Contact your Congress critters to let them know that you are tired of high gas prices.
Posted on 07/15/2008 2:44:18 PM PDT by rob777
In a dramatic move yesterday President Bush removed the executive-branch moratorium on offshore drilling. Today, at a news conference, Bush repeated his new position, and slammed the Democratic Congress for not removing the congressional moratorium on the Outer Continental Shelf and elsewhere. Crude-oil futures for August delivery plunged $9.26, or 6.3 percent, almost immediately as Bush was speaking, bringing the barrel price down to $136.
Now isn’t this interesting?
Democrats keep saying that it will take 10 years or longer to produce oil from the offshore areas. And they say that oil prices won’t decline for at least that long. And they, along with Obama and McCain, bash so-called oil speculators. And today we had a real-world example as to why they are wrong. All of them. Reid, Pelosi, Obama, McCain — all of them.
Traders took a look at a feisty and aggressive George Bush and started selling the market well before a single new drop of oil has been lifted. What does this tell us? Well, if Congress moves to seal the deal, oil prices will probably keep on falling. That’s the way traders work. They discount the future. Psychology and expectations can turn on a dime.
The congressional ban on offshore drilling expires September 30, so that becomes a key date. A new report from Wall Street research house Sanford C. Bernstein says that California actually could start producing new oil within one year if the moratorium were lifted. The California oil is under shallow water and already has been explored. Drilling platforms have been in place since before the moratorium. They’re talking about 10 billion barrels worth off the coast of California.
There’s also a “gang of 10” in the Senate, five Republicans and five Democrats, that is trying to work a compromise deal on lifting the moratorium. So it’s possible a lot of action on this front could occur much sooner than people seem to think.
So I repeat: Drill, drill, drill. Deregulate, decontrol, and unleash the American energy industry. Those hated traders will then keep selling oil as the laws of supply and demand and free markets keep working.
Bravo for Bush. Bravo for the traders.
That's what pisses me off about the MSM. They make up highly sensationalist, misleading headlines like that, that bear no resemblance to reality. Those headlines, in turn, drive poor, innumerate schmoes like you to jump to idiotic conclusions. No, the move in oil prices today is nothing special. If you had bothered to read beyond the headline, you'd find the following:
But in 1991, oil was trading at just $32 a barrel, so the more than $10 slide in dollar terms represented a record 33% drop. Oil fell 4.4% Tuesday, which does not even crack the top 100 price declines in percentage terms.
No further comment is necessary.
” Hybrids still have an engine to make heat. Defrosting the windshield and keeping the occupants warm will take a lot of electricity in an all electric vehicle.” The Prius has a 2 gallon insulated thermos tank that saves the hot coolant after you shut down the car. An electric water pump transfers the coolant @ 195 deg. to this thermos tank to be used the next time you start the car, it then reverses the flow of coolant to the engine, so that it is pre-heated for easier starting. But the really nice thing is you can turn on the car’s defroster using this 195 deg. coolant to defrost the windshield and warm the car up without ever turning on the gasoline engine. and it also has an electric heater grid to use if it is really freezing outside. The electric cars could also use a thermos tank system like the Prius. What do you call expensive? I see $75000 Lexus’s all over the place, and the Prius is 1/3 the cost, and with all the bells and whistles.
Chavez or Ahmanutjob will do something tomorrow to scare the market back up...count on it.
“give the oil to us” ?!?!?
What are you smoking? and can I have some? Are you in favor of nationalizing oil?
Ok smartass, what 'idiotic' conclusion did I jump to?
Absolutely. Some bio mass generating stations are now online, producing power not only cleaner, but cheaper.
For example:
Renegy’s commercial biomass power generation plant begins generating power
http://www.biomassmagazine.com/article.jsp?article_id=1627&q=power%20plants
There is a lot going on that you just don't hear about. It's a rapidly growing multi-billion dollar industry.
This is NOT the old tech distillation processes of yesteryear. But the arguments you hear against it are.
http://www.biomassmagazine.com/
http://www.ethanolproducer.com/
http://www.biodieselmagazine.com/
People need to learn whats going on.
