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Getbig Main Boards => Politics and Political Issues Board => Topic started by: Soul Crusher on December 01, 2010, 10:21:41 AM
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Oil drilling ban to be maintained in key areas, sources say
By Juliet Eilperin
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Obama administration officials will announce Wednesday afternoon they will not allow offshore oil drilling in the eastern Gulf of Mexico or off the Atlantic and Pacific coasts as part of the next five-year drilling plan, according to sources briefed on the plan, reversing two key policy changes President Obama announced in late March.
President Obama talks about endorsing expansion of offshore drilling. (Footage via www.whitehouse.gov/The Washington Post)During that announcement--less than a month before the BP oil spill--Obama and Interior Secretary Ken Salazar said they would open up the eastern Gulf and parts of the Atlantic, including off the coast of Virginia, to offshore oil and gas exploration.
The announcement is sure to please environmentalists while angering oil and gas companies as well as some lawmakers from both parties who have pressed for continued offshore energy exploration in the wake of massive Gulf of Mexico spill.
According to multiple individuals briefed on the plan, the Obama administration will proceed with scoping for possible drilling in the central and western Gulf of Mexico and in the Arctic as part of the upcoming 2012-2017 Outer Continental Shelf program, while keeping the other areas off limits.
The administration is likely to conduct a new environmental assessment of Shell's plan to conduct drilling in the Arctic, the sources added.
Sen. Bill Nelson (D-Fla.), who has consistently pushed to restrict drilling in the eastern gulf, welcomed the news. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar called the senator Wednesday morning, according to Nelson spokesman Dan McLaughlin, but the two men did not speak yet because Nelson is chairing a hearing.
"Drilling off Florida's Gulf coast is banned at least until 2022, under a 2006 law passed by Senator Nelson," McLaughlin said. "The senator is pleased the White House has decided rightly to keep the area off-limits. He hopes Florida's next governor and the Legislature similarly will commit to protecting the state's tourism economy and unique environment."
Activists such as Margie Alt, executive director of Environment America, also praised the administration's plan, saying, "Today, anyone who loves our beaches, who fishes in the ocean or who depends on a healthy coastal economy can thank the Obama administration for protecting the Atlantic and Pacific coasts and the west coast of Florida from oil drilling. The BP disaster earlier this year was a tragic reminder that drilling is a dirty and dangerous business. The only way to truly keep our coasts and ocean ecosystems safe is to keep them rig free."
But the move could spark a backlash from business interests as well from both many congressional Republicans and conservative Democrats such as Sen. Manry Landrieu, who argue that curbing offshore energy exploration could exacerbate the nation's economic woes.
Karen Harbert, president and CEO of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce's Institute for 21st Century Energy, said in a statement, "The Administration is sending a message to America's oil and gas industry: take your capital, technology, and jobs somewhere else."
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Just great.
$5 a gallon gas here we come.
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Administration to Reverse Offshore Drilling Policy
NRO - The Corner ^ | Dec 1, 2010 | Matthew Schaffer
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The Obama administration plans to reverse the offshore-drilling policy it had announced in March, pre-BP spill. Offshore drilling will instead continue to be severely constrained
(Excerpt) Read more at nationalreview.com ...
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You know what a solid and forward looking national energy policy is?
Not doing anything to produce more energy and stopping anyone from trying to produce more energy.
Nat gas expansion? Nat gas plants? Nuclear? Where are the wind farms Obama said would cover the plains? Certainly no oil.
CAFE for cars is retarded and doesn't address core issues. It is an easy law to pass and looks good to the huddled sheep so that is what we get.
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The gaggle of fools and dolts will probably blame Bush when gas goes to $7 agallon.
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Happy about this. Lets just expand our involvement in Canadian oil and get more of it down here. Simple. Our beaches stay clean and we get our oil. 8)
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P.S. we've already reached 'peak oil' in some estimates so oil will only go up regardless of what we do offshore, onshore or anywhere. You notice consumption is down over 1% but prices haven't changed? Nothing any US admin can do will change the higher price of oil as the world economies pick back up. So really stop harping on about bullsh*t that amounts to putting a band aid on a bullet wound.
Oil WILL rise, YOU will pay more and you only have government inability and public stupidity to blame for not creating and funding an alternative.
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KC - when oil shoots to $200 a barrell - how do elderly people heat their homes?
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KC - when oil shoots to $200 a barrell - how do elderly people heat their homes?
333 listen simply - NOTHING no drilling, no oil shale, no other touting will EVER bring oil back down long term. It will only EVER go up so either we find an alternative or people like you will continue to not understand the simple equation that less oil = higher prices.
Besides did you not see the short term solution? Canada has the second largest PROVEN oil reserves why do we need to drill off our shores? Are they a rouge government or something? Pipelines are already being built but further investment in Alberta and Saskatchewan will yield more than enough oil to allow a weening off process BEFORE it gets too expensive.
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333 listen simply - NOTHING no drilling, no oil shale, no other touting will EVER bring oil back down long term. It will only EVER go up so either we find an alternative or people like you will continue to not understand the simple equation that less oil = higher prices.
Besides did you not see the short term solution? Canada has the second largest PROVEN oil reserves why do we need to drill off our shores? Are they a rouge government or something? Pipelines are already being built but further investment in Alberta and Saskatchewan will yield more than enough oil to allow a weening off process BEFORE it gets too expensive.
Please answer the question.
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KC - when oil shoots to $200 a barrell - how do elderly people heat their homes?
Coal.
The fact is that OPEC and the ability to trade on a commodity like oil is the reason for the price.
It does not cost more to refine the oil today than it did 20 years ago, nor does it take more to get it from point A to point B.
You want to lower prices... Have everyone in america go a week without driving.
Supply and Demand... Change the demand and the supply will increase, OPEC will shit and HAVE to lower prices.
Won't happen though.
Nothing will change the gas prices unless the consumers stop using it.
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Coal.
The fact is that OPEC and the ability to trade on a commodity like oil is the reason for the price.
It does not cost more to refine the oil today than it did 20 years ago, nor does it take more to get it from point A to point B.
You want to lower prices... Have everyone in america go a week without driving.
Supply and Demand... Change the demand and the supply will increase, OPEC will shit and HAVE to lower prices.
Won't happen though.
Nothing will change the gas prices unless the consumers stop using it.
Or it gets to expensive. Prices change behavior.
Either way, the we have enough Nat gas, why not start building more powerplants using it? CNG for trucks and cars? Nat gas is plentiful and would make a hell of a bridge fuel to get us across the oil "river" so to speak. With all this talk about green this and windmill that.....nothing has been done.
Interesting.
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Please answer the question.
I just did can you not read? Oil will never go down again long term so even if we drill the sh*t out of the ocean guess what? $200 oil will still come.
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I just did can you not read? Oil will never go down again long term so even if we drill the sh*t out of the ocean guess what? $200 oil will still come.
Wrong - oil prices are a result of artificial constraints on he supply by he u.s. gvt as well as our horrendous monetary policy via the fed.
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Coal.
The fact is that OPEC and the ability to trade on a commodity like oil is the reason for the price.
It does not cost more to refine the oil today than it did 20 years ago, nor does it take more to get it from point A to point B.
You want to lower prices... Have everyone in america go a week without driving.
Supply and Demand... Change the demand and the supply will increase, OPEC will shit and HAVE to lower prices.
Won't happen though.
Nothing will change the gas prices unless the consumers stop using it.
Consumption is already down. America's oil usage regarding vehicles has been in decline for a few years now, and oil only goes up. It's a tapped out resource plain and simple, china's vehicle ownership is growing by 50% every year (although probably not this year) and will continue to grow steadily for at least a decade. Oil will only go up.
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Wrong - oil prices are a result of artificial constraints on he supply by he u.s. gvt as well as our horrendous monetary policy via the fed.
Bullshit.
Some of the cost is attributed to it sure... but not all.
Stop making it available as a trade-able commodity and see what happens. You won't go for that though I'm sure.
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Wrong - oil prices are a result of artificial constraints on he supply by he u.s. gvt as well as our horrendous monetary policy via the fed.
You are such an idiot 333.
http://www.worldenergyoutlook.org/ (http://www.worldenergyoutlook.org/)
According to the report, by 2035 three-quarters of currently operating oil fields won’t be producing anymore. In fact, current fields are only expected to account for less than one-fifth of that year’s production. And in order for the 'newer' fields to become affordable guess what price oil has to be? Triple fu*king digit.
According to IEA projections, it now appears that the production of conventional oil peaked back in 2006, that would be gasoline for your car 333. So yeah it's Obama's fault ::)
Get a clue.
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Bullshit.
Some of the cost is attributed to it sure... but not all.
Stop making it available as a trade-able commodity and see what happens. You won't go for that though I'm sure.
Cat is out of the bag at this point. We place stupid ass restraints on supply via our idiotic policies as well as devalue the dollar to prop up our unsustainable spending orgy and in return we get higher prices.
Environmentalists are the Saudis best friends.
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Bullshit.
Some of the cost is attributed to it sure... but not all.
Stop making it available as a trade-able commodity and see what happens. You won't go for that though I'm sure.
Yep complete bullsh*t by 333. His argument that these offshore oil fields will do anything to stem the tide towards triple digit oil is plain retarded and shows just how far removed he is from reality.
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Cat is out of the bag at this point. We place stupid ass restraints on supply via our idiotic policies as well as devalue the dollar to prop up our unsustainable spending orgy and in return we get higher prices.
Environmentalists are the Saudis best friends.
::) Uh 333 we already had HIGHER prices when our dollar wasn't devalued. I seem to remember triple digit oil pre-recession so yeah eat sh*t with your lies.
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Yep complete bullsh*t by 333. His argument that these offshore oil fields will do anything to stem the tide towards triple digit oil is plain retarded and shows just how far removed he is from reality.
::) ::)
Oil is traded in what denomination KC?
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::) Uh 333 we already had HIGHER prices when our dollar wasn't devalued. I seem to remember triple digit oil pre-recession so yeah eat sh*t with your lies.
::) ::)
What lies?
Again - oil is edging higher along with gold, silver, and amny other commodities -why is that?
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Cat is out of the bag at this point. We place stupid ass restraints on supply via our idiotic policies as well as devalue the dollar to prop up our unsustainable spending orgy and in return we get higher prices.
Environmentalists are the Saudis best friends.
You are ridiculous man. We are not constraining our supply what so ever... You are talking about shit that happened 30 years ago.
Since then we've started importing oil from other locations as well as exporting more oil to other places.
It has nothing to do with government constraint at all.
::) ::)
What lies?
Again - oil is edging higher along with gold, silver, and amny other commodities -why is that?
Yes, because they are all trade-able commodities... That has nothing to do with anything.
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::) ::)
Oil is traded in what denomination KC?
Oil was what price pre-recession 333? and oil is what price today after deflationary measures by the FED had started?
(http://www.wtrg.com/oil_graphs/oilprice1947.gif)
I'm not saying oil won't go up because of these measures, what i am saying is it will regardless of our dollars strength.
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You are ridiculous man. We are not constraining our supply what so ever... You are talking about shit that happened 30 years ago.
Since then we've started importing oil from other locations as well as exporting more oil to other places.
It has nothing to do with government constraint at all.
Yes, because they are all trade-able commodities... That has nothing to do with anything.
::) ::)
I guess Economics and reality is not your strong suit.
We restrict development in alaska, Gulf, etc etc and that does not = a restriction on supply? where do you think oil comes from? walmart?
and by the way you morons - oil is traded in dollars - so when we devalue the dollar based on Fed proniting schemes to pay off our INSANE level of spending, dollars are worth less, and commodities worth more, hence, silver, gold, oil, food, etc all going up and up and u.
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You're looking at ONE aspect without taking into account the whole picture. It is as if you just do not understand that oil will rise no matter how strong a dollar we have or how many environmental disasters we try to create.
This guy is Canadian but knows his sh*t -
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/commentary/jeff-rubins-smaller-world/ (http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/commentary/jeff-rubins-smaller-world/)
If you seriously want a clue on what oil is going to do and why, read it. Otherwise keep dithering in the dark about off shore oil and Obama this and that meanwhile failing to grasp the whole picture.
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::) ::)
I guess Economics and reality is not your strong suit.
We restrict development in alaska, Gulf, etc etc and that does not = a restriction on supply? where do you think oil comes from? walmart?
and by the way you morons - oil is traded in dollars - so when we devalue the dollar based on Fed proniting schemes to pay off our INSANE level of spending, dollars are worth less, and commodities worth more, hence, silver, gold, oil, food, etc all going up and up and u.
You think that if we opened up MORE drilling in Alaska that it would change the price? WRONG.
As a matter of fact, many economists believe that by us hording our oil there we are in fact helping ourselves as the OPEC nations have to live with the reality that we can go elsewhere and do not in fact "need" them.
Apparently your reality is different from a lot of peoples.
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You're looking at ONE aspect without taking into account the whole picture. It is as if you just do not understand that oil will rise no matter how strong a dollar we have or how many environmental disasters we try to create.
This guy is Canadian but knows his sh*t -
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/commentary/jeff-rubins-smaller-world/ (http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/commentary/jeff-rubins-smaller-world/)
If you seriously want a clue on what oil is going to do and why, read it. Otherwise keep dithering in the dark about off shore oil and Obama this and that meanwhile failing to grasp the whole picture.
Yes, i agree there is a massive new demand via china etc.
However, if we dont do anything to strengthen the supply or denomination it is traded in, i.e. dollars, prioces will go up ever more and more.
and guess what KC - there is no alternative whatsoever that makes sense.
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You think that if we opened up MORE drilling in Alaska that it would change the price? WRONG.
As a matter of fact, many economists believe that by us hording our oil there we are in fact helping ourselves as the OPEC nations have to live with the reality that we can go elsewhere and do not in fact "need" them.
Apparently your reality is different from a lot of peoples.
Yeah - show me which economists say that and their overalltrack record.
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Yeah - show me which economists say that and their overalltrack record.
Don't have to... it's common sense.
If you believe that:
A. Natural resources are in fact limited.
B. Using other peoples resources first makes their go away before ours.
Then:
C. Ours will be more valuable in the long run.
It's common sense dude.
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Oil May Rise as Federal Reserve Stimulus Plan Weakens Dollar, Survey Shows
By Mark Shenk - Nov 5, 2010 12:00 AM ET
Business Exchange
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Crude may increase next week after the Federal Reserve announced plans for bond purchases, weakening the dollar, a Bloomberg News survey showed.
Twenty-nine of 49 analysts, or 59 percent, forecast crude oil will rise through Nov. 12. Thirteen respondents, or 27 percent, predicted prices will fall and seven estimate there would be little change. Last week, 54 percent said futures would decline.
The dollar tumbled after the Federal Open Market Committee said on Nov. 3 the central bank will purchase as much as $600 billion of assets through June under a program known as quantitative easing. When the U.S. currency declines investors purchase raw materials as a store of value.
“The market is going higher, higher, higher,” said Peter Beutel, president of Cameron Hanover Inc., a trading-advisory company in New Canaan, Connecticut. “Everything is being interpreted as being bullish here: quantitative easing, inventories that appear to have peaked, equities at new highs for the year, the dollar at new lows for the year and demand that appears to be improving.”
U.S. gasoline inventories fell 2.69 million barrels to 212.3 million last week, the lowest level since Nov. 20, 2009, the Energy Department said on Nov. 3. Supplies of distillate fuel, a category that includes heating oil and diesel, fell 3.57 million barrels to 164.9 million. It was the biggest drop in distillate fuel supplies since the week ended Sept. 19, 2008.
Crude oil for December delivery has increased $5.06, or 6.2 percent, to $86.49 a barrel this week on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Prices are up 7.6 percent from a year ago.
The oil survey has correctly predicted the direction of futures 47 percent of the time since its start in April 2004.
Bloomberg’s survey of oil analysts and traders, conducted
each Thursday, asks for an assessment of whether crude oil
futures are likely to rise, fall or remain neutral in the coming
week. The results were:
RISE NEUTRAL FALL
29 7 13
To contact the reporter on this story: Mark Shenk in New York at mshenk1@bloomberg.net
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Dan Stets at dstets@bloomberg.net
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Please reada book fo once.
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Oil May Rise as Federal Reserve Stimulus Plan Weakens Dollar, Survey Shows
By Mark Shenk - Nov 5, 2010 12:00 AM ET
Business Exchange
________________________ ________________________ ________________________ ________
Crude may increase next week after the Federal Reserve announced plans for bond purchases, weakening the dollar, a Bloomberg News survey showed.
Twenty-nine of 49 analysts, or 59 percent, forecast crude oil will rise through Nov. 12. Thirteen respondents, or 27 percent, predicted prices will fall and seven estimate there would be little change. Last week, 54 percent said futures would decline.
The dollar tumbled after the Federal Open Market Committee said on Nov. 3 the central bank will purchase as much as $600 billion of assets through June under a program known as quantitative easing. When the U.S. currency declines investors purchase raw materials as a store of value.
“The market is going higher, higher, higher,” said Peter Beutel, president of Cameron Hanover Inc., a trading-advisory company in New Canaan, Connecticut. “Everything is being interpreted as being bullish here: quantitative easing, inventories that appear to have peaked, equities at new highs for the year, the dollar at new lows for the year and demand that appears to be improving.”
U.S. gasoline inventories fell 2.69 million barrels to 212.3 million last week, the lowest level since Nov. 20, 2009, the Energy Department said on Nov. 3. Supplies of distillate fuel, a category that includes heating oil and diesel, fell 3.57 million barrels to 164.9 million. It was the biggest drop in distillate fuel supplies since the week ended Sept. 19, 2008.
Crude oil for December delivery has increased $5.06, or 6.2 percent, to $86.49 a barrel this week on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Prices are up 7.6 percent from a year ago.
The oil survey has correctly predicted the direction of futures 47 percent of the time since its start in April 2004.
Bloomberg’s survey of oil analysts and traders, conducted
each Thursday, asks for an assessment of whether crude oil
futures are likely to rise, fall or remain neutral in the coming
week. The results were:
RISE NEUTRAL FALL
29 7 13
To contact the reporter on this story: Mark Shenk in New York at mshenk1@bloomberg.net
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Dan Stets at dstets@bloomberg.net
________________________ ________________________ _____________
Please reada book fo once.
Oil was most likely going to rise anyway... It has been rising consistently.
The two are not related, but your mind will continue to fabricate that they are.
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Oil was going to rise anyway - read the Jeff Rubin stuff idiot.
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::) ::) Yeah ok TU.
“The market is going higher, higher, higher,” said Peter Beutel, president of Cameron Hanover Inc., a trading-advisory company in New Canaan, Connecticut. “Everything is being interpreted as being bullish here: quantitative easing, inventories that appear to have peaked, equities at new highs for the year, the dollar at new lows for the year and demand that appears to be improving.”
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The dollar has been on a pretty drastic slide since 2001 and I believe oil prices trace that decline as well. I will look around for a chart on it in a bit.
Supply is one thing and exchange rates are another. Both have big hands in what the price of oil is. Of course right now U.S. oil stocks and global oil stocks are at historical highs. I get it that long term supply is only going to get harder and more expensive but the exchange rate and our dollar strength has a very big affect on oil prices at this moment. Long term supply will be priced in as demand rises and stockpiles decrease. But from a day to day, month to month outlook dollar weakness/strength has the most acute affect. For now at least.
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::) ::) Yeah ok TU.
“The market is going higher, higher, higher,” said Peter Beutel, president of Cameron Hanover Inc., a trading-advisory company in New Canaan, Connecticut. “Everything is being interpreted as being bullish here: quantitative easing, inventories that appear to have peaked, equities at new highs for the year, the dollar at new lows for the year and demand that appears to be improving.”
So you don't think with the market rising that oil will rise? Are you insane?
Oil was going to rise... If the market rises, it will rise... Oil is going to go up unless something VERY drastic changes it and your opening drilling is not going to get it done.
Oil went up under Bush without any regulation against it and it went up.
You are simply taking quotes and not looking at the big picture.
In this instance you are simply misguided.
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So you don't think with the market rising that oil will rise? Are you insane?
Oil was going to rise... If the market rises, it will rise... Oil is going to go up unless something VERY drastic changes it and your opening drilling is not going to get it done.
Oil went up under Bush without any regulation against it and it went up.
You are simply taking quotes and not looking at the big picture.
In this instance you are simply misguided.
::) ::)
Oil went up under Bush because he had a weak dollar policy.
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ANALYSIS: Federal Reserve stokes commodity prices, including oil
New York (Platts)--15Nov2010/955 am EST/1455 GMT
________________________ ________________________ ______________________
Oil prices have soared in recent weeks with other commodities as the US
Federal Reserve took steps to boost the economy, with the mere mention of
action sending prices jumping.
Prior to the Fed's announcement November 3 that the US central bank would
purchase an additional $600 billion of securities for its balance sheet,
commodities were already in the throes of another bull run, either in
anticipation of quantitative easing and/or the result of tighter global
supply/demand balances in petroleum, base and precious metals, grains and
softs -- coffee, sugar, cocoa.
From November 3 through November 10, when the New York Federal Reserve
announced the tentative outright Treasury operation schedule where $105
billion of purchases including agency debt and mortgage-backed securities
would be received between November 12 and December 9, the run-up in commodity
prices steepened as was the central banks intention.
Only deflation is worse than inflation.
From November 2 through November 11, the front-month crude contract on
NYMEX rallied to settle at $87.81/barrel from $83.90/b, up $3.29/b for an
appreciation of 4.22%. The front-month gold contract on COMEX traded up to
$1,403.3/oz from $1,356.90/oz, a gain of $46.40/oz or up 3.42%.
Front-month wheat on the Chicago Board of Trade climbed to $7.04/bushel
from $6.942, up 9.8 cents, a gain of 1.41% while cotton on ICE US jumped to
$1.4421/pound from $1.3426/pound, plus 9.95 cents/lb, an appreciation of
7.41%.
The rally in industrial metals in particular was breathtaking with the
front-month silver contract on COMEX soaring $2.569/oz, to $27.405/oz, a
30-year high and an appreciation of 10.34% while copper futures rose 18.35
cents/pound to $4.0225/lb, a gain of 4.78%.
In just about all of these futures markets, the rally was well underway
end-October and the rally in the first two weeks of November was simply a test
of even higher prices.
Already in the first nine months of 2010, the US consumer price index was
a little hotter than in 2009. In 2009 there were eight consecutive months
where consumer prices were lower in percentage terms than the same month in
2009, according to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, and resulting in
deflationary concerns.
The last time consumer prices in the US were lower than the previous year
and for several consecutive months was 1955 when GDP was 7.5%. GDP for 2009
was down 2.6%, according to the most recent data from the Bureau of Economic
Analysis.
By contrast, in October, the consumer price index in China went up by
4.4% year-over-year, or 0.8 percentage points higher than the September rise
this year, the National Bureau of Statistics in China reported Friday, while
producer prices for manufactured goods went up by 5.0% year-over-year, or 0.7
percentage points higher than in the previous month.
The data out of China raises the specter of an increase in reserve
requirements which the People's Bank of China has already done once this year
to slow the rate of economic growth by tightening lending.
Insofar as the commodity complex is concerned, which will have the
greater impact on prices -- a slowdown in the rate of growth in China or
quantitative easing in the US.
China, India, Brazil and other emerging markets such as the Middle East
were behind the run-up in global commodity prices over the past eight years,
not the developed market economies. Any slowdown in those regions which would
be induced by a tightening in interest rates to slow the pace of economic
growth would probably more than offset cheap money in the US.
--Linda Rafield, linda_rafield@platts.com
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::) ::)
Oil went up under Bush because he had a weak dollar policy.
So there's all these reasons why oil went up, but it's always the governments fault. I really see where you're coming from now.
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So there's all these reasons why oil went up, but it's always the governments fault. I really see where you're coming from now.
Most of the times - yes. The govt alters the prices va restricting supply and refining capacity, destroying he value of the denomination that oil is traded in (U.S. Dollars), law suits, taxes, etc etc.
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Most of the times - yes. The govt alters the prices va restricting supply and refining capacity, destroying he value of the denomination that oil is traded in (U.S. Dollars), law suits, taxes, etc etc.
you have no clue of what you speak of. Refining capacity has been at 100% for years now. There arent enough refinieries..bunch of land.. would be smart... but environmentalists wont sign off on it.. there hasnt been a new refinery in like 30 years.. and when one goes down from like a fire or something.. the prices rise too.. i think the solution is more refineries or chale from the rockies
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you have no clue of what you speak of. Refining capacity has been at 100% for years now. There arent enough refinieries..bunch of land.. would be smart... but environmentalists wont sign off on it.. there hasnt been a new refinery in like 30 years.. and when one goes down from like a fire or something.. the prices rise too.. i think the solution is more refineries or chale from the rockies
That was my point. We can't get approval for new refineries due to greenie lawsuits, epa, etc etc. .
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That was my point. We can't get approval for new refineries due to greenie lawsuits, epa, etc etc. .
but its not a government cap on existing refineries... they are runnun at 100%
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but its not a government cap on existing refineries... they are runnun at 100%
no kidding. We have not allowed a new refinery in years and years.
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no kidding. We have not allowed a new refinery in years and years.
I dad was a regional Exect with Unocal for like 22 years (till they got baught out by circle K) they told my dad that in order to keep is position we would have to move to AZ..
but anyway my daddy was on this massive research team that were crunching the numbers for oil production, sells etc.. and the cost for that oil shale and building refineries. But at the time no one forcasted these finincial times.The price was crunched down to like $38/barrell for shale, but the cost of crude was still like $29 so it wasnt cost effective at the time. But if we would have made the investment and built those refineries back 15 years ago in the rockies.. we wouldnt need the middle east. Its estimated there is more shale in the Co Rockies than in all of Saudi.. Look it up im sure its some stuff on it.. Im just giving you what my dad would tell me over the years.
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I dad was a regional Exect with Unocal for like 22 years (till they got baught out by circle K) they told my dad that in order to keep is position we would have to move to AZ..
but anyway my daddy was on this massive research team that were crunching the numbers for oil production, sells etc.. and the cost for that oil shale and building refineries. But at the time no one forcasted these finincial times.The price was crunched down to like $38/barrell for shale, but the cost of crude was still like $29 so it wasnt cost effective at the time. But if we would have made the investment and built those refineries back 15 years ago in the rockies.. we wouldnt need the middle east. Its estimated there is more shale in the Co Rockies than in all of Saudi.. Look it up im sure its some stuff on it.. Im just giving you what my dad would tell me over the years.
That is my point. everyone always says no to more development, expolration, etc, and says . . . if only we did it a few years ago.
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That is my point. everyone always says no to more development, expolration, etc, and says . . . if only we did it a few years ago.
yeah well.. whaddya gonna do...
I think thats italian for "shits fucked up with no way to fix it"... am i right?
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(http://www.jaguarenterprises.net/images/em/dollar_eyes.gif)
333 You really know how to tease a gal don'tcha?
When $5 a gallon gas returns, I will be all smiles.
I've got my ducks in a row there and my income will only surge!
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Notice how oil is spiking now?
Paid $3.30 this morning and its going up.
Weak Dollar policy and Obama's agenda are making things much worse.
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Notice how oil is spiking now?
Paid $3.30 this morning and its going up.
Weak Dollar policy and Obama's agenda are making things much worse.
OMG...close your trap...do you blame GW for 4.60 prices in summer 08?...no you dont..
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Bush had a weak dollar policy as well.
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Bush had a weak dollar policy as well.
so GW's agenda caused petro to sky rocket?
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Oh God Lord.... yet ANOTHER thread to blow up in 333s face because he failed to think things out before rushing on with his Obama crying.
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Blow up on me? Wtf are you talking about?
You think it is sheer coincidence that gold silver food health care and yes oil, are all jumping now?
I guess in retard land where you mal, and the rest of the obamabots reside there is no connection enacting draconian legilaslation, printing trillions of dollars of phantom money, and higher costs of commodities and goods?
Stick with taking pics of twinks in bathing suits, reality aint working out too well for you.
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Once again when nothing is left of fall back on, the latent self loathing homosexuality of 333 begins projecting.
You just got schooled from bell to bell on this thread once again. But hey... just like Cortland you jump up clapping to yourself while hoping the rest of the universe didn't see you just get pounded into the ground.
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Once again when nothing is left of fall back on, the latent self loathing homosexuality of 333 begins projecting.
You just got schooled from bell to bell on this thread once again. But hey... just like Cortland you jump up clapping to yourself while hoping the rest of the universe didn't see you just get pounded into the ground.
Eat it - lurkupmalsass
________________________ ______________________
The 'tax' you can't avoid: Oil prices rising
By Paul R. La Monica, assistant managing editor
December 6, 2010: 1:45 PM EThttp://money.cnn.com/2010/12/06/news/economy/thebuzz/index.htm
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- The price of crude is perilously close to $90 a barrel and the average cost for a gallon of gas is inching toward $3 nationwide. If they keep climbing, that could put a serious dent in economic recovery hopes for 2011.
A spike in oil and gas prices is often referred to as a tax on consumers. That's because people have little choice but to suck it up and pay higher prices. As a result, consumers may spend less on other things that are not considered as vital.
Part of the problem is that the Federal Reserve may be fueling (pardon the pun) the rise in oil with its controversial plan to buy $600 billion in long-term Treasury bonds.
Fed critics argue that this quantitative easing program, the second since the onset of the financial crisis two years ago, may weaken the dollar further and lead to higher commodity prices.
Fed chairman Ben Bernanke defended the so-called QE2 plan in an appearance on 60 Minutes Sunday night.
He also didn't rule out the possibility of more asset purchases if the economy remains weak in 2011. That may give rise to fears of a QE3-inspired super spike in commodity prices.
But Zach Pandl, an economist with Nomura Securities in New York, said he does not think there will be a drastic increase in energy costs.
Pandl argued that the Fed, despite a stance that inflation in the broadest sense is not an issue, is cognizant of how higher oil prices could cause more problems for consumers.
"Higher commodity prices could sap households' real income. That is a concern for the Fed," he said. "It is a clear, tangible cost of quantitative easing and a reason for the Fed to consider whether the expansion of the program is appropriate."
Track the price of oil and other commodities
Pandl said consumers should be able to withstand current prices as long as they don't rise much further. He said oil would need to hit $95 to $100 a barrel and stay there before it had a noticeable effect on the economy.
However, Keith Hembre, chief economist with First American Funds in Minneapolis, argues that oil prices could rise to that threshold before long.
"With the Fed pumping more cash into the system, the path of least resistance is higher oil prices yet. I do think we'll grind up to $100 a barrel," he said.
0:00 /2:28Preparing for the end of cheap oil
Hembre said that it's clear Bernanke is most interested in preventing deflation and helping to spur an increase in the prices of homes, stocks and other key assets. As such, Hembre is a bit concerned the Fed may be underestimating the impact higher energy prices will have on consumers.
That's not good news at a time when the unemployment rate remains close to 10% and corporations are citing a slow pickup in consumer spending as a reason to not hire a lot more workers.
"Economic growth could be offset to a certain degree from higher commodity prices," he said.
Others also think higher energy prices are in the offing. Tom Kloza, chief oil analyst with Oil Price Information Service, an energy trade publication based in Wall, N.J., said the average cost of a gallon of gas could rise to between $3.25 and $3.50 in early 2011.
China's risky inflation offensive
That, coupled with the possibility of higher heating oil costs this winter, could make consumers think twice about how much they need to spend on discretionary items next year.
"It's a tenuous recovery and a lot of the recent strength in the economy is based on the notion that there have been great retail sales reports," Kloza said. "But if gas prices spike this spring, that could do a significant amount of damage to consumer spending."
Of course, it is unfair to overlook other reasons for the increase in energy prices. Emerging market economies such as China and India are growing at a healthy clip.
"Oil prices are also rising because of greater demand globally. It's not just quantitative easing," said Pandl.
That may be true. There also are few fears for the time being that oil will approach the record levels of over $140 a barrel from the summer of 2008. Gas prices rose to a peak of $4.11 a gallon in the midst of the oil rally.
But Kloza believes low interest rates for a long period of time will continue to make oil an attractive investment for money managers. That could mean oil and gas prices will rise at a faster rate than what you'd expect from the normal economic forces of supply and demand.
"Will higher prices stick? Oil is almost at $90 because there is a heck of a lot of investment money in oil," he said. "I refer to this as the shadow cartel. Investors believe parking money in oil is a prudent policy over the next few years."
- The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of Paul R. La Monica. Other than Time Warner, the parent of CNNMoney.com, and Abbott Laboratories, La Monica does not own positions in any individual stocks.
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Reading from Page 1, it is still you who ate it.
Keep trying, maybe one day you can post a relevant thread. Or at least come back to this one when you understand limited natural resources.
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Blow up on me? Wtf are you talking about?
You think it is sheer coincidence that gold silver food health care and yes oil, are all jumping now?
I guess in retard land where you mal, and the rest of the obamabots reside there is no connection enacting draconian legilaslation, printing trillions of dollars of phantom money, and higher costs of commodities and goods?
Stick with taking pics of twinks in bathing suits, reality aint working out too well for you.
Seems about right to me lickbamaballsmore
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Because you are an idiot. Seems about right to me.
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P.S. we've already reached 'peak oil' in some estimates so oil will only go up regardless of what we do offshore, onshore or anywhere. You notice consumption is down over 1% but prices haven't changed? Nothing any US admin can do will change the higher price of oil as the world economies pick back up. So really stop harping on about bullsh*t that amounts to putting a band aid on a bullet wound.
Oil WILL rise, YOU will pay more and you only have government inability and public stupidity to blame for not creating and funding an alternative.
They have actually gone up here in CA. and this is suppose to be the 'cheap' time on the year.
Gonna be insane this coming summer.
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They have actually gone up here in CA. and this is suppose to be the 'cheap' time on the year.
Gonna be insane this coming summer.
Paid $3.30 lat night.
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Paid $3.30 lat night.
couple of summers ago before obama i paid $4.60
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Paid $3.30 lat night.
Paid $3.47 for diesel last night.
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It's funny just how clueless 333 is on this subject.
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It's funny just how clueless 333 is on this subject.
Really? So CNNMONEY is clueless as well?
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It's funny just how clueless 333 is on this subject.
The 'tax' you can't avoid: Oil prices rising
By Paul R. La Monica, assistant managing editor
December 6, 2010: 1:45 PM EThttp://money.cnn.com/2010/12/06/news/economy/thebuzz/index.htm
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- The price of crude is perilously close to $90 a barrel and the average cost for a gallon of gas is inching toward $3 nationwide. If they keep climbing, that could put a serious dent in economic recovery hopes for 2011.
A spike in oil and gas prices is often referred to as a tax on consumers. That's because people have little choice but to suck it up and pay higher prices. As a result, consumers may spend less on other things that are not considered as vital.
Part of the problem is that the Federal Reserve may be fueling (pardon the pun) the rise in oil with its controversial plan to buy $600 billion in long-term Treasury bonds.
Fed critics argue that this quantitative easing program, the second since the onset of the financial crisis two years ago, may weaken the dollar further and lead to higher commodity prices.
Fed chairman Ben Bernanke defended the so-called QE2 plan in an appearance on 60 Minutes Sunday night.
He also didn't rule out the possibility of more asset purchases if the economy remains weak in 2011. That may give rise to fears of a QE3-inspired super spike in commodity prices.
But Zach Pandl, an economist with Nomura Securities in New York, said he does not think there will be a drastic increase in energy costs.
Pandl argued that the Fed, despite a stance that inflation in the broadest sense is not an issue, is cognizant of how higher oil prices could cause more problems for consumers.
"Higher commodity prices could sap households' real income. That is a concern for the Fed," he said. "It is a clear, tangible cost of quantitative easing and a reason for the Fed to consider whether the expansion of the program is appropriate."
Track the price of oil and other commodities
Pandl said consumers should be able to withstand current prices as long as they don't rise much further. He said oil would need to hit $95 to $100 a barrel and stay there before it had a noticeable effect on the economy.
However, Keith Hembre, chief economist with First American Funds in Minneapolis, argues that oil prices could rise to that threshold before long.
"With the Fed pumping more cash into the system, the path of least resistance is higher oil prices yet. I do think we'll grind up to $100 a barrel," he said.
0:00 /2:28Preparing for the end of cheap oil
Hembre said that it's clear Bernanke is most interested in preventing deflation and helping to spur an increase in the prices of homes, stocks and other key assets. As such, Hembre is a bit concerned the Fed may be underestimating the impact higher energy prices will have on consumers.
That's not good news at a time when the unemployment rate remains close to 10% and corporations are citing a slow pickup in consumer spending as a reason to not hire a lot more workers.
"Economic growth could be offset to a certain degree from higher commodity prices," he said.
Others also think higher energy prices are in the offing. Tom Kloza, chief oil analyst with Oil Price Information Service, an energy trade publication based in Wall, N.J., said the average cost of a gallon of gas could rise to between $3.25 and $3.50 in early 2011.
China's risky inflation offensive
That, coupled with the possibility of higher heating oil costs this winter, could make consumers think twice about how much they need to spend on discretionary items next year.
"It's a tenuous recovery and a lot of the recent strength in the economy is based on the notion that there have been great retail sales reports," Kloza said. "But if gas prices spike this spring, that could do a significant amount of damage to consumer spending."
Of course, it is unfair to overlook other reasons for the increase in energy prices. Emerging market economies such as China and India are growing at a healthy clip.
"Oil prices are also rising because of greater demand globally. It's not just quantitative easing," said Pandl.
That may be true. There also are few fears for the time being that oil will approach the record levels of over $140 a barrel from the summer of 2008. Gas prices rose to a peak of $4.11 a gallon in the midst of the oil rally.
But Kloza believes low interest rates for a long period of time will continue to make oil an attractive investment for money managers. That could mean oil and gas prices will rise at a faster rate than what you'd expect from the normal economic forces of supply and demand.
"Will higher prices stick? Oil is almost at $90 because there is a heck of a lot of investment money in oil," he said. "I refer to this as the shadow cartel. Investors believe parking money in oil is a prudent policy over the next few years."
- The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of Paul R. La Monica. Other than Time Warner, the parent of CNNMoney.com, and Abbott Laboratories, La Monica does not own positions in any individual stocks.
-
The strongest manufacturing numbers coming out of the Chinese economy in a seven-month period, coupled with plunging oil inventories in the world’s largest energy consuming economy, have sent oil (CL-FT88.34-0.35-0.39%) prices to a 25-month high. With no let-up in China’s fuel demand, the world should be looking at triple-digit oil prices again within a quarter.
That may come as a shock to those who thought the bloated oil inventories that came in the wake of the last recession would provide a buffer against future oil price spikes. Suddenly, that buffer has literally gone up in smoke.
Refined oil stocks held by China’s two largest oil companies have fallen for eight consecutive months, while diesel stocks in the country fell 14 per cent in October. And the tightening oil market won’t just be felt in China. The 140 million gallons of international oil inventories sloshing around in floating storage on the high seas is also all but gone.
With oil prices within striking distance of triple-digit levels, don’t look for any price relief at the upcoming OPEC meeting in Ecuador. Venezuelan energy and oil minister Rafael Ramirez was recently quoted as saying that $100 (U.S.) per barrel was a fair price for both consumers and producers. (But not for cab drivers in Caracas, who will continue to be able to purchase their fuel at $20 per gallon, the equivalent of a little over $8 per barrel). Meanwhile, King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia has already served notice that, without triple-digit prices, there is little incentive for new oil exploration in his kingdom.
In other words, without the return of the kinds of oil prices that put the world economy into the deepest ever post-war recession, we shouldn’t expect major oil producing countries to find and develop new supply. Yet, according to the recently released World Energy Outlook from the International Energy Agency (IEA), world oil demand has never been more dependent on finding new supply.
How the goal posts have moved when it comes to oil prices and supply forecasts. Just as the IEA has finally recognized the reality of peak oil—at least insofar as affordable conventional oil is concerned—triple-digit oil prices have become the new normal in OPEC’s price expectations.
When both OPEC, an organization representing 40 per cent of world oil production, and the IEA, representing countries that consume roughly 50 per cent of the world’s oil, both now acknowledge the imminent return of triple-digit oil prices, perhaps it’s time our policy-makers should as well.
Our last encounter with those prices was brief but decisive. Oil demand collapsed, and, since oil powers our economy, so did GDP. What steps we have taken to ensure the same thing doesn’t happen again is far from clear.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/commentary/jeff-rubins-smaller-world/what-will-2011-bring-triple-digit-oil/article1826709/ (http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/commentary/jeff-rubins-smaller-world/what-will-2011-bring-triple-digit-oil/article1826709/)
Yeah it's all Bernake's fault he's telling the Saudi's to hold off on production and Venezuala to push prices higher ::) Those countries and China's continuing demand have nothing to do with it at all right? It's all Obama and deflation.
Clueless once again 333.
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And what are we doing - cutting off supply and not expanding refining capacity.
Guess what cluebag - we are part of the problem here bcause of our green induced suicide.
e would never have had an industrial revolution in the 1800's if we have the green fanatics around to deal with.
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And what are we doing - cutting off supply and not expanding refining capacity.
Guess what cluebag - we are part of the problem here bcause of our green induced suicide.
e would never have had an industrial revolution in the 1800's if we have the green fanatics around to deal with.
::) Still no clue i see. All our refineries are running at 100% it takes years to build new ones and by the time they are operational who is to say they will even be able to run at 100% or that oil will be any cheaper. Your constant Obama hating clouds you from making even the most basic decisions. It's sad really to see you degenerate into little more than a right wing troll constantly posting the same thing over and over without a clue for the facts.
PIP 333 you were once thoughtful, now you're a troll.
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Ha ha ha ha ha - i love that excuse from the green cult. Truly laughable bogus crap.
"It will take years" has been said from as long as I remember and had we done it during clinton or GWB, we would be in better shape.
What you enviro marxists dont get is that if we dont have afforable energy, the entire nation shuts down. but I guess you guys wants that anyway.
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And what are we doing - cutting off supply and not expanding refining capacity.
yeah thats an Obama only thing there right ::) ...dumbass
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yeah thats an Obama only thing there right ::) ...dumbass
No its not only him - its the EPA, law suits from "public interest groups", regulations, and other red tape bogus nonsense.
And remember - bama already said his goal is to jack our energy prices. Fuck him - let his stupid, incompetent, ass pay my gasoline bill.
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Ha ha ha ha ha - i love that excuse from the green cult. Truly laughable bogus crap.
"It will take years" has been said from as long as I remember and had we done it during clinton or GWB, we would be in better shape.
What you enviro marxists dont get is that if we dont have afforable energy, the entire nation shuts down. but I guess you guys wants that anyway.
Thanks for keeping the troll image alive!
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Troll? Its reality - we do everything possible to keep the price high whether it be money counterfieting schemes via the FED, enivro wacko shit, etc.
Environmentalists, Kenysians, et al are the best buddies the Saudis could ever dream of.
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It's funny just how clueless 333 is on this subject.
As I pointed out.
Then again can you think of any subject that he isn't clueless on?
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As I pointed out.
Then again can you think of any subject that he isn't clueless on?
So you tell me you fucking ignorant gay jackass why GOLD, SILVER, OIL, FOOD and commodities are skyrocketing?
hhhmmmm? ? ? ? ? ?
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Jesus Christ, you are stupid if you can't see the answer to that.
Wait..... you are stupid. I forgot that for a minute there. Time to abandon ship on this thread, you got shit on once again.
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Jesus Christ, you are stupid if you can't see the answer to that.
Wait..... you are stupid. I forgot that for a minute there. Time to abandon ship on this thread, you got shit on once again.
I do see it moron - its called debasing the currency at the FED to finance ponzi schemes, bailouts, blowouts, and bloated govt.
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::)
Going on page 4 of your facial shit storm I see. Oh well.
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The truth is oil is a currency and can be manipulated as such, with supply and demand. So even if you find a tons of oil it is not in your best intrest to sell. It's far more profitable to get together with the other DONS, and fix prices and create what ever out look you like. Public perception is just a matter of media manipulation. They are starting to do it with food too, we're getting totally played why wont anyone get that?
Eventual conclusion is we get robbed so bad, we cant pay the bills then we all fall down.
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EPA to Speed Up New Greenhouse-Gas Rules
By ANA CAMPOY And STEPHEN POWER
www.wsj.com
________________________ ____________________
The Obama administration is planning to accelerate new greenhouse-gas regulations for power plants and oil refineries amid stiff opposition from industry and congressional Republicans.
The administration is also escalating a clash with Texas Gov. Rick Perry, who has refused to sign on to its climate agenda.
The Environmental Protection Agency is expected to announce Thursday that it will propose standards for controlling greenhouse-gas emissions from U.S. power plants by July 2011 and for refineries by December 2011.
The proposed new power-plant regulations are likely to limit the amount of carbon dioxide a facility can emit for each megawatt hour of electricity produced, a person familiar with the agency's plans said.
That could compel utilities to switch from relatively cheap coal to cleaner sources of energy, including natural gas, wind or nuclear power. Utilities that rely heavily on coal have expressed concerns such a shift could cause electricity prices to rise.
The EPA is under pressure from environmental groups to start limiting emissions of carbon dioxide following Congress's failure to enact any controls on emissions linked to climate change.
EPA officials declined to comment late Wednesday.
The agency's moves to adopt new controls on greenhouse-gas emissions have drawn opposition from smokestack industries and some members of Congress, who say new regulations will chill the economy and cost jobs. Proponents of tougher action on climate change say rising global temperatures threaten disruptions to agriculture and coastal flooding, among other things.
Republican leaders in the House have said they will turn up the heat on EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson to justify the new greenhouse-gas regulations when they take control in January.
Texas has become a flash point in the controversy over greenhouse gas regulation. The oil-rich, industry-heavy state is balking at a variety of federal mandates, from slashing emissions of factories and cars to increasing oversight of oil and gas production.
The EPA's effort to regulate greenhouse-gas emissions "paints a big target on the backs of Texas agriculture and energy producers and the hundreds of thousands of Texans they employ," said Katherine Cesinger, a spokeswoman for Gov. Perry.
The EPA, in a recent letter to state officials, said it had "no choice" but to take over certain clean-air permits in the state effective Jan. 2 because of state officials' "unwillingness" to work with the agency in implementing its plan to phase in controls on greenhouse-gas emissions.
