Alaska's North Slope: Requirements for Restoring Lands After Oil Production Ceases

A chapter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "This report discusses the nature and extent of dismantlement, removal, and restoration requirements for oil industry activities that are occurring on both federal and state lands located on the North Slope of the state of Alaska. The state of Alaska, which owns the lands where most of the North Slope's current oil production occurs, has adopted general dismantlement, removal, and restoration requirements that contain no specific stipulations on what infrastructure must be removed or to what condition the lands used for oil industry activities must be restored once production ceases. Alaska's requirements are similar to those of some states but less explicit than those of other states, which create a fixed obligation to fully restore the land according to specific requirements. Until the state of Alaska defines the condition in which it would like its lands returned, there is no way to accurately estimate the cost of dismantling and removing the infrastructure and restoring the disturbed land on Alaska's North Slope. Existing financial assurances, such as bonding requirements, ensure the availability of only a small portion of the funds that are likely to be needed to dismantle and remove the infrastructure used for oil industry activities and to restore state-owned lands. Current dismantlement, removal, and restoration requirements and financial assurances for federal lands on the North Slope vary by agency, but are generally insufficient to ensure that any federal lands disturbed by oil industry activities will be restored.