BP's oil spill and ........

Sorry for the months of not posting anything. I’m not going to waste our time with a paragraph of whining about it either so let’s get started.

The other day I was watching a major news network and on it was an environmentalist talking about how oil drilling is the most horrible thing in the world. He was also talking about how due to the oil spill the ecosystems have been destroyed and the beaches in the gulf are going to cost billions to clean. The same stuff we all have heard before for several years. I’m not disagreeing with him at all, yes the ecosystem has been destroyed, the beaches will be really expensive to clean up and the lack tourism is going to hurt the local economies.

The thought that ran through my head was this: what would happen if we didn’t drill for oil?

According to Wikipedia, for what it is worth, the first oil rig was in use in China in 347 CE. So, it is fair to say that humans have been drilling and removing oil at an ever increasing rate from the earth for about 1,663 years. While doing this we are leaving massive cavities underneath the earth’s surface.
Now let us assume for a minute that humans never needed to use oil. We figured out how to use a renewable energy source regardless of the amount of money that oil brings into the pockets of people who seem to be way more important than me, not to mention the people who are educating our children to one day run this country….really? Anyway, so we never drilled for oil, what would happen?
I am not a scientist by any means and I am not all that great of a chemist ether so just bear with me.

If we never drilled for oil that means that the oil would remain in the ground. It would continue to “grow” and make the cavities they are in even bigger. Granted this would take millions of years but I am hoping the human race will be around for awhile, due to the lack of natural selection in our species now, but that’s a different topic.

So a multitude of things can happen because of all of this crude oil under the earth’s surface. I am only going to talk about 2.

As the countless barrels of oil are building under our feet the pressure and oil will have to go somewhere. It can either or up or down. If it goes down, then it might, maybe, leak into our fresh water supply. Polluting our drinking water, that’s no good. If it goes up the it will break through the surface of the earth and spill into our oceans and wash up on our beaches…….wait……that’s happening now right? Only it’s the CEO of BP’s fault because he makes 6 million a year, still haven’t figured out what that had to do with anything.

So let’s think about this oil spill or drilling like this: if we never drilled it could spill out anyway. But seeing has how we are drilling, relieving the pressure of the oil cavities, we are in a way preventing it. But we are humans, our machines have flaws, we are going to mess up and spill some oil, but mother nature might have done it anyway, so we kind of break even right?

I do think it is a horrible thing what has happened. The ecosystems, tourism, white sandy beaches are all going to take a hit. No question about it. But instead of trying to say that it is wrong to drill, take a sec and think for a minute (<-- catch that?) what could happen if we didn’t……….

For the four people who read this, feel free to leave feed back!