The actual drilling, if looking at its impact internally, might or might not result in the actual decrease in gas prices or increase of alternative fuel and energy production. But in the recent times, the real reason for such a high debate on the offshore drilling aspect has been to use it merely as a strategy and a negotiation tool.
This approach and application of this strategy is something that neither I, nor people like who think that offshore drilling has more negative effects then positive, have a problem with. I do have a problem however with how offshore drilling is portrayed as the savior for the American dependency on foreign oil. Its like love is cast off as the savior of every relationship when clearly no relationship can work without compromise, communication, respect, etc. Similarly, it is the lack of acknowledgment of the peripheral factors that makes the support for the offshore drilling a weak bet. The fact is that most of the oil companies are not even using the land and territory already available to them for the drilling which makes one wonder why the sudden push for the offshore drilling is so strong. If the oil companies aren't producing oil from the reserves currently available to them, then what's to guarantee that the investment in offshore drilling will be a profitable one (Gertz, 2008)
John Koch, who is the chairman of the Loxahatchee Group, highlighted the negative impact of offshore oil drilling in a luncheon last year conducted by the Wellington Chamber of Commerce. Koch explained that the project of offshore drilling would actually have no impact on the overall gas prices but will only present two expensive options for Americans to choose from because oil itself would not be sold as a cheap commodity to the Americans only because America was producing it internally. He also added that the risk of environmental hazards will never diminish and there will come a time when the overall weather conditions or unpredictable weather turns will cause spills, not to mention the spills that could occur due to incompetent manpower. He also supported the argument that has been made throughout this paper that the actual impact of the offshore drilling cannot be decisively agreed upon as positive and even if it were, there impact would still not be felt for at least 14-17 years in the practical sense (Parsley, 2008).
Robert Kaufman, who is a specialist on global oil markets and is the manager of Boston University's Center for Energy and Environmental Studies, voices the same opinion as Koch and asks: "Do you think oil companies are going to sell [U.S. oil] to U.S. consumers for anything less than top price?" He them himself answers: "The answer is no." There is no guarantee that, first there are enough reserves, and two that oil will be used as an alternate energy commodity for the people because even if the Congress can control whether offshore drilling is done or not, it simply cannot control how and where the produced oil will be used and to what extent (Gertz, 2008).
The fact of the matter is that oil drilling cannot guarantee any profits and it cannot guarantee a positive impact, it...
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