McCain faces energy pushback during Santa Barbara trip
SANTA BARBARA, CA - McCain’s energy initiatives faced some skepticism during his two-day trip to the birthplace of the modern environmental movement.
During a roundtable with Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, former CIA Director James Woolsey and two local environmental experts, McCain’s proposal to expand the use of nuclear power and offshore oil drilling came under attack from a fellow panelist.
“I don’t understand how it’s not compromising our environmental standards to propose a crash program to build more nuclear power plants when the industry has not complied with the federal law that requires there to be safe disposal for the radioactive waste,” said Michael Feeney, the executive director of the Land Trust for Santa Barbara County. “There is no solution to that problem, and that’s a big stumbling block for me to a rapid expansion of nuclear energy.”
Feeney didn’t stop there, adding that he was also doubtful about offshore drilling. “It makes me nervous to think about those who are proposing to drain America’s off-shore oil and gas reserves as quickly as possible in the hopes of driving down the price of gasoline,” Feeney said “I think when you look at the good sources of information, were we to open up the California coast or the Alaska natural wildlife refuge to drilling, it would be twelve, 15 maybe 20 years before those resources came online and got to full production.”
The event, at the Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History, took place a few miles from the site of a 1969 oil spill created by an offshore rig that eventually spilt 3 million gallons of oil off of the Santa Barbara coast.
McCain only pushed back on Feeney’s criticism of nuclear power, suggesting that the local director look across the Atlantic for progress in dealing with spent fuel.
“My friend, the technology is there. The Europeans do it. I mean it’s safe. It’s being done,” McCain said to applause. “They are doing fine…you should visit their reprocessing facility which they have been doing for many, many years without any accident or difficulties or problems and they are meeting closer to the Kyoto requirements of their greenhouse gas emissions, closer than just about anybody else.”
Feeney quickly backed down, noting that he was “not familiar with exactly how they’re dealing with the nuclear waste in a successful way in Europe,” but added, “we are not dealing with it in as successful way in the United States at this point. I know that.”
The exchange comes one day after a donor at McCain’s Monday night fundraiser also expressed skepticism about McCain’s recent reversal on offshore oil drilling.
“Santa Barbara has among other things a great natural beauty — one of our great natural beauties lies before you out there to the South,” questioner Dan Secord said Monday night. “We’re really kind of goosey here about oil spills, and we’re goosey here about federal drilling and oil lands, which are abundant offshore. So we ask you to look out there to the south and the southeast and remember the greatest environmental catastrophe that’s hit this state and then balance that with the notion of winning California. This is a vibrating blue city and a vibrating state, and it’s gonna be a tough haul.”
Tags: energy, gas, john mccain, offshore drilling
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Is the rest against the west. You granola dirt people are now our enemies. I am not living in a hut with no lights, food or water for your view. This election season is not going to be pretty. Look out. McCain, you better get a clue. If things do not change by August, someone else with a backbone is going to get nominated by force.
It is time to get on the ball, learn from others and act. All talk and no action gets us nowhere.
If drilling is left to the states as McCain advocates; Californians will only have themselves to account to _they’d rather blame someone else though. The 1969 accident was no more a pollutant than CODE PINK is today. Californians are better at complaining than anything else they do. If it wasn’t for Dems filibustering and vetoing drilling during Bill C’s time; we’d have our oil today. Another missed opportunity caused by the shortsighted. If they don’t want drilling, then vote against it and don’t complain that gas costs too much, you can’t have it both ways. There is no need for federal ban.
Doesn’t California have the most cars? The most traffic? The worst air pollution?
The home of the environmental movement is a place a lot of people are moving out of because of its environmental problems, #1 being overpopulation. California needs to put its own house in order before it has any credibility telling others what to do.
Do we really have a gas shortage? I am skeptical.
Have the gas stations had problems getting gas to sell us?
If oil futures are in question, why doesn’t our government enforce stricter conservation measures?
How many times have you seen a large SUV headed down the road with 1 person in it?
If we had not Attacked Iraq, perhaps we would not be in this “crisis”. Their oil refineries have been offline ever since.
Are you suspicious at why oil companies are recording record profits?
In this era of “bad” intelligence, you can’t believe everything you hear aor read. You can’t trust the News media, they are aligned with one or the other political party. It seems nobody is interested in what is in the best interest of the country. The powers that be seem only interested in pursuing their own interest be they personal and/or political.
