The Arctic Ring of Life
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Off the Arctic coast, the frigid oceans support rich ecosystems. Animals and nutrients concentrate at the edge of the ice and along the sea coast, creating the "Arctic ring of life." The animal species that can survive the harsh conditions thrive in large populations. Many kinds of marine mammals live here, adding a surprising diversity to the north country.
 The Marine Ecosystem
Polar bears are year-round residents of coastal Alaska and ice packs offshore. The bears are very sensitive to human disturbances. The fact that a large percentage of the world's polar bears live in Alaska makes oil drilling a global concern.
Endangered bowhead whales swim through open leads in the Chukchi and Beaufort Seas to reach to summer grounds in Arctic Canada. Each year, the bowheads spend 4-5 months in the Beaufort Sea, where they do most of their eating. In the fall, the whales feed intensively off the Arctic Refuge coast.
Today's western Arctic stock--about 7800 whales--is a majority of the worldwide bowhead population. During migrations, the whales travel in narrow leads in ice, where any spilled oil would likely concentrate. In spring, almost the entire population travels north together, which means that any major oil spill could be disastrous.
Alaska's oil industry is beginning to expand offshore, raising concerns. Despite initial objections from the US Fish & Wildlife Service, the first project, British Petroleum's Northstar, began production in 2001 using unproven technology to run a pipe six miles under the ocean. This pipeline is buried in potentially unstable permafrost soil under an ocean that is frozen solid or in broken ice conditions for ten months of the year.
Government estimates have predicted up to a 24 percent chance of a major oil spill (1000 barrels or more) over the 15-year lifetime of the Northstar project and acknowledge that oil spills can only be cleaned up 50% of the time, due to darkness, severe storms and broken ice conditions. In fact, recent spill drill tests conducted by BP for the Department of Environmental Conservation, indicate that they cannot successfully clean up even a small fraction of the spilled oil.
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