Posted: Thursday, February 19, 2015 12:00 am
A month after the Obama administration said it would consider opening some of the country’s south Atlantic coastline to oil exploration, the process has begun.
There won’t be drilling for years to come. But there will be plenty of public hearings. The first in North Carolina was held Tuesday in Wrightsville Beach. About 400 people signed in for a Bureau of Ocean Energy Management session held to take public comments on the drilling plan. That was nearly double the total attendance at previous hearings in Washington, D.C., and Norfolk, Virginia.
Just down the hall from the meeting, about 150 drilling opponents held a “Just Say No” rally. Jonathan Barfield, chairman of the New Hanover Board of Commissioners, warned protesters about what oil spills could do to the region’s bread-and-butter industries: tourism and fisheries. “If we have offshore drilling here in our community, it will have a long-term effect,” he said.
It may, but no danger will materialize anytime soon. Even before the oil industry can begin prospecting off our coast, figuring out whether there’s oil or gas there and whether there’s enough to make drilling worthwhile, there will be environmental studies. And if those studies give a green flag to exploration, specific sites will be identified where drilling will be allowed. And that point is still years removed from full production.
Some of the people at the federal hearing brought up important questions. Drilling proponents say oil exploration will create thousands of new jobs. But how many of them will be filled by people living in North Carolina before the exploration begins? Won’t many of them be experienced oil workers and support teams that are based elsewhere? And what guarantee do we have that the oil or gas will even be brought ashore and processed in North Carolina?
We appreciate David McGowan’s optimism, though, even as we’re a bit skeptical. The executive director of the North Carolina Petroleum Council says he’s a native of our coastline and wants to make sure our shore is protected. “I want to see this done right,” he said. “I want to see it done safely and responsibly.”
So do we. And if oil or gas are found off our coastline, we hope North Carolina will be a national model for developing it safely.
But before that, we have a long hike ahead – starting with finding out what’s out there. This could be much ado about very little.
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Thursday, February 19, 2015 12:00 am.
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