Keep It In the Ground

The more difficult it is to get oil out of the ground, the more likely the potential for oil spills.  This weekend BP dumped 95 metric tons of oil into the North Sea.  Whoops, our bad.  The only way to protect the Arctic from the impending disaster is to leave the oil in the ground.  In the North Sea there have been over 4000 spills in the last 16 years  - 258 spills a year.

Ho/Reuters

As the Arctic Ocean warms, oil giants are eyeing the northern seas for more oil exploration and development. It is a dangerous environment in which to drill.

As Greenpeace stated, "The long history of oil spills around the world has made one thing clear: the only way to prevent an oil spill is to keep oil in the ground."

The Arctic lacks the infrastructure to stop, mitigate or clean up a major oil spill, or even to quickly aid workers on a damaged platform.

But that isn't stopping oil companies. Today, Caelus Energy boasted of a "world-class" discovery that could turn out to be one of the largest finds in Alaska. In a press release, Caelus CEO Jim Musselman called the find "really exciting" and the company said the Smith Bay complex could produce 200,000 barrels of oil per day.