[Shell spent 10 years and $7 billion before withdrawing from exploring the arctic because the oil and gas reserves they found were too meager. The company needed “a multi-billion barrel discovery” to “justify going ahead,” Shell chief executive Ben van Beurden said in an investor call last January. Instead, the Berger J well yielded reserves “not sufficient to warrant further exploration,” according to a company statement (full article here ). ] Tad Patzek. 29 Dec 2012. Oil in the Arctic . LifeItself blog. Tad Patzek is a Professor and Chairman of the Petroleum and Geosystems Engineering Department at The University of Texas at Austin. Here are some of the difficulties with drilling and operating offshore oil and gas wells in the Arctic, west and north of Alaska: Gas vs. oil. Natural gas is not oil. Gas price and remoteness of the Arctic make offshore gas production and transport unprofitable. […]