Over the past year, Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott has filed eight legal actions against the EPA, including several challenges related to greenhouse gases.
The EPA has said it's efforts to curtail greenhouse-gas emissions using the Clean Air Act are justified by a Supreme Court decision and a subsequent 2009 finding that greenhouse gases are a public health threat.
Texas generates 11% of the nation's greenhouse-gas emissions, far more than any other state, according to the federal Energy Information Administration.
Write to Ana Campoy at ana.campoy@dowjones.com and Stephen Power at stephen.power@wsj.com
________________________ ________________________ __
Remember everyone - Communist Traitor in Chief obama already said his goal is to skyrocket or electc bills.
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Polluting is not a right 333 regardless of who you are. Bring on bigger caps i say. Good business will thrive and change, bad business will die.
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::) ::)
Yeah, or option 3 - Move somewhere they have sane laws and regulations not intended to bankrupt people
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::) ::)
Yeah, or option 3 - Move somewhere they have sane laws and regulations not intended to bankrupt people
Go ahead. American business has done that since day one. Outsource when labor becomes expensive etc. What you don't think a major crackdown on illegal workers wouldn't result in moving business offshore in greater numbers to find comparable labor? Of course it would. doesn't mean a stop to illegal immigration is not needed, just that in the interests of the NATION not just business it's a good idea. Same with tougher pollution regulations. It's needed and welcomed.
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Go ahead. American business has done that since day one. Outsource when labor becomes expensive etc. What you don't think a major crackdown on illegal workers wouldn't result in moving business offshore in greater numbers to find comparable labor? Of course it would. doesn't mean a stop to illegal immigration is not needed, just that in the interests of the NATION not just business it's a good idea. Same with tougher pollution regulations. It's needed and welcomed.
So fine KC - just admit you prefer a horrible economy and more poverty and unemployment and think the trade off is worthwhile. But stop the bogus nonsense about all of this helping the economy. Remember when gas went to $4 a gallon? guess what happened?
It sparked the meltdown. Look it up.
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So fine KC - just admit you prefer a horrible economy and more poverty and unemployment and think the trade off is worthwhile. But stop the bogus nonsense about all of this helping the economy. Remember when gas went to $4 a gallon? guess what happened?
It sparked the meltdown. Look it up.
::) Just admit you think it's a right to pollute this country. Admit you don't give a sh*t about anyone but your own bottom line and that 'freedom' means being able to fu*k over whoever, whatever, whenever for you. Gosh what a horrible little man you are. No wonder you have 40K posts, in real life you must be this insufferable hence no life and all those troll posts.
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::) Just admit you think it's a right to pollute this country. Admit you don't give a sh*t about anyone but your own bottom line and that 'freedom' means being able to fu*k over whoever, whatever, whenever for you. Gosh what a horrible little man you are. No wonder you have 40K posts, in real life you must be this insufferable hence no life and all those troll posts.
If I have to havea trade off between a little pollution and abject poverty, horrible structural economy, debt, no manufacturing, etc, I prefer a little pollution any day.
People can live with a little pollution, they cant live if they cant feed themselves because there are no jobs.
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People can live with a little pollution,
Yeah, we wade through your pollution on here every day.
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Oooohhhhhh ssssnnnaaaapppp. You got me big time on that!
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Ex Shell president sees $5 gas in 2012
By Laurie Segall, staff reporter December 27, 2010: 4:51 PM ET
________________________ ________________________ _______________-
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- The former president of Shell Oil, John Hofmeister, says Americans could be paying $5 for a gallon of gasoline by 2012.
In an interview with Platt's Energy Week television, Hofmeister predicted gasoline prices will spike as the global demand for oil increases.
"I'm predicting actually the worst outcome over the next two years which takes us to 2012 with higher gasoline prices," he said.
Tom Kloza, chief oil analyst with Oil Price Information Service says Americans will see gasoline prices hit the $5 a gallon mark in the next decade, but not by 2012.
"That wolf is out there and it's going to be at the door...I agree with him that we'll see those numbers at some point this decade but not yet." Kloza said.
"The demand is still sluggish enough in some of the mature economies."
Check gas prices in your state
Gasoline prices have been steadily rising. Last week, gas prices crossed the $3 mark for the first time since October 2008. According to AAA figures, prices are up 4% from a month ago and 16% from the $2.585 average a year ago.
A study from the Oil Price Information Service estimates drivers will spend $305 on gasoline in December. According to the study, fuel prices are up 13.6% from last December and 76% higher from December 2008.
Gas prices eased off last week's gains but still remained around the $90-a-barrel mark, settling at $91-a-barrel. Prices were down 51 cents from Thursday's close after China unexpectedly raised interest rates over the holiday weekend for the second time in two months.
Oil prices settled above $90 a barrel for the first time since October of 2008.
________________________ ________________________ ______________
Weak dollar, icreased demand, reduced refining caacity, stupid EPA laws, etc.
$5 a gallon here we come.
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Hey Mal & Lurker - I guess you dopes more than the Ex CEO of Shell? ::) ::) ::)
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Morning Bell: Obama Will Make You Pay More at the Pump
Posted December 29th, 2010 at 8:45
http://blog.heritage.org/2010/12/29/morning-bell-obama-wants-you-to-pay-more-at-the-pump/
________________________ ______________________-
“What do you say to people who are losing patience with gas prices at $3 a gallon? And how much of a political price do you think you’re paying for that, right now?” This was a question asked of the president at a press conference in August…of 2006. The president was George W. Bush. In fact, it was a question that was asked in one way or another regularly during the entire eight years of the Bush presidency, regardless of where energy prices stood at that moment.
In May 2004, The New York Times reported that congressional Democrats “were stepping up pressure on the Bush Administration to ease gasoline prices,” when prices were still under $2/gallon. In April 2005, at another press conference, a journalist stated: “Mr. President a majority of Americans disapprove of your handling of social security, gas prices…” In 2006, Senator Barbara Boxer (D-CA) exclaimed: “Since George Bush and Dick Cheney took over as president and vice president, gas prices have doubled…They are too cozy with the oil industry” after she drove one less-than-energy-efficient block to a press conference at a local Exxon station.
In 2008, then-Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) “blasted” the president for rising gas prices on his (and her) watch. In July 2008, ABC News asked the president what was his “short term advice for Americans about gas prices?” repeating a nearly identical question asked at a February 2008 press conference. In April 2008, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) said gas prices were “the number one issue facing America today.”
You get the point. Yet, at the end of President Bush’s presidency, gas prices were 9% lower than when he took office (adjusted for inflation). So where have these outspoken critics been since Bush left office?
Since President Barack Obama was inaugurated, gas prices have been on the steady rise, as have home energy prices. During his tenure, he presided over arguably the worst federal response to an oil spill in our nation’s history, and has pressed legislation on Capitol Hill that would, in his own words, cause electricity prices to “skyrocket.” Yet there has been almost nothing said by the media as consumers face $3/gallon gasoline at the pump in December for the first time in U.S. history and see their home heating bills soar in the winter months.
Now this week, analysts including former president of Shell Oil, John Hofmeister, say Americans could be paying $5/gallon of gasoline by 2012. Investment banks are predicting a return to $100/barrel oil, and OPEC is refusing to raise production. All of this news would be less frightening if the White House were focusing on potential ways to lower energy prices. Instead, President Obama is admittedly fixated with raising them.
Just last week (as frigid temperatures and blizzards blasted Europe and the U.S.), the EPA announced that it will begin regulating power plants and oil refineries in an attempt to curb global warming. The new regulations will seek to cut greenhouse gas emissions by making it more expensive to turn fossil fuels into energy. And Interior Secretary Ken Salazar announced that the Bureau of Land Management would issue new rules making it harder to develop natural resources on government-owned land. These measures will not only drive up the cost of electricity and gasoline but will also make us more dependent on foreign sources of energy.
But none of these actions compare to the brazen way President Obama has unilaterally declared the U.S. oil industry dead. During the BP oil spill, Obama needlessly declared a moratorium on deepwater and shallow water drilling, since no White House advisers apparently could draw a distinction between the two. After two federal courts said the moratorium was illegal, the Obama administration instead moved to a de facto moratorium, by issuing no permits, while speeding up the permitting process for wind farms.
In October, President Obama “lifted” the moratorium, but since then has issued almost no new permits. In late November, his administration effectively issued a seven-year ban on drilling in the eastern Gulf of Mexico and across the Atlantic and Pacific coasts. We’re not even talking about ANWR anymore; these are publicly and politically accepted areas of drilling. These actions, of course, increase our reliance on foreign oil, which as OPEC points out, will only become more expensive in the near future.
Finally, this all spells disaster for the jobs market. Higher energy prices translate into higher costs for small businesses, which cause less hiring. Energy producers are moving platforms out of U.S. waters rather than have multi-million dollar assets sit idle as the president destroys an industry. And local businesses and retailers who service this industry along the coast are losing money and employees, if not entirely shutting down.
President Obama knows energy prices are skyrocketing. The liberal mantra has long been to disincentive Americans from purchasing cheap fossil fuels, by driving costs up. Because the only way consumers will choose the vastly-more-expensive wind and solar alternatives is if all prices are high, rather than wait for the market to bring alternative prices down. This is a reckless and devastating way to make a point about global warming at the expense of American families.
Nearly no questions have been asked of President Obama by the media regarding: 1) his bungled response to the oil spill; 2) his unilateral policies that are creating higher home energy prices; 3) rising gas and oil prices; or 4) the de facto moratorium on domestic oil exploration. It’s time to start asking the White House some tough questions. A two year moratorium on accountability is long enough.
Quick Hits:
•Home prices across 20 major metropolitan areas fell 1.3% in October from September, the third straight month-over-month drop.
•Japan has abandoned their global warming regulation scheme due to expected job losses.
•On January 2nd, the Obama administration will officially start regulating greenhouse gas emissions.
•The Chamber of Commerce is allying with Big Labor to oppose a House Republican rule change designed to cut federal government spending.
•According to Rasmussen Reports, only 21% of voters support the FCC’s push to begin regulating the internet.
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Lurker & Mal -
Listen and learn you two. This guy met with Obama and said he is ntentionally trying to fuck us up. He is the Ex Ceo of Shell.
http://www.wor710.com/topic/play_window.php?audioType=Episode&audioId=5076772
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Saw that guy on the news this morning......scary, sad shit......
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Saw that guy on the news this morning......scary, sad shit......
In the interview I just posted, he disusses a meeting he had with obama in 2007. Check this out. Crazy shit.
Obama = vile, treasonous, communist asshole.
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Lurker & Mal -
Listen and learn you two. This guy met with Obama and said he is ntentionally trying to fuck us up. He is the Ex Ceo of Shell.
http://www.wor710.com/topic/play_window.php?audioType=Episode&audioId=5076772
BUMP FOR MAL & LURKER AND THEIR ADMITTING I WAS RIGHT.
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Dude you full of shit.
Hell, you don't even have a car so why worry about the price in the first place? Your subway token costing more now?
You right? HHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
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Idiot. Listen to the interview and stop making such a fool of yourself.
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$5 Gas Predicted Under Obama -- What, No Pitchforks?
Townhall.com ^ | December 30, 2010 | Larry Elders
________________________ ________________________ ______________
Five dollars per gallon of gas by 2012! A former president of Shell Oil considers this likely. The average price on Christmas Day for a gallon of regular gas reached $3.28 in Los Angeles County, the highest price since October 2008. In one month, the price rose 13 cents, up 35 cents year to year.
Where are the calls to sic Obama's Justice Department on Big Oil to hold the oil companies accountable for "market manipulation"? Why aren't we hunting down the amoral "oil speculators" responsible for repealing the law of supply-and-demand in order to line their pockets?
During President George W. Bush's administration, we constantly heard demands to hold the President accountable for "Big Oil's price gouging." House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., just two years ago, knew exactly whom to blame for "skyrocketing" oil prices: "The price of oil is at the doorstep; $4-plus per gallon for oil is attributed to two oilmen in the White House and their protectors in the United States Senate."
In 2007, when the average national price ranged from $2.17 to $3.22, then-Sen. Barack Obama demanded that the Federal Trade Commission investigate Big Oil for "price manipulation." In 2008, presidential candidate Obama urged the Justice Department "to open an investigation into whether energy traders have been engaged in illegal activities that have helped drive up the price of oil and food."
Obama also called for "a windfall profits penalty on oil selling at or over $80 per barrel." As of Christmas 2010, a barrel of oil sold at slightly above $90. What happened to the windfall profits tax?
Yes, back then the average price per gallon was four bucks. But blaming "oilman" Bush for high prices began when the average price was well below today's $3.05 national average.
The average price was $1.72 on March 5, 2003, when CBS News posted a story online with this headline: "Dems Blame Bush For High Oil Prices." It referred to an investigative report by Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich. Levin blamed Bush's post-9/11 decision to increase the amount of oil in the Strategic Petroleum Reserve by 40 million barrels in 2002 -- bringing the total to 600 million. Levin said, "We're confident this had a significant impact on the price of oil in 2002." Never mind that the Bush administration called the amount of oil diverted too small to matter.
The average price was $2.80 on April 22, 2006, when USAToday.com posted an article with the headline "Democrats blame Bush for high gas prices": "Consumer gasoline prices continue to soar as the Bush administration places too much emphasis on drilling reserves and not enough on alternative fuels, Democrats said." The article quoted Sen. Bill Nelson, D-Fla., who praised Brazil's "energy independence." "In Brazil," Nelson said, "drivers are filling up their cars with ethanol instead of gasoline."
Not exactly, Sen. Nelson.
Brazil may be "energy independent" in that it imports only a small percentage -- 649,000 barrels per day in 2009 -- of the oil it consumes. But that makes Brazil the 19th-highest oil-importing country in the world. Its economy relies heavily on oil that is domestically produced and consumed. Brazil is the seventh-largest consumer of oil in the world and the ninth-largest producer. Its famous -- and heavily government-subsidized -- sugar cane-based ethanol fuel is actually a blend that uses approximately 75 percent gasoline.
As for U.S. ethanol, which is made from corn, Nobel laureate environmentalist Al Gore recently called it a bad deal: "It is not a good policy to have these massive subsidies for first-generation ethanol. First-generation ethanol, I think, was a mistake. The energy conversion ratios are at best very small. ... The size, the percentage of corn particularly, which is now being (used for) first-generation ethanol definitely has an impact on food prices. The competition with food prices is real." Why did he once support ethanol? He admitted that he'd wanted to help farmers in Iowa, site of the nation's first caucus, since he "was about to run for president."
The silence over the recent price run-up is yet the latest example of left-wing hypocrisy. It was always about bludgeoning Bush rather than a sincere conviction that Big Oil was cheating. How else to explain the absence of demands for investigations?
America could achieve "energy independence" if producers were allowed to drill in Alaska, the lower 48 and offshore, where substantial amounts of untapped oil remain off-limits. Obama, who currently squanders hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars by "investing" in alternative energy, possesses no more control over the law of supply-and-demand than did "evil" Oilman Bush.
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Hutchison: EPA climate rules like ‘a new gas tax’
By Andrew Restuccia - 12/29/10 04:25 PM ET
Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-Texas) is calling on the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to delay plans to implement new greenhouse-gas standards on oil refineries, arguing the regulations would amount to “a new gas tax.”
The new greenhouse-gas standards “will hurt every American driver, trucker, farmer and flier with higher gasoline, diesel and jet fuel prices,” Hutchison said in a letter sent Wednesday to EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson. “Higher prices passed on to consumers will feel like a new gas tax.”
It's the latest example of Republicans criticizing EPA's plans to impose climate-change regulations. Republicans have made plans to attempt to block the agency's climate change authority next year.
EPA announced last week a proposed schedule for implementing greenhouse-gas standards for power plants and refineries. It has not yet determined the specifics of those standards, but it plans to issue proposed standards in December 2011 and final standards in November 2012.
The comments come as a former Shell executive caused a stir this week by predicting gas prices could reach $5 per gallon in 2012.
Hutchison also accused EPA of “circumventing the role of Congress” by trying to pass “backdoor carbon regulations.”
Here’s the full text of the letter:
December 29, 2010
The Honorable Lisa P. Jackson
Administrator
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
1200 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW
Washington, DC 20460
Dear Administrator Jackson:
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced on December 23, 2010 its plans to impose costly greenhouse gas regulations on refineries which will hurt every American driver, trucker, farmer and flier with higher gasoline, diesel and jet fuel prices. Higher prices passed on to consumers will feel like a new gas tax. I urge you to consider the economic impacts of this announcement and not to impose this burden on all Americans.
America’s families and workers are still struggling to recover from one of the worst recessions in American history. Millions of Americans remain out of work with unemployment stuck near 10 percent. Family budgets already stretched thin face gasoline prices $.39 higher and diesel fuel $.52 more expensive per gallon than this time last year. This of course raises expenses for every family and business. All of this limits the ability to create new jobs or keep life affordable for Americans.
Your agency is circumventing the role of Congress. With heavy input from constituents, Congress has already rejected attempts to use cap-and-trade to force fuel prices higher with costly new greenhouse gas mandates on the American people. A report entitled Climate Change Legislation: A $3.6 Trillion Gas Tax authored by myself and Senator Bond calculated the cost of the Waxman-Markey cap-and-trade bill on gasoline, diesel and jet fuel prices using publicly available government figures.
This effort by the administration would be imposing its own backdoor carbon regulations. The EPA previously announced regulations to require not only large industrial facilities, but eventually even hospitals, schools, farms and local small businesses to accept new costly carbon regulations. These will cripple growth and the ability to create new jobs. EPA’s recent announcement may target oil refineries with expensive new greenhouse gas performance standards; however, it is consumers who will face higher fuel prices passed on to them in the form of more pain at the pump. Threatened also are refinery workers across America who will face the prospect of losing their good-paying, middle-class supporting jobs, if your regulations curtail operations.
I urge you to forgo these intended plans and allow Congress working with the President to make responsible policy decisions.
Sincerely,
Kay Bailey Hutchison
http://thehill.com/blogs/e2-wire/677-e2-wire/135413-hutchison-epa-climate-rules-like-a-new-gas-tax
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The new greenhouse-gas standards “will hurt every American driver, trucker, farmer and flier with higher gasoline, diesel and jet fuel prices,” Hutchison said in a letter sent Wednesday to EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson. “Higher prices passed on to consumers will feel like a new gas tax.”
________________________ ________________________ ___
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Having to resort to photoshopped pics to make a point is only saying you are unable to make a relevant point in the first place.
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I guess bamas own statements r not sufficient for you.
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Yikes! Gasoline to hit $5 per gallon in 2011?
WorldNetDaily ^ | January 02, 2011 | WND
The Obama administration is continuing a ban on offshore drilling in favor of offshore wind farms at a time when gasoline threatens to reach $5 per gallon – an economic nightmare the American public might well see develop in 2011, Jerome Corsi's Red Alert reports.
With OPEC targeting $100/barrel oil as OPEC oil ministers gathered last week for a meeting in Cairo, 2011 may see oil challenge the $148/barrel all-time high reached in July 2008.
This"No amount of spin will win the Obama administration gains in public approval if gasoline tops $4 per gallon or threatens to reach $5 per gallon," Corsi wrote.
OPEC members Iran, Venezuela and Libya have weighed in favor of the $100/barrel target, rejecting Saudi Arabia's preference for prices centered at the $75 level, the level that oil has traded above since September.
The end of 2010 has seen oil prices climb above $90/barrel, as Red Alert predicted at the end of the third quarter 2010.
Earlier in December, the Obama administration reversed policy, announcing a ban on offshore drilling in the eastern Gulf of Mexico and off the Atlantic coast that is expected to continue for at least seven more years.
Ironically, in March, less than one month before the BP Deepwater Horizon oil rig disaster in the Gulf, Obama and Interior Secretary Ken Salazar had promised to open up the eastern Gulf and parts of the Atlantic coast to offshore oil and natural gas exploration.
(Excerpt) Read more at wnd.com ...
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Oil's surge in 2010 paves the way for $4 gasoline,
yahoo ^ | 1/2/111 | ap, Chris Kahn, AP Energy Writer
Price of oil rises 30 percent in 2010; gasoline prices could hit $4 a gallon in 2011
NEW YORK (AP) -- The price of oil is poised for another run at $100 a barrel after a global economic rebound sent it surging 34 percent since May. That could push gasoline prices to $4 a gallon by summer in some parts of the country, experts say.
Flying, shipping a package and ordering a pizza all likely would get more expensive in the new year if that happens and companies pass along higher energy costs. Some economists say rising energy prices will slow economic growth.
The U.S. is the world's largest oil consumer, but prices since spring have been on a roll primarily because of rising demand in developing countries, especially China. China's oil consumption is expected to rise 5 percent next year; that compares with less than 1 percent growth forecast for the U.S.
(Excerpt) Read more at finance.yahoo.com ...
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Driving US Families into Fuel Poverty
Right Side News ^ | January 3, 2011 | guy Innis, Rev. Samuel Rodriguez and Amy Frederick
________________________ _______________________
Will America learn in time from the price being paid by British companies and families?
The Obama Administration still hasn't gotten the message voters sent Washington on November 2.
The lame duck session and 111th Congress finally ended, without the White House getting key items on its wish list. So now, the Environmental Protection Agency and Interior Department intend to impose costly, job-killing, economy-strangling new rules for power plants and refineries, and implement more land-grabs that will lock up additional millions of acres and more billions of dollars of American energy.
Their goal is to end the hydrocarbon and nuclear era in America, and force us to convert to “renewable” energy. Beginning January 2, they plan to ignore clear voter mandates and consumer needs – and use regulations and executive edicts to slash carbon dioxide emissions, impose “clean energy standards,” halt onshore and offshore drilling, and hobble the vehicles, electrical generating plants and factories that are the backbone of our nation’s economy, jobs and living standards.
EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson claims these actions are needed to ensure “environmental justice” for poor and minority families threatened by “manmade global warming.” Meanwhile, the United States and entire Northern Hemisphere are enduring yet another nasty winter, marked by early snow storms and record cold temperatures. Some scientists say Earth could be entering another prolonged period of cooler temperatures.
Businesses, workers and families face unemployment, injustice, bankruptcy and worse at the hands of their government, if this regulatory power grab continues.
The Congressional Research Service says average US households will pay almost $1,000 this winter just for heat. That’s average: Alaska to Florida, Hawaii to New York. Northern states residents will pay double or triple that. Businesses, schools and hospitals will also be hammered.
In Cobb County, Georgia, hundreds shivered outside to apply for heating assistance from a welfare agency that may not have enough money for every family that needs help. Along the Canadian border, in St. Lawrence County, New York, over 8,000 households were approved for heating aid by cash-strapped local, county and state governments that wonder where the money will come from – while Albany has blocked drilling for shale gas that could fuel homes and power plants, and generate billions in revenue.
All this is before the Feds actually implement more of the job-killing, family-freezing CO2 limits and other plans they are contemplating. To see what’s in store for millions of American businesses and families, one need only look at the planet’s sole country that still obstinately clings to its draconian climate change and renewable energy goals, regardless of the costs.
Across Great Britain, household energy bills could double by 2020, to $3,900 (£2,500) a year, market expert Mark Todd of EnergyHelpLine.com has warned. Gasoline prices are likewise climbing to unaffordable levels, and the majority of United Kingdom companies will see their natural gas and electricity prices skyrocket by 100% between 2012 and 2016 – on top of a carbon tax bill of “at least” $65,660 (£42,000) annually – according to the analytical firm Carbon Masters.
Moreover, most of Britain’s older coal-fired and nuclear power plants are scheduled to be shut down, with almost nothing to replace them, even as electricity demand rises. That could bring widespread blackouts, said the Daily Mail, and cause hundreds of thousands of UK jobs to be outsourced to countries where energy costs are much lower, and air pollution and carbon dioxide emission standards far less stringent. That will hardly improve England’s economy or global environmental quality.
Far worse, more than 5.5 million households will be plunged into “fuel poverty” by early 2011 – forced to spend more than 10% of their family incomes on energy – National Energy Action and other charities said. That’s over one-fifth of all UK households and a major increase from 4.5 million families in 2008. Most in these households are over age 60, but working families are also struggling to keep the heat on, as prices soar.
Nearly 28,000 people died in Britain last winter, most of them pensioners who could not afford adequate heat. Charities say this is the highest winter death rate in northern Europe, worse even than much colder nations like Finland and Sweden. And this winter has already seen the coldest December night for Wales in 169 years of record keeping. Britain is on track to having its coldest December in a century.
To stay warm, thousands of elderly are using travel passes to ride buses all day, while others seek refuge in libraries and shopping centers, the Sunday Express noted. Others are “putting their health at risk, in an attempt to keep costs down,” by bundling up and turning the heat down or off entirely, said Age UK Charity Director Michelle Mitchell.
Now, amid the Christmas and New Year holiday, two million homes, schools and hospitals face fuel rationing. Some families could wait weeks before they can get their fuel oil tanks refilled, as more snow falls across Great Britain.
Meanwhile, the British government has cut funding for its Warm Front heating assistance program from $470 million this year to $172 million in 2011, Consumer Focus campaigner Jonathan Stearn angrily noted. And because the winds barely blow during the coldest weather, Britain’s “shiny new green” turbines were able to supply only “one-500th of the exceptionally large demand” for electricity during the frigid weather of early December, Sunday Times columnist Dominic Lawson ruefully observed.
That’s a tiny fraction of the wind turbines’ “rated capacity.” But it is a situation commonly faced with turbines on freezing Minnesota winter nights and sweltering Texas summer afternoons, when they average a measly 10% of the electricity output their subsidy-hungry backers say they are capable of.
Is this what Lisa Jackson would call “environmental justice”? How do her actions, perverse notions of “justice,” and government-driven energy price spikes square with a 2009 poll by Wilson Research Strategies? It found that 56% of blacks think politicians and bureaucrats setting climate change policy in Washington fail to consider economic and quality of life concerns in the black community. Fully 76% are unwilling to pay more than $50 a year more for electricity, to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
Northern US winters are far worse than even record-setters in Britain. Why would anyone want to impose costly and nightmarish energy and environmental policies on American families, rich or poor?
The outgoing Congress nearly enacted a bill that would have provided much needed congressional checks on EPA actions. The Murkowski bill fell just short in a Senate dominated by partisan Democrats. The incoming Senate should be far more supportive of such legislation, especially in the face of EPA and other attempts to override the will of Congress and the American people.
The Affordable Power Alliance will urge the new Congress to honor its constitutional duties, and prevent the Obama administration from imposing excessive regulations inspired by extreme ideologies. Congress, including Democrats up for reelection in 2012, needs to heed the overwhelming public demand that America’s economy no longer be held hostage by an elitist environmental network – even if that network includes the President of the United States.
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Oil price ‘threat to recovery’
By Sylvia Pfeifer, Energy Editor
Published: January 4 2011 22:32 | Last updated: January 4 2011 22:32
________________________ ________________________ _______________________
High oil prices threaten to derail the fragile economic recovery among developed nations this year, the leading energy watchdog has warned, putting pressure on the Opec oil cartel to increase production.
Over the past year the oil import costs for the 34 mostly rich countries that make up the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development have soared by $200bn to $790bn at the end of 2010, according to an analysis by the International Energy Agency.
EDITOR’S CHOICE
Jan-04.BP shares surge on spill compensation - Jan-04.South Atlantic yields more frustration - Jan-04.Petrobras in talks over Eni’s Galp stake - Jan-04.Energysource blog - Jan-04.Eurozone inflation passes ECB target - Jan-04..The increase, due to high crude prices, is equal to a loss of income of about 0.5 per cent of OECD gross domestic product, according to the IEA.
“Oil prices are entering a dangerous zone for the global economy,” said Fatih Birol, the IEA’s chief economist. “The oil import bills are becoming a threat to the economic recovery. This is a wake-up call to the oil consuming countries and to the oil producers.”
Oil prices have edged closer to $100 a barrel in recent weeks and Brent crude hit $95 a barrel for the first time in 27 months on Monday as the economic recovery has gathered pace.
Although oil prices dropped on Tuesday, the warning from the IEA will put pressure on Opec to increase its production. Despite the high prices, oil ministers decided last month to leave their quotas unchanged.
Ali Naimi, the Saudi oil minister, repeated at the time that he favoured an oil price of “$70 to $80 a barrel” and that there were no plans to convene an extraordinary meeting before June 2 this year.
However, according to Mr Birol, “it is not in the interest of anyone to see such high prices”.
OECD countries account for about 65 per cent of all global oil imports, he said. “Oil exporters need clients with healthy economies but these high prices will sooner or later make the economies sick, which would mean the need for importing oil will be less.”
In the very short term, therefore, “it may not be a bad idea that the producers are ready to increase production and show their understanding that these high prices are not good for the global economy,” he added.
Oil consuming nations, meanwhile, need to accelerate their efforts to reduce their reliance on oil, especially for transportation, he said. According to the IEA’s analysis, the European Union has seen its import bill rise by $70bn during 2010, equal to the combined budget deficits of Greece and Portugal.
On top of the high crude prices, Europe is still to feel the full impact of higher gas prices as 75 per cent of its gas contracts are linked to oil prices. The weak euro against the US dollar will also amplify the cost.
The US, meanwhile, has seen its bill jump by $72bn. Japan, which imports more than 99 per cent of its energy needs from oil, gas and coal, is paying an additional $27bn. Less developed nations are also being hit, seeing their bill rise by $20bn, equal to a loss of income of almost 1 per cent of GDP.
The ratio of countries’ oil import bills to GDP, a key measure of the cost of oil prices on economies, is close to levels last seen during the financial crisis in 2008, Mr Birol warned.
If oil prices remain above $90/barrel for the rest of this year then the ratio for the European Union will be 2.1 per cent – close to the 2.2 per cent level it reached in 2008.
“It is a very telling story. 2010 rang the first alarm bells and 2011 price levels could bring us to the same financial crisis times that we saw in 2008,” said Mr Birol.
Additional reporting by David Blair
.Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2011. You may share using our article tools. Please don't cut articles from FT.com and redistribute by email or post to the web.
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The gaggle of fools and dolts will probably blame Bush when gas goes to $7 agallon.
gas was 4.85 in Chicago a couple of years ago if I'm not mistaken. was that Obama's fault too?
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no, but he liked it
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no, but he liked it
u don't make any sense.
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???
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???
Link to solid proof that Obama liked that price then or you are just crying and whining again.
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Wait, wait, wait.......seems that the reason gas prices were rising a couple of years ago was because "Bush is an oil man" ::) He's been out for 2 years, almost 3.......so what is to blame for the rise now?
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Link to solid proof that Obama liked that price then or you are just crying and whining again.
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Instead of me watching all those bullshit videos, why not specifically point out the minute and second in each where Obama says "I liked the high gas prices in Chicago a couple of years ago"
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Watch the first one jackass.
He says: "I would have preferred the prices go up more gradually" as opposed to the spike. The others are equally self explaining.
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Oil refineries sue EPA over ethanol plan
GOPUSA ^ | January 4, 2011 | Ken Thomas (Associated Press)
WASHINGTON (AP) — A ruling by the Obama administration allowing the sale of gasoline containing 15 percent ethanol is running into legal hurdles from trade groups opposing the plan.
The National Petrochemical and Refiners Association sued the Environmental Protection Agency on Monday over the decision to allow the sale of gasoline containing higher blends of corn-based ethanol, the second major group to protest the ruling.
The Obama administration said in October that gas stations could start selling the ethanol blend for vehicles built since the 2007 model year, increasing it from the current blend of 10 percent ethanol.
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BUMP FOR LURKER
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Watch the first one jackass.
He says: "I would have preferred the prices go up more gradually" as opposed to the spike. The others are equally self explaining.
Please tell me you do realize they will ONLY go up. The question is how fast.
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Please tell me you do realize they will ONLY go up. The question is how fast.
::) ::)
Just like home prices, stocks, bonds, etc right?
Every hear of supply and demand?
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::) ::)
Just like home prices, stocks, bonds, etc right?
Every hear of supply and demand?
That is a PART of why it goes up... OPEC would cut their shit if the US would take 1 week and not drive.
Commodities like "barrels of oil" have absolutely nothing to do with supply and demand... It's perceived desire... not actual use.
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That is a PART of why it goes up... OPEC would cut their shit if the US would take 1 week and not drive.
Commodities like "barrels of oil" have absolutely nothing to do with supply and demand... It's perceived desire... not actual use.
As well as perceived supply and perceived demand.
Funny - enviro kooks never think the laws of basic economics ever apply to oil or other goods.
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Hey there is a thread up.. i want your imput.. quit ignoring it.. the word Palin is in it.. so you must click on it
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Watch the first one jackass.
He says: "I would have preferred the prices go up more gradually" as opposed to the spike. The others are equally self explaining.
Again, that is NOT saying "I like the high prices in Chicago" like you claimed.
Two different things. Looks like I was right. More bullshit and crying from you.
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BUMP FOR LURKER
Really? Because last time I asked for the specific minute and second of those videos where Obama said "I liked high gas prices in Chicago" which is what you claimed. You didn't provide that. You can't provide that. Because you are just whining and spouting your usual lies and bullshit.
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As well as perceived supply and perceived demand.
Funny - enviro kooks never think the laws of basic economics ever apply to oil or other goods.
You're right... It's all speculation. But it isn't "supply and demand" as you are stating.
That's why the people are called "speculators" and we don't use anymore oil than we did 10 years ago, if anything, we use less, so why does the price go up?
OPEC.
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You're right... It's all speculation. But it isn't "supply and demand" as you are stating.
That's why the people are called "speculators" and we don't use anymore oil than we did 10 years ago, if anything, we use less, so why does the price go up?
OPEC.
and inflation since oil is prices in US dollars which are not greatly devalued due to the FED printng scams.
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and inflation since oil is prices in US dollars which are not greatly devalued due to the FED printng scams.
True, but inflation hasn't gone up 200% like oil prices have, so what percentage of inflation can you attribute to the rise in oil prices?
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True, but inflation hasn't gone up 200% like oil prices have, so what percentage of inflation can you attribute to the rise in oil prices?
Don't know, its a portion, as is the OPEC portion, as is the supply and demand portion, as is the speculation portion, etc.
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Again, that is NOT saying "I like the high prices in Chicago" like you claimed.
Two different things. Looks like I was right. More bullshit and crying from you.
C'mon....you know exactly what Obama was implying.... how about saying "No, I don't want prices to be $5 a gallon" instead of implying he was "ok" with them being $5, just that they get there more slowly...
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C'mon....you know exactly what Obama was implying.... how about saying "No, I don't want prices to be $5 a gallon" instead of implying he was "ok" with them being $5, just that they get there more slowly...
It wasn't a question of what Obama was implying, but what 333 was implying.
He specifically said Obama liked high gas prices. Not that he was aware of the price increasing, not that he was "ok" with it being $5, etc.. 333 said Obama LIKED HIGH GAS PRICES.
I asked for proof of this and not a damn thing. Which isn't unusual from his end. Just more crying and hyperbole bullshit.
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Don't know, its a portion, as is the OPEC portion, as is the supply and demand portion, as is the speculation portion, etc.
So you have to admit that it's going to go up either way because actual "supply and demand" has gone down because we drive less SUVs and more hybrids and better mileage cars then we did 6-10 years ago, correct?
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It wasn't a question of what Obama was implying, but what 333 was implying.
He specifically said Obama liked high gas prices. Not that he was aware of the price increasing, not that he was "ok" with it being $5, etc.. 333 said Obama LIKED HIGH GAS PRICES.
I asked for proof of this and not a damn thing. Which isn't unusual from his end. Just more crying and hyperbole bullshit.
Hey jerkoff - how about instead of being the dumbest poster on this site you watch the vids of Dear Messia i posted.
He specifically said "Govt should send price signals to alter behavior"
Guess what that means you stupid fuck?
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Again, that is NOT saying "I like the high prices in Chicago" like you claimed.
Two different things. Looks like I was right. More bullshit and crying from you.
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Hey jerkoff - how about instead of being the dumbest poster on this site you watch the vids of Dear Messia i posted.
He specifically said "Govt should send price signals to alter behavior"
Guess what that means you stupid fuck?
But doesn't mean "I like high gas prices" does it. Two different things.
Perhaps next time your little bullshit hyperbole won't have you with both feet in your mouth. Though I doubt it.
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Minute and second of the video where Obama plainly states "I like high gas prices". Can you provide it?
No, you can't. Just another time you were mouthing off and got popped for it. Now continue with your exaggerating and crying.
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But doesn't mean "I like high gas prices" does it. Two different things.
Perhaps next time your little bullshit hyperbole won't have you with both feet in your mouth. Though I doubt it.
::) ::)
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So he didn't say those words did he?
Yeah.... I knew he didn't. You were just lying again. Must suck to get busted in them on here all the time.
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Minute and second of the video where Obama plainly states "I like high gas prices". Can you provide it?
No, you can't. Just another time you were mouthing off and got popped for it. Now continue with your exaggerating and crying.
"I would have preferred a more gradual clomb to these prices"
GUESS WHAT THAT MEANS JACKASS?
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Sure as shit doesn't mean it is the same as "I like high gas prices".
Why don't you just admit you were exaggerating as usual instead of making yourself look like a bigger fool?
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Sure as shit doesn't mean it is the same as "I like high gas prices".
Why don't you just admit you were exaggerating as usual instead of making yourself look like a bigger fool?
::) ::)
You are splitting hairs to try to get out of this you fool. Its not working at all.
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Updated: Sat., Jun. 19, 2010, 4:31 AM
$7-a-gallon gas?
By BEN LIEBERMAN
www.nypost.com
________________________ ________________________ ________________
President Obama has a solution to the Gulf oil spill: $7-a-gallon gas.
That's a Harvard University study's estimate of the per-gallon price of the president's global-warming agenda. And Obama made clear this week that this agenda is a part of his plan for addressing the Gulf mess.
So what does global-warming legislation have to do with the oil spill?
Good question, because such measures wouldn't do a thing to clean up the oil or fix the problems that led to the leak.
The answer can be found in Obama Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel's now-famous words, "You never want a serious crisis to go to waste -- and what I mean by that is it's an opportunity to do things that you think you could not do before."
That sure was true of global-warming policy, and especially the cap-and-trade bill. Many observers thought the measure, introduced last year in the House by Reps. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) and Edward Markey (D-Mass.), was dead: The American people didn't seem to think that the so-called global-warming crisis justified a price-hiking, job-killing, economy-crushing redesign of our energy supply amid a fragile recovery. Passing another major piece of legislation, one every bit as unpopular as ObamaCare, appeared unlikely in an election year.
So Obama and congressional proponents of cap-and-trade spent several months rebranding it -- downplaying the global-warming rationale and claiming that it was really a jobs bill (the so-called green jobs were supposed to spring from the new clean-energy economy) and an energy-independence bill (that will somehow stick it to OPEC).
Sens. John Kerry (D-Mass.) and Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) even reportedly declined to introduce their new cap-and-trade proposal in the Senate on Earth Day, because they wanted to de-emphasize the global-warming message. Instead, Kerry called the American Power Act "a plan that creates jobs and sets us on a course toward energy independence and economic resurgence."
But the new marketing strategy wasn't working. Few believe the green-jobs hype -- with good reason. In Spain, for example, green jobs have been an expensive bust, with each position created requiring, on average, $774,000 in government subsidies. And the logic of getting us off oil imports via a unilateral measure that punishes American coal, oil and natural gas never made any sense at all.
Now the president is repackaging cap-and-trade -- again -- as a long-term solution to the oil spill. But it's the same old agenda, a huge energy tax that will raise the cost of gasoline and electricity high enough so that we're forced to use less.
The logic linking cap-and-trade to the spill in the Gulf should frighten anyone who owns a car or truck. Such measures force up the price at the pump -- Harvard Kennedy School's Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs thinks it "may require gas prices greater than $7 a gallon by 2020" to meet Obama's stated goal of reducing emissions 14 percent from the transportation sector.
Of course, doing so would reduce gasoline use and also raise market share for hugely expensive alternative fuels and vehicles that could never compete otherwise. Less gasoline demand means less need for drilling and thus a slightly reduced chance of a repeat of the Deepwater Horizon spill -- but only slightly. Oil will still be a vital part of America's energy mix.
Oil-spill risks should be addressed directly -- such as finding out why the leak occurred and requiring new preventive measures or preparing an improved cleanup plan for the next incident. Cap-and-trade is no fix and would cause trillions of dollars in collateral economic damage along the way.
Emanuel was wrong. The administration shouldn't view each crisis -- including the oil spill -- as an opportunity to be exploited, but as a problem to be addressed. And America can't afford $7-a-gallon gas.
Ben Lieberman is senior analyst of energy and environmental policy in The Heritage Founda tion's Roe Institute.
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::) ::)
You are splitting hairs to try to get out of this you fool. Its not working at all.
Me? HAHA. You made a claim that you can't provide proof for. But yeah... I am the one trying to get out of it.
::)
Keep trying. Or else admit your usual exaggeration only has basis in the daily whining and crying you do. Kind of sucks when you get called on your bullshit and start running in circles doesn't it?
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Pull out a thesaurus jackass. What do you think "I would have PREFERRED pricies to have gone up more gradually" mean to you?
Obama needs and likes energy prices sky high in order to push his enviro-freak agenda.
He said specifically: "Under my plan, rates will skyrocket, they will push that along to consumers"
What does that mean to you moron?
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Still doesn't mean "I like high gas prices".
Still doesn't mean you are anything but a crying whinebag that just got popped exaggerated out of your ass again.
Come back, try again.
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Stop the word games. He said "preferred" them go up up slower than they were. What does that mean to you?
Additionally he already stated his goal is to skyrocket energy prices for people, or did you miss that too?
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What HE said and what YOU claimed he said isn't the same thing.
Now why not admit you were exaggerating in your crying and whining and move along? Why continue to chase your tail in circles when the facts have cleared illustrated you were doing your typical bullshit exaggerating.
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What HE said and what YOU claimed he said isn't the same thing.
Now why not admit you were exaggerating in your crying and whining and move along? Why continue to chase your tail in circles when the facts have cleared illustrated you were doing your typical bullshit exaggerating.
Why would Obama prefer gas prices to go UP, for any reason, at any pace?
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Why would Obama prefer gas prices to go UP, for any reason, at any pace?
I never said he did or didn't. I said that he plainly did not say that he liked high gas prices like 333 claimed he did.
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I never said he did or didn't. I said that he plainly did not say that he liked high gas prices like 333 claimed he did.
::) ::)
Please stop the bullshit. If he didnt like he would say something as follows:
"The price is too high for business and people. We are going to do everytrhing possible to bring the prices down and we will do whatever in our power to do so."
But no - as prices are skyrocketing - he says "I would have preferred them TO GO UP more gradally".
What does that mean to you?
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I never said he did or didn't. I said that he plainly did not say that he liked high gas prices like 333 claimed he did.
You are buffoon. A corpse has more brain activity than you. You think you are somehow intelligent by playing with semantics. Guess again.
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Coming from someone displaying reading skills by Sylvian, you can keep trying again too sissy boy.
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Coming from someone displaying reading skills by Sylvian, you can keep trying again too sissy boy.
::) ::)
Please you moron, just give it up. Word games will not save you from this beat down.
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Word games? I am asking you to prove your statement about what you claimed Obama likes. You haven't.
Yet this is a beat down for me? HAHAHAHAHAHA nice try fatty. You are more delusional than I thought. Which I admit, I thought you were quite a lot in the first place.
Continue on with the whining. The crying. The exaggerating. The hyperbole. You know... the usual day to day existence you bring to the board.
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"I would have PREFERRED them to go up a little slower"
________________________ _______________-
Why would he prefer them to go up at all unless he likes them higher?
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"I LIKE HIGH GAS PRICES"
Not the same thing is it? Seriously you don't understand the difference do you? No wonder you spout such shit.
Hell, by the statement you keep bleating, he didn't even say he preferred them to go up. But instead he preferred them to go up slower. Maybe he didn't want the prices to go up that fast? Hmmm? Another complete difference than what you are lying crying about.
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Yeah ok you fucking asshat. Saying you "prefer" something is really different from saying you "like" something. Got it. ::)
Keep it up moron - you are sinking even further with every idiotic post you make supporting the fool you voted for.
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Preferred it to go up or preferred it to GO UP SLOWLY?
What did your little quote say? HAHHAHAHAAH
Still didn't say he liked high gas prices either way.
Really.... you practice every day to reach this level of stupidity don't you?
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::) ::)
Yeah, keep telling yourself that fool.
Again - if he did not like high energy prices - 99.9% of sensible people which excludes you and the pofsyou suport say something like this:
"Prices are too high, we will do whatever we can to lower them."
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Obama: Cap & trade will have "HUGE SPIKES" in energy costs to people.
His words, not mine.
Why would he even propose that if he did not like it? hhhhmmmm? ? ? ? ? ? ?
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Back to posting videos again? Minute and second where Obama plainly stated he likes high gas prices.
Really now... after this dazzling display of delusional logic, I am beginning to wonder if you have progressed to solid foods yet.
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Back to posting videos again? Minute and second where Obama plainly stated he likes high gas prices.
Really now... after this dazzling display of delusional logic, I am beginning to wonder if you have progressed to solid foods yet.
His stated goal in his own words is to both "skyrocket" and "spike" our energy prices.
What does that tell you moron?
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All I am interested in is where he stated he LIKED HIGH GAS PRICES. Those exact words. Like you made claims to.
So far, you haven't provide a link to it. FAIL.
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no, but he liked it
3 pages and 2 days later, you still can't back up this claim.
Round and round he goes..... chasing his tail like nobody knows......
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Its only with sky high energy prices that he can justify and push his cap & trade scams and other "green energy" schemes.
Again you stupid piece of shit, why is he making his stated goal to "skyrocket" and "spike" our energy costs unless he liked high energy costs?
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3 pages and 2 days later, you still can't back up this claim.
Round and round he goes..... chasing his tail like nobody knows......
Still looking for these exact words.
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http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/commentary/jeff-rubins-smaller-world/how-sustainable-is-growth-with-triple-digit-oil/article1874462/ (http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/commentary/jeff-rubins-smaller-world/how-sustainable-is-growth-with-triple-digit-oil/article1874462/)
With oil prices within spitting distance of triple-digit levels, it may be time to reconsider just how long this recovery will run.
