Published: Wednesday, June 22, 2011 at 7:00 p.m.
Last Modified: Wednesday, June 22, 2011 at 3:42 p.m.
Offshore drilling threatens our coastal-dependent economy, our natural heritage and many of the most important values we enjoy every day in Sonoma County.
This Saturday, at Doran Beach in Bodega Bay, Californians will join hands with friends and neighbors to protect our coast from this dirty and dangerous practice during this year’s “Hands Across the Sand” event.
As evidenced by the unusual number of dead dolphins washing up on Gulf beaches, last summer’s BP Deepwater Horizon oil disaster continues to affect the Gulf of Mexico and the wildlife and livelihoods it supports. Instead of taking steps to ensure that offshore drilling is made safer, the House has actually passed legislation that would imperil more of the country’s fragile waters – including those off our own shores here in California.
A series of reckless drilling bills passed by the House would mandate the installation of drilling rigs only three miles off of Malibu, within Santa Monica Bay and along the Orange County beaches all the way to La Jolla – eventually including even Sonoma County – in its shortsighted offshore drilling plans.
The members of Congress spearheading these assaults on our coast know that drilling here will not, and cannot, actually lower the price of gas at the pump. For them, the issue of offshore drilling is used merely as a short-sighted political maneuver in the election cycle.
We Californians must protect the coast that is our inheritance and safeguard it for future generations. This means bringing together like-minded individuals and organizations with the conviction to organize a global movement to promote a clean energy future and end our dependence on fossil fuels.
Through these efforts we hope to convince our state legislators, governors, Congress and President Barack Obama and other world leaders to adopt policies encouraging the growth of clean and renewable energy sources in place of oil and coal.
This weekend, “Hands Across the Sand” will unite people of all walks of life, transcending political affiliations and even international borders. Last year’s movement featured events not only in all 50 states but in 43 other countries around the world. This movement is not about politics but rather the protection of our coastal economies, oceans, marine wildlife and fisheries.
Expanded offshore drilling and its potential to cause devastating accidents threaten all of these things. Only by embracing high-tech energy efficiency and responsibly-sited clean energy can we truly move beyond the dangers of dirty fossil fuels and eliminate the risks they pose to our coastal environments.
I hope to see you on Doran Beach at 11 a.m. Saturday at the whale sculpture across from the Coast Guard Station. Please bring your family and friends to help us in our effort to keep California’s coasts beautiful – and safe. To encourage carpooling, the normal daily $6 use fee for the park will be waived for our event for all vehicles with at least four occupants.
To learn more about our event, visit: www.surfrider.org/sonomacoast.
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Richard Charter is senior policy adviser for marine programs at Defenders of Wildlife. He lives in Bodega Bay.
Statement by Robert Weissman, President, Public Citizen
WASHINGTON – June 15 – Legal speculation is siphoning money from the pockets and pocketbooks of consumers.
Even Goldman Sachs suggests that legal speculation may be adding 65-70 cents to the price of a gallon of gasoline.
Speculators, in other words, are imposing a private tax on us.
This is the worst kind of tax. The proceeds of this Wall Street-imposed tax are going to Wall Street interests, giant oil companies and foreign oil interests. The Wall Street-imposed tax is regressive, with working families hit the hardest. And the unpredictability and impermanence of this Wall Street-imposed tax means that – while it imposes costs on consumers and the economy – it does not do much to shift consumer and investment decisions toward efficiency.
We, the People are not helpless in the face of this legalized rip-off. We can crack down on out-of-control legal speculation with available tools. The Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act directed the Commodity Futures Trading Commission to enact position limits to eliminate excessive speculation. But the CFTC has failed to act.
Now comes Sen. Bernie Sanders’ End Excessive Oil Speculation Now Act to mandate immediate action by the CFTC to end the Wall Street-imposed oil tax. The legislation would end Wall Street’s authority to rip off consumers. Public Citizen strongly supports the End Excessive Oil Speculation Now Act. We need it right now.
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Public Citizen is a national, nonprofit consumer advocacy organization founded in 1971 to represent consumer interests in Congress, the executive branch and the courts.
Coast News: Rancho Santa Fe News: Locals to join hands to oppose offshore drilling
by Bianca Kaplanek
6 hrs ago
DEL MAR – Area residents who oppose expanded offshore drilling and support clean energy solutions for a sustainable planet can join hands in front of Powerhouse Park at noon June 25 for the second annual Hands Across the Sand event.
