Energy & Mining

Earlier last week, activists fighting a tax cut on oil companies requested a meeting with police. They said their opponents were harassing people circulating referendum petitions, and that if this kept up, it could make it harder for the repeal proposition to get on the ballot. Now, it’s come out that the person behind the opposition effort is actually a well-known political operative who’s been promoting an initiative of his own.

If you’ve ever turned on the radio or television during the campaign season, you’ve probably heard an Art Hackney ad. He’s done work for Congressman Don Young and the late Sen. Ted Stevens. American Crossroads, the Republican State Leadership Committee, and Americans for Job Security have also been among his clients. Most recently, he’s been putting out ads like this.

NARRATOR: One pebble and BOOM. There’s a hole many times bigger than all mines in Alaska’s history put together.

Hackney’s been one of the key campaigners for a ballot initiative that could slow down the development of Pebble mine, or block it altogether. But before that, he ran an ad campaign against high oil taxes.

NARRATOR: Now, when Alberta, Canada, lowered taxes, the oil industry plowed money right back into their economy. It’s creating so many jobs, they’re inviting Alaskans to move to Alberta. Call your legislator. Ask them how tripling taxes can get results like that.

Now, Hackney is working against Pebble Mine and an effort to repeal a tax cut on oil companies at the same time. Instead of going through the airwaves, he’s putting his money on the streets. He’s set up a company called “Alaska Resources,” and he’s paying a half dozen people $15 an hour to go protest locations where signatures are being gathered for the oil tax referendum.

“We just decided why not exercise the same constitutional right they have to collect signatures by standing there and taking issue with it.”

Organizers behind the oil tax referendum learned that Hackney was behind the opposition effort just recently. And they believe Hackney’s team has gone beyond their constitutional right, and what they’re doing is intimidation. Earlier this week, the coordinators of the “Yes Repeal the Giveaway” referendum said they were being verbally and physically harassed. On Thursday, they ended up calling the police to the Anchorage Barnes and Noble when a member of Hackney’s team came to discourage people from signing their petition booklets. They need over 30,000 signatures to get on the ballot.

Pat Lavin manages the referendum group, and he compares what Alaska Resources is doing to stalking. He calls the situation “deeply troubling.”

“Of course, everybody’s entitled to their own opinion and that’s great. But when it comes to paid, determined interference with signing a petition booklet, that’s different.”

Hackney denies that they’re interfering with the signature gathering.

“It’s absolute crap. I mean, it gets reported on, and they full well know this simply because they make the allegation,” says Hackney. “[My staff] make it very clear to all of the people who come up that they have every right to sign that petition, that those signature gatherers have a right to be there and they have a right to make a case that what they’re saying is not true and that the oil tax referendum is a bad thing for Alaska and for jobs. I’m very proud of them all. I think they’re comporting themselves very nicely.”

The Anchorage Police Department investigated the referendum organizers’ claim that Alaska Resources interfered with their constitutional rights and couldn’t find any evidence that any laws were being broken.

Dani Myren is a spokesperson for the Anchorage Police Department, and she’s says they’ll keep monitoring the situation.

“If there are concerns, if there’s suspicious activity, if there’s any criminal activity, then we would hope that the parties involve would contact APD so that we could respond and address that activity.”

Hackney says he plans to keep running Alaska Resources until the signature gatherers hit their July 13 deadline, and that he’s willing to put $10,000 of his own money toward keeping the referendum off the ballot. Alaska Statute doesn’t require him to publicly report any of that spending.

Click for copies of the police report and a letter from Hackney explaining his strategy.

Thousands of people attended Juneau’s 23rd Annual Gold Rush Days at Savikko Park in Douglas, including some of the best logging competitors in Southeast, Alaska.

Alea Oien has been competing in Gold Rush Days for 17 years. Haines-resident Ashley Sage has been competing in logging competitions for 30 years. Together they make up the seventh pair in the women’s team hand bucking contest on Sunday morning.

This contest involves a two-man cross-cut M-tooth saw, otherwise known as a racing saw. This isn’t an ordinary saw. Most of these types come from a company in New Zealand. They cost over one-thousand dollars and, once you order one, it will take up to a year to get. People don’t buy this saw for logging.

