The general reaction to the President's announcement on offshore drilling on this site has amazed me. If Bush had made this announcement we'd be apoplectic. Have we lost so much from the health care reform DEFEAT we suffered (yes, it was a defeat not to have even a weak public option) that we too have joined the non-reality-based universe?
More offshore drilling is certainly going to increase our chances of a real environmental disaster. Where is our outrage?
Have we forgotten so quickly, can we ignore so much? Or is oil drilling really no big deal, environmentally? I decided to go out and see what the industry track record has been recently.
Details below the fold.
Someone commenting on the front page post about Obama's announcement chimed in with some statistics to say that I was an alarmist about potential ecological damage because oil spills are only a small part of the oil that ends up in the ocean. Lies, damned lies, and statistics.
I'd suggested in my own comment that folks watch the documentary "Black Wave: The Legacy of the Exxon Valdez", which I saw recently and which really moved me. I said that I felt the Obama announcement was a sellout.
Black Wave web site
Instead of checking out the documentary, others soon chimed in to tell me that they too believed oil spills were no big deal.
It's hard for me to comprehend that the consensus on Daily Kos is that oil spills are no big deal, and that we can trust the oil industry to safely conduct more drilling off our coasts.
So here are a few articles, for anyone who cares, that take my side:
Here are just a couple of articles, with excerpts:
Sierra club article
"This weekend’s accident [a potential 700,000 gallon spill] is just one in a long history of substantial spills seen on Alaska’s fragile North Slope since development began there. In fact, despite industry hype about the safety of development and new technology, the Prudhoe Bay oil fields and Trans-Alaska Pipeline have caused an average of 504 spills annually on the North Slope since 1996, according to the Alaska’s own Department of Environmental Conservation. Past spills have included a 300,000 gallon crude oil spill from the Trans-Alaska pipeline that was detected as far as 166 miles away; a 110,000 gallon crude oil spill caused by a bulldozer which created a geyser that spewed oil over 20 acres of tundra wetlands; the infamous 285,000 gallons of crude oil that spilled into the boreal forest after a local hunter shot the pipeline with a high powered rifle; and the disastrous 675,000 gallons that were leaked after a saboteur exploded a two inch hole in the pipeline just a few miles north of Fairbanks."
Denver Post article
"Offshore operators have had 40 spills greater than 1,000 barrels since 1964, including 13 in the past 10 years, according to data from the U.S. Minerals Management Service, which oversees exploration and production in federal waters.
"Despite the industry's technological improvements and safety planning, offshore operators have struggled to cope with the hurricanes that blow through the Gulf of Mexico. Seven of the 13 recent larger spills were hurricane-related."
National Geographic article
"A recent spill of about 267,000 gallons (1 million liters) of oil in the tundra of Alaska's North Slope is raising a new round of questions from environmental groups about proposed plans to open more land in the region to oil drilling."
Bloomberg article
"On Aug. 21, oil began gushing from a well into the Timor Sea a couple hundred miles north of Australia. One estimate suggests that the leak has been dumping about 3,000 barrels of oil a day into a pristine ocean wilderness area heavily populated with whales, turtles and other sea life. The spill comes at a particularly deadly time for sea turtles that recently hatched. There is little or no hope for a small turtle that finds itself floating in the slick.
"The work crew with the skills and equipment to stop the spill arrived only late last week, and the complicated work of stopping the catastrophe may yet last a month or more. If it takes, as many estimates suggest, 50 days to stop the spill, the total amount of oil that reaches the sea could top 150,000 barrels. By comparison, the infamous Exxon Valdez spilled about 260,000 barrels of oil in Prince William Sound in 1989."
Live Science article
"Even so, says Clusen, there are 300 to 500 spills every year, a number which will grow with increased production.
"And once you have a spill, you are pretty much screwed," NOAA's Short said. That's because oil spreads on water at a rate of one-half a football field per second. Recovery can take decades."
That's the way I feel: PRETTY MUCH SCREWED.