Saturday, June 28, 2008

"Drill Here. Drill Now. Drill ANWR."

To add to my previous post "Drilling In ANWR" I found an article about why drilling in ANWR is so vital to our energy needs by Paul Driessen. While the Democrats' mantra is "We can't drill our way out of our energy problem," the facts about oil drilling are clear:

"One of our best prospects is Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, which geologists say contains billions of barrels of recoverable oil. If President Clinton hadn’t bowed to Wilderness Society demands and vetoed 1995 legislation, we’d be producing a million barrels a day from ANWR right now. That’s equal to US imports from Saudi Arabia, at $50 billion annually.

Drilling in ANWR would get new oil flowing in 5-10 years, depending on how many lawsuits environmentalists file. That’s far faster than benefits would flow from supposed alternatives: devoting millions more acres of cropland to corn or cellulosic ethanol, converting our vehicle fleet to hybrid and flex-fuel cars, building
dozens of new nuclear power plants, and blanketing thousands of square miles with wind turbines and solar panels. These alternatives would take decades to
implement, and all face political, legal, technological, economic and environmental
hurdles."


And:

"The Geological Survey and Congressional Research Service say it’s 95% likely that there are 15.6 billion barrels of oil beneath ANWR. With today’s prices and technology, 60% of that is recoverable. At $135 a barrel, that represents $1.3
trillion that we would not have to send to Iran, Russia, Saudi Arabia and Venezuela. It means lower prices and reduced risks of oil spills from tankers carrying foreign crude."


Democrats and some Republicans have chosen to side with the radical environmentalists. Perhaps campaign donations have something to do with this. But more likely these lawmakers believe the distortions of these groups rather than doing research on their own. I don't know exactly why they hold to this view, but it is vital to elect lawmakers this November who want to free the United States from being held hostage by these radical groups who are intent on sending us back to the dark (!) ages.

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