Dave Rauschkolb, a Florida surfer and restaurateur, created the event in response to a bill passed by the Florida House of Representatives, lifting the ban on near-shore oil drilling.
With support from sponsor organizations, more than 10,000 Floridians joined hands Feb. 13, 2010, covering the state’s coastlines to show united opposition to near-shore drilling.
Two months later the BP Deepwater Horizon oilrig exploded in the Gulf of Mexico. Rauschkolb then organized a global Hands Across The Sand to urge President Barrack Obama to abandon his bid to open continental U.S. waters to offshore oil drilling.
On June 26, 2010, more than 1,000 events took place in all 50 states and in 42 countries.
Hands Across the Sand is not about politics, according to the organization’s website.
“It is about protecting coastal economies, oceans, marine wildlife and fisheries from the threats of expanded offshore drilling and the accidents associated with this,” the website states.
Participants join hands “to implore leaders and decision-makers to end the United States’ dependence on oil and coal and embrace a clean energy future for a sustainable planet.”
Participants are asked to arrive, rain or shine, at 11 a.m. and join hands for 15 minutes, forming lines in the sand to say “no” to oil drilling in coastal waters and “yes” to clean energy.
For more information, visit handsacrossthesand.org or contact local coordinator Yasmine Zein at yazmataz7@gmail.com.
The second annual Hands Across the Sand
Posted: Jun 13, 2011 8:27 AM
Updated: Jun 13, 2011 8:31 AM
MYRTLE BEACH, SC (WMBF) – People all over the world will gather to join hands in the second annual Hands Across the Sand on June 25 to take a stand against expanded offshore oil drilling and support for clean energy solutions for our planet.
Supporters from Myrtle Beach will gather at 11 a.m. at Plyler Park on the end of Mr. Joe White Avenue on the oceanfront. Everyone will join hands silently on the beach for 15 minutes. Parking will be available at Pavilion parking garage.
Local event organizer Mary Max Neely said, “We will hold hands in support of clean air, water and energy. The oil companies have reserves. Once again, we are drawing a line in the sand against drilling along America’s beaches across the nation and around the world. Our coastlines, marine life and tourism industry are too big of a risk to take.”
For more information about the Myrtle Beach event, contact Mary Max Neely at 843-283-9490, maxie@sccoast.net or www.handsacrossthesand.org.
Hold hands on the beach 6/25 — for Hands Across the Sand
June 9, 2011 | Siel Ju
Plan for a day at the beach on Sunday, June 25 – and see all your fellow environmentalists collected by the ocean at noon. The second annual Hands Across the Sand event, when people peacefully hold hands across the sand to oppose offshore drilling and call for clean energy solutions, returns later this month to a beach near you.
The first event – held on June 26, 2010, just months after the BP oil spill – got people all over the world involved, with more than 1000 gatherings everywhere from Australia to Tanzania to Santa Monica, where I showed up. That local event brought out actresses Amy Smart and Rosario Dawson, Los Angeles City Councilmember Bill Rosendahl, environmental organizations like Surfrider Foundation and Green LA, and many locals that simply want an end to offshore drilling. After a few rousing speeches about moving L.A. towards cleaner energy sources, we all held hands – and stretched across the sand, chanting “Clean energy now!”
Now, Hands Across the Sand is coming back, happening all over the world at noon (local time) on Sunday, June 25. The event returns at a time when BP oil spill related stories are still making headlines – though these articles rarely front page news now. Hands Across the Sand aims to bring back to the public consciousness the many environmental and health problems related to offshore drilling, calling for both local and international solutions that bridge political and ideological affiliations.
Though the event blew up after the BP oil spill, Hands Across the Sand was actually founded by a Florida surfer and restaurateur called Dave Rauschkolb, who organized a hand-holding event in February 2010 that attracted 10,000 Floridians – after a bill to to lift the ban on nearshore drilling passed in the Florida House of Representatives. Two months later, the BP oil spill happened – and Hands Across the Sand became a big, international event endorsed by Sierra Club, Surfrider Foundation, Oceana, and many other environmental organizations.
Ready to hold hands again? The Santa Monica event will return to last year’s spot just on the south side of the Santa Monica Pier. Show up at 11 ready to listen and learn from local activists – then grab your neighbor’s hand and join the human chain at noon.
But many other Hands Across the Sand events are also happening on other nearby beaches, from Venice to Dockweiler State Beach to the Main Beach in Laguna and the Pier in San Clemente. Visit the Hands Across the Sand website to find the event closest to you – or organize your own.
