PEREGRINE科滴 一些科文

828的鼓 0站台

The oil flows more slowly, the climate changes more quickly

石油更慢地流，候更快地化。

 

1. 2022年9月8日，安克拉治、班克斯、科策布及於阿拉斯加州的家石油自然保。  (援用自原文)

 

It is june in the Alaskan Arctic and two grizzlies are traversing the tundra at an hour that would, at lower latitudes, be dawn. One, a blonde, ambles along a riverbank, light from the already-high sun glinting off her massive haunches. The other, chocolate-coloured, is loping to catch up with her, his heaving breath audible from your correspondent’s seat at the mouth of her small tent.

於美阿拉斯加州北地，目前是6月。大灰熊正在穿越，於低度地是黎明分的苔原。一色，沿著一河岸逛，自已高升的光，照耀著其粗大臀部。另一巧克力色，正大步跑以追上。通者小篷口的座椅，能到其喘息。

 

Though she is camping on the other side of a frigid river, its channel is narrow enough to be a moment’s swim for a bear so inclined. Thankfully humans are incidental to these grizzlies’ morning. The dark bear reaches the blonde. They mate and loll, briefly, then lumber up a hill, over a ridge and vanish.

然通者在一寒冷河流的另一露，不其河道窄，就一有如此向的熊而言，是片刻的游泳。欣慰的是，此些大灰熊的早晨而言，人是偶然的。此黑熊打淡色的熊。短地交配及散地逛，然後爬上一座山丘，越山脊，然後消失。

 

The camping party was brought to this northern tundra by a bush plane, tossed around like a wiffle ball as it flew over the craggy peaks of the Brooks Range. Bulbous bush tyres bounced along a gravel riverbed; conservationists, a handful of amateur explorers and their paraphernalia were unloaded and left alone on the North Slope.

露是由一架林到北方片苔原，越布克斯山的崎山峰，如一威夫球(一改良的棒球，藉由投出去的空速流，造成化速度大的化球)般晃。球灌木箍沿著石河床跳；保主者、少探家及其身物品，被卸下孤地留在阿拉斯加州北坡(美阿拉斯加州，布克斯山的北坡地)。

 

The landscape’s most obvious trait is absence. The closest human habitation, Point Lay (pop. 176) is some 130km (80 miles) west. There is no signal for a mobile phone. There are no houses, no roads, nor even trails, save for those trodden by game. Snow is smeared in bands on gentle hills. As the Arctic has warmed the brush has inched taller and the tundra grown greener. For now, though, this is still too far north for trees.

缺乏最明特徵的景。最近的人居住地，Point Lay(人口，176人)位於西方130公里(80英里)。行信。房屋、道路，甚至除了那些被物踩的，也有小。雪以覆於平的山坡上。由於北地已暖化，因此灌木已慢慢往高移，苔原也的更翠。

 

But the emptiness is alive. Northern white anemones and purple saxifrage soak up precious sun, full grown, tiny and miraculous, shimmying defiantly in the howling summer wind. Braided rivers diverge and converge around long strips of gravel. Nesting among the mud, flowers and cotton grass are the birds—here the golden plover, a ribbon of white feathers draped from brow to breast, there the willow ptarmigan, mottled brown in summer, white when the snows come.

不，此野是充生的。北方白海葵及完全成、微小且神奇的紫虎耳草，吸收著珍的光。在呼的夏中，恣意地著。呈交的河流，著的石堆，分叉及合。在泥土、花及棉草巢。在的金，一白色羽毛，眉垂到胸前。那的柳雷(也被柳松)，夏天呈斑的棕色，下雪呈白色。

&nbp;

Musk oxen leave tufts of qiviut, an underfur warmer than wool, caught in low thickets of silvery willow. Hundreds of thousands of caribou travel north across the tundra to the coast to calve, hoping the sea breeze will bring respite from the mosquitoes: a caribou can lose two litres of blood to them over the summer. Along the game trails are pits dug long ago by indigenous hunters from which they might wait for passing caribou then move, swiftly, to strike.

麝牛留下一簇簇，被低矮柳住的qiviut (一比羊毛更暖的下毛)。北美鹿向北穿越苔原到海岸，希望海能解蚊子的：在夏天期，蚊子吸食一北美鹿，公升的血液。沿著物小，是土著人很久前挖的坑。那，他能等待的北美鹿，然後迅速移、行攻。

 

There is life across the North Slope’s surface. Beneath it there is ice—or at least frozen soil. The warmth of a single summer never gets deep enough to undo the work of winter. The summed effect of many warmer summers, though, is reaching deeper; the permafrost is thinning.

阿拉斯加州北坡，地面到有生命。在其下面有冰，或至少是土。一夏天的暖度，法深，足以消除冬天的量。然而，多暖和夏季的合效，正在及於深。因此，永久土正薄中。

 

Below the permafrost are sedimentary rocks, some of them laid down in a basin created by the rise of the Brooks Range to the south. The seas in that basin, too, were full of life. Some of its buried, liquefied remains went on to follow their own slow migration to what today are oilfields.

永久土下面是沉岩，其中有些躺在，由阿拉斯加州北部布克斯山向南上升，形成的一盆地中。在那盆地中的大淡水湖，也充著生命。其一些被掩埋、液化的骸，持著其慢的移，到了今天所的石油地。

 

A visitor sees this expanse as wilderness; indigenous people who have lived here for millennia would call it home. Climate science sees it as the retreating edge of the cryosphere, the part of the planet which is frozen. Federal law calls it the National Petroleum Reserve in Alaska (NPR-A). In Alaska land, ice and oil stack neatly one over the other. In the courts they come into conflict.

客此域荒野；在生活千年的原住民，它家。候科其冰圈(地球被的部分)的退。美邦法，其阿拉斯加州家石油自然保(NPR-A)。在阿拉斯加州的土地中，冰及石油整地堆在一起。在法庭上，他生突。

 

Persistent fights over who controls Alaska’s land, how it should be developed and how it should be protected are ramping up in the face of uncertainty over both oil and ice. Alaska’s crude-oil output is nearly 80% below the peak it reached in 1988, when the great Prudhoe Bay field was in its pomp. The state, still sorely dependent on oil revenue, is keen to slow its decline and ideally increase production.

