Environmental impact of offshore oil drilling overstated.
President Bush recently promised to lift the executive ban on offshore oil drilling that has been in place since his father was President. With the recent dramatic increase in the price of a barrel of oil and the subsequent spike in the cost of gasoline to the US consumer President Bush hopes to increase domestic production of oil and reduce market tensions and our dependence on foreign oil. But Congress must also lift the legislative ban on offshore oil drilling that has been in place for over 27 years.
Congressional Democrats, joined by some GOP lawmakers from coastal states, have opposed lifting the prohibition that has barred energy companies from waters along both the East and West coasts and in the eastern Gulf of Mexico. A succession of presidents, from Bush’s father — George H.W. Bush — to Bill Clinton, have sided against drilling in these waters, as has Congress. Their goal has to been to protect beaches and coastal states’ tourism economies.
Recent statistics by the National Academy of Science show that this fear of oil spills due to offshore drilling is no longer a valid reason for a continued prohibition against offshore drilling. According to the Academy, oil spills from offshore drilling account for only one percent of the total oil that is dumped into the oceans annually. Sixty three percent of oil that enters the oceans comes from natural seepage from cracks in the earth itself. Thirty two percent comes from consumers, primarily from recreational water craft. A further four percent is due to transportation of oil by ship. During the period from 2000 – 2004 only 1,000 barrels of oil entered the oceans as a result of spills from offshore drilling platforms. As you can readily see from these statistics the risk of spills from transportation and recreational boats greatly exceeds the risk from offshore drilling. Yet there is no ban on the use of recreational water craft or transportation by ship of oil from around the world.
Surveys of potential oil deposits off the coast of California show that there is more oil available offshore than is currently being produced in Texas. Likewise there are large oil deposits that can be drilled in the eastern Gulf of Mexico and off the Atlantic coast. As for oil deposits in the ANWR, a United States Geologic Survey study found that there may be as much as 90 billion barrels of oil and 1,670 trillion cubic feet of natural gas that can be produced by drilling there.
Given the damage that dependence on foreign oil has done to the US economy and the very small risk of damage to the environment that offshore oil drilling as well as drilling in the ANWR represents, I think it is time that the Congress lift the 27 year ban on offshore oil drilling. There is no longer a valid reason not to tap the resources that are available to us here at home and thereby reduce our dependence on foreign oil. As for the arguments that it would take too long for offshore drilling to have any major impact on our dependence on foreign oil I would answer that you have to start somewhere. If the ban had been lifted years ago the current oil crisis and its debilitating effect on our economy probably would not have happened.
Of course increased domestic production is not the answer for the long term. We must still fund, research and develop alternative energy sources such as nuclear, solar, wind, fuel cell, geothermal and others if we are to truly solve the global energy crisis that currently threatens the well-being of all citizens of the Earth. Lifting the ban on offshore oil drilling is a step in the right direction. We need to take that step now.
Comments
By Ed Gizmo on July 24th, 2008 at 2:47 pm
Great blog post. Lots of facts there that the environmental wackos probably want to don’t want to get out. We need to do something to provide for ourselves in a better fashion than we’re doing now.
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