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"  Shell Oil has canceled its plans to drill for oil in the Beaufort Sea north of Alaska in 2011, but will now set its sights on the summer of 2012. The company has run into repeated regulatory hurdles in its attempts to explore for oil in America&amp;#039;s slice of the Arctic Ocean. Most recently, in late December 2010, the Environmental Appeals Board (EAB) sent air quality permits granted by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) back to regulators for revision. Pete Slaiby, the VP of Shell Alaska, cited &amp;quot;tremendous uncertainty&amp;quot;\u2014and frustration\u2014during a press conference in Anchorage to announce the decision. The company has been seeking the required permits for the past five years. Shell had been prepared to drill in 2010 in multiple sites off the northern coast of Alaska, but those projects were put on hold following the BP oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico. The company&amp;#039;s plans for 2011 called for a small armada of support vessels to accompany the Noble Discoverer drillship to the Beaufort Sea&amp;#039;s Camden Bay, where it would drill in shallow water. No energy company is currently exploring for oil and gas offshore in the region, though exploration is going forward in waters controlled by other arctic nations.  The EAB request cited two issues. First, at what point should the EPA start counting total emissions (when the drill ship arrives onsite, when it&amp;#039;s ready to start drilling, or at some other point)? Secondly, what yardstick should the agency use to consider nitrogen dioxide emissions and their potential impact on local communities? Shell has committed to burning only ultra-low sulfur diesel on the project, and has installed emissions-reducing equipment on the Noble Discover to minimize its impact on the arctic airshed. Despite such measures, the proposal has been controversial: Opponents have cited potential impacts on wildlife as well as the difficulty of managing any oil spill that occurred in the region. An emerging wrinkle in the discussion of offshore drilling\u2014as well as drilling in the National Petroleum Reserve and the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge\u2014is the condition of the Trans-Alaska Pipeline System, which carries crude from Prudhoe Bay on the North Slope to the port of Valdez, roughly 800 miles to the south. Production in Prudhoe Bay has declined steadily after peaking in the late 1980s, and the pipeline is now operating at less than one-third of its capacity of 2.1 million barrels a day. A recent shutdown of the pipeline prompted by a leak at Pump Station 1 highlighted the engineering challenges that arise as volume drops: Oil travels more slowly, cooling as it goes and causing residues and water to separate out. Alyeska, the company that operates the pipeline, maintains that the pipeline could eventually be forced to shut down for lack of volume, long before Prudhoe Bay oilfields are depleted.  Shell says that quick action by regulators will be needed if drilling is to proceed in 2012. The company is the biggest leaseholder in the region, and considers offshore Alaska a &amp;quot;world-class energy resource,&amp;quot; according to Slaiby. Shell is also working in arctic waters in Norway, Greenland and Russia. "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.popularmechanics.com/science/energy/a6501/offshore-oil-drilling-arctic-shell-cancels/>