Anglo Dutch oil giant Shell has been given US regulatory approval to carry out test drilling in Alaska’s Beaufort Sea.

The deal will allow Shell to drill up to four shallow exploratory wells off Alaska’s northern coast beginning in July 2012.
The US Environmental Protection Agency and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service still have to give their approval for the plan, but Shell is confident of success.
Next year
‘The conditional approval of our revised Beaufort Sea plan of exploration is welcome news and adds to our cautious optimism that we will be drilling our Alaska leases this time next year,’ a Shell spokeswoman said in a statement.
Opposition from environmental groups and regulatory delays have so far stopped Shell from developing the offshore Alaska leases which it began acquiring in 2005.
Shell’s US president Marvin Odum said earlier this year The Hague-based company had spent more than $2 billion for hundreds of drilling leases in Alaska and has invested $1.5 billion on an exploration programme that ‘exceeds current regulatory requirements’.
Risks
Opponents say the risk of an oil spill is too great to allow drilling in Alaska.
‘The toxic pollution and noisy disturbance from the exploration wells threaten refuge resources dependent upon marine and nearshore estuary waters, as well as surrounding coastal habitats so vital to polar bears, migratory birds, caribou, Alaska Native subsistence, and recreation,’ Pamela Miller, a spokeswoman for the Northern Alaskan Environment Centre told Alaska Dispatch.