USA TODAY EDITORIAL
Our view on energy policy: Alaska drilling is no quick fix, but it needs to happen

$4-a-gallon gas highlights need to tap into domestic oil reserves.

Surging gasoline prices have prompted renewed calls for drilling in environmentally sensitive areas, particularly Alaska's potentially oil-rich Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.

We supported drilling in ANWR long before gas topped $4 a gallon and continue to do so. But let's be clear about what it would and wouldn't do.

It wouldn't bring relief from today's high prices, as President Bush implied Monday. And it wouldn't make the United States energy independent.

So does that mean, as critics suggest, that it's not worth doing? Not at all. Drilling in ANWR and offshore is an important piece of any long-term strategy to make the nation less vulnerable to oil-producing nations and supply disruptions. It is one of many imperfect steps needed to both increase the supply of oil and curb the demand for it, while seeking energy alternatives.

It's true that any serious oil production from ANWR would take about 10 years. But dealing with the energy situation requires an ability to look beyond quick fixes. The fact is, ANWR oil would be flowing now if President Clinton hadn't vetoed a drilling bill in 1995.

Environmentalists charge that drilling would despoil a pristine area in northern Alaska that is about the size of South Carolina and is a critical habitat for caribou, musk oxen, bears and birds. In fact, exploration in the 19 million-acre refuge would be confined to 1.5 million acres, and drilling to just 2,000 acres, an area less than half that of Atlanta's airport.

Oil production would inevitably affect the refuge. But studies at Prudhoe Bay to the west, where oil has been produced since 1977 in an area more than twice the size of the one planned for ANWR, show that the effects can be minimized and wildlife protected, particularly with today's newer exploration technology.

What would the nation get in return? Not enough to solve the nation's oil problem, but enough to make a difference. Estimates are that the area could eventually produce about a million barrels of oil a day for 30 years. That's nearly 5% of the 21 million barrels a day Americans consume, and almost as much as the United States imports from Venezuela — where the money Americans spend for oil enriches a leader who bitterly opposes U.S. interests and helps fund an armed insurrection against U.S. ally Colombia.

Congress has been arguing about ANWR for nearly three decades; it's time to break the gridlock. The Senate had a chance to say yes to ANWR drilling last month but did not, opting instead to rail about energy prices and take the almost purely symbolic step of suspending efforts to fill the nation's Strategic Petroleum Reserve.

With a few fitful exceptions, such as raising car and truck mileage standards, Washington seems unable to take the nation's energy crisis seriously.

Both parties share the blame. Democrats, fearful of offending the environmental lobby, have led the effort against ANWR and offshore drilling. Republicans ganged up late last year to kill a smart but modest proposal that would have required the nation's utilities to produce as much as 15% of their electricity with renewable energy such as solar, wind and biomass by 2020.

What's left is not an energy policy; it's wishful thinking. It took a long time and a lot of missed opportunities to get to $4 gas, and it'll take a lot more than bashing OPEC and the oil companies to dig out of this hole. Extracting more oil from domestic reserves, using environmentally sensitive techniques, is an important part of the answer.
Posted at 12:22 AM/ET, June 10, 2008 in Economy - Editorial, Environment - Editorial, Ground transportation - Editorial, USA TODAY editorial | Permalink

Sure, and to fix the health care problems lets bring back medieval barbers.

We can have a blood letting clinic on every corner....

Oil is not the answer. We aren't going to drill ourselves out of the situation we are in.....

Conservation in the short term, alternatives are the future.

Of course, you are welcome to continue the petroleum nostalgia.

Those are all good "talking points" but you didn't say much. The article also clearly states that drilling is not the be all end all. I'll suppose you are against nuclear energy as well and would prefer to see and exclusive solar and wind energy push. Am I correct?

More refining capacity would drop gasoline prices as well without drilling a single new well, but you can bet that he is firmly against building any new refineries also.

__________________
"It's not alive, It's not alive, It's not alive. Because I said it isnt', there's your proof jerk." ...lexi

"As far as your logical fallicy shit - shove it. I am a woman."...naturemomma

I suppose you have the "science" behind you, right?

Well, unfortunately reality doesn't fit with your "science", but then reality is based in what is, not what you theorize it should be.

