Issue Position: ANWR

Given the continuing unrest in Middle Eastern petroleum nations, where America gets 2.7 million barrels a day of the oil that we need to run our cars, heat our homes and fuel production of our crops, it is more important than ever that Alaskans find a way to convince Americans of the need to open a small amount of Alaska's Arctic coastal plain to oil and gas development -- specifically a portion of the 1.5 million-acre coastal plain contained in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR). The Gulf of Mexico oil spill last year has resulted in a decline in domestic oil production from the gulf of nearly 400,000 barrels a month, at the exact time that our economy is recovering. And while shale oil and enhanced recovery projects ultimately should help reverse those losses, the timing of production hikes may be painfully slow given the snail's pace of offshore drilling approvals by the new federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management. In December 2010, the Energy Information Administration predicted that world demand for crude oil, now at 83.7 million barrels per day, will resume its rise with the improving global economy to reach 110.8 million barrels per day in two decades. Even with marked conservation and energy efficiency and greater use of renewable and alternative energy sources, Americans are going to be paying a lot more for energy. If domestic production does not increase with demand, crude oil prices are expected to rise to between $125 and perhaps $200 per barrel by 2035. ANWR's estimated production of between 870,000 barrels to 1.5 million barrels a day could dramatically increase supplies and help curb energy costs. In addition, opening ANWR promises to generate hundreds of thousands of well-paid jobs and funnel $168 billion in revenue into the federal and state treasuries, assuming oil does hit $110 a barrel, , according to the Congressional Research Service. Equally importantly, it will put more petroleum helping to extend the life of the Trans-Alaska Oil Pipeline, the economic lifeline of Alaska.

In a new effort to get Congress to open the Arctic coastal plain, on Feb. 15, 2011 I reintroduced two bills to open the refuge's coastal plain, one a bill to allow exploration and production from the surface of the refuge, while limiting the actual ground that would be disturbed to 2,000 acres. That bill has the best odds of quickly permitting all of the oil in the refuge to be tapped. The second bill I introduced, both co-sponsored by Alaska colleague Mark Begich, removes any change of environmental impacts on the surface of the coastal plain by preventing any surface disturbance to the refuge in summer. The bill bars the placement of any permanent roads, pipelines, wells or buildings on the coastal plain, requiring that extended reach underground directional drilling be used to produce oil or that subsurface technology be developed to tap the refuges. The bills, the first intended to open the full coastal plain using high environmental safeguards, and the second to open it without any change of environmental damage, both would quickly allow America to gain the oil and gas it needs to help stabilize energy prices Either bill would allow America to produce more domestic oil from Alaska. According to the U.S. Geological Survey, the area is likely to contain 10.4 billion barrels of oil and 8.6 trillion cubic feet of natural gas; it having a chance of producing as much as 16 billion barrels of oil, which would make it the largest undiscovered onshore conventional oil deposit in North America. Given the current administration's reluctance to allow oil development in the National Petroleum Reserve Alaska, it is about the only place in northern Alaska capable of offering significant onshore oil production.

Sen. Murkowski believes that either ANWR proposal would allow production of oil and gas without causing disturbance or environmental damage to the refuge because new technology, extended reach directional drilling, permits oil wells to be drilled from a smaller well pad and still tap deposits located between eight and 10 miles away. While current technology limits subsurface techniques from producing all of the oil and gas likely in the refuge, technology is rapidly advancing. As technology further develops, more underground reserves will be able to be developed. Sen. Murkowski hopes that all sides will eventually see that while this nation should move toward using more renewable energy, it will remain dependent on fossil fuels for many decades and that it makes sense to utilize domestic reserves to gain that energy. She is heartened by the recent Gallup Poll found that more Americans now favor than oppose ANWR oil development and that 60% of Americans favor offshore oil and gas production. She feels that unless we do produce more oil and gas domestically that the nation's military and economic security will be threatened and the global environment endangered, since America will simply import oil from nations that have far weaker environmental laws governing its production.

She will continue to press for actions to permit environmentally sensitive oil and gas production to proceed from Alaska during the coming year.

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