From a policy perspective, I think we should reinforce this meme by fighting for incredibly high fines for any oil spill and increased spill standards.      

That said, I fear that once oil hit 250 or 300 ANWR, and the rest, will be lost.

When the US fleet averages over 50 mpg, and there are half the number of automobiles on the road in the US as there are now, then we can possibly discuss burning the last of it.  Or we could leave it for future generations.  But we probably won't since the current generation always must live like it is the last generation on earth and that we must have it to burn in 15 mpg SUVs (which sadly served ailing corporations but now represent a huge drag on the economy).  

We can shape the machine or be shaped by the machine.  We can live as a democracy as if people and the environment mattered or we can live as a technocracy and let the machine decide our fate.

If the oil were to be used to help us build a sustainable system that did not run on oil that would be a powerful argument to use it.  But if it is being tapped to merely temporarily power an inherently unsustainable system then that is a very sad and tragically fateful use for it.  When it is gone, then what?  

The democrats must fight myopically insane policy with long range vision and be able to distinguish the difference between balanced policy and poll rape.  Caving in to feed the endlessly growing demand side of the equation only feeds the Cheneyesk dead enders.  If democrats want to repeat their sad chapter of running scared on the vote to give GW the green light on invading Iraq then they will bend over on drilling.    

Not to put too fine a point on it but you are proposing to lie to the American public in order to make your point.  

The San Fransico fuel oil spill had nothing to do with oil production. Rather a container ship, the COSCO Busan collided with the Oakland Bay Bridge resulting in a release of some of its fuel.

The Korean accident (3 times less volume than the Valdez) resulted from a barge crane coming loose from its anchorage and colliding with a crude tanker. The captain of the barge crane ignored repeated warnings that he was moored too close to other traffic.  The problem there wasn't the crude tanker it was lax enforcement of maritime rules in Korea.  Not applicable here.

Besides, OCS crude production is transported by PIPELINE not tanker, so your scare tactics are laughable.  In fact the industry could use your argument FOR more domestic oil exploration.  

More domestic prodcution means more pipeline barrels, and LESS chance of oil spills as domestic production replaces crude that arrives from other countries on foreign tankers.

The same argument for drilling in the 1002 area. More domestic crude sailing fewer miles reduces the chances of accidents and is better for the planet.  US fleets have higher standards and better safety records than ships with flags of convenience.  Drill in the 1002 - save the planet!

The "last of it" was not essential the main points of my arguments.  But, there will be a time, sooner than most realize, when the last easily exploitable and relatively cheap reserves are gone.  At that stage, while we remain heavily dependent on oil, we will be much poorer for having burned so much of it, with so little to show for it.  And at that point, won't there be a much more valuable use of it than burning it?  

If we do not use the descent of oil as a step to the ascent of sustainable technology and renewable energy then the descent of oil will spell our descent. The descending track is represented by this election year rant about drilling.  

Ten thousand years worth?  LMAO!

We Floridians WANT drilling everywhere in the Gulf and even the Everglades.  Every barrel of oil we get from our own reserves is one less barrel we get from OPEC.

Senator Martinez will be voted out of office next cycle, so it doesn't matter now that he is changing his mind. He should have been a leader on this energy crisis issue, but he was not.

Drill Florida. Drill Atlantic and Pacific and Drill ANWR.

Global warming is a farce and only those most ignorant in society are green.

Kindest Regards

FPSOs are NOT tankers. FPSOs are permanently moored to one spot and just swivel around with the wind and waves. Other than Alaska, no crude oil in the OCS is transported by tankers.

That Stacey is pretty lucky that she got to go out onto an offshore rig. My dad was in insurance - boring. I had to wait until I was 30 to go out on my first rig.  

Another practice which could be reduced by more domestic production is lightering.  Ultra large crude carriers (2 million barrels or more) are too big to dock onshore. So smaller tankers come several hundred miles out and pull alongside and fill up. This manuever is completely safe, but there is always the chance of an accident.  

