Posted on 02/28/2011 2:56:19 PM PST by radioone
Interior Secretary Ken Salazar was in Houston this weekend talking with oil executives who are eager to start drilling again in the Gulf of Mexico. That may sound like progress, but after the meeting Salazar said that nothing had changed. He was not ready to approve any new drilling.
Despite everything that energy companies have done to devise advanced containment systems, Salazar is unwilling to issue a single new permit. Systems constructed by the nonprofit Marine Well Containment Company and other entities are now able to handle a flow equal or greater than that experienced during the Deepwater Horizon accident last summer. But that's not enough for Salazar, who stated that even the most advanced systems have "limitations on water depth and barrel-per-day containment capacity."
Well, yes. Any system that could be devised would have limitations on depth and per-barrel capacity. But that's not the point, as Mr. Salazar must know. The question is whether the new systems are able to handle the sorts of accident that might actually take place. Not the worst scenario that someone from the Interior Department could dream up. Combined with safely protocols now in place, the new containment equipment can do just that.
So why no permits for new drilling? It appears that the Obama administration is more interested in kowtowing to environmental donors in advance of the 2012 election than it is in controlling energy prices. Even with a federal court order to decide on new drilling in the Gulf by March 20, the Obama administration remains obdurate.
By refusing to grant a single deep-water permit in the Gulf, Obama has shut down access to one third of America's oil supply. With Libyan oil fields now closed indefinitely and with uncertainty about future production elsewhere in the Middle East, it is a dreadful time to be shutting down America's oil fields as well. Turmoil in Saudi Arabia, Iran, Kuwait, or Iraq would drive the price of oil up above $150 a barrel, at the very least. A prudent policy would be to increase domestic production in light of uncertainty abroad.
Some Americans are already paying $4 a gallon for gas, but this is not just because of what's happening in the Middle East. Government action on Gulf drilling permits would immediately calm the oil markets and bring down prices, even though new production would not come on line for several years. But instead of reducing prices, Obama seems is intent on driving them up.
It's not just the Gulf of Mexico that is off limits. Obama opposes drilling anywhere offshore, including in the rich arctic region which is known to hold billions of barrels of oil reserves.
Just as bad, in his FY2012 budget Obama proposes cutting $4.4 billion of annual tax deductions for oil and gas drilling -- deductions for depreciation and amortization that date back to 1913. Those tax deductions help energy companies pay for exploratory projects that then result in lower energy costs for all Americans. At a time when Obama is throwing away $100 billion on risky alternative energy boondoggles, a number of which have already gone bankrupt, he wants to end those modest tax advantages that actually result in the production of large quantities of new energy. That sort of accounting only makes sense to a politician.
Obama, in fact, is doing everything possible to curtail domestic energy production, and yet he says that "our dependence on foreign oil threatens our national security." If reliance on foreign oil puts America at risk, why not produce more oil at home? New drilling techniques including fracking, horizontal drilling, and deep-water drilling now make it possible to do just that, but Obama opposes all of these.
If the President knows that dependence on foreign oil threatens our national security and that new drilling techniques can increase domestic supplies, why is he intent on destroying our domestic oil and gas industry?
America is going to need new oil and gas production in a big way. In a new report, Charles T. Maxwell, the dean of U.S. energy analysts, has gone on record saying that regardless of what happens in the Middle East, oil prices are going up, way up. In a Barron's interview Maxwell stated that oil prices will hit $300 by 2020. Maxwell arrives at this number by way of a straightforward calculation. By about 2015 global oil production will peak, but demand will continue to increase on a global basis.
That leaves Americans paying $12 a gallon for gas, which is just about what Obama has said he wants. That certainly will help to end our dependence on foreign oil. The problem is there won't be anything to take its place.
At $12 a gallon, we won't be driving around much in large SUVs or in small SUVs, either. Nor will we be enjoying cheap air fares or discounted cruises. The cost of transporting goods will triple, as will the cost of heating homes, schools, and offices. And those who think that solar and wind will take the place of fossil fuels are sadly mistaken.
As Maxwell points out, solar energy now supplies one tenth of one percent of America's energy needs. Even with massive subsidies -- the kind of subsidies that have already bankrupted the Spanish economy -- solar and wind will never supply more than a small percentage of America's energy needs. Since Obama, through EPA restrictions, is busy sabotaging coal and natural gas as well, and since America has no serious nuclear program underway, we are left with nothing.
Only a president who is extraordinarily stupid would fail to see this. Conclusion: Obama is either extraordinarily stupid, or he is willing to trade America's national security for the support of environmentalist donors who are key to his re-election. Whichever it is, we're in trouble.
Where is Chuck Schumer screaming at Obama like he did to GWB when it hit $2.50 a gallon?
Maggot Libs.
Obama will never be re-elected. His is obviously on a mission to kill the US. Besides that he is defying a court order to allow drilling. He is defying a court ruling that his insane Obamacare is unconstitutional. He has started to decide which laws are to his liking and the ones that he will opt to enforce. He should be impeached!
