Might be able to live without much foreign oil at all. At least this field is not in Alaska or the Gulf where environmentalists prevent it's mining, although I'm sure they will try to come up with something to stop it.

http://www.nextenergynews.com/news1/...news2.13s.html

 

It seems to me as though drilling and exploring for additional oil reserves as well as building new refineries in this country is a matter of national security. The more we import, the greater our security threat. Our economy is being crippled by out of control oil prices. If we relied solely on our own reserves, then the value of our dollar would not have an impact on the price we pay at the pump. Frankly, I think this is a weak reason for the higher prices, anyway. Breaking up the oil companies and putting the control back into the hands of U.S. companies would also be in our national security interests. Competition ALWAYS results in lower prices and greater efficiency. I see no need for the EPA. They only seem to want to destroy industry in this country. It is a way for the government to control people and industry without using due process. It is just another useless government bureaucracy. A few people make a lot of money off of the environment. :x

 

I realize that a lot of people think the oil game is rigged(pun intended), but it might surprise a lot of folks to know that oil exploration is actually going on as fast as possible. The oil services companies report all of their teams and rigs are out there drilling and searching for oil as fast as they can and earning fantastic profits doing so. They do not have the equipment or teams to do the work.

The name of the game today appears to be Peak Oil, or as it appears these days Peak Everything. Oil demand is quickly approaching or has already passed the supply capacity. Older mature oil fields are already declining in production and new fields are just making up for production that is declining. So instead of building capacity they are struggling to maintain. Currently estimates appear to be showing that by 2012 production will likely start to decline and could decline rapidly.

You can follow some of the story at theoildrum.com, and at peakoil.com. I find it interesting and it could very well be critical for the US to find alternatives sooner rather than later. Today there are not any answers to the problem. Current alternatives put agriculture in the crosshairs, but then we start talking about fuel and food competing with each other.

So I think we have to look at the bigger picture. World oil production is in a pinch. Prices are only going to go higher. The reserves estimates given by Saudi are a farce and by the time people are aware of this fact it will be too late. We very well could be looking at a fuel and food rationing situation. The US is too dependent on cheap energy and our infrastructure depends on it.

I wish the free market had a solution, and as we have all seen government is both incompetent and dangerous. So what's the answer?

Longsnowsm

 

Everyone seems to want to make the solution complicated. I think it is very simple. Break up the oil monopolies and make it a national priority to develop alternative energy sources. I would prohibit the oil companies from participating in the alternative energy enterprises. I would also shut down the EPA and take out any roadblocks to building oil refineries and drilling new oil wells, such as in the Gulf of Mexico and Alaska. It is a very simple solution.

 

I don't know if I agree with you on getting rid of the EPA GMAN. Perhaps you've done more research than me on their activities, but if you remember the industrial revolution and the pollution that the big companies were involved in, I think we need some kind of standards and enforcement. Remember the Ohio river fires that were caused by pollution? Also, one of the rivers around Pittsburgh is just now starting to recuperate from what I here. (That came from a guy I was talking to that lived around Pittsburgh) Those are just two examples I can think of, it's early yet. So, while I think we need some kind of oversight it has to be fair as well.


I do agree on more competition in the oil companies and the need to drill more at home.

People are starting to change their habits because of the high prices. Hybrid sales are up (although vehicle sales are down overall), and public transportation use is rising. I know I've changed my habits. I still think we're in for a big correction at some point.

 

There is not much need of the EPA these days. The environmental groups are perfectly capable of reporting pollution directly to the consumers. Haven't you noticed that environmentally friendly is the new marketing angle. The free market and open exchange of information is much more effective than the government and offers a much faster response time. If a company pollutes and makes someone sick they are subject to a huge lawsuit as well. So what exactly is the role of the EPA?

Now I haven't researched it so I may be incorrect: Was there ever any legislation preventing Tuna fishing companies from using the dolphin unfriendly practices, or did the marketing angle take care of that issue. I don't think you can buy tuna that isn't "dolphin safe" now.

The rise in prices is a conspiracy of the environmentalists. They have been far ahead of us for years and we are just catching up. They have extorted money from the oil companies and have used that money to prevent exploration for oil. We are even letting CUBA steal the oil that is between florida and cuba yet we won't go get it. They have perpetuated the hoax that global warming is linked to man made carbon dioxide and in the rest of the world have created the business of carbon offsetting that has reforested prime farmland to trees so that farmers can earn a penny per tree per year. These countries are now needing to import FOOD since their farms are not producing it now, raising the price of Food worldwide at the same time as oil prices are increasing because we were not allowed to obtain new supplies. We are not allowed to use natural hydroelectric power and are even encouraged to STOP using hydro and tear down the dams that have stood for decades. Nuclear power is also taboo even though all of the pollutants are entirely 100% contained just because the soviet union trusted high school dropouts to run a poorly designed nuclear reactor during a test to see what would happen if the automatic safety systems were disengaged.

The environmentalists want us to return to the stone age. We can only live on the surface of the earth, we can't mine anything from it, we can't extract energy from anything except the sun, and we can't eat the endangered animals and plants. By the way they are all endangered, so enjoy your rock soup heated by the sun.

 

The free market could develop a new fuel supply. Windwalker can easily turn electricity into Hydrogen that can power everything. The problem lies in that as soon as the alternative hits the market the price of oil will drop like a rock, rendering the new energy source overpriced and expensive to change over to. OPEC isn't stupid and will realize that they must destroy alternatives economically as soon as they are developed by dropping the price. So I am not going to invest my millions into an alternative that can be so easily competed with.

We need to truely come to the end of feasibly obtained oil before an alternative will fly, or we will need to outlaw oil for the alternative to fly. My question is: What are you going to do when we develop the alternatives and the oil industry demands the government bail them out for the trillions they spend on exploration. If we bail out homeowners why not business?