June 30, 2017
Washington, DC- In response to the Trump administration’s first steps towards revising the five-year planning process and opening up the Outer Continental Shelf to expanded oil and gas drilling, with potential leasing in the Arctic and Atlantic, Greenpeace USA Senior Research Specialist Tim Donaghy said,
“Trump is kidding himself if he thinks opening up the Arctic and Atlantic to offshore drilling is going to be easy. People in this country demanded that President Obama protect public lands and waters from offshore oil and gas development, and communities from Alaska to South Carolina will do it again. Research shows that expanding offshore oil drilling will lead to increased global greenhouse gas emissions and higher costs that will be borne by Americans for decades to come.
Oil companies like Shell have already proven that they cannot competently drill in places like the Arctic where there is a 75 percent chance of a major oil spill should oil production start, based on the government’s own analysis. Trump can try his best to carve up every last inch of this country and slap a “for sale” sign on public lands and waters, but he will find unprecedented resistance and very few buyers. Trump can keep trying to lock the United States into a future of fossil fuels, but like every other ill-fated promise from his administration, it will fail.
Contact:
Cassady Craighill, [email protected], 828-817-3328
Report by Greenpeace and Oil Change International:
The Climate Change Costs of Offshore Oil Drilling
https://www.greenpeace.org/usa/research/climate-change-costs-offshore-oil-drilling/
