Free Republic

Leadership: As Palin jousts with Biden on energy independence, the government reports that we lead the world in energy reserves. From oil to gas to coal, we are sitting on prosperity. So why are we importing anything? One of the interesting sidelights of the NY-23 race was an exchange on energy independence between Vice President Joe Biden and the former governor of energy-rich Alaska, Sarah Palin. Biden, who came in to campaign for Democrat Bill Owens, was reminded of the issue of energy. "The fact of the matter is that Sarah Palin thinks the answer to energy was 'Drill, baby,...

Poll: Offshore drilling Should Florida allow drilling for oil within five miles of its Gulf Coast beaches? Yes No

Domestic oil refiners kept up their attack of climate legislation, saying a Senate bill under consideration could increase gas prices. Domestic oil refiners kept up their attack Wednesday of climate legislation, saying a Senate bill under consideration could increase gas prices. The group, among the fiercest critics of the measure, said the proposal could add 77 cents a gallon, or around 30 percent above today’s prices. Democrats on a key Senate panel shot back, saying the industry’s estimate is based on an inflated projection of the price of permits companies will have to hold to cover their carbon emissions. A...

U.S. consumers turned decidedly more pessimistic in October, according to a report released Tuesday, with households increasingly worried about job prospects. The Conference Board, a private research group, said its monthly Consumer Confidence Index fell to 47.7 this month, from a revised 53.4 in September, which was originally reported as 53.1. The current month's reading was well below economists' projections of 53.2, according to a survey conducted by Dow Jones Newswires. The downturn in consumer confidence at this stage of the recovery is to be expected, as it has occurred in previous recoveries (please see chart below), and does not...

Ecology: The administration creates the mother of all protected habitats for a species whose numbers have increased since Al Gore's "An Inconvenient Truth." It's our hopes for energy independence that are drowning. When filmmaker Phelim McAleer, whose documentary "Not Evil Just Wrong" takes apart the myths of global warming, got to ask Gore a question at the annual conference of the Society of Environmental Journalists, McAleer brought up the nine critical errors in Gore's film "An Inconvenient Truth." A British court two years ago listed them and said they must be righted before the film could be shown in schools...

An owner of Beck Oilfield Supply traveled from Oklahoma to Pennsylvania this year to find the best place in the midst of the Marcellus Shale natural gas drilling rush to plant one of his stores. He picked Wysox, a small town that borders Towanda, the Bradford County seat, and he wasn't alone. Two other stores that specialize in drilling and gas production supplies have opened within two miles of Beck Supply along Route 6 in the past year. The supply shops are more than specialty hardware stores; they are tailored to the uninterrupted pace and idiosyncratic needs of gas drilling....

The government is, increasingly, the enemy. Imagine the jobs, the wealth, the independence, and cutting the jihad snake off at the head. There is no downside. We could easily extract that oil with minimum impact to the trees. ..... For decades, Democrats have blocked efforts to responsibly develop this nation's energy resources, transforming vast areas of opportunity into "The No Zone." (hat tip Jim)

WASHINGTON — The Department of the Interior has frozen oil and gas development on 60 of 77 contested drilling sites in Utah, saying the process of leasing the land was rushed and badly flawed. The 77 government-owned parcels, covering some 100,000 acres in eastern and southern Utah, were leased in the last weeks of the Bush administration. But the leases were immediately challenged by conservation groups, and in January a federal judge blocked drilling on the ground that the Interior Department had failed to follow its own procedures for reviewing the appropriateness of lands designated for oil and gas extraction.

Two days ago, British newspaper The Independent reported that a secret cabal of oil-producing Arab states, Russia, and China had conspired to dump the dollar for oil trading, a move which would have seriously weakened our currency and influence abroad. Many publications picked up on this report, written by the notoriously unreliable Robert Fisk, and a round of denials promptly appeared from the named states. Left unexplained by Fisk and the Independent was how these same states, with massive holdings in the dollar (especially China), would benefit in the short or long term by attacking it. However, it once again...

A call to drill for oil and natural gas in the narrow strip of Florida-controlled waters in the Gulf of Mexico will be the subject of a forum late this month at Florida State University. Rep. Dean Cannon, R-Winter Park, wants the Legislature to lift the ban on offshore rigs in state waters and give the Cabinet authority to consider drilling applications. Cannon’s proposal came as a surprise earlier this year -- it died in the waning days of the legislative session -- and he’s now waging a campaign to win support for a drilling bill he plans to file...

With its economy in the worst shape in decades, Florida has few places to turn. This probably means that the state will have to consider...

