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THE ESKIMO AND THE OIL MAN by Bob Reiss

THE ESKIMO AND THE OIL MAN

The Battle at the Top of the World for America's Future

by Bob Reiss

Pub Date: May 15th, 2012
ISBN: 978-0-89296-076-7
Publisher: Business Plus/Grand Central

An on-the-ice view of the struggle over offshore oil exploration in Alaska.

With U.S. demand for oil skyrocketing, major petroleum companies believe the last huge undiscovered oil fields will be found north of the Arctic Circle beneath the sea. Out front in the search is Shell Oil Company, which plans to sink an exploratory well in the seabed off Alaska’s North Slope this summer. In this brisk, revealing account, veteran author and journalist Reiss (Black Monday, 2007, etc.), a former correspondent for Outside magazine, tells the story of two men whose dealings are critical to the region’s future. Pete Slaiby is the Shell employee charged with clearing the way for exploratory drilling. Edward Itta, an Inupiat Eskimo whaler and the Barrow-based mayor of the North Slope of Alaska, must protect his people’s natural resources (“The ocean is our garden,” he says) while ensuring that acceptable oil drilling generates much-needed tax revenue. Based on interviews with these men and others, the author describes the misunderstandings, suspicions and interactions between Slaiby and Itta in 2010 as they discussed plans that would transform a pristine region whose waters have sustained tribal cultures and subsistence hunting for many generations. Itta, concerned at first about the possibility of oil spills and that seismic work might scare off whales, helped build safeguards into Shell’s drilling plans for 2011, which were eventually thwarted by U.S. agencies. While Russia and other nations have clear-cut policies on Arctic oil, the U.S. has long remained indecisive. With Itta working to convince environmental and other groups to hold off on further lawsuits to block Shell’s exploration of its offshore leases, both he and Slaiby gradually became “uneasy allies” who recognized that their common enemy was a byzantine federal government mired in regulations and policies.

A rewarding glimpse behind the Alaska oil headlines.