Hold off on domestic production. We're far from crisis mode.
Better to wait until the rest of the world's oil starts drying up ... THEN sell 'em ours at a suitable supply-and-demand cost.
I say start ASAP. Starting at a third of projected production capacity will ease prices. While we're on the subject, NO new domestic drilling until we BUILD MORE REFINARIES.
It took five years to get an energy bill passed, it will take longer to get more offshore energy production, and permitting it will require vigilant shepherding every step of the way. Your reply insinuates that this is a problem of sucking the last drop of oil from the planet. I assure you, the finite fossil fuel argument is bogus. The real problem is production, and refineries. We have all the energy the world will ever consume - available today - in the form of the geothermal potential of Yellowstone Park. This resource, among others, is currently off limits.
"Hold off on domestic production. We're far from crisis mode."
We've been importing oil for years - it is wrong to not drill our own... the crisis is in sending money to Chavez, Qadaffi, and Iranian Mullahs instead of keeping it here at home.
"Better to wait until the rest of the world's oil starts drying up ... THEN sell 'em ours at a suitable supply-and-demand cost." "
Saudi Arabia has 50 years of oil. We will run out before they do. The advice defies economic logic as the price of the commodity will not rise so fast to make up the present value of a commodity in the ground vs. drilling it now.
In other words, you lose a lot of economic value by waiting longer than necessary. In any case, starting now to look means not drilling until 2010 means not producing until 2015, means not using it up until 2035.