CLIFTON M. HASEGAWA 1044 Kilani Avenue 12

Wahiawa, Hawaii 96786 Mobile: 1.808.463.1057 * Telephone: 1.808.622.8968

Email: clifasegawa@gmail.com Web: http://www.linkedin.com/in/cliftonhasegawa

October 9, 2012 The Honorable Maria Damanaki European Commissioner for Maritime Affairs and Fisheries European Commission B - 1049 Brussels

Dear Commissioner Damanaki,

Your remarks to the Arctic Region Conference, Brussels 4 October 2012 on “Arctic

Futures: A global partnership for the Arctic” was shared with me by Dennis L. Bryant, Esq.,

Principal, Bryant’s Maritime Consulting.1

Mr. Bryant retired from the United States Coast Guard with the rank of Captain after 27

years active service. He served in the icebreaker Northwind for several years including in 1969

when it escorted the oil tanker SS Manhattan through the Northwest Passage. Mr. Bryant

served as the United States Coast Guard Law of the Sea officer, in the Office of International

Affairs. He and his team implemented the Oil Pollution Act of 1990 (OPA 90). After leaving the

Coast Guard, he practiced with a major maritime law firm for 13 years. Currently, Mr. Bryant is

an independent consultant. He speaks at various forums both domestically and internationally.

His papers and articles are published. Most recently, The ECA is coming: Maritime Reporter &

Engineering News – June 2012 and On thin ice in the Arctic: Lloyd’s List – Monday, April 30,

2012.

I worked for Mr. Bryant when he was Legal Officer for United States Coast Guard,

Second Coast Guard District. We have remained in correspondence over the years.

Your remarks were succinct with deep import and your message was clear and

unequivocal. I was deeply moved by your insight and your futuristic vision that is rare in this

complex world of ours and so few are blessed to have.

Commissioner Maria Damanaki October 9, 2012 Page 2

Your first question, I am certain, is why is a person from the State of Hawaii and the

United States corresponding with a European official on the issue of the Arctic. My first

correspondence was to Senator Mark Begich, United States Senator for the State of Alaska.

A representative from Senator Begich’s office informed me that correspondence from

individuals outside State of Alaska are not given priority as Senator Begich receives over 1,000

pieces of correspondence daily. Senator Begich’s representative recommended that I contact

my senators from Hawaii.

Senator Daniel K. Akaka and Senator Daniel K. Inouye and I have divergent views of oil

exploration and drilling for oil in the Arctic region. Senators Akaka and Inouye are staunch

supporters of oil exploration in the Arctic region. I advocate a tempered approach favoring

conservation, protecting the environment - the biological effects of oil drilling fluids on the

marine environment and marine life, safe drilling practices to prevent and avoid oil spillage,

certified safe drilling designs and methodologies; the preservation and protection of native

cultural practices – impacts on the people, their way of life, their tribal customs and their

gathering rights to natural resources; and impacts on surrounding states and nations which is

the focus of my correspondence to you.

The issue is whether or not increased deep water drilling, vertical and directional

drilling, and extended reach drilling for oil in the Arctic region will create additional faults or

fissures beneath the sea floor that will accentuate and/or contribute to polar directional change

and contribute to global weather and climate change. Based on the foregoing, there exists a

high degree of probability of global weather and climate changes.

U.S. Current Path Case and Best Post‐Moratorium Case2

Well Count Forecast 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2010‐2015 Growth

North Sea / Arctic 564 568 636 632 680 684 724 732 15%

Commissioner Maria Damanaki October 9, 2012 Page 3 The Arctic Ocean and the Arctic seafloor.3

The Continental Shelf extends from Alaska to Greenland and Europe.

