Contrary to conventional wisdom, the United States has had an energy policy for decades. The policy has been to restrict access to valuable domestic energy resources thereby driving up energy prices. Maybe this “shoot ourselves in the foot” mentality could be changing though.
There’s a good chance that offshore drilling for oil and natural gas on the Outer Continental Shelf (OCS) will be allowed in areas that previously were blocked from exploration. The United States Department of the Interior is proposing to open up some areas, including some locations along the coast of North Carolina.
The government received over a half million comments regarding this proposal. Despite significant support for offshore drilling, many environmental extremists continue to fight offshore drilling. Even Governor Perdue, who was opposed to offshore drilling, is now in support of drilling.
When environmental extremists oppose offshore drilling for oil and natural gas and then suggest that the alternative solution is wind, solar, and other electricity-generating sources, they either don’t know what they are talking about or they are being very misleading (i.e. lying).
Wind and solar power can’t reduce the need for oil because they are used for electricity whereas oil is used primarily for other purposes, such as transportation. They aren’t interchangeable energy sources. According to the United States Energy Information Administration, electricity generation accounted for only about 1.5 percent of our nation’s petroleum consumption.
There’s a significant amount of oil and natural gas that is available in these currently off-limit areas. The government estimates that there’s about 18 billion barrels of oil. To put this is context, this is about 32 years worth of imports from Saudi Arabia.
There’s an estimated 76 trillion cubic feet of natural gas. This is so much natural gas that it would allow the United States to eliminate all imports of natural gas for about 19 years. If this data on available oil and natural gas was not impressive enough, the government stresses this data is “very conservative.”
The risk of oil spills is minimal. Since 1985, Outer Continental Shelf (OCS) operators produced more than seven billion barrels of oil. The government has estimated that only about .0001 percent of that oil was spilled.
In addition, according to the government, no large oil spills have occurred since 1980 despite the fact that major hurricanes, such as Hurricanes Andrew and Katrina, have hit oil platforms.
Environmental extremists also want to point to the visual blight that would be caused by offshore drilling. There may be nothing more misleading than the suggestion that somehow ugly offshore platforms will be visible from the shore.
In North Carolina, the most promising site for oil and natural gas exploration is called the Manteo Exploration Unit. It is located about 45 miles from Cape Hatteras. The only thing that would be visible from the Cape would be the Atlantic Ocean.
Ironically, environmental extremists oppose offshore drilling in part due to visual blight, but are the first to push for offshore wind farms. It isn’t a big deal if row after row of massive industrial wind turbines as tall as 50-story skyscrapers can be seen from the shore, but a platform that can’t be seen from the shore is a problem.
The United States needs to take advantage of its oil and natural gas reserves. We need the oil to help keep gasoline prices as low as possible. Unless we all start driving electric cars, our demand for oil will remain strong for the foreseeable future.
By blocking access to natural gas, our country is putting itself in a position where we have to start increasing our natural gas imports. If dependence on foreign oil wasn’t bad enough, we’ll start becoming dependent on foreign countries for natural gas. The countries we might be looking to would be Russia and Iran, the two countries with the largest natural gas reserves.
North Carolina should take advantage of having oil and natural gas along its coast. If drilling were allowed, there would be significant benefits for North Carolina. The United States House Natural Resources Committee staff estimated that there would be $23.82 billion in royalties over a 30-40 year period through revenue sharing from Outer Continental Shelf leases.
The need for affordable oil and natural gas is too important to be blocked by myths and outright lies. When it comes to energy policy, it’s time to stop listening to the environmental extremists and start listening to common sense.
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By Daren Bakst