The fact that we’re seeing oil at triple-digit prices in this cycle should come as no surprise. After all, that’s where oil prices ended up last cycle before deep-sixing the global economy. But to see triple-digit prices again this early into what by all historical standards has been a painfully slow global recovery must be disconcerting to a world economy never hungrier for growth.
If merely getting back to pre-recession levels of global industrial production has oil knocking at the gates of triple digits, where do you think crude will be trading should we be fortunate enough to sustain this economic recovery for another year?
If anyone doubts how vital oil is to economic growth, just look at what happened last year. Global oil demand grew at two and a half per cent from the year before (almost double the International Energy Agency’s original forecast for 2010).
China alone added almost one million barrels per day to its daily petroleum diet. Should demand grow by another 2 to 2.5 per cent this year, crude prices could easily be taking out last cycle’s high of $147 (U.S.) per barrel.
But the solution is deep water and ANWAR right? ::)
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Apparently we want less quality water and air, more chasing the dragon right? ::)
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Trump was on the radio and that the OPEC cartel adds a lot to the price and that it is widely agreed that it should be no more than $60 a barrell.
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Trump was on the radio and that the OPEC cartel adds a lot to the price and that it is widely agreed that it should be no more than $60 a barrell.
And? Columbia and Saudi Arabia WON'T even look or invest in more well sources until it's consistently over $100 a barrel. USA has no resources despite what you may think, to make this somehow different. Canada has oil but that too isn't affordably obtained or sourced unless oil remains high. Triple digit being the best marker for major investment in that field.
Now please keep crying about ANWAR and deep water when in reality those issues are non starters. USA has no significant oil reserves that are affordably obtained and long term solutions.
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And? Columbia and Saudi Arabia WON'T even look or invest in more well sources until it's consistently over $100 a barrel. USA has no resources despite what you may think, to make this somehow different. Canada has oil but that too isn't affordably obtained or sourced unless oil remains high. Triple digit being the best marker for major investment in that field.
Now please keep crying about ANWAR and deep water when in reality those issues are non starters. USA has no significant oil reserves that are affordably obtained and long term solutions.
Huh?
What you plan on extracting has to be expensive enough to justify the investment, that's just common knowledge.....but, come on.
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Ex-Shell Head Says Energy Policies Choke Economy
by Heather Caygle
Houston Chronicle 2/11/2011
URL: http://www.rigzone.com/news/article.asp?a_id=104068
Former Shell Oil Co. president John Hofmeister said that the Obama administration's energy policies and regulations are strangling the U.S. economy and preventing the country from decreasing its dependence on foreign oil.
Testifying before the House Energy and Power Subcommittee, the Houston businessman blamed the administration for restricting offshore drilling after the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico last year.
"I believe that the decline" in drilling in the Gulf of Mexico "will be sharper and deeper than what anyone is currently projecting," he told lawmakers. "We have made a horrible error as a country."
Hofmeister was one of six energy experts testifying about the effect of Middle East political unrest, including the ongoing protests in Egypt, on the U.S. oil market. The panelists presented a gloomy view of the America's energy future if restrictions on domestic production remain. The Obama administration lifted a moratorium on deep-water drilling in October, but the government has not approved any projects that would have been blocked by that ban.
"We have a real strangulation by regulation taking place for domestic production at the current time in this country," Hofmeister said.
"It is "absolutely critical to reduce dependence on the Middle East," he said. â??He â??said, for example, that if oil tanker traffic were shut down in the Strait of Hormuz, the price of crude would double or even triple rapidly. Rep. Gene Green, D-Texas, said last year's deep-water moratorium and "endless permitting delays" already have affected production.
Some Democratic committee members said the U.S. should focus more on alternative energy and efficiency.
"The bottom line here is we can't afford to not improve the fuel economy standards for the vehicles which we drive," said Rep. Ed Markey, D-Mass. "That is our No. 1 weapon against the Middle East."
Copyright (c) 2011, Houston Chronicle
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Bump for an explanation why bama is getting a free ride while bush was mercilessly attacked on this.
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Another one bites the dust, just how Obama the Job Destroyer wants it. 400+ more people losing their jobs due to this asshole you morons support.
http://www.usatoday.com/money/companies/2011-02-12-seahawk-drilling_N.htm#
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Obama seeks new drilling inspection fees, higher royalty rates
Fuel Fix ^ | February 14, 2011 at 11:34 am | Jennifer Dlouhy
________________________ ________________________ _______________
Oil and gas companies would face new fees and higher royalty rates under President Barack Obama’s federal budget proposal.
The proposed permit processing charges, annual inspection fees and hiked royalty rates aim to pay for more staff and resources at the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, Regulation and Enforcement while also boosting “the return to taxpayers from mineral production on federal lands and waters,” according to an administration budget document.
“Taxpayers could earn a better return through more rigorous oversight and policy changes, such as charging appropriate fees and reforming how royalties are set,” the budget summary said.
Offshore drillers would face an annual charge of $30,500 per inspection for rigs operating in more than 500 feet of water and an annual $31,500 fee for platforms and other facilities above the water line that have more than 10 wells. All told, the inspection fees would raise more than $60 million in the 2012 fiscal year that begins Oct. 1, according to budget documents.
Similar fees were proposed late last year as a way to fund ongoing improvements at the ocean energy bureau and stitch up vulnerabilities revealed by last year’s Deepwater Horizon disaster. But they have been opposed by the American Petroleum Institute and other industry trade groups, which say the money should instead come from the billions oil and gas companies already send the federal treasury in royalties and bonus bids.
“We’re providing plenty of revenue and are happy to continue doing so,” said Marty Durbin, API’s executive vice president of government affairs. It’s important to make sure the ocean energy bureau and Interior Department “have all the resources they need, but that would be the more appropriate place to get that revenue.”
Obama is seeking more than $500 million to continue reorganizing the ocean energy bureau — formerly known as the Minerals Management Service.
He also wants to charge oil companies new user fees for processing permits to drill on federal lands and waters.
And the White House proposes establishing new “use it or lose it” style fees for non-producing oil and gas leases. Designed “to encourage more timely production,” the administration says the fees would raise a projected $25 million in fiscal 2012.
Oil and gas industry leaders and congressional allies have long fought the use-it-or-lose-it fee proposals on Capitol Hill, by noting that there are already enough financial incentives discouraging companies from sitting inactive on drilling leases.
A summary of the inspection fees proposed by the Obama administration is after the jump.
Below is the administration’s summary of proposed oil and gas inspection fees for the outer continental shelf:
SEC. 109. (a) In fiscal year 2012, the Secretary shall collect non-refundable inspection fees, which shall be deposited in the “Ocean Energy Management” account, from the designated operator for facilities subject to inspection under 43 U.S.C. 1348(c).
(b) Annual fees shall be collected for facilities that are above the water line, excluding drilling rigs, and are in place at the start of the fiscal year. Fees for fiscal year 2012 shall be: (1) $10,500 for facilities with no wells, but with processing equipment or gathering lines; (2) $17,000 for facilities with one to ten wells, with any combination of active or inactive wells; and (3) $31,500 for facilities with more than ten wells, with any combination of active or inactive wells.
(c) Fees for drilling rigs shall be assessed for all inspections completed in fiscal year 2012. Fees for fiscal year 2012 shall be: (1) $30,500 per inspection for rigs operating in water depths of 500 feet or more; and (2) $16,700 per inspection for rigs operating in water depths of less than 500 feet.
(d) The Secretary shall bill designated operators under subsection (b) within 60 days, with payment required within 30 days of billing. The Secretary shall bill designated operators under subsection (c) within 30 days of the end of the month in which the inspection occurred, with payment required within 30 days of billing.
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Great job Obama - maybe you won't be happy till we all are living in tents.
http://fuelfix.com/blog/2011/02/14/white-house-proposes-new-oil-and-gas-taxes
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Ha ha ha ha-
Obama just said at his sham press conference "oil is the energy of the past" in terms of the drilling moritorium.
Two easy questions for this communist maddoff -
1. What is the energy of the present?
2. What is the energy of the future that will replace oil?
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Ha ha ha ha-
Obama just said at his sham press conference "oil is the energy of the past" in terms of the drilling moritorium.
Two easy questions for this communist maddoff -
1. What is the energy of the present?
2. What is the energy of the future that will replace oil?
Windmills and hugs
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Windmills and hugs
He is an embarrassment.
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Judge: Drill Baby Drill
the american spectator ^ | 2/17/11 | Chris Horner
________________________ ________________________ _____________
Federal Court Orders Obama Administration to Act on Stalled Deepwater Drilling Permits
Calls permitting delays "unreasonable, unacceptable and unjustified"
WASHINGTON, D.C. - Today, the Obama Administration's de facto drilling moratorium in the Gulf of Mexico was once again struck down in Federal Court. U.S. District Judge Martin Feldman granted a preliminary injunction requiring that the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, Regulation and Enforcement (BOEMRE) act within 30 days on five pending permit applications from Ensco.
"The court has now clearly found that the Obama Administration's refusal to act on permits is causing irreparable harm to companies, families and people of the Gulf," said House Natural Resources Committee Chairman Doc Hastings. "The President's de facto moratorium is destroying American jobs, hurting our economy and forcing businesses to move overseas.
(Excerpt) Read more at spectator.org ...
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The inflation disaster is near. $5/Gallon gas will shatter the Federal Reserve's plans
American Thinker ^ | 02/23/2011 | Lee Decovnik
www.americanthinker.com
________________________ ________________________ ________________________ ___________-
Five dollar a gallon gas will shatter the Federal Reserve's tightly constrained lid on inflation and accelerate the other half our long anticipated "double dip" recession. Gas and diesel powers America's 141 million cars, 100 million pickups and SUV's, 8.8 million heavy trucks and 6.7 million motorcycles. Oil runs our harvesters, delivers our groceries, cooks our food, heats our houses, propels our jets, fuels our M-1A1 Abrams tanks, and lubricates our bicycles. American business can only absorb a few percentage points increase in oil prices before passing on their additional distribution costs to the consumer. Already the increases in food and clothing prices have been felt at the cash register. Disposable income will inevitably drop along with consumer demand for domestic cars and trucks, imported goods from China, and destination vacations to resorts in the United States, Mexico and the Caribbean. Don't even ask what this means to our already sluggish unemployment numbers.
So, how close are we to $5.00 a gallon gas? This photo was shot yesterday, February 22, 2011. We may look a back at these prices as the "good old days" of inexpensive energy costs.
In June of 2008, Congressman Roy Blunt released the following information about how the House members voted on energy issues. During this time Democrats were the majority party in both the House and Senate.
ANWR Exploration:
House Republicans: 91% Supported
House Democrats: 86% Opposed
Coal-to-Liquid:
House Republicans 97% Supported
House Democrats: 78% Opposed
Oil Shale Exploration:
House Republicans: 90% Supported
House Democrats: 86% Opposed
Outer Continental Shelf (OCS) Exploration:
House Republicans: 81% Supported
House Democrats: 83% Opposed
Refinery-Increased Capacity:
House Republicans: 97% Supported
House Democrats: 96% Opposed
Summary:
91% of House Republicans have historically voted to increase the production of American-made oil and gas, while 86% of House Democrats have historically voted against increasing the production of American-made oil and gas.
In 2009, the United States still imported 51% of all its petroleum requirements, both crude and refined. This continues to be an unacceptably high number in our quest for energy independence. Gas prices remain hostage to the increasing hostile regimes that sell us oil. Our own Department of Energy has proudly halted off shore drilling. With the political unrest in so many oil producing nations, and the long-term obstruction of Democrats to domestic oil exploration and production, American families have begun to pay the steep price for our failed national energy policies. This current Administration has wasted tens of billions of stimulus dollars on solar panel factories and windmills rather than building new oil refineries and using new technologies to recover the oil buried in our own back yard.
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Editorial: $100 Oil Is Devil’s Due For Drilling Bans
IBD Editorials ^ | February 23, 2011 | Staff
Energy: President Obama talks much of moving to sustainable energy. But as he blocks domestic drilling, the reality is he’s outsourced U.S. oil needs to mad-dog dictators like Libya’s Moammar Gadhafi. That’s even less sustainable.
Oil prices hit $100 a barrel Wednesday as thousands of Libyans marched in Tripoli. The crazed Gadhafi vowed to fight to "the last bullet," denouncing his own countrymen as "greasy rats" and turning his weapons of war on 1,000 of them.
He also threatened to incinerate his nation's oil wells as he goes down, an unsubtle suggestion to Big Oil companies operating in his country that they should act to save his regime.
As a result, oil is soaring because markets worry that a string of petro-tyrants will go down like Gadhafi and energy may soon become scarce.
How did it come to this? U.S. dependence on imports — from dictators like Gadhafi — is a big factor.
The problem is that we have no political will to drill. The U.S. has plenty of oil resources. Yet our president seems set on pursuing boutique alternative energy schemes dependent on huge public subsidies.
As that happens, U.S. dependence on imports grows.
(Excerpt) Read more at investors.com ...
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fucko....its not a supply issue..its not a demand issue...its a production/processing issue....oil drilling ban or no drilling band... we would still get no different output because all US refineries are running at capacity... so get some facts and come again...
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Whatever - keep passing the buck.
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Whatever - keep passing the buck.
thats a lazy ass "youre right i dont know what im talking about" response.. there is no passing the buck.. this is you trying to use the buckshot approach to unrightfully blame someone for something they have no control over. Be a smart man for once. Look at the source for your issue and then make a statement.. and educated statement. because this bullshit has gone on long enough.
Now if you arent well versed in oil economy as it pertains to the US. i will help you out.. but "Whatever." thats a 12 year old girls response to shit. Not a grown ass ESQ,..,
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thats a lazy ass "youre right i dont know what im talking about" response.. there is no passing the buck.. this is you trying to use the buckshot approach to unrightfully blame someone for something they have no control over. Be a smart man for once. Look at the source for your issue and then make a statement.. and educated statement. because this bullshit has gone on long enough.
Now if you arent well versed in oil economy as it pertains to the US. i will help you out.. but "Whatever." thats a 12 year old girls response to shit. Not a grown ass ESQ,..,
So what has Obama done in the past 2 years to hep the situation?
NOTHING.
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So what has Obama done in the past 2 years to hep the situation?
NOTHING.
no govt intervention right.. thats what you want correct
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no govt intervention right.. thats what you want correct
Wrong you dipshit. Obama has done the exact opposite of what was needed to be done. He grossly intervened to cut off our ability to become independent of arabian oil and has never missed an opportunity to enact one WTF policy after the other.
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Wrong you dipshit. Obama has done the exact opposite of what was needed to be done. He grossly intervened to cut off our ability to become independent of arabian oil and has never missed an opportunity to enact one WTF policy after the other.
so what was the reason for 4.50 gas in 2008 (pre obama) please tell me
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so what was the reason for 4.50 gas in 2008 (pre obama) please tell me
Simple... buying commodities on the NYSE.
When prices are set by people buying commodities, there is an artificial inflation of sorts.
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so what was the reason for 4.50 gas in 2008 (pre obama) please tell me
Speculation, GWB's reckless dollar policies, his abandonment of domestic exploration, etc. I have said this many times.
Obama continued all of those WTF policies, and doubled down on stupid with his cap and trade insanity, bizarre gulf drilling bans, refusal to agree to the canadian pipeline, cutting off the alaska pipeline for future increases, etc.
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Simple... buying commodities on the NYSE.
When prices are set by people buying commodities, there is an artificial inflation of sorts.
but this asshole think it has to deal with the amount of oil available to us.. fuckin dumbass
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but this asshole think it has to deal with the amount of oil available to us.. fuckin dumbass
::) ::)
Yeah - Because Option Dumb as Shit knows more than the CEO of Shell John Hofmeister who says he opposite. ::) ::) ::)
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::) ::)
Yeah - Because Option Dumb as Shit knows more than the CEO of Shell John Hofmeister who says he opposite. ::) ::) ::)
Why would you believe the CEO of a company who wants prices to go up?
Of course he will place blame wherever he wants to... he's getting the money from it.
He has no incentive to be honest.
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::) ::) Right. Only the communists in the EPA are honest, only the supremely pure enviro freaks are honest, only obama is honest.
Between Obama's WTF monetary policies, his bizarre energy policies, his utterly failed foreign policies, all the pressures n energy prices are on the upside.
And please tell me ONE CLAIM in this clip that you think is a lie.
Even one!
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::) ::) Right. Only the communists in the EPA are honest, only the supremely pure enviro freaks are honest, only obama is honest.
Between Obama's WTF monetary policies, his bizarre energy policies, his utterly failed foreign policies, all the pressures n energy prices are on the upside.
And please tell me ONE CLAIM in this clip that you think is a lie.
Even one!
Firstly, who is talking about the environment?
I'm not... I'm just talking about price... period.
I don't give a damn what the EPA or some environmental group or even Obama has to say about it.
Why are you talking about environmental groups and their honesty? That is not EVEN REMOTELY the point.
The point I made, which you can not deny... Is that the CEO of a company has absolutely no incentive to tell the truth about the price of oil... period. He wants oil to go up because for whatever reason, if it goes up, he gets to charge more... period.
Why do you go off on some of these tangents?
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Firstly, who is talking about the environment?
I'm not... I'm just talking about price... period.
I don't give a damn what the EPA or some environmental group or even Obama has to say about it.
Why are you talking about environmental groups and their honesty? That is not EVEN REMOTELY the point.
The point I made, which you can not deny... Is that the CEO of a company has absolutely no incentive to tell the truth about the price of oil... period. He wants oil to go up because for whatever reason, if it goes up, he gets to charge more... period.
Why do you go off on some of these tangents?
Whatever - the guy is an ex-ceo. But again - please tell me one thing he said you think is a lie? Name one lie you think he tells in this clip?
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So let me get this straight.. 3333 thinks that there is a shortage or lower supply of Oil which is caused by Obama and thats why our gas prices are up.. because there is not enought available oil.. Wow.. and he has the nerve to call someone dumb.. thats the dumbest shit i have heard on this site...
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One can easily make the argument that Obama's policies have further increased our dependency on foreign oil.
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One can easily make the argument that Obama's policies have further increased our dependency on foreign oil.
you talkin about after the oil spewed in the gulf.. that he is weary of offshor drilling?
like that?
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you talkin about after the oil spewed in the gulf.. that he is weary of offshor drilling?
like that?
Its EVERYTHING. Do you even read the news? Ifyou say no because you are studying cadavers - fine, thats cool. But damn you really seem out of it lately.
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Its EVERYTHING. Do you even read the news? Ifyou say no because you are studying cadavers - fine, thats cool. But damn you really seem out of it lately.
no.. i sure dont.. i just played your ass.. you think simple supply and demand apply in this case.. and it dosent.. thats the alarming part..
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no.. i sure dont.. i just played your ass.. you think simple supply and demand apply in this case.. and it dosent.. thats the alarming part..
::) ::)
Supply & Demand is certainly part of it. The spectre of less supply in the future for a variety of reasons drives the price higher.
WTF is wrong with you?
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Whatever - the guy is an ex-ceo. But again - please tell me one thing he said you think is a lie? Name one lie you think he tells in this clip?
The first thing he mentioned is traders!
He talks about Diesel shortages and maybe I'm not the guy to know this... but did we have Diesel shortages? Really? When?
I don't think that the policies are the issue... So I think that his blame of the administration is a lie.
The bottom line is that administration doesn't cause prices to go up or down... I also think that his 3 points are EXTREMELY speculative... EXTREMELY.
He didn't relay any fact what so ever about why he was worried... He just said he was concerned by these things.
I do agree with his premise of increasing the US oil production and creating jobs.
He admits that the stats also don't add up for his ideals... Numbers don't lie though do they?
Do you not believe that it is better to suck the oil out of the middle east first, thereby creating a demand from US oil at a later date and allowing us to create a higher price for oil to the rest of the world?
I really don't see what I should think he lied about... He didn't really say much of anything.
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::) ::)
Supply & Demand is certainly part of it. The spectre of less supply in the future for a variety of reasons drives the price higher.
WTF is wrong with you?
OMG.. thats the game you idiot... its all a game you fucktard.. they need a reason. but simple "we aint got it" aint it.. its not like how availability of cotton effected the price of a tshirt.. there isnt as much cotton as before..
But the gas... there are shit tons of it.. Dude you fuckin asshole retard.. Please explain to me how, if simple supply and demand was the reason for the oil hikes.. how in the fuck do the oil companies record record profits during those same years.. jesus you are so dumb.. your extreme mancrush on obama has clouded your judgement..
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No, not at all, I dont want to have more soldiers die as part of our gamble.
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OMG.. thats the game you idiot... its all a game you fucktard.. they need a reason. but simple "we aint got it" aint it.. its not like how availability of cotton effected the price of a tshirt.. there isnt as much cotton as before..
But the gas... there are shit tons of it.. Dude you fuckin asshole retard.. Please explain to me how, if simple supply and demand was the reason for the oil hikes.. how in the fuck do the oil companies record record profits during those same years.. jesus you are so dumb.. your extreme mancrush on obama has clouded your judgement..
The companies did not set the prices fool. They bought it and sold it and made a profit.
And notice when I posted this thread you dope - it was before all of thisME stuff and prices have been going up since.
of curse you ignore that.
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The companies did not set the prices fool. They bought it and sold it and made a profit.
And notice when I posted this thread you dope - it was before all of thisME stuff and prices have been going up since.
of curse you ignore that.
Oh my god.. are you a fuckin idiot
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Oh my god.. are you a fuckin idiot
Does Exxon set the price? YES or NO?
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Does Exxon set the price? YES or NO?
i swear you dumb..If it was a supply thing.,.. they wouldnt be able to have RECORD profits... Correct?
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Didn't read the 9 pages of thread yet.... but do you realize how much 'fluff' and markup and union spending/appeasing bullshit takes place in the oil companies?
Gas could easily be half what it costs.
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BOOM
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BOOM
Boom what?
Tell me genius - who sets the price of gasoline we pay at the pump?
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Boom what?
Tell me genius - who sets the price of gasoline we pay at the pump?
GREEDY FUCKS.. WHO CAN
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GREEDY FUCKS.. WHO CAN
And why is that?
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Hamid Karzai was a "consultant" for unocal.. you do the math
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Gas prices are set by the fuel companies and suppliers. Most stations add a few pennies or percentage on top of what fuel is delivered to them for.
You are being intellectually dishonest if you think the cost of gas is subject to actual fair market forces.
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Gas prices are set by the fuel companies and suppliers. Most stations add a few pennies or percentage on top of what fuel is delivered to them for.
You are being intellectually dishonest if you think the cost of gas is subject to actual fair market forces.
I think the game is rigged, but i do in terms of there no actually being a free market.
The things in society where there is a free market - prices keep going lower, better services, etc.
I remember paying $3,400 for a toshiba lptop back in 1993 for college cause i had to. Looking back, that thing probably could not hadle even the most basic application today. Yet today, you can get a netbook for $249 which ha more power than a computer of $4,000 of years ago.
Free market works when it is tried.
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I think the game is rigged, but i do in terms of there no actually being a free market.
The things in society where there is a free market - prices keep going lower, better services, etc.
I remember paying $3,400 for a toshiba lptop back in 1993 for college cause i had to. Looking back, that thing probably could not hadle even the most basic application today. Yet today, you can get a netbook for $249 which ha more power than a computer of $4,000 of years ago.
Free market works when it is tried.
Gas isn't going to get cheaper. It's not technology.
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oil has to be the most rigged commodity on the market.
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oil has to be the most rigged commodity on the market.
Exactly!
A small group can directly control the price fluctuation by buying and holding and selling when it's time to do so.
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Libya oil production to shut down completely-BofA
Thu, Feb 24 2011
LONDON, Feb 24 (Reuters) - Oil production in Libya is expected to shut down completely and could be lost for a prolonged period of time, Bank of America Merrill Lynch said on Thursday.
"We expect Libyan production to be shut down completely and we might lose sweet crudes from Libya for a prolonged period of time," Bank of America Merrill Lynch analyst Sabine Schels told Reuters.
Schels said that the world faced the prospect of real supply shock in which the loss of 1.6 million barrels per day of sweet oil could potentially trigger a steep rise in prices and force a sharp reduction in demand to balance the system.
"Some of the supply can be replaced with Saudi light crude and some from SPR, but if the disruption is prolonged, we will need demand to drop to balance the system," Schels said.
The bank is currently discussing scenarios and outlooks, and will publish a report on its findings in the coming days.
"We already faced a demand shock last year with global demand increasing by 2.8 million bpd and on top of that, what we have now is a real supply shock," Schels said.
"In a price shock scenario whereby we lose 1.6 million bpd, the rise in prices can be a lot greater than in the case of a demand shock. (Reporting by Jessica Donati; editing by Marguerita Choy)
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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.
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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.”
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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 ...
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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 ...
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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
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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.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
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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
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I thought Noble Energy was issued a permit yesterday.
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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.
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PLEASE ANYONE TELL ME HOW THIS HELPS ANYONE -
ANYONE?
ANYONE?
ANYONE?
BTW - F U whoever still supports this admn.
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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"
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Dumbest MOFO ever to hold office.
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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.
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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.
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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!
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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. ::)
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(http://funkydowntown.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/06/bird-Victims-of-the-BP-Oil-Spill-into-Gulf-of-Mexico-9.jpg)
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(http://www.blogspan.org/images/blogs/7-2007/high-gas-prices-hurt-consumer-spending.jpg)
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They don't let facts get in their way, that's for sure. :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.
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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. ::)
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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
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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.
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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.
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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
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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. ::)
What a doofus! I've been talking about rising prices for a looong time. Nothing Obama or any subsequent president can do will lower it to a sustainable level for anything long term. The trend in oil will continue to rise long term as a) access to easy oil runs lower and lower, b) the only oil sources left become expensive and cost prohibitive unless oil rises continually and stays there.
This is the truth but hey i'm from the 'far left' so i know nothing. What a tool. ::)
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;)
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Jeff Rubin: Only A Recession Stands In The Way Of $200 Oil
Gus Lubin | Mar. 2, 2011, 4:13 PM | 579 | 2
Congratulations to Jeff Rubin, who predicted triple digit oil by the end of 2010 -- he's just a few weeks off.
The former chief economist at CIBC says this is about more than chaos in the Middle East. He points out on his blog that Brent crude was above $100 per barrel before protests erupted in Tahrir Square.
Now for his next prediction. Rubin says oil is heading to $200 unless the oil spike throws the world into recession:
When I first predicted $200 per barrel oil prices in 2008 as the chief economist of CIBC World Markets, it was in the context of expecting another four years of global economic growth. Of course, that didn’t take into account the impact of triple digit prices on fuel-dependent GDP growth. Even $147 per barrel prices brought global economic growth to a screeching halt.
It is all the more remarkable that despite triggering the world’s deepest post-war recession and a rare, albeit temporary decline in global oil consumption, oil prices had already soared back to triple digit levels even before the Arab revolt.
And it will be difficult to keep prices from moving even higher as investors start piling on the oil bandwagon, particularly when they see most of Saudi Arabia’s much touted four million a barrel a day excess capacity is largely of the fictional variety while, at the same time, noticing how little effect monetary tightening is having on restraining China’s exploding fuel demand.
Another way to look at this is recession now or recession later.
Don't Miss: Peak Oil Guru Robert Hirsch Gives The Definitive Guide To The Energy Crisis
Tags: Oil, Peak Oil | Get Alerts for these topics
Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/jeff-rubin-only-a-recession-stands-in-the-way-of-200-oil-2011-3#ixzz1FTzkvDK4
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And nothing Obama can do about it. Haha thanks for posting Rubin he's been on this for a looong time now. And gulf oil has very little to do with it. Self owned.
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And nothing Obama can do about it. Haha thanks for posting Rubin he's been on this for a looong time now. And gulf oil has very little to do with it. Self owned.
yeah self owned KC - got it. ::)
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yeah self owned KC - got it. ::)
Are you or are you not posting an economist who believes we are at or near the peak and that oil will only go up?
I believe you are, i have read and do read Rubins work quite a bit and really you have just strengthened the position i have that no amount of drilling will bring oil down to sustainable levels because oil is become more and more expensive to find and use in further and further away places.
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Whatever kc. Its not only drilling, its the no coal, no nukes, no refineries, no natural gas, devaluing the dollar , wtf policies at treasury and the fed, etc.
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- The Foundry: Conservative Policy News. - http://blog.heritage.org -
Morning Bell: How Obama Is Making Gas Prices Higher
Posted By Conn Carroll On March 3, 2011 @ 9:10 am In Energy and Environment | 53 Comments
Yesterday, for the first time since September 2008, the price of a barrel of crude oil topped $100 [1] on the New York Mercantile Exchange. But while the recent unrest in the Middle East has had some marginal effect on rising prices, the most significant factor has been increased oil demand worldwide. That is why, long before the recent protests even began, analysts were predicting $4 a gallon by this summer [2] and $5 a gallon by 2012 [3]. Anyone could have predicted that the recovering world economy, coupled with the continued growth of India and China, was going to push oil prices higher. So if an Administration wanted to keep gas prices down, they could have mitigated increased oil demand by increasing domestic oil production. But that is not what the Obama Administration has done. Instead of increasing domestic oil supplies, the Obama Administration has cut them at every opportunity, and Americans are now suffering because of those choices.
Back in February, when the protests in Egypt were first unfolding, Energy Secretary Steven Chu was asked what the Administration could do to combat rising world oil prices. Chu responded [4]: “The best way America can protect itself against these incidents is to decrease our dependency on foreign oil, in fact to diversify our supply.” It is now one month later and the Administration has not updated its talking points. Pressed on gas prices yesterday, White House spokesman Jay Carney said [5]: “We are also, as you have seen over the past two-plus years, very focused on the need precisely to develop other energy sources so that we are not as dependent on foreign oil as we have been in the past.” So what are these “other energy sources” the White House has been developing? How does the White House plan to “diversify supply” to reduce gas prices? The answers are corn, wind, sun, and electric cars. And they won’t help a bit.
According to Heritage analysts Nick Loris and John Ligon, Obama’s energy policy consists of [6]: increased biofuel production, increased electric vehicle production, and increased renewable power production. These are all terrible public policies. The major source of biomass production, corn-based ethanol, produces less energy per unit volume than gasoline, contributes to food price increases, costs taxpayers $4 billion to produce 2 percent of the total gasoline supply, and has dubious environmental effects. The electric cars the Obama Administration has invested in are prohibitively costly, do not fit the needs of the American consumer, and are also environmentally suspect. The other sources of energy the Obama Administration is subsidizing and promoting—wind and solar—not only make up a minuscule 1 percent of America’s electricity generation but are entirely irrelevant to gasoline supply in the transportation sector.
But not only has President Obama failed to diversify our energy supply in any meaningful way; he has actually proactively moved to cut our own domestic energy supplies [7]:
•First, Interior Secretary Ken Salazar canceled 77 leases for oil and gas drilling in Utah in his first month in office. According to the U.S. Department of the Interior and the Bureau of Land Management, there are 800 billion barrels (a moderate estimate) of recoverable oil from oil shale in the Green River Formation, which goes through Colorado, Utah, and Wyoming. This is three times greater than the proven oil reserves of Saudi Arabia.
•Then last summer, President Obama needlessly instituted not one but two outright drilling bans in the Gulf of Mexico. The Energy Information Administration estimates that President Obama’s offshore drilling ban will cut domestic offshore oil production by 13 percent this year.
•Last fall, Interior Secretary Salazar announced that the eastern Gulf of Mexico, the Atlantic coast, and the Pacific coast will not be developed, effectively banning drilling in those areas for the next seven years. At least 19 billion barrels of easily recoverable oil lie off the currently restricted Pacific and Atlantic coasts and the eastern Gulf of Mexico.
•President Obama has also failed to open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, where an estimated 10 billion barrels of oil lie beneath a few thousand acres that can be accessed with minimal environmental impact. Those 10 billion barrels are equivalent to 16 years’ worth of imports from Saudi Arabia at the current rate.
“The Obama Administration is repeating the mistakes of President Jimmy Carter’s failed energy policies, which marred his term and stigmatized the 1970s. They are leading us straight into another national energy disaster,” Steve Forbes warned [8] in Politico yesterday. And what would that “energy disaster” cost the American people? According to The Heritage Foundation’s Center for Data Analysis [6], an increase in the per-barrel price of imported crude oil by $10 in the first quarter of 2011 and by $20 in the second quarter would reduce gross domestic product by $20 billion, drop potential employment by nearly 100,000 jobs, and increase gasoline prices by 18 cents per gallon in 2011 alone.
Yesterday, Carney said that “the president is extremely aware of the impact that a spike in oil prices can have on gasoline prices and therefore on the wallets and pocketbooks of average Americans.” If that is true, and if Energy Secretary Chu really has recanted his belief that Americans ought to be paying $8 a gallon for gas [9], then the President must completely reverse his entire energy policy so far by allowing Americans to develop our own natural resources, issuing permits in a timely manner, and removing regulatory and litigation delays on energy projects [6].
Quick Hits:
•According to a new book, President Obama believes racism is a “key component” of the Tea Party [10] movement.
•A gunman shouting “Allahu Akbar” [11] opened fire on a bus carrying U.S. airmen in Frankfurt, Germany, killing two and wounding two.
•The Ohio state Senate approved legislation that prohibits public-employee unions from bargaining [12] over health benefits and pensions while also eliminating their ability to strike.
•The Wisconsin state Senate passed a new rule fining any Senator who misses two or more days of session [13] $100 a day.
•House Budget Committee chairman Paul Ryan (R–WI) says [14] that President Obama has failed to produce a plan to shore up Medicare as required by a 2003 Medicare law.
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Article printed from The Foundry: Conservative Policy News.: http://blog.heritage.org
URL to article: http://blog.heritage.org/2011/03/03/morning-bell-how-obama-is-making-gas-prices-higher/
URLs in this post:
[1] the price of a barrel of crude oil topped $100: http://www.dallasnews.com/business/headlines/20110302-crude-oil-tops-100-per-barrel-for-first-time-since-2008.ece
[2] $4 a gallon by this summer: http://www.necn.com/12/31/10/Stocks-quietly-finish-mixedOil-prices-ri/landing.html?&blockID=3&apID=75f4dca7c13b4504965409c7a00b1b8f
[3] $5 a gallon by 2012: http://abcnews.go.com/US/oil-executive-gas-prices-soar-2011-2012/story?id=12509267
[4] responded: http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-503544_162-20029935-503544.html
[5] said: http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalpunch/2011/03/what-is-the-white-house-doing-about-oil-prices-todays-qs-for-os-wh-322011.html
[6] consists of: http://www.heritage.org/Research/Reports/2011/03/What-To-Do-About-High-Oil-Prices
[7] proactively moved to cut our own domestic energy supplies: http://blog.heritage.org/2011/01/07/gas-prices-under-president-obama-in-pictures/
[8] warned: http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0311/50417.html
[9] Energy Secretary Chu really has recanted his belief that Americans ought to be paying $8 a gallon for gas: http://sf.streetsblog.org/2009/04/24/steven-chu-forced-to-recant-belief-in-higher-gas-prices/
[10] President Obama believes racism is a “key component” of the Tea Party: http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2011/03/02/obama-says-race-a-key-component-in-tea-party-protests?PageNr=3
[11] “Allahu Akbar”: http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/gunman-shouting-allah-akbar-kills-us-airmen-germany/story?id=13037467
[12] prohibits public-employee unions from bargaining: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704005404576176812441615134.html?mod=WSJ_hp_LEFTTopStories
[13] fining any Senator who misses two or more days of session: http://www.620wtmj.com/news/local/117248828.html
[14] says: http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0311/50548.html
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The End of the Drilling Permitorium? Guess Again
Pajamas Media ^ | March 4, 2011 | Jazz Shaw
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The first permit issued for drilling in the Gulf since the Obama administration declared a moratorium is ... not for a new well at all.
Supporters of a sane, productive national energy policy must surely be popping champagne corks and blasting their vuvuzelas all across the land this week. After 314 days of the United States government holding the nation’s oil industry hostage in a fashion which hearkened back to the Carter administration, the first deep water drilling permit in the Gulf of Mexico has been issued.
Or has it?
As The Hayride points out, this wasn’t actually a new permit. It was awarded to Noble Energy for a well at the Santiago project, located off the coast of Louisiana, not far from the scene of the Deepwater Horizon blowout. Last summer the operators had already drilled more than 13,500 feet down, well on their way to the estimated 19,000 feet required to reach the oil when they encountered an obstruction. The permit in question was actually permission to bypass that obstruction and complete the original job.
None of that stopped Michael Bromwich, head of the Obama administration’s Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, Regulation and Enforcement, (BOEMRE) from proclaiming it a glorious benchmark in the efforts of the oil industry to work with the federal government.
“This is a new well in the sense it is going into a reservoir and therefore was barred under the moratorium,” Bromwich said. ”So we treat an application for a bypass like this much as we do for new wells. I don’t think it’s right to say, ‘Oh it’s just a bypass so its not as significant as a permit for a new well.’”
The truth is that there is a significant difference which the administration is attempting to downplay. This was a well which was nearly completed at the time of the BP accident and it could have been online and producing long ago. But even though there were no serious concerns raised about this rig, they have been forced to jump through one hoop after another, installing new equipment and documenting modified protocols for months on end.
None of that is a bad thing in and of itself. While human error and a cascading series of mechanical failures were to blame for Deepwater Horizon, a potential weakness in standard systems was identified and energy developers needed to respond. And they have.
The problem is that BOEMRE isn’t going to accept — at least at this point — a new safety system being put in place for the industry or each individual company. They currently want a discrete review conducted for each and every individual drill site permit, no matter how repetitive, with the same level of reporting and review required before the necessary paper is issued. Industry insiders have already expressed private concerns that such a system will continue a de facto permitorium indefinitely.
So how did this one approval slip through the ropes and into the ring? It’s a fairly safe bet that the president is feeling the pressure not only of public opinion and pleas from the energy industry, but from two separate courts effectively holding him in contempt for not obeying an order to get the oil rigs back in business. If they can show that some permits are going out it will probably lend some ammunition to the defense in their efforts to maintain the status quo.
But even issuing one single permit, no matter how many safety precautions have been put in place, won’t be enough to satisfy some of Obama’s hard-core anti-drilling base. Observe the reaction of David Dayen of Firedoglake fame upon learning that the Santiago well was not owned entirely by Noble Energy, but also in large part by — wait for it — British Petroleum. The phrase “fit to be tied” leaps to mind.
Putting two and two together, there does seem to be a pattern emerging which could lend itself to theories about how Barack Obama plans to keep his base happy as he faces a decidedly uphill battle for a second term. I’m not generally one given to conspiracy theories, but I may have to take a fresh look at the comments of one of his prospective challengers this week.
Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour, a potential presidential contender, accused the Obama administration Wednesday of favoring a run-up in gas prices to prod consumers to buy more fuel-efficient cars.
Barbour cited 2008 comments from Steven Chu, now President Barack Obama’s energy secretary, that a gradual increase in gasoline taxes could coax consumers into dumping their gas-guzzlers and finding homes closer to where they work. Chu, then a Nobel Prize-winning professor, argued that higher costs per gallon could force investments in alternative fuels and spur cleaner energy sources.
I’d really prefer not to think along those lines. Maybe my rose colored glasses are welded too firmly to the bridge of my nose, but I would hope that any sitting president would do anything in their power to avoid inflicting more economic pain on a nation already struggling with a fiscal crisis like this one. But then again, I also keep clinging to the idea that Devo will have another top ten hit any day now.
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Bump.
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Interior appeals oil drilling ruling
By: Dan Berman and Darren Goode
March 4, 2011 10:18 PM EST
www.politico.com
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The Obama administration has fired another shot in the fight over the speed with which the Interior Department is — or isn’t — letting oil drillers resume work in the Gulf of Mexico after last year’s Deepwater Horizon explosion and oil spill.
The administration late Friday appealed a judge’s orders directing the department to act on several pending Gulf Coast deep-water drilling permits.
Gulf state lawmakers and the oil industry have accused the department of dragging its feet on the permits, enacting a de facto moratorium against new drilling, while the department has said it needs to ensure that safety and environmental protections are in place.
Friday’s appeal challenges rulings by U.S. District Judge Martin Feldman, who on Feb. 17 gave the department 30 days to make a verdict on five pending deep-water drilling permit applications. He later added two permits to that order.
Interior Secretary Ken Salazar hinted at the appeal during a Senate hearing Wednesday.
Feldman “in my view is wrong,” Salazar said. “And we will argue the case because I don’t believe that the court has the jurisdiction to basically tell the Department of the Interior what my administrative responsibilities are.”
“The policy we have in mind is unmistakingly clear,” he added. “We are moving forward with the development of oil and gas” production.
Earlier in February, the judge held the department in contempt, citing its “dismissive conduct” in blocking offshore drilling during last year’s spill.
The delay in issuing permits since last year’s Gulf oil spill is “increasingly inexcusable,” Feldman wrote.
The Interior Department on Monday announced the approval of the first deep-water drilling permit held up since last year’s spill. The permit, issued to Noble Energy for a well partly owned by BP, was not one of those that Feldman’s ruling addressed.
© 2011 Capitol News Company, LLC
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Yeah, Obama wants lower oil prices. ::) ::) ::)
Typhoid Barry is his name for a reason.
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BUMP
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Oil May Rise as Federal Reserve Stimulus Plan Weakens Dollar, Survey Shows
By Mark Shenk - Nov 5, 2010 12:00 AM ET
Business Exchange
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Crude may increase next week after the Federal Reserve announced plans for bond purchases, weakening the dollar, a Bloomberg News survey showed.
Twenty-nine of 49 analysts, or 59 percent, forecast crude oil will rise through Nov. 12. Thirteen respondents, or 27 percent, predicted prices will fall and seven estimate there would be little change. Last week, 54 percent said futures would decline.
The dollar tumbled after the Federal Open Market Committee said on Nov. 3 the central bank will purchase as much as $600 billion of assets through June under a program known as quantitative easing. When the U.S. currency declines investors purchase raw materials as a store of value.
“The market is going higher, higher, higher,” said Peter Beutel, president of Cameron Hanover Inc., a trading-advisory company in New Canaan, Connecticut. “Everything is being interpreted as being bullish here: quantitative easing, inventories that appear to have peaked, equities at new highs for the year, the dollar at new lows for the year and demand that appears to be improving.”
U.S. gasoline inventories fell 2.69 million barrels to 212.3 million last week, the lowest level since Nov. 20, 2009, the Energy Department said on Nov. 3. Supplies of distillate fuel, a category that includes heating oil and diesel, fell 3.57 million barrels to 164.9 million. It was the biggest drop in distillate fuel supplies since the week ended Sept. 19, 2008.
Crude oil for December delivery has increased $5.06, or 6.2 percent, to $86.49 a barrel this week on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Prices are up 7.6 percent from a year ago.
The oil survey has correctly predicted the direction of futures 47 percent of the time since its start in April 2004.
Bloomberg’s survey of oil analysts and traders, conducted
each Thursday, asks for an assessment of whether crude oil
futures are likely to rise, fall or remain neutral in the coming
week. The results were:
RISE NEUTRAL FALL
29 7 13
To contact the reporter on this story: Mark Shenk in New York at mshenk1@bloomberg.net
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Dan Stets at dstets@bloomberg.net
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Please reada book fo once.
Lets see that was even before the ME flare up.
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Why do you keep bumping this? The rise in oil price has very little to do with what any president can do and will continue that way into the future. You could have the most pro drill president ever and the price would probably dip $10 for a year then continue it's ever increasing rise, leaving a legacy of pollution in its wake. If you're so pro oil why not move to the gulf coast and feel the effects of the policies you so desperately want introduced?
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Why do you keep bumping this? The rise in oil price has very little to do with what any president can do and will continue that way into the future. You could have the most pro drill president ever and the price would probably dip $10 for a year then continue it's ever increasing rise, leaving a legacy of pollution in its wake. If you're so pro oil why not move to the gulf coast and feel the effects of the policies you so desperately want introduced?
dude...it rained last night.. its obamas fault in this pricks eyes
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dude...it rained last night.. its obamas fault in this pricks eyes
I can't wait to see the bullshit justifications you give in a year to defend voting a second term for the messiah.
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I can't wait to see the bullshit justifications you give in a year to defend voting a second term for the messiah.
i dont justify anything.. but i dont lie either
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Oh yeah and in case you still don't get it - Exxon has stated that "The 10-year average reserves replacement ratio is 121 percent, with liquids replacement at 95 percent and gas at 158 percent."
That's crude oil. So over the next 10 years one of the biggest oil companies in the world says for every barrel of oil they produce, they will find .95 of crude. That means reliance on higher priced oil extraction methods such as oil sands and shale, which i will add, are only economically affordable with triple digit oil prices. Do the math and tell me where the price of oil is going?
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Oh yeah bama's fault, gulf of mexico rigs and anwar destruction = $50 a barrel right? ::)
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Why We Need to Drill Here and Drill Now
Pajamas Media ^ | March 8, 2011 | Steve Everly
The president's policy won't create more energy — or more jobs.
It is truly astonishing how the Obama administration has not only failed to address the problem of rising gasoline prices, but actually spent the last two years making the problem worse.
In 2008, with a federal offshore drilling ban in place and a Congress that cared little for allowing more domestic energy production, gasoline prices began to spike toward $4 per gallon. With billions of barrels available for development offshore, our government’s decision to keep those resources under lock and key received the justified scorn of Americans who suddenly had to work longer just so they could afford to drive to and from work.
With the entire country holding their feet to the fire — even then-candidate Obama reversed his position on offshore drilling — Congress finally lifted the offshore moratorium in September 2008.
So what did candidate Obama do when he became president? He and his administration spent two years recreating the same web of regulations and bans that led to record-high gasoline prices in the first place.
Upon taking office, President Obama’s Department of Interior, led by Ken Salazar, began taking deliberate steps to reduce domestic drilling. From canceling oil and gas leases throughout the American West to banning offshore production to refusing to issue deep water drilling permits, the Obama administration has imposed virtually the same regulatory agenda that Americas soundly rejected in 2008.
