Americans Don't Believe Bush, Industry Claims on Gas Prices, Poll Shows

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WASHINGTON (July 24, 2008) - The American public is not buying the arguments of President Bush and the oil industry that new drilling will lower gas prices, a new poll finds. Despite a well-funded campaign to convince lawmakers to open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska and the offshore waters of the Outer Continental Shelf to drilling, and to allow new oil shale projects in the Rocky Mountain West, a majority (54%) of Americans do not see more drilling as a solution to high gas prices. Instead, the public overwhelmingly believes (76% to 19%) that policymakers should focus on investing in new energy technologies including renewable fuels and more efficient vehicles rather than expanding exploration and drilling for more oil. These findings were reported in a national poll conducted over the past week by Belden Russonello and Stewart, and released today.

A significant majority of Americans (63%) said that the President's proposal to open up public lands to oil and gas drilling is "more likely to enrich oil companies than to lower gas prices for American consumers." A substantial majority (66%) said that "the small percentage of public lands still protected from oil drilling should remain off limits because they are valuable natural resources that cannot be replaced."

When asked the question, "Do you think that allowing oil companies to drill in public lands and offshore areas that are currently off limits to drilling will result in lower gas prices for American consumers or not?", 54% of poll respondents said they did not believe more drilling would lower gas prices. Although Americans were initially divided on a general question of opening protected public lands and offshore areas to drilling, with a slight majority (53%) in favor, and 41% opposed, the poll found that support for drilling weakened significantly when those polled were presented with other energy policy options. When asked the question: "Looking to the future, which one of the following do you think should be a more important priority for government: Investing in new energy technology including renewable fuels and more efficient automobiles, or expanding exploration and drilling for more oil?", more than three-quarters (76%) of respondents favored new technology and renewables, and only a small number (19%) favored expanded oil drilling.

The poll, conducted by Washington, D.C., research firm Belden Russonello & Stewart, was a nationally representative telephone survey of 821 adults between July 16 and 20, 2008. The margin of sampling error is 3.5 percentage points at a 95% confidence level. See a copy of the complete survey.

Source: http://www.wilderness.org/NewsRoom/Release/20080724.cfm

[pedroh 21]

they only polled hippies

[w¡n9Nµ7 §£@¥€r 123]

they only polled hippies

[SMOKE 1,426]

maybe drilling more here wouldn't drop prices at the pump much if any. but, it would reduce the money flowing out of the US. & it needs to be done until we can figure out how to make a switch to alternative fuels. which needs to be done also.

A.J.: do you have any info on estimates showing how long it would take for us to change the transportation industy over to alternative fuels?......affordable vehicles for the average joe to the trucks hauling goods across the country.

[Peikko 1,575]

Talked to someone in the oil industry about this last night. Any change in current policy regarding drilling would result in nothing changing re gas production for at least 5-10 years. Also, an intersting point for you, although the price at the pump is high, the price at wholesale level isn't for domestic producers so actually, there is currently a contraction in the domestic industry re new projects. Hmmmmm.

[Hilarious Clinton 452]

maybe drilling more here wouldn't drop prices at the pump much if any. but, it would reduce the money flowing out of the US. & it needs to be done until we can figure out how to make a switch to alternative fuels. which needs to be done also.

yup. drilling here reduces how much oil we import.

And the fact that it will take 5+ years to develope shouldn't discourage us. Everything takes time.

We should drill here and use more nuclear, solar, wind, geothermal and clean coal. Americans like energy.

[Trumplestiltskin 5,791]

Interesting. If the cost of oil is low at wholesale - and the costs paid by the consumer are essentially added on for the retail market, then clearly there isn't a very big incentive for those same domestic producers to invest huge sums of money in new exploration projects.

People who want an overnight fix to the problem would probably be better off complaining about the huge taxes that are added onto the cost of fuel and which translates directly to pump prices.

When they say "oil driven economy" the reality is that the government is not only reliant on the product itself - but on the huge revenue they get from taxing it and which they have relied upon for many years.