Our country’s energy policy is broken. Families and small businesses are losing ground to raging inflation caused by energy supply shortages, Europe is suffering untold economic ruin due to its energy policies and yet, we still have some in the country and our federal government saying “everything’s fine, let’s enact the same energy policies as our European allies.”
October’s energy bills in the UK will be 80% higher than September’s. This is the path we should follow?
That’s insane. No American should accept it as an option.
The Europeans began their road to ruin by limiting their own oil and gas production, banning modern techniques like hydraulic fracturing or critical pipeline infrastructure, and otherwise eliminating the most affordable, reliable energy options in favor of others that could not make up the difference all the time.
If that sounds familiar, it is because our own government has issued fewer oil and gas leases in the first 19 months of this administration than at the same point for any other president since Harry Truman – when offshore drilling was in its early stages.
Now, the majority of U.S. offshore drilling happens only in the Gulf of Mexico, and it supplies 15% of our oil. But it is at risk, owing to a proposed five-year Department of Interior program that could set up no sales, too few sales or sales that are economically uncompetitive.
Offshore leasing has been the go-to for presidents that want to quickly increase our energy supplies. That’s why the bureaucratic process behind it, which most folks never see, hear or think about, is so important. Why on earth would we damage that supply relief valve when economic and national security both depend on it?
