CEO says proposed fracking will not harm endangered beluga whales

The chief executive officer of a Texas company that plans to drill below Alaska's Cook Inlet says there's no threat to endangered beluga whales from proposed hydraulic fracturing.

Benjamin Johnson of Fort Worth-based BlueCrest Energy says he doesn't even consider the company's plans to be offshore drilling.

Johnson says the company will drill about four miles horizontally from a well on shore to reach oil deposits. He says drilling 7,000 feet below the ocean bottom presents no danger to belugas from chemical leaks, noise or earthquakes.

Johnson responded to a letter sent Wednesday by the Center for Biological Diversity to the National Marine Fisheries Service.

The environmental group wants the agency to block BlueCrest's plans for fracking, the extraction of oil from rock through injection of high-pressure mixtures of water, sand and chemicals.