How to avoid petroleum imports

J. Michael Sharman
Published: July 21, 2008

“During the upcoming presidential campaign let the candidates know that peak oil is the issue of overwhelming importance. A modest tax write off for wind energy is too little and too late.“ It’s the oil supply, stupid” says Kenneth Deffeyes, retired Princeton University professor, geophysicist, and author of “Beyond Oil: The View from Hubbert’s Peak.“ 1

There isn’t a certain estimates for when the world’s oil production will hit its “peak”, but experts believe the peak may be reached “soon”, and by “soon” they mean within 20 years. 2

That does not mean we will run out of oil in 20 years, but simply that the curve of supply will stop going up at that peak point and begin going down.

Peak or not, President Bush, on July 14, 2008 lifted the Executive Order against offshore drilling and requested that Congress lift the legislative ban. 3

Two days later Bloomberg news reported the oil speculators’ response: “Crude oil [prices] fell for a second day, extending its biggest one-day slide in more than 18 years…” 4

Earlier this year former Shell Oil CEO John Hofmeister, told the Senate Judiciary Committee that: “62 percent of all onshore federal lands are off limits to oil and gas developments, with restrictions applying to 92 percent of all federal lands. [There are] outer continental shelf moratoriums” for drilling in the Atlantic Ocean, the Pacific Ocean and the Eastern Gulf of Mexico, and “bans on on-shore oil and gas activities in specific areas of the Rockies and Alaska.” And, he said, there is even a congressional ban “on doing an analysis of the resource potential for oil and gas” in the offshore areas. 5    

A very frustrated Alaskan Congressman Don Young wants drilling to immediately begin in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) on the North Slope of Alaska.

Congressman Young recently told his Congressional colleagues two truths about U.S. oil: “We have an abundance of it. We’ve had the lack of will to produce it.” 6

That lack of will was perhaps best exemplified when Senator Barack Obama and 25 other senators introduced legislation to permanently place ANWR off limits to oil and gas development.  7

“I strongly reject drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge,” Mr. Obama said,  “because it would irreversibly damage a protected national wildlife refuge without creating sufficient oil supplies to meaningfully affect the global market price or have a discernable impact on U.S. energy security.” 8

But a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service study reported that 77 wildlife refuges in 22 states in the federal system had oil and gas activities on their land in 2000. 9

In fact, the National Audubon Society has earned over $25 million in oil and gas royalties from 37 wells in its own privately owned Rainey Wildlife Sanctuary in Louisiana, which serves as winter habitat for snow geese that migrate every year from Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. 10

Here are the numbers:

Currently, we are importing 3,589,000 barrels of foreign oil per day. 11

The proposed oil drilling section of the ANWR is estimated to have between 3 and 9 billion barrels of recoverable oil. 12 When ANWR is producing, it could replace 6 years of our total imports.

The banned offshore areas hold about 18 billion barrels of oil, 13 which equal nearly 14 years of our total imports.

Instead of bemoaning our supposed “oil shortage”, we should be shouting from the rooftops that our known ANWR and offshore oil reserves would allow us to be entirely free of any oil imports for the next 20 years.

This November, we need to elect candidates who can see the obvious:  ANWR and offshore oil drilling would promise us 20 years of future oil supplies. Just the announcment of that drilling will immediately affect the global market price. It would have a powerful impact on U.S. energy security, while not doing anything on federal lands which the National Audubon Society is not already voluntarily doing on its own land.

For the 2008 election, as Prof. Deffeyes said, “It’s the oil supply, stupid.”

J. Michael Sharman is an independent columnist who practices law in Culpeper. His column appears Tuesdays in the Star-Exponent.

1 Deffeyes, Kenneth, “The View from Hubbert’s Peak”, http://www.princeton.edu/hubbert/current-events.html

2 http://www.netl.doe.gov/publications/others/pdf/Oil_Peaking_NETL.pdf

3 “There May Be Oil Offshore, But…”
http://www.businessweek.com/bwdaily/dnflash/content/jul2008/db20080718_965702.htm?chan=top+news_top+news+index_top+story

4 “Crude Oil Falls for a Second Day on Signs of Slower U.S. Demand” July 16, 2008 http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601091&sid=amC4w7_9l7to&refer=india

5 “Gas Prices and Congress”, July 3, 2008, http://www.tulsabeacon.com/?p=554

6 “Energy, government leaders call for U.S. drilling” July 9, 2008 http://www.ktuu.com/Global/story.asp?S=8651954

7 Press Release, ALASKA COALITION, November 7, 2007

8 http://www.anwr.org/archives/presidential_candidates_views_on_anwr_a_the_democrats.php

9 “Drilling in Refuges”, http://www.anwr.org/Background/Drilling-in-Refuges.php

10 “Drilling in Refuges”, http://www.anwr.org/Background/Drilling-in-Refuges.php

11 “Petroleum Basic Statistics” http://www.eia.doe.gov/basics/quickoil.html

12 “Drilling in Refuges”, http://www.anwr.org/Background/Drilling-in-
Refuges.php
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