面石油及冰的不定性，有控制阿拉斯加州的土地、如何及如何保它的持，正加中。阿拉斯加州的原油量，低於1988 年到的峰值近80%，普拉德霍大油田於其鼎盛期。仍然重依石油收入的州，渴望其衰退且完美地增加量。

 

ConocoPhillips is eager to help. In 2000 the oil major established a new site called Alpine west of Prudhoe Bay at the edge of NPR-A, some 350km across the tundra from the frisky grizzlies. The company boasts of its small environmental footprint, with horizontal wells sucking up oil miles from the main facility. If the extraction’s immediate impact on the environment is lessened, so is the environment’s impact on those doing the extracting.

一家部在美德克斯州休斯之能源走廊的能源公司，康菲公司(ConocoPhillips)很想助。於2000年，石油巨擘，在阿拉斯加州家石油自然保的普拉德霍西方，大灰熊活的苔原大350公里，建立了一名Alpine的新所。公司耀，其具有吸取主要施英里石油之向井的小境足。倘若提取境的直接影被少，境那些行提取者的影也同少。

 

In the early days of Alaska’s oil boom a reporter marvelled at oil workers’ fortitude, noting that “another species has been added to the handful capable of surviving in the North Slope wilderness—the oil man.” When your correspondent flew to Alpine with Conoco half a century later the oil men had made themselves at home. The maze of mint-green structures houses a gym and a cafeteria. Flat-screen televisions show Fox News and “The Office”.

在阿拉斯加州石油繁初期，一位者於石油工人的。特提及，「另一已被添加到，少能在阿拉斯加州北坡荒野中，生存的物—石油人。」半世後，通者康菲公司人一起往Alpine，此些石油人已安居。迷般的薄荷色建物，有健身房及自助餐。平板播放福克斯新及“公室”(美)。

 

Since establishing Alpine, Conoco has continued its move to the west with new wells in NPR-A. America’s Bureau of Land Management (BLM) is on the verge of deciding whether to allow it to exploit by far the richest of the prospects it has found there, called Willow. At 180,000 barrels a day, it would increase the state’s crude-oil output by more than a third. The deadline for comments on the proposal was August 29th.

打成立Alpine以，康菲公司一直持其向西的移，在家石油自然保新建油井。美土地管理局(BLM)即定，是否允它，其在那已，被Willow之迄今止最富的藏。一天18桶，使州原油量增加，三分之一以上。提案的，截止日期2022年8月29日。

 

More projects may follow, both in NPR-A and elsewhere in Alaska, due to new discoveries and the new Inflation Reduction Act, which accelerates oil leasing on federal lands as well as boosting green energy. Mike Dunleavy, the state’s governor, is delighted by the prospect. “People outside the state like to claim Alaska is some nirvana that needs to be saved,” he says. But, as he points out, demand for oil continues to rise. He portrays new developments as a matter of urgency.

由於新的，及加速邦土地上之石油租促色能源的新通膨降低法案，在家石油自然保及阿拉斯加州其他地方，可能之而更多的。州州，Mike Dunleavy此前景感到欣喜。他宣：「州以外的人喜，阿拉斯加州是需要被保留的佳世界。」不，如同他指出的，石油的需求持上升。因此，他新的描述急事。

 

But so, too, is limiting the effects of climate change—effects Alaska feels more keenly than most. Recent research shows that the Arctic’s pace of warming over the past 50 years has been nearly four times the global rate.

不，也正在限候的多影。阿拉斯加州比大多的州，更烈感受候的影。最近的研究示，在去50年，北地的暖化速度，乎已是全球速度的四倍。

 

Coastal erosion has forced some native villages to begin the arduous work of relocation. Greenhouse-gas emissions from the thawed-out soil and the retreat of summer sea-ice from the northern coast accelerate the warming driven by fossil-fuel use well beyond the state’s borders.

海岸侵已迫使一些原住民村，始苦的移工作。由於解之土壤的室排放，及北部海岸夏季海冰的退，加速由化石燃料使用所的暖化，超出州界。

 

If, from a small tent in an awesome expanse, Alaska looks like a window to the past, it is also a preview of what is to come. Fights over where and how much to drill are set to intensify around the world as demand for oil persists and concerns about energy security climb.

倘若，位於垠域中的小篷之，阿拉斯加州看像似一扇通往去的窗，也是即生之事的一告。著石油需求的持存在，及有能源安全的不攀升，於在何探及量的，於世界各地始激烈。

 

At the same time the impacts of climate change are becoming ever more evident as the rest of the world follows Alaska into the thawed-out and fiery greenhouse future. Nowhere more clearly shows the forces that will sustain the oil economy, or the cost of failing to give it up.

在此同，世界其他地，阿拉斯加州之後，入解及的室未，候的影正得更明。更清楚展，能持石油，或未能放它之代的影力。

 

(援用自原文)

 

Anchorage, alaska’s biggest city, is the 137th largest metropolitan area in the United States, and in some ways not that unlike Peoria, Illinois, the 138th. Mid-size office buildings sit in a modest grid. There are nail salons and hunting shops. Busy suburban intersections boast pharmacies of ecclesiastical scale.

在美，阿拉斯加州最大城市，安克拉治是第137大的都，且在某些方面第138大的城市，伊利伊州皮里市(Peoria)有什不同。中型公坐落在一中的棋式街道局中。有美甲沙及狩商店。繁忙的郊十字路口，有教模的房。

 

But Peoria contains less than 4% of the population of Illinois, while Anchorage contains more than half the population of Alaska, a state more than ten times larger. In total just 733,000 residents—less than 10% of the population of greater Chicago—occupy a state more than twice the size of Texas and larger than France, Germany and Spain combined. It is this vastness, and the extremes and riches to be found within it, which set Alaska apart from any other state.

