AmerCon : ANWR

Environment / ANWR

We need to preserve the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge as a priceless treasure.

The USGS estimates (

here

) that there is 7.7 billion barrels of oil in ANWR. That's only about

a one-year supply at America's current "burn" rate of 20 million barrels a day. This is too

little oil to affect the market or delay our need to shift to renewable sources of energy, but as

a last resort in two or three decades it may be enough that we'll be glad we have it.

Even though this is the last oil America will ever see, Alaska’s congressional delegates are

strongly pushing to resume selling Alaskan oil to China, Korea, Japan and other foreign

countries.

This is bereft of reason.

The world is

running out of oil and our

energy "plan"

is to drill faster

and sell what

we find.

America is going to desperately need this oil in the future to help us limp along while we

bootstrap ourselves into the next energy source and build infrastructure for

producing

alternatives to

plastics, rubber

and lubricants.

Our question should be: "What is driving our National Energy Policy -- national interests or

corporate interests?"

Right now it appears to be corporate interests.

This issue is close-coupled with a second disastrous foreign policy; our habit of incurring

mountains of debt with other countries, including Japan and China. This results in making

other nations our bankers and diminishes our control over our own foreign policy.

Our leadership, which prides itself on a

n illusion of

self-reliance and a pretense of self-

sufficiency,

has made America more reliant on other nations

largess than we have ever been

in history.

We're losing control of our own foreign policy because we don't have control of our

national

energy or economic policy.

America

no longer leads herself.

And she no longer leads in the world.

With respect to ANWR, we should wait at least a decade before even thinking about touching

this preserve -- and then we should proceed very cautiously. If we have to drill here for oil,

it's because we failed

at the basics of energy planning and management

. If we have to drill

ANWR, it's because we didn't plan for and build an

alternative.

ANWR holds the last oil this country will ever have. Think "nest egg."

Defenders of Wildlife

follows ANWR closely.

I urge you to support them.

ehj

Selected Reading

Save the Arctic Refuge From Big Oil

The Arctic National Wildlife Refuge is the only remaining five percent of Alaska's
North Slope not already open to drilling.

Drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge could be particularly disastrous for
wildlife because the area targeted includes some of the refuge’s most critical and
sensitive habitat.

It would take 10 years to bring ANWR oil to market.

The U.S. Geological Survey concluded in 1998 that the largest potential oil field in
the Arctic refuge might produce 1 billion barrels. And most of the refuge's potential
oil fields are smaller. So if the oil companies are allowed to drill in the refuge, they
would destroy America's finest remaining wildlife habitat for an extremely short-term
gain at best.

Just a one-mile-per-gallon improvement in the efficiency of our automobiles would
save half-a-million barrels of oil a day, forever. That's more than we can ever hope
to extract from the Arctic refuge.

Refer (here) for greater detail.

Please go (here) to sign a petition.

Defenders of Wildlife is one of the nation's most
progressive advocates for wildlife and habitat,
and was named as one of America's Top 100
Charities by Worth magazine. With more than
480,000 members and supporters, Defenders is
an effective voice for wildlife and habitat.

Visit

Defenders of Wildlife