OPINION: Why oil development on federal lands is a bad deal for Alaska

Alaskans seem divided over oil development in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and other federal lands. Of all the congressional candidates who have taken a position on the matter, only Santa Claus has it right.

Don’t do it!

My argument has nothing to do with caribou or wilderness values, however. My argument is a purely a money-grubbing and selfish pro-Alaska stance that every candidate should agree with: Federal oil development will cost Alaska money!

Imagine that you have a fruit orchard and half of the trees in your orchard have been picked over. The remaining trees are harder to access and the fruit is higher up the tree. Now imagine that there is a national park next to you with the same trees and same fruit.

The Fruit Company pays you a quarter per fruit, then sells the fruit for a half-dollar to itself and its partners (it’s an accounting thing they do). That fruit then gets resold to value-added companies that make jam and jelly and fruit leather which they market at a higher price. The Fruit Company may own some of those retailers as well.

Now The Fruit Company has figured out that if they get the right to lease the Park orchard, they will pay lower taxes and make more for picking that fruit. Plus all the roads and facilities they now use to pick our state fruit will be used for their federal fruit.

As for Alaska, all we will get for each piece of fruit from the federal orchard is 12.5 cents. That’s right, half of what we earn for our state fruit. And once the fruit picking in the federal orchard gets going, The Fruit Company will stop picking Alaska’s fruit and move over to the federal orchard for the next 50 years.

Alaska politicians have to start figuring this federal development scenario out for real; the future of Alaska hangs in the balance.

We were promised 90% of federal revenue under the Statehood Compact. That should be non-negotiable among all congressional candidates (the Alaska royalty was cut to 50% by our misguided Alaska delegation years ago).

The state will have very little regulatory control over labor, jobs and safety. The federal government will be the regulator for federal oil development. Imagine a president as corrupt as the last one having his sticky fingers on that spigot — the state of Alaska wouldn’t stand a chance.

There are more — many more — considerations in any future scenario regarding federal development in the oil fields.

But there has been a failure of leadership in considering the consequences of federal development because one major party has been bought by the industry and the other major party cringes in fear of the industry.

The fruit of the poison tree, people of Alaska, is federal development of oil and gas in Alaska.

Elstun Lauesen worked for the State Pipeline Coordinators Office for the Northwest Alaska Gas Pipeline Office. I am a retired project development professional and former columnist for the ADN.

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