Opinion: The climate cost of Alaska oil in the trillions of dollars

The Anchorage Daily News recently reported, “Though the global oil and gas industry is a major contributor to climate change, Alaska’s oil patch is not the direct driver of Alaska’s climate change impacts.” For the record, while Alaska oil may not be “the” driver of Alaska’s climate change impacts, it is a contributor.

Alaska has produced a cumulative total of about 20.4 billion barrels of oil — 19 billion barrels from the North Slope and 1.4 billion barrels from Kenai-Cook Inlet. At 564 kg CO2e emissions — the carbon dioxide equivalent of all greenhouse gases, including methane, nitrous oxide, etc. — per barrel of oil from all upstream (exploration and production), midstream (transportation and storage) and downstream (refining and use) sources, Alaska oil is responsible for releasing over 11.5 billion tons of CO2e to the global atmosphere, some of which will remain for centuries.

Additionally, Alaska’s production to date of some 9 trillion cubic feet of natural gas, primarily methane, has added another 500 million tons of CO2e to the global atmosphere.

Significantly, the combustion of crude oil produces about three times its weight in CO2, as two atoms of heavier oxygen combine with one atom of lighter carbon. So in fact, Alaska has produced far more CO2 than it has oil: 12 billion tons of CO2 versus 2.75 billion tons of oil — 20 billion barrels of oil divided by 7.3 barrels per ton.

With cumulative global greenhouse gas emissions from human activities now at about 2.5 trillion tons, Alaska’s share of the global total is roughly 0.5%. So, Alaska oil and gas is responsible for approximately 0.5% of all historic climate change impacts globally, including in Bangladesh, Maldives, South Pacific islands, Africa, India, Australia, Antarctica, Greenland, Europe, South America, the Arctic, Asia, the Middle East, Russia and of course, here in Alaska.

Alaska then owns 0.5% of the cumulative global atmospheric carbon increase (from 280 parts per million pre-industrial to 427 parts per million today, a 50% increase), global sea level rise (8-9 inches), polar ice sheet loss (now over 400 billion tons per year), annual loss of 1.2 trillion tons of ice globally, loss of 50% of Arctic summer sea ice, a 30% increase in global ocean acidity, a sustained and dangerous increase in global ocean and air temperature, approaching the threshold of catastrophic warming, increases in extreme storms, floods, wildfires, heat deaths and ecosystem damage, the displacement of millions of climate refugees and trillions of dollars in economic losses. Policymakers generally ignore this significant, long term environmental impact of Alaska oil and gas.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency estimated the “Social Cost of Carbon” — the long term economic damage, e.g. to agriculture, human health, coastal infrastructure, natural systems, etc., caused from a ton of CO2 emissions — at $190 per ton. A more recent scientific study estimates costs of more than $280 per ton of CO2 released. At these rates, Alaska oil and gas is responsible for a total of $2.3 trillion to $3.4 trillion in long-term financial losses due to climate change across the world, significantly more than its cumulative market value.

To recap, Alaska’s 20 billion barrels of oil and 9 trillion cubic feet of gas to date has released 12 billion tons of greenhouse gases to the global atmosphere, causing $2 trillion-$3 trillion in long-term damage across the world.

And here at home, Alaska continues to suffer a disproportionate share of the overall ecological, social and financial damage from human-caused climate change, for which Alaska oil and gas shares at least some responsibility.

Rick Steiner is a retired marine conservation professor from the University of Alaska.

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