不，皮里市具有不及4%伊利伊州的人口，而安克拉治市具有阿拉斯加州半以上的人口。阿拉斯加州是比伊利伊州大十倍以上的州。

共有733千居民(不及大之芝加哥人口的10%)，有一倍多德克斯州，且比法、德及西班牙和要大的州。正是，及在其中被的端事物及富源，使阿拉斯加州任何其他州分。

 

In Anchorage the climate is at the cool end of temperate. Utqiagvik (formerly known as Barrow), the northernmost town in America, frequently reports temperatures of -25°C (-13°F); its midwinter night lasts for two months. Many villages and some towns—even the state capital, Juneau—are not accessible by road. Huge swathes of land feel as they might have done before the settlers came.

在安克拉治，候於爽候的末端。特恰克市(Utqiagvik，先前被通巴(Barrow))是美最北端的城，常有度-25°C(-13°F)的；其隆冬之夜持月。多村及一些城(甚至是州首府，朱(Juneau))法由路到。大片土地的感，如同它在定居者到之前，可能已生般。

 

Its beauties range from the exquisite to the gobsmacking. After rain on the tundra, the leaves of a young lupine flower cradle a single sphere of water at their centre. When a clear day allows the huge bulk of the continent’s highest peak to be seen from Anhorage, 160km away, locals say “Denali is out” in the way people elsewhere speak of the Sun.

其美精到令人。在下雨後的苔原上，一朵清新羽扇豆花的花瓣，一水球托於中央。天晴朗，能160公里外的安克拉治市，看到此大最高峰的巨大部分。地人，以其他地方之人太方式，“德里峰(Denali，位於阿拉斯加山中段，是北美洲最高峰)在那”。

 

The machismo of the adventurer remains. Bush pilots court passengers with the slogan, “Trust us with your life, not your daughter or wife.” Scientists offered your correspondent both clear-headed analysis and way-out-there advice: how to mend your lip if you accidentally slash it with your ice axe (Krazy-Glue); how to deal with the wolves surrounding you and your recently killed caribou when you are hunting on skis in the Brooks Range at -20°C (leave the carcass, lest you become one).

冒家的男子概依然存在。林行使用，“以你的生命，而不是女或妻子的生命，信我”的，招旅客。科家向通者提供了，清醒的分析及出路建：倘若不小心使用冰斧嘴唇，如何修它(使用Krazy-水)；穿著滑雪板，在-20°C的布克斯山中狩，如何理著死之北美鹿的狼(，以免你成一)。

 

For scientists and others, including many of the native Alaskans who comprise a fifth of the population, hunting and fishing are the stuff not of sport, but everyday provisioning. The extremities of the land are to be managed, revered, enjoyed, endured or cursed—but they cannot be ignored.

科家及包括，成阿拉斯加州五分之一人口之原住民的其他人而言，狩及捕是不於育的活，而是了供每日的食物。片土地的多限，被管理、尊敬、享用、忍受或咒。不，它不能被忽。

 

This vast land has also been a setting in which America’s national impulse to bend nature to its use has clashed relentlessly with its urge to protect it. In 1954, 87 years after Alaska was bought from Russia and five years before it became a state, America’s Army Corps of Engineers proposed a 1.5km-long dam across the Yukon river.

在片袤的土地，也一直是美，使自然屈服於其用途的家力，已鼓保它，生酷突。於1954年(在俄斯手中下阿拉斯加的87年後，及其成一州的五年前)，美工程兵提，跨越育空河，建造一座1.5公里的水。

 

This Rampart dam would have created a reservoir ten times the volume of that which the Aswan Dam, begun the same year, would impound in Lake Nasser. It would have had a surface area the size of Lake Erie, or nearly as large as Belgium.

帕特水造出一，是同年始之斯文水，能蓄存湖(位於埃及南部及丹北部)水量十倍的水。它有伊利湖(北美洲五大湖之一)大小的表面，也就是乎比利一大。

 

Not to be outdone by the drawers of water, the high-priests of fire had designs on the land as well. In 1958 the scientists and functionaries of the Atomic Energy Commission’s “Project Plowshare” suggested detonating a series of nuclear bombs on the shore of the Chukchi Sea in order to create a new harbour.

不被事力或碎工作的人超越。不，在片土地上，火的大祭司也有多局。了造一新港，於1958年，美原子能委“犁”(美用於和平建目的之核爆炸物技的)的科家及工作人建，於楚科奇海沿岸引爆一系列核。

 

(援用自：https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chukchi_Sea)

 

These schemes were seen at the time as ambitious but practical ways to generate growth in a huge state with a tiny economy. That today they come across as the fever dreams of a despot (or perhaps a billionaire tech bro) shows how much thinking about the environment has changed in two generations. And the opposition to those affronts mounted by conservationists, native Alaskans, scientists, hunters and others was one of the things which set that change in motion.

於，在一具有小的巨大州中，些被，是雄心勃勃且招致成，可行的方法。今天，它看似暴君(或可能是一富翁科技兄弟)的狂想。示，在代人中，於境的思考已生多大化。而那些遭遇，由保主者、阿拉斯加州原住民、科家、人及其他人起的反，是那改的多事之一。

 

Even early on, the protection the environmentalists achieved was suitably Alaskan in scale. In 1960 activists including Olaus and Mardy Murie and Celia Hunter succeeded, by means of a federal order, in having 36,000 square kilometres (8.9m acres) in the north-east of the state designated as the Arctic National Wildlife Range. It was an area the size of the Death Valley, Yellowstone, Everglades and Grand Canyon national parks combined.

甚至在早期，保主者所得的保，模上是合阿拉斯加州。於1960 年，包括斯(Olaus)、迪·穆里(Mardy Murie)及西莉·亨特(Celia Hunter) 等行主者，藉由一邦命令，在州北部，成功得36千平方公里(890英)土地，被指定北家野生物生。此面大小是美死亡谷、石、大沼地及大谷等家公和。

 

The protection of Alaska was far from the beginning of America’s love for wilderness. But it helped provide the ideas of Henry David Thoreau, John Muir and other forebears with a new theatre, and new impetus. In 1964 Lyndon Johnson signed the Wilderness Act, codifying the notion of wilderness as a portal in time linking Americans now and in future to the past. Mardy Murie was one of those present to hear the president talk of wilderness as providing “a glimpse of the world as it was in the beginning.”

