It's Boom Time for Oil in the Gulf of Mexico, Despite a Ban on Drilling in Many Areas
Amid the debate over offshore drilling, a reality check
Reader Comments
Oil Drilling in the U.S.
Hello...
Our Government better get out of the way.!.
The Congress of the U.S. has never discovered any Oil anyplace...and never will !
Nor can they predict where Oil will be found !
And they are reluctant to desire to add any New Oil to Our Nation's Total Reserve... hoping for a substitute energy source soon..
This state of mind is presently a Wish rather than A Reality !
The Oil Reserve of the U.S. is now 21.3 billion bbls.( per U.S.G.S. stats)
Those stats mean about (7) to (10) years supply of Our Own Nation's Reserve of Oil at our present usage..before Recovery Methods kick in..(See Depletion Curves of every well in Our Nation's Reserve..)
Every time any new drilling program is announced, the prognosticators go wild in predicting the discovery..(counting the chickens before they are hatched.) which becomes a 40 billion or 400 billion bbl find...without evidence in hand !
Let me remind them..
"A bird in the hand is worth two (contemplated) in the bush.!."
Axiom : "Oil is where you find it!"
Proof is in the Past History of Oil Frilling Programs! (i.e.)
(Again..."Proof of the pudding..is in..."
A Lot of Finding and Spudding has yet to be done to increase Our Nation's Oil Reserve!
And it has NOT been done yet !
Believe it or else !
As the Babe said Drill BabyDrill...
Oil platforms don't kill marine life .Drunken Captains of single hull tankers laden with crude will though.If we were told to just "move past" Ayers & Wright ,don't tell me that you will not risk (with much better odds )even the most remote chance of an ecological incident to help make our Nation energy independent. I can say that with confidence because of vast improvements in tanker design,personel screening , bio derived cleanup, coordinated response efforts incorporating government & private capabilities. No ,I am not in the oil business.But,as a citizen & a consumer ,am tired of seeing this Nation at the mercy economically and strategically of our worst enemies ,while shrieking treehuggers are curiously mute when the Russians scuttle another creaking nuclear sub!
offshore drilling
Oil is a commodity which is bought and sold on the open market. Its price is determined by economic laws like supply and demand. The idea that oil drilled here will somehow stay here at lower prices is ludicrous at best. For that to happen, the US government would have to nationalize the oil industry, like in socialist countries.
life n offshore rigs
can u pls explain the life n a rig. with out wireless phone connection how can u contact your relatives?
energy
Would someone explain to me how oil from offshore drilling, which will be sold on the GLOBAL OIL MARKET, will decrease the price of gasoline in the US.
The amount will not be enough to effect prices more than a few cents/gal. If we produce an extra million bls/day, OPEC can decrease production a million bls/day to keep oil at the same price. You bet they will do it.
GB boasting that he could persuade the Saudis to open the spigots just didn't happen.
drilling?
Why AREN'T we drilling on the milions of already leased land?
Um....Climate Change?
I read all the comments. Remarkably, I found little or no airtime for what seems to me to be the ONLY real point about drilling more oil. If we drill it, we will burn it, and it will further compound the problem of global climate change which is destroying the biosphere. We are NOT going to go live on Mars when we have permanently altered Earth so that it does not support life in the way that we would like it to. The rest--politics, money, who gets the oil, oil rigs are ugly, are insignificant in comparison to destroying life on planet earth as we know it. Now about the 300 years worth of coal...
My three fears of increased off-shore drilling are
Even if we started drilling tomorrow, we simply cannot produce the amount of petrolem we presently use: We have to find a way to drastically cut our consumption and develop some energy alternatives. I fear that with the hope of finding the petroleum jackpot off-shore, individuals, congress, and the senate will do a 1980's turn about and complacently decide we will have the oil problem under control and not need to pursue other alternatives. I also fear environmental degradaton--remeber the Exxon Valdez-- via big accidents as well as from weather inputs (such as hurricanes, earthquakes, tsunami), and/or slow leaks.
Considering that oil companies are obligated by stock holders to make money, I further fear that instead of using the oil produced from expanded drilling to reduce our foreign oil purchases, THE OIL COMPANIES WILL SELL IT TO DEVELOPING COUNTRIES because they can make a bigger profit paying to higher bidders.
3.
Oil Boom in the Gulf
Even if there is no significan impact on oil prices from new drilling and exploration, I would rather see more fuel come from American territory, putting more Americans to work and putting more of our dollars back into American pockets, than pouring more of our money into foreign pockets.