At least McCain is proposing some action. The argument “it will take maybe 15 years, so we should do nothing” makes no sense to me. The Democrats have made NO proposal to increase oil production or lower the cost of gas. Their stance has been that they will tax the profits of oil companies but not lower the price. Their argument is that we should pay more at the pump to force other alternative fuels. They are against ethanol, nuclear power, drilling, coal, and hydrogen fuel cells (the auto worker unions are against hydrogen). What are they for???? Quit attacking the only man suggesting we do something and attack those that are doing nothing … Obama and the Democratics in the House and Senate!!!
The Democrats will tell us you can’t drill and fix the problem. i’ve got news for them, you can’t tax away the shortage either. sure it will take time to increase the supply. That why we need to start now
I live in The peoples republic of California with our RINO governor and the sad sack city of SanFreakcisco. DRILL!!! The ridiculous claims of the environmentalists have about as much bearing 40 years later as someone comparing the engine of a 1969 Chevy with a Honda or a Toyota now days. These people never heard of an energy plan that worked unless the people of the state were becoming more dependent on the government. They are STATISTS pure and simple. The reason the guy didn’t know how France and the rest of Europe was handling nuclear power is they AREN’T INTERESTED!
i love mccain-hes the best-im voting for him and so are all my friends.
his speech was the truth. the santa barbara hippy communist environmentalists cant handle because they are on medical marijuana plus their morons.envoronmentalists cause all wars over oil and blood is on their hands.
vote for john mccain
The problem with voting no on drilling or yes is who is running congress, if it is the democrats they will vote no if it is the republicans then the dems jus filbuster and block it. So if it isn’t a republican, republican you get no oil. And then there is still the chance you will get no oil. It seems the democrats don’t care what ou want, we the people are just a bunch of little kids who need daddy and mommy to tell us what we need and want.
I wonder how many of these protesters are “not in my backyard” beachfront property owners? They certainly don’t want any offshore drilling. GEE!!! There would be a very remote possibility of an oil spill. Like Obama, these wealthy, narcissistic, pseudo-environmentalist don’t care that the average American is struggling to survive financially. They, certainly, are not concerned that these spiralling oil prices will probably lead to subsequent shortages and could possibly be a threat to our national security. Their usual arrogant response will probably be “just deal with it.” At the cost of unjustified criticism, thank God that Senator Mc Cain has taken the FIRST GIANT STEP FORWARD to initiate a greatly needed transition into ALL of our energy options NOW!!! This certainly is a REAL (NOT ETHEREAL) CHANGE THAT WE CAN BELIEVE IN!!!! We cannot afford to be “asleep at the switch” anymore!!
Senator Mc Cain ‘08 for the Struggling American
Mr. Feeney is so sure that nuclear is not safe, yet when it was pointed out about France, he didn’t know about their record on nuclear. He had his blinders on and he has them on regarding off shore drilling too. Accidents happen, but they are cleaned up. Is Mr. Feeney more comfortable with the Chinese drilling off the coast of Florida ( more than US companies that are under US regulations). We will never solve our energy crisis if we are told that we can only propose this or that and nothing else. Life is a series of compromises not just my way or the highway.
Oh the democrats with Al Gore want to go green, look at Gore who made over 100 million in profits off his green investments he sales to the public, look at who is backing Obama besides old Gore. Do you really think oil is a priority for Obama or the democrats? Not today or tomorrow. And the worse part is Gores products cost more to use than what we have now. So they are not the solution. Not drilling is not the solution either. But opening the market for a sugar based biofuel and several others would help as well as if we drill now and uncap the oil rigs we already have. there are plenty of solutions already out there. There is the carborater invented years ago that gets outstanding gas milage that was bought and shelfed, there is the smaller engines that use less gas. The new hybreds get worse gas mileage than some 4 cylenders. We need to also conceder not everyone can afford to buy a new car that saves on gas. Most people are lucky if they can buy used so we need a system to convert the old cars cheaply into efficiant gas cars. We need to get out there and make congress hear the voice of the people. As for Californias polution problems you need to realize their location and why their air does not clear out. The mountains on one side and the warm ocean air on the other. It kind of builds a barrier that holds the air in place. And they want the oil drilled so if with all their problems they can see the need to drill then why can’t the democrats? Oh yeah that globle warming that half the sientist say is real and the other half still can’t figure out how they came to that conclution. It has never been proven and it does not explain the ice age to the today age. Man was not alive during the ice age and it slowly has been warming on the earth for how many years?
Don’t knock the big SUV’s some of us have no choice, but to buy big.
I have 4 kids and last I checked it was illegal to tie one of my boys to the roof so I can have a smaller car.