阿拉斯加州的保，非美荒野的始。不，有助於亨利大梭(Henry David Thoreau)、翰(John Muir)及其他前的信念，提供新所及新推力。於1964年，美林登·翰(Lyndon Johnson)署了《荒野法案》，荒野的概念纂一，及美人之在及未去起的。迪·穆里(Mardy Murie，一位博物家、作家、冒家及保主者)是在，到到，荒野提供了“一瞥世界最初貌”的人之一。

 

Then, in December 1967, six months after the Department of the Interior killed off the Rampart dam for good, a flare of natural gas suddenly lit up the winter darkness on Alaska’s coastal plain; an exploratory drilling rig had made contact with the hydrocarbons of Prudhoe Bay.

之後，於1967年12 月，在政部永久封帕特水六月後，一股突然冒出的天然，照亮了阿拉斯加州沿海平原的冬季黑暗。一部勘探接已碰到，美阿拉斯加州北坡普拉德霍的碳化合物。

 

Geologists had long thought there might be crude in the North Slope rocks; President Warren Harding had established Alaska’s Naval Petroleum Reserve, the predecessor to NPR-A, in 1923, as an emergency supply of oil for the navy, despite the area’s actual supplies being unknown.

久以，地家一直，於北坡岩石中可能有原油；沃·哈丁曾成立阿拉斯加州的海石油保留地，是阿拉斯加州家石油自然保的前身。於1923年，作海的急石油供，管地的供情不。

 

But decades of exploration and wildcatting had seen little success and by 1967 oil companies’ appetite for investment in the state was all but exhausted. Prudhoe Bay changed that. In 1968 its recoverable reserves were estimated at up to 10bn barrels. It was, the New York Times reported, “the richest treasure trove in American history.”

不，十年的探勘及掘一直少成功。因此，到了1967年，多石油公司於州投的趣乎耗。普拉德霍改了那情。於1968年，其可的量，估高100桶。《》，是“美史上最富的”。

 

Hardly, though, the most accessible. Sea ice made it impossible to get the oil to market by tanker. Transporting it to the ice-free port of Valdez on the southern coast would require a 1,300km pipeline over harsh landscape. It would also require bridging a range of legal obstacles.

不，非最易於取得的。海冰使油不可能石油往市。石油送到南部海岸不冰的瓦迪港，需要一穿越劣地形、1300公里的管道。也需要克服一系列法律障。

 

The Trans Alaska Pipeline System (TAPS) was the first big oil project forced to balance the interests of oil and the perceived interests of the nation with those of native people and the environment.

跨阿拉斯加州的管道系(TAPS)是第一被迫行，石油利益家、地人察之利益及境平衡的大型石油。

 

The need to address the claims of native Alaskans led to the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act, of 1971. It ordered the BLM to transfer more than 180,000 square kilometres to Alaska natives, about 11% of the state’s total land, and paid them nearly $1bn for lands not given.

面阿拉斯加州原住民索的需求，致了1971年，阿拉斯加州原住民索解法案。法案命令土地管理局(BLM：Bureau of Land Management)大州土地11%，超18平方公里的土地，阿拉斯加州原住民，支付了近10 美元，未得土地的人。

 

Title to native lands went to regional and village corporations charged with advancing the prosperity of their native shareholders. Along the North Slope, in particular, the interests of the most powerful native organisations were now aligned with those of the oil sector.

有土著土地的有，於促其土著股繁的地及村公司。特是，沿著北坡，最大之土著的利益，目前石油部的利益一致。

 

Environmentalists stood at right angles to that alignment. In 1970 the initial environmental-impact report filed for TAPS—just eight pages long—had immediately been challenged in the courts and the challenges had kept coming. But the Arab oil embargo in the autumn of 1973 sealed their fate.

保主者上述，一致於保守立。於1970年，有跨阿拉斯加州之管道系，最初提交的境影告(只有8)，在法庭上立即遭到疑，且挑不出。不，於1973年秋天，阿拉伯石油禁定了它的命。

 

By November Richard Nixon had signed an act exempting the pipeline from further environmental review. America’s most ambitious engineering project since the Moon landings was completed four years later at a cost of $7.8bn (about $38bn today).

到了11月，理查德尼克森署了一，豁免管道一步境查的法案。打登月球以，美最雄心勃勃的工程，在四年後完成，耗78 美元(目前大380美元)。

 

The oil boom filled Alaska’s coffers to bursting; to this day it has no income tax or sales tax. Prudently, in 1976 the state legislature had created a sovereign wealth fund, the “permanent fund”. It both pays every Alaskan an annual dividend and makes investments to assure the state an income after the oil runs out.

石油迅速展使阿拉斯加州的金爆；直到目前，它一直有所得或售。慎的是，於1976年，州已主富基金，即“永久基金”。基金兼具支付每位阿拉斯加人的年度股息，及行投以保州，在石油耗後的一收入。

 

The first premonition that the oil might run out sooner rather than later was when a vastly expensive exploration well off the coast came up dry. Hopes of another field to rival Prudhoe Bay foundered. By 1988, with TAPS handling 2.1m barrels of oil a day, production had peaked.

石油早耗的第一感是，海岸外一口耗巨大的勘探井乾涸。另一地普拉德霍的希望破了。到1988年，著跨阿拉斯加州的管道系，每天理210桶石油，量已峰。

 

Many Alaskans, and Republicans in Washington, DC, sought to improve the outlook by opening new land to exploration—specifically, some of the land in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, created as the successor to the Arctic National Wildlife Range when, in 1980, sweeping federa legislation saw 28% of Alaska’s lands protected.

