With the recent announcement that Arab oil producers plan to increase crude prices comes an unprecedented opportunity for America’s new leader to demonstrate that he is as eager to work for the environment as he is for big business.

Monday, April 02, 2001

With the recent announcement that Arab oil producers plan to increase crude prices comes an unprecedented opportunity for America’s new leader to demonstrate that he is as eager to work for the environment as he is for big business.

The Organization of Petroleum Export Countries’ price hike is likely to mean higher pump and furnace prices for Americans and has already brought new calls for exploitation of the huge oil reserves that underlie the environmentally sensitive Alaskan Arctic Wildlife Preserve. Industries that stand to profit tremendously from tapping that oil source hope that with President George Bush’s administration in power they will find a sympathetic audience for their claim that exploitation of Arctic oil is essential.

There are huge flaws in that reasoning, which is designed far more to line the pockets of big business than to provide real benefits to most Americans.

Far better than simply tapping another oil reserve and, in the process, destroying one of North America’s few remaining areas of true wilderness, would be an aggressive campaign of conservation. If he were willing, Bush could use his presidential power to push conservation much as his predecessors did during the oil crisis of the 1970s. And make no mistake, a big push from the president is what it will take to get Americans to again conserve.

But even small efforts magnified by the hundreds of millions of petroleum-using Americans would pay huge and immediate benefits. The side effect would be an improvement of air quality and, if supply and demand are allowed to work, moderation in processed petroleum prices.

OPEC’s price increase could be a trigger either for environmental devastation and a business-as-usual attitude that will eventually lead to ruin – or it could be the trigger for a healthier America. Our president holds the power to decide which path we will take.