Alaska

• developments in Prudhoe bay


  oil and gas

  mineral mining

  fishing
• where is bristol bay watershed 


  south west alaska
• what is in south west alaska

  bristol bay watershed
• challenges of development in alaska

  -9 degree average temperature

  health care is inaccessible

  equipment is frozen and vehicles are too large

  mountainous terrain

  in summer the soils are saturated which creates bogs

  developments thaw the permafrost
• conco phillips willows project

  alaska's northern slope

  located in the national petroleum reserve alaska

  its an 8 billion dollar plan

  180000 barrels produced a day

  this equates to nearly 287 million tons of CO2 produced in the next 30 years
• fishing developments


  80000 employed

  generates 5 billion for the economy

  south west of the state
• global tundra management

  1. biodiversity action plan - in canada and russia that aims to restore and protect biodiversity
  2. kyoto protocal - in 1997 there were and 192 members that signed to reduce emissions - however the USA, India, and China refused to sign
• Gwitchin community 


  7500 population

  hunt caribou

  dependent on natural resources

  they have nomadic traditions and livelihoods

  AGAINST the drilling
• impacts of development

  1. caribou migratory routes disrupted - lead to extinction and a loss of a way of life
  2. natives exposed to modernism - leads to a loss of native languages and traditions
  3. prudhoe bay disaster of 1989 - this is where 10.9 million gallons of oil split into the north atlantic sea - there was still evidence of the polluted waters 8 years later
• Inupiat community 


  live in kaktovik

  population of 300

  they subsist on 3 bone head whales a year and store them in permafrost freezers

  at the community centre they play bingo on thursday nights

  they have accumulated modern infrastructure by taxing oil companies that operate in the area

  this has increased their life expectancy by 10 years

  FOR the drilling
• mineral developments

  generated 2.2 billion dollars in 2013 from the tintina gold belt

  the environmental protection agency banned a controversial mining project, the pebble mine project, which was set to be the largest copper and gold extraction mine on the continent
• environmental impacts of the pebble mine project

  1. home to the largest sokeye salmon population globally
  2. 25 indigenous communities rely on the salmon for more than half their harvest
• general statistics

  200 biotic species

  8 million hectares of land
• trans-alaskan pipeline


  800 miles long

  links remote oil fields to the bays so that oil can be easily exported and accessed by large ships

  this creates boom towns as the sudden growth of income attracts people to go and work there