Friday 2/4/2010 Page: 11
PRESIDENT Barack Obama's about-turn on offshore oil exploration drew scathing criticism yesterday from environmentalists and congressional representatives who argued that his policy would do little to secure the energy future of the United States.It was a calculated stove to win political support for comprehensive climate legislation aimed at reducing greenhouse gas emissions while mandating a switch to renewable energy "Drilling alone can't come close to meeting our long-terns energy needs, and for the sake of our planet and our energy independence, we need to begin the transition to cleaner fuels now," Mr Obama said at his policy launch at Andrews Naval Air Facility in Maryland, just outside Washington, DC.
"I know that we can come together to pass comprehensive energy and climate legislation that's going to foster new energy, new industries, create millions of new jobs, protect our planet, and help us become more energy independent." But green groups and some Democrats said plans to expand drilling for oil along vast lengths of the North American coastline threatened marine life and coastal environs, and sent the wrong signal in the face of climate change. Republicans labelled the President's concession as too cautious. They said the additional exploration would do little to reduce US dependence on foreign oil.
The new drilling opportunities fall well short of the expansion proposed by George Bush in 2008, when Mr Obama, then a presidential candidate, condemned the plan as backWard looking. But he defended his change of heart, saying it was part of an interim solution as the US moved to tap new energy sources. The US had less than 2% of the world's known oil reserves, he said, but consumed more than 20% of current world production. "We are going to need to harness traditional sources of fuel even as we ramp up production of renewable home-grown energy." Mr Obama raised offshore drilling as a prospect for compromise on energy and climate legislation with Republicans in his January State of the Union address.
The Senate may now craft a new version of the stalled legislation. "The cynical view is that this is an attempt to buy a few more votes for a bill that would introduce carbon regulation," a spokesman for the American Gas Association, a Washington based trade group, said. The Republican leader in the House of Representatives, John Boehner, called on the President to lift the drilling ban on the west coast of the US. "Keeping the Pacific Coast and Alaska, as well as the most promising resources off the Gulf of Mexico, under lock and key makes no sense at a time when gasoline prices are rising and Americans are asking, 'Where are the jobs?'," he said.
A long approval process, which would demand time consuming environmental assessments, could delay drilling beyond 2012, however. Some Democrats, including long-time drilling opponent and New Jersey senator Robert Menendez, pledged to fight the exploration plan, describing it as dangerous. Environmentalists, too, complained. "While China and Germany are winning the clean energy race, this act furthers America's addiction to oil," Greenpeace executive director Phil Radford said. "Expanding offshore drilling in areas that have been protected for decades threatens our oceans and the coastal communities that depend on them with devastating oil spills, more pollution and climate change."
A cross-party group of senators are expected to introduce a new energy and climate bill to the Senate within weeks, after an earlier bill failed to win bipartisan support. Mr Obama has already backed the construction of eight nuclear power plants with $US8 billion ($A8.7 billion) of loan guarantees and promoted coal" target="_blank">clean coal technology in an attempt to broaden support for his climate proposals.
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