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Second-annual Hands Across the Sand set for June 25
1:04 PM, May. 23, 2011
Written by Kimberly Blair kblair@pnj.com
At noon on June 25 in time zones all across the globe people will once again join hands on beaches and in cities for the second annual Hands Across the Sand demonstration.
The peaceful protest is being organized to oppose expanded offshore drilling and promote clean energy solutions for a sustainable planet.
Hands Across the Sand is a movement made up of people from all walks of life and political affiliations, organizers say.
Florida surfer and Seaside restaurateur Dave Rauschkolb founded Hands Across the Sand in October 2009 in response to a bill passed in the Florida House of Representatives to lift the ban on nearshore drilling.
With the support of sponsor organizations, he rallied more than 10,000 Floridians to join hands on Feb. 13, 2010, covering the state’s coastlines, to show a united opposition to nearshore drilling. That event attracted 250 people to Casino Beach.
Two months later, the Deepwater Horizon oil rig exploded in the Gulf of Mexico. A second event was organized for June 26 to urge President Obama to abandon his bid to open the continental United States waters to offshore oil drilling. That event sparked 1,000 demonstrations worldwide. More than 800 people turned out on Casino Beach for that event, which fell three days after BP’s oil from the oil well disaster slicked Pensacola Beach.
On April 20, the one-year anniversary of the BP Deepwater Horizon disaster, Hands Across The Sand launched its 2011 event website so that people worldwide could organize and participate in demonstrations in their neighborhoods, cities, parks and beaches.
Local people are encouraged to go to any nearby beach at noon and wear black and display banners.
For more details, visit www.handsacrossthesand.org. To view a Flickr photo stream from June 26, 2010 event log onto:
Activists from Greenpeace have been harassing the drilling program of Cairn Energy in the Arctic off the Greenland coast citing the lack of a publicly available oil spill response plan for drilling in the sensitive Arctic environment. Cairn Energy, an Edinburgh registered company, is presently involved in exploratory deep sea oil drilling in the Arctic in the Davis Strait (Iceberg Alley).
An oil spill response plan is a requirement of the Norsok drilling standards, which Cairn Energy claims to follow, and the Arctic Council’s offshore drilling guidelines. The Arctic Council specify in their Arctic Guideline 2009 (PDF) under section 7.2 on Reponse that “Operators should be required to have site-specific or operator-specific plans.” and that “Operators should allow the opportunity for public review and comment of the Plan.”
Cairn Energy has repeatedly refused to make an oil spill response plan available for public review and comment, despite the recent disaster of the BP Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico which saw a deep sea oil gusher that took 3 months before being capped and involved extensive oil pollution damage to marine and wildlife habitats in the Gulf of Mexico.
Eighteen Greenpeace activists are being held in a Greenland jail for boarding the Cairn oil rig Leiv Eiriksson last Saturday (4 June) to look for it’s elusive oil spill response plan. They have all been charged with trespassing and breaching a security zone, fined 30,000 dkk and will be deported for their action in defense of the Arctic.
Ben Ayliffe radioed the Greenpeace ship Esperanza from the oil rig saying “We have met with the drill manager and requested a copy of the oil spill plan, which we assume he has on board, yet once again we have been refused even sight of it. What is Cairn Energy trying to hide? We have phoned, written, faxed, emailed and now even paid a visit to the rig to get a plan that should be in the public domain and should be subject to independent verification and public scrutiny.”
In late May Greenpeace activists disrupted drilling operations by suspending a survival pod with two people from the rig just metres from the drill bit.
Cairn Energy on Thursday June 9 were granted an injunction in a Dutch court against further disruption by Greenpeace entering a 500 metre exclusion zone around the Cairn Energy oil rigs. The penalty for defying the order would be damages paid to Cairn Energy of ¤50,000 a day, but no more than ¤1 million in the case of multiple violations of the order. The damages is far less than what Cairn Energy were asking for: 2 million Euros per day.