Energy: An amazing number of oil finds have been made this year, including the biggest in California in 35 years. If the world is running out of oil, why do we keep finding more of it? The mantra of the anti-drilling crowd has been that oil companies like to sit on their leases and the oil in the ground, hoping to drive up the price. They should use the leases they have or lose them, these critics say. They also like to add that the world is running out of oil so it doesn't matter anyway. Occidental Petroleum hasn't been...

Energy: An amazing number of oil finds have been made this year, including the biggest in California in 35 years. If the world is running out of oil, why do we keep finding more of it? The mantra of the anti-drilling crowd has been that oil companies like to sit on their leases and the oil in the ground, hoping to drive up the price. They should use the leases they have or lose them, these critics say. They also like to add that the world is running out of oil so it doesn't matter anyway. Occidental Petroleum hasn't been...

Beachgoers play near Galveston, Texas, with an oil rig on the horizon. An oil company wants to drill off Florida’s coast. Oil drilling off Florida's coast means jobs and money, proponents say; questions remain By Craig Pittman, Times staff writer In Print: Friday, September 18, 2009 They appeared in the spring, a secretive group trying to upend Florida's longtime ban on offshore drilling by promising millions of dollars and hundreds of jobs.<snip>But rigs could go up anywhere else, he said. That would leave Citrus, Hernando and Pasco counties open, as well as more tourism-dependent Sarasota and Collier counties and...

Energy Policy: Ignoring peak-oil Cassandras, BP has made another giant oil find in the Gulf of Mexico. We're not running out of oil. Our government just doesn't want us to look for it.The world is running out of oil and good riddance. That's the environmentalists' mantra. But since the first well was drilled near Titusville, Pa., 150 years ago, the prophecy has gone unfulfilled. Trouble is, those darn greedy oil companies keep finding the stuff. Oil has been produced in the Gulf of Mexico since the first well was drilled by Kerr-McGee Corp. in 1947. Some of the wells are...

LONDON (AP) -- BP PLC said Wednesday that it had made a "giant" oil discovery in the Gulf of Mexico but had not yet determined the size and commercial potential of the find. The well, in Keathley Canyon block 102 about 250 miles (400 kms) southeast of Houston, is in 4,132 feet (1,259 meters) of water, the company said.

Last month there was much criticism over the fact that President Obama agreed to give Brazilian Owned Oil Company Petrobras up to $10 Billion Dollars to look for Oil off the Brazil Coast. This was especially disturbing when you consider that they Administration objects to the US Drilling off its own coast, which will work toward keeping the price of oil low and help wean us off foreign oil. Why would the POTUS pay for a foreign country to drill for oil but object to his own country taking advantage of his own country's resources? Payback. Last week Hot Air...

Energy: We balk at importing "dirty" oil from Canada, but others aren't so reluctant. Exempt as a "developing" nation from Kyoto-like agreements, China has decided to help Canada develop its energy-rich oil sands.The Financial Post reports that PetroChina International Investment Co. has struck a deal to buy a 60% interest in Athabasca Oil Sands Corp.'s McKay River and Dover projects for $1.9 billion. China has been establishing energy beachheads around the world in its quest to keep its growing economy fueled. With possible conflict brewing between Israel and Iran, Beijing recognizes the need for reliable suppliers like Canada in an...

Energy: As Russian attack submarines patrol our eastern seaboard, Moscow signs a deal to help Castro's Cuba drill for oil off the Florida coast. In Moscow and Havana, the cry is "Drill, Comrade, Drill!"Two Russian nuclear attack submarines have taken up positions along our East Coast in recent days, another sign of renewed assertiveness by the former communist giant. The move comes as Moscow inks a deal with the communist relic of Cuba to drill for oil we refuse to go after. The submarines are of the Akula class, a counterpart to the Los Angeles class attack subs of the...

On Aug. 28, 1859, in the backwoods of northwest Pennsylvania, the first successful oil well went into production in the United States, ushering in an energy revolution that would make whale oil obsolete and eventually transform the industrial world. Yet 150 years later, even as demand increases in developing countries, oil's position in the global economy is being questioned and challenged as never before. Why this debate about the single most important source of energy—and a very convenient one—that provides 40% of the world's total energy? There are the traditional concerns—energy security, diversification, political risk, and the potential for conflict...

