Alaska Senator Lisa Murkowski reminding everybody that she is still a Republican.

Courtesy of HuffPo:  

Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) introduced legislation Wednesday night that would open a portion of a pristine wildlife refuge in her state to oil and gas development, a move expected to bring in slightly more than $1 billion in federal revenue over the next decade. 

The bill would open up part of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR), described by some as “America’s Serengeti,” which covers more than 19 million acres in northeastern Alaska. The region is home to polar bears, caribou, moose and hundreds of species of migratory birds. It’s considered one of the state’s crown jewels. 

In a statement, Murkowski called it “a tremendous opportunity” for the country. 

“The legislation ... will put Alaska and the entire nation on a path toward greater prosperity by creating jobs, keeping energy affordable for families and businesses, generating new wealth, and strengthening our security — while reducing the federal deficit not just by $1 billion over ten years, but tens or even hundreds of billions of dollars over the decades to come,” she said.

This is usually the point where somebody not from Alaska will chime in that Murkowski needs to be voted out of office.

The problem with saying that over and over is that it will essentially have the same effect as spitting into the ocean over and over again. In a word...none.

The problem is that instead of making Murkowski toxic in Alaska this will only prove to endear her to Alaskans most of who overwhelmingly support the opening of ANWR.

The hard truth is that the money is drying up faster than our glaciers are melting up here, and people in the state are starting to feel a little desperate.

I actually have very little confidence that this bill will pass, but even if it does not it still reinforces Murkowski's conservative credentials and signals to the voters that she is somebody who is working to make the state more prosperous.

I really do not think opening ANWR would accomplish that, but I am definitely in the minority.

In the middle of an investigation into Russian meddling to help elect Donald Trump, his Secretary of State's former employer asks for a waiver on Russian sanctions.

Courtesy of the New York Times:  

Exxon Mobil is pursuing a waiver from Treasury Department sanctions on Russia to drill in the Black Sea in a venture with Rosneft, the Russian state oil company, a former State Department official said on Wednesday. An oil industry official confirmed the account. 

The waiver application was made under the Obama administration, the officials said, speaking on condition of anonymity, and the company has not dropped the proposal. 

The proposal is now before the Trump administration at a delicate time in Russian-American relations, with rising tensions over the war in Syria and a looming congressional inquiry into reports of Russian efforts to influence the United States presidential election.

Here is how John McCain responded to the news.

Are they crazy? @WSJ: "Exxon Seeks U.S. Waiver to Resume #Russia Oil Venture" https://t.co/CHKS3sjOa8

— John McCain (@SenJohnMcCain) April 19, 2017

Well that seems an appropriate question.

As you might remember Rachel Maddow reported on this Rosnef deal way back in January, and actually suggested it had a lot to do with why the Russians were so keen on helping Trump win the White House.

Back then she even stated that the deal was "Biggest oil deal in the history of deals. So big it was expected to change the historical trajectory of Russia."

Yesterday Maddow tweeted this in response to the Wall Street Journal's reporting.

Ka-ching! Payout time.https://t.co/fovQGP09AQ

— Rachel Maddow MSNBC (@maddow) April 19, 2017

How could this NOT be our first response to hearing Exxon make this request?

So the question to ask is whether the Trump Administration is actually arrogant enough to grant this request, and what Russia will do if they do not?

Before leaving office President Obama protects the Arctic by declaring portions of it off limits for oil exploration.

President Obama in Kotzebue, Alaska.

Courtesy of Phys.org:  

US President Barack Obama on Friday declared portions of the Arctic off-limits for oil exploration for the next five years, dealing a blow to Republican efforts to expand fossil fuel extraction. 

The decision means new oil and gas exploration leasing in the Chukchi Sea and Beaufort Sea will not be considered until after 2022. 

"Given the unique and challenging Arctic environment and industry's declining interest in the area, forgoing lease sales in the Arctic is the right path forward," Interior Secretary Sally Jewell said in a statement. 

The US government made a similar announcement in March, when it removed the Atlantic Ocean from the five-year road map. 

