Democrats softening stance against offshore drilling

Check out Times staff writer Richard Simon's story today on Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's softening stance on offshore drilling.

According to the story, Pelosi and other House colleagues are considering legislation that would allow new offshore drilling as part of a broad energy bill out of worries that Democrats aren't doing enough to address high gas prices during an election year.

The issue has presented Pelosi with a sticky political problem. On one hand, with gas prices on voters' minds, public support for offshore drilling has increased, even in California, where a 1969 oil spill devastated the coast off Santa Barbara. Republicans have spotlighted Pelosi's opposition to new coastal drilling in attacks on Democrats throughout the country.

But the drilling ban has long been a priority for environmentalists, an important Democratic constituency, and party leaders prefer to shield their members from politically tough votes close to an election.

Last month President George W. Bush lifted an 18-year-old ban on new oil and gas drilling along U.S. coastlines and called on Congress to do the same because of high gas prices.

Meanwhile in California and across the country this week, crude oil prices continued to slide downward bringing motorists slight relief at the pumps.

-- Tami Abdollah

Photo: Offshore oil rigs near the Rincon Beach area in Ventura County. Public support for new offshore drilling has increased, even in California. Credit: Spencer Weiner / Los Angeles Times

Comments

[peter sterling]

Arctic Oil & Gas Corp. (AOAG) 40% Equity.
Santa Barbara Community Prosperity Energy Joint Venture
Cleaner Energy Prosperity, Here not There.

The recently proposed Santa Barbara OCS-State petroleum development project would have a daily send-out capacity of 100,000 BBL/day oil-gas. Enough to supply the daily needs of the entire Santa Barbara County as well as reduce imported oil needs for Southern California.

PRIMARY BENEFITS OFFERED TO SANTA BARBARA COUNTY RESIDENTS
1. $2.50 GASOLINE for all registered Santa Barbara County residents and County vehicles from local oil production.
2. $2.50 GASOLINE for all registered hotel guests in Santa Barbara County.
3. County-wide Clean-Air, Compressed Natural Gas (CNG) car conversions facilities.
4. $1.50 CNG for Santa Barbara and Coast residents for flexi-fuel vehicles.
5. Substantial Annual Grants to local environmental study groups and renewable energy programs.
6. Significant decrease in County-wide Air pollution from lower natural reservoir seepage.
7. Much lower C02 emissions for the County and State of California.
8. Significantly reduce potent greenhouse gas methane emissions from offshore gas seeps.
9. Much cleaner Santa Barbara beaches and oceans by reduction in beach tar balls.
10. Large new natural gas supplies from Bering Sea, landing via Santa Barbara County, to lower America’s C02 emissions from out of State coal-fired power plants, which will no longer be needed.
11. Increased local, State and National energy income streams, with monies all staying inside the County and America.
12. Provide Complete Santa Barbara energy self reliance and improve America’s energy security.
13. Significant high-paying local jobs boost.
14. Significant increased cash energy royalties to County of approximately $250-500 million p.a will improve the quality of life for all Santa Barbara County staff and local residents.
15. Special Proposed Community royalty payment from Bering Sea Gas imports landings to fund FREE County-Wide clinics and a new FREE County Hospital.
16. Lower-cost CNG for public transport-busses and vans, will enable disadvantaged and senior citizens to travel more freely.
17. Natural Gas for County home heating and cooking at a 30% discount to the prevailing rate.
18. Significant Increase in Local Property Values due to many of the above benefits.

LIFE WITHOUT HYDROCARBONS
Our entire modern society is build on fossil fuels. If the oil companies went on strike, within a month half the population would be dead! Alternative energy supply systems such as wind etc., aren't being built because they cost way too much.

"...Randall Luthi, director of the US Minerals Management Service, said the US should aggressively pursue energy development in the Outer Continental Shelf off Alaska, as well as regions of the OCS currently closed to drilling, including the eastern and western US coasts and the eastern Gulf of Mexico.

"Much of the future US demand can -- and let me underline can -- be met by OCS production, particularly from new areas in Alaska and the Gulf of Mexico, if we can survive the threat of hurricanes and survive the hurricane of litigation that surrounds oil and gas development," he said...."
www.gasandoil.com/goc/...

