Ocean advocates slam expanded U.S. offshore drilling

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Ocean advocates from Hollywood to North Carolina’s fragile beaches on Wednesday assailed a proposed expansion of offshore oil and gas drilling along the entire U.S. East Coast and four parts of California.

“Ecosystems are disrupted top to bottom by the short and long term effects of oil,” Ted Danson, actor and founder of American Oceans Campaign, told the House of Representatives Natural Resources Committee.

Danson spoke one day after U.S. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar extended the period for public comment on the Bush administration plan to expand offshore drilling, delaying any decision until September.

The Bush plan, drawn up in the last days of that Republican administration, had called for only 60 days of comment.

Representative Nick Rahall, a Democrat who chairs the committee, said there are more drilling rigs operating in the United States than in the rest of the world.

“Anyone who implies that we are not currently going after our own resources is being misleading, perhaps a little disingenuous,” he said.

Reuters