The result of these policies is also the same as last time. Oil prices above $100 per barrel for the first time since 2008. Two years ago the Energy Information Administration predicted a 9% increase in domestic production for 2011, but because of the Obama administration’s bans and delays on offshore drilling, EIA now projects a decline of 220,000 barrels per day in 2011. Several drilling rigs have left the Gulf, and at least one major drilling company, Seahawk Drilling, was forced to file for bankruptcy after “an unprecedented decline in the issuance of offshore drilling permits,” according to Seahawk’s CEO.
Meanwhile, gasoline is heading back to $4 per gallon. Prices at the pump set a nationwide record for February, and some experts are predicting $5 per gallon gas by year’s end. Recent unrest in the Middle East has intensified the situation and caused prices to spike even further.
What is the White House doing in response to these rising costs?
President Obama thinks Americans should just “ride out” the situation and hope that prices will stabilize. The deputy secretary of energy says OPEC has “ample supplies” of oil, and the administration’s position is to hope that foreign dictators “will continue to support our economic recovery.” Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner says consumers just shouldn’t worry about higher prices, while White House economic adviser Austan Goolsbee miraculously claims that high gasoline prices won’t hurt the economy.
In fact, the president’s latest budget actually includes billions of dollars in new taxes on American oil production, which will further increase gas and diesel prices, kill more American jobs, and increase our dependence on overseas energy.
New taxes won’t create more American energy, and Americans deserve a better response than being lectured with “don’t worry, be happy.”
We have more than 80 billion barrels of oil offshore in the Outer Continental Shelf, more than 10 billion barrels in one small portion of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, and an astounding 800 billion barrels – three times the proven reserves of Saudi Arabia — in shale oil deposits in parts of Wyoming, Colorado, and Utah.
All of these resources represent opportunities to lower prices at the pump and boost the American economy. A recent study, for example, found that offshore drilling in Alaska could create 50,000 new American jobs every year and generate $160 billion in new federal revenues. Additional offshore and onshore drilling could create hundreds of thousands of additional jobs and generate even greater revenues, which could be used to reduce the massive federal deficit.
But all of these resources are also off limits due to Obama administration policies.
For the past two years America has been transformed back into a grand laboratory for the anti-drilling ideology that defined our energy policy for three decades. It didn’t work then, it’s not working now, and it won’t work in the future.
It’s time to end the senseless bans on oil and gas drilling so we can permanently lower gasoline prices, create more American jobs, and lessen our dependence on foreign dictators for our energy supplies.
It’s time to move forward with responsible American energy production.
It’s time to drill here and drill now.
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IBD/TIPP Poll: Americans Back Offshore, ANWR Drilling
Investor's Business Daily ^ | 3/7/2011 | Sean Higgins
With the price of gas up 39 cents at the pump in a month and heading higher amid turmoil in much of the Middle East, Americans wonder why the U.S. isn't doing more to exploit its own oil resources.
They favor drilling in territorial waters, 67%-29%, according to a new IBD/TIPP poll. That is up from 61%-30% from last May and 64%-25% when Republicans touted drilling in the 2008 election as oil topped $147 a barrel.
There's also been a solid shift toward drilling in Alaska's Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, with support at 54%-40%. That's up from 49%-43% last year.
(Excerpt) Read more at investors.com ...
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Americans back it because most of America doesn't live anywhere near ANWR and most of America is as ill informed as you 333. Drilling for oil will not lower prices in the long term. It may have some effect on short term prices, but they will continue to go up. The fact we are even talking about drilling in anwr, which poses geographical challenges for transporting the oil, not to mention the environmental impact of any kind of mishap, shows just how scare oil really is, and why it would HAVE to stay high in order for the economics to make sense in drilling in deeper and deeper water and further and further away from our major ports and cities. Do you not see the issue here? If the oil was easily removable it would have been done a long time ago. The cost must be high enough to sustain development of more technologically advanced methods of extraction in even more remote places on Earth. That alone tells you what impact this will have on oil prices - zilch. It may stop it's rise for a few years but it will not cause a downward trend because quite simple - the cost of extraction, transportation etc will not allow it. Unless you propose a government subsidy to offset the losses.
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Americans back it because most of America doesn't live anywhere near ANWR and most of America is as ill informed as you 333.
"I'm a far-lefty, thus I'm better than you and know what's best for you. I'm never wrong. Ever."
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"I'm a far-lefty, thus I'm better than you and know what's best for you. I'm never wrong. Ever."
Oh it's mr generalization back to post generalizations about a topic he less knowledge than his 'partner' 333 ;D
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High Energy Prices Are Obama’s ‘Explicit Policy Goal,’ Inhofe Says
CNS News ^ | March 10, 2011 | Christopher Neefus
CNSNews.com) – A prominent GOP senator on energy issues accused President Barack Obama Thursday morning of having set an “explicit policy goal” of making energy prices more costly for Americans.
“My message today is simply this: higher gas prices - indeed, higher prices for the energy we use - are an explicit policy goal of the Obama administration,” said Sen. James Inhofe (R-Okla), ranking member of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee. “Let me put it another way: the Obama administration is attacking affordable energy.”
Inhofe’s comments come as crude oil futures traded up on anxiety over unrest in the Middle East and broke the triple-digit mark in recent weeks. As of Thursday, light crude was trading at over $101 per barrel.
“We have, in fact, 163 billion barrels of recoverable oil - nearly six times higher than what President Obama and the Democrats like to claim,” Inhofe continued. “Let's think about 163 billion barrels for a moment: that is enough to maintain our current levels of production and replace our imports from the Persian Gulf for more than 50 years.”
The senator, who regularly rails against the Obama administration’s support of so-called “cap-and-trade” legislation, said such policies are about starving the country of energy supply.
“You see, the cap-and-trade agenda is also about energy austerity,” Inhofe said on the Senate floor. “The hope is that if we restrict enough supply, the price will increase, and we can then simply shift to less costly alternatives. Yet this is wishful thinking.”
“If you think $4.00 is too much for a gallon of regular, fasten your seat belts.”
Inhofe made the speech in support of the Energy Tax Prevention Act, legislation designed to bar the Environmental Protection Agency from moving to regulate carbon dioxide emissions under the Clean Air Act, which Republicans claim is outside the agency’s purview. After he introduced the bill last week, it quickly picked up 42 more co-sponsors, including Democrat Joe Manchin (W.Va.).
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Shocker: Domestic Oil Production Down, Foreign Imports Up
Hotair ^ | 03/11/2011 | Jazz Shaw
Fortunately for all of us, the wise energy policies of the Obama administration have us well on the way to a sustainable, secure energy future for our nation. After all, who could argue with a policy where we seek to import less oil from abroad, stifle the domestic production of such resources and do nothing to replace the shortfall?
With that in mind, surely nobody would expect a result like this.
The lack of effective leadership on this vital issue has drawn the ire of a group of conservative leaders who recently provided a summary of just what we can expect in the future if nothing happens. Brace yourselves, as I’m sure none of you could have called this one.
Issue-in-Brief: Continued instability in the Middle East, combined with unprecedented foreign demand for oil and an uncertain economic recovery at home, has left the United States at the mercy of foreign dictators and markets – issues that would be alleviated if the Administration lifted its self-imposed energy freeze and let domestic producers get back to work, particularly in the Gulf. There is an obvious lack of leadership from the Obama Administration.
Demand for Oil is Skyrocketing
•Since President Obama assumed office gas prices have risen 87%! (From $1.83 to $3.43 and even higher in some states!)
•Global demand for oil is rising, and the competition for foreign resources has intensified. By 2035, the United States, Japan, OECD Europe, China, and India are projected to need 25 percent more imported oil than in 2005, with China and India accounting for the major portion of that increase.
•Instead of reaping the economic and social benefits of developing our domestic resources, the Gulf of Mexico (GOM), even despite the recent permit granted by the Department of Interior (DOI), remains closed for business. According to the Energy Information Agency, domestic offshore oil production will fall 13 percent in 2011, a loss of about 220,000 barrels/day, mainly due to the continued lack of permits for the GOM.
Shocking. That’s the only word for it. Who could have imagined that we would have to import more oil from unstable foreign sources if we don’t allow domestic producers to drill for it here? With this in mind, I would like to officially nominate the Obama administration for the Hot Air Capt. Louis Renault Award.
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Obama Administration's Increasing Reliance on unstable Foriegn Energy.
Nice spelling. Hahaha really official.
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So i was having a read of the EIA Short-Term Energy Outlook. Here are some interesting things to ponder -
There are many reasons for market uncertainty that could push oil prices higher or lower than current expectations. Among the uncertainties are: the continued unrest in producing countries and its potential impact on supply; decisions by key OPEC member countries regarding their production response to the global recovery in oil demand and recent supply losses; the rate of economic recovery, both domestically and globally; fiscal issues facing national and sub-national governments; and China';s efforts to address concerns regarding its growth and inflation rates.
World crude oil and liquid fuels consumption grew by an estimated 2.4 million bbl/d in 2010 to 86.7 million bbl/d, the second largest annual increase in at least 30 years. This growth more than offset the reductions in demand during the prior two years and surpassed the 2007 consumption level of 86.3 million bbl/d. EIA expects that world liquid fuels consumption will grow by 1.5 million bbl/d in 2011 and by an additional 1.7 million bbl/d in 2012 (World Liquid Fuels Consumption Chart). Non-OECD countries will make up almost all of the growth in consumption over the next 2 years, with the largest demand increases coming from China, Brazil, and the Middle East. EIA expects that, among the OECD regions, only North America will show growth in oil consumption over the next two years, offsetting declines in OECD Europe and Asia.
Hmmm and Exxon Mobil expects to replace .95 barrels of liquid crude for every 1 barrel it produces over the next 10 years. Considering it is the largest refiner in the world, where do you think oil prices are going? And why would drilling make little more than a dent in the price of oil over the next few years?
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nuclear energy will take a hit if this in japan blows sky high.
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nuclear energy will take a hit if this in japan blows sky high.
Haha, no it won't.
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Haha, no it won't.
Suppose this thing shoots radiation all over japan and we hear a month straight stories of all the fallout misery.
No politician will stand on tv and shout about his new nuclear plant bill at that point. They'd hold off 6 months.
Same way people stopped grabbing their junk screaming "drill baby drill!" for 9 months after the BP Gulf mess. It's cool to yell about drilling NOW. But they had to wait a while.
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Suppose this thing shoots radiation all over japan and we hear a month straight stories of all the fallout misery.
No politician will stand on tv and shout about his new nuclear plant bill at that point. They'd hold off 6 months.
Same way people stopped grabbing their junk screaming "drill baby drill!" for 9 months after the BP Gulf mess. It's cool to yell about drilling NOW. But they had to wait a while.
Yeah man, there are tons of nuclear plants sitting in areas where a 9.0 earthquake and a 50 foot tall wall of water can hit them. ::)
The plant handled this pretty damn impressively. 3 of the 4 reactors were shut down without a problem and the other one has a minor leak after being hit by one of the worst natural disasters in history. Thumbs up for nuclear energy!
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Yeah man, there are tons of nuclear plants sitting in areas where a 9.0 earthquake and a 50 foot tall wall of water can hit them. ::)
The plant handled this pretty damn impressively. 3 of the 4 reactors were shut down without a problem and the other one has a minor leak after being hit by one of the worst natural disasters in history. Thumbs up for nuclear energy!
Doesn't matter man.
Ask any soccer mom if she wants a nuke power plant in her city, 5 minutes after she's watching some heartbreak news story on mutated japanese kids.
Hell, "drill baby drill" sure as hell wouldn't affect 95% of americans with anything like a BP spill. But everyone STFU for a while about it. It's jsut what politicians do - let things cool off.
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Doesn't matter man.
Ask any soccer mom if she wants a nuke power plant in her city, 5 minutes after she's watching some heartbreak news story on mutated japanese kids.
Hell, "drill baby drill" sure as hell wouldn't affect 95% of americans with anything like a BP spill. But everyone STFU for a while about it. It's jsut what politicians do - let things cool off.
How do you think that soccer slut will react with rolling blakouts in 90 degrees in July and her house smells like shit, her kids are crying for AC, every day is a bad hair day, she is sitting in a pool of sweat daily, etc?
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Doesn't matter man.
Ask any soccer mom if she wants a nuke power plant in her city, 5 minutes after she's watching some heartbreak news story on mutated japanese kids.
Hell, "drill baby drill" sure as hell wouldn't affect 95% of americans with anything like a BP spill. But everyone STFU for a while about it. It's jsut what politicians do - let things cool off.
Mutated Japanese kids. You're making some amazing assumptions here, what with the fact that everyone in the area of that nuke plant was evacuated hours ago.
The half dozen or so refineries burning right now says a lot, though.
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How do you think that soccer slut will react with rolling blakouts in 90 degrees in July and her house smells like shit, her kids are crying for AC, every day is a bad hair day, she is sitting in a pool of sweat daily, etc?
hey, i didn't say there was any common sense element to it. Same with drilling - it's safe and I could give a shit if we trash some wilderness if it means we get off the saudi teet.
I'm just telling ya the reality of things is that following any well publicized tragedy/event involving drilling, nuke energy, guns, whatever... politicians know to keep their heads down for a little bit until the masses forget about it and the stigma is gone.
Unless you think it's a coincidence that palin dropped "drill baby drill" suddenly after BP? And another coincidence that she stopped her nonstop "reload" rhetoric 5 seconds after the Giffords shooting? Palin was 100% in the clear on both of these - her domestic drilling policy has zero to do with BP, and her reload comments had nothing to do with Gifford shooting.
But she's media saavy, and knows to STFU on hot topics for a few months to let people forget, right or wrong, related or not.
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You're making some amazing assumptions here, what with the fact that everyone in the area of that nuke plant was evacuated hours ago.
really? I used the word IF.
nuclear energy will take a hit if this in japan blows sky high.
So I didn't assume anything. IF it blows up, you bet your collar poppin' ass that US politicians (obama included) will STFU about nuclear energy for a few months.
Really, we're just arguing hypothetical political strategy here. Sounds like they'll get it under control.
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How do you think that soccer slut will react with rolling blakouts in 90 degrees in July and her house smells like shit, her kids are crying for AC, every day is a bad hair day, she is sitting in a pool of sweat daily, etc?
Thread saved.
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Thread saved.
lol THAT'S NOT THE TYPE i AM TALKING ABOUT.
I'm talking about that yupie pofs with perfect nails, drives a expedition or yukon or X5, has the perfect highlights in herhair, the Louie Vuitton bag, has kids dressed with only LL Bean, slaps the shit out of her pussified husband every night, etc.
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lol THAT'S NOT THE TYPE i AM TALKING ABOUT.
I'm talking about that yupie pofs with perfect nails, drives a expedition or yukon or X5, has the perfect highlights in herhair, the Louie Vuitton bag, has kids dressed with only LL Bean, slaps the shit out of her pussified husband every night, etc.
again, being right factually - and being right in the media perception sense - are two different things. Period.
Doesn't matter if it's related. IF IF IF that thing blows, then politicians will walk on eggshells for the next 6 months about the topic. You can argue it's bullshit, and it is, but it's the reality of how things work.
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I'm talking about that yupie pofs with perfect nails, drives a expedition or yukon or X5, has the perfect highlights in herhair, the Louie Vuitton bag, has kids dressed with only LL Bean, slaps the shit out of her pussified husband every night, etc.
Oh god, not another palin thread, PLEASE.
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again, being right factually - and being right in the media perception sense - are two different things. Period.
Doesn't matter if it's related. IF IF IF that thing blows, then politicians will walk on eggshells for the next 6 months about the topic. You can argue it's bullshit, and it is, but it's the reality of how things work.
Ha ha ha ha - I just know how theas yuppie broads act. In 90 degree swealtering heat, the last place you or anyone else wants to be is within 50 miles of one of these beasts if there are rolling blackouts
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Oh god, not another palin thread, PLEASE.
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(http://www.getbig.com/boards/index.php?action=dlattach;topic=357900.0;attach=405855;image)
The great thing about her show was seeing just how incompetent this hunter - who claimed SHE killed animals for food - was when handling weapons.
Levi was right when he said she didn't know shit about guns, they were props. She showed us herself by acting like she had never touched a gun before, 5 minutes after bragging about the moose meat she ate from the moose SHE killed personally. Not someone on her expedition - her.
but back to the thread. What were we talking about again?
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Oh god, not another palin thread, PLEASE.
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Yeah, the plant worked just fine in the face of one of the biggest earthquakes/tremors in history. 3 of the 4 reactors were shut down and the 4th may leak because the coolant system is only getting on and off amounts of energy to power it.
If anything it shows that it can take the absolute worst of what mother nature can throw at it and come out in pretty good shape.
But just imagine if this happened to a plant in China or, good for fucking bid, Russia.
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Bill Clinton: Drilling delays 'ridiculous'
Politico ^
Bill Clinton: Drilling delays 'ridiculous' By: Darren Goode March 11, 2011 04:55 PM EST
Former President Bill Clinton said Friday that delays in offshore oil and gas drilling permits are “ridiculous” at a time when the economy is still rebuilding, according to attendees at the IHS CERAWeek conference.
Clinton spoke on a panel with former President George W. Bush that was closed to the media. Video of their moderated talk with IHS CERA Chairman Daniel Yergin was also prohibited.
But according to multiple people in the room, Clinton, surprisingly, agreed with Bush on many oil and gas issues, including criticism of delays in permitting offshore since last year’s Gulf of Mexico spill.
“Bush said all the things you’d expect him to say” on oil and gas issues, said Jim Noe, senior vice president at Hercules Offshore and executive director of the pro-drilling Shallow Water Energy Security Coalition. But Clinton added, “You’d be surprised to know that I agree with all that,” according to Noe and others in the room.
Clinton said there are “ridiculous delays in permitting when our economy doesn’t need it,” according to Noe and others.
“That was the most surprising thing they said,” Noe said.
The two former presidents both generally agreed on the need to get offshore drilling workers back on the job.
(Excerpt) Read more at politico.com ...
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Hugh Hewitt: Obama's oil production protest fails fact-checking test
Comments (0) Share Print By: Hugh Hewitt 03/13/11 8:05 PM
Examiner Columnist
."So any notion that my administration has shut down oil production might make for a good political sound bite, but it doesn't match up with reality." So declared President Obama Friday with the practiced firmness of voice and direct look into the teleprompter that signals to veterans of the Obama watch that the chief executive has strayed far from the truth.
In May of 2010, Obama's secretary of the interior, Ken Salazar, issued a six-month moratorium order for drilling on the outer continental shelf. When the courts struck down that illegal order, Team Obama switched to a slow-roll strategy, demanding new permits for exploration, and accomplished the same thing as a moratorium.
Jonathan Tilove, the New Orleans' Times-Picayune's Washington correspondent, set a standard that few met national reporters met when he collected the statements of Louisiana legislators in response to the president's whopper:
"The gap continues to widen between what President Obama claims to be true about domestic energy production and what Louisianans know is true," said Sen. David Vitter, R-La.
"With prices at the pump climbing toward $4 per gallon, the president is asking us to believe that his administration supports expanded drilling off the Gulf Coast," Vitter continued. "I guess that's true only if you don't actually need a permit."
"Someone should tell the president that April Fool's Day is still weeks away," said Rep. Jeff Landry, R-La., told Tilove. "Today's news conference is another example of the president misleading the American people regarding his energy policy.
Tilove got similar quotes from Louisiana Republican Reps. Charles Boustany (the "president's remarks ... are wholly untrue"), Rodney Alexander, Bill Cassidy and Steve Scalise. They all provide variations on the same theme: The president isn't telling the truth about oil production and his administration's war on new supplies.
Of course, we don't have new wells off East or West Coast, and, of course, the president hasn't done anything to expand production in Alaska either. It is absurd for the president to claim anything other than that for which he deserves complete credit: Bringing new exploration to a halt in a vain and destructive attempt to force America to stop consuming the oil that in his mind and the mind of his political allies is imperiling the planet.
Far more remarkable than the president's brazenness with the truth, which has become a routine feature of Obama's "preside-but-don't-lead" tenure in the Oval Office, is the liberal mainstream media's willingness to indulge it.
The president preaches fiscal restraint but advanced a reckless budget and refuses to suggest any entitlement reform. The MSM is silent.
The president imposed Obamacare on an unwilling country and then issues more than a thousand waivers to the friends of Obama and the politically connected. The MSM is silent.
And now with gas prices soaring and an angry population turning their political fury on the president, he runs from the responsibility which is surely his and claims childlike wonder at the idea that his no-growth/no-oil policies are to blame. And the MSM is silent.
A craven MSM continues to abet the president's enormous incompetence in all aspects of his job. The credibility gap that has grown and grown around the president since January 2009 has now reached the point where Obama no longer cares to pretend to the truth and the press no longer cares to report that fact.
The price at the pumps doesn't lie, however, and that is Obama's price, a price that flows from his policies, and which defines his politics. That price will also define his presidency from now until November 2012.
Examiner Columnist Hugh Hewitt is a law professor at Chapman University Law School and a nationally syndicated radio talk show host who blogs daily at HughHewitt.com.
Read more at the Washington Examiner: http://washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/columnists/2011/03/hugh-hewitt-obamas-oil-production-protest-fails-fact-checking#ixzz1GZkUY6NU
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Obama at Wheel of Father's Oldsmobile
By Debra Saunders
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2011/03/15/obama_at_wheel_of_fathers_oldsmobile_109219.html
At Friday's news conference, President Obama tried to connect with the common man coping with rising gasoline prices. Instead, the president left little doubt that he is clueless about cars.
"You may want to buy a fuel-efficient car," quoth Obama, "but you may not be able to afford it. And so you're stuck with the old clunker that's getting 8 or 10 miles a gallon."
Eight to 10 mpg? Which clunker would that be? I wondered. An old Hummer? Your father's father's Oldsmobile? A late-model Lamborghini? It takes a luxury brand, a boat-sized machine and/or a few decades to approach those dismal mileage numbers.
An 11-year-old Pontiac minivan, for example, gets 17 mpg in the city, 24 mpg on the highway.
You have to go back to the Carter administration years or earlier to find Obama's idea of a gas-guzzling family car -- and even that vehicle would have been a van, light truck/SUV or luxury model. And yet he is behind the wheel of Washington's energy policy.
Can you blame me for believing Team Obama was pushing the pedal to the metal in a rush for higher gas prices?
On March 11, Obamaland pushed back against the perception that its anti-drilling policies -- implemented in the wake of the April 2010 BP Deepwater Horizon blowout -- have contributed to high prices at the pump. The cost of filling one's gas tank has risen uncomfortably close to $4 per gallon in the Bay Area of California.
The administration rightly notes that domestic oil and natural gas production have increased since 2008, while imports have decreased.
OK, but: Erik Milito of the American Petroleum Institute told Environment & Energy Publishing, "The increased production levels in 2010 are a credit to the vision of previous administrations." Milito credited the 1995 Deepwater Royalty Relief Act signed by Bill Clinton and passed by a GOP-controlled Congress.
To his credit, Interior Secretary Ken Salazar had supported offshore oil drilling in the Gulf of Mexico. But after an oil platform explosion left 11 workers dead and coated beaches with oil, he reacted. Then Salazar overreacted.
Democrats like Sen. Mary Landrieu of Louisiana saw their home states suffer first from the oil spill, and then the oil-job shutoff. Landrieu came to vigorously oppose what had evolved into a de facto moratorium on drilling permits.
Clinton himself lamented "ridiculous delays in permitting when our economy doesn't need it." The administration didn't issue a permit since the blowout until last month -- and then only after a federal judge's prompting.
Not to mention the steady job-killing creep of climbing gasoline prices.
There always has been a corner of Obamaland that doesn't appreciate the job-creating properties of cheap fuel. Now-Energy Secretary Steven Chu told the Wall Street Journal, "Somehow we have to figure out how to boost the price of gasoline to the levels in Europe." Chu said that in September 2008 -- and still Obama picked him for the slot.
Then again, if you think there are a lot of Americans cruising Main Street in gas-guzzling monstrosities, you probably wouldn't even notice the high price of gasoline -- until your approval ratings started to approach, well, Jimmy Carter levels.
dsaunders@sfchronicle.com
Copyright 2011, Creators Syndicate Inc.
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Pump prices may put Obama in peril
The Washington Times ^ | March 20, 2011 | Ralph Z. Hallow
Consumers’ pain at the gas pump will likely be shared by President Obama at the polls in 2012 and could cost him a second term unless energy prices take a drastic turn for the better in the next 18 months.
“Energy prices should be the Achilles’ heel for Obama,” said Scott Wheeler, executive director of a conservative political action committee.
The average gasoline pump price across the country is $3.621 per gallon, the Energy Information Administration reported. Prices in some parts of the country are already topping $4 a gallon.
And the uncertain global situation isn’t helping.
“Unrest in the Middle East and Japan’s loss of nuclear-powered electricity add pressure to oil prices that were already growing along with the world economy,” Heritage Foundation energy economist David W. Kreutzer told The Washington Times. “While the U.S. only generates 1 percent of its electricity from oil, Japan uses 9 percent and will need more to fuel standby generators and to replace lost nuclear production.”
Analysts see a perfect political storm hitting when it comes to energy supply and demand. China and India, with booming economies, are suddenly world-class consumers of oil and other energy sources. The unrest in the Middle East and the bad news out of Japan have unsettled the supply picture even more, a disruption being reflected in prices at the pump in Wichita and Altoona
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtontimes.com ...
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I agree unless energy prices lower Americans will vote with their wallets. Obama will likely be gone.
However, drilling offshore will not provide what is needed. It will not lower prices substantially nor will it stop Americas reliance on foreign oil. It's a smoke screen, a red herring. The issue is not where will the oil come from, but when do we start funding investment into alternatives. When do we decide that this roller coaster is only trending up and it's best we get off before it's too late. Put our best and brightest onto it and within 10 years, the same amount of time to get ANWR's pitiful reserves up and running, i'm confident we will have a sustainable solution.
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I agree unless energy prices lower Americans will vote with their wallets. Obama will likely be gone.
However, drilling offshore will not provide what is needed. It will not lower prices substantially nor will it stop Americas reliance on foreign oil. It's a smoke screen, a red herring. The issue is not where will the oil come from, but when do we start funding investment into alternatives. When do we decide that this roller coaster is only trending up and it's best we get off before it's too late. Put our best and brightest onto it and within 10 years, the same amount of time to get ANWR's pitiful reserves up and running, i'm confident we will have a sustainable solution.
Money is tied up in new Lybian war of choice.
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Money is tied up in new Lybian war of choice.
Oh please don't try to derail this thread into a Libya Obama thread. There is enough spam on that subject already.
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I agree unless energy prices lower Americans will vote with their wallets. Obama will likely be gone.
However, drilling offshore will not provide what is needed. It will not lower prices substantially nor will it stop Americas reliance on foreign oil. It's a smoke screen, a red herring. The issue is not where will the oil come from, but when do we start funding investment into alternatives. When do we decide that this roller coaster is only trending up and it's best we get off before it's too late. Put our best and brightest onto it and within 10 years, the same amount of time to get ANWR's pitiful reserves up and running, i'm confident we will have a sustainable solution.
A big part of the problem is refining capability, we are maxed out, haven't built a new refinery in 30 years.
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Oh please don't try to derail this thread into a Libya Obama thread. There is enough spam on that subject already.
Make love not war.
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A big part of the problem is refining capability, we are maxed out, haven't built a new refinery in 30 years.
Because we don't have the oil to refine. By the end of 2010 there was a 5 million barrel a day shortfall. Exxon predicts it will find .95 barrels for every barrel it produces. The only oil left of large quantities is energy intensive and costly to get. It relies on cheap natural gas prices and high oil prices.
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Because we don't have the oil to refine. By the end of 2010 there was a 5 million barrel a day shortfall. Exxon predicts it will find .95 barrels for every barrel it produces. The only oil left of large quantities is energy intensive and costly to get. It relies on cheap natural gas prices and high oil prices.
I have heard enough from people in the industry, that statement is BS, so is peak oil. The people who drill for oil simply shut down well....... until the price gets to where they want it, then start them up again.
But our refineries run at 100% capacity ???
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I have heard enough from people in the industry, that statement is BS, so is peak oil. The people who drill for oil simply shut down well....... until the price gets to where they want it, then start them up again.
But our refineries run at 100% capacity ???
Oil will never disappear, in our lifetime anyway, that is true. But there is coming a time when the amount of oil needed out weighs the amount of oil found and produced. According to the IEA that was 2009.
The only oil found now is costly to extract and refine, leading to higher costs overall. So you can live with triple digit oil, or you can find an alternative.
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Oil will never disappear, in our lifetime anyway, that is true. But there is coming a time when the amount of oil needed out weighs the amount of oil found and produced. According to the IEA that was 2009.
The only oil found now is costly to extract and refine, leading to higher costs overall. So you can live with triple digit oil, or you can find an alternative.
I don't believe that... According to sources there are many wells in places like texas and what not where they are simply capped over and have loads of oil in them.
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I don't believe that... According to sources there are many wells in places like texas and what not where they are simply capped over and have loads of oil in them.
American oil production has halved since the 70's. It peaked in 1970 i believe. An oil well is not pumped dry, they have economic formulas that allow them to determine when it makes sense to abandon a well.
"When the economic limit is raised, the life of the well is shortened and proven oil reserves are lost. Conversely, when the economic limit is lowered, the life of the well is lengthened.
When the economic limit is reached, the well becomes a liability and is abandoned. In this process, tubing is removed from the well and sections of well bore are filled with cement to isolate the flow path between gas and water zones from each other, as well as the surface. Completely filling the well bore with cement is costly and unnecessary. The surface around the wellhead is then excavated, and the wellhead and casing are cut off, a cap is welded in place and then buried.
At the economic limit there often is still a significant amount of unrecoverable oil left in the reservoir. It might be tempting to defer physical abandonment for an extended period of time, hoping that the oil price will go up or that new supplemental recovery techniques will be perfected. However, lease provisions and governmental regulations usually require quick abandonment; liability and tax concerns also may favor abandonment.
In theory an abandoned well can be reentered and restored to production (or converted to injection service for supplemental recovery or for downhole hydrocarbons storage), but reentry often proves to be difficult mechanically and not cost effective"
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Petrobras gets permit for U.S. deep waters
http://www.upi.com ^
WASHINGTON, March 18 (UPI) -- Washington has given Petrobras America Inc. permission to start oil and gas production in the Gulf of Mexico, a regulator said.
The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, Regulation and Enforcement gave Petrobras approval to use a floating production storage offloading facility at its Cascade-Chinook project in the Gulf of Mexico.
The approval marks the first time FPSO technology will be used in U.S. waters of the Gulf of Mexico.
The oil and gas project is about 165 miles off the coast of Louisiana in 8,200 feet of water. The FPSO has a production capacity of 80,000 barrels of oil and 16 million cubic feet of natural gas per day.
The BOEMRE approved the production safety system permit and a supplemental deep-water operating plan from Petrobras. The regulatory agency said it was satisfied that operations would be safe from hurricanes and other natural disasters.
"These regulatory approvals pave the way for safe, new production of oil and gas resources in the Gulf of Mexico," BOEMRE Director Michael R. Bromwich said in a statement.
Noble Energy in early March was awarded a BOEMRE permit to drill in the Mississippi Canyon block about 70 miles south of the Louisiana coast.
The permit was for what the BOEMRE described as a bypass well meant to drill around a mechanical problem in the original hole.
Deep-water exploration is under scrutiny following the April oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. The U.S. government lifted a moratorium on deep-water drilling in October, six months after the Deepwater Horizon oil rig caught fire and sank in the Gulf of Mexico.
(Excerpt) Read more at upi.com ...
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Petrobras gets permit for U.S. deep waters
http://www.upi.com ^
WASHINGTON, March 18 (UPI) -- Washington has given Petrobras America Inc. permission to start oil and gas production in the Gulf of Mexico, a regulator said.
The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, Regulation and Enforcement gave Petrobras approval to use a floating production storage offloading facility at its Cascade-Chinook project in the Gulf of Mexico.
The approval marks the first time FPSO technology will be used in U.S. waters of the Gulf of Mexico.
The oil and gas project is about 165 miles off the coast of Louisiana in 8,200 feet of water. The FPSO has a production capacity of 80,000 barrels of oil and 16 million cubic feet of natural gas per day.
The BOEMRE approved the production safety system permit and a supplemental deep-water operating plan from Petrobras. The regulatory agency said it was satisfied that operations would be safe from hurricanes and other natural disasters.
"These regulatory approvals pave the way for safe, new production of oil and gas resources in the Gulf of Mexico," BOEMRE Director Michael R. Bromwich said in a statement.
Noble Energy in early March was awarded a BOEMRE permit to drill in the Mississippi Canyon block about 70 miles south of the Louisiana coast.
The permit was for what the BOEMRE described as a bypass well meant to drill around a mechanical problem in the original hole.
Deep-water exploration is under scrutiny following the April oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. The U.S. government lifted a moratorium on deep-water drilling in October, six months after the Deepwater Horizon oil rig caught fire and sank in the Gulf of Mexico.
(Excerpt) Read more at upi.com ...
Would love to hear one of the Obama drones justify that.
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Good news for Petrobras investors
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Good news for Petrobras investors
Yeah, like George Soros. And obama the Traitor gave them 2 Billion via te import export bank.
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Good news for Petrobras investors
Your lack of outrage when you sat there crying and defending Obama's decision to hold back permits for US firms speaks wonders. :-\
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Your lack of outrage when you sat there crying and defending Obama's decision to hold back permits for US firms speaks wonders. :-\
I want him to hold back permits for all companies. Hence my statement it's good for Petrobras investors. Not necessarily for America. All it does is provide false hope.
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The possible benefits to triple digit oil. During the 2007 peak of oil prices, Chinese steel production shrunk by 20%, whilst US steel production grew by 10%. Could a world with higher oil prices actually mean a more competitive manufacturing market? As the cost of shipping from China becomes like a tariff will we see jobs coming back to America again?
Something to think about.
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The possible benefits to triple digit oil. During the 2007 peak of oil prices, Chinese steel production shrunk by 20%, whilst US steel production grew by 10%. Could a world with higher oil prices actually mean a more competitive manufacturing market? As the cost of shipping from China becomes like a tariff will we see jobs coming back to America again?
Something to think about.
Shipping costs. The fuel cost needed for shipping products globally compresses margins and causes capital to flow to more efficient centers of production.
Triple digit oil and the economic cost associated with it still outweighs these gains.
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Industry: No such thing as ‘idle leases’
Fuel Fix ^ | March 31, 2011 | Tom Fowler
In his speech Wednesday outlining a broad national energy strategy, President Obama cited an Interior Department report that says the oil and gas industry has vast numbers of leases sitting idle.
The study says 70 percent of federal Gulf of Mexico leases and 57 percent of federal onshore leases “are not producing or not subject to approved or pending exploration or development plans.”
The oil and gas industry has heard this before and was ready with the reply: There really is not such thing as an idle lease.
In a press call this week the American Petroleum Institute chief lobbyist Erik Milito depicted the report as blind and deaf to how companies go about exploring for oil and gas.
“The administration’s report assumes that oil and natural gas are spread uniformly across the lease acreage – suggesting that 70 percent of idle leases equates to 70 percent idled resources. As if finding oil was no more difficult than sticking a pipe in the ground,” Milito said.
Rather, when the government puts up many hundreds of thousands of acres at a time in lease sales, there’s no way all of that acreage will actually get drilled – onshore wells can cost tens of millions of dollars to drill and offshore wells hundreds of millions. And even after spending millions shooting and analyzing seismic data, there’s no guarantee a drilled well will be a successful one.
Knowing exactly where the good spots are takes a lot of work, so the practice is to use the varying amounts of pre-lease data available to put bids on as many of the acres as you believe/hope/pray will have a high probability of success.
Over on Exxon Mobil’s company blog, Ken Cohen notes that the DOI report defines “inactive leases” as areas that “may be subject to certain ancillary activities such as geophysical and geotechnical analysis, including seismic and other types of surveys.”
Did they just call a seismic survey – one of the most fundamental activities of finding oil and natural gas – ancillary? Meaning it’s not essential, secondary in nature, or extra activity?
Yes, they did. And that proves my point. You don’t have to be an industry expert to know that seismic surveys – along with a whole host of other activities – are among the most essential activities in oil and gas exploration, and anything but a sign of “inactivity.”
Exxon has more like 93 percent of its leased acreage under production or being studied and analyzed in some form, Cohen said.
Industry also finds it a bit ironic that the Department of Interior would criticize it for a lack of Gulf drilling activity given the recent drilling moratorium and the slow resumption of permitting.
“This is like leasing an apartment from the government for $20 million dollars and the government refuses to give you the keys to the apartment – then the government proceeds to complain because you are not occupying the premises,” API’s Milito said.
In all likelihood the Department of Interior knew all this already. But in the always heated/politicized war of words over energy policy, the numbers in the lease report look damning at first blush and provide good fodder for firing up the faithful.
Now before you go jumping up and down about regulators injecting politics and deceptive information into the debate, don’t forget that’s a two-way street.
Mentioning drilling permits and current pump prices in the same breath is misleading, as a permit issued today won’t really affect the supply/demand balance for months or years.
And API has no problem dropping mentions of Brazil into its talking points to whip-up the grassroots frenzy over the Obama/George Soros/Petrobras conspiracy. It lacks context (the $2 billion Ex-Im Bank loan from a few years ago was to have Brazilians buy U.S. equipment and services) and avoids the notion that increased Brazilian oil production has been touted by government and industry alike as a friendlier alternative to Middle Eastern oil.
Don’t forget: no one – not the feds or the industry – is really talking about U.S. “energy independence,” as in self-sufficiency. That ship has sailed and it’s widely accepted we’re not going to produce all the energy we consume.
The language instead is all about “energy security,” meaning we should not be held hostage to hostile sources.
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Obama says little short-term help for gas prices
Obama pushes clean energy, says he can do little to affect gas prices in the short term
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Obama-says-little-shortterm-apf-1680912387.html?x=0&.v=4
Obama shakes hands upon his arrival at Philadelphia International Airport in Philadelphia, Wednesday, April 6, 2011. (AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais)
Darlene Superville, Associated Press, On Wednesday April 6, 2011, 3:26 pm
FAIRLESS HILLS, Pa. (AP) -- Pitching the promise of energy independence, President Barack Obama cautioned Wednesday that it's going to be tough to transition from America's oil-dependent economy and acknowledged there's little he can do to lower gas prices over the short term.
"I'm just going to be honest with you. There's not much we can do next week or two weeks from now," the president told workers at a wind turbine plant. It's a theme Obama's struck before as he tries to show voters he's attuned to a top economic concern with gas prices pushing toward $4 a gallon.
Obama said he wants to move toward "a future where America is less dependent on foreign oil, more reliant on clean energy produced by workers like you." That will happen by reducing oil imports, tapping domestic energy sources and shifting the nation to renewable and less polluting sources of energy, such as wind, the president says. He has set a goal of reducing oil imports by one-third by 2025.
But the president said it won't happen overnight and if any politician says it's easy, "they're not telling the truth."
"Gas prices? They're going to still fluctuate until we can start making these broader changes, and that's going to take a couple of years to have serious effect," Obama said.
Obama needled one questioner who asked about gas prices, now averaging close to $3.70 a gallon nationwide, and suggested that the gentleman consider getting rid of his gas-guzzling vehicle.
"If you're complaining about the price of gas and you're only getting 8 miles a gallon, you know," Obama said laughingly. "You might want to think about a trade-in."
The president spoke at a town hall meeting at Gamesa Technology Corp., a Spanish company that makes giant turbines that use wind to generate electricity. According to the White House, it is the first overseas company of its kind to set up shop in the U.S.
Back in Washington, negotiations continued on a budget deal to avert a government shutdown Friday and Obama urged lawmakers to get it done. The president said he wants to cut spending, but not at the expense of cutting priorities like energy and education.
As fuel prices rise because of growing demand worldwide and political unrest in oil-producing nations in North Africa and the Middle East, drivers are feeling pinched at the pump. Republicans blame Obama and his policies and he, in turn, is striving to show the public that he gets it.
Gasoline prices rose another 2 cents Tuesday to a new national average of just over $3.68 a gallon, according to AAA and other sources. Obama's visit to Gamesa was his fourth energy event since March 11. He's scheduled a fifth for Friday in Indianapolis.
Obama argues that shifting to cleaner and domestic energy sources will help create jobs and boost U.S. competitiveness.
Education is another item on Obama's competitiveness agenda. That issue was to be the focus of a speech he was giving later Wednesday to the Rev. Al Sharpton's civil rights group in New York City. Obama's appearance keeps a promise he made to the National Action Network when he spoke there as a presidential candidate in 2007. Obama pledged to return, win or lose.
He returns just two days after launching his re-election bid. He is facing a key constituency that at times has scolded him for not being attentive enough to certain issues, such as double-digit black unemployment, but continues to hold him in high regard.
Obama deflects such criticism by arguing that his polices to expand the economy, create jobs and improve the education system, among other goals, will help the country as a whole, blacks included.
Ninety-five percent of blacks who voted, opted for Obama in 2008. A Gallup poll released last week showed his job approval among blacks holding at 84 percent, about the same as six months earlier.
AP National Writer Jesse Washington contributed to this report
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Obama is correct. There is little he can do in the short term. America needs to ween itself off oil and the sooner the better, cause it ain't getting cheaper.
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Obama is correct. There is little he can do in the short term. America needs to ween itself off oil and the sooner the better, cause it ain't getting cheaper.
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Obama: "I Remember What It Was Like Pumping Gas"
Real Clear Politics ^ | 6/6/11 | staff
President Obama, speaking to Al Sharpton's organization, says he is not "out of touch."
"I remember that," Obama added.
"I'm just going to be honest with you. There's not much we can do next week or two weeks from now," Obama said earlier today about gas prices.
(Excerpt) Read more at realclearpolitics.com ...
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Obama: Don’t like gas prices? Just buy a new car!
Flopping Aces ^ | 04-08-11 | DrJohn
The man who made clear that he wanted gas prices to be higher has made good on his promises.
[VIDEO AT SITE]
Gas prices have doubled under Barack Obama. The pain visited by the higher prices will not be felt only at the pump. It will felt in many areas.
1. Transportation of Goods – While rising gas prices often lead to higher prices for a gas tank of fuel, the cost of oil is built into the price of anything. Oranges, for example, may travel several hundred or even thousands of miles from Florida. All that travel time means burning fuel, and later higher costs for oranges, even though oranges aren’t directly tied to oil. So, basically everything rises in cost after oil does.
2. Export Economies – These higher oil costs often mean economic softening in areas that are dependent on foreign purchases of goods. Take, for example, China and Vietnam which each produce a large amount of consumer products for export to the United States. Due to the distance these goods have to travel, they become more costly in foreign markets against local competitors with lower exposure to oil. Thus, exports usually decline.
3. Consumer Spending – Higher gas prices mean that shoppers are either 1) valuing more the small amount of extra money they have to spend or 2) seeing a general decline in the amount of money they can afford to spend.
4. Rising Derivative Costs – Oil may help us get from A to B in the form of gasoline, but it is also very important in making plastics and polymers, two very important materials that are used in just about everything. Higher prices for oil means higher prices for plastic and ultimately higher prices for transporting the plastics from one place to another.
And of course, home heating oil.
Barack Obama's answer to the high cost of home heating oil?
Just buy a new car!
Obama needled one questioner who asked about gas prices, now averaging close to $3.70 a gallon nationwide, and suggested that the gentleman consider getting rid of his gas-guzzling vehicle.
“If you’re complaining about the price of gas and you’re only getting 8 miles a gallon, you know,” Obama said laughingly. “You might want to think about a trade-in.”
[VIDEO AT SITE]
When an audience member commented that he had a family of ten kids, Obama replied:
"Well, you definitely need a hybrid van then."
Hilarious.
Except, where is one to get a hybrid van? Let's start with mini-vans.
(Excerpt) Read more at floppingaces.net...
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Gas Prices Climbing Toward $5 Per Gallon
April 11, 2011 5:53 AM
http://chicago.cbslocal.com/2011/04/11/gas-prices-climbing-toward-5-per-gallon
Gas prices are spiking to $4.39 per gallon at the BP station at Congress Parkway and Dearborn Street. (Credit: CBS)
CHICAGO (CBS) – At one time, $5 per gallon gas seemed like a farfetched idea, but that is no longer the case.
As CBS 2’s Roseanne Tellez reports, as of Monday, the average price for a gallon of regular unleaded gasoline in the Chicago area is $4.11, compared with $3.71 a month ago, and about $3.10 a gallon at this time a year ago.
Experts say $5 per gallon gas is likely by Memorial Day.
Drivers Monday morning were practically numb to the price spikes.
“What are you going to do?” said Shannon Thompson. “We’ve become so gas-dependent in this country. There are so many SUVs. I mean, I’ve had a hybrid. It worked great. Right now, I’m just going to deal with it.”
Prices at some gas stations were as low as $4.09, a bargain compared to the $4.29 at some service stations downtown.
LISTEN: Newsradio 780′s Bernie Tafoya reports
“It’s painful,” said Lamar Magee. “You’ve got to make a decision on where you drive and where you go nowadays.” He said he is “definitely” making changes to his routines.
Magee says it will cost him about $120 to fill up the 30-gallon tank on his van.
But even that pales in comparison to the big rigs. Truck driver Mark Kanarowski says his truck holds 200 gallons.
“It’s got to be a huge expense for the company,” Kanarowski said. “I went to St. Louis over the weekend to fill up my own car, and I was paying about $4.13 a gallon. It hurts.”
A limo driver shared his thoughts as he filled up his tank at the Des Plaines Oasis.
“Normal-sized tank, big price – when you get done at the pump, it’s killing business, and a lot of one-way trips now,” he said, “like I’m going to get somebody this morning, and I’m not bringing him home. His wife will probably bring him home, because everyone’s trying to save a little bit here, a little bit there.”
The Lundberg Survey says the national average for a gallon of regular unleaded as of Monday was $3.76. That is up 19 cents since March 18, and up 91 cents since this time last year.
The sharply rising prices hearken back memories of the summer of 2008.