Drill Baby Drill - the Moraritorium is Unconstituional stand up to the lily livered pansy butt Obama Administration and Stae the following.
We have reviewe the Oil Drilling Moratarium and have found it wanting and it is Unconstitutional Therefore being that we a Constitutionally minded and this administration has deemed to many Laws Unconstitutional. We hereby declare the Obama Administration, you have 30 days to undeem everything that has been deemed Unconstitutional. By the way when you come back to this State of Texas you better have your Legal Birth certificate, College Transcripts, from Occidential, Columbia and Harvard, as well as your Passports from the US and Pakistan. keep in mind in the Great State of Texas, we are now the law. If you fail to bring any of these documents with you and enter into the State of Texas including Texas Air Space you are in violation of our Law. Texas frowns on illegal aliens and idiots whom claim something they are not.
have a good day you moron.
2012 can’t come soon enough! We need to eliminate the communists, eco-terrorists, and union scum from our leadership positions. 2012 may be the last chance this can be done peacefully!
All that John Deere equipment that plants and harvests our food runs on diesel.
Those 18 wheelers that move food and so many other things across the country have to have diesel fuel to make them go.
Railroad engines use a heavy oil as fuel.
Cattle drives will do a better job of moving beef from Kansas to New York City than will windmills.
FUBO and FUKS
Force to permit since meeting with congress this week.
Obama Approves 1st Gulf Deepwater Drlling Permit Since BP Disaster!
Wall Street Journal/Dow Jones ^ | 2/28/2011 | WSJ
Posted on Monday, February 28, 2011 6:17:52 PM by Positive
Noble Energy out of Houston...was already at 13,000 feet when they had to pull and plug it. They should be drilling through the cement around the end of March and reach the targeted depth by late May.
Tanks run on petroleum fuels
Bradleys and Strykers run on petroleum fuels
Apaches, Kiowas, Chinooks, Cobras, and other military helicopters run on petroleum fuels
Fighters and bombers run on petroleum fuels
The MLRS and all other artillery systems run on petroleum fuels
Deuce and a halves, five tons, HMMWVs, HEMTTs, HETs and all other military wheeled vehicles run on petroleum fuels
Many smaller naval vessels, like destroyers, frigates and support ships run on petroleum fuels.
That's not to mention all the civilian Chevies, Fords, Dodges, Toyotas, Nissans, etc, that Americans depend on to get to work, to make our free market economy actually run.
We need oil to survive. We should have started drilling our own years ago.
Scouts Out! Cavalry Ho!
Out perfect Constitution bestows too much power for too long onto these fools (i.e. the PEZidents.)
This is a purely hypothetical response to Barack Soetoro’s illegal drilling ban.
Step 1.
Rick Perry needs to announce that if all new, compliant, deep water drilling permits are not approved by May 1, 2011.... the federal Government MUST close all Federal non-military offices in the State of Texas.
Step 2.
Texas needs to prepare to take over the functions of said Federal entities that will cease operations in the state.
Step 3.
Texas must determine how much of its National Guard troops and officers are willing to remain loyal to the state and how many Federal troops might cross over to Texas control.
Step 4.
Texas must prepare to estatblish an embargo of refined oil products, from its refineries, to the blue states and their residents that helped to elect Barack Soetoro.
Barack Soetoro has clearly decided to engage in an illegal cold war of economic oppression on the State of Texas. If the blue states that elected Soetoro want to be green, then we in Texas can make them as green as they can be REAL fast. By my estimation, Illinois and California would like to be the first go green.
The Petrochemical industry
5% of the worlds fertilizer is made from Natural Gas.
Industrial oils and greases that keep our manufacturing and food processing machines running.
51 percent of heated homes in the U.S. (or 49.1 million homes) used natural gas heating in 2000.
Commercial heating and cooling by Natural gas.
Don't want to forget those power plants that use natural gas to make electricity.
The list just keeps growing.
This seems like kind of a silly analysis. All the campaign money in the world from lefty environmentalists wouldn’t overcome the negative effects of an economy wrecked by a severe energy crunch. Maybe Ken and Barry just hate the peasants living prosperously; election be damned.
Warehousing just-in-time shipping systems have only about a month of product in the system. Short term in the event the U.S. oil imports by tanker dried up; the reserves down in the Lone Star salt domes may well be the deciding factor of sufficient food to avoid riots and looting in cities of coastal states. In the long term synthetic nitrate fertilizer, farm equipment, grain bulk storage, push boat-barge shipment, rely on petroleum oil/ gas products for the next crop. The consequences, of a lack of natural gas through existing pipelines to the east coast, could be extrapolated from the Texas and New Mexico winter experience of 2011. Coal processed to liquid fuels could reduce the future shortfall of imported crude oil. Start a garden and stock up.
Yep, Extraordinarily Stupid Indeed!
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