多阿拉斯加人，及盛特的共和人，求藉由勘探的新土地，改善前景。特是，於北家野生物保的一些土地。於1980年，全面的邦立法，使阿拉斯加州28%的土地受到保，成北家野生物生的後者。

 

In 1989 a Senate committee took the first steps to authorising such exploration. A week later the Exxon Valdez, a tanker, ran aground not far from the port for which it was named, pouring more than 250,000 barrels of crude into waters home to seals, otters and orca. The ensuing outrage pushed drilling in the refuge back off the table. But its enthusiasts never lost the faith.

於1989年，院委取了，首批授此探勘的步。一周後，一艘油Exxon Valdez，在它被命名的港口不，超25桶原油注到海豹、水及虎息的水域。之而的怒，在保的探推回判桌。不，其狂者未失去信心。

 

They saw the flow through TAPS dwindle year by year—in 2021 the average was 477,798 barrels a day, with the oil heated lest its cold, slowed flow see solidifying wax cling to the pipeline’s inner walls—and fulminated.

他看到，由跨阿拉斯加州之管道系的流量逐年少。管石油被加以免其冷、流慢、看到凝固的粘在管道壁上及爆，不於2021年的平均流量一天477,798桶。

 

The refuge was a symbol of all sorts of environmental rules seen as constraining America’s economic and geopolitical clout. Those who opposed drilling there were ill-informed meddlers, rain clouds searching for a parade.

保是，被制美及地政治影力之各境的一象徵。那些反在那探的人，是找展的雨。也就是，不知情的管事者。

 

Though she did not originate it, it was no accident that the imperative “Drill, baby, drill” became indelibly associated with Sarah Palin, former governor of Alaska, former Republican vice-presidential nominee and, as of a special election on August 16th, defeated candidate for Alaska’s single House seat.

然，不是Sarah Palin起的。不，2008年共和的重要口“探，，探”，成阿拉斯加前州、前共和副候人，及在8月16日的一特中， 阿拉斯加州一院席位候人的她，有著不可磨的，不是偶然的。

 

And drill Ms Palin’s babies have, much to environmentalist chagrin. But they have done so in the lower 48, where fracking and associated technologies have made it possible to draw far more oil from the ground than seemed possible in the 1970s.

而Palin女士的老弟也有探，令保主者非常懊。不，他一直在下48州(用於描述不阿拉斯加及夏威夷以外的美)，行。在那，水力裂及相技，已使其可能地下抽出多於，在1970年代看似可能的石油。

 

When, in 2017, a Republican-led Congress at last authorized oil leasing in the refuge, Kara Moriarty, the boss of the Alaska Oil and Gas Association, framed the relevant pages of the bill, signed by Lisa Murkowski, the state’s senior senator, and hung them in her office. But when the BLM subsequently auctioned leases in the refuge in 2021, no big oil companies bid.

於2017年，共和的在最批准，於保的石油租，阿拉斯加州石油暨天然，Kara Moriarty思了，由州深Lisa Murkowski署之此法案的相面， 它於其公室。不，美土地管理局後，在2021年，拍保的租，有大型石油公司出。

 

In the 1970s, Alaska’s importance was that the oilfields in the lower 48 were all past their peak; only Alaska could offer new supply. Now fracking, which makes adding production quick and cheap, has provided the energy security that hard-to-work Alaska never in the end delivered.

在1970年代，阿拉斯加州的重要性是，在下48州的油田皆已了高峰期；阿拉斯加州可能提供新供。在，使增加量得快速且廉的水力裂技已提供了，以作之阿拉斯加州，在最未曾的能源安全感。

 

In August the last oil firm with an interest in the refuge, a tiny company called Knik Arm Services, gave up its lease. BP, a supermajor, has sold its holdings in Prudhoe Bay to Hilcorp, a private company that an analysis of greenhouse emissions by the Clean Air Task Force and Ceres, two non-profits, ranks as America’s dirtiest.

於8月，保感趣、名Knik Arm Services的最後一家小石油公司，放了其租契。石油巨擘，英石油公司(BP：British Petroleum)已其，在普拉德霍的股份出售Hilcorp公司。是一家分析，被Clean Air Task Force and Ceres非利，列美最之室排放的私人公司。

 

Deadhorse, Prudhoe Bay’s main air hub, is strewn with pipe and rigs. Some will be transported to drill sites in winter, when ice roads can bear their weight. But it is hard to escape the impression that a giant toddler has lost interest in its playthings.

普拉德霍的主要航空，死(Deadhorse)被散著送管及塔。在冰路能承受其重量的冬天，有些被往探地。不，很避一巨大跚步的小孩，其玩具失去趣的印象。

 

Nevertheless, Alaskan oil still has its hopes. Hilcorp is boosting production from BP’s old wells. Ms Moriarty has guarded against increases in oil taxes, educating legislators on the importance of attracting investment. “A lobbyist ain’t nothin’ but a good teacher,” she says, quoting the advice of an early mentor. And there are Conoco’s new discoveries in NPR-A.

管如此，阿拉斯加州的石油仍然有其希望。Hilcorp公司正在提高，自英石油公司的油井量。Moriarty女士一直注意石油的增加，教立法者有吸引投的重要性。引用一位早期明的建言，她宣：「外的者非要的人，而是一名好老。」因此，在阿拉斯加州家石油自然保中，才有康菲公司(一家能源公司)的新。

 

Oil prospecting has changed a lot since the first gushers of Prudhoe Bay. Truck-bound plates send seismic waves deep below the tundra, sensors gather their echoes, powerful computers interpret their data. Drill bits zig and zag as they sniff around beneath the surface, guided by sensors detecting fault lines. New technology which lowers the work’s environmental footprint also lowers production costs.

打普拉德霍的首批油井以，石油勘探已生很大化。卡上的物，送出苔原下深的地震性波，感器收集此些波的回波，大的算解它的。在地表下到探勘，由的感器引，它呈出曲。降低作境足(示人占用自然源的定量指)的新技，也降低生成本。

 

Last year Conoco told investors that it could make a profit at Willow with oil in the mid $30s per barrel. In addition to the 600m barrels which it has found at Willow itself, the company pointed with optimism to some 3bn additional barrels of oil and gas nearby, equivalent to about one-sixth of the proved reserves of the Permian basin in west Texas and New Mexico.

