Obama Admn keeping Oil drilling ban ($6 a gallon gas here we come) - Told You So

[Fury]

I wonder about that. Apparently the rebel groups took control of most of Libya's oil fields today and said that they're going to honor the oil contracts for the time being. Who knows, though.



BENGHAZI, Libya, Feb 25 (Reuters) – Rebels in eastern Libya said on Friday they now controlled most of the oil fields east of the town of Ras Lanuf, and said they would honour oil deals as long as they were in the interest of the people.

The eastern Libyan town of Brega and its oil terminal are under rebel control, and soldiers who have defected are helping the rebels to secure the port, Reuters witnesses said on Friday.

“This area is controlled by the people,” said Mabrook Maghraby, a lawyer from Benghazi who is now involved with the local committees defending Brega.

[Soul Crusher]

New Study Shows That Offshore Drilling Could Make Alaska the Eighth Largest Oil Producer in...
CNSNews ^ | February 25, 2011 | Penny Starr



Complete title: New Study Shows That Offshore Drilling Could Make Alaska the Eighth Largest Oil Producer in the World – Ahead of Libya and Nigeria


(CNSNews.com) – A new study says drilling on Alaska’s Outer Continental Shelf (OCS) could make Alaska the eighth largest oil resource province in the world -- ahead of Nigeria, Libya, Russia and Norway.


The report -- by the consulting firm Northern Economics and the University of Alaska-Anchorage’s Institute of Social and Economic Research -- says that developing Alaska’s OCS could produce almost 10 billion barrels of oil and 15 trillion cubic feet of natural gas, create around 55,000 new jobs and produce $145 billion in new payroll nationally, generating a total of $193 billion in government revenue through the year 2057.


A senior policy advisor with the American Petroleum Institute, the trade group for hundreds of U.S. oil and gas producers, said in a statement about the study that offshore drilling for oil and natural gas can help with the country’s energy and economic needs.


“America will need all forms of energy to get our economy back on track, and that includes oil – we can either produce it here and create more American jobs or import it and create jobs elsewhere,” Richard Ranger said. “The administration and Congress need to adopt an ‘all of the above’ energy approach that leverages our offshore resources in Alaska to create an energy plan for America that boosts, rather than inhibits, our economy.”


About 77 percent of world oil reserves are owned or controlled by national governments and the U.S. currently imports over 60 percent of its crude oil, according to API. The Northern Economics-University of Alaska study estimates that Arctic offshore development could cut U.S. imports by about 9 percent over 35 years.


Crude oil prices in New York broke through the $100-a-barrel threshold on Thursday, with rising prices linked to the unrest in the Middle East, including Libya and its vast oil reserves.


The Washington Post reported on Thursday that U.S. pump prices for regular gasoline jumped 4 cents a gallon overnight to $3.23, an 8-cent-per-gallon increase in the past week and 55 cents more than a year ago.


“Given the current political turmoil in the Middle East and increased demand from a slowly growing economy, it is more essential now than ever before that we develop Alaska’s OCS to increase domestic production,” Ranger said. “Increased OCS production in Alaska would also extend the operating life of the 800-mile Trans-Alaska Pipeline System (TAPS), a critical lifeline of domestic energy for America.”

[Soul Crusher]

Salazar: Won't Bow to Political Pressure to Restart Gulf Deepwater Drilling
Dow Jones Newswires via Rig Zone ^ | February 25, 2011 | Ryan Dezember

________________________ ______________________-


Interior Secretary Ken Salazar said that U.S. regulators would not bow to political pressure to restart deepwater drilling in the Gulf of Mexico before they are certain the oil-and-gas industry is capable of containing an oil spill like the one that followed last BP's Deepwater Horizon disaster.

Salazar and Michael Bromwich--the head of the U.S. Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, Regulation and Enforcement, which oversees offshore drilling--were in Houston Friday to meet with oil industry executives to assess the spill-containment systems they have developed in the wake of nation's worst-ever marine oil spill.

