Margaret Kriz Hobson, E&E reporter
Published: Thursday, June 28, 2012
In the coming weeks, as the thick winter ice melts in the Arctic Ocean, U.S. researchers will sail into the frigid waters north of Alaska to collect seafloor data that could help pave the way for the largest national expansion since the Louisiana Purchase.
The United States is mapping the floor of the Arctic Ocean and the territory off its other coasts to determine whether the nation can lay claim to lands beyond its 200-mile exclusive economic zone (EEZ). In total, the United States might be in line to take control of outer continental shelf lands that are the equivalent of two Californias, according to David Balton, deputy assistant secretary of State for oceans and fisheries.
To assert a claim to the areas beyond the EEZ, the government would have to show “that the seafloor beyond 200 miles is a natural prolongation of your continent,” Balton said. “But that term ‘natural prolongation’ is defined in a number of different ways, and we’re exploring just how far out we can make such a claim in the Arctic and elsewhere.”
At least 50 countries have submitted data to the Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf, a United Nations panel, in support of claims to lands beyond their EEZs. Territorial requests are pending in the Arctic from Canada, Norway, Russia and Denmark on behalf of Greenland.
The United States is still studying the seabed terrain along its coasts. Eventually, the government expects to assert a claim over
territory in the Arctic, the Atlantic and the Gulf of Mexico, as well as off the Pacific Northwest coast and in the Bering Sea. Other offshore lands may also be claimed, including areas off the Aleutian Islands and along some U.S. Pacific islands.
“We’re likely to have one of the largest areas of the continental shelf of any country in the world,” Balton said. “The biggest piece will almost certainly be in the Arctic.”
But even if the United States can prove that Alaska extends far into the Arctic, the government can’t guarantee ownership because the nation is not a part of the United Nations’ Law of the Sea Convention. “Once we’re ready to set the outer limits of our continental shelf, the obvious, best way of doing so is as a party to this treaty,” he said. “If we are still a nonparty at that point, I really don’t know what will happen. And I doubt that we would have the same ability to establish the outer limits.”
With the other Arctic countries eager to tap the region’s plentiful oil and gas resources, President Obama is pulling out the stops to persuade the Senate to approve the pact.
The 1982 Law of the Sea treaty sets rules for freedom of navigation, fishing, oil and gas development, deep seabed mining, and
environmental protection. Ratification of the treaty, approved by 160 other nations, continues to fall short in the United States because conservative Republicans argue that it would undermine U.S. sovereignty.
Balton said the oil industry would be reluctant to explore beyond the 200-mile EEZ unless the United States can finalize the seafloor territory boundaries. “They would not get the financing or the insurance necessary to actually begin exploring for oil and gas and other resources out there unless there were no cloud on the title of that land,” he said. “Unless we joined the Law of the Sea convention, there will always be a cloud on the title of those pieces of seafloor.”
Treaty talk in the Senate
Today the Senate Foreign Relations Committee is holding a hearing featuring business leaders who favor the treaty. Obama administration Cabinet secretaries and military chiefs argued for ratification at earlier hearings.
In testimony set to be delivered this morning, American Petroleum Institute President Jack Gerard backs the treaty. “The Law of the Sea Convention provides the certainty that companies need to invest billions required and offers the potential of greatly and definitely broadening the offshore areas from which we can access new resources to meet our nation’s growing energy needs,” his testimony says.
“In addition, it will give the United States a seat at the table as the Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf continues the process of dividing up millions of square miles of offshore territory and assigning management rights to all of the world’s marine resources– a process that has been described as probably the last big shift in ownership of territory in the history of the Earth.”
Treaty opponents, including former Secretary of State Donald Rumsfeld, warn that the pact would send a small portion of royalties from oil drilling on the extended continental shelf to be distributed by a U.N. body (E&E Daily, June 15).
Under the terms of the Law of the Sea convention, countries can develop resources beyond their 200-mile zone for five years without having to pay royalties into an international fund managed by the United Nations. On the sixth year, the country would be required to contribute 1 percent of the value of the resources extracted. The royalty would increase by 1 percentage point for six years and plateau at 7 percent.
Balton said the royalty formula was developed with the help of the oil industry. “They still support it today, in part because they believe that at almost all sites on the continental shelf, they would be able to extract the large majority of whatever resource might be there within the first five years,” he said.
At a June Senate hearing, Steven Groves of the Heritage Foundation questioned the administration’s hand-wringing over the treaty, saying that “no legal barriers prevent U.S. access, exploration and exploitation of the resources of the deep seabed. The United States has long held that U.S. corporations and citizens have the right to develop the resources of the deep seabed and may do so whether or not” the Senate approves the treaty.
Special thanks to Richard Charter