In August 2012, representatives of the international environmental organization Greenpeace International climbed onto the Prirazlomaya oil platform, which belongs to a subsidiary of Gazprom. This event became part of a large-scale protest action of public figures against the extraction of "black gold" in the Arctic. According to ecologists, they are trying to save "the last untouched corner of the planet."
In August 2012, nature fighters from the Greenpeace team boarded the Arctic sunrise ship in the Murmansk port and headed for the Prilazlomnoye field. The drilling platform was created specifically for the development of the Arctic shelf of the Russian Federation - the country's resource potential. Being in the very center of development was supposed to allow ecologists to conduct a more complete study of the ecological situation in the Arctic Circle.
On the morning of August 24, six representatives of the environmental organization reached the platform in the Pechora Sea in inflatable boats. With the help of mountaineering equipment, they anchored on the sides of the Prirazlomnaya, where they were greeted by streams of water from the fireboats. However, the workers of the drilling rig and representatives of the authorities did not stop the activists - after a while they managed to settle down on the platform itself and launched slogans calling to stop the drilling of wells.
According to Kumi Naidu, executive director of Greenpeace International, the task of ecologists is to draw the attention of the government and the public to the Arctic oil rush. The corporations Gazprom, Rosneft, BP and Shell, from Naidu's point of view, pose a huge risk to the region. The difficult conditions of drilling wells at the bottom of the Arctic waters will require the clearing of drifting ice and icebergs, and an environmental disaster becomes a matter of time. If it does happen, the rescue operation will be extremely difficult to organize: weather conditions, long polar night and remoteness of the territory will interfere.
Oil production can be dangerous for the wildlife of the North Pole. Thus, fish die from seismic acoustics, while walruses and polar bears develop various pathologies. The Greenpeace people believe that the only way to save the world of the Arctic plume is a complete ban on oil production in the region. This was reported by "Komsomolskaya Pravda" and "RIA-Novosti".
15 hours after the start of the action on the Prirazlomnaya platform, Kumi Naidu's team left the rig, but promised to keep oil production under their control. The Union of Oil and Gas Producers of the Russian Federation called the action of ecologists senseless. In an interview with Moskovsky Komsomolets, the president of the Union, Gennady Shmal, emphasized that the extraction of "black gold" in the Arctic cannot be stopped. One Prirazlomnoye field will allow to produce 72 million of oil, therefore it is the most important project of the Russian government.
This is not the first time Greenpeace International has attacked oil companies in the Arctic. For example, in 2011, environmentalists were able to enter a rescue capsule above a drill on an English oil platform owned by Cairn Energy. Activists of the "green world" do not give up, and are going to achieve their goal - to create a world reserve around the North Pole.
