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Government Relations and Policy

We Can’t Drill Our Way to Energy Security

With gasoline prices approaching $4.50 a gallon, Americans are struggling to keep up with rising energy costs. The response by the Administration and others in Congress is to open up the entire outer continental shelf off America’s coastlines to drilling. 

Push for a Real Solution to High Gas Prices

Tell your members of Congress to reject oil drilling along our nation’s coasts and to push for a real solution to high gas prices -- one that is sustainable and doesn’t threaten our environmental heritage.

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Tell your senators and representative that you want them to reject oil drilling

Much of this area has been protected through bipartisan action for decades through a congressional moratorium on offshore drilling. After the Exxon Valdez oil spill, then-President Bush put in place an executive level moratorium (1990) to also protect our shores and coastlines from excessive offshore development. The President has now lifted this moratorium and asked Congress to do the same with its ban, calling for more offshore drilling. More drilling is not the answer to lowering gasoline prices.

WWF is calling on Congress to uphold the congressional moratorium on offshore development and instead find new and innovative ways to secure our energy future.

Our most sensitive coastal and Arctic areas are vulnerable to the impacts of oil exploration, oil pollution and the risk of spills. Two years ago, the scientific experts at the National Marine Fisheries Service advised against lease sales offshore in Alaska as there was a lack of information and scientific data to effectively deal with the negative impacts from oil development.

Alaska, especially in the Bering Sea and Bristol Bay, provides nearly half of the fish caught in the U.S. and the risk of an oil spill would have catastrophic impacts on the economy, jobs dependent on fishing, and the marine ecosystem. Oil spilled from the Exxon Valdez in 1989 is still found in Prince William Sound, illustrating how long spill impacts take to clean up. There are no current proven methods of cleaning up oil spills in Alaskan waters.

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WWF Experts

Jason Patlis

Vice President and Managing Director
Government Relations

"Government is neither the problem nor the panacea, but it can be a powerful partner for conservation - one requiring both support and vigilance."

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