Offshore drilling Vs Conservation

That sounds sensible. Unfortunately the only one I've seen propose this mix is Paris Hilton.

 

Agreed! We have clearly reached a tipping point as far as price at the pump goes to change behaviour. SUVs are being discounted heavily and still not selling well. Toyota is starting Prius manufacture in the USA. Gas now costs in the USA what it's cost in Europe for many years with their higher taxes and it should come as no surprise that Americans are falling in love with SMALLER cars and efficient things like hybrids.

The trick is to figgure out how to maintain the price of a galon of gas at a level that keeps the market pressure on development of PHEVs and alternative energy sources. We are there now, possibly a bit higher than necessary once some more monentum builds.

Drilling and increasing supply to where the price at the pump drops back to "cheap enough I don't care any more" would be a bad thing. Increasing supply to hold the price where it is so it doesn't hurt the economy even more would be bad.

All of this oil will be drilled for eventually. It's a good thing to have a reserve in place for when other parts of the world start to run out. I think we are getting CLOSE to the peak oil point here and time to get the 10 year process of bringing some of the reserves online. Even if you decide to drill today, there are no drilling platforms available today and it takes about 10 years to get an offshore field into production.

DDR

 

Canadian living in Houston here... would vote Obama if I could vote...

However!

Most recently Barack proposed "Just inflate your tires and get a tuneup, we won't have to drill, and everything will be OK."

At least thats how they were spinning it on conservative talk radio which I listen to here for giggles.

DDR

 

Obama needs to sit down with Amory Lovins and the Rocky Mountain Institute who specialize in efficiency. One of RMI's books is Winning the Oil Endgame. Amory and Yale University have demonstrated the first place to drill is Detroit. Higher efficiency, carbon fiber bodies (lighter, stronger, cheaper to produce) as shown in NOVA's "The Car of the Future," is the way we are going, globally. Only idiot politicians and Detroit continue to look backwards.

 

Yeah, and we wouldn't need to import any oil if everyone would just walk.

Again, nobody is only saying, "just drill."

 

McCain needs to sit down with Amory Lovins . . .

 

No he didn't. You nailed it. It's a right wing nutjob talking point displaying a lack of critical thinking. Same as the "paygrade" soundbite they're currently peeing their pants over.

 

Not necessarily true. Link.

"Oil companies have long pledged that California's 27 offshore platforms will be removed after their wells run dry and they become obsolete. Now, a movement to leave the submerged portions of abandoned rigs intact has won the support of the California Legislature and sparked a debate about the fate of the hulking steel structures that have become the adoptive home to an unforeseen abundance of sea life."

"Some people have an emotional response to this bill," said state Sen. Dede Alpert (D-Coronado), who sponsored the legislation. "They never wanted offshore oil drilling, they had a spill off their coast and they don't want to do anything that would benefit an oil company."

Alpert, an environmentalist, broke ranks with her friends on the issue. She is convinced it would be better to leave the artificial reefs as oases for fish. The reefs, at least initially, would remain off-limits to fishing."...

..."Milton Love, a UC Santa Barbara researcher who has been tracking the demise of rockfish, such as bocaccio, lingcod and cowcod, has found many times more of those overfished species near the platform legs than anywhere else."
​

 

Laugh all you like, but for some of us, that really is a viable solution. It's worked for me all my life. If we paid more attention to the design of our cities, walking would be far more common. We'd have less pollution, lower health care costs, and friendlier neighbourhoods.

 

That's great . . . but it isn't a solution for EVERYONE.

Nor are those other pie in the sky 'solutions.'

To solve the energy shortage problems, it's going to take more than one approach. And to say, "don't drill elsewhere" - does nothing to help solve the problem.

 

Ok my 2 cents.

Leave it in the ground for our kids and grandkids. It is a finite resource and all we have done is squandered it. Not sure how this turned into an Obama vs MCcain thing but they both suck. The only thing worse would be if we took the best from both and made an Obamccainenstien. I would probably move to Zimbabwe if that happened.

Two reading assignments. One short one long and you will be a more informed person after reading both.


short one:

I am a nuke so I got a sweet spot for Hyman G.

"Energy resources and our future" - remarks by Admiral Hyman Rickover delivered in 1957 | Energy Bulletin

Long one:

I read this book maybe 2 years ago and I guess it was the first step in changing my life and the way I look at the world. After I read it all I could say was "Damn".

Internal Combustion by Edwin Black--Home Page

 

According to the DOE the total offshore oil reserves that can't be touched under current law: 18.7 billion barrels. The US uses 7 billion barrels of oil a year (next is China at about 2 billion barrels). Doesn't seem like to last too long.

According to a McCain ad running, the US has more oil reserves than Saudi Arabia. Really? The only thing I can find that would make that add up is if you're counting oil shale. And we've been working on that since WW1. And even the current theory uses more electricity and water than is available.

And economically, energy independence if you mean more US oil and gas production doesn't make sense. None of our oil can be produced as cheaply as Saudi Arabia produces it- $10 a barrel is what I've read.

And overall, more drilling isn't going to lower gas prices. Gas prices are high because speculators (pension fund managers no less- scary isn't that?) are trying to make up for losses in real estate and stocks, and because we have a shortage of refining capacity, created by the oil companies. We have fewer refineries than we did in 1975, and only one under construction (by a Canadian company of course).

 

Were you interviewed by him?

 

Oh My I am not that old.

 

I am.

 

Sufferin' P---s Envy says" That's great....but it isn't a solution for EVERYBODY"

In the Pickens thread someone stated wind energy was not a solution because " there is no wind east of Texas and south of Tennesse."

The wingnuts' corporate masters have them trained to to believe there are No solutions unless they can be provided by BIG CORPORATIONS (but made in China). So far the only solution offered by the BIG CORPORATIONS is drill, drill drill.

There are MANY solutions, not all work for everyone and not all work in every location (solar probably is not big in Buffalo, NY.).

Best quote I have seen in awhile on PC: "Exactly the problem with most large American corporations, they see the moment, and not the future, and they keep buying politicians to make sure the future doesn't happen."

The future is happening and the wingnuts better not count on their corporate masters to deal with it.

Second best quote: "Leave it in the ground for our kids and grandkids". Wow, and I thought it was all about me!