Agree.
That's what is currently killing the all-electric car. The rapidity of BTU energy transfer from gas pump to gas tank is a hard mark to beat. Consequently, the hybrid car is the more logical approach to cutting down on (and, hopefully, someday eliminating) our dependence on foreign oil. The question is how much corn do we have to plant to make it a completely renewable resource? ;-)
Similarily, the oil and gas drilling industry has - in the face of a heck of a lot of pressure, it must be admitted - finally developed much more environmentally sound and less environmentally demanding production technologies. This new technology is what makes the case for drilling in the environmentally-sensitive ANWR plausible. If we were using the production methods of the 1940s-60s, it would be impossible to sell.
Spilled oil is money lost.
The ability to drill multiple wellbores from one location translates into money saved. (on location construction, infrastructure, etc.)
Horizontal well drilling technology, only well developed since the 1980s, and far, far more reliable in the last 10 years has made this possible, as well as made possible economic recovery of reserves not previously producible.
Environmental pressures have not been to 'clean up' drilling for oil, or the production thereof, but to prevent drilling and production altogether.