Poll shows support against offshore drilling
Thursday’s question was: Do you agree with APAMO that there should be a ban on oil drilling and exploration in the area of the barrier reef? Eighty-four percent of those who polled said they did and the remaining sixteen percent said no. On our e-poll one viewer said: Ban all offshore exploration, I agree with APAMO. But another viewer who says he’s an environmentalist wrote: “I can categorically state that oil spills are cleaned up far more quickly and easily by Mother Nature than the lingering of artificial chemicals and heavy metals that are constantly poured into our oceans by activities far more damaging to our Belizean way of life”.
So how quickly does mother nature clean up an oil spill? 1 year? 5 years? 10 years? Whatever the amount of time, it’s not worth the risk. We aren’t even sure of how much oil we have off our shores. We could have 1 billion barrels but we could also only have 10 million. Many people believe that a country automatically gets rich and that the citizens benefit as soon as oil is found. How have we truly benefited from the oil in Spanish Lookout? Not by much. How many people do you think will really care if there is a spill off Belize’s coast? How many days will it be shown on CNN? If BP can screw up off the coast of the U.S and no one in the American Govt can truly do anything about it. Imagine what will happen to Belize when one of these multi billion dollar companies screw up and decide to ignore the problem. We shouldn’t leave mother nature to clean up what common sense can prevent. Our reef fuels tourism and fishing and is way too important to be put at risk. You don’t allow your kids to play with a ball inside the house next to your best china, do you? Somethings are just too valuable to risk. Drill inland all you want, if there is a spill it can be more easily contained in the jungle.
@Kinslito
Normally crude oil exposed to the elements doesn’t last more than a few weeks before the light ends evaporate off and you get a small tar ball. These tar balls are not particularly environmentally damaging. (Trinidad has a tar lake that flowed out to sea for millions of years), and bacteria do dispose of them quite quickly. If it didn’t we would be up to out necks in them. Just offshore the finest beaches in California are over two thousand documented oil seeps. Oil seeps have put billions of barrels of oil into the seas over millions of years and yet where are all the warning notices about not going to the beach in California? Where are all the oil slicks? Where are all the dead fish?
Yes, Belize has truly benefited from the oil at Spanish Lookout by the receipt of millions of dollars, it is ridiculous to suggest otherwise. I personally believe BNE should pay far more, but that is a governmental issue.
Then you say that BP has screwed up the coast of the USA, but there is zero evidence of any coastline being screwed up yet. I also don’t believe that the coastline will be badly affected. Oh, and it also wasn’t BP that caused this mess, it was a failure of equipment owned, maintained and operated by Transocean. BP just owned the lease, not the equipment that failed.
Then again you say that drilling puts the reef at risk. Where is your evidence of that? If you do a simple bit of research you will find that the reef is being constantly damaged by tourism and fishermen, and yet you are very happy for that to continue. Wherever you go in the world, oil activity has been shown to actually increase the biodiversity of the surrounding area, not decrease it.
Also transporting oil has historically proven to cause far more oil spills than drilling. Yet you seem happy with all of the oil tankers that deliver oil to Belize, as well as the tankers that fill up with crude oil at Big Creek. Perhaps they should stop and we should watch all the lights go out just before Belize is plunged into abject poverty?
Would I let my kids play football next to my best China? Yes, of course I would. I would just make sure that the China was protected.
Oh and drilling in the jungle is just as environmentally damaging to drilling at sea, if not more. We have plenty of sea and not much jungle left.
I have spent the last thirty five years dealing with environmental disasters, and have cleaned up more spills than you could ever imagine.
People need to find out the facts and act on them rather than imaginary scenarios blown out of all proportion.
JUST SAY NO, with the oil spill that will happen eventually, and the marine life that people use to survive on plus tourism, don’t make NO SENSE FOR A LITTLE DIME THAT BELIZEANS will receive from it. Taking it a little farther, it could also flow into the Belize River and that will be the end of half the population, I DO BELIEVE THERE IS A CONSPIRACY BEHIND THIS, goverment would like it so, they don’t have to deal with more crimes.