Free Republic

State’s share of shale soaring The discovery of the Haynesville Shale — a huge natural gas cache in north Louisiana — pumped nearly $100 million into state coffers this month. The state is raking in millions. More revenue is expected from tax collections and royalties. The state stands to profit in a number of ways, including: n The lease of state-owned property and state-owned water bottoms. n Increases in income tax from payroll and profits. n Sales tax revenue from the purchase of materials and supplies. n Severance taxes when the natural gas is extracted from the ground. n Royalties,...

“Russia’s adventure in Georgia has been described as a ‘warlet,’ a contained firing spree that wound up and down within a week. But to Europe’s energy markets, it was the equivalent of wide-scale carpet bombing,” writes Eric Reguly in Britain’s Global and Mail on August 15th. snip The U.S. is now trapped, however, in the crossfire between Russian military/economic aggression, Moslem extremism and European energy starvation. We will soon be enormously grateful for our opportunity to drill off our own coasts and in our own ANWR, to import our Alaskan gas through a new pipeline, to tap Appalachia’s big, tough...

HOUSTON — American natural gas production is rising at a clip not seen in half a century, pushing down prices of the fuel and reversing conventional wisdom that domestic gas fields were in irreversible decline. The new drilling boom uses advanced technology to release gas trapped in huge shale beds found throughout North America — gas long believed to be out of reach. Natural gas is the cleanest fossil fuel, releasing less of the emissions that cause global warming than coal or oil. Rising production of natural gas has significant long-range implications for American consumers and businesses. A sustained increase...

Authorities seized a small amount of radioactive material and nerve gas from a taxi in the Georgian capital and detained the driver, officials said Monday. Tedo Mokeliya was detained May 31 after police in this former Soviet republic discovered two containers with 3 curies of cesium-137 and 12 microcuries of strontium in his taxi, said Givi Mgebrishvili, chief of the Interior Ministry's main criminal investigation department. Cesium and strontium, which have medical and industrial applications, are considered likely ingredients for a so-called "dirty bomb," in which conventional explosives are combined with radioactive material. Mgebrishvili said at a news conference that...

Dan wanted to know if there was a legitimate claim behind those companies that offer better gas mileage through water-based contraptions in your car. Here's what he said: Recently I was introduced to a "Water4Gas" system that claims it can boost an internal combustion engine's gas mileage by 10 to 100 percent. The person trying to push/sell this innovative system (that I hear has been around already for quite some time) is named: Ozzie Freedom' (probably not his real name). It's being marketed as an "experimental add-on" that eliminates carbon deposits in the cylinders, boosts performance, and prevents smog. It's...

Asking Jesus to do for the nation what the Democrats won't. What's that all about? See for yourself in today's "Geeks On Caffeine" cartoon! NOTE: The author has requested that you visit his web site and refrain from copying the cartoon within this post. Thank you very much! Have a great one!

A few speculators dominate vast oil market Regulators: Swiss energy firm holds 11 percent of contracts on NYMEX Regulators had long classified a private Swiss energy conglomerate called Vitol as a trader that primarily helped industrial firms that needed oil to run their businesses. But when the Commodity Futures Trading Commission examined Vitol's books last month, it found that the firm was in fact more of a speculator, holding oil contracts as a profit-making investment rather than a means of lining up the actual delivery of fuel. Even more surprising to the commodities markets was the massive size of Vitol's...

Quite unconcerned with the suffering of his fellow Americans, green lefty blogger Chris Bowers of Open Left is positively delighted that Americans are paying an arm and a leg for their gasoline. Bowers opines that sky-high gasoline prices constitute a "major progressive victory" and are actually good for America: "Higher gas prices have created a broad shift in American behavior that is good for the environment and good for progressives." The fact that mass transit ridership is up, while driving is down, helps the environment, he argues. Bowers contends that increased reliance on mass transit and reduced driving is good...

The Perdido spar will bring production in from three fields—Great White, Silvertip and Tobago—with a production design of 130,000 boe/day. The Shell-operated Perdido Regional Development Spar has arrived in the ultra-deep waters of the Gulf of Mexico (GOM) and is currently being secured to the seafloor in 7,816 ft (2,382 m) of water, a process that will take about one month. Perdido will be the deepest oil development in the world, the deepest drilling and production platform in the world and have the deepest subsea well in the world to date. Other partners in the joint venture are BP...

Jack Risko of Dinocrat.com charts oil and gas prices, showing a pattern that looks very much like a speculative bubble. Notice in particular the freefall of natural gas prices (the red line), suggesting that oil prices may fall even further. Jack speculates that one motive for the Soviet invasion of Georgia is to threaten the major pipeline supplying Europe, thereby helping to sustain oil prices. A major fall of oil prices to pre-run-up levels would severely cut the income of Russia, not mention the oil states of the Gulf and Hugo Chavez.

