Target: U.S. President Joe Biden
Goal: Permanently protect California’s coast from offshore oil drilling.
A catastrophic oil spill has devastated the coast off Southern California, contaminating beaches with toxic petroleum and killing untold numbers of birds, fish, and other wildlife. This latest industry disaster is a reminder that oil development is an intrinsically risky business that threatens human health and the wellbeing of our planet. At a time when more and more people, governments, and corporations are trying to eliminate their dependence on fossil fuels, the moment has come to ban offshore drilling in California waters once and for all.
An estimated 3,000 barrels of oil have spread over at least 13 square miles of ocean off of Huntington Beach, California, trapping seabirds in toxic goo and poisoning marine animals at all levels of the food chain. A break in an offshore pipeline connected with a drilling platform owned by Amplify Oil is believed to have caused the catastrophe. While cleanup efforts are ongoing, it will likely take years to repair the damage to wildlife, ecosystems, and local economies.
Once, oil spills may have seemed like an unavoidable cost of pumping the fuel that powered the world economy. Today, however, renewable energy and clean technologies like electric vehicles provide a viable path for transitioning to an oil-free future. Furthermore, the worsening climate crisis makes eliminating our dependence on fossil fuels a survival imperative. The Amplify Oil spill should be the wakeup call that ends future oil development off California’s coast as the world turns its back on a dirty, dangerous industry.
Sign the below petition to urge the Biden administration to permanently ban offshore oil development in the waters off California.
PETITION LETTER:
Dear President Biden,
The Amplify Oil spill off Southern California’s coast is a wakeup call: we cannot continue our country’s suicidal dependence on petroleum any longer. With the world pivoting to a clean energy future, the time has come to establish policies that protect local ecosystems and economies by keeping oil in the ground. Please work with Congress and appropriate federal agencies to establish and enforce a permanent ban on oil development in federal waters off the California coast.
Your administration has taken much-needed steps to reduce our dependence on petroleum, including proposing new fuel economy standards for the auto industry. We have the technology to drive our cars and power our economy without fossil fuels that worsen the climate crisis and endanger the health of our communities. Now it is time to stop dangerous oil drilling practices that are incompatible with a clean energy future.
Please, do everything in your power to ban oil drilling off the California coast, and prevent more disasters like the Amplify Oil spill from occurring.
Sincerely,
[Your Name Here]
Photo credit: Marine Photobank
It isn’t only the California coastline in jeopardy; nor only America’s land and waters being destroyed. it may already be too late, but we must try. In short order, much of the land, waters of all kinds, forests / deserts / crop lands will be beyond saving. Humans will have ruined our only planet, our only home.
Every creature also occupying this wet rock in space is staring at us in fear, in puzzlement, in lost hope that we will stop the destruction of all our lives, our futures, our Only chance, for useless profit.
What will riches buy if it’s all gone? Ask your grandchildren…
C. Cook.
You are absolutely brilliant, truly, thank you for an intelligent well thought out comment.
Well said, and true, not just that coast.. already happened in the Gulf and still feeling the harms towards animals and people? They’re spending so much to go to space and other planets, knowing they’re destroying this planet but in hope for another planet to settle on?? So very sad
Agree all comments stop now. Have a heart for wildlife and marine life.
It is horrible and disgusting and heart-breaking that our marine mammals and sea birds have to suffer and get sick and sometimes die for these careless and irresponsible oil spill accidents.
STOP NOW!!! HAVE COMPASIÓN FOR OTHER LIVING BEINGS.
Oil drilling must stop
I want ALL living beings to live and be free as nature intended. I also realize we are dependent on oil, hopefully less each year, until we can move to clean energy. That’s the goal but the problem is we still need oil for the time being as we transition. Due to Covid the ships bringing goods which America needs are tied up due to inefficient ports here in the US. The infrastructure bill will help yet improvements take time too. These huge ships need to be cautious, not drag anchors as they can see the oil structures sitting in the channel. The world can’t afford oil spills. We don’t know how to clean them up. Patches of oil are still clumped on the sand bed from the last oil spill in the Gulf many years ago. Also ship strikes of whales and other mammals need to be ended. The US and the world need to come together to be sure ships deliver goods with the least amount of harm. Machines and Hight Tech need to be placed on ALL ships to show any problems, malfunctions, or mistakes so we can limit them from happening.We also need to hold those doing harm are accountable. So much must change as we cope with climate change, get rid of Covid, and make life better for everyone. It can be done but it will require cooperation and individual diligence. Without effort we will not survive.
All of these oil spills around the world have got to be stopped immediately. To hear what happened off the coast of California is just down right disgusting. Why in the hell is pipe lines just laying on the ocean beds instead of being buried under ground. The American people have got to stand up and make their voices be heard loud and clear, that these oil corporations will do just about anything to save a freaking buck so that they can make millions in profits for them and their investors.
Quit buying oil stock – get a hybrid/electric car
It is devastating to see images of wildlife soaked in oil, dead fish washing a shore, and the harmful affects that these oil spills have on our ocean life and human life. This is the very reason many people oppose oil drilling off our shores because of these catastrophic oil leaks or spills.
This is terrible — the oil companies MUST be held responsible to clean this up and MAKE SURE that this never happens again . it is deasting to see the effect this has on innocent fish and anima;s/
HUMAN GREED IS DESTROYING THIS HOME OF ALL LIVES..SO NOW WHAT WILL YOUR GREEDY MONEY BUY AND WHERE IF THE EARTH IS GONE.
I DO NOT WANT TO SEE ANOTHER OIL SPILL ETC. PLEASE DO WHATEVER IT TAKES TO STOP THESE DISASTERS FROM HAPPENING AGAIN!!!! …AND HOLD ALL ACCOUNTABLE!
LETS SHOW RESPECT FOR ALL ANIMALS THAT LIVE THERE! ..