North to Alaska. Go north, the rush is on. So went the lyrics to a popular Johnny Horton song written for the 1960 film "North to Alaska."
The song and movie depicted the famed Klondike gold rush that attracted 100,000 prospectors to Alaska at the turn of the 20th century. The Land of the Midnight Sun experienced a "black gold" rush when oil was discovered at Prudhoe Bay in 1968, and then another a decade later once the 800-mile pipeline was finished.
If on a much smaller scale, Alaska looks poised to experience another such rush. It looks likely now that ConocoPhillips will receive Biden administration approval to drill for oil at its Willow site on the National Petroleum Reserve.
The Biden administration took a step closer to that earlier this week by issuing an analysis that calls for a scaled-back version of the original plan: three drill sites instead of five and reducing the length of roads, airstrips and pipelines needed to support the drilling.
Biden officials say they also are considering additional environmental measures such as delaying permits and planting trees. Neither of which is likely to appease green disciples if any oil is drilled at the Willow site.
The analysis from the Bureau of Land Management is the last regulatory hurdle required before the administration makes a final ruling. The scaled back version is expected to be given the go-ahead though, and oil should be flowing on the North Slope in extreme northern Alaska, 23 years after acquiring the leases and five years after the permitting process was begun.
As expected, environmentalists have entered apocalypse mode.
The project will produce around 600 million barrels of oil over its 30-year lifespan with a peak output of 180,000 barrels a day, officials say. ConocoPhillips says the project will create 2,500 construction jobs, 300 permanent jobs and generate between $8 billion and $17 billion for the federal, state and local governments over the course of its lifetime.
But the Greens say the cost to the planet for the project is too high: 278 metric tons of carbon dioxide emissions, the rough equivalent of 66 coal-fired power plants.
Environmentalists love to talk of reality. But that reality includes the cold hard fact that going green, worthy endeavor as it is, will require continued reliance on oil to get there. Flying hither and yon to decry the end of the world necessitates these fossil fuels. All those EV plants, including the ones coming to Arkansas, will need them.
Most Americans driving to and from work and heating and cooling their homes need them, too. For now. And the less reliance the better for those resources on outside actors, many of whom don't have Americans' interests at heart.
It's not official yet, but the Willow spigot on Alaska's North Slope could be turned on soon. So, for now, north to Alaska. The rush to get to green is on.