That year, oil prices were driven well above $100 per barrel, and in June of that year and gas prices were well over $4 a gallon. The highest record price was $4.34 per gallon, set July 2008.
No one is eager to break that record. But with no end in sight to the turmoil in the Middle East, analysts say we’re likely to do just that – and just as holiday travelers hit the highways for Memorial Day weekend.
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Oil drilling ban to be maintained in key areas, sources say
By Juliet Eilperin
________________________ ________________________ ______
Obama administration officials will announce Wednesday afternoon they will not allow offshore oil drilling in the eastern Gulf of Mexico or off the Atlantic and Pacific coasts as part of the next five-year drilling plan, according to sources briefed on the plan, reversing two key policy changes President Obama announced in late March.
President Obama talks about endorsing expansion of offshore drilling. (Footage via www.whitehouse.gov/The Washington Post)During that announcement--less than a month before the BP oil spill--Obama and Interior Secretary Ken Salazar said they would open up the eastern Gulf and parts of the Atlantic, including off the coast of Virginia, to offshore oil and gas exploration.
The announcement is sure to please environmentalists while angering oil and gas companies as well as some lawmakers from both parties who have pressed for continued offshore energy exploration in the wake of massive Gulf of Mexico spill.
According to multiple individuals briefed on the plan, the Obama administration will proceed with scoping for possible drilling in the central and western Gulf of Mexico and in the Arctic as part of the upcoming 2012-2017 Outer Continental Shelf program, while keeping the other areas off limits.
The administration is likely to conduct a new environmental assessment of Shell's plan to conduct drilling in the Arctic, the sources added.
Sen. Bill Nelson (D-Fla.), who has consistently pushed to restrict drilling in the eastern gulf, welcomed the news. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar called the senator Wednesday morning, according to Nelson spokesman Dan McLaughlin, but the two men did not speak yet because Nelson is chairing a hearing.
"Drilling off Florida's Gulf coast is banned at least until 2022, under a 2006 law passed by Senator Nelson," McLaughlin said. "The senator is pleased the White House has decided rightly to keep the area off-limits. He hopes Florida's next governor and the Legislature similarly will commit to protecting the state's tourism economy and unique environment."
Activists such as Margie Alt, executive director of Environment America, also praised the administration's plan, saying, "Today, anyone who loves our beaches, who fishes in the ocean or who depends on a healthy coastal economy can thank the Obama administration for protecting the Atlantic and Pacific coasts and the west coast of Florida from oil drilling. The BP disaster earlier this year was a tragic reminder that drilling is a dirty and dangerous business. The only way to truly keep our coasts and ocean ecosystems safe is to keep them rig free."
But the move could spark a backlash from business interests as well from both many congressional Republicans and conservative Democrats such as Sen. Manry Landrieu, who argue that curbing offshore energy exploration could exacerbate the nation's economic woes.
Karen Harbert, president and CEO of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce's Institute for 21st Century Energy, said in a statement, "The Administration is sending a message to America's oil and gas industry: take your capital, technology, and jobs somewhere else."
________________________ ________________________ ________________________ _
Just great.
$5 a gallon gas here we come.
Wow - 5 months ago I called this!
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We are inching towards $5. >:(
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Again 5 months ago I called this.
Haters can fuck off with their hope and change nonsense and suck a cock for all I care.
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Again 5 months ago I called this.
Haters can fuck off with their hope and change nonsense and suck a cock for all I care.
lmao.. um.. ok tough guy. ::)
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The excuses are going to be epic if/when gas hits $5. I can't wait to see what the Obama sheeple come up with.
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So clueless 333 as usual.
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The excuses are going to be epic if/when gas hits $5. I can't wait to see what the Obama sheeple come up with.
you never answered.. when gas was $4.60 in 2008.. was it Bush's fault BF
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So clueless 333 as usual.
Hahaha, as if you're not.
you never answered.. when gas was $4.60 in 2008.. was it Bush's fault BF
Yes. And the rest of the country that castrated him for the prices thought so, too. And if gas hits $5, Obama's going to be in a world of hurt. It's actually fucking astounding that no one has anything to say now at $4.
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The excuses are going to be epic if/when gas hits $5. I can't wait to see what the Obama sheeple come up with.
It's sad that presidents going forward will get the blame for a simple equation that is out of whack - cheap supply has fallen, demand has risen. Throw in some stupid policies about ethanol production, which you can more than fault Obama on for keeping, and you have $5 gas.
Either the US changes it's habits, changes it's fuel, or prepares for $10 a gallon in the future. 8)
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It's sad that presidents going forward will get the blame for a simple equation that is out of whack - cheap supply has fallen, demand has risen. Throw in some stupid policies about ethanol production, which you can more than fault Obama on for keeping, and you have $5 gas.
Either the US changes it's habits, changes it's fuel, or prepares for $10 a gallon in the future. 8)
Methinks you should read today's article on Yahoo about the Utah oil fields. You continually come off as incredibly uninformed on this.
What's sad about it, though? Bush was castrated by you lefties for the rising prices in 2008. It's barely into spring yet and gas prices have been flying past any increases under Bush's watch. Obama's going to rightfully get the blame for this just like Bush did.
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It's sad that presidents going forward will get the blame for a simple equation that is out of whack - cheap supply has fallen, demand has risen. Throw in some stupid policies about ethanol production, which you can more than fault Obama on for keeping, and you have $5 gas.
Either the US changes it's habits, changes it's fuel, or prepares for $10 a gallon in the future. 8)
You douchebags blamed Bush/Cheney for it and Bama the destroyer will get blame himself. One Term and done - thankfully.
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You douchebags blamed Bush/Cheney for it and Bama the destroyer will get blame himself. One Term and done - thankfully.
It's pretty comedic that now they're crying about "unfairly" blaming the president for gas prices when they spent months castrating Bush for 2008. What is it with far-leftists and their ridiculous hypocrisy?
It's April, gas prices are over $4/gal, have been rising for over 19 straight weeks now and people are busy trying to play down Obama's role in this by acting like it's not his fault.
They think it's bad now. Wait until inflation really hits later this year. 8)
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Obama still is not approving the canadian oil pipeline they havebeen begging him to approve. This mess is on obama, between his horrible dollar policy, his oil drilling policies, his ethanol mandates, etc.
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Methinks you should read today's article on Yahoo about the Utah oil fields. You continually come off as incredibly uninformed on this.
What's sad about it, though? Bush was castrated by you lefties for the rising prices in 2008. It's barely into spring yet and gas prices have been flying past any increases under Bush's watch. Obama's going to rightfully get the blame for this just like Bush did.
Haha yeah okay Utah will save us ::)
Think of this - US production has declined since 1970. IF Utah was an easy cheap source of crude, it would have been tapped decades ago. The reason it's being talked about now? The economics make sense. The price is high enough to justify the drilling and refining costs. Just like with tar sands in Canada, the cost of oil is high enough to justify the production. For someone claiming to be informed you really aren't, because if you were you'd know the Utah oil reserve is tar sands. An energy intensive and costly exercises that only makes sense when oil is at high levels and going to stay that way.
What is it with you and this 'you lefties' nonsense? ::)
It's like you can not get your little mind around the idea that people can hold a certain set of values and still have individual thoughts and views on things. Stereotype much?
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Obama still is not approving the canadian oil pipeline they havebeen begging him to approve. This mess is on obama, between his horrible dollar policy, his oil drilling policies, his ethanol mandates, etc.
Valid points to rip him on the pipeline, although it's not like we aren't getting oil from Canada as it is. It will go through i'm just unsure of why he's holding out. Perhaps protecting US oil interests?
Ethanol is stupid and should be stopped.
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Not to mention the Lybia war!
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Haha yeah okay Utah will save us ::)
Think of this - US production has declined since 1970. IF Utah was an easy cheap source of crude, it would have been tapped decades ago. The reason it's being talked about now? The economics make sense. The price is high enough to justify the drilling and refining costs. Just like with tar sands in Canada, the cost of oil is high enough to justify the production. For someone claiming to be informed you really aren't, because if you were you'd know the Utah oil reserve is tar sands. An energy intensive and costly exercises that only makes sense when oil is at high levels and going to stay that way.
What is it with you and this 'you lefties' nonsense? ::)
It's like you can not get your little mind around the idea that people can hold a certain set of values and still have individual thoughts and views on things. Stereotype much?
You're under the impression that increased demand from countries like China and Russia are what caused this astronomical rise in oil prices when there's no fucking way in hell demand from those countries has increased at a level to drive prices over $4 since November. You clearly have no idea what you're talking about and refuse to condemn the actions of your God-King that have led to 19+ weeks of skyrocketing prices.
This country is about to be cold-kocked by inflation and you're busy spinning some bullshit story about rising demand being the driving force behind this exponential rise in oil prices.
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You're under the impression that increased demand from countries like China and Russia are what caused this astronomical rise in oil prices when there's no fucking way in hell demand from those countries have increased at a level to drive prices over $4. You clearly have no idea what you're talking about and refuse to condemn the actions of your God-King that have led to 19+ weeks of skyrocketing prices.
I don't believe they are the sole reason at all. OPEC countries for example are using more and more oil and soon will combine to use more than OECD countries. But that's not the only thing. You have an increasingly global world, increased demand in the BRIC's and throw in dwindling crude reserves and more reliance on higher cost oil (like tar sands) what does it equal? All together now...High prices!
But hey i'm the one with no idea ;)
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Bottom line is that 5 months ago I calle this to a tee and you obama dildos still spinning his kenyan turds need to STFU.
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Bottom line is that 5 months ago I calle this to a tee and you obama dildos still spinning his kenyan turds need to STFU.
Gosh you're a loser. The recession depressed prices because demand dropped, demand is back up, so are prices. Presidents are interchangeable, supply and demand are not.
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I don't believe they are the sole reason at all. OPEC countries for example are using more and more oil and soon will combine to use more than OECD countries. But that's not the only thing. You have an increasingly global world, increased demand in the BRIC's and throw in dwindling crude reserves and more reliance on higher cost oil (like tar sands) what does it equal? All together now...High prices!
But hey i'm the one with no idea ;)
Yes, as has been shown throughout this thread, you ARE the one with no idea. Like 333 said, you Obama dicksuckers and your refusal to put any of this on your God-King is a sad, pathetic joke. For one, you refuse to acknowledge the failed fiscal policies of your Messiah that have contributed to 19+ weeks of increased oil prices. Secondly, trying to pin this on a "recovery" from the recession is another sad joke as there is no recovery. And there certainly wasn't any talk of recovery in November, when prices started going up. But you keep hanging onto your fantasy about demand, though. ::)
I'd hate to rain on your parade but you really need to read into China's current economic situation. It's not roses like you think and their demand for oil is falling right now due to inflation's effects starting to him them hard. But hey, you go ahead and thump your chest about demand until you're blue in the face. Maybe if you draw blood it might come true.
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Like food, silver, gold, commodity, and other inflation - this is entirely on bama/bernake for their WTF policies.
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ohh,... oops...
Leonard Castille, vice president of sales for Frank's Casing Crew & Rental Tools, said the flow of deepwater offshore drilling permits issued recently by the federal bureau that controls the tap has been a shot in the arm for local oilfield service sector.
"We're seeing it as a positive thing," said Castille, who has his finger on the pulse of the industry here and across the oil patch. "Right now we're seeing more people going back to work, and everybody I talk to in Houston and New Orleans and Lafayette are real upbeat and are projecting our industry is going to get real busy."
http://www.theadvertiser.com/article/20110410/BUSINESS/104100331/1046/business/Drilling-permits-boost-oil-industry-?odyssey=nav%7Chead
10th permit issued to drill in the deep
WASHINGTON — Federal regulators on Friday gave Statoil permission to drill a deep-water well - the 10th project approved since such work was halted after last year's Gulf spill.
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/business/7514069.html
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Demand has been down for 5 consecutive weeks..However, prices continue to go up..
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ohh,... oops...
Leonard Castille, vice president of sales for Frank's Casing Crew & Rental Tools, said the flow of deepwater offshore drilling permits issued recently by the federal bureau that controls the tap has been a shot in the arm for local oilfield service sector.
"We're seeing it as a positive thing," said Castille, who has his finger on the pulse of the industry here and across the oil patch. "Right now we're seeing more people going back to work, and everybody I talk to in Houston and New Orleans and Lafayette are real upbeat and are projecting our industry is going to get real busy."
http://www.theadvertiser.com/article/20110410/BUSINESS/104100331/1046/business/Drilling-permits-boost-oil-industry-?odyssey=nav%7Chead
10th permit issued to drill in the deep
WASHINGTON — Federal regulators on Friday gave Statoil permission to drill a deep-water well - the 10th project approved since such work was halted after last year's Gulf spill.
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/business/7514069.html
Is this what an oil drilling ban looks like lol?
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Demand has been down for 5 consecutive weeks..However, prices continue to go up..
Which shows you that it's not supply and demand causing this.
I've been saying this for years!
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Demand has been down for 5 consecutive weeks..However, prices continue to go up..
US demand has been going down slowly for longer than that. Point is elsewhere it isn't and the oil used to replace the light crude is most cost intensive, leading to a higher price overall.
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Yes, as has been shown throughout this thread, you ARE the one with no idea. Like 333 said, you Obama dicksuckers and your refusal to put any of this on your God-King is a sad, pathetic joke. For one, you refuse to acknowledge the failed fiscal policies of your Messiah that have contributed to 19+ weeks of increased oil prices. Secondly, trying to pin this on a "recovery" from the recession is another sad joke as there is no recovery. And there certainly wasn't any talk of recovery in November, when prices started going up. But you keep hanging onto your fantasy about demand, though. ::)
I'd hate to rain on your parade but you really need to read into China's current economic situation. It's not roses like you think and their demand for oil is falling right now due to inflation's effects starting to him them hard. But hey, you go ahead and thump your chest about demand until you're blue in the face. Maybe if you draw blood it might come true.
You keep bringing up China why is that? China isn't the driver of oil prices by themselves are you dense?
OPEC consumes almost as much oil as OECD countries, it's one of the only countries where oil demand is rising.
The fact remains you have proven nothing but a fool who doesn't see behind the partisan rhetoric. I have never once not said Obama doesn't have a hand in this. I have acknowledged that inflation is playing a part but it's not the MAIN driver. There are other issues at play here.
You have failed over and over to see that even the oil companies have acknowledged the time of cheap oil is over. Look at the investment they are making in Canadian oil sands, heck you pointed out the Utah oil sands, know why those are being talked about now? Because the price of oil isn't going to come down enough to make the investment worthless. These are businesses they are there to make money. You really think they would invest billions in an oil resource that needs oil to be at or around $60+ a barrel if they thought it would drop back down? Are you that stupid that you don't understand the simple economics behind that? They aren't spending billions with the expectation of cheap oil in the future.
But hey it's all China right? It seems you have two 'points' One is Obama's money printing policy. A good argument to make, but one that doesn't take into account what the oil companies themselves are doing and investing in. So you see only part of a story.
The other is China. China? Really? I've mentioned over and over OPEC's demand outpacing OECD but no it's China. Really? Is that the only thing you can refute? Hahaha i get it now. Stick to what YOU know, which isn't much.
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Partisan view? Please. The Dems had control of everything for two years. They set the wheels of inflation in motion by recklessly spending and printing money when they needed more (Hi, QE2!). And I keep referencing demand because you keep talking about it. China, along with India, are two of the juggernauts driving increasing oil demand. You keep referencing the OPEC countries but, in the grand scheme of things, their increasing demand, ALONG with that of China/India/whatever, still won't create the environment for the 19 straight weeks of increasing prices that we've seen. You harp on demand while ignoring the fact that QE2 and other fiscal policy failures of the Obama regime are the driving force behind the rising oil prices. Not only that, both China and India are fighting inflation right now that is on the cusp of becoming a gigantic problem for both countries so their oil demands have actually fallen over the last few months. As 225 for 70 said, demand keeps falling and prices keep rising. That is not demand driving those increases, but a weak dollar and rising inflation on the home-front. Why is that so hard to grasp?
Demand is NOT the main driver in this. There is not, nor will there be in the short future, any level of demand to warrant the prices we've been seeing. You're a fucking fool if you think this is the case.
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Partisan view? Please. The Dems had control of everything for two years. They set the wheels of inflation in motion by recklessly spending and printing money when they needed more (Hi, QE2!). And I keep referencing demand because you keep talking about it. China, along with India, are two of the juggernauts driving increasing oil demand. You keep referencing the OPEC countries but, in the grand scheme of things, their increasing demand, ALONG with that of China/India/whatever, still won't create the environment for the 19 straight weeks of increasing prices that we've seen. You harp on demand while ignoring the fact that QE2 and other fiscal policy failures of the Obama regime are the driving force behind the rising oil prices. Not only that, both China and India are fighting inflation right now that is on the cusp of becoming a gigantic problem for both countries so their oil demands have actually fallen over the last few months. As 225 for 70 said, demand keeps falling and prices keep rising. That is not demand driving those increases, but a weak dollar and rising inflation on the home-front. Why is that so hard to grasp?
Demand is NOT the main driver in this. There is not, nor will there be in the short future, any level of demand to warrant the prices we've been seeing. You're a fucking fool if you think this is the case.
Oh dear it's one issue BF harping on at one issue thinking it's the ONE thing that has caused this. It can't be demand, it can't be 4 million barrels that are lost each day and need to be found just to stay at current supply levels. It must be the one issue you can wrap that little brain around and look up on your right wing sites. Hahaha i actual feel bad for you bro.
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This article is correct. Read and learn:
http://www.cpeterson.org/2011/03/10/why-gas-is-so-expensive-today-hint-its-not-libya/
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This article is correct. Read and learn:
http://www.cpeterson.org/2011/03/10/why-gas-is-so-expensive-today-hint-its-not-libya/
This is also what I've been saying... oil being a commodity is designed to go up in price.
Thanks HD.
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This article is correct. Read and learn:
http://www.cpeterson.org/2011/03/10/why-gas-is-so-expensive-today-hint-its-not-libya/
Good post and speculation and traders account for a some of the increase.
And i may have been misunderstanding BF's point of view, i do concede that inflationary policies have led to an increase in oil, i would imagine without it oil would be no less than 60 no higher than 80.
However, there is little a government can do other than nationalize it's oil reserves and sell it to it's people cheaply a la OPEC, or subsidize oil imports a la India. Stopping the printing presses will result in a temporary decrease, but it will not result in a return to $40 a barrel oil.
You need to look no further than what the oil companies themselves are investing in and saying. There are generally two types of oil, crude and tar sands/bitumen. One is relatively easy and cheap to pump once you have the infrastructure set up. The other is costly and energy intensive not to mention environmentally toxic.
Access and abundance of crude have kept oil prices low, OPEC shocks notwithstanding, for decades. The cost is relatively small and once an oil well reaches it economic life (this is different from its actual oil capacity as it is more costly to pump the last 40% or so than it was to pump the first 60%) they seal it up and move on.
This worked well for a long time, but then we stopped finding new crude in easily accessible places. It was becoming cost intensive and more and more risky. We see that with the boom of offshore drilling n the gulf of Mexico, a hurricane haven. But the economics worked, oil had risen enough to offset the costs to set up and pump.
The exact same thing is happening in Canada. They have the 2nd largest proven reserves in the world but it ain't crude. It's bitumen/tar sands. This is exponentially more cost intensive than crude, you dig a pit, pump chemicals heated to 1000's of degrees to lighten the oil trapped in the sand and pump it to the top. This costs and involves a lot more than pumping crude and does not make economic sense unless oil is at or above the generally accepted break even point - $60 per barrel. Prior to the economic crisis investment from the oil companies was worth billions of dollars, when oil collapsed to $40 a barrel almost every single project for expansion was canceled.
But when it rises over $60 a barrel what happens? Billions flood back into Canada. The oil sands start expanding again and new plans are in place. The oil companies don't spend this money thinking "lets do this for a while and wait for oil to drop back down". They do this because they know crude is in short supply. Exxon has already forecast that for every barrel of crude they produce of the next 10 years .95 will be replaced. Meaning less crude, more reliance on tar sands. What does that mean for the consumer? Sustained higher oil prices.
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This article is correct. Read and learn:
http://www.cpeterson.org/2011/03/10/why-gas-is-so-expensive-today-hint-its-not-libya/
Bump
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Bump
QE2 - same with gold, ilver, food, 10% inflation using old method, oil priced in dollars, speculation based on world events, drilling and refinery bans, ec.
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Good post and speculation and traders account for a some of the increase.
And i may have been misunderstanding BF's point of view, i do concede that inflationary policies have led to an increase in oil, i would imagine without it oil would be no less than 60 no higher than 80.
However, there is little a government can do other than nationalize it's oil reserves and sell it to it's people cheaply a la OPEC, or subsidize oil imports a la India. Stopping the printing presses will result in a temporary decrease, but it will not result in a return to $40 a barrel oil.
You need to look no further than what the oil companies themselves are investing in and saying. There are generally two types of oil, crude and tar sands/bitumen. One is relatively easy and cheap to pump once you have the infrastructure set up. The other is costly and energy intensive not to mention environmentally toxic.
Access and abundance of crude have kept oil prices low, OPEC shocks notwithstanding, for decades. The cost is relatively small and once an oil well reaches it economic life (this is different from its actual oil capacity as it is more costly to pump the last 40% or so than it was to pump the first 60%) they seal it up and move on.
This worked well for a long time, but then we stopped finding new crude in easily accessible places. It was becoming cost intensive and more and more risky. We see that with the boom of offshore drilling n the gulf of Mexico, a hurricane haven. But the economics worked, oil had risen enough to offset the costs to set up and pump.
The exact same thing is happening in Canada. They have the 2nd largest proven reserves in the world but it ain't crude. It's bitumen/tar sands. This is exponentially more cost intensive than crude, you dig a pit, pump chemicals heated to 1000's of degrees to lighten the oil trapped in the sand and pump it to the top. This costs and involves a lot more than pumping crude and does not make economic sense unless oil is at or above the generally accepted break even point - $60 per barrel. Prior to the economic crisis investment from the oil companies was worth billions of dollars, when oil collapsed to $40 a barrel almost every single project for expansion was canceled.
But when it rises over $60 a barrel what happens? Billions flood back into Canada. The oil sands start expanding again and new plans are in place. The oil companies don't spend this money thinking "lets do this for a while and wait for oil to drop back down". They do this because they know crude is in short supply. Exxon has already forecast that for every barrel of crude they produce of the next 10 years .95 will be replaced. Meaning less crude, more reliance on tar sands. What does that mean for the consumer? Sustained higher oil prices.
I don't understand why their gas is so expensive when they have all that money going back into their economy, especially considering they have a stronger dollar right now. Sounds like price fixing is the answer, no?
I wonder what oil works out to be when priced in gold?
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QE2 - same with gold, ilver, food, 10% inflation using old method, oil priced in dollars, speculation based on world events, drilling and refinery bans, ec.
and obama
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and obama
He has made the situation worse.
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He has made the situation worse.
im sure.. gas is his fault.. ::)
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so is this cloudy day..
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im sure.. gas is his fault.. ::)
QE2
Drilling Bans
Moritoriums
Dithering on the Canadian Pipeline
Emboldening the financial crooks in this scheme
Fosterig middle east unrest
Etc. Sorry bro - time to take off the dark colored shades (literally) and see your messiah for the disaster he is economically. Worse than bush.
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QE2
Drilling Bans
Moritoriums
Dithering on the Canadian Pipeline
Emboldening the financial crooks in this scheme
Fosterig middle east unrest
Etc. Sorry bro - time to take off the dark colored shades (literally) and see your messiah for the disaster he is economically. Worse than bush.
HAHAHA.. ok
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HAHAHA.. ok
Starting a war in lybia, forcing Mubarak out, etc is real settling.
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Endless amounts of red hot, cheep dollars being pumped into Wall Street/Financial system + a dead dollar + useless zero return Treasuries = Oil/stocks being the ONLY game in town to actually see a return. This is a big reason why commodities are skyrocketing, it's the only place to make any money, fundamentals be damned.
Add the above to U.S. grain stores being at 15 year lows, rising demand and more and more of the Ethanol Joke eating into stores and you get higher grain prices.
Any industry that uses oil/petro products = rising prices. Although the latest reports show that those prices are eating into margins and not being totally passed on to us. That doesn't bode well for future inflation.
And I'm with kcBaller on the point that it isn't all inflation/trading etc, there is a supply/demand component involved as well. The world sits on the razors edge of supply/demand as it is so any disruption, no matter where in the world, is felt by all. Cushing my have run out of space to store reserve oil, but the M/E is scaring traders so that rising tide lifts all boats.
We need to diversify the types of energies used, we need to find more supply and we need to work on conserving what we have.
Efficiency gains are a tough one though. The Jevons effect states that efficiency gains usually lead to more use, I believe this to be true for the most part.
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Starting a war in lybia, forcing Mubarak out, etc is real settling.
OH REALLY ::)
you have reduced yourself to a hateful irrational little man
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OH REALLY ::)
you have reduced yourself to a hateful irrational little man
So Bama didnt start a war over there?
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Endless amounts of red hot, cheep dollars being pumped into Wall Street/Financial system + a dead dollar + useless zero return Treasuries = Oil/stocks being the ONLY game in town to actually see a return. This is a big reason why commodities are skyrocketing, it's the only place to make any money, fundamentals be damned.
Add the above to U.S. grain stores being at 15 year lows, rising demand and more and more of the Ethanol Joke eating into stores and you get higher grain prices.
Any industry that uses oil/petro products = rising prices. Although the latest reports show that those prices are eating into margins and not being totally passed on to us. That doesn't bode well for future inflation.
And I'm with kcBaller on the point that it isn't all inflation/trading etc, there is a supply/demand component involved as well. The world sits on the razors edge of supply/demand as it is so any disruption, no matter where in the world, is felt by all. Cushing my have run out of space to store reserve oil, but the M/E is scaring traders so that rising tide lifts all boats.
We need to diversify the types of energies used, we need to find more supply and we need to work on conserving what we have.
Efficiency gains are a tough one though. The Jevons effect states that efficiency gains usually lead to more use, I believe this to be true for the most part.
Great post. Efficiency gains did lead to more Americans driving more miles. The answer is not temporary cheap oil, it's an actual discussion and presentation on financially viable alternatives and a government plan to help foster that.
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Great post. Efficiency gains did lead to more Americans driving more miles. The answer is not temporary cheap oil, it's an actual discussion and presentation on financially viable alternatives and a government plan to help foster that.
ha ha ha ha - was having a debate on this w my GF this weekend. I am looking for a new car now. I am tryingto choose between Jeep Wrangler 4 Door, Subaru outback, or a Honda CRV. I need something to go off road, tow the jet ski, go in the now, etc. right now I like the outback even though it is a nerdy wagon. she is like "but its un-manly". I am like "but it gets good mpg, tows the jet ski, gores in the off road and snow etc".
ha ha ha hah.
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ha ha ha ha - was having a debate on this w my GF this weekend. I am looking for a new car now. I am tryingto choose between Jeep Wrangler 4 Door, Subaru outback, or a Honda CRV. I need something to go off road, tow the jet ski, go in the now, etc. right now I like the outback even though it is a nerdy wagon. she is like "but its un-manly". I am like "but it gets good mpg, tows the jet ski, gores in the off road and snow etc".
ha ha ha hah.
obama influenced your decision
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ha ha ha ha - was having a debate on this w my GF this weekend. I am looking for a new car now. I am tryingto choose between Jeep Wrangler 4 Door, Subaru outback, or a Honda CRV. I need something to go off road, tow the jet ski, go in the now, etc. right now I like the outback even though it is a nerdy wagon. she is like "but its un-manly". I am like "but it gets good mpg, tows the jet ski, gores in the off road and snow etc".
ha ha ha hah.
Subaru's are notoriously for homosexuals.
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Subaru's are notoriously for homosexuals.
Damn it! I like the Jeep wrangler - but mpg suck and they are usually bad reliabilitiy
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Subaru's are notoriously for homosexuals.
Unless you get the Forester XT or WRX STI. Then you are a legit badass who can take down any American made trash.
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Unless you get the Forester XT or WRX STI. Then you are a legit badass who can take down any American made trash.
got to be honest - right now I am favoring the subaru and not questioning my manhood over it. The new outbacks are pretty badass.
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$6 Gas? Could Happen if Dollar Keeps Getting Weaker
Published: Wednesday, 20 Apr 2011 | 1:46 PM ET Text Size By: Jeff Cox
CNBC.com Staff Writer
A dollar plumbing three-year lows is hitting Americans squarely in the gas tank, and one economist thinks it could drive prices as high as $6 a gallon or more by summertime under the right conditions.
CNBC
High gas prices in California
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With the greenback coming under increased pressure from Federal Reserve policies and investor appetite for more risk, there seems little direction but up for commodity prices, in particular energy and metals.
Weakness in the US currency feeds upward pressure on commodities, which are priced in dollars and thus come at a discount on the foreign markets.
One result has been a surge higher in gasoline prices to nearly $4 a gallon before the summer driving season even starts, a trend that economists say will be aggravated as demand increases and the summer storm season threatens to disrupt oil supplies.
"All we have to have is a couple badly placed hurricanes which could constrain some of the refinery output capacity in some key locations," says Richard Hastings, strategist at Global Hunter Securities in Charlotte, N.C. "If you get weakness in the dollar concurrent with the strong driving season concurrent with the impact of one or two hurricanes in the wrong place, prices could go up in a quasi-exponential manner."
Using a model that combines "subtle rates of change" with movements in the dollar index [.DXY 74.35 -0.69 (-0.91%) ] and commodity prices, Hastings figures the low dollar is responsible for about one-third, or $1.31, of the total gas-at-the-pump cost. Regular unleaded Wednesday was $3.84 a gallon nationwide, according to AAA.
While there's far from unanimity about the dollar's future course, the proportionate contribution that currency weakness makes to oil prices is clear.
The dollar as measured against a basket of foreign currencies has dropped 6 percent this year, while regular unleaded gasoline is up about 28 percent.
Gas prices also have been boosted from turmoil in the Middle East which in turn has triggered a wave of speculation that traders estimate has added about $15 or so to the cost of a barrel of crude [CLCV1 111.40 3.12 (+2.88%) ], which is now teetering above the $110 mark.
RELATED LINKS
Current DateTime: 12:00:31 20 Apr 2011
LinksList Documentid: 42683985
Consumers May Cut BackOil Rallies on Weak DollarOil May Hit $150, Gold $2,000: Risk Assessor
Hastings sees gasoline having "no problem" getting to $6.50 a gallon over the summer after increased demand and storm disruptions come into play.
Others, though, say gasoline prices haven't needed any help so far from other events—the moves by the Fed to keep interest rates in negative real terms are enough to boost energy by themselves.
Michael Pento, senior economist at Euro Pacific Capital in New York, says there is an almost perfect negative correlation between the falling dollar and oil prices—minus-0.9 to be exact.
"When you have negative correlations that strong, it's not hard to understand that the reason why we're having this price spike in commodities is primarily because of the weaker currency and not because of shortages of oil or international tensions or global growth," Pento says.
The assertion from Hastings that the weak dollar is responsible for one-third of the total cost for a gallon of gas "sounds very low," Pento says, adding that a barrel of oil should be closer to the $65 to $70 range if priced properly.
"That's exactly where it would be if we weren't crumbling our currency," he says.
Should events follow their current course, sharply higher gas prices will burden consumers further as they also cope with the rise in food costs this year.
Hastings projects the dollar index to test 72 at some point—another 3 percent drop—while Peter Cardillo, chief economist at Avalon Partners in New York, sees the dollar dropping to the 73.50 level.
"The global economy is quite strong, and the weak dollar is basically fueling even higher energy prices. That's not transitory," Cardillo says. "Gas prices in the Northeast are over $4 a gallon. How could anyone say that's not a burden?"
© 2011 CNBC.com
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wow - so i was right again. Go figure .
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Obama: Think about ditching those gas-guzzling SUVs
The Hill ^ | April 21, 2011 | Andrew Restuccia
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President Obama urged the public Thursday to think about trading in their SUVs for more fuel-efficient vehicles, arguing that gas-guzzlers keep the country dependent on foreign oil.
“When you do decide to buy a new car, think about that we’re putting a whole bunch of money into the pockets of some folks who do not like us at all,” Obama said in remarks at a town-hall meeting in Reno, Nev., referring to oil-producing countries in the Middle East and North Africa. Obama noted, however, that not all Americans can afford to buy a new car.
As gas prices continue to rise, Obama has made reducing the country’s dependence on foreign oil a major part of his administration’s domestic policy agenda.
In a speech last month, Obama laid out a goal of reducing the country’s oil imports by one-third by 2025. As part of the pledge, the administration is partnering with major U.S. companies to transition their vehicle fleets to electric and hybrid vehicles.
(Excerpt) Read more at thehill.com ...
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How about this communist traitor and piece of trash stop taking AF1 across the nation weekly for campaign fundraisers and he stops using his 8 mpg tank that carts his ass around?
How about he tell his fat nasty bitch wife to stay home and stop flying all over the world as well?
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Battered by gas prices White House starts attacks on oil companies
The Hill ^ | 04/23/11 | Ian Swanson
The White House has joined congressional Democrats in targeting oil companies with criticism for nearly $4 per gallon gas.
President Obama lashed out at oil companies -- and the tax breaks they get from the government -- for a second day in a row on Thursday and again in Saturday's address.
“Four billion dollars of your money are going to these companies at a time when they’re making record profits and you’re paying near record prices at the pump,” the president said at a Nevada town hall. “It has to stop."
(Excerpt) Read more at thehill.com ...
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Obama’s Blame Game Continues: Who’s Behind Oil Price Rise?
By Liz Peek
April 21: President Barack Obama speaks at a fundraiser at Sony Pictures Studios in Culver City, Calif.
President Obama is at it again. Soaring gasoline prices are hitting Americans where it hurts, and threatening to undermine our fragile recovery. With oil hitting $111 today, and gasoline topping $4 a gallon in many markets, economists are beginning to ratchet down their GDP forecasts, boding ill for continued job growth. Meanwhile, and not coincidentally, the nation is souring on our elected officials, and on the president, whose approval ratings are sinking like a failed soufflé. A staggering 70% of the nation thinks we’re headed in the wrong direction. What’s Obama’s solution? Find someone to blame.
To show he’s on top of our energy crisis, the president has…created yet another commission! This one – a task force from the Justice Department - is charged with ferreting out the scoundrels behind the jump in gasoline prices – surely there must be some nefarious speculators or market manipulators who can be hauled before Congress in one of those satisfying and cathartic inquiries that, at the end, yield almost nothing. But, these hard-light investigations do provide plenty of room for posturing and prime-time sound bites.
President Obama has resorted to the blame-game throughout his presidency. GW Bush was responsible for the recession, the budget deficit, extravagant healthcare costs, the quagmire in Afghanistan, potholes, global warming and quite possibly Charlie Sheen’s meltdown. Wall Street fat cats brought on the banking crisis (not aided and abetted by Barney Frank et al), insurance miscreants are to blame for soaring healthcare expenses, oil companies are guilty of sitting on leases, pharmaceutical companies should be taken out and shot and Republicans have been mulishly resistant to even the most winning proposals. Now, rascals are at work pumping up gasoline prices; what is a president to do?
On oil prices, the president is vulnerable. First, the administration is accused by U.S. oil explorers of issuing misleading information about why offshore drilling is not moving forward. At the moment, the number of rigs operating in the Gulf of Mexico is about half the level of a year ago; the head of the Independent Petroleum Association of America has said that the government has dragged its feet in issuing the permits necessary for work to move forward.
President Obama dismisses these allegations, pointing out that domestic oil production was up last year. He didn’t mention that when oil prices move dramatically higher, production always increases, as marginally profitable wells are brought on stream. Our output would have been even higher if offshore development had moved forward as planned. Instead, the new organization charged with issuing permits is like a deer in the headlights – panicked that they will approve a drilling project that will one day go awry. No one doubts the need to buttress our safety standards, and especially in deep waters, where failed technology led to the Deepwater Horizon blowout. Still, with the impact of climbing oil prices becoming all too visible, no one should prevent us from ramping up domestic supply as quickly as possible.
Also, economists worldwide are blaming the loose monetary policies of Fed Chair Ben Bernanke for having helped unleash commodity price inflation around the globe. Though Mr. Bernanke denies that the quantitative easing programs in the U.S. are boosting the prices of gold, corn, cotton, copper and oil, to name but a few, his is quickly becoming the minority position. The U.S. dollar is sinking and excess liquidity is flowing into commodities markets. Bernanke is singularly focused on preventing deflation; that global food and raw materials prices have climbed as much as 40% to 50% over the past year and that inflation is creeping higher seems to have eluded his gaze.
Finally, Americans may connect the rise in oil prices with disruptions in the Middle East. Though no one can hold President Obama responsible for the popular uprisings in Tunisia or Egypt, our disconnected and inconsistent response has heightened uncertainty in the region. Confusion is the enemy of price stability.
Mr. Obama’s blame game is quickly losing favor. Americans are now ready to hold President Obama responsible for their problems, recognizing that he has had two years in which he and his party were in charge. He needs to channel Harry S. Truman and acknowledge: “ the buck stops here.”
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Battered by gas prices White House starts attacks on oil companies
The Hill ^ | 04/23/11 | Ian Swanson
The White House has joined congressional Democrats in targeting oil companies with criticism for nearly $4 per gallon gas.
President Obama lashed out at oil companies -- and the tax breaks they get from the government -- for a second day in a row on Thursday and again in Saturday's address.
“Four billion dollars of your money are going to these companies at a time when they’re making record profits and you’re paying near record prices at the pump,” the president said at a Nevada town hall. “It has to stop."
(Excerpt) Read more at thehill.com ...
This is a true statement to be honest.
It's not the entire problem, but it's definitely a part of it... Speculators on oil commodities are to blame as well.
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Protecting Soros: Obama's Dishonest Oil Price Investigation
Who's to blame for the high price of gas?
If you listen to Obama, it's the speculators and traders who are to blame. The same people who create the liquid market for commodities. He suggests that they've bid up the price of oil and are rigging the markets to force consumers to pay up for something they need. It's a move right out of Hugo Chavez's playbook - blaming the free market for accurately reflecting reality. Chavez has made a very good career for himself by impoverishing the Venezuelan people while simultaneously blaming capitalism. It's a strategy that depends on a high degree of ignorance in the population.
Now that Eric Holder's on the case, we can expect to see traders and money managers paraded in front of the public like so many criminals for, basically, doing their jobs. It'll make for great press, as the MSM focuses like a laser on the greed that they'll say is causing our crisis. They'll help the left wing and Obama portray a frenzied rush for oil, and suggest that speculators are causing a bubble in the price of this rare commodity that the world's running out of. But that'll be a bunch of crap, a message for the morons, if you will, and here's why.
Oil is a global market, and it's denominated in dollars. What that means is that, whenever anyone, anywhere, buys oil, they are doing so on the basis of its price in dollars. Right now, there's no shortage of oil. Obama and the left wing are lying about that. In fact, Saudi Arabia's talking about reducing the amount of oil produced, due to oversupply. Despite what Obama's administration is saying, there's definitely no frenzied rush for oil right now. So, why the sudden rise in oil prices?
The dollar. What's really going on is that the dollar is crashing. Relative to other currencies. Relative to other commodities. And relative to oil. You may have noticed gold is pushing $1500 an ounce, and silver nearing $50, but you don't pump those in your tank every day. Obama knows that, so he's going after the lowest common denominator - the price of oil. Like every other dollar-denominated item anywhere in the world right now, including the bread I bought today at the supermarket, and the train ticket I buy every month, the price of oil is rising. More accurately put, the instrument we use to buy oil, gas, bread, gold, silver, and train tickets is going DOWN in value. And that's because Obama's monetary policy is devaluing the dollar.
This is no small threat to our national prosperity. Obama, Bernanke, Geithner, and the whole lot of them should be arrested for what they're doing. The America that watches the mainstream news is about to get really angry at the commodity traders who are getting blamed for the rise in the price of oil, but the real villains are the henchmen carrying out yet another George Soros-led attack on a currency. The differentiating factor between this hit on the American dollar and Soros' previous attacks on various European currencies is that this time, Soros has the ultimate inside man - Barack Obama.
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You are such an idiot 333.
http://www.worldenergyoutlook.org/ (http://www.worldenergyoutlook.org/)
According to the report, by 2035 three-quarters of currently operating oil fields won’t be producing anymore. In fact, current fields are only expected to account for less than one-fifth of that year’s production. And in order for the 'newer' fields to become affordable guess what price oil has to be? Triple fu*king digit.
According to IEA projections, it now appears that the production of conventional oil peaked back in 2006, that would be gasoline for your car 333. So yeah it's Obama's fault ::)
Get a clue.
$6 Gas? Could Happen if Dollar Keeps Getting Weaker [/b]
A dollar plumbing three-year lows is hitting Americans squarely in the gas tank, and one economist thinks it could drive prices as high as $6 a gallon or more by summertime under the right conditions.
With the greenback coming under increased pressure from Federal Reserve policies and investor appetite for more risk, there seems little direction but up for commodity prices, in particular energy and metals.
---
Michael Pento, senior economist at Euro Pacific Capital in New York, says there is an almost perfect negative correlation between the falling dollar and oil prices—minus-0.9 to be exact.
"When you have negative correlations that strong, it's not hard to understand that the reason why we're having this price spike in commodities is primarily because of the weaker currency and not because of shortages of oil or international tensions or global growth," Pento says.
http://www.cnbc.com/id/42683030/
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Energy in America: EPA Rules Force Shell to Abandon Oil Drilling Plans
Fox News ^ | April 25, 2011 | Dan Springer
Shell Oil Company has announced it must scrap efforts to drill for oil this summer in the Arctic Ocean off the northern coast of Alaska. The decision comes following a ruling by the EPA’s Environmental Appeals Board to withhold critical air permits. The move has angered some in Congress and triggered a flurry of legislation aimed at stripping the EPA of its oil drilling oversight.
Shell has spent five years and nearly $4 billion dollars on plans to explore for oil in the Beaufort and Chukchi Seas. The leases alone cost $2.2 billion. Shell Vice President Pete Slaiby says obtaining similar air permits for a drilling operation in the Gulf of Mexico would take about 45 days. He’s especially frustrated over the appeal board’s suggestion that the Arctic drill would somehow be hazardous for the people who live in the area. “We think the issues were really not major,” Slaiby said, “and clearly not impactful for the communities we work in.”
The closest village to where Shell proposed to drill is Kaktovik, Alaska. It is one of the most remote places in the United States. According to the latest census, the population is 245 and nearly all of the residents are Alaska natives. The village, ...
The EPA’s appeals board ruled that Shell had not taken into consideration emissions from an ice-breaking vessel when calculating overall greenhouse gas emissions from the project. Environmental groups were thrilled by the ruling.
“What the modeling showed was in communities like Kaktovik, Shell’s drilling would increase air pollution levels close to air quality standards,” said Eric Grafe, Earthjustice’s lead attorney on the case. Earthjustice was joined by Center for Biological Diversity and the Alaska Wilderness League in challenging the air permits.
At stake is an estimated 27 billion barrels of oil.
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
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President “Necessarily Skyrocket” Obama Baffled by Rising Gas Prices
Share | | (6) Comments | Subscribe | Back to full Article | Contact Us
By Fred Dardick Monday, April 25, 2011
http://canadafreepress.com/index.php/print-friendly/35840
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The same person who promised to bankrupt coal plants and cause electricity prices to “necessarily skyrocket” as a candidate would have us believe that he has nothing to do with Americans paying $4 or more a gallon at the gas pump now that he is President. According to Obama, it’s all a mystery to him.
Last week Obama feigned righteous anger towards “traders and speculators” whom he called responsible for our predicament. He promised to hunt down and prosecute any “manipulation in the oil markets”. In that case I guess Obama should arrest himself since no other individual on the planet is more responsible for rising gas prices than him.
His goal has always been to make energy less affordable. Ever since taking office Obama has worked relentlessly to demonize “dirty” fossil fuels and replace them with prohibitively expensive “green” energy. His administration has shut down oil exploration in the Gulf of Mexico, Alaska, outer continental shelf and Western states and has given the EPA free reign to unilaterally set carbon emission limits (energy taxes) on American industries without the approval or input of Congress.
He has perpetuated the myth that America only has less than 2% of the world’s oil reserves. In reality the United States leads the world in recoverable fossil fuel deposits and given the right political environment, we wouldn’t have to import another drop of foreign oil for the next hundred years or so, if ever.
Obama’s latest “solutions” will only make things worse. Last week he called for transferring even more of our national wealth to the unicorns and pixie dust green energy economy and promised to eliminate “$4 billion in taxpayer subsidies we give to the oil and gas companies”, a cost that will “necessarily” be passed on to consumers.
I don’t know how many Americans are still buying Obama’s innocent act, but I have a feeling that regardless of party affiliation many will hold him personally responsible. Until the United States adopts a sensible energy policy that taps into our vast fossil fuel resources and stops throwing away billions on failed green technologies, gas prices will continue to rise.
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Obama Clears the Way For America's 2 Largest Oil Wells to be Shutdown in Texas
ChicoER Gate ^ | 4/25/11 | Chuck Wolk
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From the moment Richard Nixon created the EPA in 1970, and signed the Endangered Species Act (ESA) into law, they have been the primary engines of social change used by leftists environmental elitists to destroy America. They have done so by infiltrating the EPA, and the US Fish & Wildlife (USF&W) the agency which decides what animals will be listed as endangered. Now, 28 years later, these renegade environmentalist wackos are prepared to use the ESA to shut down oil and gas operations in portions of Southeast New Mexico and in West Texas, including the state's top two oil producing counties. All because of a tiny lizard they claim to be endangered, and Obama who has the power to put it on a waiting list has cleared the way for it to be listed.
Through the years the EPA & the ESA have been used to shut down vast areas of America that we as Americans need to survive in a modern world. Areas that contain, rich farmland needed to grow food that both America and foreign countries need to feed billions of people. Forest areas so rich in timber that the price of building homes could be reduced dramatically if only we were allowed to harvest them. Instead, year after year we spend billions fighting fires that reduce the timber to ashes. When it comes to energy, these government paid earth worshipers have used their power to keep us from drilling for oil, and stand in the way of building needed power plants all across America. According to a recent Congressional report America has the largest oil, coal, and natural gas reserves in the world, if tapped we could be completely energy independent. Truth is, America has enough natural energy reserves, timberland, sustainable farm land, freshwater lakes and underground reservoirs that we could reduce the cost of living for each and every American by more than 50%, if only the governments chains of restrictions were removed.
