Which brings us to why ANWR proponents feel good these days. What we have been saying for so long about arctic technology and our ability to protect the environment is bearing fruit. The Alpine development is identified by none other than Secretary Babbett as exemplary. North Star with 150 million barrels of recoverable oil, but situated 13 miles offshore in the hostile Beaufort Sea, is economically profitable. 3-D seismic has led to the discovery of new fields such as Tarn, Badami and Sourdough.
Roadless development is now a reality.
The footprint of arctic development is demonstrably becoming smaller and has less impact. These truths help our cause, but so too do the new USGS oil resource figures. They are not only, in some categories, the highest ever calculated. For example, the estimate that the smallest commercially viable field must contain 512 million barrels of recoverable oil goes against all recent experience elsewhere on the North Slope. If that figure was reduced by half, which it should be, the reserves would increase accordingly.