Posted: 06/30/2006
Off Shore Drilling Victory Step In The Right Direction
DALLAS (June 30, 2006) - The House voted Thursday to end a quarter-century offshore drilling ban and allow energy companies to tap natural gas and oil beneath waters from New England to Alaska. The vote puts the needs of consumers ahead of special interests and is long overdue, according to National Center for Policy Analysis (NCPA) Senior Fellow H. Sterling Burnett.
"Its long past time that Congress acted put America's security and economic needs ahead of the desires of powerful environmental lobbyists," said Burnett. "Ending the moratorium, with state revenue sharing, is a positive step in that direction. The question is whether the Senate will follow or take the road too often traveled."
The Minerals Management Service (MMS) has estimated that the Outer Continental Shelf contains more than 85 billion barrels of oil, quadruple current U.S. reserves and more than 419 trillion cubic feet of natural gas. Of these reserves, between 21 and 41 billion barrels of oil and between 94 and 164 trillion cubic feet of natural gas lie under the East and West Coasts, and in portions of the Gulf of Mexico where production is currently banned.
According to Burnett, these moratoria were put in place due to environmental concerns. Yet while off-shore platforms have occasionally had substantial spills or leaks, technology has improved greatly since the earliest platforms were built. As proof, very little oil was spilled into the Gulf in the aftermath of hurricane's Katrina and Rita. Indeed, despite the fact that the storms destroyed 111 production platforms - most of them built before new standards were imposed in 1998 - and seriously damaged another 52 platforms and 457 pipelines, the MMS has found only six hurricane-related oil spills of at least 1,000 barrels and none of the spills impacted shores or wildlife.
"The U.S. is the only industrialized country with substantial coastlines not actively seeking new offshore oil and gas deposits," noted Burnett. "Canada and even economically backward Cuba are moving forward with plans to drill in off-shore areas that abut U.S. coastal waters. Since pools of oil do not respect international boundaries, it is almost certainly true that Canada and Cuba will be accessing oil that could otherwise be developed by and for the benefit of Americans."