Five Big Reasons to Drill, Baby, Drill

There are five compelling reasons why the next Congress should not renew the decades-old congressional ban on drilling for domestic oil and natural gas in areas now considered off-limits, according to a new study: Jobs, revenue, economic growth, public demand, and energy independence.

Developing U.S. domestic energy resources would create up to 160,000 new high-paying American jobs, including 5 million “green” jobs, and generate $1.7 trillion in new royalties for federal and state governments. Since the energy industry is one of the few bright spots in the U.S. economy, it could help pull the rest of the nation out of recession. Sixty-eight percent of Americans say they want more domestic drilling, according to exit polls. Finally, every added barrel of domestically produced oil is one less that has to be bought from OPEC.

The study by ICF International, which was commissioned by the American Petroleum Institute (API), estimates that if drilling restrictions are lifted on the Outer Continental Shelf off U.S. shores, the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska, and federal land in the Rockies, production of non-imported crude oil would increase 36 percent by 2030, with production of clean-burning domestic natural gas rising 10 percent. That comes out to about 2 million additional barrels of oil and 5.3 billion extra cubic feet of natural gas per day, offsetting 20 percent of our oil imports and 61 percent of our gas imports.

Drilling would bring the U.S. much closer to true energy independence and much quicker than any other idea on the table. When added to already accessible deposits on federal land, it would generate an estimated $4 trillion in royalties over the life of the operations. Those royalties could be used to pay down the $10. 6 trillion national debt, stabilize Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid, and fund research and development efforts for renewable energy sources. As API’s new president, Jack Gerard, said recently, ramping up domestic energy extraction is a bipartisan “win-win proposition” that will benefit every American.

The recent dramatic drop in oil prices temporarily changed the short-term politics of the energy issue, but not the long-term supply/demand equation. Most of America’s  economic activity depends upon oil and natural gas, and those fuels even play a significant role in the production of alternatives like ethanol. These fuels simply cannot be replaced any time soon without severe economic disruption. The only real question during the lengthy transition phase is do we develop our own domestic reserves or continue to import oil and gas from foreign nations? The answer is, as they say, a no-brainer.