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Summary: This document discusses some of the issues regarding the proposed development of the OCS off the coast of California. If we decide to relieve the pressure to drill the OCS off the Califomia coast, a price must be paid. We must either put the burden on other sources and localities--who are no more anxious to develop their resources than are people here in Callfomia-- or we must all make the hard decisions, even sacrifices, required to reduce consumption. We have only a limited number of options for improving supply and there are trade-offs among those as to costs, environmental damages, and dependability. And while there are greater options in reducing demand, they tend to be difficult to implement because of traditional fears that reduced demand necessarily means reduced economic growth. We will need to depend mainly on oil and gas for energy in the next 5 to 10 years. Even crash efforts to develop the western oil shale and coal options or to make large increases tn nuclear power generation will take at least that long before significant impacts will be felt in reduced pressure for more oil and gas. If its going to be difficult to decrease demand and troublesome to increase imports, then we ought to make sure that we drill for oil where it's most likely to be found and least likely to do irreparable damage. And we must keep in mind that leasing of the OCS does not mean production. If we were to open the entire OCS to leasing today, no one would have a clear idea of how much more production could be expected or when. The constraints--lack of rigs, pipe, trained labor, and environmental and legal concerns--all argue against a policy of rapid leasing.
