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How oil exploration cut a grid of scars into Alaska's wilderness

Nolan, a geophysicist, saw a grid of tracks left by heavy vehicles involved in recent seismic testing for oil and gas exploration in an area called Point Thomson.

Nolan, a geophysicist, saw a grid of tracks left by heavy vehicles involved in recent seismic testing for oil and gas exploration in an area called Point Thomson. The tracks, several hundred yards apart, were as regular as a checkerboard and ran across the landscape just outside of the refuge.

A similar dense grid may soon cover some of the refuge itself, perhaps beginning as early as December, if seismic testing starts under a plan to sell leases for oil and gas exploration that was approved by Congress last year and that is strongly opposed by environmental and conservation groups. The northern part of the refuge, 1.5 million acres of the Arctic coastal plain known as the 1002 Area, is thought to overlie billions of barrels of oil and gas.

Disturbances like the tracks Nolan saw could remain for decades or longer like a tattoo on the refuge, a vast tableau of mosses, sedges and shrubs atop permafrost that is considered one of the most pristine landscapes in North America. There are still signs, for example, of a much less dense pattern of tracks from the only other time testing was allowed there, in the mid-1980s, and of the only drilling pad, which was built at the same time.

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Any new tracks could also potentially alter how surface water flows in the tundra, draining lakes or accelerating the thawing of permafrost in some areas.

Nolan spent most of July flying across the 1002 Area making a high-resolution elevation map that will serve as a baseline for any changes to come. When he saw the tracks outside the refuge (lingering snow and ice made some of them easier to spot) he decided to map those as well. He found that they were up to half a foot deep.

Nolan, a former research professor at the University of Alaska in Fairbanks who has mapped changes in land and glaciers for years, said he was not taking sides in the fight over drilling in the refuge, “but I want to make sure that whatever happens out here happens in the most responsible way.”

“Leaving grid marks all over — that to me is unacceptable,” he said.

Environmental and conservation groups, which have fought to preserve the 19-million-acre refuge for decades, say that seismic testing, not to mention eventual drilling and production of oil and gas, could irreversibly alter the 1002 Area and potentially affect the habitat and behavior of caribou, polar bears and other animals there.

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“There’s not a lot in here that you can look at and feel good about,” said Kristen Miller, conservation director of the Alaska Wilderness League, referring to a plan for testing in the 1002 Area put forth this year by a seismic services company, SAExploration, and two Alaska native corporations.

That plan proposes that testing begin this winter, when ice and snow provide some protection to the tundra, and resume, if necessary, the following winter. In addition to special trucks that vibrate the ground, the effort would include movable fuel tanks as well as housing and other facilities for two crews of 160 workers each. In the plan, the company said it and its partners were “dedicated to minimizing the effect of our operations on the environment.”

By producing three-dimensional images of the subsurface, the testing would help oil companies determine whether there are enough reserves to make it worth buying leases to drill in the area.

The plan drew criticism from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service when it was first put forth in May. But another agency of the Interior Department, the Bureau of Land Management, will review the plan and decide whether to allow testing. Lesli Ellis-Wouters, a bureau spokeswoman, said that SAExploration had been asked to provide more information.

The approval process includes conducting an environmental assessment, a less-thorough appraisal than an environmental impact statement, or EIS, although the bureau can require an EIS later if the initial review finds the work could result in significant impacts.

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Ellis-Wouters said there would be a 30-day public comment period when the assessment is finished. She said there was no time frame for a decision as yet.

But Matt Lee-Ashley, a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress, a liberal research organization in Washington, said the bureau seemed intent on moving quickly so that testing could begin this winter, part of an overall push to conduct lease sales within a few years.

Nolan has financed his mapping project himself, spending about $30,000 on fuel for his single-engine Cessna, among other expenses. To make his map he uses a method called photogrammetry, combining tens of thousands of digital aerial photographs, each with precise location data, to form a three-dimensional map of the land surface.

The map, which Nolan claimed in a blog post would be the best topographic map ever made of the 1002 Area, should have a resolution of about 5 inches. The map will be, in effect, a snapshot of the current landscape that can be compared to future maps to detect even small changes.

Nolan said he hoped to sell the finished product to oil companies, environmental groups and government agencies. “My hope is that it’s all of them,” he said. “I’m doing it now to support rational decision-making when it comes to oil and gas stuff.”

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He said he thought the seismic work could be done differently to reduce impacts — perhaps using less elaborate, and heavy, facilities for the crews. “This is a place where we’re supposed to do things different and better,” he said.

Sue Natali, an ecologist at Woods Hole Research Center in Massachusetts who studies Arctic tundra and permafrost, said that depressions, even shallow ones, can have cascading effects. “The ground sinks, so it gets wetter,” she said. Since water carries and conducts heat, the land thaws more and then sinks more. “The impact can last for a very long time,” she said.

“The issue is, you’re causing connections and movements of water across the landscape that perhaps weren’t happening before,” Natali added.

Ellis-Wouters, the bureau spokeswoman, said that hydrological and visual impacts, as well as effects on vegetation, would be considered in the review. “The visual impacts are only detected from the air,” she added.

She said the bureau expected that more advanced 3-D testing technology would result in less surface impact than the work done in the 1980s.

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Nolan acknowledged there was little time to pressure the Bureau of Land Management or exploration companies to change their approach. Still, he said, the existence of his new map may have an effect.

“I hope the oil and gas people understand that someone’s watching,” he said. “When you know someone is watching you get on better behavior.”

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

Henry Fountain © 2018 The New York Times

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