Green Jersey

President removes ban on offshore oil drilling

President Bush yesterday nixed the presidential moratorium on offshore oil and gas drilling on the Outer Continental Shelf of the U.S. It was mostly a symbolic move, because Congress still has a moratorium in place.

Bush argued the drilling could produce “a decade’s worth of oil” and be unobtrusive, causing no spills or reef damage. Congress, he said, was “the only thing standing between the American people and these vast oil resources” (from the New York Times).

From Environmental Capital, a Wall Street Journal blog:

By itself, as White House spokeswoman Dana Perino said, President Bush’s decision is meaningless until Congress reverses its own moratorium that limits oil exploration on the continental shelf, and which has been renewed every year since 1982. And while many congressmen got an earful over the 4th of July from angry constituents, expanding offshore drilling is still anathema to most Democrats, including Sen. Barack Obama.

When it comes to actually increasing domestic oil production to ease the pain Americans feel at the gas pump, neither Mr. Bush nor Congress can do much to help right now. New offshore exploration and production in the U.S. would take years to come on line, and even then would represent only a tiny fraction of global output.

Gov. Corzine said he doubted Congress would follow the president’s lead, but that if it did, the decision to drill would fall to individual states along the coast. Corzine would then organize Atlantic Coast governors to block offshore oil exploration. He told Star-Ledger reporters yesterday that he didn’t know a single governor who supported the drilling.

An editorial in today’s Star-Ledger says Bush’s actions help perpetuate the myth that the country can drill its way out of its energy problems.

The president would do a greater public service, and have more effect on today’s oil prices, by focusing more on urging Americans to conserve the oil already available, perhaps by slowing down a bit on the highway. And by pursuing a shift to alternative energy technologies as indefatigably as he has pursued drilling new oil wells.