“Liberals” and “logic” are two things that typically don’t go well together. “Liberals” and “emotion”, there you’ve got something.
foesn't work worth beans after your car has been sitting out all night in -40f winter nights, or all day in a parking lot. It may be fine for a warm climate.
Turn on that electric element for heat and see how long the battery power lasts on an all electric car.
And they are expensive. They have a life expectancy of 150,000 Kilometers, 1/3 of a regular car. The batteries are an environmental nightmare.
Electric cars have a long long ways to go before they actually save fuel and the environment. Take a look around a nickel mine them try tell me the increased mining activity is 'good for the planet". An old VW diesel rabbit was far more environmentally friendly and fuel efficient.
Sure it's cheaper than say a Ferrari. But it's far more expensive than an ford escort. The escort gets better mileage, has a longer lifespan, and is less costly to the enviroment to produce.
BTTT!
Neither, or maybe both, but he's definitely an imbecile.
The market will "sell" to the buyer that garners them the most profit. Drilling in Anwr, for instance allows a very cheap delivery to the American market through a pipeline. Off-shore drilling allows for a short haul to coastal refineries. The cost of getting the oil to market is as big of a concern to oil companies as exploration and extraction. Whether it is foreign companies or not, the oil over all is cheaper to bring to market. But wait. I agree with you on the more important point that you sort of made
Adding a glut of oil to the world market improves supply and fosters competition. No matter who or where the oil is produced, more of it should drive the price down. Now you have the issue with the oil cartels, OPEC. Not all oil producing companies and nations are members. But since they have the most leverage, their influence is vast. The speculators look at them when deciding how best to advance their investment fortunes. If America were to produce enough oil to supply ourselves independent of foreign interests, it would rock the influence that OPEC has on the futures market and the commodity should, in theory, start to balance based on true supply and demand as independent nations and companies start competing for the sale of their product.
The irony here is that, initially "Big Oil" profits will soar as the Middle East feels the pinch. In a perfect scenario where American properties were producing 125% of our demand of crude, we would be exporting about 50% of everything we produced. We would not only be energy independent, but we would be stealing the customers of Middle Eastern Oil.
None of this happens overnight. But if the plans came together over the next 6 to 18 months to make it happen, the speculators and futures markets would considerably drive down the cost of a barrel of oil. It may take 10 or 20 years to see this whole utopia come together (if it ever did).
Think of the national security interest in this as well as the economic stability it would provide for us starting soon and gaining momentum long into the future.
Add gas, coal and nuclear elements to the equation and the vision for America's future actually starts to look pretty "powerful."
Of course, this is all fantasy predicated on some government leadership that actually wanted to do what's best for the country Vs. their electability and reputation with the green crowd.
Bernanke didn’t say anything of note today (Wednesday) and it is still falling.
Contact your Congress critters to let them know that you are tired of high gas prices.
Yea so? Is that supposed to prove something?
Traders were very surprised by the huge increase in crude and gas inventories reported today. IT IS a confirmation that slowing activity is cutting oil/gas usage/demand.
Are our untapped reserves really that big? Do you have a source that can confirm it?
http://network.nationalpost.com/np/blogs/fpcomment/archive/2008/07/12/abundant-energy-will-power-future-growth.aspx Abundant energy will power future growth Posted: July 12, 2008, 2:46 PM by Lawrence Solomon
Lawrence Solomon
Up! Up! Up! The world is consuming more and more energy and, as if by miracle, the amount left to consume grows ever higher. Never before in human history has energy been accessible in greater abundance and in more regions, never before has mankind had more energy options and faced a brighter energy future.
Take oil, the scarcest of the major energy commodities. In the Americas, proven oil reserves have increased from 170 billion barrels to 180 billion barrels over the last two decades, according to the 2008 Statistical World Review from British Petroleum. In Europe and Eurasia, proven oil reserves almost doubled, from 76 billion barrels to 144. Africa's proven oil reserves did double, from 58 billion barrels to 117. Even the Asia Pacific region, where China and India are reputed to be sucking up everything in sight, has increased its proven reserves. And the Middle East, the gas tank of the world, shows no sign of slowing down -- its reserves soared by almost 200 billion barrels, from a whopping 567 billion barrels to a super-whopping 756.
