In the latest development in the ongoing saga of the proposed land swap in the Yukon Flats National Wildlife Refuge, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has decided to prepare an environmental impact statement for the area. The purpose of the land swap, which would be between Fish and Wildlife and Doyon Ltd., a Fairbanks-based Alaska Native regional corporation, is to consolidate some existing Doyon oil and gas prospects with prospects on adjacent Fish and Wildlife Service land.
Some communities in the flats have expressed vehement opposition to the proposal while others have expressed support. Back in March, faced with a barrage of questions, Fish and Wildlife extended the public comment period for the proposal from April 1 to July 30.
EIS not required by law
Although an EIS is not required for the conveyance of National Wildlife Refuge Lands to a Native organization, Fish and Wildlife is responding to numerous requests for an EIS for this particular land exchange.
“One of the things that we did hear from a lot of people in the public meetings and through the comments that we’ve received so far was that people wanted us to do an EIS,” Ted Heuer, Yukon Flats National Wildlife refuge manager, told Petroleum News. “We decide to give everyone who wants to weigh in on the issues more time to think about it and we’ll have a better evaluation of the social and economic-type impacts that could be associated with this.”
In Febuary Fish and Wildlife issued an evaluation and review report on the land swap. That report contains some of the environmental and potential impact information that would go into an EIS.
“We will use the comments that we receive on that evaluation document as kind of scoping for the EIS, to see what issues were raised,” Heuer said.
Support from Doyon
Doyon supports the development of an EIS, James Mery, Doyon’s vice president for lands and natural resources, told Petroleum News.
“We’re supportive of it and have been for some time,” Mery said. “There was some reluctance (to do an EIS) on the part of the Fish and Wildlife service last fall.”
Mery said that the complexity of the land exchange and the potential linkage to oil and gas development was raising concerns. He said that there had been “some concerns by even our own shareholders that maybe we’re going a little fast on this thing and a little more study might be needed.”
Everything underscored the need to do an EIS and to get folks more comfortable with the proposal, Mery said.
Prospective lands
The land swap would involve shuffling the ownership of a jigsaw puzzle of land tracts inside the outer boundary of the Yukon Flats National Wildlife Refuge. Doyon would assemble an area of fee title estate over the deepest part of the Yukon Flats sedimentary basin, on the southern side of the basin — fee title involves both surface and subsurface ownership. The area of fee title estate would be surrounded by a halo of Doyon-owned subsurface estate, accessible by directional drilling from the fee title estate.
In December of last year the U.S. Geological Survey published its oil and gas assessment of the Yukon Flats basin. That assessment pointed to the possible existence of 173 million barrels of oil and 5.5 trillion cubic feet of natural gas technically recoverable from the basin. The deep southern side of the basin where Doyon would gain land is particularly prospective.
So Doyon and its Native shareholders stand to reap substantial profits from oil or gas developments on land acquired in the swap. The Doyon shareholders live in interior Alaska, including the Yukon Flats area.
Oil and gas development activities could also bring an influx of money and work to the Yukon Flats.
Determining the acreages
According to its evaluation and review document Fish and Wildlife based its land selections for the swap on fish and wildlife habitats and on the contribution that the land might make to the refuge. Fish and Wildlife believes that it would “acquire many of the high-priority fish and wildlife habitats identified on Doyon’s lands.” On the other hand, much of the land that Fish and Wildlife would give to Doyon lies in upland areas of the refuge.
Fish and Wildlife would receive acreage appraised to be equal in value to the acreage that it would be giving to Doyon. The actual acreage of land to be swapped would be determined using the Uniform Appraisal Standards for Federal Land Acquisition, a code that all government appraisers use to ensure consistency in establishing land values when acquiring real estate on behalf of the United States.
Because of the valuable oil and gas potential of the land that Doyon receives and because of the subsurface “halo” lands, Fish and Wildlife would receive a higher surface acreage than the surface acreage that it would give up. An agreement in principle for the exchange anticipates that Doyon will receive 110,000 acres of fee title land and 97,000 acres of subsurface land. Fish and Wildlife will receive 150,000 acres of fee title land.
In addition, Doyon will reallocate most of its remaining 12(b) entitlement of 56,517 acres under the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act to an area outside the Yukon Flats Refuge. “Without this agreement, Doyon would likely allocate their remaining 12(b) entitlement to villages within the Refuge, reducing total federal holdings inside the boundaries,” according to the agreement in principle.