去年，康菲石油公司告投者，在油每桶於30多美元左右的下，它能在Willow利。除了在Willow本身的6桶石油外，公司地指出，附近有大30桶石油及天然，相於大德克斯州西部新墨西哥州二盆地，之量的六分之一。

 

To the oil industry and the many Alaskans who depend on its revenue, developing Willow is sensible and necessary, a rational strategy to deliver a product the world wants. Through another lens, it is an exercise in elaborate denial.

石油工及多依其收入的阿拉斯加人而言，Willow是切合且必要的。是一提供世界所需品，基於理性的策。另一角度看，是精心策之拒中的一用。

 

About 50km north of the Arctic Circle, on the edge of the Chukchi Sea, sits Kotzebue (pop. 3,283). It has an airport, a hotel owned by nana, a native regional corporation, a grocery store and a hospital. It has a playground and beside it a cemetery.

科策布市(Kotzebue)座落於，北圈北方大50公里的楚科奇海(人口3283人)。它有一、一家由地地公司，NANA公司有的旅、一家店及一家院。它有一，旁是一墓地。

 

In summer it buzzes with the dull roar of all-terrain vehicles as residents enjoy the midnight sun; there is often a child perched between driver and wheel. A bulletin board features notices for Miss Teen Arctic Circle and a food bank funded by ConocoPhillips.

在夏季，居民享受午夜的光，著全地形的低沉，市嗡嗡作。常有一孩子坐在司之。一告上刊登了，有北圈青少年小姐及康菲公司助之食品行的海。

 

As in many Arctic towns the cadence of life depends on ice. In English ice is qualified by adjectives; thick, thin, blue and so on. In Iñupiat its many instantiations have distinct nouns, each an entity unto itself—sarri (ice pack), sikuliak (ice thick enough to walk on), tuvak (landlocked ice), aunnik (rotten ice), pikaluyik (glacial ice) .

多北城一，生活的步取於冰。在英中，冰由形容修；厚、薄、等。在伊努皮特中，其多具例有不同名，本身每是，sarri (冰袋)、sikuliak (厚到可以行走的冰)、tuvak (冰)、aunnik (易碎的冰)、pikaluyik (冰川的冰)。

 

In June men such as Bobby Schaeffer, an Iñupiat elder, spend much of their time on boats, their prey the bearded seals sunning themselves on ice floes in Kotzebue Sound. Hunters look for kunguk, the brightness on the horizon that suggests the presence of sea ice beyond reflecting light to the clouds.

於六月，如Bobby Schaeffer，一名伊努皮特人之年者的男人，大部分都在船上度。他的物是，在科策布海(Kotzebue Sound)之浮冰上，太的髯海豹。人找kunguk，是在地平上示，除了反射到的光之外，也存在著海冰的亮度。

 

The patterns of kunguk are changing. “You see it each year,” says Mr Schaeffer, who tracks sea-ice extent not just as a hunter, but as part of a project run by the University of Alaska Fairbanks to record conditions around Kotzebue. According to John Walsh of the International Arctic Research Centre summer sea-ice in the Arctic has shrunk by about 12% a decade since 1979.

kunguk的模式正在生化。追海冰，其不身一名人，而且是一由阿拉斯加大班克斯分校所行，以科策布市周遭之成的Schaeffer先生宣：「人每年看到它。」根北研究中心，John Walsh的法，打1979年以，於北地的夏季海冰，一直每十年少大12%。

 

The shrinking sea-ice is one of the reasons that the Arctic is warming faster than the rest of the world, a phenomenon called Arctic amplification. Less sea-ice means the amount of sunlight reflected back out into space is lower and the amount absorbed and turned into warmth higher. This and other amplifying mechanisms have long been understood, and Arctic amplification is seen clearly in climate models.

海冰是北地，正比世界其他地更迅速暖化的原因之一。是一，被北放大效的象。少的海冰意味著，反射回太空中的光量少。而被吸收的量，因此成高的暖度。其他的放大制，早已被解。因此，北放大效，在候模型中，明被。

 

But the rate at which it is happening is still a surprise. In a study of observational data sets published in August by Communications Earth and Environment, a peer-reviewed journal, Mika Rantanen and colleagues at the Finnish Meteorological Institute argued that Arctic temperatures had risen at roughly four times the global average from 1979 to 2021.

不，其生的速度仍然是一件令人的事。由自然出版集所同行之《通地球暨境》期刊，於8月刊登的一集研究中，芬象研究所的Mika Rantanen及其同僚，1979年到2021年，北度已上升，大是全球平均值的四倍。

 

And it feeds on itself. The cranking up of temperatures speeds the further melting of sea-ice, which speeds further warming. Other feedbacks come into play, too. As temperatures rise trees will creep further north; snow hidden beneath forest canopies reflects less sun than snow spread over empty tundra, so more warmth will follow.

因此，以其能源。度的刺激加速海冰一步融化，而加速一步暖化。其他反也始起作用。著度上升，木更向北方慢慢移； 覆在空苔原上的雪相比，藏在森林冠下的雪，反射更少光。因此，而是更高的暖度。

 

Perhaps the most pernicious is the thawing of permafrost. Some 85% of Alaska has permafrost beneath the surface, be it hundreds of metres in depth or a slim slice of frozen soil. In the short term, thawing permafrost transforms common landscapes into surrealist ones. So-called drunken forests have trees tilting wildly this way and that, tipped by slumping soil. Behind Mr Walsh’s office in Fairbanks a once-orderly car park has become an undulating funhouse floor.

或，最有害的是永久土融解。阿拉斯加州大85%，在地表下，有深百米或小片薄土的永久土。在短期，融解永久土常的景，成超主的景。所的醉林有木，以方式度斜，而且遭坍塌的土壤翻倒。在Walsh先生位於班克斯市(Fairbanks，阿拉斯加州第二大城市)的公室後面，一曾井然有序的停，已成一，起伏之中的恐怖屋地板。

 

But permafrost poses broader challenges, too. There are about 1.6trn metric tonnes of carbon stored in Arctic permafrost; that is twice the amount currently found in the atmosphere. As temperatures rise, the carbon in soil that had been frozen becomes food on which microbes feast. Carbon dioxide and methane, a more powerful greenhouse gas, escape into the air.