1. Major fracture zones:

a. Greenland Fracture Zone

b. Jan Mayan Fracture Zone

c. Spitzbergen Fracture Zone

2. Major troughs:

a. East Novaya Zemlya Trough

b. Svyataya Anna Trough

c. Voronin Trough

3. Major straits:

a. Davis Strait

b. Denmark Strait

c. M’Clure Strait

d. Nares Strait

A. The North Pole is in the Fram Basin surrounded by the Continental Shelf.

Concerning are the avoidable impacts of increased and additional deepwater drilling in

the Arctic region with new technologies giving no regard to changes to the sea floor, formations

beneath the sea floor and existing formations.

Until the 1970s, rotary drilling was sufficient. Then experts realized that vertical wells alone were not enough to tap the full potential of reservoirs. So horizontal drilling was developed to enable access to areas of reservoirs that were previously unreachable, thereby increasing production. More recently, the same concept has been pushed further with great results: Directional and extended-reach drilling have allowed operators to access reservoirs far from the drilling location . . .

Commissioner Maria Damanaki October 9, 2012 Page 4

As of 2011, Chevron was one of the world's more active offshore operators. Key exploration areas are the U.S. Gulf of Mexico, the deep waters off western Africa and offshore northwest Australia. Drilling and seismic activities occurred or are being planned in several test areas, including the North Atlantic Margin offshore the United Kingdom, the east coast of Canada and deepwater Brazil.4 (Emphasis supplied)

The projected drilling of new deepwater oil wells and the re-drilling of existing oil wells with the application of new technologies will produce multi- tremor, seismic disturbances , create points of lesser resistance below the sea floor significantly amplified by extreme oceanic pressure, the consequent applied torques beneath the earthocean interface, when combined with the naturally occurring events above and below the earth’s surface, supports the high probability that increased deepwater drilling for oil in the Arctic region will contribute to and possibly accelerate global warming and climate change.

Analysis of the observed number of major earthquakes, geomagnetic polar shift and estimated obliquity, total solar irradiance, global temperature, and greenhouse gases showed that the major factor affecting the global warming and climate change problem is obliquity change. This is consistent with Drysdale et al. which found that obliquity changes have caused previous global warming events [citation omitted]. The present study showed in several ways that the present global warming problem including GHG rise is due mainly to earthquake-perturbed obliquity change and changes in the total solar irradiance. [T]he observed motion of the geomagnetic poles showed that the North Pole has abruptly shifted since 1970. Evidently, this has caused the temperature and CO2 concentrations to rise dramatically since then. The polar shift data showed that major earthquakes and associated forces and applied torques within the earthocean interface proved to be the major cause of enhanced planetary tilt as shown by the sudden obliquity change when the frequency of major earthquakes started to increase . . . The observed polar amplification of climate change is a strong manifestation that seismic enhanced obliquity through oceanic pressure forces and the concomitant increase of absorbed solar radiation by higher latitudes, is the real cause of the global warming problem and GHG rise presently occurring on earth. As major earthquakes occur in the future, the obliquity could reach the maximum value of 28.4° which would further increase the net radiative flux on earth resulting to faster decline of polar ice mass, more forest fires and GHG emission during the summer, and a considerable impact on the weather and climate on earth.5

Commissioner Maria Damanaki October 9, 2012 Page 5 The learning curve from Arctic deepwater oil exploration and drilling has wider application. Specifically, from Arctic projects, Shell (Shell Offshore, Inc.) filed information as to its intent for oil exploration and an environmental analysis. Most concerning is the statement in Shell’s submission of its Environmental Impact Analysis 2010 Outer Continental Exploration Drilling Program and the omission of any information to address the impact of disturbances to the sea floor. , “Shell does not intend to conduct exploratory seismic surveys in the Beaufort Sea OCS (Outer Continental Shelf) during the 2010 open-water season.”6 (Clarification Supplied)

This is a frontier exploration drilling project in the truest sense of the words. The drill sites are 16 and 22 miles offshore in Arctic waters that are inaccessible for up to nine months of the year due to pack ice. They are remote from any infrastructure, and Shell’s proposed 2010 operations will be the only offshore exploration drilling program taking place on federal outer continental shelf (OCS) lands in the entire Beaufort Sea (an area of approximately 71,550 square miles [sq mi] 185,314 square kilometers [sq km].7

