Offshore Drilling Persuasive Essay

547 Words3 Pages
Informed and rational decisions can be reached through the understanding of how complex technological systems can impact the environment, our economy, our politics, and ultimately our culture. Skyrocketing fuel prices, unprecedented home foreclosures, rising unemployment, escalating food prices, increasing climate disasters, and the continued war on two fronts have prompted greater public support for renewed offshore drilling for oil. A Gallup poll conducted in May of 2008 found that 57 percent of respondents favored such drilling, while 41 percent were opposed (Wangsness, 2008). The political landscape is also being changed in favor of offshore drilling, with the results of a Zogby poll (Zogby International has been tracking public opinion…show more content…
Bush lifted a 1990 executive order by the first President Bush banning offshore drilling, while at the same time calling for drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. As of August 2008, however, a 1982 congressional ban is still in place, making Bush's action a symbolic gesture, and now the congressional ban is being debated in terms of both environmental issues and U.S. energy independence. In an almost complete reversal of policy, on July 30, 2008, the U.S. Department of the Interior released a news report saying that the nation's energy situation has dramatically changed in the past year. Secretary of the Interior, Dirk Kempthorne, said, "Areas that were considered too expensive to develop a year ago are no longer necessarily out of reach based on improvements to technology and safety." Kempthorne went on to say that, "The American people and the President want action, and a new initiative (the development of a new oil and natural gas leasing program for the U.S. Outer Continental Shelf) can accelerate an offshore exploration and development program that would increase production from additional domestic energy resources." President Bush is urging Congress to enact legislation that would allow states to have a say regarding operations off their shores and to share in the resulting revenues (United States Department of the Interior, 2008). Shortly
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