Bush stumps for oil drilling in Alaskan wildlife refuge Associated Press March 10, 2005 COLUMBUS, Ohio -- President Bush said Wednesday that the answer to high gasoline and oil prices was a long-range energy plan that includes drilling in an Arctic wildlife refuge. Bush gave his energy pitch in Ohio, where consumers have been battling high winter heating bills and gasoline prices exceeding $2 a gallon. "Higher prices at the gas pump and rising home heating bills and the possibilities of blackouts are legitimate concerns for all Americans," Bush told a crowd of supporters inside the Franklin County Veterans Memorial here. Ohio was at the center of a massive power blackout nearly two years ago, but broadly supported proposals to increase power grid reliability have been tangled up in the debate on wider energy legislation in Congress. "We've had four years of debate on a national energy bill. Now is the time to get the job done," Bush said. While acknowledging that high energy costs are hurting Americans and "are a drag on our economy," Bush offered no new proposals that would have any short-term impact on prices. A White House spokesman reiterated the administration's opposition to using the government's emergency oil reserves of more than 600 million barrels to try to dampen oil prices. In Washington, a group of Democrats said Bush should release that oil in a swap that would guarantee that the crude will be replaced when prices decline. Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., urged Bush to pressure the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries to boost supplies. Republican leaders in Congress hope to use a budget measure to get approval for drilling in the Arctic refuge. But that approach encountered a setback Wednesday when some House lawmakers refused to include expected revenue from Alaskan refuge lease sales in their budget measure.
At best this section of ANWR can only yeild a 10 month supply for the US. Then what are we going to do?
Better than nothing I suppose. The use of coal would be a good thing in my opinion as would nuclear power.
yes just 10 months but that is ONLY if we didnt buy any oil from anyone else at all period. Did you know that the ANWR was set up and when it was a portion was set aside just for oil drilling? It sure was when it was first made the ANWR. So if that section was set aside for oil then why arent we using it?
Good on all counts. If a 10 month supply of oil for the US were added to current world production prices of oil would crash. I love it when the dems push for cheaper oil when its expensive oil that would accomplish for them many of the energy savings they promote.
Drippingsprings....can you substantiate that statement? I have never heard before that there was an area set aside for oil drilling from the beginning. But there are a lot of left-wingers who are standing in the way of that happening, in any case. I have heard that the area is such a small piece of the ANWR that the effect would be miniscule. I am willing to hear the facts.
The origin of ANWR dates back to 1960, when the Eisenhower Administration set aside nine million acres of land in the northeast corner of Alaska for conservation efforts. Twenty years later, the Carter Administration and Congress added slightly more than 10 million acres to that site, officially designating it ANWR. To put it into perspective, ANWR is roughly the size of South Carolina. At the time Congress established ANWR as a protected area, one significant sliver of it along the coastal plain, known as the 1002 area, was not included. Congress specified further study of that portion for its oil and gas production potential. Today, the largest untapped onshore energy reserve in this country is made up of roughly 2,000 acres of the 1002 area. For others, however, ANWR represents the calving ground of the porcupine caribou and a temporary stopover for migratory birds. Itâs also a growing vacation spot for enviro-tourism. The Eskimos who actually live there predominantly favor oil and gas exploration in ANWR, but their opinions seem not to matter. While friends of the porcupine caribou struggle to protect the 1002 area from oil drillers, itâs estimated that we could be pumping as many as 16 billion barrels of oilâ as much as 30 years worth of Saudi Arabian-type oil â out of a 2,000 acre drill area, which is a little more than one-hundredth of 1 percent of ANWR. By our math, that would leave approximately 18,998,000 acres for visiting birds, Snowcats (the mechanical variety) and the caribou, who, by the way, donât have the good fortune in this case of being endangered, or this debate would have already been over. What of the environmentalistsâ concerns? Not that they are willing to listen, but the United States has developed advanced drilling technologies that can operate without disturbing the environment. These technological innovations have drastically reduced the size of production pads and allow for so-called "extended drilling." Extended reach wells generally stretch twice as far horizontally as vertically, thus reducing the number of drilling pads needed for production. For example, the DOI explains that if an oil production pad were put on the White House lawn, the well could reach oil under the Capitol, the Pentagon and Georgetown, without disturbing any surface areas. Senator John Kerry (D-Mass.), has pledged to filibuster any provisions aimed at opening ANWR to drilling if such legislation makes it to the Senate floor. If ever there was a time to put aside politics-as-posturing in the interest of national security, it is now. Two thousand acres is not a lot for the caribou to share when thereâs a war effort underway. Congress should move quickly to open ANWR because, as Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham has said, "Without energy security, you canât have national security." This is of course the very property that we are now seeing all the fghting about. There are many many links about this here is one from an educational site as well http://www.unc.edu/~money/geography/history.html
Thank you so much. I have a 21 yr old son who is anti-government everything and anti-fossil fuel consumption. He needs to read your post.
