Posted on 01/06/2008 4:01:44 PM PST by Graybeard58
An elderly caller to Dan Lavallo's program on WWCO-AM told a harrowing tale Wednesday about energy prices. The man keeps his home thermostat at 40 F during the day, raising it slightly at night to ensure the pipes don't freeze. He is trying to make 200 gallons of oil last the heating season.
His is the most dire story we've heard to date, but he is not alone in feeling the pinch. Heating oil was about $2.50 a gallon after Labor Day but climbed to $3.15 this week, and is expected to rise further when $100-a-barrel oil hits the market. A prolonged frigid spell, a disruption in world oil production or a refinery breakdown could send the price into orbit.
Meanwhile, offshore and beneath Alaska's north coast are tens of billions of barrels of crude just waiting to be tapped. The Arctic National Wildlife Refuge is said to have enough oil to meet 100 percent of domestic demand for 25 years, and the offshore fields could be richer still. Congress, however, has declared those areas off-limits.
Sensible Republicans on Capitol Hill have tried for more than a decade to open a few square miles of the 19.5 million-acre refuge for exploration and development.
Cheered on by Rep. Christopher Shays, R-4th District, then-Rep. Nancy Johnson, R-6th District, and the rest of the Connecticut's congressional delegation, Bill Clinton vetoed a bill in 1995 that would have opened ANWR to drillers. His justification? It would be of no immediate help because it would take 10 years for the oil to reach the market. Reps. Johnson and Shays were more concerned about winning environmental awards than securing their constituents' energy future.
Back then, crude fetched less than $20 a barrel; it's an inflation-adjusted 333 percent higher today. Suffice it to say, the elderly caller to Mr. Lavallo's program might benefit from a little ANWR oil today.
President Bush, the Democratic Congress and the Connecticut delegation are insane if they think energy independence will be achieved with 35-mpg vehicles, ethanol and compact fluorescent light bulbs. Alternative fuels are decades from replacing oil as the fuel that drives our economy, heats our homes and powers our autos. How high must the pile of frozen corpses be before they come to their senses?
Shivering consumers should raise holy hell with the delegation. Here are the numbers to call: Sen. Joseph Lieberman, (800) 225-5605 or (202) 224-4041; Rep. Christopher Murphy, aka Congressman Green, D-5th District: (203) 759-7541 or (202) 225-4476; Rep. John Larson, D-1st District: (860) 278-8888 or (202) 225-2265; Rep. Rosa DeLauro, D-3rd District: (203) 562-3718 or (202) 225-3661; Rep. Shays: (203) 579-5870 or (202) 225-5541.
Forget former Connecticut Sen. Christopher Dodd; he's been too busy running for president to help anyone back home.
Yes, politics makes things worse whether it is keeping reserves off limits or funneling resources into energy wasting alternatives. Political constraints invariably benefit a few at the expense of the many.
Require physical delivery of the commodity to the holder of the contract.
To take a related example, if you had a contract for 1000 pork bellies, and couldn't sell them, your lawn would be disgusting (apologies to Dave Barry). Cheers!
Fixed it for him....here's a reminder of the President's Energy Plan, not the one he had to accept from this Congress.
http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,110237,00.html
No, we should hold her accountable. She was in the White House pulling the levers of power.
Just listen to her tell it.
Here’s irony. I’m living here at the edge of the treeline in what is without a doubt the coldest place in the United States. We use about 380 gallons of diesel each year as the only source of heat for our home. (It’s a toasty -19 degrees outside right now; we’re actually wasting energy, since the freezers out in the garage are keeping the food 20 warmer than the air around them.) So we use a little less than twice the amount of fuel that he uses in a climate that is literally Siberian, and I’m not talking about southern Siberia.
I’m sorry for the poor slob in balmy (gardening zone 5) Connecticut. If his home had been built to the same standards as our house, he could probably keep warm simply with the residual heat from his appliances, the sun, and his body in a climate that’s a lot more forgiving than interior Alaska. The reason our house in Alaska is built this way is a decision made by the builder, not the government. We have no housing code out here. I’ve lived in Connecticut, too, most of my childhood and early adulthood, and the place is crawling with regulation and taxes - and that has a tendency to atrophy the section of the brain dedicated to thinking ahead and planning for yourself.
I don’t know why this guy didn’t insulate and build and plan for winter. He had enough money to pay for 200 gallons of heating fuel, which at the current price is about $500. You can buy a lot of insulation for that money. In fact, if you work at it a little at a time, year after year, you could really get your house set up to survive what they call cold down there in my former home... if the code enforcement department allows that, if the regulations allow that, if he didn’t have to spent hours and dollars filling in paperwork to do it.
I’m up with ANWR oil, too. Believe me when I say that I wouldn’t be in favor of ANWR drilling if it would harm the environment. I’ll bet Pres. Obama or Pres. Rodham Clinton would lock it up for decades, too. *sigh*
“...High oil prices: Who’s to blame?...”
That’s what I’d like to know.
Try closer to 1.3 trillion bbls, which is the fig my friends at Shell are throwing around, unofficially of course. Figure 5-year startup with the in situ and microwave processes.
That's 5 years AFTER all the pols and enviromorons shut up and get out of the way. The only way that this latter event occurs is if the electorate make it too hot for the pols to keep sitting on their thumbs.
You tell me: when will that occur? $200/bbl? $300?
The politicians have absolutely no intention of letting US resources be developed unless and until they are forced to do so.
Happy thought, that, eh?
So if I'm an oil producer and the price falls below my cost of production, I'm not allowed to sell oil futures to maintain my income?
Leave the bellies in the freezer forever, if you like, as long as you pay the monthly storage/insurance (the 'carry').
What happens in most cases, of course, is that the person receiving delivery either pays a fee to re-deliver, or pays 1 month's carry (in the spring) and sells the next month's futures, intending to deliver back the bellies at that point.
Tch, tch for that silly old canard about a yardfull of wheat or a yardfull of bellies.
Happy thought, that, eh?
I'm all for denuding the Middle East (oil) and China (polluting factories) to support our lifestyle!
"Not in My Backyard" writ nationally.
Cheers!
Isn’t it ALWAYS BUsh’s fault?
Not the Democrats in Congress ... Nah - it’s Bush’s fault.
More likely, having watched the mkt falling for a bit, the real-world producer has already sold ('hedged' is the usual term) his future production.
Good trading to you!
Lots of folks don't seem to get his jokes lately.
Cheers!
The problem with ANWR and why the State is less than excited about producing the fields is the 90-10 which is even worse than the 75-25 producers get in the ME, and that’s our FedGov out-arabing Arabs.
It would be very close to the same price.
Your state is a piker.....look at Washington State - and I think it’s gone up since March of 2007....
http://bp0.blogger.com/_CQyU4ayBifw/Rl9PPcquezI/AAAAAAAAAUA/XY10-XGYu2Y/s1600-h/gas+tax+2.gif
Dear President Bush & Congress,
ALLOW THE OIL COMPANIES TO GO AFTER OUR UNTAPPED OIL !!!
Thank you.
And BTW, the estimate was up to ~ 10 billion barrels, not tens of billions.
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