Shortsighted Drilling
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Robert J. Samuelson [op-ed, April 30], like the Bush administration, thinks the solution to our energy problems is more drilling to increase petroleum production.
Neither mentions the correlate: Drilling sooner means that the oil will be exhausted sooner. This is classic short-term thinking. They give no thought to the needs of future generations that will need petroleum for other purposes. Burning petroleum destroys it, just as surely as burning a forest destroys the trees.
Increasing production will just encourage consumption. Sadly, the high prices we are now paying for petroleum-based fuels are going into company profits, not to finance the discovery and development of alternative energy sources. Increased production would mean more of the same.
President Bush and Vice President Cheney fairly sneer at conservation; it's no more than "personal virtue," Mr. Cheney said. But their alternative would deny future generations the benefits of the many products made from petrochemicals while ensuring the accelerated environmental degradation that occurs at drilling sites. In this case, that would be in a dedicated wildlife reserve.
What's next? Yellowstone Park? Yosemite?
JOHN W. CROSS
Alexandria
