I’ve passed north of the polar circle on our trip visiting the west coast of Greenland. The temperature has dropped to -15C: snow is mounting outside my window and in the beautiful harbour city Sisimiut the fjord is filled with ice. At night time, the northern lights are dancing in the sky to the distant howling from the town’s sledge dogs. This wolf-like dog is only allowed north of the Arctic Circle. In a few days, I will be debating oil drilling at the local college – a college that focuses specifically on minerals and petroleum.
We have spent the last couple of days in Greenland’s capital Nuuk, a visit that proved quite interesting. I’ve talked to 200 students about the dangers of oil drillings, but also on how Greenland in general can ensure a sustainable development in the future.
I’ve also had a splendid dialogue at Greenland's parliament the Inatsisartut with members of the sub-committees on environment and business about the several instances where the drillings has led to unacceptable consequences like the discharge of drill cuttings and red-listed chemicals. We also discussed the undemocratic practice of denying a country’s citizens public access to the oil spill response plan - a plan Cairn Energy so fiercely denied to make public that Kumi Naidoo, Greenpeace International's executive director, and a score of other activists felt compelled to scale the Cairn's oil rig last summer off the coast of Greenland.
Another interesting thing happened in the evening later the same day. The university in Nuuk had invited students and citizens to a debate about oil drilling with environmental organizations. A few people stood out from the others - sat scowling in the back of the room were representatives from Maersk, Shell and Cairn. I don’t know why they were there, but I doubt it’s from their deep and sincere concern for the environment and the global climate. However, this leads me to my next point,: why are we here?
Cairn Energy has found nothing in the two years they have been drilling of the coast of Greenland. Reuters has been reporting that Cairn may be leaving Greenland permanently. So, have we won? The answer is without any doubt: no! For instance, Cairn might be looking for a partner in crime to share the expenses. Either way, as the silent listeners at the university in Nuuk demonstrated, other dirty oil companies are waiting behind the scenes ready to move into the Arctic.
And it is not only on the west coast of Greenland. Oil companies are eyeing the north-east coast of Greenland. If irresponsible ideas could be portrayed by the size of mountains, this one belongs to the Himalayas. Even an oil spill off the west coast would prove impossible to clean up for a number of reasons. Among these, the lacking infrastructure and the impassable environment is an important one. These problems will be severely amplified in the even more remote and isolated north-eastern area, as the constant sea ice and the icebergs the size of islands roams the area.
However, even without an accident, drilling will have highly concerning effects on the environment.
The Danish National Environmental Research Institute has been conducting an environmental impact assessment of the north-east area. One of the concerns raised in this report is discharge of produced water that contains small amounts of oil, salts and chemicals:
“Some of these chemicals are acutely toxic or radioactive, contain heavy metals, have hormone disruptive effects or acts as nutrients which influence primary production. Some are persistent and have the potential to bioaccumulate”.
Oil drilling in the Arctic continues to be an incredible gamble with the nature and the environment; it is quite simply a very bad idea. And even though our journey up along the west coast is coming to an end soon, we will keep challenging the dirty oil.
Jon Burgwald is an Arctic campaigner for Greenpeace Nordic. Read his previous blog from Greenland.