Oil is still the fuel of the immediate future - you can bet on it! We must move forward to a future in which cleaner natural gas, electricity, and renewable energy fuels cars and heats homes. But this transformation will take 20-30 years. Yes we need to wean ourselves from oil, but only as fast as technology can replace oil energy while we keep our country and economy safe. This is breaking the backs of American consumers and domestic industry infrastructure still dependent on fossil fuels, this is unacceptable anti-social, Anti-American behavior. Change is urgently needed.

"Before you get all excited about tearing down the energy industry, stop and think for a moment about what makes your comfortable life possible. Your heat and most of your electricity are provided through the burning of oil and natural gas. The thousands of plastic items in your home, car and office are all made from crude oil. Much of your clothing is woven of fibers made from petroleum.
Without the hard work and ingenuity of the men and women who work for the energy companies, we would be living in the 17th century - no electricity, running water, cars, trucks, airplanes, ships, factories, waterproof clothing, soda bottles, safety glass, sterile food and medical containers, air conditioners, televisions, microwave ovens, X-Boxes, I-Pods, or any of the millions of other products made using power generated from the burning of fossil fuels."
"You would have to grow your own food, or ride your donkey to a nearby market, where there would be no refrigerators or electric lights. You'd have to kill and clean your own meat and cook it over an open fire. You'd have to chop down the trees for your home, and provide your own light by making candles from the fat of animals. Every single thing in your modern life is utterly and completely dependent upon a steady supply of oil and gas. Without it, the entire Western world would collapse completely in a matter of weeks; tens of millions would perish from starvation, exposure, and disease." Todd Keister
To bring down the price of gasoline you need to drill where there is a lot of oil quickly. Not where there is little or no oil. America is sitting on vast supplies of proven oil and gas reserves, all ready to produce in short order.

Its all under an OPEC sponsored embargo compliments of Congress.,
Our Modern Economy Still Needs Oil and Gas Today.
Without hydrocarbons fuel the United States would quickly revert to an early 19th century type of country. Except that we would have 10 times as many people and no way to distribute food to most of them.
Without hydrocarbons fuel you would soon be walking. You couldn’t be driving cars, and it wouldn’t do any good to call the maintenance or repair people because they wouldn’t be able to get there, as they would be walking too.
The food distribution system would quickly grind to a halt as cold-storage warehouses stockpiling perishables went offline due to lack of electricity, (which is 20% powered by natural gas and 50% powered by coal) and by the lack of diesel fuels for trucks. Warehouses equipped with backup diesel generators would fail, because we wouldn’t be able get fuel for generators or trucks to distribute food.
Most of the things we depend upon would be gone, and we would literally be depending on our own food assets and those we could reach by walking to them.
America would begin to resemble the 2002 TV series, “Jeremiah,” which depicts a world bereft of law, infrastructure, and memory.
Without hydrocarbons fuel people in hospitals would be dying faster, because they depend on electrical power and natural gas for warming to stay alive. But then stoppages would soon include water, food, civil authority, emergency services. And we would end up with a country with many, many people not surviving.
We can treat our oil addiction, but it's not going to disappear. U.S. consumption has started to ebb, but the U.S. still accounts for 24 percent of the 86 million barrels of oil consumed in the world every day. We buy about two-thirds of the oil we use from overseas. Much of it comes from lands that are engulfed in political turmoil.
It's critical to reduce the U.S. dependence on oil. But it's most critical to reduce the U.S. dependence on foreign oil.
Technology is making drilling less of a risk and the demand for it is growing. The Democratic leadership in Congress has to start listening.
We need to support the continued development of alternative and renewable sources of energy and to increase conservation. In the meantime, lifting the congressional ban on oil and natural gas exploration in outer continental shelf waters is an absolute imperative if we are to rescue any sort of functioning economy.

[sheila]

peter, you have just presented the BEST set of arguments why we need to get away from this monopolistic, paternalistic Big Energy nightmare and establish point of use renewables on every property. life without electricity is NOT the same as life without Big Energy.

i sincerely hope the hijacking will end soon, those of you with Stockholm Syndrome will either be cured or at least outnumbered, and sensible, responsible stewardship of the earth and all its inhabitants will come into style.

thanks for this, it is very convincing...

[Larry]

Of Course Democrats are softening their stance. In absence of conviction, there is only need.

