The Atlantic

Can Trump Open Nearly the Entire U.S. Coastline to Oil Drilling?

Here’s what’s next for the proposal to line the Atlantic and Pacific coasts with offshore oil rigs.
Source: Henry Romero / Reuters

Five years from now, there could be a handful of operating oil rigs within a hundred miles of Miami or the Florida Keys. Dozens more could sit from the coast of Georgia to the Outer Banks and Delmarva peninsula. Still more might rise from the sea between Cape May Lighthouse, at the southern tip of New Jersey, and West Quoddy Head Light, at the easternmost tip of Maine.

At the same time, oil production would expand across California. Dozens of new oil wells would add to the 43 already in production in the state’s south. They’d be joined by new wells near Monterey Bay and San Francisco; and more new wells in the state’s north, near the . More new wells would open off the coast of Washington or Oregon.

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