Spill reminds public of drilling's true costs
Editorial
San Francisco Chronicle
04/28/2010
A spill 30 times the size of San Francisco is doing more than fouling the Gulf of Mexico. It's reminding the public of the risks and human costs of expanded offshore drilling.
Until now, the deep-water platforms were durable enough to survive Hurricane Katrina as they drilled for oil and gas thousands of feet below the ocean floor. Spills were small and isolated, and the coastal rigs supplied a quarter of the country's energy.
But this disaster is erasing that benign image.
The spill is a human tragedy that's left 11 missing and presumed dead. The giant drilling rig has sunk, and an ocean-bed leak is spewing 1,000 barrels per day. Just wait until the giant oil slick hits the gulf coastline from Texas to Florida. If the mess isn't mopped up quickly, the oil industry knows it will have a hard time selling coastal drilling in other
locations, especially East Coast states and Alaska.
President Obama had mapped out these locations for exploration.
