Sarah Palin explained in an April 10 commentary:
"No human endeavor is ever without risk – whether it’s sending a man to the moon or extracting the necessary resources to fuel our civilization... I continue to believe in [domestic drilling] because increased domestic oil production will make us a more secure, prosperous, and peaceful nation."Lawrence Cathles, professor of earth and atmospheric sciences at Cornell University, agrees:
Here's one geologist's advice: Don't overreact to the accident in the gulf, and recognize that all domestic energy production involves both financial and physical risk.Read Professor Cathles' full op-ed here.
The gulf currently contributes about 25% of all the oil and gas produced each year in the United States. About half a billion barrels of oil and gas equivalent is being produced from water more than 1,000 feet deep from the U.S. portion of the Gulf. Over the next few years this production is expected to double, affecting about 1.7 million jobs.
[...]
Yet there have been calls for a moratorium on new exploration in the gulf, and six West Coast U.S. senators have proposed a permanent ban on drilling in the Pacific. The sponsors of the U.S. Senate climate and energy bill have rewritten the section on offshore oil drilling to reflect mounting concern over the gulf oil spill, raising new hurdles for any future drilling off the Atlantic and Pacific coasts, although allowing it to proceed off Louisiana, Texas and Alaska.
We should be careful what we wish for. Every source of energy we could utilize is at least as risky as getting oil and gas from the gulf. Tapping geothermal energy is hazardous, requiring bleeding gas into the atmosphere to prevent blowouts... Solar and wind installations are vulnerable to storm damage, resulting in potentially serious power disruptions. Nuclear power carries risk in handling and transporting radioactive materials.
How our society responds to the recent setbacks will reveal a great deal about our future.
- JP
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