The Last Wild Place: War Over Arctic Oil

(2 of 6)

Later this month Murkowski plans to introduce a Senate bill calling for oil exploration in 1.5 million acres of the ANWR coastal plain, north of the Brooks Range and east of the Canning River--a section known as Area 1002. Murkowski's legislation, like the Bush recommendations that will follow it, faces stiff opposition in the evenly divided Senate, not just from Democrats but from a key bloc of at least eight Republicans--Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins of Maine, Bob Smith of New Hampshire, James Jeffords of Vermont, Lincoln Chafee of Rhode Island, Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania, Peter Fitzgerald of Illinois and Gordon Smith of Oregon--who have the power to defeat the bill. (Only three Democratic Senators, Louisiana's John Breaux and Daniel Inouye and Daniel Akaka, both of Hawaii, have come out so far in favor of drilling in the refuge.) Murkowski promises to attract antidrilling Senators to his cause. What remains unclear is how hard Bush intends to fight for oil exploration in the Arctic refuge. If ANWR is in the Bush energy bill, New Hampshire's Smith tells TIME, "it will be the lightning rod, and very good parts of the energy bill will be lost. I think it would be a mistake to have it in."

Smith and his fellow Republicans don't relish the idea of voting against their President--especially if Bush decides to make ANWR a test of party loyalty. But the legislators from environmentally conscious states also know the public remains troubled by the idea of drilling in the refuge. In the latest TIME/CNN poll, a majority of those surveyed, 52%, said they oppose drilling there, while 41% were in favor. Environmental groups, which argue that the oil deposits in question could amount to less than a six-month domestic supply (see box), are confident they can win this war. "If we have to have a first big battle, this is a good one to have," says Carl Pope, executive director of the Sierra Club.

But big oil is also optimistic that it can push through a bill before oil prices come down and the sense of crisis abates. "We are in a window, which basically forces us to go flat out," says Roger Herrera, a 33-year veteran of British Petroleum who now lobbies for opening ANWR in Washington. "We'll use a range of arguments. National security, dependence on unreliable sources in the Middle East, cost of energy. The best way of winning is to make people concerned about the cost of filling up their gas tank. It will all be over by September."