“There are some people who are just die hard competitors in this and the best way to keep an edge on everybody is practice, practice, practice,” says Jesse Hay. He’s off to the side watching, waiting for his turn to compete later on. Hay owns three saws but doesn’t have an M-tooth race saw yet. He says it’s in the budget. “Both me and the wife are competing so it’s an investment”

Hay has been helping out with Gold Rush Days since 1992 and started competing ten years ago. His wife Anna has been competing for four. Together they’ve racked up substantial prize money in the past and they’re hoping for the same this year.

“You never know who’s going to show up. Some years it’s a little lean on competitors. Other years, there’s a bunch of them. It’s the luck of the draw and a lot of skill and a little bit of preparation,” says Hay.

According to Gold Rush Commission member Jerry Harmon, this year’s competition is stiff.

We have guys here that compete on the national circuit. They’re around. They’re here today. They come and go. They’ll compete for a while. Prize money is pretty good this year so they’re probably over here trying to get some of that and they will.”

But Gold Rush Days isn’t just about the money. It’s a celebration of mining and logging and of the people who do this work. “We let people know we have families, we drive cars, we fish, we cry, we laugh. We’re just like anybody else and it’s our job to mine and log,” Harmon explains.

Back at the women’s team hand bucking contest, Oien and Sage cut through a 13-inch log in 23 seconds. They get first place. Their secret, says Oien, is “experience.”

Sage says it’s about getting the right rhythm. “Back and forth, and back and forth, and faster, faster, faster and hopefully it’s done real soon.”

As first place winners in this event, Oein and Sage will share a prize of $150. That’s just one contest. There are six more logging events in the day and Oein is competing in all of them.

If Gold Rush Days doesn’t fulfill everyone’s thirst for winning, there’s always next month’s logging competition in Haines.

Alaska Senator Mark Begich calls it a mistake for EPA to extend its comment period on mining impacts to Bristol Bay. During a town hall meeting in Juneau on Friday, Begich said he spoke to the Environmental Protection Agency and made it clear he wanted the watershed assessment complete.

“I wanted the science to determine the outcome of what should happen in that region and the longer they take, the more politics are played. And so adding these 30 days is not something I supported. I think they should’ve completed it and move forward. I know some like that, some don’t like that. But science should make the determination before you start talking about swapping non-renewable resources for renewable resources – mining versus fishing.”

The public comment period for EPA’s revised draft assessment began April 26 and was supposed to end at the end of May. According to EPA’s website, the 30-day extension was granted in response to request from interested parties. The new comment period deadline in June 30.

After the final EPA assessment is complete, Begich says he’ll make a stronger statement on where he stands on the issue.

Five US Democratic senators from the Pacific Northwest recently wrote a letter asking President Barack Obama to consider blocking the proposed Pebble Mine in Bristol Bay. Begich was not one of these senators.

Interior Secretary Sally Jewell showed up in a standard-issue, D.C. business suit. It gave her the look of a standard government official.

She mostly stuck to script, and did not divulge too much information and show too much candor.

But she did step forward with her opinion on Arctic oil and gas drilling.

Senator Lisa Murkowski asked Secretary Jewell whether the Fish and Wildlife Service’s final conservation plan for ANWR will include a development plan for oil and gas.

“The president has made it clear, it is not part of his agenda to do oil and gas exploration in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, and I support that decision,” the Secretary told Murkowski.

As a member of the Cabinet, Jewell is expected to defend the president’s position. It would take an act of Congress to open ANWR up to drilling.

In his most recent budget, President Barack Obama proposes using money from onshore leases to help clean up legacy wells in the National Petroleum Reserve.

That’s something Senator Murkowski doesn’t support.

“Monies that would be going to the state of Alaska and its residents are going to be choked back,” she said Thursday morning. “That’s not appropriate.”

The president’s budget is far from law, so that plan is not in practice yet. And there’s no sign in Congress the two chambers will agree on a budget resolution anytime soon.

The wells were drilled by the Navy and Bureau of Land Management between 1944 and 1982. Lois Epstein, Arctic program director for the Wildness Society, said there are more pressing wells to plug in the Lower 48 that are closer to large populations of people.

“There are some that do need remediation [in NPR-A]. Interior has been making some progress on that, but it’s extremely expensive to do so in the National Petroleum Reserve. It’s very remote, hard to get equipment there, and frankly there aren’t many people there who are actually at risk,” she said from Anchorage.

Secretary Jewell told the committee she’s committed to capping the leaking wells in the NPR-A, but Congress needs to do its part and find the money to do so.

