In the end, it just wasn’t worth it for Shell to continue exploring oil reserves in the deep Arctic. It’s too far, there’s too little infrastructure, it’s too dangerous, and there were way too many lawyers and regulators and walruses hanging around, watching their every move.

To turn a profit, Shell would have had to find “ALL. THE. OILZ!” They didn’t come close. From Fuel Fix:

Because of the costs of extracting oil and building the infrastructure to deliver it to market, Shell CEO Ben van Beurden bluntly warned earlier this year that the economics of Shell’s Arctic project would only work “if the structures are full of oil.”

An oil discovery that would be viewed as commercially viable in other basins, such as a 1 billion barrel find in the Gulf of Mexico, wouldn’t pay off in the Arctic right now, noted Dave Pursell, head of securities at Houston-based energy investment bank Tudor, Pickering, Holt & Co.

The system worked. This is how the system is supposed to work. Shell wanted to hit a motherload of oil in an ecologically fragile region. Environmentalists wanted to prevent all drilling whatsoever. The government compromised: it gave Shell a chance to explore for oil subject to some tough but sensible environmental restrictions. Shell tried, didn’t find enough oil to justify further investment, will write down some costs and keep moving forward. Nobody got what they wanted, everybody survived.

We didn’t have to ban it. Sarah Palin didn’t have to machine gun a snow fox. Shell didn’t have to bribe anybody. Nobody had to chain themselves to an iceberg. Compromise took the day.

And now, we can probably stop worrying about Arctic drilling for a little while:

The company’s declaration is likely to chill oil industry investment in the region, illustrating anew that despite the tremendous promise of crude and gas locked under Arctic waters, the financial and environmental risks of getting it may be too high. Other oil companies, including Statoil and ConocoPhillips, have leases in U.S. Arctic waters but have delayed their own exploratory bids, citing regulatory uncertainty.

Does gas even cost money anymore? Let’s take some of the money we’re pouring into Arctic Ocean and spend it on renewables. We’re not ready to make Arctic drilling economically viable. That’s how the market is supposed to work: if doing one thing doesn’t make money, we find something that makes money.