Bromwich said he was "quite confident that we are getting very close to the point where we can begin issuing deepwater permits." But he and Salazar said the industry still has work to do before exploration of the Gulf's deepest waters can resume.

The U.S. government shut down deepwater drilling shortly after the Deepwater Horizon exploded on April 20, killing 11 and unleashing a catastrophic oil spill.

The government's official ban was lifted in October, but regulators have yet to allow drilling to resume in water deeper than 500 feet despite mounting political pressure from congressional Republicans and Gulf Coast Democrats to reopen one of the nation's primary energy fields.

"We don't respond to political pressure," Salazar said. "We are frankly doing what's right for America's energy program."

Both Helix Energy Solutions Group, whose system helped stem the flow of BP's runaway well last summer, and the nonprofit Marine Well Containment Co., formed by a consortium of major oil companies, say their systems are ready to respond to spills on par with Deepwater Horizon. But the nation's top energy regulators said that they felt differently.

"These containment systems are work in progress," Salazar told reporters after the meetings. "Both systems currently have limitations on water depth ...


(Excerpt) Read more at rigzone.com ...

[Soul Crusher]

Parnell claims administration openly hostile to oil states
Anchorage Daily News ^ | February 26th, 2011 | ERIKA BOLSTAD





With the unrest in the Middle East as his springboard, Gov. Sean Parnell lashed out at the Obama administration's stance on domestic oil production, saying the White House approach was having a tangible effect on the country's foreign policy.

In a speech at the National Press Club, the Republican governor called the federal government "openly hostile" to oil-producing states, particularly for the delays in allowing Shell to drill exploratory wells on leases off Alaska's northern coast that the company purchased in 2008.

"If it looks like a moratorium and walks like a moratorium ... maybe it is," said Parnell, who is in Washington this weekend for the National Governor's Association winter meeting.

Parnell said there's a direct link between the economic recovery and the failure to use Alaska's oil reserves as a national security buffer against the uncertainty in Libya and other oil-producing countries in the Middle East. Higher gasoline prices could harm any economic recovery, Parnell said.

...

Parnell also criticized President Barack Obama's proposal in his State of the Union address to do away with some tax credits for oil companies, echoing the governor's statements about Alaska needing to cut its own oil-production tax.

"Anything you tax more, you get less of," Parnell said, adding that overregulation can have the same effect.

"The Department of Interior and the EPA appear to be driving U.S. policy in the Middle East and North Africa," Parnell said. "In many senses, the State Department is forced into a reactive, mitigating role because of the increasingly hostile stance that Interior and the EPA have taken to domestic energy exploration and production."


(Excerpt) Read more at adn.com ...

[Soul Crusher]

BUSINESS
FEBRUARY 25, 2011.

Pressures Mount to Resume Drilling .Article Stock
  http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703905404576164792761814146.html

By TENNILLE TRACY And RYAN TRACY

WASHINGTON—Interior Secretary Ken Salazar plans to meet with oil industry executives in Houston Friday to assess the industry's readiness to handle a major offshore oil spill, amid growing pressure from congressional Republicans and a federal judge to resume deep-water drilling in the Gulf of Mexico.

Journal Topics
Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill

.Mr. Salazar is expected to meet with representatives of an industry-led consortium, Marine Well Containment Co., and Helix Energy Solutions Group Inc., a company that aided BP PLC with BP's response to last year's Gulf of Mexico oil spill.

The Obama administration has said the oil industry must demonstrate it can quickly contain a large offshore spill before it will allow companies to resume drilling in waters deeper than 500 feet.

The recent jump in world oil prices and U.S. gasoline prices following unrest in Libya has spurred renewed calls from many Republicans and Gulf Coast Democrats in Congress to allow more domestic production. One House committee is scheduled to hold hearings on drilling policy next month.

Crude oil futures pulled back late Thursday after hitting the highest levels in more than 2 1/2 years on fears that the chaos in Libya would disrupt supplies.

