There is more oil in the oil shale in Colorado and Utah than in Saudi Arabia. Anwar and the gulf could provide enough oil to make us independent form Mexico and Venezuela. If we did not import such massive amounts the world price would fall and we would have a steady price that would would not fluctuate much. What would be gas price for $30-40 per barrel oil?
Until the cost of extracting shale oil, approaches the costs of pumping light, sweet crude from Saudi Arabia and elsewhere, the capital market will continue to invest in more oil fields and purchase oil from abroad. If you increase the cost of energy, everything else goes up. And then there are the environmentalists and Congress who are skewing the marketplace by preventing exploration and drilling and refining. We aren't going to conserve our way out of this mess.