Sitka took a stand

[ewade07]

I was hoping it was a thread that Sitka was leaving Bozeman and taking all the flat bill bro brah, you tube warrior Subaru driving douche bags with them...

You hit the nail on the head there about Bozeman

 

[CorbLand]

Apples to oranges. Yellowstone is a pimple to the size of ANWR. The development area is a pimple to Yellowstone. Point Thompson is already right on the edge of ANWR. Here it is, built roads there every winter for quite awhile. If you step off the road you can get fired, honk at wildlife fired, a caribou lays in the road for 8 hours? You are parked, non hazing, no pushing, they own that road now.

The maps showing 1002 they put out to fight this is a joke, the area they show is the size of most large states as the “drilling area”. It is an amazing place, not a wasteland as I’ve seen. The number of waterfowl is crazy on the ponds. The caribou just don’t mind, the calving herds lay around the area, no predators bother them there. A polar bear or griz will wander through occasionally, saw one set of wolf tracks on the ice road in winter and I watched for wildlife nonstop.

Pr Thompson marked with arrow

They are already basically there, so the impact over current would be minimal. I’m ok with the other 49 paying AK’s way, keep it coming. As long as you don’t mind funding us. We get to make 6 figures with no taxes and you get to pay for our infrastructure, deal!

I’ll be retired before any of the dire oil predictions come into effect, so I’m good. But I’d sure like Alaska to not look like downtown Detroit in 50 years when the only game in town is gone.

This is the argument that scares me the most about allowing this. If I understand what you are saying Coop, because we already have drilling on the edge of the refuge, going a little farther wouldn't be a problem? So, if we allow this what happens in 20 years? Just a little farther into the Refuge?

Slippery slope, death by a thousand cuts, pick your term.

 

[EastMT]

This is the argument that scares me the most about allowing this. If I understand what you are saying Coop, because we already have drilling on the edge of the refuge, going a little farther wouldn't be a problem? So, if we allow this what happens in 20 years? Just a little farther into the Refuge?

Slippery slope, death by a thousand cuts, pick your term.

Yes death by 1000 cuts is about right, no road there it crosses fed land, no mine there too many fish, no oil there too many caribou. There are 14,000 caribou killed by locals up there, 800 by non locals per year. So you can have 800 people who may see a rig 20 miles away in the distance and ruin their day, or employee people not draining the system.

I do believe hunting was the cause of nearly making extinct every major big game species in North America, not animal die off from seeing/encountering infrastructure.

 

[CorbLand]

Yes death by 1000 cuts is about right, no road there it crosses fed land, no mine there too many fish, no oil there too many caribou. There are 14,000 caribou killed by locals up there, 800 by non locals per year. So you can have 800 people who may see a rig 20 miles away in the distance and ruin their day, or employee people not draining the system.

I do believe hunting was the cause of nearly making extinct every major big game species in North America, not animal die off from seeing/encountering infrastructure.

There is also a solid argument to made that what is currently causing a major stress on animals is human encroachment and infrastructure.

 

[EastMT]

There is also a solid argument to made that what is currently causing a major stress on animals is human encroachment and infrastructure.

Well we will just have to disagree. They have an area bigger than Texas to roam. I guess the deficit isn’t going any lower so might as well add to it, keep sending those federal dollars up here. Nothing like collecting welfare on 6 figures, would rather be self sufficient, but hey govt keeps printing, Alaska will take it!

 

[AKBC]

I've been to Prudhoe, Point Thomson, and ANWR. I saw no negative impacts on caribou or bears, except that 20 years ago they were still working to correct earlier mistakes related to unsecured trash attracting bears and ravens. It is my opinion that ANWR can be developed with no negative impact on wildlife.

Perhaps a few dozen mostly wealthy people seeking a remote, wilderness experience would see a rig off in the distance but that is the only impact I imagine. And they can just deal with it.