Separately, three Democratic lawmakers called on the administration to consider releasing oil from the government's strategic petroleum reserves to tamp down gasoline prices.

 
United Press International
 
Interior Secretary Ken Salazar

.White House spokesman Jay Carney said Thursday that the U.S. "has the capacity to act in the event of a major disruption" in oil prices, but did not take a position on the lawmakers' request.

"We are in touch with the IEA and oil-producing countries about the developments in the market," Mr. Carney told reporters, referring to the International Energy Agency, a body that the U.S. and other countries use to coordinate oil reserves.

Clearing the way for more offshore drilling would do little in the near term to increase domestic oil supplies. But it could insulate the Obama administration from Republican charges that the White House is denying access to domestic supplies at a time when markets are increasingly jittery about the security of Middle Eastern oil supplies amid the unrest across the region.

Since last summer's Deepwater Horizon disaster, the worst offshore oil spill in U.S. history, the Obama administration has questioned whether the oil industry can prevent another such accident or contain a large-scale spill. After lifting a moratorium on new deep-water drilling last fall, the Obama administration has yet to issue a permit for a new oil and gas well.

Last week, the industry consortium, led by Exxon Mobil Corp., said it was ready to deploy a device that can capture up to 60,000 barrels a day of oil gushing from an underwater well—approximately the amount the government estimates was leaking from the BP well.

"I'm on my way to Houston now to go examine the latest on the sealing caps that have been prepared by the two different companies on oil spill containment," Mr. Salazar told reporters at the Center for American Progress, a Washington-based think tank. He left the event without elaborating on the purpose of the trip.

Mr. Salazar also faces some legal pressures to act. Last week, a federal judge ordered Mr. Salazar's department to decide within 30 days whether to grant a set of five permits for deep-water drilling projects in the Gulf of Mexico, saying the administration's inaction on the requests is "increasingly inexcusable."

The ruling by Judge Martin Feldman of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana came in response to a lawsuit filed by London-based Ensco PLC.

On Thursday, a spokeswoman for Mr. Salazar declined to comment on how the department will respond to Judge Feldman's ruling.

—Stephen Power contributed to this article.
Write to Tennille Tracy at tennille.tracy@dowjones.com and Ryan Tracy at ryan.tracy@dowjones.com

[Soul Crusher]

Rising Gas Prices: All Signs Point to Obama
The Sunshine State News ^ | March 1, 2011 | Kenric Ward


Media reports blame rising gasoline prices on Mideast turmoil, but industry analysts say the real reasons are closer to home -- at the White House and the Federal Reserve.

President Barack Obama's moratorium on drilling and his anti-oil policies continue to rattle energy markets and fuel ongoing price hikes at the pump. And no one -- least of all Obama -- is surprised.

On the campaign trail in 2008, then-candidate Obama called for cap-and-tax policies under which energy prices would "necessarily skyrocket." Studies have since questioned the environmental and economic value of such policies.

Undaunted, the Obama administration canceled hundreds of gas- and oil-drilling leases in Western states. Obama then slapped a series of bans on offshore drilling.

Two federal courts have struck down portions of these moratoriums, but, as with the ongoing implementation of Obamacare (declared unconstitutional by a U.S. district judge), the administration flouts the courts and continues to choke off domestic oil production.

American Solutions, a conservative Washington, D.C., think tank chaired by former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, says Obama's actions have "ultimately led drillers to relocate their rigs (and hundreds or even thousands of good-paying jobs) to other parts of the world, and the long-term impact on domestic production will no doubt be devastating for consumers."

By contrast, the University of Alaska at Anchorage estimates that drilling for oil and gas off Alaska's coast could create more than 50,000 new jobs per year, in addition to producing more than 10 billion barrels of oil and 15 trillion cubic feet of natural gas.

There are another 86 billion barrels of oil in America's Outer Continental Shelf, yet the Obama administration has banned most production there. Not a single new drilling permit has been issued in the United States since last October.