The earth worshiping environmentalists running the USF&W have used an owl to shut down logging in the Northwest, a mouse to shut down wheat farming in Colorado, a minnow and rat to end vegetable growing in California, a frog has closed fish hatcheries in the deep South, while the reintroduction of wolves are endangering the lives of ranchers, farmers, and hunters all across America from the Rockies to Maine. Now they are planning to use a lizard to shut down two of Americas largest oil wells in Texas. We already have one of the largest oil reserves put off limits by the EPA in Anwar Alaska, while Obama is ignoring a Federal judges order to allow drilling to continue in the Gulf. This while almost every communist country in the world has oil wells operating in our backyard, the Gulf of Mexico.
In a logical universe, we would have politicians that would do all they can to make sure Americans had a cost of living so low that no one in America would be struggling to make ends meet. Instead these traitors would rather see Americans struggle to survive while they act as if their various government programs are saving the day. Never before in the history of the world has a countries leaders tried so hard to force its citizens to become so dependent and subservient to other countries. Many of which are our sworn enemies. Can anyone imagine Alexander, Caesar, or even George Washington forcing their citizens to humble themselves before an enemy of lesser power like Persia, Carthage, or England? No, only a modern day Judas, Ephialtes, or Benedict Arnold, would cause their own people to suffer the indignities our leaders so consistently force us to.
The current threat to America's freedom comes from a 3 inch lizard called the Sceloporus Arenicolus, or better known as the Dunes Sagebrush Lizard or the Sand Dune Lizard. It was originally classified as a subspecies of the Sceloporus Graciosus, or Common Sagebrush Lizard. Before they designated the Dune Lizards as a separate species, there were so many of them you could feed them to the Chinese as a delicacy and never run out. It was in 2002 that the Center for Biological Diversity first petitioned to have the lizard listed as endangered. The Bush administration stood in the way of the lizard being listed for 6 years, but last year Obama cleared the way by ordering his administration to back off from delaying the listing. This in spite of the news that Obama has repeatedly refused to grant species the protection for which they are known to qualify adding them instead to the waiting list. So why did he allow this lizard to be listed? There can be only one reason, and that is because Obama wants to destroy America's ability to be energy free. So his relentless attack on America's energy capabilities continues. Go figure.
There was a rally in Roswell NM last week on April 20th that had hundreds protesting the listing and there will be another one on Tuesday April 26th, in Midland Tx at the Midland Center that begins at 5 p.m. with Congressman Mike Conaway will speaking to the concerned citizens. Then on Wednesday April 27th, there will be a public hearing held at 6:30 p.m at the Midland Center. If you want to be heard then be there to support those at the front line in the battle to stop a lizard from shutting down Americas 2 largest working oil wells.
"It does not require a majority to prevail, but rather an irate,
tireless minority keen to set brush fires in people's minds."
-- Samuel Adams --
Leader in our Fight for Independence
The following is from the Federal register PDF file. In it the USF&W explains what they are attempting to accomplish through the Endangered Species Act,
(here is the link to the official PDF file)
We, the USF&W, propose to list the dunes sagebrush lizard (Sceloporus Arenicolus), a lizard known from southeastern New Mexico and adjacent west Texas, as endangered under the Endangered Species Act of 1973, as amended. If we finalize the rule as proposed, it would extend the Act's protections to this species. We have determined that critical habitat for the dunes sagebrush lizard is prudent but not determinable at this time.
Proposed Listing Determination We have carefully assessed the best scientific and commercial information available regarding the past, present, and future threats to the dunes sagebrush lizard. The dunes sagebrush lizard faces immediate and significant threats due to oil and gas activities, and herbicide treatments. Habitat loss and fragmentation due to oil and gas development is a measureable factor impacting the species due to the removal of shinnery oak and creation of roads and pads, pipelines, and power lines that create habitat patches and increase the proportion of habitat edge to habitat interior. In addition, impacts that are not easily quantified such as climate change, competition, and pollution may exacerbate adverse effects caused by habitat loss. Cumulative threats to the dunes sagebrush lizard are not being adequately addressed through existing regulatory mechanisms. Oil and gas pollutants are a current and ongoing threat to the species throughout its range.
We believe the following actions may jeopardize this species, and therefore we would seek to conference with BLM and NRCS on these actions:
The lease of land for oil and gas drilling,
Applications to drill,
Applications for infrastructure through dunes (including, but not limited to pipelines and power lines),
OHV activities,
Seismic exploration,
Continued oil and gas operations (release of pollution and routine maintenance),
Grazing leases,
Renewable resource activities, and
Chemical and mechanical removal of shinnery oak habitat.
Do not place power lines and fences through shinnery oak dune complexes;
Develop transmission corridors for pipelines and power lines;
Limit pollution by inspecting pipelines and equipment;
Develop and implement plans for cleaning oil spills;
Limit hydrogen sulfide emissions;
Maintain wells; and
Limit any further infrastructure that would remove the shinnery oak dunes.
Possible measures that could be implemented to conserve the dunes sagebrush lizard and its habitat are:
Maintain 500-m (1640-ft) wide dispersal corridors in shinnery oak dunes for the dunes sagebrush lizards to disperse between habitat patches;
Discontinue chemical spraying within occupied or suitable habitat;
Place well pads outside of shinnery oak dunes and corridors between dune complexes;
Manage well density to limit development in habitat;
Minimize well pad size and carry out site reclamation;
Develop techniques to recreate shinnery oak dunes;
Limit OHV use in occupied habitat;
Minimize impacts of seismic exploration by thumper trucks;
Develop a public awareness program;
(Article has been posted in full, so there is no need to visit my site.
However if you wish to give my site a hit it would be much appreciated.)
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Strange how high gas prices are everyone elses fault now that Obama is POTUS ::) Why is anyone surprised? Hell he told everyone what he was going to do when he was running
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Strange how high gas prices are everyone elses fault now that Obama is POTUS ::) Why is anyone surprised? Hell he told everyone what he was going to do when he was running
He has done EVERYTHING possible to skyrocket oil prices and now people are surprised?
This is intentional! He wants us paying $10 a gallon and has said so many times. Its only the deluded jerkoffs ad 95% ers like mal, benny, andre, et al who give him a pass for reasons I better leave alone. We all know it.
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Michele Bachmann: Obama and oil
Article by: MICHELE BACHMANN Updated: April 25, 2011 - 9:26 PM
Why should the United States be one of Brazil's 'best customers' when we need to increase reliance on our own resources?
. Americans are feeling the pain of spiking gas prices, and the unrest spreading through the Middle East seems to point to even higher costs at the pump.
Last month President Obama made a hopeful declaration: "We want to help you with the technology and support to develop these oil reserves safely, and when you're ready to start selling, we want to be one of your best customers."
Sadly, the president's words weren't offered to developers in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) where 30 to 50 years of oil may be available. They weren't offered to developers of the vast shale deposits in the Rocky Mountains, which are estimated to contain three times more oil than Saudi Arabia.
And they weren't offered to the dozens of companies that have applied for Gulf Coast drilling permits that are awaiting federal review. Many have had their hands tied for the year since the Deepwater Horizon spill.
No, Obama gave his enthusiastic support for drilling to Brazil.
Why should the United States be one of Brazil's "best customers" when we need to increase reliance on our own resources? If an all-of-the above energy plan was encouraged here, we could create numerous, high-paying jobs and move our economy forward.
For example, nearly three-quarters of a million jobs could be created if just the northern coast of ANWR were opened to exploration.
In his State of the Union address, Obama said 80 percent of our energy must come from so-called clean sources. How much money will the taxpayer have to pay to subsidize green energy sources like solar, biomass, wave and wind power?
I'm worried about the impact this will have on our deficit, since we know green jobs cannot stand by themselves.
A 2009 study from Spain showed that for every green job, at least 2.2 jobs were lost in other industries. Gabriel Calzada, an economics professor from King Juan Carlos University and author of the report, found a $774,000 cost for each Spanish green job created since 2000.
Last month Verso Economics released a similar study on the United Kingdom which showed that 3.7 jobs were lost for every green job created.
Oil production can create dependable jobs in the United States if given the chance. Too bad Obama has said "no" to American energy production.
There has been no urgency from the administration to grant offshore oil drilling permits. Seventy-seven oil leases in Utah alone are ready to move forward on production.
Gas was $1.83 the day before Obama took office. Now the national average is $3.84 and trending upwards.
Energy production must be opened up to American producers willing to invest in domestic resources. We can and must wean ourselves off foreign oil from the Middle East.
The United States can be its own best energy customer.
Michele Bachmann represents Minnesota's Sixth District in the U.S. House.
* * *
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Gasoline Prices and Speculators: They Think You Are Stupid
American Thinker ^ | 4-25-11 | Joseph Svetlic
________________________ ________________________ ________
It is with great interest that I read this past week about the President's initial response to rising gas prices. What or who was to blame? According to the President...speculators. Nameless, faceless speculators. They are to blame for the rising price of crude oil up and the accompanying price at the pump!
The problem is...speculators and people make various bets, and they say, you know what, we think that maybe there's a 20 percent chance that something might happen in the Middle East that might disrupt oil supply, so we're going to bet that oil is going to go up real high. And that spikes up prices significantly.
Now this interested me because I worked in the petroleum industry and I studied energy law at law school, and I have taken a strong interest in macroeconomics in recent years. (I read Market Ticker and Zero Hedge, if you are wondering.) I'm going to disregard for this note the fact that higher gas prices are not objectionable at all to our President, despite the fact that they are connected to every product we buy. He doesn't have a problem with high gas prices, only wishing that they become high on a gradual basis. I'm also going to ignore the moratorium on drilling in the Gulf and general opposition to domestic exploration and production of petroleum by this Administration.
No, the main culprit here isn't the nameless, faceless "speculators" that are now the object of the President's scorn, but government policy itself, both with the Federal Reserve (monetary) and the budget deficits accrued in recent years (fiscal). What is going on is that the government is trying to deflect blame to these nameless, faceless speculators for their own disastrous fiscal and monetary policies.
In other words, they think you are stupid.
Let me remind you that the Federal Reserve (Fed) began "quantitative easing" (using printed money to buy assets, chiefly Treasury Bonds) in September 2008 with over $2 trillion. "QE1" continued through the end of the first quarter of 2010, the end of March 2010. Thereafter, we got QE2, which continues to this very day but is slowly wrapping up QE2 is a third the size of QE1, but it means the same: monetizing debt.
On the fiscal side, our President has run up a lot of debt in the past two years, despite running in 2008 on a "net spending cut." He's up to nearly 4 trillion in debt over just a little more than two years.
How are we financing this? Well, the Fed is stepping up to buy 70% of treasuries. They're doing it with printed money, "quantitative easing." What's the effect of this? You're dollar is worth less. Using printed money to buy the debt of the same country will inflate the currency. Our dollar is not backed by anything. It floats. Therefore, the money that you have has been drastically devalued since the onset of "quantitative easing." This is what I call "loose money."
Why is it important to you? Because inflation is a stealth tax on every dollar you have.
Whom does this hurt the most? The poor and those on fixed incomes. To any progressives reading this who really do want to help the poor reach the middle class and get off government assistance: is the way to help them through a stealth 20% tax on every dollar they have in their pocket, a unilateral tax that bypasses Congress? That stealth, regressive tax can only drive more middle class into being poor, right? Shouldn't we want every dollar they own to have maximum purchasing power, to be worth as much as possible? Does this have anything to do, you suppose, with the record number on food stamps, one in six Americans?
These are the ravages of a loose monetary policy, high-deficit, spendthrift government. It is impoverishment. It is precisely the opposite of what is necessary for a true, strong recovery. A true recovery will feature fiscal responsibility and a strong dollar. The President ran in part on such a platform in 2008, promising a "net spending cut." Had he run on trillion-dollar deficits and monetizing debt, he would've never been elected. Such a strong recovery will have to wait until the President and Fed Chairman are replaced, beginning in 2013.
This spendthrift, loose (and reckless) policy is also reflected in the price of gold and silver, which are historical safe harbors from inflation because (as precious metals) they store value and are never worthless. Gold as of this writing was over $1,500/oz, silver over $46/oz. Gold at the beginning of the Obama Administration was just over $850/oz, silver at under $11.50/oz. Just this month, the price of silver skyrocketed from $40/oz to $45/oz in only 12 days. The loss of confidence in the dollar has been striking.
So, they are hoping that you don't pay attention to their fiscal and monetary policy. They want you to blame nameless, faceless "speculators" for the rise in the price of gas, even though everything else has risen, thanks to their loose monetary policy and spendthrift fiscal policy. They want you to ignore the rise in commodity prices and the drastic hike in gold and silver. They think you'll go after the nameless, faceless "speculators" because they think you are stupid.
My question is this: Are they right about you?
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Obama says he wants oil producers to boost output
Yahoo ^ | 4/26/11 | Jim Kuhnhenn - ap
Posted on April 26, 2011 10:52:26 PM EDT by NormsRevenge
As the high cost of gasoline takes a toll on politics and pocket books, President Barack Obama said Tuesday he is calling on major oil producers such as Saudi Arabia to increase their oil supplies to help stabilize prices, warning starkly that lack of relief would harm the global economy.
"We are in a lot of conversations with the major oil producers like Saudi Arabia to let them know that it's not going to be good for them if our economy is hobbled because of high oil prices," Obama told a Detroit TV station.
His remarks signaled a broad new appeal in the face of skyrocketing gasoline prices in the United States and they came as he reiterated a call for Congress to repeal oil industry tax breaks.
(Excerpt) Read more at sfgate.com ...
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April 27, 2011
Why Isn't Obama Celebrating High Oil Prices?
By David Harsanyi
www.realclearpolitics.co m
It's about time the administration began taking on the ogres of the left's imagination seriously. Attorney General Eric Holder has formed the "Oil and Gas Price Fraud Working Group to Focus on Energy Markets" to expose the speculators, the gougers and those fat cat millionaires. And if we can't confront make-believe distractions with "working groups," well, we are surely a nation in decline.
But of course, Holder will find the biggest frauds right in his administration, which -- as a matter of policy, as a matter of faith -- believes the price of fossil fuels ought to be extortionate and has done all it can to ensure it.
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David Harsanyi RealClearPolitics
energy oil prices
Obama administration
The left's "energy" initiatives of the past decade -- the entire purpose of energy policy, in fact -- have been aimed at artificially driving fossil fuel prices up to incentivize the bitter clingers to embrace the government's Utopian energy schemes. No secret has been made of it. In 2008, candidate Barack Obama was asked by CNBC's John Harwood, "So could the (high) oil prices help us?" Obama: "I think that I would have preferred a gradual adjustment." Sudden spikes are bad (politically speaking), but gradual price spikes? Helpful. That same year, current U.S. "Energy" Secretary (then just a zany professor) Steven Chu clarified that "somehow we have to figure out how to boost the price of gasoline to the levels in Europe."
Who says this administration doesn't get things done?
What we need are clean energy investments, properly inflated tires, Chinese-style rail systems -- all free of the distraction of capitalism. Also, we must rid the nation of oil subsidies. This I completely support, as long as the funds are reinvested into projects beneficial for the struggling American worker, say, bike paths or public service announcements.
We all, you see, have to make adjustments. As President Obama explained, "if you're complaining about the price of gas and you're only getting 8 miles a gallon ... you might want to think about a trade-in." What kind of trade-in, sir? Let me guess. A $41,000 economy-class government-made Chevy vehicle (a real cost of 100K-plus without taxpayer support) that plugs into expensive government-subsidized energy produced by the sweet howling wind? Yes, these are the serious people.
Then, of course, there is all the profit-mongering we keep hearing about. The Congressional Budget Office reported that in January, federal and state fuel taxes sucked in about 48 cents per gallon for gasoline and 53 cents per gallon for diesel fuel. Government typically sees more profit per gallon of gas than the oil companies. At least the fossil fuel oligarchs -- smart enough to control the entire world market but too dumb to do it more often -- have the decency to provide a product before taking carnal advantage of us at the pumps.
Let's not forget the Environmental Protection Agency, which, as we speak, is in the process of rolling out the "the most far-reaching environmental regulatory scheme in American history," according to Time magazine. Using the Clean Air Act to regulate greenhouse gases -- so, all useful energy -- the EPA is trying to initiate cap and trade by fiat. It has to because even a Democratic monopoly in Washington was unable to muster the courage to launch this kind of assault on prosperity.
Complaints about our "dependency on foreign oil" -- considering the fungibility of the commodity, where we get it from and how long it takes to increase production -- seem to be nothing more than crowd-pleasing bipartisan talking points. Surely, there could be a useful debate on the topic, if this administration cared one whit about increasing production at home. The de facto moratorium on offshore oil drilling and the regulatory burdens placed on new production prove that any "dependency" on oil, not just the Middle East variety, is the real problem.
The administration, of course, isn't at fault when oil prices spike; it just seems to make matters worse. Or better, if you happen to be an environmentalist. So why isn't it celebrating? Though the left may be wary of the political consequences, it has been pining for high fuel costs for decades. So here they are. Let's see how the economy responds.
Copyright 2011, Creators Syndicate Inc.
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EDITORIAL: Obama running on empty
Leftist policies pump up America’s dependence on foreign oil
By THE WASHINGTON TIMES
The Washington Times
7:32 p.m., Tuesday, April 26, 2011
ASSOCIATED PRESS More than six of every 10 Americans have cut back on other expenses and reduced their driving as a result of the rising gas prices caused by tumult in North Africa and the Middle East. President Obama’s approval rating has taken a hit.
Skyrocketing gasoline prices have sent President Obama's public-approval ratings plummeting. The White House is searching for someone to blame, but the problem rests not with the pumps but with the president.
Mr. Obama maintains that lack of supply is not driving up prices. However, domestic demand is not the issue either, since U.S. energy use per capita has been on the decline. So the White House has formed an interagency working group to root out the "traders and speculators" whom he says are responsible for America's gasoline woes. This type of populist blame-game is typical of the Obama administration's approach to policy challenges, and diverts attention from the true proximate causes of the oil spike, such as the crises in the Middle East.
If prices are being manipulated, perhaps Mr. Obama should take it up with the OPEC potentates who are the most direct beneficiaries. Mr. Obama also said he wants to end what he says is a $4 billion annual taxpayer subsidy to oil and gas companies, though how removing a subsidy will lower gasoline prices has yet to be explained.
Mr. Obama's scapegoat safari notwithstanding, the current energy crisis underscores the general failure of administration energy policies. The promised brave new world of green technologies is slow in coming, and the government is quickly putting reliable domestic fossil fuels further out of reach. Even as vast new energy reserves are being discovered, such as the Saudi-topping Bakken formation in North Dakota, domestic production is declining. Mr. Obama has banned new domestic offshore drilling while subsidizing it in Brazil. This week, Shell Oil Company announced that it is abandoning Arctic Ocean drilling plans because the Environmental Protection Agency is blocking key permits, sacrificing 27 billion barrels of oil. Last month, the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) projected a reduction in total U.S. crude oil production of 110,000 barrels per day in 2011 and a further 130,000 barrels per day in 2012. Given the current profitability of oil production, the blame can only rest with the White House.
Mr. Obama talked a good game regarding reducing dependency on foreign oil before he was president. In 2006, then-Sen. Barack Obama said the United States should cut oil imports by 7.5 million barrels a day by 2025, which at the time would have amounted to a 50 percent cut. He was highly critical of President George W. Bush's energy policies, but according to the EIA, oil imports declined from a daily average of 13.7 million barrels in 2005 to 11.7 million by 2009. At that rate, a 50 percent reduction would have been reached by 2016.
Since Mr. Obama took office, foreign oil imports have increased. In 2010, oil imports rose by 62,000 barrels per day, and in January 2011, the latest month for which government data are available, the average was up an additional 200,000 barrels daily. Mr. Obama has now reduced his 2025 target to a one-third cut. Ignoring for a moment the disingenuousness of presidents who promise miraculous results arriving years after they leave office, so far Mr. Obama's policies have only dug a deeper hole.
In 2006, Sen. Obama declared, "When it comes to finding a way to end our dependence on fossil fuels, the greatest vacuum in leadership, the biggest failure in imagination and the most stubborn refusal to admit the need for change is coming from the very people who are running the country." In 2011, we could not agree more.
© Copyright 2011 The Washington Times, LLC. Click here for reprint permission.
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Why Gas Prices Are High
By Kimberly Amadeo, About.com Guide
Why Are Gas Prices So High?:
The main reason for high gas prices are high crude oil prices. Oil prices normally rise when demand is greater than supply. However, in 2011, high oil prices were caused by investors' fears about unrest in Libya and Egypt. Even before that, oil prices were steadily rising, as commodities traders took bet against a declining dollar, and bought gold and futures contracts. These are agreements to buy or sell oil at a specific date in the future at a specific price. Commodities traders can create a self-fulfilling prophecy by bidding up oil futures prices. Once this starts, it can create an asset bubble.
When Else Have Gas Prices Been High?:
In the summer of 2008, gas prices rose to $4 a gallon as oil prices skyrocketed to $145 a barrel, even though demand and supply were fairly constant. In summer of 2009, gas prices again rose, despite the recession, which decreased demand. Commodities traders were the reason for both. Gas prices also usually rise during the summer vacation season, as driving increases. Finally, gas and oil prices also increase whenever there is concern about surging demand from China and India, or a curtailment of oil supply.
How High Oil Prices Make High Gas Prices:
Crude oil accounts for 55% of the price of gasoline, while distribution and taxes influence the remaining 45%. Usually, distribution and taxes are stable, so that the daily change in the price of gasoline accurately reflects oil price fluctuations. Occasionally, however, distribution lines are disrupted or are down for maintenance, which can sometimes make high gas prices even when oil prices are down.
What Is the Biggest Factor in High Oil Prices?:
Like most of the things you buy, oil prices are affected by supply and demand. However, oil prices are also affected by oil price futures, which are traded on the commodities futures exchange. These prices fluctuate daily, depending on what investors think the price of oil will be in the future. When traders think oil will be high, they bid it up even higher. This soon causes high gas prices..
Another reason for high oil prices is the declining dollar. Since oil is denominated in dollars, the 40% decline in the dollar in the last six years puts upward pressure on oil prices. (Source: BBC, Oil Price May Hit $200 a Barrel, May 7, 2008)
Sometimes commodities traders drive up the price of oil, even when supply increases and demand falls. The EIA cites an increased flow of investment money into commodities markets. In other words, money that used to be invested in real estate or the global stock markets is now being invested in oil futures. (Source: EIA Short-Term Energy Outlook)
What Makes High Gas Prices Go Down?:
The summertime vacation driving season usually increases gas prices by an average of ten cents per gallon. This price increase is despite the increased use of ethanol. Gas prices usually go down in the winter, since transportation needs are lower. This even offsets an increase in oil usage for winter heating in the Northeast U.S.
What Can We Do About High Gas Prices?:
The most immediate thing we can do is reduce our usage of gas, either through driving less or increasing fuel efficiency. Surprisingly, the best way to increase fuel efficiency is to keep tires inflated. These, and other suggestions, are included in the "Related Reading" section of this article.
Longer term, we can change our need for oil and gas by switching to alternative fuel vehicles, using public transit and moving closer to work to reduce commuting time. This will reduce the impact of gas prices on each of us individually by reducing use.
Could this reduction in itself reduce gas prices? It could, if it could reduce demand for oil enough to lower oil prices. It would have to happen on a sustained basis over a long period of time. That's because gasoline accounts for only 20% of each barrel of oil. Oil companies would still profit from the non-gasoline parts of their business. Therefore, even if consumers could conceivably stop 100% of gasoline use, oil prices might only decline 20%.
Furthermore, other pressures on the price of oil, such as dollar decline and commodities traders, would not be impacted by a gasoline boycott.
Could a gasoline boycott force gas prices down even if oil prices stayed high? Probably not by much. That's because the other elements of gas prices would take a long time to change. Taxes, which comprise 19% of gas prices, would require legislative approval, which could take months. Refinery costs (also 19%) couldn't be lowered, and neither could distribution costs (9%), both of which are fixed. (Source: EIA, A Primer on Gas Prices)
A boycott of one brand of gas could actually increase prices, since there would be fewer gas outlets. Those companies that were boycotted would simply sell their gas to those that weren't boycotted, defeating the purpose.
The only real way to lower gas prices is to lower demand for gas and oil over a long period of time. This would work, since the U.S. consumes 25% of the world's oil. This has increased over the last 20 years, from 15 million barrels per day (bpd) to 20.7 million bpd. A concerted effort might convince commodities traders, who have driven oil prices up 25% in the first quarter of 2008, that oil was a bad investment, thus allowing oil prices to return to pre-bubble levels. Article updated March 3, 2011
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Oil tax breaks needed, Congress members say
tulsaworld.com ^ | 27 Apr 2011 | Jim Myers
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WASHINGTON - Members of Oklahoma's congressional delegation on Tuesday flatly rejected separate suggestions from an unlikely duo - President Barack Obama and House Speaker John Boehner - to kill or at least review tax breaks for oil companies.
Democratic U.S. Rep. Dan Boren said Obama just needs to be quiet.
"Americans are tired of empty rhetoric on both sides and want a real plan,'' Boren said. "If the president doesn't want to stand up and be a leader, then his silence would be appreciated from people who are trying to find solutions.''
Boren described Obama as completely uninformed about the oil and gas industry.
"The industry is not made up of just major companies,'' he said. "It is made up of small independent firms like those in Oklahoma that produce a vast majority of our domestic production.''
For every CEO of a major company, Boren said, there are thousands of blue-collar jobs that are affected by the Obama administration's energy policy.
"It is a policy that is very inadequate and has left so many on the Gulf Coast unemployed.'' Boren said.
Republican Rep. John Sullivan said he has not talked to Boehner about his comments, but the congressman made it clear he does not support raising anyone's taxes.
"Targeting the oil and gas industry with tax increases would not only raise gas prices even higher, but it would place hundreds of thousands of Oklahoma jobs in jeopardy of being eliminated or shipped overseas,'' Sullivan said.
Sullivan pointed out that the oil and gas industry employs more than 300,000 people in Oklahoma and 9.2 million nationwide, who pay almost $100 million per day in taxes to the federal government.
Republican Sen. Jim Inhofe described Obama's move merely as a distraction from what every American knows can help restrain rising prices *-snip-*
(Excerpt) Read more at tulsaworld.com ...
________________________ ______________________
BOOOOOMMMMMM
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Obama Administration Moratorium on Oil Drilling Hurts Consumers, Report Says
Thursday, April 28, 2011
By Penny Starr
(CNSNews.com) – Although the Obama administration officially lifted the six-month ban on offshore drilling in the Gulf of Mexico in October 2010, a new report finds that the “de facto” moratorium still in place is harming American consumers and the budgets of local and state governments.
Since October, the Department of the Interior has approved only a handful of deepwater drilling permits in the wake of last year’s BP well explosion and subsequent oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.
The report, issued by the National Center for Policy Analysis (NCPA), said increasing offshore drilling production could add nearly $5 million in revenue a day to the federal treasury and “significantly” reduce gas prices.
“While President Obama says he supports deficit reduction, his administration’s policies are only contributing to the country’s deficit problem,” Rob Bluey, report author and adjunct scholar at NCPA, said in a statement about the report issued on Wednesday. “Federal revenue from offshore drilling is down sharply as a result of the Obama administration’s anti-drilling agenda.”
Bluey said the royalty fees paid to the federal government on oil produced are significant.
“Oil companies pay an 18.75 percent royalty to the federal government on the oil produced,” Bluey said. “With oil currently trading above $100 a barrel that equals $4.7 million in lost revenue each day.”
Bluey added that if the government’s own projections are accurate, that would amount to $1.7 billion this year.
“The federal government could recoup the lost revenue almost immediately if it began issuing new permits for the Gulf of Mexico,” Bluey said.
Royalties are not the only factor causing a sharp decline in federal revenue, according to the report. Rental and lease fees also generate revenue, and those numbers have for the most part declined.
In 2008, the offshore industry paid $237 million in rent, $8.3 billion in royalties and $9.4 billion for bids on new leases.
By comparison, last year those numbers were $245 million in rent, $4 billion in royalties and just $979 million in lease bids.
Federal, state and local taxes related to the offshore oil and gas operations in the Gulf totaled $13 billion in 2009, according to NCPA.
Sterling Burnett, senior fellow at NCPA, called the Obama administration’s delays in increasing oil production “obstructionist tactics.”
“This research provides yet another reason why the Obama administration should cease its obstructionist tactics and allow more domestic offshore oil and gas production,” Burnett said.
________________________ ________________________ ________
Like I said - this is intentional. Obama is trying to collapse the nation and make everyone destitute.
FFFFUUUUUBBBBBOOOOOOOO
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Obama’s new math
By Boston Herald Editorial Staff
Thursday, April 28, 2011 - Updated 14 hours ago
Where the hell did Barack Obama learn economics?
So he’s in a panic at rising gasoline prices — because there’s nothing worse than angry voters furious at what it costs to fill up the tank, especially at the start of the summer driving season. In a letter sent to congressional leaders Tuesday Obama put part of the blame for the sharp spike in gas prices on “increased global demand” compounded by “unrest and supply disruptions in the Middle East.” Well, China’s demand didn’t spike overnight and any disruptions from the serial crises in the Middle East have far more impact in Europe than here.
So the president notes — again — that “there is no silver bullet.” However, when in doubt blame Big Oil and propose to “eliminate unwarranted tax breaks to the oil and gas industry,” which he insisted were “wasteful subsidies.” Now if you take away $4 billion in tax breaks from the oil industry, what do you suppose that will do to the price of gasoline? Make it go up or down?
We’re not sure how the natural gas industry gets fingered here, but then this White House simply won’t let facts get in the way of a good beat-down for corporate America.
And with $4 billion at stake, it’s no wonder the president wants to get his hands on those “subsidies” as part of his high-wire budget-balancing act. The current gas “crisis” is just another of those opportunities this administration can’t imagine going to waste.
What the current crisis ought to prove is that this nation needs to become energy independent — the smart way, by using the natural resources within our own reach — oil, gas and — oh, horrors! — coal included. The very inconvenient truth for Obama is that those “subsidies” for the oil and gas industry help encourage and fund exploration — that is if this administration would end its regulatory jihad against deep-water drilling.
It’s either that or we could all go out and buy ourselves one of those nifty new Chevy Volts the president is so fond of. That is if we have $40,000 sitting around we don’t know what to do with.
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ExxonMobil hits back at Dems, renewables
ExxonMobil is going on the offense on a day it reported high earnings for the quarter. | AP Photo CloseBy DARREN GOODE | 4/28/11
ExxonMobil Thursday defiantly accused White House and congressional Democrats of playing politics with oil prices as the company announced $10.7 billion in first quarter earnings.
The company went on the offense on a day it reported its highest earnings for a quarter since 2008, a fact that President Barack Obama and Democrats are using to justify their push to repeal billions in annual tax incentives going to the oil and gas industry.
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POLITICO 44
“We understand that it’s simply too irresistible for many politicians in times of high oil prices and high earnings — they feel they have to demonize our industry,” Ken Cohen, ExxonMobil’s vice president for public and government affairs, said in remarks prepared for an afternoon media call.
There has been “predictable political positioning but no action to actually help bring down energy prices,” Cohen said.
This includes Obama's recent announcement of setting up a Justice Department-led task force to examine possible price manipulation in oil and gas markets, which Cohen dismissed as "now a time-honored tradition when prices increase."
ExxonMobil — like others in the industry — wants the government to open up more areas for energy exploration and production.
Obama wants to repeal about $4 billion in tax incentives for the oil and gas industry and move that money to renewable energy projects and other efforts to reduce dependence on oil as one way to address gas prices.
“Over the last week as earnings season has approached, the Democratic Party leadership again talked about removing what they call $4 billion in oil industry subsidies,” Cohen said. “But what they really mean is that they want to increase our taxes by taking away long-standing deductions for our industry while leaving these same deductions in place for other sectors of the economy.”Cohen also took aim at critics of hydraulic fracturing, which has allowed a number of new natural gas plays in the United States but comes with worries of water contamination.
“[P]olitical overreaction to a small number of isolated environmental issues could jeopardize this emerging industry and the benefits it provides,” Cohen said.
He also suggested lawmakers look at subsidies for renewable energy development like wind and solar, and “avoid a bias against natural gas and fossil fuel development in favor of far more costly energy sources that are already receiving massive subsidies.
“In fact, we've already spent more on alternative energy subsidies than we did on the Manhattan and Apollo projects combined. And what do we have to show for it? Unreliable and uneconomic energy sources that still can’t complete — even at today’s prices,” Cohen said.
Rep. Ed Markey (D-Mass) — top Democrat on the House Natural Resources Committee and a leading oil industry foe in Congress — countered in a statement, “In just the first 3 months of the year, Exxon has earned more profits than all of the tax breaks given to the major oil companies in an entire year.” He added that “there is absolutely no reason to continue to subsidize the most profitable companies in the history of the world.”
This article first appeared on POLITICO Pro at 12:33 p.m. on April 28, 2011
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Obama’s Energy Lunacy--Will consumers revolt against the Volt?
Pajamas Media ^ | April 21, 2011 | Mike McDaniel
Posted on April 21, 2011 2:14:49 PM EDT by jazusamo
The Scene: An executive conference room at General Motors HQ. The mood: grim.
CEO: “Thanks for that report, Tom. What’s next on the agenda, Bob?”
Executive Vice President #1: “Uh, Steve Jenkins from Chevrolet is here to report on the Volt task force.”
CEO: (Perking up) “Ah! Some good news at last!”
Jenkins: (Nervously) “Uh, Mr. Chairman, I’m afraid the news isn’t so good…”
CEO: (Frowning) “Just get on with it.”
Jenkins: (Swallows) “Well, the Volt is only getting about 25 miles per charge…”
Executive Vice President #2: “Wasn’t it supposed to get 50?”
Executive Vice President #3: “Nah. That was marketing hype. Forty is more like it.”
CEO: “Forty? Didn’t I just hear Jenkins say 25?”
Jenkins: (Sweating) “Well, Mr. Chairman, it seems that customers are insisting on carrying passengers, using air conditioning, the heater, the radio, lights, turn signals, and other accessories like that.”
EVP#3: “Oh yeah. That kind of frivolous, luxury stuff will really drain the battery fast.”
CEO: (Sighs) “Go on.”
Jenkins: (Wipes sweat from his brow) “Uh, well, our sales volume is (whispered) 1210 units…”
CEO: “What’s that? How many?”
Jenkins: (Pale and stuttering, a little louder) “Uh, um, 1210 units?”
CEO: “One thousand two hundred and ten units?! For last month?
Jenkins: (About to pass out) “Well, uh no, that’s…that’s for 2011.”
CEO: “For 2011?! But that’s not enough profit to keep the employee restrooms in toilet paper!”
Chief Accountant: “Actually, if we use the new, low-fiber content toilet tissue, the kind you can actually see through, it…” (CEO shoots him an angry look and he shuts up) “…ahem.”
CEO: “Isn’t there any good news about this battery-powered wonder?”
Jenkins: (Nervously clears his throat) “Well sir, the heater works better than we thought it would.”
CEO: “The heater? Better?”
EVP#2: “Actually Mr. Chairman, we didn’t expect it to work at all, but it has proved to be at least substandard.”
CEO: “Substandard?”
EVP#3: “Oh, at least substandard, Mr. Chairman, easily.” (EVP#2 and EVP#3 nod in happy agreement)
CEO: “Great.”
Executive Secretary: (Bursts breathlessly into the room) “Mr. Chairman, Mr. Chairman!”
CEO: “What is it?”
ES: “We’re saved!” (Triggers a remote control and the massive bar along one side of the room transforms, Bond-villain-like, into an enormous TV screen) “Look!”
Barack Obama fills the screen. The executives prostrate themselves before the screen for several minutes as Mr. Obama conducts a stirring teleprompter reading. At the conclusion of the reading, all heads turn, expectantly, toward the CEO.
CEO: (Aside to EVP#1) “Crank up the assembly line! We’re going to sell every unit of this sucker we make.” (To the assembled executives) “Bonuses for everybody! It’s on the taxpayers!”
The scene fades, executives raising a rousing cheer amid backslapping, booze swilling, etc.
What did the excited GM executives learn? In a March 30 speech in Washington, Mr. Obama announced his mandate that 100% of the federal vehicle fleet be “advanced technology” vehicles by 2015. This means that every vehicle in the federal fleet — some 600,000 currently — will have to be a hybrid or electric vehicle. In an extraordinary coincidence of the kind so common during the Age of Obama, General Electric — headed by Jeffrey Immelt, the chief of the president’s Council on Jobs and Competitiveness — will contribute to the brave new “advanced technology” future by buying at least 12,000 Chevy Volts.
For taxpayers, this mandate means extraordinary and unnecessary additional costs. For example, the conventionally fueled Chevy Cruze, the platform on which the Volt is based, would cost approximately $17,000 per unit. For 100 vehicles, that’s $1,700,00. Replace those with the Volt at $41,000 per unit and the figure skyrockets to $4,100,000. It’s just too frightening to contemplate the cost of 600,000 Volts. Hybrid vehicles cost substantially more than comparable conventional vehicles. While it might be possible, with very conservative driving, to recoup that additional initial expense with money saved through higher mileage for some hybrids, the taxpayer will be forever in the hole for every Volt purchased.
Don’t some government employees, law enforcement officers, park rangers, or BLM employees require SUVs, pickups, trucks, or other specialized vehicles that do not come in “advanced technology” trappings? Can a dead moose fit in the trunk of a Volt? I think there’s a joke in there somewhere. Mr. Obama’s mandate, of course, has a loophole that exempts him, allowing him to travel in style in enormous, conventional SUVs.
Until the enlightened Age of Obama, the free enterprise system was pretty easy for manufacturers to understand. Identify a market, build a product that market wants to buy at a price they’re willing to pay, and rake in the profits. Unfortunately for corporate America and the taxpayer, the proverbial monkey wrench has been thrown into the works by Mr. Obama and his economic advisors — whose only advice seems to be to wreck the economy by spending as much money as possible.
I’ve been following the dim fortunes of the Chevy Volt for some time (here,here, here, here, and here). The Volt is an electric pseudo-hybrid compact with a $41,000 manufacturer’s suggested retail price (MSRP) — currently selling for as much as $65,000. To “incentivize” the Volt, the Obama administration is providing a $7,500 tax rebate for each sale, a tax rebate it is planning to turn into a direct, point-of-sale rebate in the near future. After all, cash for clunkers was so economically stimulating, this gesture should make Volt sales explode. (Considering the tendency of lithium-ion batteries to do, more or less, just that, this may not be the most encouraging analogy.)
The Volt’s abysmal all-electric range is supplemented by a weak gasoline engine that requires premium fuel. Charging requires up to 12 hours, but may be halved for an additional $2,000 (installation costs not included) for a special 220V home “fast charger.” Depending on the kind and quality of home wiring, installation costs may be daunting. The charger draws so many amps that considerable rewiring may be required, and proud Volt owners may not be able to use any other high-amp appliances (vacuum cleaners, microwave ovens) while their Volt is charging. Remember that the Volt’s only potential claim to real-world practicality — apart from green street cred — is its high-tech electric drive system which promises unlimited gasoline-free miles. Consider that there is no actual charging infrastructure out there in the real world — not that this will matter in parts of the country that experience actual winter. Cold has the unfortunate effect of rapidly draining and even disabling batteries.
The fictional GM executive wasn’t kidding. Volt sales volume is abysmal, and while GM won’t admit it, even at $41,000 MSRP it is almost certainly losing money on every car. In a genuinely free market, this should not be surprising. After all, for something between $33,500 and $57,500 (that’s minus the $7500 tax rebate), plus more than $2,000 for a charger (installation not included), anyone can be the proud owner of a car that will likely get no better mileage than many conventional vehicles which cost tens of thousands of dollars less. Who could resist that siren song? As it turns out, just about everyone.
Who are the proud Volt owners? Young first-time car buyers? No. Young families? Unlikely. Buyers of limited means? Certainly not. The premium prices being forked over suggest that Volts are the exclusive province of green types and/or the wealthy who can afford as much as $65,000 for a novelty car with no advantage over conventional vehicles available at a fraction of the price.
Pre-Obama businessmen would likely think GM’s decision to put the Volt into production is sheer lunacy, and they would be right. It would surely seem to them that in trying to recover from bankruptcy, GM is plunging headfirst back into bankruptcy. Why else would it build a car featuring not-ready-for-prime-time technology, a car with a tiny to all-but-non-existent potential market? Surely they would consider this to be a shocking, inexplicable display of ignorance or of contempt for the principles of free enterprise? Of course — unless the principles no longer apply.
Just four years from now, Mr. Obama has mandated a CAFE average of 35.5 MPG for all manufacturers. The current average achieved is 22.2 MPG. It is not possible, with current technology, to say nothing of customer preferences, to reach this absurd goal. Only the production and sale of huge numbers of “advanced technology” vehicles will allow GM to avoid huge fines for failing to engineer technologically ignorant wishful thinking.
In GM, taxpayers have a corporation partially owned by the government of Barack Obama. GM management surely understands the wishes of Mr. Obama and his bureaucrats, and the consequences for ignoring them, despite Obamaite claims to have no role or influence in daily operations. What else explains a company trying to recover from bankruptcy by making, at great cost, a product with no real market that can only succeed in the long term with the development of a nationwide charging infrastructure that no one is lining up to build? It seems clear that one power most satisfying for the Obama administration is the ability to pick winners and losers, to award friends and punish enemies. Why not also assume the power to mandate and make manifest markets where none previously existed?
What better market for a car no one wants than a government work force that is now at an all-time record of 2.15 million and constantly increasing? And what better way to provide the transportation needs for that artificially conjured market than “advanced technology” vehicles that will cost substantially more than comparable conventional vehicles? Forget not the astronomical additional cost of the huge charging infrastructure that will be, of necessity, installed at federal facilities throughout the nation. Mr. Obama will no doubt tout the plethora of jobs “saved or created” in this pursuit, for the few weeks — or months — that they last.
From where will come the extra electric generating capacity necessary to power this short-ranged but mighty green fleet? Has not Mr. Obama essentially shut down the construction of new power plants, despite his recent rhetoric seemingly to the contrary? The charging infrastructure alone will represent one of the most egregious cases of corporate welfare and cronyism in American history. Guess which corporation currently close to Mr. Obama’s heart and the taxpayers’ pocketbooks is already marketing EV charging stations? That’s right: General Electric. What a coincidence.
Won’t the $7,500 rebate help? GM tried that already when it announced that it had paid off one of its government loans early — by using money loaned to it from federal TARP funds. The Obama administration is certainly not above financial chicanery, but taking money out of a left pocket only to transfer it to the right might embarrass even Timothy Geithner or Ben Bernanke.
Whether the economic damage already wrought through action and inaction by Mr. Obama can be undone remains an open question. With his political wings clipped by a Republican House, Mr. Obama plainly intends to do by executive mandate what the law and legislature will not allow, and this end run around free enterprise is but a single recent example. With projects like this vehicular “advanced technology” boondoggle, it seems ever more likely that economic ruin is the future — a future into which Mr. Obama is plunging the nation with advanced technology, at warp speed.
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Obama’s Plan to Solve Soaring Gas Prices: Beg the Saudis for More Oil
(E2 Wire) — President Obama on Tuesday said the administration is pushing Saudi Arabia and other countries to boost their oil production.
“We are in a lot of conversations with the major oil producers like Saudi Arabia to let them know that it’s not going to be good for them if our economy is hobbled because of high oil prices,” Obama told a Detroit TV station, according to The Associated Press.
The Wall Street Journal reports that oil markets are watching Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke.
http://thehill.com/blogs/e2-wire/677-e2-wire/157915-news-bites-obama-pushes-saudis-oil-production-and-more
Should have thought about that before he pissed the King off to the point that they don't even want to talk to us right now. Smooth work from this "master" of foreign policy. ::)
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Ha ha ha. Bf ad you kidding? The Saudis are going to screw Bama bigbtime on this now in revenge.
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Ha ha ha. Bf ad you kidding? The Saudis are going to screw Bama bigbtime on this now in revenge.
Hahaha. As if they give a fuck what Obama thinks. He should have thought about that before he threw Mubarak under the bus after the King asked him not to.
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That recent article I posted really was like a ton of bricks. The foreign policy disasters seem even worse than the domestic. It's almost like we put the bathroom attendant in charge of the nation.
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Obama’s Plan to Solve Soaring Gas Prices: Beg the Saudis for More Oil
(E2 Wire) — President Obama on Tuesday said the administration is pushing Saudi Arabia and other countries to boost their oil production.
“We are in a lot of conversations with the major oil producers like Saudi Arabia to let them know that it’s not going to be good for them if our economy is hobbled because of high oil prices,” Obama told a Detroit TV station, according to The Associated Press.
The Wall Street Journal reports that oil markets are watching Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke.
http://thehill.com/blogs/e2-wire/677-e2-wire/157915-news-bites-obama-pushes-saudis-oil-production-and-more
Should have thought about that before he pissed the King off to the point that they don't even want to talk to us right now. Smooth work from this "master" of foreign policy. ::)
What a total and complete disaster Obama has been. Kissing Saudi ass for more production when the unelected enviro-czars at the EPA just told Shell Oil to go fuck themselves over an 8 billion dollar, 27 billion barrel oil project in the Beaufort Sea.
Wow. Great energy policy, destroy domestic production, scare off would be producers and increase our dependence on foreign oil.
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Obama’s Energy Lunacy--Will consumers revolt against the Volt?
Pajamas Media ^ | April 21, 2011 | Mike McDaniel
Posted on April 21, 2011 2:14:49 PM EDT by jazusamo
The Scene: An executive conference room at General Motors HQ. The mood: grim.
CEO: “Thanks for that report, Tom. What’s next on the agenda, Bob?”
Executive Vice President #1: “Uh, Steve Jenkins from Chevrolet is here to report on the Volt task force.”