不，永久土也生更泛的挑。於北永久土中，藏了大1.6兆公的碳；那是倍於，目前大中的量。著度升高，土壤中一直被的碳，成微生物盛宴的食物。二氧化碳及甲烷(一更有力之的室)逸出到空中。

 

“The permafrost in the Arctic that has been a carbon sink for tens of thousands of years may slowly be shifting to a carbon source,” explains Sue Natali of the Woodwell Climate Research Centre, an independent institute.

一所立的研究所，伍德威候研究中心的Sue Natali解：「於北地，一直是一碳(能限期累及存碳化合物的天然或人工「」)年的永久土，可能慢地成一碳源。」

 

The trouble is, scientists have only a nebulous understanding of how quickly the shift is happening. Ms Natali is leading an effort to measure and model the thaw. Its measurements of the gases released from the soil are breathalyser tests for a planet under the influence.

是，有此正多快生中，科家只有模糊不清的解。Natali 女士正一，量及模此融解的。土壤中放之的量，是在此影下之行星的呼醉。

 

If the pace of permafrost thaw is uncertain, the way to limit its ultimate extent is clear: slash emissions. “What’s happening here is America’s wake-up call,” Barack Obama told a crowd packed into Kotzebue’s gym when he visited in 2015.

倘若，永久土融解的速度不定，那限其最程度的方法很明：削排放。於2015年，巴拉克巴(Barack Obama)造，他科策布健身房的人群：「正在生的事，是美的警。」

 

It was the first time a sitting president had come north of the Arctic Circle. “Part of the reason why I wanted to take this trip”, he told Rolling Stone, “was to start making it a little more visceral and to highlight for people that this is not a distant problem that we can keep putting off.” He spoke of the urgency of both investing in clean energy and adapting to the impacts of climate change.

是於任期的，首次曾到北圈北方。他告《石》：「我想行次之旅的部分原因，是始使其更加自心，向人，不是一，我能持推的。」他到了，投於能源及候影的迫切性。

 

Seven years later, the country is only just starting to act with the urgency he called for. The Inflation Reduction Act, signed by President Joe Biden in August, includes America’s most significant investments in clean energy to date and will have a substantial impact, in the best case reducing America’s emissions by 2030 to about 40% below the levels of 2005.

七年後，家才始，他呼的迫切性，取行。於8月，·拜登署的《少通膨法案》，包括迄今止，美在能源方面的最重要投。因此，有上的影。在最佳情下，到2030 年，少美排放量到，低於2005年水平的40%左右。

 

But the law does nothing to curb the use of oil—no carbon tax, no cap and trade. And such are the time lags inherent in climate change that even grand cuts today will not appreciably change outcomes for decades. Green energy will ramp up, oil demand will persist and the world will continue to warm.

不，法律限石油的使用。有碳，有限及交易。因此，的法律，是候中，本就有的延，以致於即使今天大幅削，也不明改果，十年。色能源暴增，石油需求持。因此，世界持暖化。

 

Already, climate change has begun to scramble the Arctic’s natural clock. Plants are reaching full growth earlier in the season; that poses challenges to the birds and caribou who migrate over hundreds of miles, only to reach plants and insects past their nutritional peak. But the threat is not just to some magnificent wildernesses, or some abstract idea of the planet. It is to the people who live there.

候已始北地的自然。只是了到植物及昆去的素高峰，植物在本季早些候到完全生；那徙百英里的及北美鹿成多挑。不，此威不只是一些的荒野，或地球的一些抽象概念。也是，在那生活之人的威。

 

So far this year some 12,600 square kilometres of Alaska have been enveloped in flames. Early snowmelt made the ground drier and more susceptible to flames. Warming temperatures have made shrubs taller, providing fires with more tinder. As wildfires burn soil, permafrost is exposed to warmer temperatures, which speeds up its thaw, releasing more greenhouse gases.

迄今止，今年阿拉斯加州大有12千6百平方公里的土地，已遭大火罩。早期的融雪使得地面乾燥，因此容易受到火焰的影。暖化的度使得灌木得更高，火提供了更多火。野火燃土壤，永久土曝露於更高度下，加速了其融解，而放出更多的室。

 

The once-timeless wilderness still needs protection against the oil industry; but now that industry also needs to protect itself against the downstream impacts its products are having on the weather. Consider Willow. The BLM’s newest, court-ordered Draft Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement on Willow, published last month, spans 2,402 pages.

石油工而言，曾是永的荒野仍然需要保。不，目前行也需要保自己，免受其品正天造成的多後段影。思考Willow。土地管理局Willow，上月布之最新、法院命令的充境影告草案，共有2402。

 

It considers five alternatives, including one with no drilling at all. Conoco’s preferred option includes five drill sites, an air strip, a facility to process crude, 506km of pipeline, 60km of gravel roads, a mine to supply that gravel and seven bridges. To stimulate the flow of oil the company would frack the sediments, blasting sand, water and chemicals into each well at 12-20 access points.

草案考了五替代方案，其中一全然不探。康菲公司喜的包括，五探地、一航空跑道、一原油加工施、506公里的管道、60公里的碎石路、一供那碎石路及七座的山。了刺激石油的流，公司在12到20入，沉物、爆破後的砂、水及化品，水力裂到每一口油井中。

 

These elements, Conoco says, are designed to minimise the project’s impact. Extra-long drills allow the company to reach more oil from a single wellhead. Infrared cameras will note the location of polar-bear dens so as to avoid crushing them during construction of each winter’s ice roads. Some assurances drift toward the absurd, the chain of cause and effect a Gordian knot.