Anchorage, AK - Governor Palin posted this article on her Facebook. page. Governor Palin has been fighting for more and more offshore drilling since she was appointed to the Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission. The court had no choice but to side with her . The ultra liberal or activist 9th Circuit Court also had a decision overturned by the US Supreme Court, in Governor Palin’s favor, back on July, 22. The article: 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruling allows Beaufort drilling: A ruling Thursday by the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals has cleared the way for Shell Oil...

ANCHORAGE, Alaska -- A ruling Thursday by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals has cleared the way for Shell Oil to resume its exploration and development in the Beaufort Sea. The court's ruling says the Bush administration was correct in not demanding a new environmental impact assessment for the company's drilling leases

Energy Policy: New York's governor wants to tap into a shale formation that can supply the entire U.S. with natural gas for 65 years. Will NIMBY environmentalists let him stimulate New York's and America's energy economy? Last week, David Patterson released a draft report of his Energy Planning Board that does something Democrats are loath to do: It proposes developing a domestic energy resource — the huge amounts of natural gas trapped in the Marcellus Shale formation. New York produces 5% of its natural gas in-state and imports more than 95% from the Gulf Coast and Canada. The Marcellus Shale...

Sarah Palin keeps hitting... Sarah Palin pummeled Team Obama over the news yesterday that the government will fund Brazilian offshore oil development and research but deny US companies access to oil deposits off our own shores. From her Facebook page, via Free Republic: YOUR TAX DOLLARS HARD AT WORK: FIRST CARS, NOW FOREIGN OIL. Today's Wall Street Journal contains some puzzling news for all Americans who are impacted by high energy prices and who share the goal of moving us toward energy independence. For years, states rich with an abundance of oil and natural gas have been begging Washington, DC...

Energy Policy: New York's governor wants to tap into a shale formation that can supply the entire U.S. with natural gas for 65 years. Will NIMBY environmentalists let him stimulate New York's and America's energy economy?Last week, David Patterson released a draft report of his Energy Planning Board that does something Democrats are loath to do: It proposes developing a domestic energy resource — the huge amounts of natural gas trapped in the Marcellus Shale formation. New York produces 5% of its natural gas in-state and imports more than 95% from the Gulf Coast and Canada. The Marcellus Shale stretches...

When he was trying to shove the Porkulus bill down the throats of the American people the POTUS kept repeating a message such as this: Millions more Americans will lose their jobs. Homes will be lost. Families will go without health care. Our crippling dependence on foreign oil will continue. That is the price of inaction. Our crippling dependence on foreign oil??? One of his first actions as President was to cancel land leases that would allow drilling off of Utah. It is the Democrats who are increasing our dependence on foreign Oil. New York State fiscal status is not...

Brian Wixom's company has paid the U.S. government hundreds of thousands of dollars for leases to drill for oil and gas on federal lands over the years, only to never put a rig in the ground. The money simply sits in a federal bank account as Wixom and other drillers wait for an agonizing bureaucratic process to run its course. As it turns out, the federal government is holding a boatload of money for leases it auctioned and sold but hasn't issued, holding them back for bureaucratic review because of environmental protests and lawsuits. The backlog grew exponentially under the...

Reporting from Sacramento -- Although 28 members of the California Assembly supported a measure to allow new oil drilling off the Santa Barbara coast, their votes are nowhere to be found in the official state database. After the measure failed, Assembly leaders expunged the vote altogether, sparing lawmakers running for reelection an official record of their controversial decision. The voting logs made available to the public on the Legislature's website do not indicate who voted for and against the bill on July 24. ... It wasn't the first time the Assembly has done this. The little-known practice of purging votes,...

It is estimated that there are anywhere from 18-95 BILLION Barrels of oil underneath our continental shelf. There are almost 7 TRILLION Barrels of Oil in the shale under the Rocky Mountains (to be fair, with present technology we can only get to around 800 billion barrels of it). Today America Consumes about 20 Million Barrels/day approximately 7.5 million of which we get domestically. My math tells me, using the minimum numbers (18+800 Billion) divided by 20 million, divided by 365 days, the US has an import free Oil reserves of at least 112 YEARS. Drilling would be a true...

The agreement signed last week between Cuba and a Russian oil company to explore waters in the Gulf of Mexico raises a question that seems almost like a joke - if Cuba can explore for oil and gas off the coast of Florida, how come the United States can't?

Last week Chuck DeVore did his best to get the California Assembly to vote through the first major offshore drilling efforts in over two decades. After the Senate passed the measure the Assembly voted down the measure and later voted to expunge the record, as if it didn't exist. As Chuck noted: "George Orwell would be proud." Glenn Beck quotes Chuck in this 2 minute report. Glenn Beck on Chuck DeVore and the Orwellian Vote in California

WASHINGTON -- A federal appeals court ruling won't stand in the way of new oil and gas drilling in the Gulf of Mexico. The U.S. Court of Appeals in Washington clarified late Tuesday that its decision earlier this year to block some Bush-era drilling plans was meant to apply only to activity in Alaska, not the Gulf.