The Shell proposal does not contain any information on a multi-disciplinary level that would address seismic activity from its operations other than to sea life and mitigation measures for sea life. Allowing Shell to proceed may be lead to disaster for the Arctic region and beyond. The impact of Shell’s operations on undersea plates, slope stability and mudslides is not addressed. Shell’s Environmental Analysis states that there will disturbance to the seabed causing plumes by removal of mud, rocks, and debris following traditional structure and format. The disturbance of the undersea plates, slope stability and possibilities of major mud slides were not addressed in prior studies or the current environmental analysis. Drilling to understand submarine slope instability is . . . multidisciplinary. Drilling proposals should address scientific questions . . . in a variety of geological environments. The teams of proponents should include a wide range of tsunami experts, sedimento-logists, paleoceanographers, geotechnical engineers, and deep-sea observatories.8

Commissioner Maria Damanaki October 9, 2012 Page 6 Tsunamis are seismic sea waves caused by earthquakes, submarine landslides, and, infrequently, by eruptions of island volcanoes.9

The expansion and movement of deepwater drilling for oil to the Arctic region is not geographically confined. Deepwater Drilling Rig Forecast 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2010‐2015 Growth10

US GoM Current Path Case 29 25 27 27 28 28 ‐ 3%

US GoM Best Post‐Moratorium Case 29 25 35 36 38 38 31%

Africa / Mediterranean 31 38 47 58 59 60 92%

Asia / Pacific 46 44 44 46 53 54 96%

North Sea / Arctic 40 40 43 43 45 46 15%

South America 70 98 107 129 130 131 86%

Mexico & Canada 7 9 9 11 11 11 57%

The impact to the world is far reaching.

Volcanoes are not randomly distributed over the Earth's surface. Most are concentrated on the edges of continents, along island chains, or beneath the sea forming long mountain ranges. More than half of the world's active volcanoes above sea level encircle the Pacific Ocean to form the circum-Pacific "Ring of Fire.”

In the past 25 years, scientists have developed a theory -- called plate tectonics – that explains the locations of volcanoes and their relationship to other large-scale geologic features. ... According to this theory, the Earth's surface is made up of a patchwork of about a dozen large plates that move relative to one another at speeds from less than one centimeter to about ten centimeters per year (about the speed at which fingernails grow). These rigid plates, whose average thickness is about 80 kilometers, are spreading apart, sliding past each other, or colliding with each other in slow motion on top of the Earth's hot, pliable interior.

Commissioner Maria Damanaki October 9, 2012 Page 7

Volcanoes tend to form where plates collide or spread apart, but they can also grow in the middle of a plate, as for example the Hawaiian volcanoes.

Divergent boundaries occur along spreading centers where plates are moving apart and new crust is created by magma pushing up from the mantle . . . Perhaps the best known of the divergent boundaries is the Mid-Atlantic Ridge. This submerged mountain range, which extends from the Arctic Ocean to beyond the southern tip of Africa, is but one segment of the global mid-ocean ridge system that encircles the Earth. The volcanic country of Iceland, which straddles the Mid-Atlantic Ridge, offers scientists a natural laboratory for studying on land the processes also occurring along the submerged parts of a spreading ridge. Iceland is splitting along the spreading center between the North American and Eurasian Plates, as North America moves westward relative to Eurasia. The consequences of plate movement are easy to see around Krafla Volcano, in the northeastern part of Iceland. Here, existing ground cracks have widened and new ones appear every few months. From 1975 to 1984, numerous episodes of rifting (surface cracking) took place along the Krafla fissure zone. Some of these rifting events were accompanied by volcanic activity; the ground would gradually rise 1-2 m before abruptly dropping, signaling an impending eruption. Between 1975 and 1984, the displacements caused by rifting totaled about 7 m. . . . (In Iceland the Mid-Atlantic Ridge is exposed on land; Clarification supplied) As with earthquakes, volcanic activity is linked to plate-tectonic processes. Most of the world's active above-sea volcanoes are located near convergent plate boundaries where subduction is occurring, particularly around the Pacific basin. However, much more volcanism -- producing about three quarters of all lava erupted on Earth -- takes place unseen beneath the ocean, mostly along the oceanic spreading centers, such as the Mid-Atlantic Ridge and the East Pacific Rise.11

