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OPINION: Drill: Domestic oil recovery creates domestic jobs(Paducah Sun, The (KY) (KRT) Via Acquire Media NewsEdge) Sep. 6--One thing you've got to say about developing more domestic energy sources: the jobs won't be outsourced. It will be American workers drilling in new oil fields and recovering natural gas reserves along the Outer Continental Shelf and on the Alaskan North Slope. American workers will recover the oil shale in Colorado. The natural resources are already here. That oil, gas and shale belong to the United States. It will be drilled, mined and recovered here, and those jobs can't be moved overseas. So it's hard to understand how Barack Obama and Bruce Lunsford expect to win the support of labor. New drilling is not included in their energy plans and gets scant attention in their public appearances. Yet drilling for new oil is not only the first and most obvious means of reducing our dependence on foreign oil, it can provide new jobs the fastest. Obama continues to mimic Nancy Pelosi with the line, "We can't drill our way out of the energy crisis." Maybe. But it would be a great first step. He promises to make the United States energy independent in 10 years without significant new drilling or recovery of shale oil. Then he says with a straight face, "Making sure your tires are properly inflated, simple thing, but we could save all the oil that they're talking about getting off drilling if everybody was just inflating their tires and getting regular tune-ups; you could actually save just as much"? We can't drill our way out of the energy crisis, but we can inflate our way out of it? How can Americans take Obama's energy proposals seriously? The truth is, no single action will solve the energy crisis. And everything in Obama's energy plan combined won't do the trick. High on his list is conservation. We must indeed conserve more energy. But unless Americans are ready to give up their cars and stop heating their homes in winter, conservation cannot make a significant impact in reducing our dependence on foreign oil. Obama says opening up new oil fields for drilling won't reduce the price at the pump now. What in his plan will? Actually, nothing else will reduce the price faster. New oil from the Outer Continental Shelf can, according to energy experts, be in production in as little as two years. And the impact on the oil markets will be immediate. Those speculators who have been betting on the price continuing to rise might lose their shirts as supply catches up to demand, but families will get quick relief in their heating bills and at the pump. T. Boone Pickens may be right that wind is to the United States what oil is to Saudi Arabia. Harnessing the abundant power of wind across the Great Plains makes sense as a new energy source. And it's true that American workers will build and operate the wind turbines. But the number of new jobs created will be negligible. Increasing nuclear power generation is not included in Lunsford's energy plan, and Obama's qualifiers for new nuclear plants all but ensures they will not be built. But nuclear remains the cleanest, safest and most economical source of energy. It must be part of any comprehensive energy plan. The alternative energy sources Obama and Lunsford favor should be included as new technologies make them economically feasible. But they are only part of the solution. Obama says he will reward companies that retain jobs at home and punish those that ship jobs abroad. So why not allow those energy companies he now demonizes for political purposes to create more domestic jobs by tapping into our vast domestic oil reserves? It will create more energy and more jobs. America needs an "all of the above" path to energy independence. And new domestic drilling must be moved from the bottom to the top of the list. To see more of The Paducah Sun, or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.paducahsun.com. Copyright (c) 2008, The Paducah Sun, Ky. Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services. For reprints, email [email protected], call 800-374-7985 or 847-635-6550, send a fax to 847-635-6968, or write to The Permissions Group Inc., 1247 Milwaukee Ave., Suite 303, Glenview, IL 60025, USA. |