SAN FRANCISCO -(Dow Jones)- California could allow new oil drilling under a tentative agreement the state's governor and lawmakers reached to plug the state's $26.3 billion budget hole. In a rare agreement with environmental groups, oil producer Plains Exploration & Production Co. (PXP) has proposed promptly expanding oil drilling off the coast of Santa Barbara, then shutting down four oil platforms and two onshore processing facilities in Santa Barbara by 2022. The company also agreed to donate 4,000 acres of land for public use. The company would slant-drill into the state's seafloor from a platform it operates in federal waters....

Sacramento is so desperate to erase the state budget's $26.3 billion shortfall that Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and the Democratic Legislature seem poised to end decades of prohibition so that they can tap new revenue from a widely occurring natural resource - one dear to many Californians and known for its unmistakable aroma. That's right, Sacramento is considering a budget that would raise as much as $1.8 billion in royalties over 14 years by allowing new offshore oil drilling off the coast of Santa Barbara. As of my deadline, the outcome is uncertain. The Governator points out that the Tranquillon Ridge...

The American Petroleum Institute has just released the results of its third annual “Energy IQ” survey, and it reflects that Americans’ knowledge about energy issues is lacking. The survey, conducted by Harris Interactive, comes as President Obama and Congress are pursuing aggressive energy and climate policies that threaten the nation’s economy, and which will determine America’s economic competitiveness for years to come. Some high points from the survey: • When asked about the role fossil fuels such as oil, natural gas and coal will play in meeting global energy demand, only 10 percent of respondents answered correctly that fossil fuels...

This would create new jobs and stop the obama Death Spiral into Depression and China would once again be buying from us! As it is now "Welfare Rolls have seen a SHARP Increase" we have the worse housing market in this generations memory and the Death Spiral continues. Scientists Confirm U.S. Has World’s Biggest Oil Reserves It has been more than a year since the Department of Interior announced that North Dakota and Montana have an estimated 3 to 4.3 billion barrels of recoverable oil in an area known as the Bakken Formation, but little is being done about it....

The number of rigs actively exploring for oil and natural gas in the United States rose by 23 this week to 899, the second time this year the weekly count has increased. Of the rigs running nationwide, 692 were exploring for natural gas and 196 for oil, Houston-based Baker Hughes Inc. (BHI ) reported Friday. Eleven were listed as miscellaneous. The only other time this year the count increased was the first week of April. A year ago, the rig count stood at 1,906. The U.S. count is down 56 percent since the end of August as weak energy demand...

Congress is debating a bill that would open up oil and natural gas platforms just ten miles from portions of Florida's Gulf and Atlantic coasts. It's putting pressure on state lawmakers to decide how close is too close to search for new energy sources. As it stands, oil and natural gas exploration is limited to dozens of miles away from Florida's beaches and some in the state worry that allowing access just ten miles away, in Federal waters, puts Florida at risk environmentally without any of the financial windfalls.

The proliferation of marine life around oil production platforms turned on its head every "environmental expert" opinion of its day. The original plan, mandated by federal environmental "experts" back in the late '40s, was to remove the big, ugly, polluting, environmentally hazardous contraptions as soon as they stopped producing. Fine, said the oil companies. About 15 years ago some wells played out off Louisiana and the oil companies tried to comply. Their ears are still ringing from the clamor fishermen put up. Turns out those platforms are going nowhere, and by popular demand of those with a bigger stake in...

There are several studies that prove this. UCSB's study is rather bold right up front in it's findings: Next time you step on a glob of tar on a beach in Santa Barbara County, you can thank the oil companies that it isn't a bigger glob. That's pretty clear, isn't it? There's a study out there from the US Government which has taken note of seepages and compared them with leaks that happen from offshore oil rigs and notes that rigs leak less than the ocean floor does. The Brits have also noticed the positive benefits of offshore riggery, though...

CLEBURNE, Texas — The earth moved here on June 2. It was the first recorded earthquake in this Texas town's 140-year history — but not the last. There have been four small earthquakes since, none with a magnitude greater than 2.8. The most recent ones came Tuesday night, just as the City Council was meeting in an emergency session to discuss what to do about the ground moving. The council's solution was to hire a geology consultant to try to answer the question on everyone's mind: Is natural gas drilling — which began in earnest here in 2001 and has...

