Oil Spill Response, Shipping Activities & More

Oil Spill Response

• Alaska Clean Seas.
• North Slope Borough: An Oil Spill Workshop – NOAA’s Office of Response and Restoration held the “North Slope Borough: An Oil Spill Workshop” for Natural Resource Damage Assessment (NRDA) & Environmental Response Management Application (ERMA®) on November 8 & 9, 2012 in Barrow, Alaska. The goal of this meeting was to discuss community involvement in spill response and natural resource damage assessment (NRDA) and restoration/recovery. Community concerns and recommendations collected at the workshop will be provided to the State of Alaska and the U.S. Coast Guard for their use in planning oil spill response in the region. The report findings will be used by NOAA and other agencies to establish priorities for NRDA and restoration. NOAA will also use the report to establish priorities for data to augment the Arctic Environmental Response Management Application (ERMA) Workshop Report.
• Community Oil Spill Response in Bering and Anadyr Straits – Report from the workshop hosted by the Wildlife Conservation Society in Anchorage, Alaska, November 2013.

Shipping Activities and Impacts

• US Coast Guard.
• Arctic Shield 2012.
• Arctic Shield 2012 Environmental Assessment.
• Arctic Council Arctic Marine Shipping Assessment 2009 Report – Brigham, L. and M. Sfraga (eds.). 2010. Creating a roadmap forward: the Arctic Marine Shipping Assessment. Workshop report for October 22-24, 2009, University of Alaska Fairbanks and the University of the Arctic Institute for Applied Circumpolar Policy.

More Oil and Gas Development Resources

• USGS: An Evaluation of the Science Needs to Inform Decisions on Outer Continental Shelf Energy Development in the Chukchi and Beaufort Seas, Alaska.
• Summary Fact Sheet: Holland-Bartels, L., and B. Pierce. 2011. An evaluation of the science needs to inform decisions on Outer Continental Shelf energy development in the Chukchi and Beaufort Seas, Alaska: U.S. Geological Survey Fact Sheet 2011-3048, 4 p.
• Report: Holland-Bartels, L., and B. Pierce (eds.). 2011. An evaluation of the science needs to inform decisions on Outer Continental Shelf energy development in the Chukchi and Beaufort Seas, Alaska. U.S. Geological Survey Circular 1370, 278 p.
• North Slope Science Initiative (NSSI) – The NSSI is an intergovernmental effort to increase collaboration at the local, state, and federal levels to address the research, inventory, and monitoring needs as they relate to development activities on the North Slope of Alaska. Partners in NSSI include the following organizations: ADF&G, ADNR, ASRC, BLM, BOEMRE, NOAA, NPS, NSB, NWS, USARC, USDOE, USFWS, and USGS. Go to the link above for more information on the projects and reports from this group.
• Journal articles: Streever, B., et al. 2011. Environmental change and potential impacts: Applied research priorities for Alaska’s North Slope. Arctic 64:3(390-397). This paper was drafted by the Science Technical Advisory Panel of the NSSI. There are some recommendations in the article that NSSI hopes to implement in the coming years.
• Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) – This webpage provides information on the federal offshore and Outer Continental Shelf (OCS) oil and gas leasing programs, including proposals, EIS’s, and notices of hearings and other meetings BOEM Alaska OCS Region.

Reports on impacts of oil and gas to NSB:

• Braund, S.R. et al. 2009. Impacts and benefits of oil and gas development to Barrow, Nuiqsut, Wainwright and Atqasuk harvesters. Prepared for the North Slope Borough Department of Wildlife Management.
• Dasher, D. et al. 2016. Offshore oil/gas wastewater study: 2014 Assessment of Simpson Lagoon. Report prepared for the Coastal Impact Assistance Program, US Fish and Wildlife Service and the US Department of the Interior. Additional funding provided by the North Slope Borough/Shell Baseline Studies Program.
• Offshore Oil/Gas Study: 2014 Simpson Lagoon – In 2014 the Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation and University of Alaska Fairbanks Institute of Marine Science partnered through the Alaska Monitoring and Assessment Program (AKMAP) to conduct a study of sediment and water quality in Simpson Lagoon and Gwydyr Bay. The survey objective was to obtain current information on trace metals and hydrocarbons in amphipods, mysids and sediment, and to assess several water quality parameters. This report provides study results and a comparison with a 1977 study of sediment trace metals. The Offshore Oil/Gas Simpson Lagoon website was updated with a new map and final report. All data is available to download or view through Alaska’s Water Quality Map.

Reports on oil spill prevention, response, etc.:

• Advancing Oil Spill Response in Ice-Covered Waters. 2004. Prepared for Prince William Sound Oil Spill Recovery Institute, Cordova, Alaska, and the United States Arctic Research Commission, Arlington, Virginia, and Anchorage, Alaska.
• Oil Spill Prevention and Response in the U.S. Arctic Ocean: Unexamined Risks, Unacceptable Consequences. November 2010. Report to the PEW Environment Group by Nuka Research and Planning Group, LLC, and Pearson Consulting, LLC.
• Sørstrøm, S.E., et al. 2010. Joint industry program on oil spill contingency for Arctic and ice-covered waters. SINTEFF Materials and Chemistry, Report no. 32.
• National Commission on the BP Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill and Offshore Drilling. 2011. Deep Water: The Gulf Oil Disaster and the Future of Offshore Drilling, Report to the President.

Protection of the Arctic Marine Environment (PAME):

• Arctic Council. 2009. Arctic Offshore Oil and Gas Guidelines. April 29. Protection of the Arctic Marine Environment (PAME) Working Group.

Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) on the Effects of Oil and Gas Activities in the Arctic Ocean:

• Being prepared by NOAA Fisheries, Office of Protected Resources. You can find more information at this website.

Fisheries Monitoring in the NPR-A:

• Noel, L.E., L.J. Moulton, M.S. Whitman, and L. Bontrager. 2008. NPR-A Fisheries Monitoring Implementation Plan. Report prepared for U.S. Department of Interior, Bureau of Land Management, Arctic Field Office, Fairbanks, Alaska. This report provides an assessment of the effects of oil and gas activities on surface resources in the NPR-A and the subsistence use of those resources. It also includes an evaluation of the effectiveness of current mitigation measures and management policies.