A large oil spill in Cook Inlet is the stuff of nightmares for Alaskans who call the area home. One of the organizations dedicated to cleaning up potential spills is CIRCAC, the Cook Inlet Regional Citizens Advisory Council. CIRCAC has a new tool in its clean-up toolbox that it’s calling a “game changer.”

Imagine a disc-shaped device – like a large donut – that’s coated in a soft, fuzzy material. That’s about as good a description as any for oil skimmers – devices that are attached to oil booms for the purpose of soaking up oil in the event of an offshore spill.

Linda Giguere is Public Outreach Director for CIRCAC. She says that oil skimmers have been around for a long time – since before the 1989 Exxon Valdez spill – and have figured prominently in oil spill cleanup all over the world. The problem is that in reality, they just aren’t that efficient.

Giguere says that the industry-standard equipoment, called “Transrecs,” actually pick up as much as 80 percent water to only 20 percent oil, a ratio that some in the oil spill response community were never happy with.

Giguere says the new skimmers have been in development since 2007.

“It started with a lot of research … to find out what manufacturers would be willing to invest in capital and take a risk to build the skimmer that would meet the standards we were looking at,” said Giguere.

It was Eric Haugstad, Tesoro Alaska’s Director of Emergency Response, who took the lead on developing the project. Haugstad pored over catalogues of many different products, eventually finding a company from Gretna, Louisiana, called Crucial, Incorporated. It was Crucial who agreed to develop a new skimmer to meet Alaska’s standards.

With help from the Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation and Cook Inlet Spill Response, Incorporated – or CISPRI – the new skimmers went through many rounds of testing. The new skimmers passed all of the tests with flying colors, says Giguere – even surpassing the highest expectations by collecting as much as 84 percent oil to 16 percent water.

“The response industry is really optimistic that this is going to be … quite a game-changer,” she said.

Giguere says the old-style skimmers will eventually be completely replaced by the new disc skimmers.

CISPRI has already bought two 56‐disc skimmers to pair with two larger response vessels, the Perseverance and Endeavor. They have also purchased five 13‐disc skimmers for near-shore cleanup to be used with two smaller vessels.

Giguere says CIRCAC is in the process of revising oil spill contingency plans and once that is completed, the new oil skimmers will be put into place.

KDLL reporter Shaylon Cochran assisted with this story.

On Monday, BP committed to spending at least a billion dollars in Alaska over the next few years. The oil giant plans to use that money to bring two drill rigs to Prudhoe Bay and to potentially expand into undeveloped parts of that field. The announcement comes on the heels of a major change to the state’s oil tax system.

“That change in the taxes really allowed us to move forward and get the support of the working interest owners to move these projects forward,” says Dawn Patience, a spokesperson for BP.

Patience says that BP will be adding 200 jobs to their Alaska operations just to bring on the new drill rigs. She says that BP is also working with Exxon and ConocoPhillips to start building up the western part of Prudhoe Bay, which could mean more than 100 new wells in that area.

BP can’t say how much new oil these developments will yield. But the Parnell administration is applauding the announcement, and the Department of Revenue says the new rigs are good for the state treasury. During the oil tax debate, the Department was estimating that the legislation would cost the state at least $3 billion in lost revenue over the next five years. Oil tax adviser Mike Pawlowski expects that number to go down substantially with BP’s new rigs.

“The fiscal note we always put out as a worst-case scenario with no new investment and new production,” says Pawlowski.” And this is obviously different. We’re seeing significant new announcements. So, I think overall it’s very exciting.”

Not everyone is celebrating BP’s announcement. At the end of the legislative session, Democratic lawmakers who opposed the oil tax cut said they expected to see lots of “brass bands” and “ribbon cuttings” for work that was already expected to happen. Bill Wielechowski, a senator from Anchorage, says that BP’s announcement is part and parcel of that.

“It’s a shame that the governor gave away billions and billions in tax breaks to get something that the oil companies were going to do anyway because it’s so profitable.”

Wielechowski adds that one of BP’s Alaska executives already acknowledged that some of the work that they’re planning to do would have happened anyway, just at a slower pace.

BP will be putting contracts for the rigs out to bid this summer, and they expect the first of the two to go online in 2015. Spokesperson Dawn Patience says that the company is not factoring in a referendum to repeal the new oil tax system in its investment decisions. That referendum could be on the ballot next summer, while the rig work is underway.