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Politics : THE WHITE HOUSE -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: DuckTapeSunroof who wrote (20946)	7/31/2008 1:59:52 PM
From: DuckTapeSunroof	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 25737

On the Federal drilling ban: My personal guess would be that the federal ban (forgetting the various State bans for now...) will not be extended in it's current form. But, at the same time as people are getting all worked-up over the policy question, it would probably be wise to remember a few supportive facts: 1) The US Energy Department (& Interior) say that --- even if all legal impediments to federal leasing were magically removed TODAY --- it would STILL be at least FOUR YEARS before the government could write the required regulations, get them approved, solicit bids, and then conduct it's first new lease sale... 2) And --- largely because of the global shortage of drill ships and other required equipment, and time-lines required to build out infrastructure --- a winner of a new lease (four or more years from now) would likely take several more years before actually getting around to any drilling.... 3) AND the Feds say that the inevitable resultant of these basic facts is that it would likely be at least 2020 (or later) before the FIRST DROP of oil could be produced from any of these newly leased areas. 4) AND the Feds claim that petro production from these new areas would not peak until, perhaps, 2050 or so. (And that --- at peak production --- per-gallon fuel costs might be reduced a maximum of 10 or 15 cents or so... but from WHAT higher baseline? From the expected $15 per gallon gasoline cost of 2030 or later?) 'Every drop helps' I'm sure we all will agree (and I personally have never been opposed to federal leasing on the outer continental shelf, and I ALSO strongly belive the government should get off of it's ass and RATIFY the Law of the Seas Treaty --- so the US can start legally making deep sea resource claims the same as our major competitors who have already ratified are able to...) but in the short-to-medium term we will be extremely lucky if any of this adds up to even 1 or 2% of global demand. So we shouldn't try to hoodwink the public, to pander for election votes, over this business. Because --- once we approved drilling on the C.S., the vast BULK of our energy problems will still be with us. And it will be high time to get around to the heavy lifting that will be required to solve our problems (once this marginal issue is resolved). Finally, on the question of drilling into the federal deep continental shelf waters, if we are to believe the US Geological Survey's data (and why not...) out of ALL of the US's yet-unexploited continental shelf resources the vast bulk of the petroleum and natural gas reserves are most likely to be found in two general areas: Primarily: #1) --- off of Florida's Gulf coast (and why not? The Gulf of Mexico is the largest single source for all of our domestic oil and gas production) And Secondarily: #2) --- off of Alaska's coast line (especially it's Arctic). (In the third position for potential reserves --- but far, far down the list --- is the entire remaining non-Alaskan Pacific coast of California/Oregon/Washington... and even further down is the entire Atlantic coast line.) So, basically what the government says is that they expect 70% or so of all yet unexploited US continental petro resources to be off of FLORIDA and ALASKA... with perhaps 45 to 50% of the whole to be off of Florida. So... those two areas (Florida and Alaska) are where the big returns are expected. Those two areas are where the political game is to be played out. All the rest --- remaining Pacific and all of Atlantic coast lines --- fade into relative insignificance. Florida and Alaska... that's what it comes down to. And, How hard will the Florida tourism industry, Disney, Hilton, Real Estate interests, etc., etc., fight against the oil interests to preserve their profits???????????