Offshore Oil Moratorium

I would like to dissent from the editorial entitled “Truce on Offshore Oil.” If the preliminary agreement to ban offshore leasing in some of the nation’s most promising acreage becomes final, it will subject the nation to:

--A 25-to-30-year moratorium (it takes 8 to 15 years to develop new oil-producing fields).

--A fragmented national energy policy. (Other coastal states, with justification, would ask for similar treatment.)

--Greater dependency on insecure foreign oil supplies. (U.S. oil imports are on the increase while domestic production continues to decline.)

The editorial suggests that Californians must be winners because of the widespread protests from the oil industry. On the contrary, the preliminary agreement makes all Californians losers. In its earnest, albeit shortsighted, attempt to protect California’s coastline, the delegation is actually endangering that economy far more than a feared oil spill could.

California is the nation’s largest gasoline-consuming state. In the event that fuel supplies are curtailed to a point necessitating lifting of the ban under the emergency clause, production of any subsequent oil reserves would be too late. Even with a crash program, it would take about 10 years to develop any newly found reserves.

The bottom line is that the preliminary agreement plays Russian roulette with the California economy and the nation’s security.

T. D. WALKER

Los Angeles

Walker is public affairs menager for Chevron U.S.A.