Interior Secretary, Ryan Zinke, announced last week that the Trump administration has moved to vastly expand offshore drilling from the Atlantic to the Arctic oceans with a plan that would open up federal waters off the California coast for the first time in more than three decades.
This new five-year drilling plan could also potentially open new areas of oil and gas exploration in areas off the East Coast from Georgia to Maine, where drilling has been blocked for decades.
Zinke commented that responsible development of offshore energy resources would boost jobs and economic security while providing billions of dollars to fund conservation along U.S. coastlines.
“This is a draft program,” he stated. “Nothing is final yet, and our department is continuing to engage the American people to get to our final product.”
Image courtesy of Chris Carlson/Associated Press