Obama Confronts Big Oil

The lead article in today’s New York Times, “Drilling Permits for Deep Waters Face New Review,” describes the implementation of new environmental reviews before approval of new offshore oil drilling.

The new procedure is a welcome change to bring multinational oil companies within the umbrella of public safety and a comprehensive regulatory system. The article describes the previous misuse of “categorical” exemptions widely accepted in the past. These exemptions allowed oil companies to forego environmental assessment requirements if they asserted a previous oil well with an assessment had already examined the issues involved for a similar location.

As expected, the American Petroleum Institute echoed its usual refrain about the regulations costing jobs, and even compared the new common-sense approach to the oil industry’s “Three Mile Island.” TMI, a nuclear plant that nearly underwent a meltdown, resulted in prohibitive regulations that halted the construction of new nuclear plants for 30 years.

In any case, the United States should be moving towards a system of clean energy promotion instead of trying to find oil in more and more difficult locations. It will not be a tragedy if we move away from offshore oil drilling with all its inherent difficulties to a more sustainable energy future for the United States and the world.