Come on Amazing, the Earth has already been so compromised there's almost nothing left.  Justlou offered a reasonable compromise, though it should be a lot less than half the vehicles.  If I'm the environmentalist who oversees drilling in your plan, all drilling except by hand would end!

Right. I guess all these trees and this tropical jungle I am observing out my window are an illusion. The Mekong river flowing by with huge fish in it (which I have seen caught) isn't really there at all. There's no water, there's no wildlife....... except of course for the snake that almost bit me three days ago. Yep, the earths been destroyed. We're aren't actually living here at all........

Victory in Pattani

I think it's idiotic to drill offshore.  But if they are going to, we have to get something in the deal.  

Another point we could make when the inevitable spills occur, and the emergency equipment is not in place to catch it, is to ask people what they would rather see offshore.  Wind power platforms or oil drilling platforms.

As with nukes, "clean" coal, and fuel farming, the lobbying, media hype, and political ignorance are most likely going to force offshore drilling.

Nuclear power seems to be dying of capital starvation.  Fuel farming might be killed by the food shortage coming soon, due to the flooding.  "Clean" coal still has legs.  Ethanol will try to go cellulosic.

I think throwing a modest amount of dollars in R and D to make these go away politically is a good idea.  New experimental safer offshore rigs, nuclear reactors, cellulosic ethanol plants, and CCS coal plants.  

Demand oversight and performance, push the results out a decade or so to give renewables and conservation a chance to pull well ahead from mass production with subsidy diversion.

We could even insist that before the old technology gets R and D money, industry has to give up it's subsidies to fund renewables/conservation and the R and D.  

http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog

there are always going to be some on the right who do not think oil drilling is at all dangerous or destructive.  Note that oil company ad which runs after the NewsHour with Jim Lehrer, claiming that oil drilling is done cleanly and "respectfully."  Dick Cheney has for a long time been emphasizing that new techniques in oil drilling require only a very small footprint.  And earlier this week, Mary Matalin was talking with Wolf Blitzer, and told him she had been to Alaska a few months ago to see how oil was drilled on the North Slope, and insisted that their operations were "cleaner than my kitchen."

So, there is a formidable array of pro-oil-drilling advocates who are already at work denying that oil spills are a problem.

Chickens deserve our true friendship! So do fish! So do other sentient beings! Let us learn to be kind.

without drilling for it, you need to market that puppy. But right now, and certainly at least for the next 20 years, oil is going to be a critical resource in the global economy. No matter how much environmentalist want it to go away, it ain't happening over night.

This isn't a question (as foolishly suggested) of investing in renewables or oil extraction. This is a question of investing in renewables AND oil extraction. Cause it has to happen.

Victory in Pattani

Mad Mac,

Only 5% of the native forests and other natural ecosystems of the Earth are left intact, every bit of land, air, and water is contaminated with unnatural human pollutants, humans and their infrastructure -- including farming -- are everywhere, and we're in the sixth great extinction.  Just because you happen to live in the 5% of what's left intact doesn't mean that everything's OK, as you anti-environmentalists like to claim.

And with your extreme lack of knowledge of biology or ecology, I can't even trust that the trees you see are not just that as opposed to an intact forest (i.e., trees per se don't make a forest, and a tree farm is certainly not one).  But even if what you see is an intact forest, it's now rare, not the rule.

right?  The reports from EIA and others that say drilling now won't effect oil or gas prices now.  Did anyone notice that Mccain quoted 21 billion barrels in his speech, and the next day Bush quoted 18 billion barrels in his speech?  That hopefully, by the time the oil does hit the market (10-15 years) the price should have dropped considerably due to alternative energy use and conservation, making the cost of drilling it now and selling it then unprofitable unless they sell futures and pass the bad luck to someone else? Wonder if the insane rise of oil/gas prices, spurring insane oil company profits, and ethanol/weather related global food crisis, and the massive last minute ditch effort to re-open protected areas for oil drilling happening at what most presume is the end of the oil friendly republican white house era is a coincidence?
I am just not convinced this isn't a huge 'gotcha! by the admin as they head out the door. All in all, it feels to me like the entire run has been one 'Let's see if they'll buy it!' routine after another with this the final cherry on top.