Still, Obama's Interior Secretary Ken Salazar said the government feels "no pressure to hurry its permitting process.”

Ironically, administration policies that drive higher gas prices are helping the very industry that Obama tries to demonize. While rising petroleum costs threaten to tank the U.S. economy, Exxon Mobil's fourth-quarter profits soared 53 percent.

Then there's the Federal Reserve, whose "reflation" policies are driving down the value of the dollar.

In an analysis of recent oil prices, the Wall Street Journal noted, "It's important to keep in mind that oil was already trading in the $85 to $90 a barrel range before the recent irruption in the Arab world. The run-up to that price territory began in earnest last year after the Federal Reserve embarked on its QE2 strategy of further monetary easing."

"QE2" is "quantitative easing, which, in effect, pumps more money into the economy. But in doing so, the Fed devalues the greenback and triggers speculation on things like oil.

The Fed claims that rising oil prices are simply a reflection of higher demand. But, the Journal found that demand is "not enough to explain what has been a nearly across-the-board spike in prices for dollar-traded commodities."

"The Fed will use the Libya turmoil as another alibi, but there's no doubt that oil prices include a substantial [Fed Chairman] Ben Bernanke premium."

Obama's Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner seems nonchalant. "The world's got a lot of experience in managing the tensions that could come with short-term impact on commodity prices," Geithner told reporters last week. He added, "It's not rocket science."

But since the U.S. consumes about 7.5 billion barrels of oil a year, every $10 a barrel increase costs the U.S. economy about $75 billion. And, notes the Journal, "Since over half of that oil is imported, the benefit flows to foreign producers."

Industry analysts argue that the Fed's monetary policy and the Obama administration's energy policy are the two biggest factors in the rising price of gasoline.

Obama maintains that his "green" polices that impose higher fees and charges on the petroleum industry will "break our dependence on oil."

Energy economists say such a strategy is ultimately counterproductive.

"If the president is truly serious about raising revenue, then he should eliminate all energy-related tax preferences and let all sources compete," said Robert Bryce, a senior fellow at the conservative Manhattan Institute.



--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[Soul Crusher]

In an analysis of recent oil prices, the Wall Street Journal noted, "It's important to keep in mind that oil was already trading in the $85 to $90 a barrel range before the recent irruption in the Arab world. The run-up to that price territory began in earnest last year after the Federal Reserve embarked on its QE2 strategy of further monetary easing."


________________________ ____________----


BUMP

[Jadeveon Clowney]

I thought Noble Energy was issued a permit yesterday.

[Soul Crusher]

I thought Noble Energy was issued a permit yesterday.

Compared to the multitude that have been shut down, the number that have closed down their rigs, the number that have already delcared Bankruptcy, etc, its too little too late. 

Its more CYA by this pofs admn seeking to skyrocket energy costs and cause an energy crisis to try cap & tax again. 

     

[Soul Crusher]

PLEASE ANYONE TELL ME HOW THIS HELPS ANYONE -

ANYONE?

ANYONE?

ANYONE? 

BTW - F U whoever still supports this admn.   

[Soul Crusher]

Mind you - this is the same mini-madoff who flies his PT EVERY WEEK to the WH to get his fat ass wife in shape.   

"Do as I say, not as I do"   

 

[Soul Crusher]

Dumbest MOFO ever to hold office.   

[Soul Crusher]

[Option D]

Federal regulators have granted Noble Energy (NBL) the first new permit for new offshore drilling activities in the Gulf of Mexico following last April’s tragedy aboard the Deepwater Horizon, which saw 11 workers perish and led to the biggest oil spill in the U.S. history. Not surprisingly, the Offshore Drilling Stocks Index is benefiting from the news, jumping 0.6% today.

