The U.S. Department of Transportation,
Office of Pipeline Safety (USDOT), has designated
much of the Arctic Coastal Plain of Alaska that is
currently occupied by oil and gas infrastructure as
an Unusually Sensitive Area (USA) for Spectacled
Eiders (Somateria fischeri), a threatened species
under the Endangered Species Act (ESA). The
USA designation affects the USDOT-regulated
pipelines in the region including Badami, Endicott,
North Star, Prudhoe Bay NGL, Milne Point,
Kuparuk, Oliktok, Alpine, and the Trans-Alaska
Pipeline. Four DOT-regulated lines are operated by
ConocoPhillips Alaska, Inc. (CPAI), in the
Kuparuk River and Colville River units (Figure 1).
These consist of the Oliktok Pipeline, Kuparuk
Pipeline (including the Kuparuk Extension),
Alpine Oil Pipeline, and the portion of the Alpine
Arctic Heating Fuel Pipeline under the Colville
River. As part of the Pipeline Integrity
Management Plan, CPAI instituted surveys in 2004
for threatened eiders within a corridor along the
USDOT Alpine Oil and the Arctic Heating Fuel
pipelines (hereafter, the Alpine Pipelines) between
the Alpine facilities on the Colville River delta and
Central Processing Facility 2 (CPF-2) in the
Kuparuk Oilfield; the other USDOT pipelines in
the Kuparuk Oilfield area have been covered by
annual aerial surveys for pre-nesting eiders since
1993 (Stickney et al. 2011). CPAI contracted with
ABR, Inc., to conduct an aerial survey for
pre-nesting eiders along the Alpine Pipelines
during June 2011 and to conduct ground surveys
for nests if any Spectacled Eiders were seen during
the aerial survey, as directed by the U.S. Fish and
Wildlife Service.