Nmber of refineries on Jan 1, and capacity in thousands of barrels a day.
1949 336 6,231
1950 320 6,223
1951 325 6,702
1952 327 7,161
1953 315 7,620
1954 308 7,984
1955 296 8,386
1956 317 8,583
1957 317 9,072
1958 315 9,358
1959 313 9,761
1960 309 9,843
1961 309 9,999
1962 309 10,015
1963 304 10,011
1964 298 10,306
1965 293 10,420
1966 280 10,394
1967 276 10,658
1968 282 11,353
1969 279 11,702
1970 276 12,021
1971 272 12,860
1972 274 13,292
1973 268 13,642
1974 273 14,362
1975 279 14,961
1976 276 15,237
1977 282 16,398
1978 296 17,048
1979 308 17,441
1980 319 17,988
1981 324 18,621
1982 301 17,890
1983 258 16,859
1984 247 16,137
1985 223 15,659
1986 216 15,459
1987 219 15,566
1988 213 15,915
1989 204 15,655
1990 205 15,572
1991 202 15,676
1992 199 15,696
1993 187 15,121
1994 179 15,034
1995 175 15,434
1996 170 15,333
1997 164 15,452
1998 163 15,711
1999 159 16,261
2000 158 16,512
2001 155 16,595
2002 153 16,785
2003 149 16,757
2004 149 16,894
2005 148 17,125
2006 149 17,339
2007 149 17,390
2008 149 17,436

As the data shows, more refineries means lower refining capacity; at the maximum of 336 refineries, 187 more refineries than today, the capacity was only 6,231, one-third of capacity today.

For reference, the US produced 8,572,000 barrels per day of oil in 1981 when Reagan took office, 7,613,000 when he left office. When Bush the elder left office, it was 6,847,000. When Bush the idiot took office, 5,801,000, and at last report, 5,139,000.

That means, to fill the current refineries requires more than 12 million barrels of imported oil, while the imports to fill the refineries when Reagan took office was a mere 11 million barrels a day.

So, opening up all sorts of new areas for drilling in the US and Alaska, especially areas in the west for oil shale, with lots of corporate welfare for oil companies, the production has done nothing but fall.

So, Reagan-Bush-Bush are all masters of oil industry voodoo, doing exactly the opposite of what they say they will do.

And for reference, after all sorts of corporate welfare, Alaska added only two million barrels of oil per day, which clearly didn't slow the decline in US producyion. The oil pipeline needs to be replaced because it is on its last legs, as planned when the Alaska oil is close to running out.

At best ANWR would only slow the decline in US production, not increase production.

Here is some data on US drilling activity for oil and gas, the number of rigs in operation at the end of each year:

1949 2017
1950 2154
1951 2543
1952 2641
1953 2613
1954 2508
1955 2686
1956 2620
1957 2426
1958 1922
1959 2071
1960 1748
1961 1761
1962 1641
1963 1499
1964 1501
1965 1388
1966 1272
1967 1135
1968 1169
1969 1194
1970 1028
1971 976
1972 1107
1973 1194
1974 1472
1975 1660
1976 1658
1977 2001
1978 2259
1979 2177
1980 2909
1981 3970
1982 3105
1983 2232
1984 2428
1985 1980
1986 964
1987 936
1988 936
1989 869
1990 1010
1991 860
1992 721
1993 754
1994 775
1995 723
1996 779
1997 943
1998 827
1999 625
2000 918
2001 1156
2002 830
2003 1032
2004 1192
2005 1383
2006 1649

And we have had lots of glowing reports of a Saudi Arabia of oil in the Gulf of Mexico in deep water, projects that the US government practically pays the oil companies to develop with all sorts of tax credits, zero royalty rates, etc.

One of the biggest constraints on drilling is a lack of oil scientists, oil engineers, and oil technicians, and even the oil rig workers who man handle the pipe on the oil rig.

The industry laid off thousands of workers over thap two decades, and only in the past couple of years have the mining schools restarted their mining programs in many cases, and for the several that kept them, expanded them.

And probably more than half the experienced people are baby boomers who are going to retire soon, or the guys before them that have retired and are now returning to work for high contract rates.

Drilling the way out of the oil crisis did not solve in during the era of conservatives directing energy policy. Reagan did nothing to deal with the problem; it had already been set in motion during the Nixon, Ford, and Carter administrations.

Conservatives just keep being stuck on stupid, thinking the solution that didn't work before might work if we keep trying it.

No.

I would prefer to see multiple sources of energy.

There are many sources of energy other than petroleum.

There are no alternatives to oil, coal, and nuclear. Except
- solar PV
- solar thermal
- wind
- geothermal
- tidal
- wood
- ethanol from sugar cane imported from Cuba, Brazil, ....
- ethanol from cellulose
- bio oil from algae

not to mention not consuming oil, coal, or nuclear or any power at all by
- highly insulated building
- lighter cars
- shorter commute
- public transport
- greater use of rail for everything
- walking
- biking
- cohousing shopping, working, and living
- higher efficiency lighting, heating, cooling

See, we are totally locked into oil, coal, and nuclear because no alternatives exist.