There's something about the oil business that turns even intelligent people into frothmouthed loons: they're raping the planet, shafting Joe Sixpack or, from the other side, insisting that the drill in every back yard is the very definition of America. I realise that in the middle of an election that the small still voice of reason isn't going to get much airplay but let's give it the old school try anyway.

Perhaps spurred by the controversy surrounding Beijing’s smoggy skies during the ongoing 2008 Olympic Games, PRC officials are set to put the economic clamps on the purchase of large displacement engines – in theory the worst automotive polluters. Using a sales tax system that works on a percentage basis, the government will actually make buying small engined vehicles cheaper – in this case those with displacements smaller than or equal to 1.0-liter – by reducing the tax on them from three to one percent. Meanwhile engines that displace more than 4.0-liters will face a huge duty of 40 percent,...

"Your Wallet: The Only Place Democrats Want to Drill"The Tennessee Republican Party has released a new bumper sticker designed to help motorists express their disapproval of the Democrat Party’s refusal to approve increased drilling for oil in our own country in order to combat high gas prices and our dangerous dependence on imported oil. The TRP releases the bumper sticker, and reiterates its endorsement of the grassroots Drill Here, Drill Now, Pay Less campaign, at the same time that Democrat leaders such as Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi are blocking all attempts by Republican lawmakers...

After batting down the hype over startups and DIYers claiming they could run a car on water, PM's senior automotive editor installs a hand-built HHO kit—only to find he was right the first time. Can bad chemistry keep the myth of the water car alive? More heavy testing in the PM garage will tell. Water-powered cars continue to be the largest single topic taking over my in box—and the Comments section of this Web site. And it's not just my recent column on the truth about water-chugging prototypes. This trend has become an obsession with many backyard inventors, and some...

Stuart Shepard shares how to save 40 cents a gallon on gas – and how stealth taxes hurt struggling families...VIDEO

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Retail gasoline prices fell on average almost a penny overnight, extending declines for the 24th straight day, a survey of gas station credit card swipes showed Sunday. The national average price for a gallon of regular gas fell to $3.818 from $3.826 the previous day. That's down more than 7% from the record high of $4.114 that gas prices hit on July 16. Gas prices have eased substantially in recent weeks amid signs that global demand for petroleum products is slowing. But gas prices remain high in historical terms. Friday's national average price is more than...

Dear Friend, I don't need to tell you that gas prices are high, but there is someone I do need to tell... Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid. ...and I need your help to do it. Please mail me your gas receipts and a short note about what your family has had to sacrifice because of out-of-control prices at the pump. I'll bundle together all the receipts and stories I receive and send them to Senator Reid. Together, we will send a message to Washington and show Harry Reid that high gas prices are hurting Oklahomans. Please mail your gas receipts...

A modern society such as that in the United States requires personal transportation — cargo trucks, planes, and cars — to make a market economy work. Any serious effort to move our country to mass transportation, such as trains and buses, for everyone and everything all the time — or even most of the time — would destroy not only our economy, but the American way of life. To provide our personal transportation for the foreseeable future, the United States needs oil or an oil substitute. Electric vehicles, the proposed solution by many for America’s transportation problems, have serious drawbacks...

(August 6, 2008)—Oil prices are falling, dropping briefly below $118 a barrel again, following a government report of bigger-than-expected jumps in supplies of crude oil and distillates, suggesting high energy prices are still eating into demand. The price of crude has recovered some now, but fell $2.03 to $117.14 a barrel in morning trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange, the lowest since May 2. Oil prices are now down about $30 from their record high of $147.27, reached July 11th. Falling crude kept weighing on retail gas prices. Filling stations hungry for business reduced the price-per-gallon of regular on...

I told her that my heating oil went up over $2 a gallon, so it's going to be a tough winter for her constituents in our extremely cold state, etc., etc.. Anyway, I asked her aide what the congresswoman is doing about it re: drilling, etc.. The aide said that the congresswoman is getting together with four other congresspersons to work on it. So I said, in D.C.? The aide said No. Maybe she really is working on it in her home state, but since they're not in D.C., it sounds like they're mostly on a five-week paid vacation. So...

Just now listening to Roger Hedgecock's KOGO AM radio show. Hedgecock is interviewing Congressman Brian Bilbray and former Presidential hopeful and Congressman Duncan Hunter about the vote for drilling in Washington, D.C. and Pelosi shuting down the House.Hunter and Bilbray are reporting that regular citizens are now being invited to sit in the actual chairs of the no-show Democrats of the House--an action that may never have happened in American history. Congressman Hunter wants to get a number of our nation's Truckers to come to D.C. and have their voices heard, too! After all...he says, it's the people's House!!!

