No to off-shore drilling!

Have you ever seen those compelling Dawn liquid detergent commercials? Perhaps, you haven’t so I will explain. There is slow music playing while images of ducks covered in oil are being carefully cleaned and nursed back from the dead using the cleaning product.
There are animals that suffer as a result to man’s mistake when we mess with our big important oil. The detergent helps to save their lives because their bodies can no longer function while being covered in oil. Destroying marine life and ducks doesn’t seem like the best solution for energy independence.
The Trans-Alaska Pipeline have caused an average of 409 spills annually on the North Slope since 1996 (Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation spill database.)
The countless amount of animals killed by the spills is too many to imagine but the money we waste with our mistakes is even greater. Oil is the crutch of this century. It has become necessary for survival for most yet unaffordable.
Now as the unreliable resource has become less available people think we can revert back to the 70s when it was ok to destroy coastlines. The latest technology has been discovered to offer other cleaner alternatives. Yet, we want to take a step backward?
The hybrid car is a great example of technology at it best. You see the advertisements for the vehicles almost daily on television. That is why there is a huge waiting list for the Toyota Prius.
There is such a huge demand for the Hybrid vehicle that Toyota has recently announced a new one billion factory under construction. Not in Japan mind you, but Blue Spring, Mississippi. There are also Toyota Camry Hybrids that are being produced currently in Kentucky. These plants should generate much-needed jobs in an area that normally is a Bush stronghold.
Although it is now very over priced because of supply and demand, it is a simple way to break the addiction to foreign oil and help our economy. There are waiting lists to get these highly coveted cars because not everyone is ready to tear their own engine apart and convert it to cooking oil.
I rode in a car that ran on cooking oil and a tiny bit of diesel and it still got me from point A to point B. However, us proclaimed do-it-our-selfers should beware. That is the kind of project you need to research before diving in on your personal quest for energy-efficiency. But- it is a way for those who can’t afford a hybrid to begin to save money today.
The internal combustion engine has been obsolete for over 50 years. The technology for alternate energy sources isn’t ten years from being developed it is already here.
There are also other ways to keep us warm and cozy in our homes like solar power and further exploration of wind power. It is all very doable with just a fraction of the money we spend fighting a war that was declared: missing accomplished a long time ago by our good pal President George Bush.
There is no way to deny it. Almost every American has been uttering a few choice words when filling up at the pump in the past year. Everyday the headline on the evening news seems to be that oil is setting a new price record.
Then the stories about how prices of everything from food, to checking a bag at an airport are going to cost everyone more as a result of oil. It seems that everyone is reaching the boiling point when it comes to the price of oil.
Everyone except the Bush administration and the current republican candidate for president John McCain because they can afford the skyrocketing price of gasoline. The solution that they have placed their stamp of approval on is one that shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone that remembers that our current president is an oilman from Texas. The proposal is that we are going to drill our way out of the current energy crisis.
Not only can we break our addiction to foreign oil, but we can also become the model for other countries, which could repair our already tarnished image by showing the world what a global player we can be.
U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) in their Annual Energy Outlook 2007, reported:
“The projections in the OCS (Offshore Commission Solutions) access case indicate that access to the Pacific, Atlantic, and eastern Gulf regions would not have a significant impact on domestic crude oil and natural gas production or prices before 2030.”
I personally don’t want to imagine how much a gallon of gas will cost by 2030. It’s ridiculous to continue to ignore scientific evidence that offshore drilling is not a feasible answer to our energy crisis.