ANWR Drilling: Allowed or Not?

863 Words2 Pages

The debate on drilling in the Alaskan National Wildlife Refuge is an intensely debated topic of America today. Proponents of the oil drilling believe that the oil in the refuge will solve the high prices of gasoline, but they don’t even know what amount of oil the refuge holds and the amount of oil that we use every year in the United States. The drilling in ANWR will severely damage the wildlife refuge and its environment. The oil would take years to access with drilling and so far there has been no proof that the drilling would actually produce enough oil to sustain our needs as a country. Also a reason to not drill in the refuge is because the reserve is being saved for when our country is in a national emergency, or until when there is no oil left because of its rapid decline in availability. How did you feel when just about a year ago there was the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico? That event killed the environment in the Gulf and millions of innocent animals died to our screw up, if the drilling in ANWR is allowed we could be faced with these same exact circumstances again. These are the reasons that the oil drilling in the national refuge should not be allowed.

How would you like to see a repeat of the devastating event that took place in the Gulf of Mexico? If we were allowed to drill in the refuge all that it would take is for another malfunction like that and the environment of that refuge would be damaged for years. “Most important of all are the more than 130,000 caribou of the Porcupine herd…, these caribou are at the heart of environmentalists’ case against drilling” (McCarthy). The reason that these specific animals are the reason for not drilling is that the caribou migrate to the plains, where the drilling would ...

... middle of paper ...

...table results are other reasons for the drilling to not take place. Lastly, the reserve should be saved until the country is in a more desperate need for the oil than it is now such as a national emergency of some kind, or even until there is no other oil left to be drilled for. The act of playing it safe and not drilling is the smarter thing to do because there are no positive outcomes from drilling for oil in ANWR.

Works Cited

Gelb, Bernard A. "Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR)." Almanac of Policy Issues. Congressional Research Service, 28 Aug. 2002. Web. 09 May 2011.

McCarthy, Terry. "War Over Arctic Oil - TIME." Breaking News, Analysis, Politics, Blogs, News Photos, Video, Tech Reviews - TIME.com. Cable News Network, 11 Feb. 2001. Web. 09 May 2011.

"The Debate Over ANWR Drilling Begins Anew." ENewsUSA. ENewsUSA, 2 Mar. 2009. Web. 09 May 2011.

Open Document