 

[CorbLand]

Well we will just have to disagree. They have an area bigger than Texas to roam. I guess the deficit isn’t going any lower so might as well add to it, keep sending those federal dollars up here. Nothing like collecting welfare on 6 figures, would rather be self sufficient, but hey govt keeps printing, Alaska will take it!

I dont disagree that we need to find ways to continue to extract resources but I do disagree doing it places that have been set aside to be protected. Those places are needed and are part of the reason we have been able to return many species from the brink of extinction. I would hate to see all that effort undone.

I took a class in college where we took an entire semester learning why a lot of environmental laws were passed and regulations put in place and honestly, it was eye opening. Even just learning what the plan for the Yellowstone area before it was made a park was crazy to think about. I would hate to see us turn around and do that now.

 

[cubdriver84d]

There's a number of anecdotal accounts of development not affecting caribou in this thread; however, the scientific literature suggests otherwise. Just one example of a quite large body of literature is this paper that came out earlier this year: https://wildlife.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/jwmg.21809

Excerpt from the abstract: "These findings corroborate a growing body of evidence suggesting that habituation to industrial development in caribou in the Arctic is likely to be weak or absent, and emphasizes the value of minimizing the footprint of infrastructure within important seasonal habitat to reduce behavioral effects to barren‐ground caribou."

The 1002 area does hold important seasonal habitat for the Porcupine herd, mostly during the critical first couple weeks or so of the post-calving period.

For the skeptics, I'd once again direct you to this podcast that I also linked earlier, assuming you'd rather listen to a podcast than wade through the scientific literature. https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podca...ehill-fran-mauer/id1504907503?i=1000488827498

Also, don't forget the porcupine herd is migratory, so Canada is also an important stakeholder: https://yukon.ca/sites/yukon.ca/fil...e-caribou-herd-potential-development-anwr.pdf

 

[EastMT]

I dont disagree that we need to find ways to continue to extract resources but I do disagree doing it places that have been set aside to be protected. Those places are needed and are part of the reason we have been able to return many species from the brink of extinction. I would hate to see all that effort undone.

I took a class in college where we took an entire semester learning why a lot of environmental laws were passed and regulations put in place and honestly, it was eye opening. Even just learning what the plan for the Yellowstone area before it was made a park was crazy to think about. I would hate to see us turn around and do that now.

I agree, the past was a disaster and I do agree with your sentiment. The regulations now are so strict up there it’s insane. When you fuel a truck, you have a “duck pond” spill catcher under the nozzle, just a splash on the ground is reported and dig up. The problem is that so much is off limits, the National Parks are as big as states, which is great but you can’t support a state on 1% of the land. My thoughts are it’s less intrusive to connect to current projects than to create new ones.

I don’t support the Pebble Mine Project, I do believe the risk reward is too high. I do believe it will be mined some day, the need for precious metal will get so high with technology it will be necessary but that could be generations, I don’t know. But it’s nice to know that if the world falls apart we do have a nice supply in the apocalypse storage.

 

[AKBC]

There's a number of anecdotal accounts of development not affecting caribou in this thread; however, the scientific literature suggests otherwise. Just one example of a quite large body of literature is this paper that came out earlier this year: https://wildlife.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/jwmg.21809

Excerpt from the abstract: "These findings corroborate a growing body of evidence suggesting that habituation to industrial development in caribou in the Arctic is likely to be weak or absent, and emphasizes the value of minimizing the footprint of infrastructure within important seasonal habitat to reduce behavioral effects to barren‐ground caribou."

The 1002 area does hold important seasonal habitat for the Porcupine herd, mostly during the critical first couple weeks or so of the post-calving period.