[Forrest]

Here are our energy options

Oil - Not allowed to develoip ( some people think CO2 is a pollutant based on junk science and the media ) plus limited supply, probably only another century or 2 of oil avaialble ( seen estimates from between 50 to 250 years, experts do not agree on this )
Gas - Same problem with Oil
Nuclear - People are scared of it ( creates waste which is hard to get rid of )
Wind - Ugly, Bulky, inefficent, and unreliable.
Solar - is a joke, inefficent as all get out, been waiting for improvment in this for over 2 decades, about once every 2 years I read an article stating that they have just had a 'break through'
Biofuel - Great idea if only it were not food, and even so there is a good chance of major enviromental impact.

Look, out of all of these options the most 'sustainable' is Nuclear. Biofuel will rape the enviroment if done on a massive scale. Solar and wind can help mitigate the load until you get nuke up, but the only thing that gives you a big bang for the buck is Nukes.

Sorry folks thats just the way it is.

[RJ]

Oh please, nobody really believes that the oil companies are going to lower gas prices if we agree to let them drill in sensitive ecological areas. If they do actually lower fuel prices, it will be temporary. Just like when they lower fuel prices preceding a major election so they can get more of their own politicians into office. I'm sorry, I mean politicians who are sensitive to the oil companies' need to make 4 billion dollars per month in profits; the highest profits of any entity on the planet. But, consider their lobbying expenses. Although those have been less during the last 2 presidential terms.
Don't believe for a second that the oil companies are going to give you a break after you give them a break.

[saint peter ii]

the democrats have no stance to soften. they have sold out to the consensual lowest common denominator so often for so long they represent only the private interests of the empty suits that populate their election day slates and the fat cats who they vote money too once they are sworn in. bought and sold before they are inaugurated. see misters drip & drop of the 6:01 news for the definitive work on the difference between democrats and republicans and why people are confused about the difference. http:www.saintpeterii.com

[42itus1]

When was the last time energy market prices were reduced? I'm not speaking of short-term market corrections or pricing anomalies, but a true reduction in the cost of oil, gasoline or natural gas. Prices have never been reduced and will never come down absent the government (FERC specifically) performing it's mandated responsibility over energy flowing in interstate commerce. Don't be sucked into the hype by big energy, oil and natural gas, or it's government cronies that say new offshore drilling will have a mitigating impact on prices. Offshore drilling will not make one iota of difference. Our energy history bears this out with deregulation that has occurred over the last 30 years. The government's acquiescence to deregulation was the quid pro quo intended to spur competition, keep prices down and increase supply. We've seen how well that has worked. What's that old saying Bush can't seem to remember? Fool me once....wake up people, you're about to be fooled again.

[Packdude]

Forrest is right. The only long-term sustainable high-output option for electrical power generation is nuclear fission, at least with our current grasp of physics. We also have a lot of coal reserves in the US, which can get us by till we get nukes back.

We should reserve the petroleum for use by vehicles and stop burning it for heating and electrical power production. The use of more train freight instead of so many long-haul semi trucks and airplanes would also be a much better use of diesel fuel. We just have to relinquish some of our 'immediate gratification' for having stuff shipped so fast.

Reactor technology has come a long long way since the days people started to get scared of nuke power, and there are actually countries who still generate a lot of power with nukes. Even Japan, who was bombed with atomic weapons in WWII, has nuclear reactors. France has tons of them as well. Just because the Ukrainians didn't know how to safely run them (Chernobyl), doesn't mean we have to shy away. The United States developed nuke technology for Pete's sake (they just made Hanford's B Reactor at Hanford a National Historic Landmark because it was the world's first large-scale nuclear reactor) , but we've all but abandoned it.

There are also reactor designs that limit the amount of waste that can be used to create nuclear weapons, or so I've heard. This alleviates another one of the concerns about nuke power.

With all the nuclear site cleanup efforts underway around the country (Fernald, Hanford, etc.), our capacity to treat wastes is on the increase. If the DOE gets their act together and finishes some of the waste vitrification projects underway, we could easily and safely store high level waste encased in molten glass, deep in underground rock caverns. So the waste really isn't an issue.

Crazy environmentalists! Do you know that I actually have a university degree in conservation biology, and yet I am pro-nuke? I cannot believe how stupid some of the environmental people have become.

Read Michael Crichton's most excellent book "State of Fear" -- it will change the way you think about radical environmentalists and liberal junk science mongers like Al Gore.