McCain's Sea Change On Offshore Oil
By INVESTOR'S BUSINESS DAILY | Posted Tuesday, June 17, 2008 4:20 PM PT

Energy Policy: While Democrats want to continue to outsource our energy supplies to the likes of Hugo Chavez, John McCain wants to repeal the federal ban on offshore drilling. The energy tide is turning.

IBD Series: Breaking The Back Of High Oil

McCain has rightly called rising energy costs due in large part to restricted domestic supply a national security issue. On Monday, he previewed a Tuesday speech in Houston and said that as commander in chief he would end the federal ban on offshore drilling first enacted in 1981 and continued by every president since.

We "must embark on a national mission to eliminate our dependence on foreign oil," he said. "But a federal moratorium stands in the way of energy exploration and production. . . . It is time for the federal government to lift those restrictions."

Indeed, a Manhattan Project on domestic energy is long overdue.

Democrats say that increasing domestic production will take years and won't have that much of an effect on prices. Yet when the Saudis agreed last Friday to increase their production by a meager 500,000 barrels a day, oil prices fell on the New York Mercantile Exchange by $1.88 cents a barrel. Imagine the impact of opening up the Outer Continental Shelf.

The OCS holds an estimated 115 billion barrels of oil and 635 trillion cubic feet of natural gas. If this and other domestic sources are developed, U.S. reserves would increase by a factor of five, and we'd jump from 11th place to 4th in the world in the size of our proven reserves — enough to make OPEC and speculators blink.

In his speech, McCain had harsh words for speculators who drive prices higher by betting they will go higher still. The way to deal with what McCain calls "reckless wagering unrelated to any kind of productive commerce" is not through legislation, as the Democrats want, but through offshore drilling, as he wants. Increasing supply reduces prices.

Barack Obama doesn't like the idea, saying through a spokesman that "John McCain's plan to simply drill our way out of the energy crisis is the same misguided approach backed by President Bush that has failed our families for too long and only serves to benefit the big oil companies."

Obama's approach is to tax our way out of the energy crisis by targeting oil companies' "windfall" profits. But that will only increase what we pay for gasoline at the pump. Obama says he's for "change." Lifting the offshore ban is the change we need.

"Our dependence on foreign oil strains family budgets, and it saps our economy," Obama said in Flint, Mich., on Monday. Yet he wants to leave American oil in the ground and in coastal waters while sending half a trillion dollars overseas to foreign dictators, some of whom use it to support America-hating terrorists.

Who knows? Some of these petrodollars may even be used to prop up energy prices in the futures market, putting further strains on a U.S. economy that our enemies wouldn't mind seeing "sapped."

The one problem we have with McCain's proposal is that while lifting the federal ban, he'd still let the states decide. Florida Gov. Charlie Crist had opposed offshore oil development even while China and Cuba planned to drill off his coast.

But on Tuesday, Crist said he now supports exploratory drilling because "Floridians are suffering." We commend the governor for selflessly bowing to economic reality and his courage in touching what has been considered a "third rail" of political issues to be avoided by coastal governors.

As for other states with offshore resources, maybe letting them share in the revenues (as McCain has suggested) will change minds. But federalism and national security usually don't mix.

Environmentalists are aghast at all this. But Brazil, Britain, Norway and other countries drill safely offshore, and no major spills were recorded when Hurricanes Katrina and Rita roared through some 3,000 offshore oil and gas platforms in the Gulf of Mexico.

Energy is a national security issue, one that should be discussed in this campaign. A clear majority of Americans now say they want to drill here and drill now. John McCain has caught a wave, one he may ride all the way to the White House.

I'm listening to Democrats defend not drilling offshore for oil.
Their defense "Save our pristine waters"

Apparently, Democrats in Congress do not know the US has over 2,025 offshore rigs in those pristine waters now. An increase of 15% in active rigs from last year.

Democrats said US oil companies are raising the cost of oil, as if the cost of oil is cheaper in the rest of the world. lol

Democrats did not say anything about Russia, China and France drilling in our pristine waters 60 milles from US shores.

I would say this is the most incompetent and transparent argument I have seen in some time. It's obvious, Democrats have jacked up the cost of oil to get Obama elected and Americans are paying the price for it.

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Victory in Iraq