Energy: Will oil hit $250 a barrel? The Russians think so, as crude prices climb to an eight-month high. Meantime, House Republicans advance a plan to help the administration keep a domestic energy promise.The cost of July deliveries of crude bounced over $73 Thursday as the American Petroleum Institute reported shrinking U.S. inventories as the dollar weakens against the euro. Alexei Miller, chairman of the Russian energy giant Gazprom, is repeating his prediction of a year ago that oil may eventually reach the $250 mark.

There is anywhere from 18-95 BILLION Barrels of oil underneath our continental shelf. There is almost 7 TRILLION Barrels of Oil in the shale under the Rocky Mountains (to be fair, with present technology we can only get to around 800 billion barrels of it. Today America Consumes about 20 Million Barrels/day approximately 7.5 million of which we get domestically. My math tells me, using the minimum numbers (18+800 Billion- to 95 to 7,000) divided by 20 million, divided by 365 days, the US has an import free Oil reserve of 112 -972 YEARS. Drilling would be a true stimulus...

Democratic staffers on the House Resources Committee have released a “discussion draft” that would raise the royalties companies pay to drill on federal lands from 12.5 to 18.75 percent and shorten lease terms from 10 to five years. Oil and gas companies, which still give twice as much to Republicans as to Democrats, are already fighting a push to repeal $31 billion in tax breaks and a climate change bill that could reduce demand for their products. They are now facing a third threat: the House Democratic bill that could cost the industry billions of dollars more for drilling on...

Under a House Democrat-crafted bill described as a “sweeping” reform of federal drilling rules, oil and natural-gas companies would pay more to drill on federal lands and have less time to access the resources. The measure, crafted by House Natural Resources Democratic staff, raises the royalty fees oil and gas companies pay to drill on federal lands for the first time since the 1980s. It also shortens the duration of federal leases to access those federal resources from 10 years to five. The proposed changes are likely to draw vocal complaints from oil and gas companies that have already been...

Drill, baby, drill? Shame, shame Three to 10 miles offshore exploration and drilling — the first oil spill from the Gulf onto our beautiful beaches will happen. All who voted for this should have to stand barefoot in oil and explain why they voted for this. It would make a wasteland on the Florida West Coast, for supposed profits in the distant future. Lillian Savage Bradenton Safe drilling OK I want to keep Florida’s beaches pristine, too. They are why I moved here! I also support offshore oil and gas exploration and recovery in a safe and environmentally responsible manner....

1. Only 8% of ANWR Would Be Considered for Exploration Only the 1.5 million acre or 8% on the northern coast of ANWR is being considered for development. The remaining 17.5 million acres or 92% of ANWR will remain permanently closed to any kind of development. If oil is discovered, less than 2000 acres of the over 1.5 million acres of the Coastal Plain would be affected. That¹s less than half of one percent of ANWR that would be affected by production activity. 2. Revenues to the State and Federal Treasury Federal revenues would be enhanced by billions of dollars...

CALGARY - Cannibalism is rearing its ugly head in the drilling sector as service firms try to save cash by tearing equipment off idle drilling rigs to repair ones that are working, industry insiders say. This is the traditional slow time of the year for Alberta’s oil and gas exploration sector, as the melting landscape imposes weight limits on backcountry roads and makes many out-of-the-way regions of the province impassable. Spring is also traditionally when drilling companies pull equipment back to their maintenance yards in places such as Nisku and Blackfalds or park them in truckers’ yards or on their...

The Interior Department's Web site links to a page highlighting key officials. It's blank. ... Part of the holdup stems from a clash with Utah's two senators [...]. ... "We have a lot of work to do and some of it is on hold simply because we don't have the personnel confirmed as of this point," Salazar said. ... Sen. Bob Bennett, for one, isn't sure he wants that team in place. Bennett has placed a hold on the nomination of David Hayes to be deputy secretary out of concern about Salazar's decision to pull back on 77 leases for...

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — Gov. Charlie Crist says he is "open minded" about a bill that would let him and the Cabinet OK oil drilling within 10 miles of Florida's Gulf Coast. The moderate Republican governor has built a reputation as an advocate of environmental causes. But Crist said Wednesday the state needs to study allowing more drilling. Crist first softened his opposition to drilling last year, when gas prices rose above $4 a gallon. However, even then Crist said he wouldn't want rigs too close to Florida beaches. A House bill (HB 1219) would repeal the ban on offshore drilling...