Environmental groups hailed Friday's decision as historic and coming at a key moment, as President-elect Donald Trump has promised to expand drilling for oil and to revive the American coal industry. 

Apparently the decision pissed off Alaska Senator Lisa Murkowski which proves that it is a good one.

However it is also a fact that if Donald Trump decides to do away with his ban it is within his power to do so, though he will receive significant resistance from environmental groups and Democrats.

Even with only weeks remaining of his term President Obama is still doing what he can to protect us, and our planet.

Sarah Palin gets herself all excited and has herself a gusher over the possibility of a Trump administration raping the planet a little harder.

Courtesy of the fracking moron's Facebook page: 

Drill, Baby Drill! American Made Energy Makes America Great Again (Not to be all science-y or anything but you cannot MAKE energy. You can only release energy or harness energy.)

Permian, ANWR, Prudhoe, Bakkan.... and so much more. NOW is the time to shut off the Saudi oil cartel flow valve and develop our own God-given natural resources. The only excuse not to become energy independent is a political excuse. (Exactly which is why President Obama spent so much of his time and political capital toward developing renewable energy sources. But of course that's not what she means is it?)

The inherent link between energy and security, and energy and prosperity, is real and recognized by every American except sketchy politicians and deceived faux environmentalists. We have the resources, we have the technology, we have the manpower. America has the highest environmental and worker safety standards in the world... it's time to say, "Screw Arab oil. We're making America great again!" We've always led in oil, gas and mineral development innovation. Let's tap it. (There is a reason those are called "fossil fuels," because they are rapidly becoming old and outdated. Kind of like your moldy old catch phrases.)

Politics have kept us beholden to countries that do not like us and use energy as a weapon. It's a farce when Pres. Obama and other progressives claim we're not reliant on those resources anymore. And a sicker farce is the claim we must go to war over oil. (Okay well that "sicker farce" was a product of the George W. Bush administration, NOT the Obama administration. Let's put the blame where it belongs.)

Shut off foreign rulers' flow that has kept their peasants poor and terrorizingly (Not a word.) desperate, and watch the world become a safer place.  (Do you know what else might help to accomplish that? Abolishing religion. Just a thought.)

And here at home, shovel out the BS "Peak Oil" claim that demands we abandon conventional energy sources in favor of unrealistic, uneconomic, unreliable, lobbyist- driven green energy boondoggles. ("Peak oil" is the point in time when the maximum rate of extraction of petroleum is reached, after which it is expected to enter terminal decline. Some would suggest that we have already reached it or are about to reach it soon.)  Drill now while we shore up realistic renewables for a legitimate "all of the above" future energy plan. (Why waste more money drilling up dirty oil, and mining pollution causing coal, which damages our environment when we are making such progress with renewable energy sources that leave the atmosphere virtually untouched, the blogger asked himself knowing that using logic and facts like that would only confuse and anger the co-author of this Facebook post.)

Be ready for faux environmentalists - with their disdain for American jobs dressed in Carhartts and steel toed boots - to target this massive Texas find, despite all commonsense and responsible reason to explore and produce. (Confused "commonsense" and "responsible" with "illogical" and "unnecessary" again.)


It's time to unleash the private sector on new refineries, rigs, pipelines, infrastructure, service provisions, etc... all basic needs for more responsible domestic extraction, and all leading to the USA boom our working class deserves.

Man you can almost feel how excited she is at the prospect of having an administration in place with as little respect for the planet as she has can't you?

You know I thought about simply ignoring this, because you know Sarah Palin who?

However the fact is that she, and others of her ilk, really do now have a sympathetic ear in the White House, and we stand the very real possibility of seeing years of research and development concerning renewable energy tossed aside like one of Donald Trump's former wives.

Trump himself has said that he believes that global warming is a hoax perpetrated by "Jina," so even if he does not choose Palin as the Secretary of the Interior, the person he does pick will very likely be almost as dangerous to our environment.

I just had a terrible thought.

Do we think it conceivable that Trump will believe in Palin's mythological energy bona fides and actually ask her for advice on energy and oil exploration?