Disturbing the earth, on land, above or below the sea, the air above has consequences, some not immediately discernible, others immediate. We need to proceed with due diligence, with caution and with the vision and forethought that what we do today will be our legacy for generations to come.

Commissioner Maria Damanaki October 9, 2012 Page 8 The changes to the earth caused by the polar shift, global warming, and the melting of the polar caps require greater scrutiny in an environmental analysis, assessment and impact statement. The impact of activity in one area of the world should not be insular and localized as the impact may reach beyond that region or area. My hope is that you and members on your team can provide an answer. I believe that solutions come from faraway places. Thank you for the opportunity to share my thoughts with you. Respectfully,

Signed Electronically

Clifton M. Hasegawa Copy to: Dennis L. Bryant, Esq.

Table of Citations

1. Bryant’s Maritime Consulting. Web site: http://brymar-consulting.com

2. Quest Offshore Resources, Inc. prepared for American Petroleum Institute, The State of

the Offshore U.S. Oil and Gas Industry. Sugar Land, Texas: Quest Offshore Resources,

Inc., December 2011. at page 27. Web Reference:

http://energytomorrow.org/images/uploads/Quest_2011_December_29_Final.pdf

3. Garver, Jr., John B., Chief Cartographer. "Exploring and Mapping the Seafloor." World Ocean Floors: Arctic Ocean. Washington, D.C.: National Geographic Society, January 1990. Print. 4. "Drilling and Completions." Chevron Worldwide. April 2012. Web Reference: http://www.chevron.com/deliveringenergy/oil/drillingcompletions 5. Rivera, Paul C., and Tariq Masood Ali Kahn. "Discovery of the Major Mechanism of

Global Warming and Climate Change." Journal of Basic & Applied Sciences. 8. (2012):

59-73. Web Reference:

http://www.lifescienceglobal.com/images/Journal_articles/JBASV8N1A10-Rivera.pdf

6. Environmental Impact Analysis 2010 Outer Continental Shell Exploration Drilling Program, Appendix H, at page 341. Web Reference: http://www.alaska.boemre.gov/ref/ProjectHistory/Shell_CamdenBF/2009_EP/2009_ EP_h1.pdf

7. Environmental Impact Analysis 2010 Outer Continental Shell Exploration Drilling

Program, Appendix H, at page 341, cited above.

8. Camerlenghi, Angelo, Roger Urgeles, Gemma Ercilla, and Warner Brückmann. "Scientific

Ocean Drilling Behind the Assessment of Geo-Hazards from Submarine Slides." Scientific

Drilling. No. 4. (March 2007): 45-47. Web Reference:

http://www.iodp.org/iodp_journals/12_Scientific_Ocean_Drilling_Behind_SD4.pdf

9. U.S. Geologic Survey (USGS). Web Reference:

http://vulcan.wr.usgs.gov/Glossary/Tsunami/description_tsunami.html

10. Quest Offshore Resources, Inc. prepared for American Petroleum Institute, The State of

the Offshore U.S. Oil and Gas Industry. Sugar Land, Texas: Quest Offshore Resources,

Inc., December 2011. at page 27. Web Reference:

http://energytomorrow.org/images/uploads/Quest_2011_December_29_Final.pdf

11. U.S. Geologic Survey (USGS). "Ring of Fire", Plate Tectonics, Sea-Floor Spreading, Subduction Zones, "Hot Spots" Web Reference: http://vulcan.wr.usgs.gov/Glossary/PlateTectonics/description_plate_tectonics.html