[apache girl]

Both democrats and republicans---DO NOT READ THIS. This is for real people. I have a solution. Big oil makes around 4% profit. Walmart makes 17% profit. Why is there not a windfall tax on Walmart ? Everyone call your congressman. Those of you in California, don't bother, your "thing" is not really a congressman.

[GHM]

Pelosi is useless.

[ccaudi]

Nukes are definitely the way to go.

My generation could have plentiful supplies of electricity.

What do I care if in 50 years, the next couple generations of humans have to store highly toxic waste products that could maim and kill tens... hundreds of thousands with a failure of one valve or pipe coupling.

Oh but we build with perfect engineering, indestructible parts and manage with infallible technicians. We use lots of computers and Microsoft operating systems.

Nukes... it's all good.

A note to Forrest... Where's my flying car?

[peter sterling]

If you could boil down the ideal U.S. energy policy to a few words it would be this: We have to stop buying foreign oil. U.S. dependence on it creates too much political, economic, environmental and national security vulnerability.

A NEW SANTA BARBARA AND CALIFORNIA ENERGY PLAN SUMMARY
The recent strategic nine AOAG OCS and State Lease applications form part of a wider plan to:
1. Quickly and safely solve Santa Barbara’s and California’s chronic transportation fuel energy shortage. Develop more fuel-efficient cars and alternative energy sources while making the country more "energy independent."
2. Revitalize the local and State economy by bringing many thousands of energy and related service jobs back into the local Santa Barbara and California communities.
3. Significantly lower the price of gasoline transportation fuels to $2.50 per gallon of gasoline and $1.50 for CNG, for Santa Barbara registered residents and provide alternative CNG transportation fuels at a price of under $2.50 per gallon, eventually for the entire State of California.
4. Provide for transshipment of large supplies of low-C02 natural gas from the Bering Sea for electrical power generation to supply energy for an upcoming new fleet of Statewide electric and hybrid vehicles, thus significantly lowering C02 emissions and California’s global warming climate impact. See; CNG provides viable Alternative Article.
5. Increase Santa Barbara County property values by revitalizing the economy of Santa Barbara, with the creation of thousands of new jobs and increased County Tax receipts from oil-gas royalties, creating improved demand for housing and commercial services.
6. Create untold billions in local business incomes, County and State revenues and taxes, which will improve the quality of life for everyone in the County and beyond.
7. Significantly improve the public health on a Santa Barbara County-wide basis by creating a cleaner local environment by reducing ongoing natural oil-gas seeps estimated at 100-200 barrels of oil per day, which are despoiling our beaches and poisoning the very air we breathe.
8. Transform Santa Barbara County into the most energy-secure county in America, by making it oil and gas self-sufficient and a net exporter of clean transportation and electricity fuels via natural gas developments.
9. Provide funding to aggressively develop clean, renewable energy & conservation technologies.

[peter sterling]

Our Modern Economy Still Needs Oil and Gas Today.
You all have to wake up and smell the energy roses that oil and gas represent today.
If the much maligned oil companies went on strike, within a month half the population would be dead; this probably includes you!

‘Buy America Energy’ should be our focus for the future.
The world oil shortage is political, not geological.
In the U.S., the government prohibits drilling offshore, effectively blockading American companies from supplying oil to Americans so that foreigners can make obscene profits from our energy stupidity.
Low cost power is vital to an industrial economy, and we have ignored this vital infrastructure issue for 20 years or more. The entire economy and our communities are facing collapse because of the irrational ongoing attack on American Energy.

Many Santa Barbara Beaches are constantly despoiled by tar from natural oil seeps.
Your elected officials and the environmental movement have let you down, destroyed your life….. and they don’t even know it! They certainly won’t admit it either.
Advocates for the continued American Energy Embargo are in the direct or unwitting employ of OPEC and Russia. These people should be had up on charges of economic treason, if not fired for anti-American activities, or gross incompetence.
To oppose developing America’s energy supplies immediately is Anti-American and akin to treason.
American oil is all under an OPEC sponsored embargo compliments of County, State and Congress Embargos, which are also ruining the Santa Barbara air quality and beach environment.
Santa Barbara’s beaches are heavily polluted with natural oil and tar seeps, which make the air unfit to breathe and the water unfit to swim in.
Its not pristine beaches “environmentalists” and County officials are protecting, its only OPEC’s and big oil’s profits. These people are traitors to their enviro-supporters and traitors to America.
Sooner or later you are going to get massive lawsuits from locals and tourists who are affected by the pollution –and Anti-Environmentalists who have destroyed our environment and our economy.
I don’t blame people from walking from their loans and houses here. Your local “environmental” groups are actually spoiling the air and ruining the local and State economies at the same time as selling America out to its enemies. Why would any thinking person live in such a self-destructive community, a community sold out by American Energy Traitors amongst us.

