In the midst of what has become the worst oil disaster in U.S. history, the April 20 explosion of the BP-operated Deepwater Horizon oil rig, the nation has found itself at a momentous crossroads, as it collectively ponders what is next to come in the future of energy production.
Many have already decided what should come next: weaning ourselves off of oil and developing alternative forms of energy.
Amen.
Oil consumption, at the current U.S. rate of over 20 billion barrels per day, has numerous inherent problems. For one thing, it’s not renewable, and once it’s gone, we’d better have a backup plan.
The fears of critics and hopeful proponents of oil exploration alike have been realized in a nightmarish scenario, as millions of barrels of oil gush into the Gulf of Mexico, despite repeated assurances from big oil that “new technology” makes for a safer oil rig. Whoopsie.
When we extract it, we harm the Earth’s delicate ecosystems and risk disasters like the one at hand.
When we burn it, we pollute our air, ocean, and land. It gives off CO2, and contributes to global warming.
And we hastily and selfishly rely on it far beyond necessity.
We use excessive amounts of electricity, which requires the burning of fossil fuels, when solar, wind, and geothermal energy is just as realistic.
We rely on oil to mass-produce food, use it for fertilizer and pesticides, and then to deliver it across the country. Localized, small-scale, organic agriculture is a sustainable alternative.
We farm mass numbers of animals for meat or use them for household products, completely oblivious to the high costs in oil. Cutting non-free-range meat and animal products partially, if not fully, from a diet can have a tremendous effect on oil consumption.
We continue the development of suburban sprawl – an inherently oil-dependent community model, since it isolates neighborhoods from accessible businesses, thereby encouraging individuals to drive their cars rather than walk, bike, or take public transportation to places like the grocery store.
Instead of renewable resources, we use oil in excess for common household plastics and petroleum-based products. Ink, synthetic materials in shoes and clothing, milk cartons, grocery bags, and plastic water bottles all require oil. However, there are sustainable, not to mention safer, alternatives to all of these.
Even George W. Bush, whose personal involvement with big oil is well-known, conceded at a press conference May 25 that the nation must move away from oil and actively explore alternative forms of energy – what environmentalists and scientists have been suggesting for years.
While nobody could have predicted the Deepwater disaster, have we reached a point where only after irreversible damage is done do we finally look at facts and science and stop dividing ourselves on an issue that ultimately belongs to a bigger picture?
Maybe, in the face of this disaster unfolding in the Gulf, we might clear our collective heads and understand the issue of oil is not divided by party lines, but is, on the contrary, bound by human experience.
One of the great sorrows of our time is that it took a tragedy like the Deepwater Horizon oil leak for us to finally admit that a future of relying on oil for energy is simply a pipe dream.
Let us move forward into a clean, sustainable future!