CEO: (Perking up) “Ah! Some good news at last!”
Jenkins: (Nervously) “Uh, Mr. Chairman, I’m afraid the news isn’t so good…”
CEO: (Frowning) “Just get on with it.”
Jenkins: (Swallows) “Well, the Volt is only getting about 25 miles per charge…”
Executive Vice President #2: “Wasn’t it supposed to get 50?”
Executive Vice President #3: “Nah. That was marketing hype. Forty is more like it.”
CEO: “Forty? Didn’t I just hear Jenkins say 25?”
Jenkins: (Sweating) “Well, Mr. Chairman, it seems that customers are insisting on carrying passengers, using air conditioning, the heater, the radio, lights, turn signals, and other accessories like that.”
EVP#3: “Oh yeah. That kind of frivolous, luxury stuff will really drain the battery fast.”
CEO: (Sighs) “Go on.”
Jenkins: (Wipes sweat from his brow) “Uh, well, our sales volume is (whispered) 1210 units…”
CEO: “What’s that? How many?”
Jenkins: (Pale and stuttering, a little louder) “Uh, um, 1210 units?”
CEO: “One thousand two hundred and ten units?! For last month?
Jenkins: (About to pass out) “Well, uh no, that’s…that’s for 2011.”
CEO: “For 2011?! But that’s not enough profit to keep the employee restrooms in toilet paper!”
Chief Accountant: “Actually, if we use the new, low-fiber content toilet tissue, the kind you can actually see through, it…” (CEO shoots him an angry look and he shuts up) “…ahem.”
CEO: “Isn’t there any good news about this battery-powered wonder?”
Jenkins: (Nervously clears his throat) “Well sir, the heater works better than we thought it would.”
CEO: “The heater? Better?”
EVP#2: “Actually Mr. Chairman, we didn’t expect it to work at all, but it has proved to be at least substandard.”
CEO: “Substandard?”
EVP#3: “Oh, at least substandard, Mr. Chairman, easily.” (EVP#2 and EVP#3 nod in happy agreement)
CEO: “Great.”
Executive Secretary: (Bursts breathlessly into the room) “Mr. Chairman, Mr. Chairman!”
CEO: “What is it?”
ES: “We’re saved!” (Triggers a remote control and the massive bar along one side of the room transforms, Bond-villain-like, into an enormous TV screen) “Look!”
Barack Obama fills the screen. The executives prostrate themselves before the screen for several minutes as Mr. Obama conducts a stirring teleprompter reading. At the conclusion of the reading, all heads turn, expectantly, toward the CEO.
CEO: (Aside to EVP#1) “Crank up the assembly line! We’re going to sell every unit of this sucker we make.” (To the assembled executives) “Bonuses for everybody! It’s on the taxpayers!”
The scene fades, executives raising a rousing cheer amid backslapping, booze swilling, etc.
What did the excited GM executives learn? In a March 30 speech in Washington, Mr. Obama announced his mandate that 100% of the federal vehicle fleet be “advanced technology” vehicles by 2015. This means that every vehicle in the federal fleet — some 600,000 currently — will have to be a hybrid or electric vehicle. In an extraordinary coincidence of the kind so common during the Age of Obama, General Electric — headed by Jeffrey Immelt, the chief of the president’s Council on Jobs and Competitiveness — will contribute to the brave new “advanced technology” future by buying at least 12,000 Chevy Volts.
For taxpayers, this mandate means extraordinary and unnecessary additional costs. For example, the conventionally fueled Chevy Cruze, the platform on which the Volt is based, would cost approximately $17,000 per unit. For 100 vehicles, that’s $1,700,00. Replace those with the Volt at $41,000 per unit and the figure skyrockets to $4,100,000. It’s just too frightening to contemplate the cost of 600,000 Volts. Hybrid vehicles cost substantially more than comparable conventional vehicles. While it might be possible, with very conservative driving, to recoup that additional initial expense with money saved through higher mileage for some hybrids, the taxpayer will be forever in the hole for every Volt purchased.
Don’t some government employees, law enforcement officers, park rangers, or BLM employees require SUVs, pickups, trucks, or other specialized vehicles that do not come in “advanced technology” trappings? Can a dead moose fit in the trunk of a Volt? I think there’s a joke in there somewhere. Mr. Obama’s mandate, of course, has a loophole that exempts him, allowing him to travel in style in enormous, conventional SUVs.
Until the enlightened Age of Obama, the free enterprise system was pretty easy for manufacturers to understand. Identify a market, build a product that market wants to buy at a price they’re willing to pay, and rake in the profits. Unfortunately for corporate America and the taxpayer, the proverbial monkey wrench has been thrown into the works by Mr. Obama and his economic advisors — whose only advice seems to be to wreck the economy by spending as much money as possible.
I’ve been following the dim fortunes of the Chevy Volt for some time (here,here, here, here, and here). The Volt is an electric pseudo-hybrid compact with a $41,000 manufacturer’s suggested retail price (MSRP) — currently selling for as much as $65,000. To “incentivize” the Volt, the Obama administration is providing a $7,500 tax rebate for each sale, a tax rebate it is planning to turn into a direct, point-of-sale rebate in the near future. After all, cash for clunkers was so economically stimulating, this gesture should make Volt sales explode. (Considering the tendency of lithium-ion batteries to do, more or less, just that, this may not be the most encouraging analogy.)
The Volt’s abysmal all-electric range is supplemented by a weak gasoline engine that requires premium fuel. Charging requires up to 12 hours, but may be halved for an additional $2,000 (installation costs not included) for a special 220V home “fast charger.” Depending on the kind and quality of home wiring, installation costs may be daunting. The charger draws so many amps that considerable rewiring may be required, and proud Volt owners may not be able to use any other high-amp appliances (vacuum cleaners, microwave ovens) while their Volt is charging. Remember that the Volt’s only potential claim to real-world practicality — apart from green street cred — is its high-tech electric drive system which promises unlimited gasoline-free miles. Consider that there is no actual charging infrastructure out there in the real world — not that this will matter in parts of the country that experience actual winter. Cold has the unfortunate effect of rapidly draining and even disabling batteries.
The fictional GM executive wasn’t kidding. Volt sales volume is abysmal, and while GM won’t admit it, even at $41,000 MSRP it is almost certainly losing money on every car. In a genuinely free market, this should not be surprising. After all, for something between $33,500 and $57,500 (that’s minus the $7500 tax rebate), plus more than $2,000 for a charger (installation not included), anyone can be the proud owner of a car that will likely get no better mileage than many conventional vehicles which cost tens of thousands of dollars less. Who could resist that siren song? As it turns out, just about everyone.
Who are the proud Volt owners? Young first-time car buyers? No. Young families? Unlikely. Buyers of limited means? Certainly not. The premium prices being forked over suggest that Volts are the exclusive province of green types and/or the wealthy who can afford as much as $65,000 for a novelty car with no advantage over conventional vehicles available at a fraction of the price.
Pre-Obama businessmen would likely think GM’s decision to put the Volt into production is sheer lunacy, and they would be right. It would surely seem to them that in trying to recover from bankruptcy, GM is plunging headfirst back into bankruptcy. Why else would it build a car featuring not-ready-for-prime-time technology, a car with a tiny to all-but-non-existent potential market? Surely they would consider this to be a shocking, inexplicable display of ignorance or of contempt for the principles of free enterprise? Of course — unless the principles no longer apply.
Just four years from now, Mr. Obama has mandated a CAFE average of 35.5 MPG for all manufacturers. The current average achieved is 22.2 MPG. It is not possible, with current technology, to say nothing of customer preferences, to reach this absurd goal. Only the production and sale of huge numbers of “advanced technology” vehicles will allow GM to avoid huge fines for failing to engineer technologically ignorant wishful thinking.
In GM, taxpayers have a corporation partially owned by the government of Barack Obama. GM management surely understands the wishes of Mr. Obama and his bureaucrats, and the consequences for ignoring them, despite Obamaite claims to have no role or influence in daily operations. What else explains a company trying to recover from bankruptcy by making, at great cost, a product with no real market that can only succeed in the long term with the development of a nationwide charging infrastructure that no one is lining up to build? It seems clear that one power most satisfying for the Obama administration is the ability to pick winners and losers, to award friends and punish enemies. Why not also assume the power to mandate and make manifest markets where none previously existed?
What better market for a car no one wants than a government work force that is now at an all-time record of 2.15 million and constantly increasing? And what better way to provide the transportation needs for that artificially conjured market than “advanced technology” vehicles that will cost substantially more than comparable conventional vehicles? Forget not the astronomical additional cost of the huge charging infrastructure that will be, of necessity, installed at federal facilities throughout the nation. Mr. Obama will no doubt tout the plethora of jobs “saved or created” in this pursuit, for the few weeks — or months — that they last.
From where will come the extra electric generating capacity necessary to power this short-ranged but mighty green fleet? Has not Mr. Obama essentially shut down the construction of new power plants, despite his recent rhetoric seemingly to the contrary? The charging infrastructure alone will represent one of the most egregious cases of corporate welfare and cronyism in American history. Guess which corporation currently close to Mr. Obama’s heart and the taxpayers’ pocketbooks is already marketing EV charging stations? That’s right: General Electric. What a coincidence.
Won’t the $7,500 rebate help? GM tried that already when it announced that it had paid off one of its government loans early — by using money loaned to it from federal TARP funds. The Obama administration is certainly not above financial chicanery, but taking money out of a left pocket only to transfer it to the right might embarrass even Timothy Geithner or Ben Bernanke.
Whether the economic damage already wrought through action and inaction by Mr. Obama can be undone remains an open question. With his political wings clipped by a Republican House, Mr. Obama plainly intends to do by executive mandate what the law and legislature will not allow, and this end run around free enterprise is but a single recent example. With projects like this vehicular “advanced technology” boondoggle, it seems ever more likely that economic ruin is the future — a future into which Mr. Obama is plunging the nation with advanced technology, at warp speed.
Bad article, one sided and very biased. If the GM bailout never happened this article wouldn't have ever been written about the Volt. Most articles from car publications have stated that it hits the upper end of the battery range of 50miles (which it was designed to do) and the ER mode nets around 35mpg. And that's with typical pedal to the medal race car magazine testing. The car works. Period.
Strip away the political hatred and focus on the car, a Gen1 car. It's a technological marvel, plain and simple. Read the magazine reviews, look at the awards its garnered and actually look at the tech, the fact that it was designed and is built in America and the potential for future iterations. Gen2 and Gen3 are already in development, advances in weight reduction, aerodynamics, battery chemistry and other efficiencies are what the exciting part is. Plus, price will go down with increased volume. The car as is means that most Americans would use little to no gas during commutes with it.
GM said they will produce 10000 Volts in the first year, and to be honest they are selling everyone they can build. I will make the call now that they will have a buyer or a leaser for all 10000 by next November/December. If I'm wrong I will eat crow, but I have a hunch that I won't be.
To Review:
Did GM leverage the Volt to sway politicians for bailout money?Probably.
Did I like the bailout? Hell No.
Is the car expensive? Hell Yes.
Do I like the tax credits? Hell No.
Is the car perfect? No, nothing is.
Is the technology behind the Volt worth exploring? Hell Yes.
I admit, it is more of a tech showpiece that a mass production car at this point, but everything has to start somewhere.
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Problem is that for 41k I can buy a honda civic pay for gas for ten years for what a volt costs.
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Problem is that for 41k I can buy a honda civic pay for gas for ten years for what a volt costs.
Absolutely. The car is in its infancy, with volume and technical improvement the prices will drop.
Nothing is a guarantee, who knows if GM will be around in 10 years, but the car is pretty fucking cool. I mean, come on, Volt owners have reported going up to 1000 miles before having to fill the gas tank. That pretty neat.
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Can someone explain the tech differeneces between their older electric cars that they scrapped and this volt?
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Can someone explain the tech differeneces between their older electric cars that they scrapped and this volt?
Sure. Give me a little bit, I'm working at the moment. It's actually a pretty cool story.
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Pump Prices Jump to $3.91 on Tightening Supplies
ShareCommentsPrintFont SizesBy SANDY SHORE AP Business Writer
April 29, 2011 (AP)
Gas pump prices across the country rose to within a dime of $4 a gallon Friday, as weather-related refinery outages tightened supplies and pushed prices up.
The national average increased 2 cents to nearly $3.91 a gallon for regular gasoline. It's the highest level since July 31, 2008, when pump prices were falling from a record $4.11 a gallon on July 17 of that year.
Drivers in nine states and the District of Columbia already pay $4 a gallon or more for gas. At the current rate of increase, the national average could reach $4 by May 8, Analysts expect it to start falling later in the month, as refineries return to full production and more gas becomes available.
A series of severe storms caused power outages that temporarily shut down seven refineries in Texas, Alabama and Pennsylvania this week. The shutdowns aren't expected to last more than a few days, but 750,000 to 1 million barrels a day of production a day has been halted intermittently, according to Tom Kloza, publisher and chief oil analyst at Oil Price Information Service.
The affected refineries mostly ship product to the Southeast, Midwest and Gulf Coast states, Kloza said. That's where motorists will probably see the biggest increases in pump prices over the next few days.
The Commerce Department said Friday that personal incomes rose 0.5 percent and consumer spending rose 0.6 percent in March, but higher gas prices are taking a toll on consumers' wallets.
"The increase in ... spending was swallowed up by higher gasoline and food prices," said IHS Global Insight economist Chris Christopher. "This report is good news since it shows that consumers are plowing ahead despite rising gasoline and food prices. The bad news is that consumer spending adjusted for inflation has lost the momentum it had in the last quarter of 2010," he said.
Some economists think lower gas prices could encourage consumer spending in other areas, but the high unemployment rate will keep the economic recovery in low gear.
Both oil and gasoline futures have risen around 35 percent since mid-February when uprisings broke out in Libya and other countries in the Middle East and North Africa. Traders have been concerned that the anti-government clashes will disrupt oil supplies, although that hasn't happened yet.
Prices for oil and other energy futures got a boost from a weaker dollar on Friday. The dollar his a three-year low against six major currencies. Since commodities are priced in dollars, they become more of a bargain for traders using other currencies.
Benchmark crude for June delivery rose 56 cents to $113.42 a barrel in midday trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange.
Heating oil rose 1.36 cents to $3.2595 per gallon, gasoline futures gained a penny at $3.3809 per gallon and natural gas rose 6 cents to $4.689 on the Nymex.
In London, Brent crude rose 62 cents to $125.64 on the ICE Futures exchange.
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What a total and complete disaster Obama has been. Kissing Saudi ass for more production when the unelected enviro-czars at the EPA just told Shell Oil to go fuck themselves over an 8 billion dollar, 27 billion barrel oil project in the Beaufort Sea.
Wow. Great energy policy, destroy domestic production, scare off would be producers and increase our dependence on foreign oil.
Saudi Arabia claims that they have 3 million barrels a day of excess capacity. Not only America but Europe have been asking for the increase. The trouble is the Saudi's may not actually have it. By holding back it's not a political statement but more a financial one. Triple digit oil will bring a trillion dollar revenue to OPEC, when you have a dwindling resource of light crude you hold out for the best price for as long as humanly possible. The Saudi's will help to stop another recession and in doing so lessen their future production abilities, but they will wait a bit longer. Remember Bush asked them in 08 to increase capacity, they didn't and we have a recession which pushed down demand and subsequently prices. They understand this so if they have the capacity it's in their best interests to use it.
Question is do they have it?
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Saudi Arabia claims that they have 3 million barrels a day of excess capacity. Not only America but Europe have been asking for the increase. The trouble is the Saudi's may not actually have it. By holding back it's not a political statement but more a financial one. Triple digit oil will bring a trillion dollar revenue to OPEC, when you have a dwindling resource of light crude you hold out for the best price for as long as humanly possible. The Saudi's will help to stop another recession and in doing so lessen their future production abilities, but they will wait a bit longer. Remember Bush asked them in 08 to increase capacity, they didn't and we have a recession which pushed down demand and subsequently prices. They understand this so if they have the capacity it's in their best interests to use it.
Question is do they have it?
That's why this whole thing is a disaster. The Saudi's have been claiming the same level of crude reserves for something like the past 30 or so years with little variation to the up or downside. I have to wonder how much salt water they are pumping into Gwahar to keep it producing at near peak capacity. That's why this is stupid, go and beg the Saudi's, like Bush did, for more production when there may not be much spare capacity left. The last thing the Saudi's would want, if the capacity actually isn't there, would be for "Us" to find out and really take this stuff seriously. They need the revenue to keep their hold on power. They know this, and as you said is it theater or do they really have spare capacity. If they don't and it gets out....that's one hell of a black swan.
Listen, I agree with a lot of what you say when it comes to energy and oil, but the switch to alternate forms of energy can't be done over night or over a decade. We need time, a bridge, something to keep the lights on while we can transition. We need more production, no it won't be enough to save us all and let us have cheap gas for 100 years but there needs to be more supply in the short/medium term.
What we should transition to is a matter for debate, but while that is being worked on there needs to be more production.
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Presidents and politicians of all political affiliations have said for decades the U.S. must find an energy source that can serve as a viable alternative to crude oil imports from foreign nations -- a fair number of which aren't exactly gushing supporters of the red, white and blue.
That talk hasn't translated into much action, however. Now oil prices are up again, holding above $110 a barrel, which is sending gas prices higher and weighing on consumers. Finding a solution we can all agree on regarding America's energy future isn't going to be easy. Daniel Weiss, a senior fellow and director of climate strategy at the Center for American Progress, believes his group has the answer.
"There's a few things we have to do to fight the recent spike in oil prices," he tells Aaron in the accompanying clip. "First, we need to crack down on speculators -- make sure that they're not intentionally driving up prices in order to make a quick buck. Second, let's eliminate the $40 billion in subsidies [over 10 years] for big oil companies that are going to make overwhelming profits anyway." (See: Tax Breaks for Big Oil Make "No Fiscal, Moral or Political Sense" )Additionally, Weiss is pushing for more fuel-efficient cars, specifically vehicles that would get 60-plus miles per gallon by 2025. He's also advocating a limit, starting in 2013, on the amount of foreign oil the U.S. imports each year and reducing that total by 5% a year.
"That will drive investment into oil-reduction technologies because they know that there will be a market for the product," he says. Weiss wants to increase "market demand" for clean energies such as wind and solar, but the question of practicality arises.
For Weiss, the hope is that energy alternatives will continue their trend toward becoming less expensive. If traditional sources of power such as coal- and nuclear-generated electricity see their costs rise, wind and solar will become "more economical than they are today."
The U.S., he contends, is behind what other nations like China and Germany are doing, and that needs to change. "This is going to be a $2 trillion worldwide market," he says of clean energy. "It's important that we're competitive."
Weiss has also recommended that the White House consider selling up to 30 million barrels of oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve and then invest the proceeds in public transportation and energy alternatives.
"It would generate over $3 billion," he says. "We could invest that money in making transit much more accessible and affordable for people."
For more of his thoughts on energy and policy, be sure to watch the accompanying interview.
Related Quotes:XLE 80.479 +1.18 (+1.49%) CLM11.NYM 113.93 +0.87 (+0.77%) NGK11.NYM 4.377 +0.00 (+0.00%) ^GSPC 1,363.61 +3.13 (+0.23%) XOM 87.98 +0.64 (+0.73%) COP 78.89 +1.44 (+1.86%) USO 45.15 +0.32 (+0.71%) OIL 29.98 +0.25 (+0.84%) PWND 11.28 +0.06 (+0.53%) ICLN 18.37 +0.48 (+2.68%)
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Obama, Gas Prices & the Faculty Lounge
By Victor Davis Hanson
www.realclearpolitics.co m
Are high gas prices a good thing?
That is not as dumb a question as it sounds. Examine a few revealing past remarks from President Obama and the cabinet officials who are now in charge of the nation's energy use and oil leases on federal lands. Then decide whether the current soaring gas prices are supposed to be good or bad.
In 2008, Sen. Ken Salazar (D., Colo.) - now secretary of the interior, in charge of the leasing of federal oil lands - refused to vote for any new offshore drilling. In a Senate exchange with minority leader Mitch McConnell (R., Ky.), Salazar objected to allowing any drilling on America's outer continental shelf - even if gas prices reached $10 a gallon. We can now see why the president appointed Salazar, inasmuch as Obama recently promised the Brazilians that he would be eager to buy their newfound offshore oil - while prohibiting similar exploration here at home.
From 2007 to 2008, Steven Chu, now secretary of energy, weighed in frequently on global warming and the desirable price of traditional energy. At one point Chu asserted, "Somehow we have to figure out how to boost the price of gasoline to the levels in Europe." Chu also lamented, "We have lots of fossil fuel; that's really both good and bad news. We won't run out of energy, but there's enough carbon in the ground to really cook us."
In other words, $10 a gallon for gas would be desirable, while an enormous amount of recoverable American oil, gas, coal, tar sands, and oil shale should be left untapped.
During the 2008 campaign, Obama himself had strange ideas about the prospect of expensive prices for fossil-fuel-generated energy: "Under my plan of a cap-and-trade system, electricity rates would necessarily skyrocket." Candidate Obama also elaborated on the envisioned role of his administration in ensuring such high prices: "So if somebody wants to build a coal-powered plant, they can. It's just that it will bankrupt them."
As for consumers' plight in paying skyrocketing gas prices, the president, now and in the past, has sounded ambivalent. He recently told a questioner, "If you're complaining about the price of gas and you're only getting eight miles a gallon, you know, you might want to think about a trade-in." Few large passenger vehicles today get only eight miles a gallon, and many squeezed Americans in recessionary times cannot so breezily think of "a trade-in."
In 2008, Obama addressed consumer fears about climbing gas prices: "But we could save all the oil that they're talking about getting off drilling, if everybody was just inflating their tires and getting regular tune-ups. You could actually save just as much."
Note again the fantasy. Few of today's cars have distributor points. New-generation spark plugs and computerized ignition usually ensure 75,000-100,000 miles without a so-called "tune-up." There is no evidence that Americans' tires are chronically underinflated, or if they were, that such negligence would waste more gasoline than all that could be recovered from new offshore oil drilling.
What explains the weird rhetoric from Obama and his administration? First, not long ago they considered high energy prices as not that bad. Government-sponsored mass transit and alternative-energy projects - from wind and solar to the federally subsidized Chevy Volt - pencil out only when gas gets expensive. And if you believe in man-made global warming, then the less coal, gas, or oil that Americans use, the better for the planet.
Second, a president who believes that modern cars get eight miles per gallon or need frequent tune-ups, and that proper tire inflation can substitute for drilling oil, has never run a business that hinged on having moderately priced gas to power a truck, tractor, or car fleet. In fact, most in the Obama administration came to Washington from either academia or prior state- and federal-government employment, where policy is theoretical, without grounding in real experience.
So much of this administration's talk about energy sounds similar to a bull session in the faculty lounge, or what we would expect from lifelong bureaucrats and public functionaries who have never experienced long commutes or struggles in the harsher, profit-driven private workplace.
Now the global economy is recovering and energy use is climbing, as the U.S. dollar sinks. The oil-rich Middle East is in chaos. And more than 2 billion people in India and China are desperate for imported oil. The result is that American gas prices are astronomical, and the public is furious and starting to demand relief from the administration.
Its answer? Simple: Since reelection looms, the administration now insists that high energy prices are no longer good, but suddenly bad. And the evil oil companies are mostly to blame!
Victor Davis Hanson is a classicist and historian at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University, and author, most recently, of "A War Like No Other: How the Athenians and Spartans Fought the Peloponnesian War." You can reach him by e-mailing author@victorhanson.com.
Copyright 2011 Tribune Media Services, Inc.
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Unbelievable.
What a liar and a fraud. FUBO!
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Hey President Obama!
Could you please list the exact subsidies you are talking about, what they do and the companies that receive them? That would be great if you could clarify!
This fool is a clown. More class warfare bullshit. No specifics, no details, no plan, which is par for the course, I guess. He can't and won't detail what the subsidies are or anything. Just broad classwarfare garbage. Is he going to go after the subsidies that G.E. receives? Or the deductions that Apple or all other major corporations get? What abotu the deductions/credits/subsidies that smaller companies get? Gonna go after those too, Obama? Of course not.
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Flashback 2008: Last Time Gas Was $4 Gallon Pelosi Blamed “Oil Men in the White House”
(CNSNews.com) — Back in 2008 then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) knew where she wanted to place the blame for high gas prices. “The price of oil is at the doorstep — 4 dollars plus per gallon for oil, is attributed to two oil men in the White House,” Pelosi said in a CNN interview on July 17th, 2008.
Now that President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney are out of the White House, Pelosi has been silent on the issue. She has made no public comments on gas prices over the past few months. President Barack Obama however, has been fielding questions on the issue as he begins his bid for re-election.
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Flashback 2008: Last Time Gas Was $4 Gallon Pelosi Blamed “Oil Men in the White House”
(CNSNews.com) — Back in 2008 then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) knew where she wanted to place the blame for high gas prices. “The price of oil is at the doorstep — 4 dollars plus per gallon for oil, is attributed to two oil men in the White House,” Pelosi said in a CNN interview on July 17th, 2008.
Now that President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney are out of the White House, Pelosi has been silent on the issue. She has made no public comments on gas prices over the past few months. President Barack Obama however, has been fielding questions on the issue as he begins his bid for re-election.
I wonder what those gullible dupes in the audience in Iowa think now? BTW - brutal video!
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:D
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For the real drivers of the oil price, the President needs to look closer to home.
The US has continued to devalue its currency by allowing the Federal Reserve to print dollars like they are going out of fashion. This has boosted the price of all commodities – and the trend is likely to continue for the rest of this year.
Commodities such as oil are priced in dollars. When the dollar falls, these commodities – be they copper, wheat or oil – become cheaper in other currencies. This prompts "speculators" to buy. Prices of raw materials have therefore risen on a sea of dollar liquidity – fuelled by cheap money and quantitative easing.
This is the reason that the gold price keeps hitting all-time highs, as US policy causes faith in "fiat money" to crumble. No country in the world has its currency backed by gold – and the plan to spend America out of the downturn is making a mockery of the country's "strong dollar" policy.
The President must also remember that it's not only "evil" bankers who are involved in the oil derivatives markets – airlines and other large consumers have to hedge their businesses against fluctuations in prices. Oil companies also use derivatives to hedge positions. The proportion of speculators in the market is really quite small – it's just that they are an easy target for politicians wishing to deflect opinion away from their own shortcomings.
"Speculation only makes up a small portion of the market," according to Andrew Moorfield, Global Head of Oil & Gas at Lloyds Banking Group Corporate Markets.
"The idea that this minority can influence prices to the extent that is sometimes believed seems unreasonable. It is also a position that enjoys very limited empirical
(Excerpt) Read more at telegraph.co.uk ...
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Posted on May 1, 2011 12:24:27 PM EDT by Rennes Templar
The oil industry is enjoying record profits as the price for a barrel of oil soars to more than $110. Chevron posted its profit numbers for the first quarter. The numbers were tough to stomach. Chevron reported earnings of $6.2 billion ($3.09 per share -- diluted) for the first quarter 2011, compared with $4.6 billion ($2.27 per share -- diluted) in the 2010 first quarter.
The Chevron press release set off a media blitz vilifying the big oil companies. How can these oil companies be making so much money while the American people are struggling to make ends meet and fill their gas tanks. Americans are making daily decisions on sacrifices they must make to put food on the table and pay their mortgage as the oil companies are making obscene profits.
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The next time you drive by a gas station and see the price of a gallon of unleaded gas more than $4 a gallon, focus on the root cause of the problem. The Obama administration's refusal to allow oil exploration and bring the United States back to fore front as a leading producer of oil.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
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May 4, 2011
Gasoline and Onions
The speculators are ripping us off!
"The skyrocketing price of gas and oil has nothing to do with the fundamentals of supply and demand, and has everything to do with Wall Street firms that are artificially jacking up the price of oil in the energy futures markets. ... (T)he same Wall Street speculators that caused the worst financial crisis since the 1930s through their greed, recklessness and illegal behavior are ripping off the American people again by gambling that the price of oil and gas will continue to go up."
Here we go again. That quote was Sen. Bernie Sanders doing what some always do when the price of oil spikes: complain about speculators. Now, President Obama says he'll investigate them: "We are going to make sure that no one is taking advantage of the American people for their own short-term gain." I assume that his new Financial Fraud Enforcement Working Group, like its predecessors, will uncover nothing untoward.
In America, we don't have a free market -- we have a government-saturated economy in which oil companies and other corporations have a cozy relationship with politicians and bureaucrats. That's wrong, but even that can't explain the recent run-up in prices. Oil companies today are no more greedy or clever than they have been all along.
We have to look for a better explanation -- and it isn't hard to find. Demand for oil rises with the growth of China, India and other developing countries. When poor people get a little richer, they buy cars, computers and refrigerators. They burn more fuel to make them and to run them. Rising demand, other things being equal, increases prices.
And other things have not been equal. Japan's nuclear plants are out of commission, and Libya, which accounts for about 2 percent of world oil production, is wracked by civil war. This is small compared to previous disruptions in the region, but it still affects the price.
The evil oil-speculator theory also runs up against the fact that the Federal Reserve's inflationary policies (QE2) and other factors have continued the dollar's slide against foreign currencies -- to a three-year low. As the dollar loses value, oil sellers demand more for their product. "Commodities, along with most traded goods globally, are priced in dollars," former Federal Reserve official Gerald P. O'Driscoll of the Cato Institute writes. "It is the old story of too much money chasing too few goods."
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If Sanders and other economic illiterates get their way, we'll have new laws banning "speculation." That will raise prices further. Don't believe me? Think back to a previous time when a Senate committee said that "speculative activity causes severe and unwarranted fluctuations in the price. ..." That was in 1958, when people got upset about the price of onions. Fools in Congress addressed that problem by banning speculation on onion prices.
The result? A Financial Times analysis found that the ban made prices less stable. This year, the retail price of onions rose more than the price of gasoline -- 36 versus 24 percent. Most years, the price of onions fluctuates more than other goods. No mystery there. Speculators help keep prices stable. When they foresee a future oil shortage -- that is, when prices are lower than anticipated in the future -- speculators buy lots of it, store it and then sell it when the shortage hits. They know they can charge more when there's relatively little oil on the market. But their selling during the shortage brings prices down from what they would have been had speculators not acted.
Speculators are like the ants in Aesop's "Ants and the Grasshopper" fable: They save resources for lean times. Everyone benefits because everyone has a chance to buy from them in those lean times.
Speculators don't "artificially jack up the price of oil" -- they take risks. Those who guess wrong lose a lot of money.
Historically, speculators have been convenient scapegoats, and they have suffered greatly for it. So have the rest of us.
While government should never create political opportunities for speculation, it should also stop interfering with its legitimate economic function.
We all are harmed when central planners take charge.
‹‹Previous Page |1 | 2 |
Copyright 2011, Creators Syndicate Inc.
Page Printed from: http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2011/05/04/gasoline_and_onions_109746-full.html at May 04, 2011 - 06:09:01 AM PDT
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Obama’s Oily View of America
Townhall.com ^ | May 4, 2011 | Robert Knight
When Barack Obama is in flyover country, if you close your eyes, you can almost hear a moderate Republican on the stump.
But when he’s on the Left Coast, the real Obama surfaces, bristling with praise for confiscatory taxation, redistributing wealth and ever bigger government.
It was in San Francisco, after all, that he let slip his famous gaffe on April 6, 2008 about rural Pennsylvanians clinging to “guns and religion.” And it was in San Francisco on April 20, 2011 that he told a Democratic National Committee audience that America’s greatness comes from government spending. Not from God-given liberty, limited government and a market economy that produced the freest, wealthiest country in history.
No, America’s greatness, apparently, came only with the New Deal and Great Society, when Washington grew from a sleepy town into a confiscatory monster sucking the life out of the rest of the country. That’s when Michelle Obama became, for the first time in her adult life, proud of her country. Wait, sorry. That was when Barack won the nomination in 2008.
But it’s never enough. Like the gangster in the 1948 Bogart classic Key Largo, Obama, like Johnny Rocco, wants more. “Yeah, Rocco (Barack) wants more.”
Here’s a snippet of Obama’s April 20 remarks:
“I will not reduce our deficit by sacrificing the things that have always made America great. The things that have made Americans prosper. I won’t sacrifice our investments in education. I will not sacrifice those. I won’t sacrifice our investments in science and basic research. I won’t sacrifice the safety of our highways or our airports.”
Read: Republicans want cars and planes to crash, scientists to hang up their lab coats and kids to get dumber.
In one of the most appalling displays of sheer gall, Obama actually decried America’s dependence on foreign oil. This is the president whose executive agencies have strangled new ventures to tap America’s enormous fossil fuel resources.
“I won’t sacrifice our investment in clean energy at a time when our dependence on foreign oil is causing Americans so much pain at the pump,” he told the DNC crowd.
And more pain is on the way. Obama’s EPA has denied a permit to Shell Oil Company to drill off Alaska’s coast. The company spent five years and nearly $4 billion preparing to give America a 27-billion-barrel shot in the arm of our domestic oil supply, which is down to 7 million barrels a day, 13 million short of what America uses.
Too bad, Shell. The extremist green lobby that dominates this administration is intent on destroying fossil fuel industries to prepare us for a mythical wind, solar and rickshaw-powered immediate future. You can’t say Obama did not warn us. He said explicitly in January 2008, for example, that his proposed cap and trade system would “bankrupt” anyone who wanted to build a new coal-fired plant.
On Tuesday, Obama was at it again, urging Congress to punish oil companies by ending “unwarranted” tax breaks. The man who has done more than anyone to jack up the price of gas said that high pump prices “provide more than enough profit motive to invest in domestic exploration and production.” Yes, if you will stop flirting with Brazil and get your foot off the neck of U.S. energy companies.
Meanwhile, China is expected within five years to require 15 million barrels of oil a day, up from the current 9 million. India is going to need 7 million barrels, up from its current use of 4 million. That’s a lot of competition for resources that Obama is making even scarcer.
Former Shell Oil President John Hofmeister, who is arguing for a balanced energy policy through his nonprofit group Citizens for Affordable Energy, warns that the government’s sabotage of fossil fuels and the world’s growing appetite will cause not just crippling prices but outright shortages here within two to three years.
While Obama scoffs at the notion that new drilling would make a difference, the U.S. sits on perhaps one trillion recoverable barrels of oil, enough to last more than 200 years without any Middle Eastern oil. Unleashing this could create millions of jobs, lift the economy and free us from dependence on foreign oil. Instead, the president pretends to back new production while his bureaucrats smother it.
Obama’s most misleading assertion might be that the United States has “about two, maybe three percent of the world’s proven oil reserves; we use 25 percent of the world’s oil.” As Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski noted in a recent column, “That line is crafted to make the audience think that America is both running out of oil and using oil at an unsustainable rate.”
The weasel term is “proven.” That includes only oil under sites already approved and prepared for harvest. The Congressional Research Service estimates that the U.S. has 157 billion barrels of recoverable oil. Another 900 billion from shale and other unconventional sources will soon be recoverable. The only thing blocking this energy bounty is the hard leftists who populate the White House, executive agencies and U.S. Senate. They are hell bent on making America swallow the Gaia version of the Earth, socialist economics, and Al Gore’s man-caused global warming.
As for the gaping federal deficit that’s freaking out the numbers crunchers at Standard & Poor’s, Obama’s friends at the leftwing Center for American Progress have an answer. In a Good Friday column in The Washington Post, Matt Miller trashed the House GOP’s budget proposal and admitted that Obama’s plan would add “$7 trillion in red ink over the next decade.” He touted, instead, the Congressional Progressive Caucus (read: socialist) plan, which “still wins the fiscal responsibility derby thus far; it reaches balance by 2021 largely through assorted tax hikes and defense cuts.”
That’s the ticket. Give the government even more of our money (that should teach them not to spend so much!) and soften the Defense Department while the Middle East blows up.
The only hope we have is if Americans ignore the Obama-crazy media and start asking why our spendaholic government needs higher taxes and why gas pumps are functioning like ATMs in reverse.
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The Obama Watch
Obama's War on Oil
By Peter Ferrara on 5.4.11 @ 6:10AM
http://spectator.org/archives/2011/05/04/obamas-war-on-oil/print
As a guest on a black radio talk show recently, I suggested that someone ask President Obama what his plan is for bringing down high gasoline prices.
What a gaffe that question would be. The current high gas prices, and more, are precisely the President's plan.
President Obama's Secretary of Energy is former Berkeley physics professor Steven Chu, who said in 2008, "Somehow we have to figure out how to boost the price of gasoline to the levels in Europe." We still have a way to go to achieve Secretary Chu's goal. The average price for a gallon of gas in Europe is over $8.
President Obama's Secretary of Interior is Ken Salazar. When he was a Senator in 2008, he proclaimed on the floor of the Senate that he would oppose any offshore drilling no matter how high the price of gasoline rose, even to $10 a gallon.
When President Obama took office in 2009, the average price of gasoline in America was $1.83 a gallon. Today it is more than double that at $3.87. As the above quotes indicate, the Obama Administration's policy is to increase it well beyond that.
Extremist Quackery
Why would President Obama want high gas prices? It's a matter of ideology for him. He thinks it's good for the environment for gas prices to be high. The higher gas prices are, the less you will drive.
Also, higher gas prices make his beloved "alternative fuels" more competitive. That is because these alternative fuels are inherently more expensive, and so can't compete with cheaper gas. Note this is not a prescription for easing the financial burden on working people. High gas prices make it more likely you will buy expensive "alternative fuels." But either way, your wallet will still be drained.
Worst of all, these "alternative fuels" are not anywhere near sufficiently viable to power the modern American economy into the 21st century. To sharply restrict and drive up the price of the traditional energy that can power our economy today decades before any possible alternative energy can take on the burden is a policy of national economic suicide. That is President Obama's energy policy today.
Don't even bring up the notion of global warming to justify President Obama's high gas price policy. I have discussed the discredited science behind that phony ideological claim in this space in detail before. If you need a refresher course, check out the Heartland Institute's definitive, 800-page tome Climate Change Reconsidered. The most advanced climate scientists such as MIT's Richard Lindzen now have definitive proof that man-caused greenhouse gas emissions will not raise earth's temperatures anywhere near dangerous levels. The increased CO2 in the atmosphere and the resulting slightly increased warmth will only improve agricultural productivity and human health.
These are the reasons why Victor Davis Hanson wrote in a recent column, "So much of this Administration's talk about energy sounds similar to a bull session in the faculty lounge, or what we would expect from lifelong bureaucrats and public functionaries who have never experienced long commutes or struggles in the harsher, profit-driven private workplace."
Supply and Demand
President Obama has raised gas prices by carrying on a war against U.S. oil production. One year after the Deepwater Horizon Gulf oil spill, the environment in the gulf has mostly recovered, but the same cannot be said for the American economy. Instead, after a deepwater drilling moratorium declared illegal in several judicial rulings that still dragged on for months, and then a continuing drilling permit slowdown also judicially condemned, giant deepwater drilling rigs have now been uprooted from the Gulf of Mexico and sent to friendlier economic environments in the Congo, Brazil, and elsewhere. The Gulf of Mexico has been a mainstay of U.S. oil production for decades with little adverse environmental effects. But President Obama seized on the opportunity provided by the spill to shut down as much of the Gulf production as possible. Maybe that political opportunity is why the Administration was so slow to act to minimize damage from the spill.
Also never recovered from the spill has been the congressionally-approved offshore drilling plan for the eastern Gulf of Mexico, the South Atlantic, and the mid-Atlantic, which President Obama deep-sixed in response to the spill. That action alone deprives the American people of an estimated 7.6 billion barrels of oil and 36.6 trillion cubic feet of natural gas.
Just warming up, the Obama Administration also rescinded already issued permits for drilling in the Chukchi Sea off Alaska. Shell Oil recently discovered that after spending $4 billion to develop shallow-water drilling on vast tracts already leased from the federal government in the Beauford and Chukchi Seas north of Alaska, President Obama's EPA has denied it permits to begin exploratory drilling. That leaves another estimated 27 billion barrels of oil in the ground.
But the Obama Administration has not just squelched offshore drilling. Drilling opportunities have been withdrawn in Montana, and oil shale production activities have been stopped in Colorado and elsewhere in the American West.
In December, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service began the process of listing the dunes sagebrush lizard as an endangered species. As Investors Business Daily explained on April 28:
If the dunes sagebrush lizard, now considered a separate species, is granted endangered status, oil and gas production in the Permian Basin in New Mexico and Texas may have to be shut down…. The Department of Energy says the Permian Basin has a quarter of the nation's proven reserves and 20% of the nation's daily production comes from there. It has a quarter of the nation's active oil and gas wells and is home to 21% of the rigs actively drilling in the U.S.
Supply down, prices up. That should not be too hard to understand even for a grassroots Democrat. But highly skilled Obama propagandists say, hold on, domestic oil production for 2009 and 2010 is up, not down. President Obama cited the figures himself, saying, "So any notion that my administration has shut down oil production might make for a good political sound bite, but it doesn't match up with reality."
But the reality is that just as the economy grows over time, oil production is supposed to grow with it. All of the above actions the Obama Administration has taken to shut down oil production means unambiguously that oil production is now or soon will be lower than it would have been otherwise. Which means prices are higher than they would have been otherwise.
Moreover, oil is not produced by flipping a switch. It takes years of development. Which means the increasing oil production in 2009 and 2010 that Obama and his propagandists cite is due to the policies of the Bush Administration. The impact of the policies adopted by the Obama Administration over the last two years, as part of its War on Oil, will be seen in oil production figures in the years ahead. Already the Energy Department projects that oil production in the Gulf will be down 20% just this year. That translates into a loss of 375,000 much needed, good paying jobs. The Department further projects that domestic oil production overall will drop sharply over the next two years.
In addition, oil markets today are not blind to what is coming down the pike. Today's oil price reflects the outlook for tomorrow. And constrained supplies tomorrow mean higher prices today. Opening up new oil supplies for tomorrow will similarly mean lower prices today.
Beyond oil supply and demand, there is another powerful factor driving up oil and gasoline prices. The price of oil tracks closely with the price of gold going back many decades. Look it up for yourself. The same wildly loose, Keynesian, Federal Reserve monetary policies (fully backed by President Obama) that have been causing gold to soar are causing oil to soar as well, along with other commodities across the board. Hence the rise of inflation, which is causing real wages to decline in this brave, new world of Obamanomics.
Obama's Scapegoating: Another Abuse of the Public
In addition to the above abusively misleading propaganda, President Obama is already scurrying to deflect blame for the gas price suffering resulting from his deliberate policies to others -- the scapegoats.
He has ordered the Justice Department to investigate the possible illegal actions of speculators. In his April 23 radio address, Obama bragged that as a result the Attorney General has "launched a task force with just one job: rooting out cases of fraud or manipulation in the oil markets that might affect gas prices, including any illegal activity by traders and speculators. We're going to make sure no one is taking advantage of the American people for their own short term gain."
But unless the Justice Department is going to investigate President Obama and his policies, that last sentence cannot possibly be true. When Attorney General Eric Holder said his task force had already uncovered a couple of things that are disturbing, the Wall Street Journal editorialized in response, "That must be some crack squad."
That response was apt because all the sermonizing about speculators is a long standing, disreputable abuse of the public raised by political scoundrels every time oil prices rise. Oil prices are set in a world oil market. Speculators speculate that oil prices will fall as well as that they will rise. If they speculate the wrong way, they lose their shirts. That is why an exhaustive investigation in 2008 by the Commodities Futures Trading Commission, which unlike Obama's politicized Justice Department actually enjoys expertise on the issue, concluded that the net effect of speculation was to reduce prices. That is because all the speculation just nets out to accelerating market recognition of supply and demand conditions, making oil prices smoother and less volatile, reducing risk and hence price.
That is why as Investors Business Daily editorialized on April 26, "At last count, 35 such investigations have been conducted over the decades, and none -- not a single one -- has turned up wrongdoing by investors or oilmen." All of this talk of speculation is just boob bait for bubbas, intentionally misleading the gullible, uneducated, and easy to command. As IBD added, "Rather than carry out another useless inquisition of private citizens, our political class should be investigating its own role in the price crisis. The result would be a revelation for those who fall for Washington's line about greedy businessmen whenever gasoline prices become painfully high."
But President Obama does have a policy answer to the question, what is your plan to address rising gas prices? He wants to raise taxes on oil companies. With all of the profits oil companies are making, Obama says, they don't need any subsidies. He labels $4 billion in tax loopholes as oil company subsidies and calls for those loopholes to be closed.
Oil companies should not be getting subsidies from the government in any event. But the dollar amount of oil profits is high because the oil companies invest such huge amounts to produce oil. As a return on investment or sales, oil profits are modest. While ExxonMobile and the other oil companies earn about 7% on sales, respected public citizens such as Google, Microsoft, and McDonald's regularly earn 20% or more.
Moreover, the fundamental truth is that the government doesn't subsidize oil companies. Oil companies subsidize the government. ExxonMobile alone pays more in income taxes than the bottom 50% of income earning citizens combined. In 2008 alone, ExxonMobile paid $116.2 billion in taxes. The effective corporate tax rate for all oil companies in 2008 was 42.3%.
In addition, the tax provisions Obama calls subsidies for oil companies involve the oil depletion allowance, expensing for indirect drilling costs, and the foreign tax credit, the first in the tax code since the beginning almost 100 years ago. But these are standard tax provisions allowed all mining, manufacturing and international companies for business expenses, depreciation and taxes paid to foreign governments, not subsidies. Abolishing them for oil companies would involve simply punitive taxation appropriate only for political scapegoats.
But this policy answer should earn President Obama a follow up question: how does raising taxes on oil companies reduce oil prices? Answer: it doesn't, it raises them even more.
A Consistent Obama Policy
When a citizen did manage to ask President Obama about rising gas prices recently, Obama answered coldly, "If you're complaining about the price of gas and you're only getting eight miles a gallon, you know, you might want to think about a trade-in."