Well since he apparently appointed a racist, antisemitic,  misogynistic pig as his adviser I think that seems more than feasible.

Okay how soon will those commercial trips to Mars be available again?

I'm asking for a friend.

Another one bites the dust. Yet one more oil company decides that exploring the Alaskan arctic is not worth the trouble.

Courtesy of Think Progress:  

Norway’s state-owned oil and gas company, Statoil, announced Tuesday it is pulling operations out of the Alaskan Arctic. 

“Since 2008 we have worked to progress our options in Alaska. Solid work has been carried out, but given the current outlook we could not support continued efforts to mature these opportunities,” Tim Dodson, executive vice president for exploration, said in a statement. 

The company — one of six that recently called for a price on carbon — will be closing its Anchorage office. It is giving up on 16 leases in the Chukchi Sea, as well as partial stake in 50 others held by ConocoPhillips. All the leases expire in 2020. 

“The leases in the Chukchi Sea are no longer considered competitive,” Statoil said Tuesday.

And that is how it goes.

One by one they fall, until the day we are finished with them all.

However this should also serve as a wake up call to Alaskans that our days of suckling at the teat of big oil are rapidly coming to an end.

If we don't come up with viable replacements for the millions, or perhaps billions, of dollars that flowed into our state from oil production, we are going to be in a world of hurt.

Obama administration cancels drilling leases. There will be no more drilling for oil in the Arctic Ocean.

Courtesy of The Hill: 

The Obama administration took a number of actions Friday to restrict future offshore drilling in the Arctic Ocean. 

The Interior Department is canceling two lease sales it had planned over the next year and a half for Arctic drilling rights and denying two oil companies’ requests to extend the time on leases that they currently hold. 

The decision comes weeks after Royal Dutch Shell pulled out of the Arctic for the foreseeable future, saying the little oil it found in this summer’s drilling is not worth the cost. 

The administration said its decisions are based on the current oil markets and low interest in Arctic drilling. 

But it’s also a significant action to crack down on one of the most controversial types of offshore oil and gas drilling that has environmentalists fired up in opposition. 

“In light of Shell’s announcement, the amount of acreage already under lease and current market conditions, it does not make sense to prepare for lease sales in the Arctic in the next year and a half,” Interior Secretary Sally Jewell said in a statement, complimenting her staff’s work overseeing the safety and environmental standards of Shell’s drilling in the Chukchi Sea, about 70 miles northwest of Alaska’s coast. 

Shell’s Chukchi lease is due to expire in 2020. Norway’s Statoil had also requested an extension of a lease expiring in 2017 in the nearby Beaufort Sea, which was also rejected.

Well I guess that takes care of that. At least for the duration of the Obama administration.

And Hillary Clinton has already tweeted that she is opposed to drilling in the Arctic, which means unless there is a Republican in the White House in the near future the Arctic is safe from the environmental impact caused by oil spills.

Well at least from American oil companies that is.

Okay is it possible that we all got played by President Obama?

I mean I got pretty pissed off at the President over the fact that he allowed Shell oil to drill in the Arctic Ocean in the first place, only to see them fail miserably.

And now with this decision it seems he is using that failure to justify restricting ALL drilling in the Arctic. You know, just as if he planned it all along.

Why do I get the feeling that in about twenty years people are going to start learning what was really going on behind the scenes of this presidency and that their minds will be blown when they do?

Just when I thought Alaska Governor Bill Walker might be one of the good ones.

Courtesy of the BBC: 

Expanding the search for oil is necessary to pay for the damage caused by climate change, the Governor of Alaska has told the BBC. 

The state is suffering significant climate impacts from rising seas forcing the relocation of remote villages. 

Governor Bill Walker says that coping with these changes is hugely expensive. 

He wants to "urgently" drill in the protected lands of the Arctic National Wilderness Refuge to fund them. 

Alaska has been severely hit by the dramatic drop in the price of oil over the past two years. 

The state is the only one in the US that doesn't have an income or sales tax, getting 90% of its day-to-day expenditure from levies on the production of oil and gas. 

But the halving in the price of crude over the past year has seen Alaska's financial health deteriorate.

