Americans Don't Believe Bush's Off-Shore Drilling Claims Will Reduce Gas Prices

A poll conducted by a Washington D.C. research firm showed a majority of Americans don’t believe Bush and oil industries claims that off-shore drilling will reduce gas prices.

The American public doesn’t believe President Bush and the oil industry's claims that new off-shore drilling will help reduce gas prices. Sixty-three per cent said it will only enrich oil industries’ profits. Nearly 76 per cent favor renewable energy exploration over drilling. Bush and his cabinet have submitted a report to convince Congress to allow them to open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska and the offshore waters of the Outer Continental Shelf to drilling. They also want to pursue oil shale projects in the Rocky Mountain West. About 54 per cent of the respondents said more drilling is not going to solve high gas prices. About three-quarters favor investing in new technologies and only 19 per cent support off-shore drilling. The public also wants the government to focus on energy efficient vehicles. A majority (66 per cent) of the respondents said oil drilling in protected public lands should be avoided at all times and they want to preserve the natural resources in those lands. The poll was conducted by Belden Russonello & Stewart, and did a nationally representative telephone survey of 821 adults between July 16 and 20, 2008 with a sampling error of +/- 3.5 percentage points at a 95% confidence level interval. The copy of the full survey is available in this PDF document. Bush will leave the office soon, but if McCain wins he will continue the off-shore drilling plans. McCain highly favors off-shore drilling and he strongly believes it will reduce prices. McCain later admitted off-shore drilling will not provide immediate benefits but it will provide psychological benefits. Arnold Schwarzenegger criticized Bush’s and McCain’s off-shore drilling plans a few weeks ago and said the politicians are blowing smoke.

Politicians have been throwing around all kinds of ideas in response to the skyrocketing energy prices, from the rethinking of nuclear power to pushing biofuels and more renewables and ending the ban on offshore drilling…But anyone who tells you this would bring down gas prices any time soon is blowing smoke.

He also pointed out that U.S. as a whole gets only 2 per cent of its energy from renewable sources compared to 12 per cent in California. Will the administration listen to the public or will they say “So what?” and ignore the poll and the sentiments.