For the skeptics, I'd once again direct you to this podcast that I also linked earlier, assuming you'd rather listen to a podcast than wade through the scientific literature. https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podca...ehill-fran-mauer/id1504907503?i=1000488827498

Also, don't forget the porcupine herd is migratory, so Canada is also an important stakeholder: https://yukon.ca/sites/yukon.ca/fil...e-caribou-herd-potential-development-anwr.pdf

As a scientist with 30 years of professional experience, I encourage being skeptical of "science". Meaning, consider the reason the "science" was prepared; often its to advocate for or against something and is often biased. I haven't looked at the study you mention but offer this as a general caution. Everyone is shopping these days for science that supports their position.

 

[cubdriver84d]

As a scientist with 30 years of professional experience, I encourage being skeptical of "science". Meaning, consider the reason the "science" was prepared; often its to advocate for or against something and is often biased. I haven't looked at the study you mention but offer this as a general caution. Everyone is shopping these days for science that supports their position.

As a scientist with less than 30 years of experience, I agree. Science can definitely have an agenda and/or be spinned toward an agenda. However, we as taxpayers pay state and federal biologists to go out and gather the best available evidence to inform development and wildlife management decisions. If we don't listen to them, at least sometimes, why am I paying taxes? And, why am I paying an excise tax on all guns, ammo, and archery equipment to fund wildlife research?

 

[EastMT]

Well I appreciate the debate and keeping it civil. This goes to show why it’s important to have both sides. Far right will drill/dig everywhere, far left will shut it all down. The rest of us are in the middle, hoping that the least invasive gets the go ahead as we have yet to be able to harvest metals from sea water, maybe someday, I know they are trying.

 

[firemanthornman]

Too bad they didn't take a stand again making things cheaply in China and then charging us made in the US prices.

 

[PredatorX]

Just like Target, Dicks, etc...Sitka won't get a penny from me for this virtue signaling stunt....in an election year.

.00010% of 19M acres is what they want to develop.

Sitka seems hell bent on keeping jobs away from Americans...

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[Akwoodchuck]

Curious as to what makes anyone think that there is even any recoverable oil on the refuge:

ARCTIC: Trump's ANWR push: Will it really yield much oil?

Companies may soon have their first shot at securing drilling rights in Alaska's Arctic National Wildlife Refuge if a Trump administration plan comes to fruition this year. But experts are divided on whether the proposal will release as much oil as claimed.

www.eenews.net

 

[Akwoodchuck]

Pretty ridiculous what they accomplished in Cook Inlet while everyone was hyper-focused on Pebble Mine, Susitna Dam and a road through the preserve down in southwest AK. I’m guessing most have no clue what I’m talking about though.

Imagine what they accomplish while everyone is squabbling over ANWR...

I leave it at that.

Cook Inlet was crashing for years until the state started the pyramid scheme of injecting massive cash credits into drilling companies, and they've STILL been going bankrupt or pulling out left and right...only one producer left, and they're super shady. That's a success story?

 

[PredatorX]

Curious as to what makes anyone think that there is even any recoverable oil on the refuge:

ARCTIC: Trump's ANWR push: Will it really yield much oil?

Companies may soon have their first shot at securing drilling rights in Alaska's Arctic National Wildlife Refuge if a Trump administration plan comes to fruition this year. But experts are divided on whether the proposal will release as much oil as claimed.

www.eenews.net

That's why they want to do some exploratory drilling to find out. Something Obama rejected in 2014.

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[Akwoodchuck]

That's why they want to do some exploratory drilling to find out. Something Obama rejected in 2014.

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Obama opened offshore federal areas in the arctic to drilling, and it was a total disaster....even a company as big as Shell couldn't make a go of it, lost their ass, and nearly lost all their infrastructure...

 

[PredatorX]

How much of that was due to over the top regulations? ( Shell was only allowed 1 well if I recall correctly). Kinda hard to make money when stiff regulations hamstring you. That and the public backlash was probably too much so shell pulled out.

Shell dropped 7 billion on that endeavor. Do you think they believe is oil there?

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[11boo]

If Sitka really wanted to make a stand for the environment they should quit making their gear in China, one of the worst polluters in the world. Anyone buying their gear should really consider that.