Guest commentary: We can't drill our way to lower gas prices
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The drill babies are back, touting Exxon-Mobil's wish list under the guise of cutting the price of gas. But the truth is we're already on the way to reducing what we spend on it.
In this political season, we're hearing the broken-record answers to $4 gas: Drill, baby, drill, build the Keystone XL pipeline and raid emergency reserves.
None will solve the price problem today or in years to come. Each feeds the United States' oil addiction. Each risks damaging the environment or draining strategic supplies. Most important, this noisy debate over supply misses the point: Nothing will cut gas prices right now. But by reducing how much gas we use — by reducing demand — we are already on the road to cutting fuel bills.
With 98 percent of the world's oil reserves in the hands of other countries and an international cartel exerting a powerful hand on prices, the United States cannot control what we pay each day at the pump. Under President Barack Obama, drilling already is up 12 percent. Nonetheless, prices have risen. Even new drilling every place that has the oil industry panting would not provide enough to reduce prices significantly.
The U.S. Energy Information Administration estimates that new drilling on the outer continental shelf would not affect prices over the next decade and would cut them by only three cents a gallon in 2030.
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