12(b) entitlements consist of land areas earmarked for villages in excess of the acreages in and immediately around village locations. Many of the 12(b) entitlements have yet to be conveyed to the villages.
Furthermore, “if Doyon produces oil and/or gas on the lands acquired from the Service, Doyon will pay the United States a production payment of 1.25 percent of the resource value at the wellhead. These payments would increase to 1.5 percent if a transportation corridor crosses Refuge lands,” the agreement in principle says. The federal government would use the money to purchase further lands within national wildlife refuges. And if oil or gas production occurs from Doyon’s acquired land Doyon will sell to the United States an additional 120,000 acres of surface and subsurface land within the perimeter of the Yukon Flats Wildlife Refuge.
Local concerns
The potential net loss of Native-owned surface land acreage within the Yukon Flats forms one of the more contentious issues facing the land swap proposal. Local communities use the flats for subsistence hunting and retain control over land that they own.
Fort Yukon, also known by its Gwich’in Athabascan name of Gwichyaa Zhee, is fervently opposed to the land swap. Gary Lawrence, executive director of the Gwichyaa Zhee Gwich’in Tribal Government, told Petroleum News about the community’s concerns.
“Doyon is trading more lands for what they are receiving, based on appraisal value,” Lawrence said. “We think if there is going to be a switch it should be acreage for acreage and not based on any appraisals.”
Lawrence is particularly critical about the potential loss of 12(b) lands from the flats.
“We’re already checkerboarded and our land is rapidly leaving Native hands,” he said. “We believe we’re losing our Native land base within our traditional territories.”
Lawrence also said that the Gwichyaa Zhee community has for some time been opposed to oil and gas development in the Yukon Flats because of the potential environmental impacts on the area, especially on the Yukon River.
“We can’t compromise in oil development on one of the largest rivers in the world and we depend on this river for all of our subsistence resources — ducks, geese, fish etc.,” he said.
Lawrence also expressed concern about potential pollution from gas flaring.
“We live in a big basin here and in the winter time when it’s 50 below all of that … smoke and pollution is going to be settling on top of the land and contaminating the resources and us at the same time,” he said.
Lawrence questioned how much local employment might result from oil and gas developments — he said that Doyon has in the past fallen well short of its commitments for shareholder hire in North Slope oilfield work.
The Gwichyaa Zhee community also worries that easy road access and an influx of industry will undermine traditional ways of life. A lot our people will leave the village; there will be more drugs and alcohol; and people from elsewhere will have easier access to subsistence resources, Lawrence said.
While accepting that industrial development brings both benefits and problems, Lawrence expects that the overall impact on his community would be negative.
“We believe it’s a direct threat on our Gwich’in way of life,” he said.
Gwich’in Gathering
The tribal leaders from five villages in the Yukon Flats held a Gwich’in Gathering on June 13 to 16 to discuss the land swap. According to a Fairbanks Daily News-Miner report the majority of the chiefs at the gathering expressed concern about the potential impact of oil and gas development in the area.
“Development would destroy the land,” Paul Nathaniel, first chief of Circle said. “It’s our land and we should have a right to say what comes out of the land.”
However, some people in the communities want to make sure that the villages in the flats benefit from any development.
“People want to benefit from this,” Beaver resident Cliff Adams said. “The opposition is the opinion of the tribal leaders but an issue this big should be taken up with a vote of all the tribal members.”
And some tribes in the flats have previously been reported as supporting the land swap. For example, Birch Creek Chief Winston James has stated that oil and exploration and development would prove vital to his community’s survival and long-term sustainability — Birch Creek is located near the area where Doyon wants to consolidate its prospective land holdings.
So, how will this complex issue be resolved?
Both Heuer and Mery expect that the EIS process will provide opportunity for discussion and thought about the proposals. It’s not yet clear exactly when the EIS process will start, although Mery expects the process to last 18 to 20 months.
Meantime, a group within the Native community will work through some of the issues.
“We had a meeting just last Friday with all of the chiefs and village corporation presidents and some additional council members from the Yukon Flats communities,” Mery said on June 3. “We identified over a dozen issues that they want to learn more about and understand better. All of us agreed to … cooperate over the coming months to work through those different issues.”
Mery agreed that one of the big issues is the potential impact of people from outside the area on the traditional way of life.
“That’s an issue of high concern,” Mery said. “We think we’ve got the tools to address all of that and we just need to work cooperatively with the folks out there (in the villages).”
We want to make this a project that can work for everybody, Mery said.