The McCain campaign seizes the moment; from an e-mail: John McCain says we need offshore oil drilling and we need it now. Senator Barack Obama has consistently opposed offshore drilling - calling it a "gimmick." Senator Obama's solution to high gas prices is telling Americans to make sure their tires are inflated. Today, I'm asking for your help in putting Senator Obama's "tire gauge" energy policy to the test. With an immediate donation of $25 or more, we will send you an "Obama Energy Plan" tire pressure gauge. Will simply inflating your tires reduce the financial burden of high gas...

For Immediate Release 08/04/2008Washington, D.C. – Speaker Nancy Pelosi released the following statement today on Democratic proposals to bring relief to Americans at the pump:“Democrats offered a real solution to high energy prices that would bring immediate relief within 10 days by forcing the President to free our oil from the nation’s stockpile.  The Republicans propose to giveaway public lands to Big Oil, which will not immediately reduce the price at the pump and save Americans only 2 cents 10 years from now.  This Republican hoax is unworthy of the serious debate we must have to reduce the price at...

<p>Although most experts agree that financial speculation was not responsible for the surge in the global prices of food and energy, many people remain puzzled about the source of these remarkable price rises. Economics offers a simple supply-and-demand explanation and reason for optimism about the future of commodity prices. In the case of oil, economics also suggests how policy changes today that affect the future could quickly lower the current price of oil.</p>

The inevitable backlash against the watermelons has begun. “Watermelons” is the word used by Conservative bloggers and writers to describe most environmentalists because they’re green on the outside and red (Marxist) on the inside. Multiple polls taken over the last few months have shown that a large majority of the American people are now willing to support off-shore drilling and will support drilling for oil almost anywhere if it will lower gas prices. It is wonderful and amazing that the American people understand free market solutions better than most of the politicians they have elected. To this day, bubble-headed Democrats...

Barack Obama is proposing tapping the nation's strategic oil reserves to help drive down gasoline prices, his campaign said Monday. Obama supports releasing light oil from the emergency oil stockpile now and replacing it later with heavier crude more suited to the country's long-term needs, according to a campaign fact sheet. Light crude oil is easier to refine into gasoline than heavier oil. Also on Monday, the Obama campaign unveiled a television ad that criticizes Republican John McCain's energy policies. "After one president in the pocket of big oil we can't afford another," says the ad, referring to President Bush's...

Continuing with their guerilla tactics from last week, House Republicans will be back on the floor Monday to talk gas prices, even though Congress is in recess, and they may stay there all week. More than a dozen Republicans have already committed to make appearances, according to House GOP leadership aide, including National Republican Congressional Committee Chairman Tom Cole (Ga.). Rep. Tom Price (R-Ga.) and Mike Pence (R-Ind.), who lead Friday's five-hour talkathon after the House shut down for the August recess, are also expected to be there, according to this aide. "In an urgent memo sent to GOP Members...

HERE IT IS

JUNEAU -- Gov. Sarah Palin's natural gas pipeline license won final legislative approval Friday, and an executive for the Canadian energy company that will hold the license said his firm aims to start work right away. We are all smiles and we are full of gratitude for our good lawmakers making a very, very wise decision for Alaska," Palin said in her Capitol conference room packed with applauding aides and supporters. After two hours of sometimes animated debate, the Senate voted 14-5 to pass House Bill 3001, which gives the Palin administration clearance to issue the license to TransCanada Corp....

As Congress begins a five-week break without passing legislation to address high gasoline prices, Democrats and Republicans are fighting for the political high ground in the energy debate. [Nancy Pelosi] In a flurry of ads and on the campaign trail, Republicans are pounding Democrats for failing to allow votes on lifting a federal ban on oil and gas drilling in offshore areas to boost domestic production. Democrats are accusing Republicans of blocking renewable-energy initiatives and protecting wealthy oil companies at consumers' expense. On Thursday, House and Senate Democrats held a press conference to highlight oil companies' record profits. The Senate...

Congressman Nick Lampson, Representing the 22nd District of Texas Website | About | Issues | Legislation | Newsroom | 22nd District | Contact | Dear XXXXX, Last week I introduced The Domestic Drilling Act (H.R.6593) and The Consumer Energy Supply Act (H.R. 6578) to address our energy security needs in both the short- and long-term. As we find ourselves competing with rapidly growing nations such as China and India for energy, it is clear that we must increase supplies to reign in skyrocketing prices. Both pieces of this legislation would increase domestic supplies of energy and put more oil...

