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Domestic prices may go up but on the other hand with less and less foreign oil being consumed the price for that should drop as well with foreign despots licking our hands instead of buying them just to induce us to buy more of their oil. Its no secret that Arab oil interests have shown interest in buying stakes in emerging alternative energy technologies because of America’s past genius in solving past technological problems. They can see the hand writing on the wall when America finally hits about 80 percent of its energy needs being supplied domestically with the other twenty percent remaining “adjustable” as to source, type, and supply(meaning we could do without the Arabs or Venenzuela)

You have misunderstood what I wrote.

Any drop in prices will lead to the shut-in of US oil production, since it is much more expensive to produce oil domestically.

Domestic prices would go DOWN, not up, were there to be some new energy sources, as you imagine above.

The Zero Sum gain/loss bean counters also never seem to factor in as well the intrinsic costs of BEING INDEPENDENT from other nations, even if Domestic energy sources are a bit more costly to produce! You say that the ratio of (ie cheaper than Domstic)Foreign Oil vs Domestic may have to increase as Domestic supplies would be more expensive to produce. But as alternative sources of energy more and more hit the market...the over-all need for oil from any source will diminish putting downward pressures on all world wide oil prices. That is, not counting the FUD that oil futures speculators love to put out to spook oil prices higher!

There are no significant energy independent nations on the planet. Even the Saudis import refined products. Energy independence is neither possible nor desireable.

Domestic petroleum is not "a bit more costly"; it is 2 or 3 times as expensive.

There are no significant alternative enrgy source that are hitting the market. Nor are any likely in the next 10 years. Oil prices will continue to rise along with demand as India and China continue to industrialize. Additionally oil prices will rise in US dollar terms as the US dollar continues to decline.

I don’t think we’ll ever be free of the need of oil in terms of manufacturing...we get so many use-ful products from it. The advances being made in alternative fuels and energy sources how-ever will certainly give us more leverage in dealing with foreign oil despots, who with these current higher prices are exacting a Dhimmitude Tax on us already!

The US will continue to import petroleum in greater quantities every year for at least the next decade. The "leverage" from insignificant contributions to the US total energy budget such as from solar, wind, or biofuels will make no real difference. The only possibility for the US to change its energy sources significantly would be to construct scores of new nuclear plants, which is quite unlikely.

jas3

Well i would like to see more Nuke plants but even if the Enviro’s were all beamed back to their mother ships and a crash program of building new plants instituted, I would be an old man before the full benefits of the plants come on line. I would all be for more domestic drilly.

I don’t think the energy needs from all alternatives is going to be “insignificant” as you describe, but certainly won’t make an impact before the next 5 years or so. Part of the coming impacts is the revolution in electrical storage and the development of more efficient technologies that use less energy but run better and do more work for less. Intel’s new cpu chip sets for example come to mind, or my solar calculator that does scientific functions in candlelight! A single new product may not make much difference but many more efficient technolgies will in the aggregate!

But what my main focus has been and maybe I have not communicated it, if the intrinsic worth of energy independence. If we could supply all our own domestic energy needs of all types, even if the price were higher compared with what commodities we currently need to purchase from the outside, would that not be more desirable? I hate paying 3$ a gallon(equivalent ie electric, fuel,ect) to some foreign power out of sheer principle...but I don’t mind it so much paying it to domestic producers who supply jobs to our economy and pay taxes to our government!