Congressman Chris Smith (R-NJ), dean of the New Jersey Congressional delegation, delivered excerpts of the following remarks on Friday at Point Pleasant Beach at the signing of the STOP Offshore Oil and Gas Act by New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy:
Special thanks to Governor Murphy for his invitation to join him as he signs this extraordinarily important legislation to ban oil and gas exploration, development and production in State waters—that is to say, within three nautical miles from our coastline.
By prohibiting “any pipeline or other infrastructure that transports oil or natural gas from production facilities located in federal waters or other coastal state waters in the Atlantic Ocean through New Jersey State waters, and any land-based support facilities…” the STOP Offshore Oil and Gas Act makes drilling now or into the future nearly impossible.
Why is all of this important? Opening the waters off the coast of New Jersey to oil and gas exploration, development and production poses catastrophic risks to our 127 mile shoreline, tourism, marine habitat, plant life and fishing.
Seldom has any issue united the people of New Jersey, the congressional delegation, the State Legislature and local public officials as our opposition to offshore oil and gas drilling.
The biggest takeaways from a meeting a group of us had with Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke on February 27th was that the dearth of oil or gas reserves off our coast and the lack of existing shoreline infrastructure including pipelines meant we weren’t likely to be on the final list. But “likely” doesn’t mean we’re in the clear. Significantly, as of today, any shoreline infrastructure designed to enable oil or gas development is comprehensively prohibited by state law.
Let’s not forget that the last three Presidents—Bush, Obama and now Trump—have all initially proposed offshore drilling off our coast.
The legislation the Governor just signed is our best insurance policy to ensure that doesn’t happen now—or ever.
