By Michael Aron
Chief Political Correspondent
Tim Dillingham of the American Littoral Society, is upset about the prospect of oil drilling in the Atlantic.
“You know, the public in New Jersey has fought for years to clean up the ocean. We stopped New York City from dumping sewage sludge. We stopped industry from dumping their waste out there. And we didn’t do that to turn around and give a clean ocean over to the oil industry,” he said.
The Obama administration announced yesterday it would open a vast area starting 50 miles off the coast of Virginia, North and South Carolina and Georgia to oil and gas exploration.
The announcement came two days after the administration greatly expanded a drilling ban in Alaska.
Some saw the two announcements as balancing each other out.
The petroleum industry in New Jersey welcomed the news.
“Any area that opens up for the possibility of exploration or production is a positive signal that America continues to reinforce its independence and assure domestic energy security,” said Jim Benton.
The big concern, of course, is that an accident, like the BP explosion in 2010, could foul ocean waters up and down the Atlantic and compromise the Jersey Shore.
Five New Jersey federal lawmakers of both parties, including the two U.S. senators, have complained.
“The fact is drilling in the Atlantic is a risk-reward proposition. All of the risk is put on the backs of our shore communities. And all of the reward goes to Big Oil,” said Sen. Robert Menendez.
“If there’s an accident, which I think the BP oil spill showed us could happen, it would be devastating to the industries in New Jersey that rely on a clean ocean — our tourism industry, our recreational fishing industry and the wildlife which uses the ocean,” Dillingham said.
“No one absolutely has a crystal ball to say no accident can ever occur, but the demonstrated track record of the industry is that they can manage exploration and production carefully, responsibly and in accordance with all environmental standards. And when a spill unfortunately does occur, they can respond to it in a way that helps clean up the environment to the appropriate standards,” Benton said.
Although alarm along the shore is considerable, oil drilling in the Atlantic is still likely a long way off. The authorization period begins in 2017, with 20 public hearings to be held, and Mid-Atlantic lawmakers fighting tooth and nail. Experts say the first rig wouldn’t be dropped until 2025 or 2030 at the earliest.
Oil drilling is the last thing New Jersey’s sacred and fragile coastline needs. Our government does not have the right to hand us over to the oil interests, always in the name of ‘security’. Ever since 9/11, ‘security’ has been an open sesame for everything from land despoilation to invasion of privacy to war itself. Remember that the Gulf Oil spill was originally touted as ‘only a few hundred gallons.’ Remember that, for a long time, no one anywhere, not even in our government, let alone BP, seemed to know how to cap that ceaseless death-dealing flow. I applaud every legislator with the courage to stand up for our state, for the environment.
Carolyn Foote Edelmann, NJWILDBEAUTY Nature Blog Princeton