For decades, a key argument against the energy industry was that domestic drilling doesn’t affect gas prices. Oil is sold on a world market, the logic went, and the U.S. doesn’t produce enough to move the needle.
The shale oil boom has eviscerated this argument. After decades of declining output, the U.S. eclipsed Saudi Arabia this year to become the world’s largest oil producer. As a result, Americans are paying less at the pump. Gas prices dropped to $3.20 on Oct. 13, according to AAA, representing the lowest Columbus Day gas prices in four years. The Associated Press credits U.S. oil production gains as “the main driver behind the decline in gasoline” prices in America.
Families could save even more money if the federal government wasn’t standing in the way. The domestic drilling boom has occurred primarily on state and private lands. However, America also holds vast energy resources in offshore areas, including in the Atlantic, but the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management prohibits leasing in many of these areas.
The feds ought to open the spigot. A new study by Dr. Timothy Considine at the University of Wyoming finds massive untapped oil and gas potential off the East coast. Producing that oil would help further drive down gas prices.
It would bring other benefits, as well. Considine finds that, by 2035 Georgia, could gain between $416 million and $2.3 billion in added economic value and between $118 million and $659 million in tax revenues. Georgia would also gain between 449 and 2,500 full-time jobs per year.
This promising news hasn’t stopped environmentalists from crying foul. Earlier this year, the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management took steps toward possibly leasing acreage off the Atlantic coast as early as 2017, when the current lease plan expires. The Natural Resources Defense Council dubbed the decision a “gateway drug to offshore drilling.”
If seismic testing is indeed a “gateway” to drilling, it’s one we should embrace. Yet environmentalists wax apoplectic. The Sierra Club, for instance, claims that seismic testing would “threaten [the] Atlantic coast.” Meanwhile, Greenpeace — which films its activists boarding offshore oil rigs as a PR stunt — dubs seismic testing (not even drilling) a “domestic threat” to the ocean.
Their claims ring hollow. Offshore development, like any form of energy production including wind and solar, carries environmental risks. Considine took these risks into account, including clean-up costs and environmental damages associated with potential oil spills and additional greenhouse gas emissions. Even so, under every scenario the benefits of exploring the Atlantic far outweigh the costs. At worst, benefits exceed costs by 3 to 1.
Major oil spills are incredibly rare. The ability to clean up after tragic spills has improved immensely. After the 2010 oil spill, activists predicted the Gulf of Mexico would turn into an uninhabitable wasteland. Yet after the spill, BP accepted much of the blame and devoted dollars and man hours to Gulf restoration. Four years after the spill, the Gulf is faring better than expected by most accounts and permanent damage seems less likely than it did in the immediate aftermath.
Though the environmental damage hasn’t been nearly as tragic as environmentalists predicted, it hasn’t stopped activist groups from using the BP spill to push for a complete ban on any offshore drilling even though the threat is minimal compared to potential rewards.
Fortunately, we don’t have to choose between filling up our gas tanks and protecting our environment. We can do both at low cost and low risk. We just have to listen to reason over rhetoric.
