It's an addiction that threatens our economy, our environment and our national security. It touches every part of our daily lives and ties our hands as a nation and a people. The addiction has worsened for decades and now it's reached a point of crisis. In 1970, we imported 24% of our oil.
Today it's nearly 70% and still growing.
Oil prices have come down from the staggering highs of last summer, but lower prices have not reduced our dependence on foreign oil or lessened the risks to either our economy or our security.
If we are depending on foreign sources for nearly 70% of our oil, we are in a precarious position in an unpredictable world. In additional to putting our security in the hands of potentially unfriendly and unstable foreign nations, we spent $475 billion on foreign oil in 2008 alone. That's money taken out of our economy and sent to foreign nations, and it will continue to drain the life from our economy for as long as we fail to stop the bleeding.
Projected over the next 10 years the cost will be $10 trillion — it will be the greatest transfer of wealth in the history of mankind.
America uses a lot of oil. Every day 85 million barrels of oil are produced around the world.
And 21 million of those are used here in the United States.
That's 25% of the world's oil demand. Used by just 4% of the world's population.