If the drilling does strike oil or gas, the next step will be to find out how significant the discovery is and whether it is financially worthwhile to commence commercial production. This process could take five years. It is still to be decided whether Dunedin will be the base of operations, but the city’s proximity to the drill site gives it a strong advantage.
For many students, their transient lifestyle in Dunedin will leave them little desire to consider a topic such as deep sea drilling. However, it is a particularly important debate that has the potential to shape Dunedin’s future, impacting on the future students of Dunedin. Critic spoke to various supporters and opponents of the drilling …
For
Pro Oil and Gas Otago spokesperson and Dunedin City Councillor, Andrew Whiley, believes there will be ‘’massive’’ benefits for the city’s economy if the drilling project goes ahead. Whiley insists that “all of the data coming in is showing it is 90 per cent gas down there and 10 per cent condensate, anyway. Oil is barely being looked at.” He says “I am all about growing Dunedin. The real issue is where the base is going to be.” The base for operations will be either in Timaru, Invercargill or Dunedin, all of which could plausibly handle the opportunity.New Zealand would gain approximately $385 million in royalties and even more from the tax on income paid to the oil/gas workers. Whiley says “Every part of the city benefits. If we can bring in five hundred people on $90,000 a year, that will bring in huge benefits.” Whiley believes that Dunedin has been poor at showing it is open for business and has not been putting its “game face on.” Timaru is now partly owned by Port of Tauranga, and Whiley says “they wouldn’t have bought shares if they didn’t think there was opportunity there.” All three potential operation centres have big hospitals, but “Dunedin is the best option in terms of city infrastructure.”
Whiley is “totally supportive of green technology,” and agrees that the city could be doing “a whole lot more.” He says that for us to move forward with clean energy, we need investment, and investment comes from money, “and money comes from opportunity.”
In response to protestors Oil Free Otago, he says, “I think they run a great campaign, but it drives me nuts that they all talk about oil.” He continues that gas is what is being searched for and the oil off Otago “is not under pressure, anyway. We would have to suck it out.”
Critic spoke to Dunedin City Councillor Hilary Calvert, who welcomes the deep sea drilling “providing safeguards are put in place.” She says the drilling could create jobs, whilst boosting the city’s economy. According to Calvert, “Dunedin’s risk of not having any economic development is reasonably high.”
She believes the opponents are being hypocritical. “People are getting into vehicles to go and protest about not using vehicles.” When asked why alternative measures such as renewable sources could not be taken, Calvert explained “nobody is taking the steps.”
“It’s a rich person’s game being environmentally friendly … we can only afford to worry about those things if the local people have what they need, like jobs and warm dwellings.” She says the council cannot afford to spend money on wind turbines and renewable sources, and “we can’t keep telling people how to spend their money here.” She also states that if we were to put resources into wind turbines, people would complain about where the wind turbines were put.
Calvert believes that if gas were to be found, “it would be a game changer to Otago’s economy.” However, she added that the Government’s current focus is on Christchurch and Auckland, “so we need to look after ourselves.” She explains that without the government bringing jobs to Dunedin, we need to encourage the work to come here. “Even if the jobs are given to foreigners, once they are here, they are here. They are spending money and paying taxes. The jobs might not go to graduates, but the benefits will still be had by all.”
“I’m not saying there aren’t environmental issues but you don’t see a whole load of green people putting $20 a week to a fund looking into alternative sources of fuel.” Calvert wants the people who are protesting against this potential source of income to “put their money where their mouth is.” She says that being a poor city, the elderly worry about having a warm home. She says “students are not vulnerable. Worrying about whether the planet will be nice for your children is a high level worry which can only be a concern when basic necessities are met.”
Against
Protestors of the drilling say it is extremely risky for the environment and they question the safety record of US-based Anadarko, which was one of the companies involved in the Deepwater Horizon oil spill disaster in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010. Even if only gas is found, “taking any more hydrocarbons is still stuffing up the environment,” says Kuini Scott, a spokesperson for the St Martin Island Community, many of whom have participated in the protests against Anadarko. She believes that “there are not really two sides to this” because “if we don’t act as a city now, our choices will only get more limited.”Associate Professor Bob Lloyd, Director of the Energy Studies and Energy Management degrees in the University of Otago Physics Department, says “this oil and gas is not part of the world’s known reserves, and so by all scientific accounts cannot be used if we are to keep our climate habitable.” This is because these “known reserves” already contain five times the amount of fossil fuels required to raise the world’s temperature beyond what is inhabitable; as such, it seems foolish to add any more. He explains that substituting coal for gas will “delay the required transition to sustainable energy sources in the short time we have left,” as well as financially benefitting “companies like Anadarko that will search for yet more oil and gas and deliver more CO2 into the atmosphere. We have to stop this cycle of fossil fuel dependence, not extend it.”
Lloyd has completed extensive research in the field of renewable energy, highlighting the research instigated by the DCC that shows that “it is currently economic to put solar PV [photovoltaics] on your rooftop.” He says “the two thirds or so of existing fossil fuels that should not be extracted add up to hundreds of trillions of dollars of profits. But what do profits mean when the earth is uninhabitable? What do dollars mean when there is nothing to spend them on?”
Niamh O’Flynn, of Oil Free Otago, says deep sea drilling “is not the way forward and it will be 10 years before the drilling would be commercially viable.”
“Calling us hypocrites is an attempt at shutting us down,” O’Flynn explains. “We are not saying ‘stop driving your cars’ or ‘stop using any fossil fuels.’ We’re just saying that existing fuels should be used as transitional fuels as we move on to cleaner energy sources. The Government is putting millions into fossil fuel extraction but some of this should be going into clean energy alternatives.” She goes on to say that instead of making the most of the research and innovation we have here in Dunedin, “we are choosing to invest in foreign industries where we gain nothing.”
MP Gareth Hughes believes drilling is “too risky.” He says that allowing the drilling is “directly risking the whole of the South Island” and will be “catastrophic for fisheries, tourism, and the coastline.” Hughes believes wind energy should be getting more focus as it is “a smarter use of electricity.”
He says the biggest reason for people supporting the drilling is that the Government is “cheerleading for the oil industry.” He thinks the Government sees it as “an easier path than coming up with a real economic strategy,” describing the drilling as a “lazy gamble” to avoid any innovation, with the Government “just hoping that someone foreign finds something deep.” Instead, he believes we should be looking at the long-term future.
Hughes also thinks the economic benefits are “massively overstated” and that only a handful of jobs will be brought to Dunedin. He refers to the employment in Taranaki, where, he says, “oil drilling has the lowest job producing potential as a percentage of any other sectors.”
Both O’Flynn and Hughes have referred to the growth in clean energy in the US, which has found that for every dollar going into clean energy, this creates two to four times as many jobs than if the dollar were to go into the oil industry.
Despite the light condensate evaporating and dispersing more quickly than heavier oils, over 14,000 tonnes are predicted to reach shore if a spill occurs, according to Anadarko’s own modelling report, which has been prepared for Maritime New Zealand. There’s also a medium chance that more than two hundred kilometres of foreshore, from Ashburton River to Waimakariri River, would be contaminated.
Associate Professor Lloyd told Critic, “while the visible signs of global warming are increasing every year, world governments appear incapable of acting to mitigate climate change. Unless the general population of all countries, including NZ, express their concern by trying to stop the insanity, governments will continue not to act. It may be that to just sit on your backside vaguely contemplating the problem and not protest is crazy. And yes, I was one of the (not so young) alleged radicals protesting at Port Chalmers the other week.”
