Don't Drill in the Arctic Ocean

A message from CREDO Action:
After the Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf, President Obama said it was "the most painful and powerful reminder yet that the time to embrace a clean energy future is now."

But since then, President Obama has embraced expanded oil drilling, including in pristine, undrilled areas of the Arctic Ocean.

The Administration just conditionally approved drilling in the Arctic's Beufort and Chukchi Seas and is now considering a five-year plan that includes further sales of Arctic offshore drilling leases.

This is entirely the wrong direction. The Department of the Interior is accepting comments on the plan until Monday — we need to urge them to reverse this dangerous course in the Arctic.

Tell the Department of the Interior: Don't drill in the Arctic Ocean. Submit a comment now.

Arctic drilling is profoundly dangerous and risky. In fact, there is no proven way to clean up an oil spill in the Arctic because of its extreme weather — including hurricane force storms, 20-foot swells, pervasive sea ice, low temperatures and months of darkness.

If cleaning up spilled oil was difficult during Summer in the Gulf, imagine a clean-up during Winter in the Arctic. Even getting clean-up equipment to these remote regions is far more challenging.

Despite the President's promises after the massive BP spill in the Gulf, or his call during his campaign that "the age of oil must end in our time," oil production has increased ever year he has been in office, and there are more drilling rigs in operation today than at any point in the last 25 years.1

And despite the increase in production, Americans are now pouring a higher percent of their income down their gas tank — 8.4% for the average family — than at any point in the last 30 years.2

Everything about this picture is wrong. As President Obama and the Department of the Interior lay out their plan for the next five years, they need to be moving our country away from oil dependence, oil spills, climate change and record oil company profits — not opening up pristine new areas of the Arctic to dangerous, impossible-to-clean drilling.

Click below to urge the Obama Administration to pursue clean energy, not Arctic drilling:
http://act.credoaction.com/r/?r=366343&id=33160-2593817-8j8Javx&t=7

Thank you for fighting our dependence on oil.

Elijah Zarlin, Campaign Manager
CREDO Action from Working Assets

1. "Drill, Baby, Drill Fails: Obama Presides Over Record Growth in Oil Rigs, Still Gets Blamed by GOP for High Oil Prices," Climate Progress, August 31, 2011
2. "At gas pump, 2011 was year of the big squeeze ," Associated Press, January 1, 2012