Peak oil piques energy concern

The high natural gas prices on most Americans’ minds this winter may be the least of our worries when it comes to energy. What if oil itself, the lubricant and fuel that keeps our entire industrialized world running, is running out?

I spent a few days recently among some of the sharper editorial writers in the country listening to people with high-voltage expertise in energy. This gathering hosted by the Knight Center for Specialized Journalism at the University of Maryland convinced me that not only do I need to know much more about our nation’s energy outlook —- you do, too. Because when it comes to paying for energy, the choices awaiting us promise only to get tougher.
Coastal drilling coming

How much, for instance, are we willing to pay to keep our ocean horizons free from oil derricks or wind farms? Those old platforms off Santa Barbara helped launch (and somehow survived) the environmental movement, but a perennial push to make more of them gushed onto Capitol Hill this year. Industry ambitions to drill in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge may get the most ink and airtime, but offshore drilling is much closer to home for Californians. The Republicans running Congress retreated from their recent effort to open the outer continental shelf to new oil exploration, but it was only a temporary victory for those who value unspoiled ocean vistas.

“We need to drill in the outer continental shelf because that’s where the oil is,” John Felmy, chief economist for the American Petroleum Institute, told the assembled editorialists.

North County Times