Bottom line for the world: an incredible 36% increase in oil reserves during the two decades that saw the greatest globalization-spurred oil consumption in the history of mankind. And that doesn't include the 152 billion barrels in proven oil reserves obtainable from Canada's tar sands. Is there any reason to doubt that the next two decades won't build on the steady growth of the last two?
These oil reserves aren't the end of it. These figures -- for the year ending December 2006 -- represent oil that's not only known to be available, but also economic at 2006 prices using 2006 technology. Since prices have soared in the last year, and technology has improved too, BP's annual assessment for the 2007 year will show greater proven oil reserves still.
But this is still not the end of it. Unconventional oil reserves are now in play. In 2005, the Rand Corporation estimated that the oil shale in America's Green River Formation, which covers portions of Colorado, Utah and Wyoming, contains 1.5 to 1.8 trillion barrels of oil, with as much as 1.1 trillion barrels of oil recoverable, an amount comparable to the reserves of four Saudi Arabias. Oil shale becomes recoverable at $95 a barrel, it determined. With oil now trading at $140 a barrel, oil shale exploitation is now very much economic. Then there's Canada's tar sands, with its even greater potential--estimates of the total reserves that may be available top two trillion barrels, or eight Saudi Arabias.
This is still not the end to it. Most of the oil we know about lies in the well travelled portions of the globe. But most of the world remains unexplored -- the interiors of Africa, Asia and South America have seen relatively little oil exploration. Oil exploration in the oceans, too, is in its infancy. For all practical purposes, mankind has limitless oil supplies available to it. The story is similar for natural gas and coal, the other major nonrenewable sources of energy. And for nuclear power. And for the renewables.
The amount of solar power landing on Earth could supply our current needs 10,000 times over. This potential will soon start to be realized on a large scale thanks to breakthroughs in the U. S. and Israel that have dramatically brought down the cost of solar technology. Wind also represents an inexhaustible resource, as seen in a 2005 NASA-funded study at Stanford University of viable wind sites worldwide. It found that wind power could satisfy global demand seven times over, assuming a realistic capture rate of 20%. Some European countries already meet a significant portion of their power needs with wind.
The world is awash with exploitable energy, both renewable and non-renewable. Availability is not at issue and never has been.
The only issue is the cost --both economic and environmental --at which it can be exploited.
Nuclear currently fails on economic grounds. But most fossil fuel technologies don't need subsidies and soon, neither will most renewable technologies. That leaves the environment as the chief determinant of what energy we use, and where we use it. Thanks to environmental awareness and the high energy prices we now face, energy production has become ever cleaner, safer, and more efficient, giving us more meaningful options than ever before.
Whatever the outcome, whatever energy forms we ultimately rely on, the table is diverse and bountiful, allowing the world economy to grow large and to grow cleanly. And it will have been largely set by environmentalists.
Lawrence Solomon is executive director of Energy Probe and Urban Renaissance Institute.
LawrenceSolomon@nextcity.com
Oil Shale ends up putting us over the top.
Oil Consumption in North America
Currently, the United States consumes 19.6 million barrels per day, of oil, which is more than 25% of the world’s total.. As a result, the U.S produces one fourth of the world’s carbon emissions. Despite predictions that the U.S. will exhaust it’s supply of oil in as little as forty years, the demand is on the increase, and is predicted to continue increasing, because of the ever increasing population. Increase in resource consumption is caused by three factors: population growth, new uses found for a resource, and increase in demand for a resource to increase living standards. The rate of consumption for oil is increasing at a rate of about 2% yearly.
http://maps.unomaha.edu/Peterson/funda/Sidebar/OilConsumption.html
There is more to read there. Do some research and correct me. No offense taken and none intended. I put the utopian caveat in there.
http://maps.unomaha.edu/Peterson/funda/Sidebar/OilConsumption.html
I posted that to the wrong person. See my post to American...
Apologies.
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