Yes which is why we need to aggressively diversify into other income source, including renewable energy, and step away from big oil's teat.

You know there are a lot of reasons to admire Governor Walker, not the least of which was the Medicaid expansion.

But this is a big step in a really bad direction.

And what's more it is a waste of time because, as EVERYBODY already knows, there is no way we will ever open ANWR to drilling.

Why President Obama, just why?

Courtesy of Politico: 

President Barack Obama crushed greens’ hearts Monday by giving Shell the final go-ahead to drill for oil in Alaska’s Arctic waters, just two weeks after he thrilled them by issuing his landmark regulations on climate change. 

In the long run, Obama’s successors will determine whether the industry can tap Alaska’s prized offshore oil — and one 2016 contender, Hillary Clinton, has expressed “doubts” about opening the Arctic to drilling. But it was Obama’s Interior Department that gave Shell its nod Monday, in the face of an opposition campaign that has seen activists dangling from a bridge in Oregon and swarming the company’s Arctic-bound rig with kayaks to try to block the project.

For greens, the announcement was even more galling because it arrived only two weeks before Obama is due to talk climate change during his first visit to Alaska’s Arctic. 

“The president cannot have it both ways,” Greenpeace USA Executive Director Annie Leonard said. “Announcing a tour of Alaska to highlight climate change days before giving Shell the final approval to drill in the Arctic ocean is deeply hypocritical.” 

Now you guys know that I am an ardent supporter of this President.

I have taken his side over and over again, and defended his actions even when I was not sure of the end game.

Here we are moving toward a more responsible energy policy here in America, and then the President acts as if he is taking advice from Sarah "Drill baby, drill" Palin.

The ecosystem in those arctic waters is incredibly fragile, and if there were an event even a tenth the size of the Deepwater Horizon spill is would have the kind of devastating effect that would last for decades.

No Mr. President, this is wrong, and you sir are wrong for supporting it.

No excuses.

P.S. Hillary Clinton tweeted this yesterday, which I think marks the first time that I have found her take on  situation to be more reasonable than Obama's.

The Arctic is a unique treasure. Given what we know, it's not worth the risk of drilling. -H

— Hillary Clinton (@HillaryClinton) August 18, 2015

Oklahoma is having 600 times more earthquakes than they did in 2008. If you guessed the reason was oil drilling, give yourself a pat on the back.

Courtesy of Yahoo News:  

The onslaught of seismic activity in Oklahoma in recent years has captured the attention of the nation. 

State scientists say they have uncovered the root cause of the majority of the state’s earthquakes: the oil and gas industry’s disposal of billions of barrels of water underground. 

Now, as the public absorbs this information, Oklahoma’s regulatory bodies are keeping a watchful eye on these disposal wells and planning their next moves. 

On Tuesday, the Oklahoma Geological Survey (OGS) issued its most strongly worded statement yet linking the oil and gas industry to the state’s earthquakes. 

State geologist Richard D. Andrews and state seismologist Austin Holland say the spike in earthquakes — particularly in central and north-central areas of the state — is “very unlikely to represent a naturally occurring process.” 

“The primary suspected source of triggered seismicity is not from hydraulic fracturing but from the injection/disposal of water associated with oil and gas production,” the report from the Oklahoma Geological Survey (OGS) reads. 

The seismicity rate in Oklahoma is about 600 times greater than it was before 2008, around the time dewatering started in the state.

Just last year, 585 magnitude 3+ earthquakes hit Oklahoma — compared with 109 in 2013.

Interestingly enough I wrote on this same exact problem in Oklahoma back in 2014, at which time I pointed out that the 30 year average before fracking came to the state was two earthquakes that were 3.0 or higher PER YEAR.

So here we are a year later and the problem has become exponentially worse. In fact it is getting so bad that if things continue at this rate the state of Oklahoma will never stop shaking. 

But you know I am sure it's all worth it because, you know, cheap oil.

I think this might be a good place to point out that harnessing wind energy does not result in earthquakes, and harnessing the energy of the sun is unlikely to shake you out of your bed at three o'clock in the morning.

Just saying.