclaim the sites of 
so-called legacy wells within the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska. The government drilled nearly 140 drilled nearly 140 wells in the reserve as part of an exploratory oil and gas program between 1944 and 1981.... The U.S. Bureau of Land Management oversees the abandoned wells. The resolution says just seven wells have been properly plugged and reclaimed. ...
Rep. Charisse Millett (NGP Photo), R-Anchorage, the resolution's primary sponsor, said the wells threaten the Arctic ecosystem. But she told the House Resources 
Committee this week that the state can't tell the federal government what to do, hence the resolution. Nearly the entire Alaska House has signed on in support of the measure.
BLM-Alaska Deputy State Director Ted Murphy testified that the agency in Alaska gets just $1 million for legacy wells. He and Cathy Foerster (NGP Photo), a commissioner with the Oil and Gas Conservation Commission, said collaboration is important for moving ahead. But Foerster didn't hold back in her frustration, pointing out what she called the hypocrisy of the federal government in wanting to protect the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge while leaving a mess at the petroleum reserve. She showed pictures of rusting barrels that she said were taken by BLM. She said BLM claims to have an insufficient budget to clean up the barrels but had the money for the helicopter to go out to photograph the barrels and for BLM to write a report.
Gov: Senate bill an oil tax increase; senator cites drafting error, says that's not the intent - The Republic, Becky Borher - Gov. Sean Parnell says the oil tax bill unveiled in the Senate Wednesday represents a tax increase. Technically, he's right. But Sen. Bert Stedman says that was never the intent.
Canada, China sign investment, energy agreements - Bloomberg Business Week, Gillian Wong - Canada and China expanded cooperation Wednesday with agreements to boost bilateral investment and promote energy exports to China as Ottawa seeks to diversify its oil sales.
Alaska Senate committee begins pipeline lawsuit review – Fairbanks Daily News – Miner, Matt Buxton - The decision by Superior Court Judge Sharon Gleason in Anchorage raised the value of the pipeline for 2007 through 2009 by as much as $4.3 billion. She wrote that the remaining reserves on the North Slope are substantial enough to extend the life of the pipeline many years past what oil companies claim.
U.S. Sen. Maria Cantwell helps kill latest Arctic drilling plan - The News Tribune, Rob Hotakainen - The Washington Democrat and member of the Senate Finance Committee raised objections Tuesday when Utah GOP Sen. Orrin Hatch offered a plan that would have allowed drilling rigs into the refuge and protected waters off the coast of Florida and southern California
Council considers how to pay to get natural gas – Homer News, Michael Armstrong - If the city can show a commitment to building a natural gas distribution system, it might convince Gov. Sean Parnell the city has "skin in the game," the phrase Parnell used in suggesting he might approve the gas line if he sees the city putting up part of the cost.
Senator Tom Wagoner offered an alternate viewpoint on the lifetime of the TransAlaskan Pipeline System (TAPS) in testimony before the Senate Resources Committee Thursday. Brad Keithley gave a 45 minute presentation countering the four and a half hours of testimony earlier in the week. Keithley’s point is that the issue is not the lifetime of TAPS but what is moving through it. Readers can find the press release at Senator Wagoner’s web site. -ed
1-31-12 Taxpayers Pay For Enviro Attacks On Economy
Yesterday the EPA announced it is seeking public input on two draft waste water discharge permits for oil and gas exploration activities in Alaska’s Beaufort and Chukchi Seas. The comment period closes March 30, 2012.
The PEW Environment Group writes on its webpage that, "In 2009, more than 400 scientists signed a letter to the President asking for a time-out on oil and gas development in the U.S. Arctic Ocean. This letter was extremely well received and contributed to the Obama administration’s decision not to offer new oil and gas leases and to temporarily suspend exploratory drilling in the Arctic Ocean. Download 2009 Letter".|
Recommendations: That while Alaska continues to support free speech, we financially support messages consistent with the policies established by Alaska’s Constitution, the Legislature and the Administration. That certain University of Alaska Fairbanks research funding be cut. That any state Wildlife funding for the North Slope Borough be cut. That any state funding for the Inuit Circumpolar Council Alaska at UAA be cut. That funding for certain inappropriate Alaska Department of Fish and Game activities be cut.
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We’ve noted that at virtually all federal environmental hearings since the Obama Administration took control, University of Alaska professors have turned out to encourage a stop to oil and gas activity until the government funds a massive, ecological baseline research program, presumably operated by them and benefitting them.
We now connect the dots between those hearings and this month’s letter, signed by many of them. It is an environmental activist strategy which, in large part, we pay for with public dollars funneled through Academia.
Our remedy is to encourage our elected leaders not to pay for activities that debase our economy and threaten the lifestyles of our children.
Since some of this activism also emanates from private university professors, the remedy in that case deals with withholding voluntary university contributions not restrictions of public funding.
-dh
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‘scientists’ are being concerned about the economy that sustains them.
Shell's Permit to Environmental Appeals Board
ADN/AP by Dan Joling. Earthjustice is asking the EPA Environmental Appeals Board to examine the air permit granted last month to one of Shell's two drill ships, Discoverer. It filed the appeal on behalf of 11 environmental or Alaska Native groups. Earthjustice attorney Colin O'Brien said from Juneau that the Discoverer and a fleet of support vessels would emit tens of thousands of tons of carbon dioxide, more than 300 tons of nitrous oxide and tons of other pollutants. The drilling rig, he said, is not just a boat with an engine or two.
