ENERGY SUMMARY
Sonji Toussaint-Watson
SCI/362
August 27, 2012
Brandy Shroeder

ENVIRONMENT
The Arctic National Wildlife Refuge

Within the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge the need to find oil has been and still is an

environmental issue that conflicts with the economy and this issue has been going back and forth

since 1980. The Arctic refuge is home to many different species of animals which live in an area

called America's Serengeti. Some of these animals include the arctic foxes, polar bear,

wolverines and the snow geese just to name a few of the many animals that inhabit the area. If

one was to come that area and start disrupting the land by digging for oil it can cause problems

for animals that live there and use that land to birth and raise their babies, and this would be the

herds of the caribou. Within the caribou family there is a herd called the Porcupine caribou

which has over 150,000 caribou's within the group. And in addition the to the caribou herd which

could be displaced and disrupted there are lots of plants which are important to the coastal plain

and they are dominant to the area. Some of these plants include but not limited to be mosses,

lichens, grasses, dwarf shrubs and lots of small herbs that is growing on the land. Even though

the tundra is loaded with lots of biological richness, it is still a very delicate ecosystem due to its

very harsh climate. The different organisms that reside on the tundra have already gotten use to

the environment that they have been accustomed to living in, but if people were to come in and

start digging and tearing the land up could put a lot of stress on all the living organisms there

which could lead to organisms that live there to be harmed or even die. Artic organisms are not

used to humans intervening and messing up the way they are living.

Supporters of the refuge being opened for oil drilling claim that it would help

economically and this is the main reason they want to drill for oil within the refuge. Many of the

oil companies have been very anxious to be able to develop within this particular site because it

is close to Prudhoe Bay where there are large deposits of oil that have already been tapped into.

As of today is claimed that Prudhoe Bay has produced approximately fourteen billion barrels of

crude oil. On this flip side the conservationist feel that the exploration of oil threatens to do

permanent damage to the already delicate balance of the nature within the Alaskan wilderness.

The conservationist feel that in using the domestic oil, this is considered only a short term fix and

in the long run it will lead to a greater dependence on foreign oil. The conservationist would

rather invest in renewable energy sources and energy conservation which could lead to

permanent solutions to the energy problem. Since the government has been drilling for oil in the

tundra there has been major damage to the habitat and the damage so bad that the numbers for

the wolves and bears have declined drastically within the Prudhoe Bay area. Predators that are at

the top of the food chain can adapt to the environmental imbalances more than the organisms that

are at the bottom of the food chain. Therefore, is safe to say that it is in no way financially

possible to restore the Arctic’s developed areas to their natural state, and once tampered with this

cause irretrievable damage in the natural environment.

Yucca Mountain

The Yucca Mountain is the very first mainstream commercial power plant that was opened

in 1954. In 1982 the passing of an act, The Nuclear Waste Policy Act, with this Act this site had

to be up and running by 1998 and the United States government was now responsible for the

nuclear wastes. In 1987 an amendment to the Nuclear Waste Policy designated the Yucca

Mountain which is in Nevada as the only state candidate that is being seriously considered to be

the permanent underground storage site for the use of storing high level radioactive wastes from the commercial operated power plants. At a rate of 42,000 tons or more of spent fuel that is

produced within the USA to this day plus the accounted spent fuel that will be produced until

2025, by this time the Yucca Mountain will be full and the government will have to find a new

area to deposit the radioactive waste. One disadvantage of the waste plant being in Nevada is that

there is a volcano there although there has not been an eruption in over 20,00 years and it also

near and active earthquake fault lines. The chances of a the volcano erupting is 1 in 10,000

within the next 10,000 years. Residents are concerned that if there is an earthquake this might

irritate the site and could possibly raise the water level which will lead to radioactive

contamination of the air and the groundwater. How the high levels of wastes from the various

weapons site and nuclear reactors is of major concern for the opponents of the Yucca Mountain

site. Normal shipments can and will travel on an average of 2300 miles and the wastes would be

traveling through 43 states, and of these 43 eight states Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Missouri,

Nebraska, Utah and Wyoming which has major highways that leads to the Yucca Mountain. This

is an issue that worries the residents of these states. I feel that the government should look for

other areas that are un-inhabited to store waste like somewhere in the ice lands.

The Three Gorges Dam

The Three Gorges Dam was built to produce 18GW of electricity which equals 18 nuclear power

plants or large coal power plants. For years the people living in the rivers basin faced drought

and flood for years which was so severe that it had killed many people through drowning or

famine. Within this last century the advantages of the hydropower made damming of the Yangze

more compelling. China started the building of the TGD in 1990, the name was taken from a

long reservoir floods the three upstream gorges. In 2003 they started to fill the reservoir and by

2008 the dam was full and completed. The dam will be better for agricultural production that is

being done downstream and will be greatly used. In 1998 1/10 of the grain supply of China was

damaged by the flooding that would have been avoided if the dam had been built. One of the

disadvantages of the TGD is that they had to relocate approximately 1.5 million residents who

were displaced by the dam that was being built. There was wide corruption by the people who

were handling the money that was to be distributed to the residents who were being moved to

another place. With the dam being built animal life has been put in danger such as the Yangze a

river dolphin, it is speculated that this animal probably was already driven into extinction due to

the overfishing and the pollution that was all around the city. The reservoir was polluted by the

industrial plants which were upstream and this contaminated various sites in the area that was

flooded. Due to the flooding many historical and priceless cultural treasures which includes

ancient hanging coffins, temples, cultural treasures etc. were submerged due to the flooding.

China had a very rough time in finding investors, reason being many were not so sure about how the dam was designed and its construction and not leave out its effectiveness. One down side of this is that the toxic materials the waste of humans and animals still remained in the water which obviously contaminates the water within the newly created reservoir. If there is too much sediment this would undermine the reasons why the dam is needed. And this would also interfere with irrigation, flood control and the hydro power production.
I feel that these various governments are doing the best they can with the strategies they have available, yes strategies can be improved but it has to be researched well before they just jump right into another project. If they seek new strategies one will have to apply the scientific method to ensure that they will come up with the right results in the end which could corroborate whether a new strategy will work..
References
Raven, P., Berg, L., & Hassenzahl, D. (2010). Environment. (7th ed.). Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley and Sons, Inc.