3/1: Comment On Offshore Drilling
The Department of Interior has announced plans to expand offshore oil and gas drilling in U.S. waters, including the Atlantic, Pacific, Arctic, and Gulf of Mexico. This devastating plan would overturn the current 5 year program which protects these areas and was developed by years of environmental review and input from millions of citizens. Currently 94% of the offshore continental shelf (OCS) is protected from drilling. Yet there were 589 oil spills in federal waters between 2001 and 2015. This proposal will open 90% of the OCS to drilling, and the number of oil spills will be in the thousands. The Interior Department estimates a 75% chance of a major oil spill in the Arctic’s Chukchi Sea from just a single lease sale, and 47 leases are planned in U.S. waters. The drill rigs will permanently damage fragile marine ecosystems, and the inevitable oil spills will devastate the fishing, tourism, and recreation industries which sustainably employ millions of people and generate many billions of dollars for our economy. The catastrophic BP Deepwater Horizon oil spill showed why we must stop drilling our oceans for oil and transition to a clean energy economy based on renewables and conservation.
SUGGESTED COMMENT TO DEPT. OF THE INTERIOR:
I oppose the replacement of the current 5 year Offshore Drilling Plan, which was responsibly developed over several years with more than 1.4 million comments from the public. Your department has put forth a hastily conceived plan that is designed only to benefit the petroleum industry at the expense of marine life, our beautiful seacoasts, and the sustainable industries that depend on them. It threatens us with devastating oil spills, keeps us shackled to the heavily polluting fossil fuels of the past, and blocks our path to a clean energy future. It has provisions to dispense oil leases without due process or public input. I do not support this dirty, dangerous, and unnecessary plan.
WHERE TO COMMENT: https://www.regulations.gov/
COMMITTEE CONTACT: jmonell64@gmail.com
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION: https://insideclimatenews.org/
SEARCHES:
NRDC offshore drilling
Sierra Club offshore drilling
Defenders of Wildlife offshore drilling