Posted on 12/17/2001 2:12:02 AM PST by JohnHuang2
Could a plumb-bob be dropped from the truth about Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, it would never touch the statements made recently on national television by Senate Majority Leader, Tom Daschle.
With his best impression of South Dakotan sincerity, he looked straight into the camera and said that we should not destroy our last pristine wilderness for six months of oil. This statement arises not from truth or fact, but from the propaganda mills of environmental extremist organizations.
Two issues: 1) Will drilling for oil in ANWR really destroy ANWR, and 2) is there only a six-month supply of oil there? The answer to both questions is a resounding no!
ANWR is 19 million acres. The Coastal Plain, where the oil is, consists of 1.5 million acres. The area affected by proposed drilling is about 1,500 acres. If Mr. Daschle had a trust fund of $19 million dollars, I doubt that he would consider it destroyed if he chose to spend $1,500 on a water well on his own property in order to reduce his dependence on water from sworn enemies.
Daschle's "six-months supply" is based on the low end of the range estimated by the U.S. Geological Survey of 5.7 billion barrels to a high of 16 billion barrels. Were the actual amount of oil in ANWR to be no more than 5.7 billion barrels, the most we could extract would be two million barrels per day because of the pipeline capacity. At that rate, the minimum estimated reserves would last 25 years.
The most probable quantity of ANWR oil is over 10 billion barrels, using today's extraction technology. Now we're talking about a 50-year supply, pumping at maximum capacity.
How can the Senate Majority Leader make such a misleading statement? Environmental organizations have twisted logic to divide the total daily U.S. oil consumption by the minimum estimated ANWR reserves, and concluded the supply would last only six months, totally disregarding the reality that there is no way to extract and distribute a supply to equal the total U.S. demand from any single source.
The fact is that we are now using only about half the capacity of the Alaskan pipeline, due to a diminishing supply of oil from Prudhoe Bay. We are also importing a million barrels per day from Iraq, and more than 56 percent of our total oil requirement from other foreign sources. The ANWR reserves would allow us to replace the oil we now buy from Iraq, and reduce our dependence on foreign sources. This should be done now, as a first step.
In view of the Sept. 11 attack, the "environmental" arguments offered to block ANWR drilling in order to protect 0.00007-percent of a 19-million-acre wilderness, ring hollow indeed. Moreover, opening ANWR would provide up to 750,000 jobs at a time when our economy needs them. Most important, it would help reduce our reliance on countries that are infested with followers of Osama bin Laden.
America's priorities changed on Sept. 11. While our military pursues its top priority, we at home must pursue ours: improving our domestic security. Energy self-sufficiency is essential to domestic security. Utilization of ANWR, and other oil and coal reserves, should no longer be a matter of debate. We can do what we need to do with minimum environmental impact, and we will. To refuse to use our own resources in order to protect a bug, beetle, or open space, is just plain misguided.
Several national organizations, working through the "Freedom 21 Campaign" have called on the president to "take responsible action to utilize our domestic sources of coal, oil and nuclear energy," as the first step to achieving domestic security.
Sen. Daschle and Rep. Dick Gephardt continue to wave the banner of their special-interest contributors, i.e., environmental extremist organizations. Their alternative is to force Americans into a different lifestyle. Gephardt wants to use tax incentives and disincentives, to force people to buy higher mileage automobiles, which have proven to be more deadly than larger, less mileage-efficient vehicles.
Environmental extremists want to force an end to the use of fossil fuels and nuclear energy altogether. They are quite willing to force taxpayers to subsidize exotic wind and solar energy sources and penalize taxpayers for using the vehicles and other products of their choice.
Alternative energy sources should, and are being developed as rapidly as possible. They should be developed, however, by a free marketplace. Government does not know best; markets do. Government has no business trying to shape the behavior of its citizens or the marketplace. Neither Daschle nor Gephardt agrees with this statement. They apparently believe that it is their duty to dictate how everyone else should live.
They, and those who share their view, continue to block passage of legislation that will allow us to get on with the task of improving our domestic security by reducing our dependence upon foreign oil. They are willing to distort the facts and misrepresent the truth. We no longer have time for this foolishness. We must take care of America first.
What a double bucket barf alert! They never tire of using those special interest clichets do they? They go smoothly from this sh*t to a black church and preach/speak about the evils of Republicans and warn that blacks will be dragged behind trucks the minute a Republican becomes president.
And since he does, how many other issues is he equally deceitful about? And what does this say about his whole party and what kinds of things they do to get elected and stay in power? And what does it say about those people who so readily believe the lies and refuse to consider any other perspective?
U.S Drivers in SUV gas-guzzling buying (spree)
It shows that even with the most optimistic projections of the ANWR oil reserves, ANWR oil will not come close to offsetting the decline in domestic oil production from all other sources. Therefore, in order to reduce our dependence on foreign oil, we will have to do a lot more than drill ANWR.
A recent article indicated that oil companies are actually doing a good job of reducing U.S. dependence on Middle East oil by diversifying foreign sources. That's a good step, but the U.S. economy is still highly dependent on foreign oil imports, and our dependence is going to increase in coming decades. So the U.S. needs to consider both conservation and alternative energy sources. Nuclear energy may be a good bridge if new nuclear plants can get built.
They graphed data supplied by the Department of Energy. If you look at a lot of sources, the highest estimates for ANWR reserves are about 16 billion barrels.
The DOE would have to be consulted regarding the accuracy of the data.
And you trace that right back to Teddy Roosevelt and his progressive land grabbers, don't you?
There is absolutely nothing to make me think that the oil is going to run out before technology finds a replacement.
And by replacement, I mean something that is the same price or cheaper per unit of energy, not some pie-in-the-sky delusion of radical environmentalists that actually uses more oil to produce than it displaces.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.