The hydrogen gas systems being used by several mid-valley drivers cannot deliver any kind of efficiency, says Bob Paasch, the Boeing professor of mechanical design at Oregon State University. “The process is a scam,” he said. “It’s wishful thinking. If it were true, every power company and auto company in the world would be using it.” Paasch said the systems — which use water and baking soda to create hydrogen via an electrical charge from the battery and alternator — violate the second law of thermodynamics and can’t work. “People who buy into this are wasting their money,” he said....

You've already tried saving a few dollars at the fuel pump by driving slower, consolidating trips and keeping your tires properly inflated. But the high cost of fuel is still killing your budget. Companies sensing an opportunity are offering some clever innovations to wring more mileage out of your car. Here are three plausible solutions that look beyond gasoline. They center on three gases: hydrogen, nitrogen and methane — in ways you may not expect. Hydrogen If you can't afford one of the new gas-electric hybrid cars, Bruce White, co-founder of H2 Hydrogen Technologies in East Hartford, says his fledgling...

I want to urge all my fellow FReepers to phone the White House comments line at 202-456-1111 and leave a message for President Bush urging him to call a special session of Congress and force them to vote on off shore and ANWR drilling. If the Dems vote it down then McCain needs to be all over the media speaking about this. I'm so sick of "Let Them Eat Cake" Pelousi. Congress needs to be reminded that they (still) work for us.

LONDON (Reuters) - Oil fell more than $4 a barrel to below $121 on Tuesday, touching the lowest price since May, as signs of weakening demand outweighed a disruption to Nigerian oil output. The drop also coincided with a firmer U.S. dollar, which may have reduced the appeal of commodities to some investors, and comments from OPEC's president that oil could fall to $70 or $80 in the long term. "We still believe that crude's rallies are vulnerable and we would advise not buying into them," said Edward Meir, analyst at MF Global who earlier on Tuesday said he expected...

An unprecedented cutback in driving is slashing the funds available to rebuild the nation's aging highway system and expand mass-transit options, underscoring the economic impact of high gasoline prices. The resulting financial strain is touching off a political battle over government priorities in a new era of expensive oil. A report to be released Monday by the Transportation Department shows that over the past seven months, Americans have reduced their driving by more than 40 billion miles. Because of high gasoline prices, they drove 3.7% fewer miles in May than they did a year earlier, the report says, more than...

Liberals say Iraq is another Vietnam; conservatives say Barack Obama is Jimmy Carter redux. ABBA's a mega-hit and Elton John's going to be performing at Madison Square Garden. Had enough of these '70s flashbacks? Brace yourself for another: the return of the national speed limit, courtesy of one of the country's most venerable politicians. Senator John Warner (R-VA) — elected in 1978 — recently expressed interest in the idea of a national speed limit to conserve gasoline. Warner, who is not running for re-election this year, wrote to U.S. Secretary of Energy Sam Bodman, asking "at what speed is the...

The Arctic holds as many as 90bn barrels of undiscovered oil and has as much undiscovered gas as all the reserves known to exist in Russia, US government scientists have said in the first state assessment of the region. The estimates could fuel the race among polar nations, such as Russia, the US, Denmark, Norway and Canada, vying for control of the region, though the study said Russia and the Alaska platform appeared to have the most undiscovered resources. Alaska's large estimated holdings are likely to stir the debate about opening protected areas of the state to development. The 90bn...

Liberals have done a U-turn on conservative billionaire oilman T. Boone Pickens. Formerly reviled for funding the "Swift Boat Veterans for Truth" campaign against Sen. John Kerry, he's now adored by the Left — unfortunately, for trying to gaslight the rest of us on energy policy. This column recently spotlighted Pickens' proposed plan to get America off foreign oil by substituting wind-generated electricity for natural gas-generated electricity and then using the natural gas to replace gasoline. Already having addressed the proposal's flaws — and Pickens' plan to profit at taxpayer expense from it — let's consider how Pickens' marketing shades...

NEW YORK: The race for petroleum resources above the Arctic Circle is likely to speed up in coming years, as the polar ice cap melts and access to oil and gas reserves in many other places around the world becomes more challenging. The lure of the Arctic as oil's next big frontier was vindicated this week as a major geological survey found the region might hold as much as a fifth of the world's yet to-be-discovered oil and natural gas reserves. Many of these new resources, according to the survey, are to be found in Russia. If true, that would...