According to Greenpeace the Injunction judge stated in his ruling: “A leak of this kind could indeed have major consequences for humans, wildlife and the environment in a large region. It is therefore evident that it is also in the interests of many who are not directly involved with the drilling that maximum safety is observed during the drilling including that there are plans and operational possibilities in place to address a possible incident of this kind. In that sense Greenpeace serves a general public interest with its call for attention to the risks of the drills.” (Greenpeace Blogpost by Nick Young – What the Judge said)
An oilspill in the Arctic would be near impossible to clean in this pristine environment – and would be much worse than the BP Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. British Energy Minister Lord Howell has been briefed in documents obtained by Greenpeace under Freedom of Information that “The impact of such a spill in the Arctic would be proportionally higher due to the lower temperatures and (in winter) lack of sunlight that will inhibit oil-eating bacteria (which played a large role in cleaning up the Macondo spill). The Arctic ecosystem is particularly vulnerable, and emergency responses would be slower and harder tha in the Gulf of Mexico due to the area’s remoteness and the difficulty in operating in sub-zero temperatures….”
The Davis Strait where oil exploration is ocurring is also known as Iceberg Alley. Cairn Energy have ships to watch for and tow smaller icebergs away from the rigs; for larger ice bergs, the rigs have to stop operations and move out of way. The two exploratory drill sites are AT-7 well in the Atammik Block, approximately 160 kilometres offshore Nuuk, west Greenland and the LF-7 well in the Lady Franklin Block approximately 300 kilometres offshore Nuuk. Drilling is being done at water depths of 905 and 989 metres respectively. The area is famous for its narwhal population and is an important fisheries area for Greenland. Fisheries products represents 88 per cent of Greenland’s export earnings. An oil spill would potentially devestate this industry.
With the onset of peak oil, exploration and extraction of the more difficult fossil fuel reserves is taking place. This includes deep sea and Arctic oil exploration and drilling, shale oil and tar sands mining. These fossil fuel reserves are much more expensive to develop and involve greater expenditure of energy and carbon emissions contributing to climate change, and real and potential damage to local environment and ecosystems.
Renowned NASA climate scientist Dr James Hansen believes coal mining and other fossil fuel extraction such as shale oil, tar sands and deep sea oil drilling, needs to be quickly curtailed if we are to achieve the necessary emission reductions to avoid dangerous climate change.
China’s Vice President Xi Jinping, left, and Cuba’s President Raul Castro walk before a meeting at Revolution Palace in Havana, Cuba, Sunday June 5, 2011. Jinping is in Cuba on a two day official visit. AP Photo/Alejandro Ernesto, Pool
HAVANA (AP) – Chinese Vice President Xi Jinping toured a joint oil exploration project in Cuba near the end of a three-day visit during which the two countries signed economic accords that include the expansion of a refinery, Cuban state media said Tuesday.
Xi, who is widely expected to be China’s next president, called the Camarioca Norte 100 exploratory well and other projects a sign of excellent relations and close economic cooperation. Chinese equipment is operating at the well, Cuban Communist Party newspaper Granma said Tuesday.
Ministry of Basic Industry chief Tomas Benitez said Empresa de Perforacion y Extraccion de Peroleo del Centro, Cuba’s leading hydrocarbons concern, is working with Chinese help on several oil exploration and exploitation projects in the country.
Cuba’s domestic production is exclusively heavy oil with a high sulfur content, but there are high hopes for offshore Gulf reserves that could contain large quantities of lighter, sweet crude. A test well in 2004 turned up only modest deposits, however.
Benitez said drilling is expected to begin later this year on six deep-water exploration wells with the help of a platform built in China and scheduled to come online starting in October, according to government Web portal Cubadebate.
Washington’s 48-year-old trade embargo prohibits U.S. companies from investing in Cuban oil exploration and production.
Earlier during Xi’s visit, he and Cuban President Raul Castro presided over the signing of 13 accords in areas from telecommunications and transport to biotech and energy.
The agreement on the Cienfuegos refinery is a joint plan by China and Cuban-Venezuelan oil company Cuven Petrol SA, a division of China National Petroleum Corp. and Technip Itali SA. A liquid natural gas project is also in the works, but specifics were not announced.
China is Cuba’s No. 2 commercial partner after Venezuela. The Chinese ambassador was recently quoted as saying trade between the two nations was $1.8 billion last year.
Chinese exports to the Caribbean nation mainly fall in the transportation, communications, agricultural and electricity sectors, in addition to consumer goods like appliances, while Cuba provides China with services in health, biotech and pharmaceuticals.
Xi also met Monday with former President Fidel Castro, Chinese state-run Xinhua News Agency reported.
Xi was to leave later Tuesday bound for visits to Uruguay and Chile.
Special thanks to Richard Charter.
"Be the change you want to see in the world." Mahatma Gandhi