NET POSITIVE ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACTS
The Santa Barbara and State environmental impact of these combined energy projects will be significantly net positive due to:
A) The reduction in offshore Santa Barbara natural oil seeps due to lowering reservoir pressure, which are today despoiling Santa Barbara beaches with 170-200 BBL oil-gas and subsequently significantly lowering Santa Barbara’s air quality.
B) The availability of large quantities of lower cost, clean, low-C02 natural gas from the Bering Sea for power generation, will enable the lowering of Coal-fired electricity plants C02 emissions.
C) Significant Bering Sea Natural Gas recovery will supply fuel for a new generation of cleaner, less expensive Compressed Natural Gas, (CNG) vehicles.
See; http://newsok.com/cng-provides-viable-alternative/article/3266351/
The local offshore natural oil seepage causes more air pollution than all of the vehicles in Santa Barbara.
These natural seeps are thus a large endemic source of air pollution in Santa Barbara County. One estimate suggests air pollution is equal to twice the emission rate from all the on-road vehicle traffic in the county.
Redondo also has huge ongoing natural oil seeps, read this article.
Stop Oil Seeps California.
________________________________________

[kl]

the problem is not one just of visual impact, it is that big polluters escape remedies under "defunct" bankrupt superfund exits, or big money litigation. look at exxon valdez - 500M awarded 30 years ago, litigated to 200M then now to something like 50M today (corrections welcome). the fishing industry and community don't feel they have been compensated for their losses and it certainly didn't serve as any form of deterrent (the valdeze is now being used in other waters). To add insult to injury, record breaking profits occur while exxon pays cheaper dollars 30! years later (50M now is like 11.5M 30 years ago at 5%/year interest) on 1/10 the original award. What is needed to let them drill is 1) as set of laws that more easily sides with the public interest in disaster compensation as a condition of drilling. 2) a 3rd party bond escrow account for every barrel pulled out retained as potential compensation for likely disaster - think of it as "in place superfund mitigation costs" - so that the taxpayer is not ever left cleaning up the mess after a company distributes profits, closes doors and just walks away under bankruptcy protection.

[kl]

I see the oil PR person felt no need to offer enhanced understanding and correct my figures (which I pulled from faulty memory)

Court slashes judgment in Exxon Valdez disaster
Wednesday June 25, 2:12 pm ET
By Pete Yost, Associated Press Writer
Supreme Court cuts $2.5 billion penalty in Exxon Valdez disaster to $500 million

The Supreme Court on Wednesday slashed the $2.5 billion punitive damages award in the 1989 Exxon Valdez disaster to $500 million.
A jury decided Exxon should pay $5 billion in punitive damages. A federal appeals court cut that verdict in half in 1994.
Nearly 33,000 plaintiffs are in line to share in the award, an average of about $15,000 a person. They would have collected an average of $75,000 each under the $2.5 billion judgment.

So the original judgment went from 5B, to 2.5B to 500M by stalling for 19 years so that 500M is equivalent to 198M (@5%), or 165M(@6%), or 138M (@7%) paid out in today's cheaper dollars. That is why there needs to be a precondition for drilling that has accepted siding for the public justice. that is why there should be a "bank as you go" fund for mitigation and restitution of disasters so that there is no escape from payment (as we see too often in superfund situations).

the biggest problem is with the oligopoly the energy companies form. It's a deflection to talk about "profit margins compared to walmart" when the government pays for a 3T war by stealthy taking $21,000 from the back pocket of every family to subsidize the oil invasion and control just so the haliburton, chevron, exxon, royal dutch, bp's etc of the world can benefit. You know on your 1040 tax form where it says "would you like donate to abused children, firefighters fund, endangered species, Alzheimer's research etc". Imagine instead if it said "we will take $21,000 would you like it spent on a foreign invasion war to benefit exxon and others in the oil and gas industry, be used to promote alternate solar and wind, or expand nuclear power?" Just how do you think the public would answer?

[ffasdfff]

no offshore drilling!