Following the spill, the Obama Administration placed a moratorium on deepwater drilling in the Gulf and while that moratorium was lifted in October, no new permits for drilling had been issued, frustrating offshore drilling firms and workers in the Gulf Coast region. Texas-based Noble won a permit to drill 6,500 below the Gulf’s surface. Nearly 40 shallow-water permits have been approved since June, according to the BBC.

The moratorium and subsequent stall on issuing new permits has forced companies such as Diamond Offshore Drilling (DO) to move idled rigs out of the Gulf to other locations where they can be put to use. Shares of Diamond Offshore are up 1% today. Shares of Hornbeck Offshore Service (HOS), the company that led a lawsuit last year that sought to overturn the moratorium, are down 1%.

Small-cap name Hercules Offshore (HERO) is leading the Index with a 6% surge. Transocean (RIG), owner of the Deepwater Horizon rig and the world’s largest provider of offshore drilling services, is lower by half a percent. BP (BP), Europe’s second-largest oil company, operated the Deepwater Horizon rig.

[kcballer]

Ouch that's gotta sting!  Funny thing is this will do pretty much nothing to the price of oil.  It will continue to go up, and all we'll be left with is destroyed ecosystems because retards like 333 believe we should drill baby drill. 

[Soul Crusher]

Ouch that's gotta sting!  Funny thing is this will do pretty much nothing to the price of oil.  It will continue to go up, and all we'll be left with is destroyed ecosystems because retards like 333 believe we should drill baby drill. 

Dear God are you morons dumb.  He was ordered by the judge to do so since he was in contempt! 

[Fury]

Dear God are you morons dumb.  He was ordered by the judge to do so since he was in contempt!  

They don't let facts get in their way, that's for sure.

Anyone who thinks that Obama's reckless economic policies aren't responsible for the rising prices is a fool. Funny how quickly the far-left forgets that prices were already rising BEFORE the Arab revolts. 

[kcballer]

[Fury]

[Soul Crusher]

They don't let facts get in their way, that's for sure. 

I'm serious- the level of ignorance of your average ObamaDildo like Mal is embarrassing.   Obama is in contempt of court as it is for disobeying the Federal Judges' order that is nearly 9 months old!  


I'm serious BF - idiots like this should be subject to a literacy test in order to vote.  

  

[Fury]

I'm serious- the level of ignorance of your average ObamaDildo like Mal is embarrassing.   Obama is in contempt of court as it is for disobeying the Federal Judges' order that is nearly 9 months old!  


I'm serious BF - idiots like this should be subject to a literacy test in order to vote.  

It's pretty sad knowing that robots like kcballer cancel out the votes of people who don't live in fantasy land.

In their world, gas prices just started rising in the last 7 days. 

[Option D]

They don't let facts get in their way, that's for sure.

Anyone who thinks that Obama's reckless economic policies aren't responsible for the rising prices is a fool. Funny how quickly the far-left forgets that prices were already rising BEFORE the Arab revolts. 

what economic policies manifested themselves in our gas prices

[Fury]

what economic policies manifested themselves in our gas prices

Couldn't have been the dumping of hundreds of billions of dollars of useless money into the market with QE2. 

Do you think gas prices just started going up last week? I've been paying over $3 (now over $3.60) a gallon for a few months now. Something that I can't ever remember happening in winter.

The Arab crises are only compounding Obama's suicidal economic policies.

[Soul Crusher]

what economic policies manifested themselves in our gas prices

1.  WTF energy policies in stopping Alaskan drilling, Gulf Drilling, stopping the Canadian pipeline, EPA gong wild on people, etc.  

2.  QE2 and spending like there is no tommorow and devaluing the dollar.

 

  

[Option D]

I'm serious- the level of ignorance of your average ObamaDildo like Mal is embarrassing.   Obama is in contempt of court as it is for disobeying the Federal Judges' order that is nearly 9 months old!  

I'm serious BF - idiots like this should be subject to a literacy test in order to vote.  

aye check this out chief.. i told you before about talking to me crazy on these boards.. if you want to debate me or have a conversation, do that... calm the fuck down with the labeling chief