Obama lifts ban on East Coast offshore drilling

WASHINGTON - President Barack Obama announced yesterday that his administration will approve significant oil and gas exploration off America's coasts.

The move ends a long-standing moratorium on oil and gas drilling along much of the East Coast, from Delaware to Central Florida.

In a speech on energy security, Obama said he was steering a course between staunch opposition to any new offshore drilling and advocacy of opening all U.S. waters to energy exploration without restriction.

The compromise, which Obama said has been under consideration for more than a year, split environmentalists, with some applauding the administration's moderation and others questioning its precedent-setting decision. Republican critics welcomed the expansion of offshore exploration but complained that it did not go far enough.

"Given our energy needs, in order to sustain economic growth and produce jobs and keep our businesses competitive, we're going to need to harness traditional sources of fuel even as we ramp up production of new sources of renewable, homegrown energy," Obama said.

Obama made the remarks in an appearance with Interior Secretary Ken Salazar at Joint Base Andrews Naval Air Facility Washington, formerly Andrews Air Force Base. He spoke against the backdrop of a new fighter jet and a light armored vehicle that the military has been testing to run on a mixture of biofuels.

The new strategy calls for oil and gas exploration in the eastern Gulf of Mexico, more than 125 miles from Florida's coast, and in large areas in the Chukchi and Beaufort seas in the Arctic Ocean, north of Alaska, after the government conducts detailed studies.

The administration will continue to bar exploration in Alaska's Bristol Bay, which is a critical wildlife habitat, and canceled several lease sales in the Chukchi and Beaufort seas that had been planned under the Bush administration.

Obama pledged that new technologies would be employed to reduce the impact of oil exploration.

The U.S. military is developing alternative fuel sources as a matter of national security, he said, pointing to an experimental F-18 Navy fighter jet behind him, which will be flown for the first time on Earth Day. "