Well first off there are four spheres that are affected, or can be affected by Oil Rigging. That is the Hydrosphere and Biosphere.
Hydrosphere: Oil rigging does not provide any positive effects for the hydrosphere, only negative. When mining there is always a chance that an oil spill will occur. If this were to happen the water will become polluted, and poisonous to the biology inside the water. Along with that, the water will be removed of its dissolved oxygen making it hard for fish to breath.
Biosphere: Like mentioned before, If an oil spill occurs and responders cannot get in time before it hits an area with lots of fish and other animals. The pollution will poison the animals, and kill them if the are not treated. This is a very serious
Geosphere: This may come as a surprise to many people when they hear that Oil spills affect the Geosphere. This is because when Oil Spills occur normally they are in the middle of the ocean, but as the oil travel they will beached to beaches, shore, and other areas. This will contaminate the soil, created a toxic environment, that will need to be cleaned up by workers.
Environmentalists are one the biggest critics against the notion of increasing domestic oil drilling. By increasing the amount of drilling we do in the United States, we increase the risk of disasters like the Deepwater Horizon spill in the Gulf of Mexico. Disasters are hardly the only source of economic damage either, to find oil reserves under the ocean, seismic waves are generated into the ground. These waves bounce off the ground back up to the ship, where computers and scientist can use the results to make educated guesses on whether or not oil is located under the surface. These seismic waves can wreak havoc with marine animals like whales; where in one case over 100 whales beached themselves to get away from the painful experience (Nixon). Using seismic waves does not even guarantee that oil might be located underneath the surface, the only way to tell is to actually drill into the potential finds causing even more destruction for what might be for no gain. Once oil is found and drilling has begun, the amount of damage done to the environment can become unimaginable. The recent example is that of the Deepwater
Offshore drilling has become an essential part of today’s oil production and demand for energy. With the growth of population comes the increasing demand for oil. The oil industry today, is one of the most used providers of energy. Today in the 20th century the majority of the population in America has a car and cars needs gas to run. The oil reserves in the earth that are easily accessible via land are starting to run dry and are becoming harder to find. This is why we have begun to see more and more offshore oil drills. Although there are benefits of offshore drilling such as profit, lower gas prices, and becoming less dependent on foreign oil. There are also many drawbacks in which if something were to go wrong, the mistake would be catastrophic impacting the environment, the nature, and have trickling effects all around the world.
Imagine living in a third world country with overcrowded houses and no job. That is how, “about 22% of our country’s 5.2 million Native Americans live” (A Program of Partnership With Native Americans). Right now Native American people take up about 2% of all land in North America, most of it being around the area of North and South Dakota. Over the past week there have been protests over the insertion of an oil pipeline through the Native American people, mainly the Standing Rock tribe’s, sacred land. This new pipeline would, “threaten water supplies for the Standing Rock Sioux and millions of others downstream, and its route would destroy tribal burial grounds and sacred cultural land” (Healy). Many of the Native American people, along
Still people make the argument that oil is just too important to stop drilling and that if anything we should drill more. Again author Margaret Haerens talks about how “According to the nation academy of Sciences, current cleanup methods can only remove a small fraction of the oil spilled into the ocean, leaving the remaining oil to continue affecting ocean ecosystems over time” (126). The long term impacts of offshore spills continue to corrupt the oceans and who knows when they will completely be gone. The effects of the oil directly on sea life such as sea birds, fish, shellfish, and other sea life are extremely dangers. “Studies have shown that tiny amounts of oil – as little as one part per billion – can harm pink salmon and cause their eggs to fail” (Haerens Margaret). Imagine swimming in the ocean when a large pool of toxic oils comes floating along right into you when you are trying to enjoy a day at the beach. Not only is offshore drilling have one of the longest lasting ecological impacts on society and living things on and off shore, it effects our economy as well.
Humans are a poisonous sludge, slowly poisoning ourselves and all other inhabitants. There are many ways we do this, offshore oil drilling being one of them. Offshore oil drilling is the process of drilling into the earth and pulling up petroleum, a natural fuel source made of decomposed organisms. While there are many positive effects, there are too many negative ones for oil drilling to continue. Offshore oil drilling is too dangerous to be considered safe for use in the ecosystem. Not only is it too dangerous, oil rigs are made in an environment many would deem too hazardous for settling any type of structure. Oil drilling kills many people each year and pollutes the marine environment, killing the oceans natural inhabitants.