康菲公司表示，些要件旨在使的影至最少。超的探使公司得以，一油井口得更多石油。外影能，北熊洞穴位置，以避免每年冬天，於冰路施工程中，碎它。一些保走向了荒，因果是一戈迪安(Gordian knot，通常被用作一以解之的喻)。

The company would use thermosiphons, standard practice in Alaska, to keep the ground cool “in areas where permafrost degradation would be likely due to local conditions or project facilities.” The gravel roads will be bulked up so as to protect the underlying permafrost from the pressure and heat provided by heavy trucks, and thus to protect the road from the effects of thawed permafrost.

公司使用，於阿拉斯加州的做法，虹吸管在，“由於地或施，可能致永久土的地”，保持地面爽。碎石路被加厚，以保下面永久土免受重型卡生的力及量，而保道路免受永久土融解的影。

 

As for the project’s own contribution to climate change, the statement notes that the government “has not set specific thresholds for ghg [greenhouse gas] emissions and while a single project of this size cannot significantly impact global ghg emissions, all projects may cumulatively have a significant impact on global climate change”—the global tragedy of collective action, distilled in the prose of the bureaucrat.

至於本身候化的，明指出，政府“有室排放定具，管模的一，不全球室排放生重大影。不，所有可能累出，全球候生重大的影”。集行的全球悲，在官僚的文章中，遭到。

 

Willow, like every new project in Alaska, has its critics. “Our life, health and safety should not be the cost of oil and gas development and national energy needs,” says Rosemary Ahtuangaruak, former mayor of Nuiqsut (pop. 433), a village close to Alpine. She fears the development will change the migration patterns of the caribou on which her community depends.

如在阿拉斯加州的每新般，Willow的也有其批者。靠近Alpine(位於美阿拉斯加州北坡自治市的一非建制地)之Nuiqsut村(人口，433人)的前村，Rosemary Ahtuangaruak宣：「我的生命、健康及安全，不成石油、天然，及家能源需求的牲物。」她心，此展改，其社所依之北美鹿的徙模式。

 

Peter Winsor of the Alaska Wilderness League, who guided your correspondent on her visit to the wilds of NPR-A, argues that drilling’s risks are not confined to climate change; there was a gas leak at Alpine this year. “These ecosystems and the people who live there are already under such pressure,&rdqu; he protests.

阿拉斯加州荒野盟的Peter Winsor(曾通者造拉斯加州家石油自然保荒野)，探的不限於候；今年在Alpine地生了煤漏。他抗：「些生系及生活在那的人，已承受著的力。」

 

That points to the new reality of Arctic environmentalism: it can no longer be about keeping the wilderness as it was. The caribou are already changing their paths in response to changing seasons; the permafrost is already melting.

那示了北保主的新：不再是有保持荒野的原。在季化作出反上，北美鹿已改了它的路，永久土已融化中。

 

The environmentalists know all this; they know the past will go whatever they do in the present. But Mr Winsor argues that this makes conservation ever more crucial. Minimising all new assaults gives the fragile Arctic its best chance of adjusting to the change it cannot avoid.

保主者知道一切。他知道，他目前做什，去都去。不，Winsor先生，使得保得更重要。使所有新威至最少，脆弱的北有其法避免之化的最好。

 

But the drive for development is strong. ConocoPhillips spent $5.9m on lobbying in the first half of the year, more than in any 12-month period since 2011. The Arctic Slope Regional Corporation, a native conglomerate with $3.9bn in revenue, is firmly in favour of Willow; its boss, Rex Rock, calls the project “critical to the economic well-being of our region’s eight Iñupiat villages”.

不，的力很。今年上半年，康菲公司在上，花了590美元，比2011年以之任何12月的期都多。一家收入39美元的本土合企集，北斜坡域公司支持Willow。其老Rex Rock“我地，八伊努皮特村的福利至重要”。

 

Ms Murkowski points to $10bn in tax revenue, 2,000 jobs in construction and another 300 over Willow’s lifetime. A final BLM decision is expected by the end of the year.

Murkowski女士指出，有1百美元的收、2千在建方面的工作及在Willow存在期的另外300工作。今年年底前，土地管理局做出最後定。

 

Those who want to preserve additional swathes of Alaskan nature are elitist hypocrites, Mr Dunleavy maintains. Oil not drilled in Alaska will be drilled elsewhere—perhaps in a country with fewer environmental protections and a more despotic government. “You have to decide where that energy is going to come from and in what form,” he says. “And there’s nothing free.”

Dunleavy先生持，那些想要保留更多阿拉斯加州自然景域的人，是精英主的君子。在阿拉斯加州石油不被探，也在其他地方被探。或是在一少具有境保且政府制的家。他宣：「人必定，能源哪，及以什形式。因此，有代的事。」

 

Mr Dunleavy is favoured to win his race for re-election this November. Ms Murkowski is hoping her moderate politics and oil-friendly policies will once again secure her place in the Senate, despite her vote to impeach Donald Trump in 2020. Ms Palin will again run against Mary Peltola, who by beating her in August became the state’s first native Alaskan representative.

Dunleavy先生有望，在今年11月得任。管，Murkowski女士在 2020年投票劾唐德·川普。不，她希望其和的政治手腕及石油友好的政策，能再次保她在院的席位。Palin女士再次，在8月她，成州第一位阿拉斯加原住民代表的Mary Peltola。

 

On the coast Kotzebue is bracing for autumn storms—harsher now that the sea ice stands farther from the shore. The caribou have already travelled back across the tundra to winter in the south, a thundering procession along rivers and ridges. Grizzlies are guzzling fish and berries. By late autumn they will hibernate, waiting out the winter as they have always done. Every time they wake, their world is less what it was.

位於沿海的科策布市，正秋季暴做好。更酷的是，目前海冰海岸更。北美鹿已穿越苔原，回南方冬，是一沿著河流及山脊，然似雷般的行。大灰熊正狼吞虎地吃著及果。到了深秋，冬眠，如其往常般等待冬天去。每次醒，的世界不再是其原貌。

 

 

址：https://www.economist.com/essay/2022/09/08/the-alaskan-wilderness-reveals-the-past-and-the-future

翻：