Quote:
Originally Posted by Strong_as_Steel
Oil Shale Reserves - A Daily Reckoning White Paper Report
Hear is the solution to our oil needs and the liberals are lining up against it BECAUSE THEY WANT HIGH OIL PRICES!
Someone finds a great solution and liberals start maoning that it makes there pussies ach and hurt. Oh boooo hoooo liberals.
The environmental morons are screaming like someone is stealing there communist maniphestoes
Liberals hate America
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From the conclusion of the article:
Quote:
There is dispute within the industry over how long, if ever, demonstration extraction technologies can become
commercially viable. I've spoken with some of the smaller companies that have applied for leases from the BLM. Some
of them will have to raise money to conduct the project. And some of them have been less than forthcoming about how
exactly their extraction technology is different or better than previous methods.
How will it all unfold? Well, for starters, it could all utterly fail. To me, Shell's in-situ process looks the most
promising. It also makes the most sense economically. There may be a better, less energy-intensive way to heat up the
ground than what Shell has come up with. But Shell, Chevron, and Exxon Mobil clearly have the resources to
scoop up any private or small firm that makes a breakthrough.
And there are a host of smaller firms involved with the refining and drilling process that figure to play a key
role in the development of the industry, should that development pick up pace.
The Energy Policy Act of 2005, otherwise known as a listless piece of legislation without any strategic vision,
does, at least, make provision for encouraging research into the development of shale. But government works slow,
when it works at all. It's going to take an external shock to the economy to really ratchet up interest and
development of the nation's energy reserves…say…something like a nuclear Iran.
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No where does it indicate that it is liberals who are preventing development of these resources.
Unless you are intending the term liberal to apply to the Bush administration and the investment bankers and other investors who need to put up the money for what are still R&D projects.
And as the article notes, Jimmy Carter, clearly a liberal, was the one who opened up the fields to development, but it was Reagan-Bush, presumably not liberals, who didn't make sure that the development of these fields continued.
Of course, one might ask why they aren't investing in a system of solar thermal to provide the heat. For example, one of the liquids used to transmit the collected heat from the sun is molten salts, and salt is commonly found in conjunction with oil given that it derives from sediments from the oceans.
That would eliminate the cost of electricity, and the cost of the gold or silver electrical conductors.
But I suppose the oil companies just don't have the profit potential to do the research, so the need government welfare to guarantee them a fair profit to them based on the government investment in the project. Perhaps if the government invests $100 Billion and then an on going profit of $10B a year to the oil companies to make the project feasible.