This week’s news involves a bit of both. Shell Oil announced on Monday that it will be postponing the completion of its Alaskan Arctic wells until 2013. The reason behind the setback of a $4.5 billion, six-year investment? A spill containment dome — equipment required by environmental regulations — was damaged during a testing accident. It’s almost as if the environmental regulations are actually working!

“The time required to repair the dome, along with steps we have taken to protect local whaling operations and to ensure the safety of operations from ice floe movement, have led us to revise our plans for the 2012 – 2013 exploration program,” the company said in a statement. “In order to lay a strong foundation for operations in 2013, we will forgo drilling into hydrocarbon zones this year.”

While this isn’t the end of Arctic drilling, it is a wake-up call to Shell and other “Drill, Baby Drill!” advocates that are extracting oil from thousands of feet below Earth’s surface. Temperatures below freezing, icy waters and high swells make the region an especially dangerous one for offshore drilling.

Environmentalists have long opposed using the Arctic as an oil reservoir. “We think it’s crazy,” said Niel Lawrence, senior attorney for the Natural Resources Defense Council. “And the evidence is mounting that shows it’s crazy.” Greenpeace echoed those sentiments in an email: “Investors must now be asking whether investing such vast sums of money trying to exploit the fragile Arctic is really worth it.”

Other factions, unsurprisingly, are expressing different sentiments. “It’s a disappointment that this particular system is not ready yet,” said Marvin E. Odum, the president of Shell Oil.

This “disappointment” for Shell Oil may be a small bit of good news for the Pacific walrus, one of Alaska’s many victims of climate change and its receding ice.

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Shell’s plans were delayed by several factors. The first and probably most significant, is the need to build an emergency spill containment barge, which is now required by federal law. The barge will hold a very important containment dome to be lowered on a wellhead if a spill were to occur. Oil would then be carried through an attached hose from the dome to the barge for processing.

Shell is also experiencing problems obtaining a necessary air pollution permit, called for upon the discovery that Shell’s drill ship’s generators were testing above acceptable levels for ammonia and nitrous oxide. Smith said his company would reach an agreement with the Environmental Protection Agency, but environmental and Alaskan Native groups are posing a challenge. They claim the vessels will pollute the air and contribute to Arctic warming.

The company is also dealing with Mother Nature, who is keeping the sea ice attached to Alaska’s coastline with a firm grip. But the company says the ice is moving away, leaving only the EPA to get in the way of Shell’s plans.

Even drilling the two wells still planned for 2012 is expected to be difficult. Deadlines of September 24 and October 31 are set for drilling in parts of the Chukchi Sea and Beaufort Sea, respectively. The company will also have to halt operations in the Beaufort Sea while Alaskan natives hunt the migrating bowhead whale. Shell Alaska Vice President Pete Slaiby admitted “it’s going to be a challenge.”

Photo credit: Shutterstock

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