Oil is a very important fossil fuel that is used for various sources of energy. Oil supplies power to industries, fuel for transportation, heat for buildings, and provides raw material for plastics, paints, textiles, and other materials (hybrid cars). To access this fossil fuel, oil drilling is used. Land-based oil drilling became less productive and as the global stipulation for energy increased, technology, law, and geology impacts stepped in and pushed the exploration of oil away from shores (CITE). With its historical background, offshore oil drilling is one of the most important aspects of today’s economy although we are faced with its risks and consequences, such as the BP Deepwater Horizon explosion of the Gulf of Mexico.
Meta: Hop in your 18-wheeler and get ready to embrace the open road, as NuWorks has gone trucks crazy with its latest slots release. Big Rig is big in name and big in stature, but will you be able to ride the reels to this game’s biggest jackpot?
As offshore drilling was a new industry, regulations had to develop at the same time the industry developed. Unfortunately regulations were usually enacted and enforced after accidents had already occurred. Analyzing the development of the offshore oil industry in comparison to the process of regulating its operations will show the international, national, and local processes involved in attempting to balance the economic benefits with the environmental risks involved. An applicable example for showing the relationship between the environment and the economy created by the offshore oil industry is the drilling operations in the Gulf of Mexico.
Oil is one of the most precious substances on Earth. It takes millions of years to form and has many applications throughout the world. Offshore oil drilling in the coastal waters of the United States is a technique used by companies to extract the oil buried deep beneath the ocean floor. Many people refer to the ways that offshore drilling will help the economy, both locally and globally, but despite the apparent benefits, the process is not without controversy. Oilrigs produce wastes which affect marine life and the associated fishing industry, and they pose a danger to the employees who operate them. Because of these consequences, the United States should look to restrict offshore oil drilling.
Is offshore drilling a risk for environmental destruction? The subject oil and gas as energy resources needs to be analyzed with different option on which way to go on drilling offshore in the US. There could be away chosen onto the right solution where we see the positive, negative and the compromise on this question. The past show catastrophic consequences with the BP Oil Company’s pipeline, where they spilled millions of tons of oil into the deep sea waters. Offshore drilling could provide America with significant economic geopolitical gains. Oil Imports from America versus nationalized oil producing countries, the OCS calculates oil and natural gas drills, so fare could create nearly 100.000 and more jobs
Oil rigs are built on the arctic ice because the arctic is full of oil and nutrients, but in order to get to those things they have to build big oil rigs and put them on/into the ice. First, what would you do if you went outside into your yard and saw a huge piece of equipment that was taking up your whole yard? Would you start to freak out and wondering what it was and why it was there? Well that's what it’s like for the polar bears. Not only are these oil rigs in the way but they have the potential risk of spilling oil. Second, oil spills happen when oil tankers carry oil from one place to another and their tanks leak spewing oil into the ocean or onto the ice. If a polar bear was to fall into this mess they would get sticky black smelly
There are many risks involved in this job which includes fires and drowning. Since the rigs are in the middle of the water, it is difficult to escape in case of an emergency. Offshore drilling also leads to a lot of environmental problems. One of the problem is carbon emissions. High amounts of carbon emission is put into the atmosphere causes by the drill that is used to drill the seabed. This contributes to the global warming problem. Another major problem is oil spill. Oil spills causes a lot of damage to the marine life. It also contaminates the water. All the fishes in the ocean can be contaminated and it can go up the food chain affecting all other organisms
The people of the United States are suffering because of money hungry oil companies. While others might believe drilling is good for our economy, it is actually true that drilling damages our planet and causes huge environmental change. Oil drilling affects the people in the United States because it can cause climate change, water pollution, and oil spills that can create a disaster.
Another benefit of offshore oil drilling consists of increasing job opportunities for people. The unstable economy in the United States results in people losing their jobs quite often. In the book Offshore Drilling, the loss of job opportunity in the United States is explained this way: