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I read Dr. Banziger's latest rail against the oil and gas industry over the weekend, and I'm calling BS.
For years he has accused the oil and gas industry of causing every malady known to man while comfortably living off all the products and energy oil and gas provide. This week he was "saving" the Ohio state park flora and fauna from this evil intrusion. Has he ever stopped to think that without oil and gas, those public forests would not exist? They would have been neutered and burned for heat. Without fertilizer or fuel for mechanized farming, these areas would be required for farming or pasture to support human life.
What is the learned doctor's alternative -- wind and solar? Give me a break! If he had a fraction of the "technical knowledge" he apparently thinks no one has, he would know the physical limitations of these power sources -- even when the sun shines and the wind blows. Oh yeah, doctor, it takes oil and gas to make these intermittent power sources. As America has reduced CO2 emissions because of natural gas, Asia has increased CO2 emissions more than four times by burning coal.
In California, environmentalists handle the intermittent power problem with individual backup generators that run on natural gas. What hypocrites! Do you have a backup generator, Dr. Banziger? With the positions you've taken, you are going to need it.
Oil and gas can be, and has been, developed responsibly -- even if not perfectly. However, the benefits of the oil and gas industry are far superior to the 19th century existence we would have without it -- killing whales to light our lamps.
Gene Huck, BS Petroleum Engineering
1979 Marietta College graduate