I was listening to Rush Limbaugh at lunch today, and he mentioned that Ms. Nancy Pelosi (D, CA) was castigating the President for failing to release any of the "700 million barrels" of oil in the Strategic Petroleum Reserve (our emergency supply). Guess what? Nancy has been preventing the production of a lot more than 700 million barrels of our oil, and she has been doing it for years. Take a look here: http://www.mms.gov/omm/pacific/offshore/oil-gaspdfs/2000-063.pdf"Unproved reserves are estimated to be 1,316 million barrels of oil and 922 billion cubic feet of gas, in 25 fields."That's ONE BILLION, THREE HUNDRED AND SIXTEEN...

WASHINGTON, DC –Today, United States Senator Ken Salazar declared victory for the communities of Colorado’s Western Slope. Efforts by Reps. John Salazar and Mark Udall and Senator Salazar will now ensure that language is included in the omnibus spending bill that will prohibit the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) from issuing any final regulations for commercial-scale leasing of oil shale and from offering any commercial oil shale leases during fiscal year 2008. Senator Salazar was also able to work in language that specifically reiterates how important it is for the Department of Interior and BLM to cooperate more fully with...

Alaska House Approves $26.6B TransCanada Gas Pipeline Plan by Cassandra Sweet Dow Jones Newswires 7/23/2008 URL: http://www.rigzone.com/news/article.asp?a_id=64567 SAN FRANCISCO (Dow Jones Newswires), July 23, 2008 The Alaska House of Representatives approved a bill late Tuesday that would award TransCanada Corp. (TRP) an exclusive license to build a $26.6 billion natural gas pipeline from Alaska's North Slope to Alberta, Canada. The proposal, by Republican Gov. Sarah Palin, could go up for another vote by the state House on Wednesday, under what's called "reconsideration." If the bill doesn't fail in a reconsideration vote, it would proceed to the state Senate, which has...

A new gasoline tax that ensured high prices would accelerate the move toward fuel-efficient vehicles and provide enough revenue to allow a cut in corporate taxes. On the surface, the market's behavior on certain days of June and July has been so illogical that my brain simply has refused to accept it. Double-digit intraday swings in prices of stocks without any material catalyst have become routine. But last week's trading has finally explained what should have been clear for a while: Though current economic troubles may have started with lax credit and underwriting standards and the ensuing subprime-mortgage fiasco, they...

Gas taxes are for the little people not Democratic party dignitaries. The committee hosting the Democratic National Convention is using the city's gas pumps to fill up on fuel, avoiding state and federal highway taxes, officials said today. "There's something there that just doesn't seem right to me because, in a sense, you're saying then that the officials who pass the laws are not willing to live by them, and that concerns me," Councilwoman Jeanne Faatz said. ...Faatz asked if it was customary to have "fleets for dignitaries" not pay for highway taxes if they're using government fuel facilities. (Mayor...

As fuel prices rise, gas tax receipts drop, and money for roads and bridges dries up - Gas prices are soaring. That's the bad news.But as they soar, motorists drive less, and that produces some benefits: less air pollution and less congestion. That's the good news.And then there's the bad news about the good news. The federal gas tax is levied on a per-gallon basis. So the less people drive and the less gas they use, the less the federal government collects from gas taxes. So it is that recent record high gas prices have produced record low gas tax...

Possibly the first political spot in history to feature ecstatic cheers for the other guy on the soundtrack. Any ad that leverages the GOP’s advantage on drilling is a good ad, I guess, but this one does too much and too little, neglecting to hammer the Dems on that gas-tax hike they’re flirting with and seemingly blaming the global spike in oil prices squarely on, um, Barack Obama. (Maybe he is omnipotent.) Also, as a simple factual matter, it’s not true that Obama says no to independence from foreign oil: It’s that he wants independence from foreign oil exclusively through...

Good-bye summer gas tax holiday. Hello, higher gas taxes. If you are outraged that gas taxes might go up instead of coming down for the summer, we don't blame you. But the way things are going, it's a possibility that we will be paying more to Uncle Sam when we gas up. Just as the country was digesting the possibility of the 90-day hiatus on gas taxes for the summer to alleviate gas prices, lawmakers learned that a trust fund that pays for road construction and repair countrywide is actually heading in the red, and needs every dime it can...

Despite calls from the presidential campaign trail for a Memorial Day-to-Labor Day tax freeze, lawmakers quickly concluded — with a prod from the construction industry — that having $9 billion less to spend on highways could create a pre-election specter of thousands of lost jobs. Now, lawmakers quietly are talking about raising fuel taxes by a dime from the current 18.4 cents a gallon on gasoline and 24.3 cents on diesel fuel. Not so quiet any more, is it fellas? That's a 54% increase. That's not all. It seems they want to increase it by more than 100% by the...

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.