But at least President Obama's answers and policies on the issue have been consistent. When asked about allowing more drilling during the 2008 campaign, he answered, as quoted by Investors Business Daily, that such drilling would not "lower gas prices today. It would not lower gas prices this summer. It would not lower gas prices this year." He added that "There's no silver bullet that can bring down gas prices right away," and anyone who says otherwise is just "trying to grab headlines or score a few points." He said he would not offer the "false promises, irresponsible policy and cheap gimmicks that might get politicians through the next election."
In other words, he did not campaign on bringing down gas prices. He said actually that doing so was not possible, even though policies enacted that very fall opening up future oil supplies led to collapsing oil prices soon enough.
America holds vast energy resources, far more than any other country overall, enough for America to be the world's number 1 coal producer, natural gas producer, nuclear power producer, and darn near the world's number 1 oil producer, if producers were just set free. But voters already have their answer from President Obama on this issue. If you want the lower gas prices, lower oil prices, and lower energy prices necessary for a booming economy, you are going to have to get yourselves another President.
Letter to the Editor
StumbleUpon| Digg| Reddit| Twitter| Facebook
Peter Ferrara is Director of Policy for the Carleson Center for Public Policy, Senior Fellow for Entitlement and Budget Policy for the Heartland Institute, and General Counsel of the American Civil Rights Union. He served in the White House Office of Policy Development under President Reagan, and as Associate Deputy Attorney General of the United States under the first President Bush. He is the author of America’s Ticking Bankruptcy Bomb, forthcoming from HarperCollins.
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Boooooooommmm.
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Obama on Oil | Living a Lie
Natural Born Conservative ^ | May 7, 2011 | Larry Walker, Jr.
________________________ ________________________ ________________________ ___
“We’re actually producing more oil here than ever.” ~ Barack Obama (05/06/2011) ~
The truth: We are producing fewer barrels of oil here than we did in 1951. ~
Obama would be correct, if our nation was founded in the year 2003. But of course anyone born before 2003 knows that Obama’s statement is - in fact - not true. For those more interested in truth, than in the shallow words of lying politicians, we are actually producing fewer barrels of oil today than we produced in the year 1951.
It’s time to start drilling, and time to stop lying. If Obama won’t do it, then let’s find someone who will.
References (Check the facts):
http://tonto.eia.doe.gov/dnav/pet/hist/LeafHandler.ashx?n=PET&s=MCRFPUS2&f=A
http://www.eia.doe.gov/totalenergy/data/monthly/pdf/sec3_3.pdf
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Gas prices will stay high until U.S. stops dreaming and starts drilling
washington Examiner ^ | 5/9/2011 | Mark Tapscott
Remember when you were a kid and your mother told you to eat your brussels sprouts because "they're good for you." That's exactly the attitude we get today from President Obama, Energy Secretary Steven Chu and Interior Secretary Ken Salazar concerning high gas prices. This is no surprise, of course, because Obama clearly said during the 2008 presidential campaign that his environmental programs would cause energy prices to "necessarily skyrocket."
And today, as millions of Americans struggle to make ends meet while gas prices reach and exceed $4 per gallon, Obama shrugs his shoulders and claims there's no "magic bullet" to restore reasonable energy costs, while telling a father with a family of 10 that he should buy a "hybrid minivan," which doesn't yet exist. But magic isn't required to make energy costs come down. The last time gas prices hit $4 per gallon was when President Bush was in office.
Oil prices were at record highs of nearly $150 per barrel. But the day Bush signed an executive order allowing increased U.S. offshore oil and natural gas drilling, the price of oil plummeted and gas prices at the pump soon followed suit. Obama could do the same thing today with the stroke of a pen on an executive order, or by picking up the phone and calling Salazar and Chu.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonexaminer.com ...
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Demand, not speculation, cited for rising oil prices
May 6, 2011
http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/sc-cons-0505-money-consumer-watch-20110506,0,6142022.story
High oil prices are here to stay, and they're caused by surging demand and limited new supply, not Wall Street speculators.
That's the message from Fatih Birol, chief economist at the International Energy Agency.
"Speculators are only responding to what is going on in the markets," Birol said. "We don't see enough oil in the markets. The major driver is supply and demand."
Birol said growth in worldwide oil demand is outstripping growth in new supplies by 1 million barrels a day per year.
Much of that new demand is coming from China, which is adding 800,000 vehicles to its roads each year, he said, and is responsible for fully half of the world's demand growth. Birol noted the growth in China's oil consumption is equal to all of the new output expected from Iraq over the next few years.
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Check out our crossword, sudoku and Jumble puzzles >>
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Plus, countries that export oil are not doing enough to invest in new production, and countries that use a lot of oil are not doing enough to cut back.
This isn't good news for American drivers, currently paying an average of nearly $4 a gallon at the pump.
"We have to learn to live with these higher prices," said Birol, who declined to say exactly how high oil will go. "They are here for a long time."
The International Energy Agency represents oil-consuming countries such as the United States, European nations and Japan. It was formed following the Arab oil embargo in the early 1970s, and it is responsible for shuffling strategic oil reserves among developed nations during a time of crisis. It also conducts extensive research on world oil markets.
Some argue that the world has plenty of oil, but that it is trapped in shale rock, tar sands or other types of formations.
Birol said challenges to extracting that oil include cost and environmental impact.
"There's a difference between having those reserves in the ground and having them at the gas pump," he said.
Birol's bleak view is not shared by everyone. Other analysts say plenty of new production from places such as Iraq and off the coast of Brazil should combine with sluggish worldwide economic growth to create an oil glut for at least the next few years. They place most of the blame for high prices on Wall Street, not soaring demand or price gouging from companies such as Exxon Mobil, BP, Chevron and Royal Dutch Shell.
Birol said U.S. politicians can do little in the short term to lower oil and gas prices.
In the long term, he said, the U.S. should focus on increasing its own domestic oil production and limiting consumption through higher fuel-efficiency standards and better incentives for electric cars.
"Oil will be more and more expensive unless countries like the U.S. and China use less," he said.
yourmoney@tribune.com
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Demand, not speculation, cited for rising oil prices
May 6, 2011
http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/sc-cons-0505-money-consumer-watch-20110506,0,6142022.story
High oil prices are here to stay, and they're caused by surging demand and limited new supply, not Wall Street speculators.
That's the message from Fatih Birol, chief economist at the International Energy Agency.
"Speculators are only responding to what is going on in the markets," Birol said. "We don't see enough oil in the markets. The major driver is supply and demand."
Birol said growth in worldwide oil demand is outstripping growth in new supplies by 1 million barrels a day per year.
Much of that new demand is coming from China, which is adding 800,000 vehicles to its roads each year, he said, and is responsible for fully half of the world's demand growth. Birol noted the growth in China's oil consumption is equal to all of the new output expected from Iraq over the next few years.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Check out our crossword, sudoku and Jumble puzzles >>
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Plus, countries that export oil are not doing enough to invest in new production, and countries that use a lot of oil are not doing enough to cut back.
This isn't good news for American drivers, currently paying an average of nearly $4 a gallon at the pump.
"We have to learn to live with these higher prices," said Birol, who declined to say exactly how high oil will go. "They are here for a long time."
The International Energy Agency represents oil-consuming countries such as the United States, European nations and Japan. It was formed following the Arab oil embargo in the early 1970s, and it is responsible for shuffling strategic oil reserves among developed nations during a time of crisis. It also conducts extensive research on world oil markets.
Some argue that the world has plenty of oil, but that it is trapped in shale rock, tar sands or other types of formations.
Birol said challenges to extracting that oil include cost and environmental impact.
"There's a difference between having those reserves in the ground and having them at the gas pump," he said.
Birol's bleak view is not shared by everyone. Other analysts say plenty of new production from places such as Iraq and off the coast of Brazil should combine with sluggish worldwide economic growth to create an oil glut for at least the next few years. They place most of the blame for high prices on Wall Street, not soaring demand or price gouging from companies such as Exxon Mobil, BP, Chevron and Royal Dutch Shell.
Birol said U.S. politicians can do little in the short term to lower oil and gas prices.
In the long term, he said, the U.S. should focus on increasing its own domestic oil production and limiting consumption through higher fuel-efficiency standards and better incentives for electric cars.
"Oil will be more and more expensive unless countries like the U.S. and China use less," he said.
yourmoney@tribune.com
Thanks 333 i've highlighted the good quotes. Nothing Obama can really do, high priced oil is here to stay!
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Judge orders action on 6 Gulf drilling permits
AP/Yahoo ^ | 5/10/2011
NEW ORLEANS – A federal judge has given the Obama administration 30 days to act on six permits for deep water drilling in the Gulf of Mexico.
U.S. District Judge Martin Feldman on Tuesday ruled on a lawsuit filed by Ensco Offshore Co. and others. He rejected Interior Department arguments that the issue was moot because it already has resumed issuing permits following the moratorium that was imposed last year after the massive BP oil spill.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
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flood on the mississippi.. gas will cost.. its obamas fault.. he summoned "Storm" from the X-men to cause the rain to fall ::)
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Gasoline prices to stay high through 2012, federal agency says
Plain Dealer ^ | 5/11/11 | John Funk
Gasoline prices will remain high through 2012, the U.S. Energy Information Administration says. The government's prediction Tuesday assumes significant increases in global oil consumption, oil price increases to go along with that, and even stronger profits for oil companies in the short run. But it does not mention the volatility that has beset oil markets in the last couple of weeks, driving prices to near record highs. The spikes -- driven by massive amounts of investor money electronically moving in and out of the commodities markets -- have convinced many motorists that somebody is gouging them.
(Excerpt) Read more at cleveland.com ...
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Mary Landrieu (D-La) pushes back against attacks on Big Oil
Politico ^ | 5/11/11
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Landrieu pushes back against attacks on Big Oil
May 11, 2011
Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-La.) has thought of a novel way for oil industry executives to protest her party’s attacks on their federal subsidies: Pack up your things and go elsewhere.
“I don’t think the oil executives would ever do this, but if I were one of them, I would be tempted to just shut off the spigots and go elsewhere and maybe America could run everything on solar power for the next decade or two and see what happens,” Landrieu told POLITICO.
Landrieu, who hails from a major oil producing state, has grown frustrated with the push by her party to target the subsidies as a way to pay down the deficit. Democrats – who have long targeted the industry – say that eliminating the tax breaks would slash the deficit by $21 billion over the next decade. A number of oil industry executives will testify before the Senate Finance Committee Thursday.
“It’s really very disappointing to me,” Landrieu said. “We should be really working on tax code reform for all industries, not singling out this particular industry.”
Late Wednesday, Landrieu and Alaska Sen. Mark Begich (D) sent a letter to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid saying that “although it is politically appealing to take a swipe at America’s oil and gas industry at this time of high profits, repealing the tax incentives now will hurt consumers, discourage domestic production and jeopardize millions of American jobs.”
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Good for her. Screw these environazis and psychos.
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Rex Tillerson: Proposed tax hikes are ‘discriminatory and punitive’ {Oil/Gas}
Fuel Fix ^ | May 12, 2011 | Jennifer Dlouhy
Senate Democrats are unfairly singling out the nation’s five biggest oil companies with a “discriminatory and punitive” plan to eliminate tax credits and deductions used broadly by other industries, Exxon Mobil CEO Rex Tillerson is set to tell Congress on Thursday.
Tillerson is expected to join executives from the other four oil giants — Shell, ConocoPhillips, Chevron and BP — in arguing before the Senate Finance Committee that if the targeted tax provisions are eliminated, it would discourage new investment key to unlocking more natural gas and oil in the future.
“A much better solution” for raising federal revenue is for the U.S. to open up more land and waters for oil and gas development, Tillerson will say, according to prepared testimony.
“Arbitrarily punishing five U.S. oil and gas companies by raising their taxes will generate far less government revenue than if we were allowed to compete and produce our nation’s resources,” Tillerson is set to say.
In his written testimony, Tillerson argues that the targeted tax provisions are similar to deductions and credits used by a range of other companies. For instance, Senate Democrats have proposed axing a domestic manufacturing tax deduction that is broadly available to companies producing goods in the U.S., including farmers, newspaper publishers, movie producers and chemical factories.
Removing the Sec. 199 domestic manufacturing deduction for just “a select few companies within the oil and gas industry . . . is tantamount to job discrimination,” Tillerson will say. “Why should an American refinery worker employed by a major U.S. oil and gas company in Billings, Mont., be treated as inferior to an American movie producer in Hollywood, an American newspaper worker in New York or an employee at a foreign-owned refinery in Lemont, Ill.?”
The Senate Democrats’ proposal aims to raise $21 billion over the next 10 years. Supporters argue that with crude prices over $100 per barrel and the biggest oil companies raking in outsize profits, the tax provisions amount to “wasteful and ineffective corporate subsidies.”
“While families across the country are being squeezed, your industry is doing better than ever,” said several Senate Democrats in a letter to the CEOs of the top five oil companies on Wednesday. “And yet the U.S. government continues to dole out $4 billion a year in tax breaks to your companies. These subsidies are not sustainable, and we intend to end them.”
But the plan could backfire, warned Conoco Phillips CEO Jim Mulva on Wednesday. Mulva, who also is set to testify before the Finance Committee, stressed that tax hikes could effect gasoline prices.
“At a time when everyone is concerned over the cost of gasoline,” Mulva said, “Congress shouldn’t do anything that could actually worsen the situation.”
The Senate Democrats’ bill would block the top five major integrated oil companies from claiming:
A tax credit on payments to foreign governments — including petroleum income taxes – that they pay in exchange for some economic benefit. The five biggest oil companies would still be able to deduct foreign payments.
- A domestic manufacturing deduction, which has generally been available to a broad range of U.S. firms.
- A deduction for intangible drilling costs, such as the cost of repairs, site preparation and hauling supplies. Currently, integrated oil companies can expense 70 percent of the cost of these intangible drilling costs, but the legislation would require the big five oil companies to instead capitalize all of these costs.
- A percentage depletion deduction for oil and natural gas wells, computed using a portion of the revenue from the sale of those hydrocarbons.
- The bill also would limit the deduction of certain tertiary injectants, chemicals used to boost the amount of oil and natural gas that can be recovered from individual wells. Currently, companies are allowed to deduct the cost of those injectants, but the bill would force the big five oil companies to instead capitalize those costs and recover them over time.
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Stalling offshore drilling is costing jobs and gas prices
By Alan Nunnelee (R-Miss.) - 05/12/11 09:07 AM ET
Energy prices are once again dominating kitchen table conversations across the country - with families facing tough decisions as more of their hard-earned paychecks go towards feeding the pump.
While these astronomical prices are most notable on the five foot signs outside of every gas station across America, they are also notorious for affecting normal day-to-day activities and the price of consumer goods. Back in Mississippi, concerned citizens are asking, how am I going to continue driving to work or taking my kids to school, soccer practice and piano lessons when it puts such a huge dent in my budget? Most of all they are asking, when will gas prices go down and what do we have to do to keep them low?
The continued stalling of energy production by this Administration is preventing Americans from finding relief at the pump. Since taking office, President Obama has actively delayed, blocked and stalled American energy production.
The American people are sick of the stalling tactics and that is why House Republicans are concentrating on three key initiatives that will reverse the Obama Administration’s policies that are hurting families, destroying jobs and increasing our reliance on foreign oil.
Last week the House passed The Restarting American Offshore Leasing Now Act, which requires the Secretary of the Interior to conduct oil and natural gas lease sales in the Gulf and offshore Virginia that have been delayed or canceled by the Obama Administration. This week the House focuses on The Putting the Gulf Back to Work Act and The Reversing President Obama’s Moratorium Act.
In May 2010, President Obama put a moratorium on drilling permits in the Gulf. The ban was officially lifted in October 2010; however, the Obama Administration has chosen to drag their feet and stall the permitting process.
This stalling tactic is costing Americans jobs. In fact, reports indicate that if the Obama Administration’s de facto moratorium is sustained for 18 months, it will cost the United States over 36,000 jobs – 24,532 of those in the Gulf. Twelve rigs have already left the Gulf for other regions, taking hundreds, even thousands of jobs with them.
The Administration’s stalling efforts are also causing a significant decline in American energy with production in the Gulf expected to fall by 240,000 barrels per day in 2011.
The Putting the Gulf Back to Work Act sets a firm 30 day timeline for the Secretary of the Interior to act on drilling permits and restarts permits that were approved prior to the moratorium imposed in May 2010.
When President Obama took office, the Atlantic Coast, Pacific Coast and areas in Alaska were open for new offshore drilling. Now, the President’s actions have placed the entire region off-limits and blocked access to some of the most promising shallow water resources.
The Reversing President Obama’s Offshore Moratorium Act will implement a smart drilling plan by requiring the Administration to move forward on American energy production in areas containing the most oil and natural gas resources.
All three energy bills combined could create 250,000 jobs short-term and 1.2 million jobs long-term. By putting the Gulf back to work and expanding offshore drilling, we will keep and create good jobs in America.
Finally, this is about America’s energy security. As a member of the House Energy Action Team (HEAT), I am committed to promoting policies that will strengthen our national security by decreasing our dependence on foreign energy. America will continue to face problems as long as we rely on our enemies for our needs. House Republicans know that our energy security will only come through an all-of-the-above approach, including more American oil, natural gas, clean coal, nuclear energy and new technologies such as wind and solar power.
America - we are listening and focusing on long term goals to get more American energy out of the ground. Robust domestic energy production, free from the Obama Administration’s stalling games, will put an end to the gas prices that are straining budgets and compromising our energy security.
http://thehill.com/blogs/congress-blog/energy-a-environment/160773-stalling-offshore-drilling-is-costing-jobs-and-gas-prices
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INSANITY: Bromwich Grasps At Double Regulation On Offshore Oil
Posted by: MacAoidh on Tuesday, May 3, 2011, 17:35
Tagged with: David Vitter Michael Bromwich Obamoratorium offshore oil
Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, Regulation and Enforcement director Michael Bromwich, who has been caught repeatedly making statements which are patently untrue in congressional testimony and who has been under constant fire for his agency’s failure to resuscitate the offshore oil exploration business through the issuance of permits, made headlines yesterday by announcing that he wants not just to ride herd over the oil companies he’s tasked with regulating and permitting, but over the oilfield service companies as well.
Bromwich’s gambit would put contractors and suppliers under his agency’s management, at a time when he has already decried a lack of resources available to BOEMRE for its current mission of regulating the rig operators.
Bromwich stressed the move wouldn’t upset the longstanding principle that oil and gas companies are “fully liable for things that go wrong” offshore.
“There is a virtue in the clarity that we’ve had historically in being able to go directly against the operators even when it relates to contractors, but there are at least a small number of cases where we want to be able to go against contractors,” Bromwich said.
“Certainly in at least some cases, where the behavior of non-operators — that is, contractors – is egregious enough, we need to have the ability to move directly to enforcement actions, through the assessment of civil fines and through the other regulatory tools that we have.”
Bromwich said an internal review of current laws concluded that the agency already has “broad legal authority over all activities relating to offshore leases, whether it is engaged in by lessees, operators or contractors.”
Bear in mind, the kinds of things BOEMRE would attempt to fine or sue oil contractors for are already regulated. The operator of a rig is held responsible for compliance with federal regulations on the part of all of its contractors, suppliers and other business partners on that rig. Separate regulatory activity threatens a blizzard of paperwork that would put the industry at even more of a standstill – particularly given the current performance of BOEMRE, which has slowed permitting for drilling by 78 percent in deepwater since the Deepwater Horizon accident last April. Permitting in shallow water since February is off by 26 percent from the five months previous to Deepwater Horizon as of last month.
Randall Luthi, the head of the National Offshore Industries Association, said it’s unclear how the ocean energy bureau will assert its authority – especially given that its resources are already strained.
“Once you shift from just regulating the operators to the contractors, the universe could be huge,” Luthi said. “We’ve got an agency that – according to every report we’ve read in the last year – is chronically underfunded and doesn’t have the personnel to do what they were designed to do. And just as funding starts to come in, there is what looks like a push to do more.”
Sen. David Vitter (R-LA), who has become perhaps Bromwich’s chief tormentor on Capitol Hill, was enraged at the news.
“BOEMRE is perpetually failing at showing itself capable of handling its basic responsibility to issue permits. The rate of permitting is abysmal and should be Director Bromwich and Secretary Salazar’s primary focus,” said Vitter. “Instead, they’re diverting resources to expand their authority while adding more confusion to the process. That’s not a recipe for lowering prices at the pump or getting Louisianians working again.”
Vitter fired off a letter to Bromwich today questioning his agency’s legal authority and available resources to begin regulating and investigating oilfield service companies – a letter which won’t likely find a happy reception at BOEMRE’s offices…
Dear Mr. Bromwich:
I have strong concerns with your remarks made yesterday in Houston regarding expanded jurisdiction at the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, Regulation and Enforcement (BOEMRE). It appears this expansion of regulatory authority will serve as another hurdle to expanding our domestic production by inserting even more confusion to the permitting process. I would appreciate a detailed response on several items relating to your expansion of jurisdiction and responsibility in light of the fact that you have said publicly, on multiple occasions, that BOEMRE does not have adequate staff to handle permitting as an excuse for your agency’s abysmal pace of approving permits. Expanding the reach of your agency while simultaneously claiming you are “understaffed” is nothing short of confusing.
Particularly, I request the followin
1.A copy of the memorandum of legal authority that has been written. The BOEMRE regulations currently apply to the operators because the regulations are incorporated into the lease contracts – in other words, the regulation has a contractual basis. I am aware of no such privity of contract that exists between DOI and the support contractors.
2.How can BOEMRE apply existing regulations to contractors when the proposed regulations specifically only applied to lessees? Are there not legal problems with this expansion of jurisdiction beyond the current contractual authority?
3.Your analysis of how the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act authorizes BOEMRE to manage contractors. I am very skeptical of a broad scale regulation of contractors by BOEMRE, especially with no new regulatory proceedings that give them the opportunity for notice and comment under the Administrative Procedures Act.
4.Finally, please identify what staff you intend to direct away from their current responsibilities at Interior and explain why they could not better be utilized in the permitting process to get our energy industry and thousands of Americans back to work.
Again, you have on multiple occasions claimed to be understaffed, yet now – despite these claims – you appear to have adequate staff to expand BOEMRE’s jurisdiction and responsibility. This announcement leaves Congress with no other reason but to believe that BOEMRE has always had the necessary means, staff, and flexibility to meet the rising challenges and demands on the agency. Many of my colleagues in Congress would argue that includes the rising challenge of increased energy prices, a direct result of the lack of offshore drilling permits that could increase domestic supply.
I look forward to a detailed plan of how you intend to maneuver staff with this newly acknowledged flexibility to meet that very real need for increased permit approval.
In related news, the average gasoline price nationwide is poised to top the $4-per gallon mark by the weekend.
http://thehayride.com/2011/05/insanity-bromwich-grasps-at-double-regulation-on-offshore-oil
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Myths About Oil and Gas
www.Townhall.com
May 13, 2011 | Bob Beauprez
As voters around the country wince at rising gas prices, panicked Democrats, in a rush to cover the failure of their all-or-nothing bet on the alternative energy industry have started singing a familiar tune – blame the oil and gas industry. Instead of facing the reality of his owned failed policies, President Obama is calling for an end to the "tax giveaways" he claims amount to $4 billion in “subsidies” to the energy industry.
This tactic isn’t surprising given the effect that rising gas prices have on the President’s approval ratings and his obsession with re-election. But, less than truthful innuendos and political spin hardly helps American working families that are getting hammered at the pump.
If our leaders are going to have an honest discussion about energy, it's important to clear up a few rumors, misconceptions and outright falsehoods being perpetrated about the oil and gas industry. Let's begin with three of the more common ones:
1. The industry doesn’t receive any taxpayer funded subsides. None.
2. Rampant speculation and Wall Street tricks aren’t driving up gas prices.
3. The oil and gas industry is not dodging the taxes they owe and withholding “their fair share”.
I'll say it again; contrary to popular opinion and the President's spin, oil and gas gets no taxpayer funded subsidies. The tax code does allow them certain tax credits and deductions to encourage continued investment in an industry that is heavily front-end loaded with capital expense. These are the same kind of incentives available to Coca-Cola, General Electric, Ford, and Micro-Soft and other companies doing business in the U.S. Or, for that matter, like the deduction for mortgage interest payments enjoyed by homeowners. But, importantly these are tax credits, and markedly different from direct taxpayer cash subsidies like the 45 cent per gallon payment blenders get to put ethanol in fuel mixes.
When businesses invest in America, we all benefit. The oil and gas industry plows about $300 billion into domestic projects per year – that's 75 times more than Obama's phantom "taxpayer giveaways" amount - and employees over 9 million people. Those are real numbers; not Washington spin, and if government would allow and encourage even more domestic production there would be more jobs and more investment – and more total taxes paid, too.
Another argument that often circulates when gas prices go up is that a phantom class of “Wall Street speculators” is to blame for the increase of prices. So pervasive was this school of thought that in 2008, President Bush commissioned an exhaustive review, via the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, of the effect that speculators had on market prices. Their conclusion was surprising, according to The Wall Street Journal, “The agency concluded that speculators—otherwise known as traders—were putting downward pressure on prices. The liquidity they provide helps to smooth volatility.”
Not satisfied with the 2008 study, President Obama recently resurrected this school of thought, even tapping Attorney General Eric Holder to police perceived illegal activity and price gouging. Yet within the Presidents’ own Administration, the Federal Trade Commission found that the recent spike in oil prices is due primarily to normal market forces, including booming demand from developing economies in India and China and not because of any questionable behavior from Wall Street.
The third popular attack is that somehow oil and gas industry isn’t paying its fair share in taxes. Democrat mythology aside, the oil and gas industry pays a much heftier percentage of net income in taxes (41.1%) than the average of all other S&P Industrials (26.5%). Every single day, the industry is sending more than $85 million to the U.S. Treasury for taxes and royalty payments. Yes, the energy companies are profitable, but their profit margins are right in line with manufacturing, aerospace, and food industries, while computer, pharmaceutical, and the beverage companies have triple the net income margins of traditional energy.
I don't like subsidies and I don't like Congress or the IRS deciding what is good economic behavior and what is bad. But, I do understand that you get more of what gets incentivized, and less of what is penalized. And, there is a huge difference in "redistributing the wealth" through direct subsidy payments, and a tax credit that encourages investment in much needed production that creates jobs and taxable income.
If congress is serious about creating jobs and jump starting the economy, they should lower the corporate tax rate, which is the highest among the 34 OECD nations, rather than increase the tax burden on energy or any industry.
Capital is fungible, and energy production is the prototypical global industry. Plenty of nations around the world are providing a far more welcoming business environment for energy production that the U.S. already with a less onerous tax code and far less regulatory burden.
If increasing our domestic supply is really a national objective, then this might not be the best time to send exactly the opposite message to the people that provide the capital to drill the wells.
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Farmers across America ditch tractors for oxen in bid to beat rising fuel prices
The Daily Mail ^ | May 9, 2011 | Daily Mail Reporter
Posted on 05/15/2011 7:01:59
When farmers Danielle and Matt Boerson realised they could no longer afford to run their tractors, they took the bull by the horns - and ditched them for oxen.
Soaring petrol prices had become so high that the couple, who run an 80-acre farm near Madison, Wisconsin, were forced to get rid of their two tractors, hay baler, plough and rotavator.
So they took a course at the agricultural institute in traditional farming techniques.
'It gave me the confidence that, yes, I could do this', Danielle told the Times. 'It just required a lot of concentration and a firm voice.' Their instructor was former peace core volunteer Dick Roosenberg, 64, who learned the trade while working for the UN in West Africa. He took the skills he had honed back to Michigan and set up Tillers International.
At first the company was aimed at helping Third World farmers harvest in the cheapest way possible.
On the side, he also helped historically-themed villages. But his specialist knowledge is now enjoying a new wave of interest with farmers from Wisconsin to Alaska now joining his courses.
(Excerpt) Read more at dailymail.co.uk ...
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Obama’s Oil Drilling Subterfuge
www.Redstate.com
5/16/2011 | Daniel Horowitz
Many liberals in the media are expressing shock over Obama’s apparent willingness to increase oil production. We all know that he is full of …, I mean ethanol, and they do too.
Those of you who were befuddled at the news that Obama will ‘expand drilling’ in Alaska are not missing anything. Obama has pulled this political chicanery a number of times. Whenever a specific proposal that he so adamantly opposes becomes too popular to ignore, he announces his support for it by promising to implement inconsequential reforms. To that end, he declared during his Saturday radio address that he is “directing the Department of Interior to conduct annual lease sales in Alaska’s National Petroleum Reserve, while respecting sensitive areas, and to speed up the evaluation of oil and gas resources in the mid and south Atlantic”.
So we are to believe that the Beaufort and Chukchi Seas and ANWR, all of which are impounded from drilling leases by the administration, are more sensitive than Alaska’s National Petroleum Reserve? Caribou, baby, Caribou in ANWR; drill, baby, drill in ANPR? Think again.
Here is the report from The Hill:
President Obama announced Saturday the government would hold annual onshore lease sales in Alaska’s National Petroleum Reserve; extend the life of leases in the Gulf of Mexico and in some areas off the coast of Alaska for one year; speed up ongoing Interior Department testing in the mid- and south-Atlantic to gauge the level of resources; and establish an interagency task force to coordinate permitting for offshore drilling in Alaska.
The White House is making the policy shifts after taking intense criticism from Republicans in recent weeks over energy policy as gas prices have topped $4 per gallon in some parts of the country.Many of the proposals are incremental expansions of existing policies and had been set in motion prior to Saturday’s announcement. It’s also unclear by how much the plan will increase domestic oil production. (emphasis added)
Once again, Obama is attempting to diffuse disquiet over his anti-energy policies by embracing the opposition through inconsequential and empty promises. He attempted this stratagem earlier this year when he announced wholesale regulatory reform in a Wall Street Journal op-ed. Amidst growing pressure to roll back job killing regulations, Obama announced a momentous effort to “study” onerous regulations. Needless to say, the regulations in the federal register have only grown since his vapid announcement. In fact, he is attempting to regulate every facet of our economy; from the broadband providers to oil refineries, without congressional approval. Nonetheless, he is still studying the problem.
Obama used the same ploy in his State of the Union Address by embracing popular policies, such as a corporate tax cuts and tort reform. We haven’t heard about them since the address and probably never will.
His promise to reform land lease permits and to allow drilling in Alaska is another attempt at subterfuge for the purpose of tamping down the outrage toward his job-killing, anti-growth policies. After all, didn’t the administration oppose all three GOP bills that would implement some of these very changes just last week? House Natural Resources Committee Chairman Doc Hastings (R-WA) released the following statement on Obama’s radio address:
“In the last week, House Republicans passed three bipartisan bills that will create 1.2 million jobs, triple American offshore oil production and generate $840 million in revenue - real action to produce real American energy. It’s ironic that while the White House and Congressional Democrats strongly criticized these efforts, President Obama is now taking tiny baby steps in our direction. The President is finally admitting what Republicans have known all along - that increasing the supply of American energy will help lower prices and create jobs. One weekend address announcing minor policy tinkering, while positive, does not erase the Administration’s long job-destroying record of locking-up America’s energy resources.”
As Drudge observed yesterday, Obama made the exact same pledge over a year ago, immediately preceding his inexorable and unprecedented moratorium on drilling in the Gulf of Mexico and the Outer Continental Shelf (OCS). Sadly, the New York Times was credulous enough to believe it and carried water for Obama by headlining a story at that time titled, “Obama to Open Offshore Areas to Oil Drilling for First Time.” That didn’t exactly work out according to plan.
As such, don’t be fooled by this foxhole conversion. His speech does not reflect a newfound obsequious to the will of the American people; he will never abdicate his radical ideology so easily. Moreover, his political appointees at the Department of Energy and Department of Interior will wait for the inevitable lawsuits from environmental legal defense groups to scuttle the plans. That is what the administration did when they blocked Shel Oil from drilling in the Arctic Ocean. The environmentalists are already chomping at the bit. And as is the case with every other proposal, he will encumber any meaningful drilling policies with endless environmental impact studies. It’s akin to Obama’s promises of securing the border, even as his minions at the Department of Homeland Security instruct ICE agents not to apprehend non-criminal aliens. Talk is cheap, Mr. President, and in your case, it is worthless.
Call your members of congress and request that they support H.R. 1777, which would implement comprehensive pro-energy reforms, such as opening ANWR for drilling, streamlining the permit and leasing process, and lawsuit reform (summary and commentary here). Let’s unmask Obama’s fallacious attempt at being pro-energy and make him take a stand against real energy production legislation!
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Exxon fires back at NYT editorial on oil industry taxes {NYT enjoys same tax break}
Fuel Fix ^ | May 16, 2011 | Jennifer Dlouhy
A wise person (possibly Mark Twain) once famously cautioned: “Never pick a fight with a man who buys his ink by the barrel.” But it doesn’t look like Exxon Mobil is heeding that advice.
The company today hit back against a New York Times editorial that said it was “utterly absurd” for the nation’s five biggest oil companies to argue proposed tax increases would raise consumer prices and discourage domestic energy production.
In a blog post, Exxon Mobil Vice President Ken Cohen points out that one of the industry tax breaks Senate Democrats and the Obama administration have targeted for elimination is also enjoyed by the Times.
“The Times neglects to mention that it enjoys a higher deduction than we do for one of the measures it’s campaigning to have taken away from our industry,” Cohen writes.
At issue is the Sec. 199 domestic manufacturing provision, which is broadly used by a range of industries, including automakers, movie producers and newspaper publishers, to score a 9 percent deduction. Federal law limits the oil and natural gas industry to 6 percent domestic manufacturing deductions.
The deduction is one of a suite of tax breaks that Senate Democrats are pushing to end for the five biggest oil companies in legislation that could come up for a vote on Wednesday. A Senate Finance Committee hearing last week explored the issue with executives from those major oil companies, including Exxon Mobil CEO Rex Tillerson.
The New York Times editorial makes the case that the oil industry tax breaks are unnecessary, especially at a time when the companies are raking in substantial profits. “There is also an elemental matter of fairness here,” the Times editorial board writes.
The newspaper continues:
“More than anything, one has to wonder why the oil companies are fighting so hard for a comparatively small amount of cash, at least for them. The only explanation we can come up with is that they have always gotten what they wanted and expect to do so now, so why not?
While the domestic manufacturing deduction isn’t unique to the oil and gas industry, several of the targeted tax provisions are, the New York Times notes. Even without them, the Times editorial asserts, the “industry is not going to stop drilling on American territory as long as the oil is there and yielding big dollars.”
In his blog entry today, Cohen responds with a reprise of Tillerson’s arguments before the Senate Finance Committee last Thursday. His case boils down to a few points:
- Taxes on a select few companies would put them at a disadvantage against competitors when it comes to capital investments.
- It would be unfair to single out the oil and natural gas industry — and the jobs that are tied to it — with tax hikes.
- A better way to boost federal revenue would be by opening more U.S. lands and waters to oil and gas development. Oil companies pay royalties to the federal treasury for the energy produced on federal leases.
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Rep. Kevin Brady: Fed policies add 56 cents per gallon of gas
Fuel Fix ^ | May 16, 2011 | Richard Dunham
________________________ ________________________ ________________________
Attempts by the Federal Reserve Board and the Obama administration to head off an economic collapse in 2008 have resulted in a jump in gasoline pump prices of 56 cents per gallon, Rep. Kevin Brady, R-The Woodlands, said today.
Brady, the top House Republican on the congressional Joint Economic Committee, released a study that looked at the economic costs to average Americans of the massive infusion of dollars into the U.S. economy by the Fed designed to stimulate the economy and stave of a national economic catastrophe as the U.S. financial system teetered on the brink of collapse.
“Americans are paying a steep price at the pump as a result of the weak dollar policies pursued by this administration and the Federal Reserve”, said Brady.
The study, entitled The Price of Oil and the Value of the Dollar, states that the value of the U.S. dollar has declined by 14 percent since the Fed began its program formally known as “quantitative easing” (also called “QE1″) in November of 2008, as the financial system neared meltdown.
By pumping out dollars to stave of an impending disaster, the Fed effectively devalued the U.S. currenc.y With oil an international commodity that trades in U.S. dollars, the declining value of the dollar has added $17.04 per barrel to the price of Brent Crude oil, the study found.
“There are two lessons here,” Brady said. “Rather than pointing fingers at energy manufacturers the president should be looking to his own Treasury and the Fed for answers to the high price of fuel. And this drives home the point that the Federal Reserve should have one mandate, price stability, to prevent inflation and preserve the value of the U.S. dollar.”
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BBOOOOMMM.
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Just Who is Gouging Us on Gasoline?
American Thinker ^ | 5-17-11 | Jeff T. Allen
________________________ ________________________ _______
Americans are fed up with high gas prices, and some U.S. senators are getting disgusted enough to act. Appearing in front of an Exxon gas station last week, Charles Schumer and several other senators called for the elimination of tax deductions oil companies use in their business of finding, refining, and marketing the precious energy we use. It is time we are outraged by blatant greed at the gas pump, they implored. Some of us agree, but for different reasons. Let's have the courage to name those who are getting the biggest cut from our gasoline dollars, and put a stop to it.
Understand where our money goes when we fill up at our corner station. Oil company profit is one place: the after-tax profits earned by the most successful oil companies in America works out to about 8-9% of revenues. That's 8 cents of every dollar we spend at the pump, and it's been much lower in years when prices are squeezed by too much supply. Sometimes there are no profits, but rather huge costs, if mistakes that get nasty are made in exploration or transportation (e.g. Exxon Valdez and BP Gulf spills).
The senators standing in front of the gas station would have you think such profit is the biggest chunk of your purchase price -- but it isn't even close. The taxes on gasoline at retail amount to a national average of 47 cents per gallon (including federal taxes of 18 cents, state and local taxes of 18 cents, and sales/other taxes at retail of more than 10 cents). And before taxpayers have paid that princely sum (to people who haven't invested a penny to produce the product), the operating profits of the explorers are taxed at 34% -- which is always passed on to consumers in the form of higher prices. States get into the act here too, taxing the retailers' profits after taxing the product at the pump. And let's not forget the other costs that drive up the gallon price, such as drilling restrictions that force explorers 5 miles deep under the ocean, transportation regulations and taxes, refining regulations, licenses, leases, and myriads of others.
Pulling huge quantities of wealth out of the ground isn't easy. Finding and refining oil takes knowledge of geology, drilling technology, finance, transportation logistics, and environmental science. Pulling even larger amounts of wealth out of taxpayers, however, takes only two things: ignorance and envy.
You see, average Americans have no concept of what it takes to deliver a gallon of gasoline to their neighborhoods -- for 1/10 the price/oz. of the latte they buy on the same corner. Most Americans aren't geologists. And they don't like high prices. So Americans routinely grumble about oil company profits, without any knowledge of the relative size of them or what risks it takes to earn them. Yet it is clearly the government which benefits most from our purchases at the pump, without lifting a finger to make the product.
Ignorance and envy are something our senators are banking on when they rail against oil profits. Our media culture loves to help them. But if corporations are to be "accountable" for egregious profits, where is the senatorial and media outrage over other company profits? Microsoft earns record profits of $18 billion, more than 30% of its revenues net of all taxes. The latte-maker Starbucks earns 11% of revenue. But there is no move from Mr. Schumer & Friends decrying the write-offs of Microsoft's development costs. Why isn't Mr. Schumer standing in front of Best Buy railing against the taxpayer "subsidy" of Microsoft? Do Microsoft's contributions to his campaign have any influence on his choice of targets? Is Microsoft (or any company) more worthy of egregious gain than Exxon?
If the public weren't so ignorant and envious of such capitalist exercises as making gasoline, perhaps they might turn their attention toward the biggest cost in their lives and also the biggest reason gas prices are high: government. If the government would spend less time punishing and restricting energy exploration and delivery, we might have more energy. If the government, however, wants to raise the after-tax costs of producing energy, we will surely get less, driving prices higher still.
As government elites gain greater money and power from exploiting our ignorance, they posture again about taxpayers and pump prices. But they really don't care about taxpayers and pump prices at all. Nothing in their behavior over energy policy leads to that conclusion. Rather than sticking up for taxpayers and consumers, the biggest pigs at the trough are looking for another way to stick it to taxpayers and consumers. In classic Atlas Shrugged fashion, the know-nothings mooching off the productivity and ingenuity of capitalists take the public stage to throw sand in the gears of a vital American output engine. The gouging continues. on "Just Who is Gouging Us on Gasoline?"
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Do you enjoy posting in threads over and over with the same sourced drivel? I mean seriously. You have an obsession with one part of the equation on oil prices and only fixate on that. It makes for a stupid thread full of the same sources over and over.
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::) ::) ::)
These articles are posted as they come out. You and mal tried telling my I was clueless that there was a connection between the weak dollar policy and gas procies. Both of you were and still are dead wrong on that.
This is why Obama policies of weak dollar, inflation, and scarcity via moritoriums are going to get his ass booted in 2012 thankfully.
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::) ::) ::)
These articles are posted as they come out. You and mal tried telling my I was clueless that there was a connection between the weak dollar policy and gas procies. Both of you were and still are dead wrong on that.
This is why Obama policies of weak dollar, inflation, and scarcity via moritoriums are going to get his ass booted in 2012 thankfully.
Oh please. I've long said the weak dollar policy doesn't help. You fail to even heed the words of the articles you post. You act as if Obama is the sole reason for high oil, i have proven and articles that aren't redstate or some other nonsense have proven the exact same thing, over and over.
This is bigger than the president and there is little he can do to stop the rising prices. This thread is nothing more than a pitiful attempt to show how uninformed you are on oil and gas.
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No, he is greatly adding to the problem by fdoing everything possible to make the matters worse and reacihng his stated goal of "SKYROCKETING ENERGY PROCES"
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::) ::) ::)
These articles are posted as they come out. You and mal tried telling my I was clueless that there was a connection between the weak dollar policy and gas procies. Both of you were and still are dead wrong on that.
This is why Obama policies of weak dollar, inflation, and scarcity via moritoriums are going to get his ass booted in 2012 thankfully.
ps the US doesn't have enough oil to make much of a dent if any in the overall price. The amount of oil we consume can not be paid for at current prices from US oil. They would need to rise and stay high in order to make economic sense for oil companies to invest in Utah and further afield. You fail to understand this basic principal - you do not save the cheapest, easiest oil for last.
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No, he is greatly adding to the problem by fdoing everything possible to make the matters worse and reacihng his stated goal of "SKYROCKETING ENERGY PROCES"
Oh please. More of the same alarmist nonsense. It's bullsh*t, everything you write is written with a slant and no objectivity. It shows even greater when all you can do is find right wing articles agreeing with you.
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Yeah - real right wing source right here.
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You're such a doofus. Obama has little influence on a free market resource that the US has hardly any of.
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Editorial: Don't Let Alaska Oil Pipeline Shut Down
IBD Editorials ^ | May 17, 2011 | Staff
Posted on May 17, 2011 9:45:40 PM EDT by Kaslin
Energy: Lack of oil volume due to administration bans on new Alaskan drilling may force the shutdown of the Trans-Alaska Pipeline, denying us even the tens of billions of barrels left in already developed fields.
The Trans-Alaskan pipeline is dying, another casualty of the Obama administration's war on domestic fossil fuel energy and its deliberate effort to drive up energy prices to make so-called "green" energy alternatives more attractive.
It was built to handle the oil produced on Alaska's North Slope at Prudhoe Bay and was a marvel of American engineering and exceptionalism. When oil exploration began in Prudhoe Bay, 60 miles east of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, more than three decades ago, environmentalists claimed it would yield only a "few months' supply" of oil and would wreck the ecosystem.
Prudhoe Bay turned out to be the largest oil find ever in North America. It has in fact supplied an average of 9%, and as much as 12%, of our daily consumption since its inception and is among the most environmentally sensitive oil operations in the world. Caribou frolic and play by the pipeline, and the herds have thrived.
At its peak, the pipeline carried 2 million barrels of oil a day, 3% of the world's crude, to the port of Valdez 800 miles away, taking just three days to do so.
As oilfields do over time, Prudhoe Bay's output is declining, even though there's plenty of oil left. But it soon may not be enough to keep the Alaskan pipeline open.
With the pipeline carrying just a third of its peak volume, the pressure drops, so the crude takes five times as long to make the journey and sometimes arrives at a mere 40 degrees — vs. the normal 100 degrees.
(Excerpt) Read more at investors.com ...
TOPICS: Business/Economy; Editorial; Front Page News; US: Alaska; Click to Add Topic
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;D
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Obama Can't Feel Your Pain at the Pump
Townhall.com ^ | May 20, 2011 | Bob Beauprez
________________________ ________________________ ___
The price at the pump has increased 28% in just the last four months, 116% since Barack Obama took office.
The reaction from the White House and the Democrats?
Punish the energy industry with $85.5 billion in new taxes – a penalty that will further discourage domestic production and sure to be passed on to consumers driving prices even higher.
The President says that oil and gas should pay their "fair share." I did a little checking and found that the industry pays an average 41.1% of net income in taxes compared to 26.5% for all other S&P industrials. Only the most died-in-the-wool oil and gas haters can possibly think 15% more isn't enough.
Oil and gas also ponies up billions of dollars each year in royalties, rents, and leases. Back in 2008 when the last gas price spike occurred, the Bush Administration encouraged more domestic production by issuing new leases and permitting new wells.
Production went up, prices at the pump fell, and those royalty revenues more than doubled from the previous several years to $23.3 billion, according to the Office of Natural Resources Revenue (ONRR).
But, when the Obama Administration took over, one of the first actions by Interior Secretary Ken Salazar was to cancel many of those leases. Then after the Deep Horizon well explosion, Salazar put a moratorium in place in the gulf as well as many other restrictions and drilling bans throughout the nation and offshore.
In 2010, royalty, rent, and lease payments declined to just $8.6 billion from oil and gas companies; a decline of $14.7 billion from 2008.
In the gulf alone, the Administration's policies have led to a decline in production of 300,000 barrels per day, and the Energy Information Administration projects another 300,000 bpd decline this year. That means a 35% decline in production in the region that supplies about a third of all domestic supply. In February, 2011 of 126 drilling rigs in the Gulf of Mexico, only 25 were operating; half the total prior to Salazar's moratorium.
The oil and gas industry pumps $85 million into the U.S. Treasury every day in taxes and production fees. They also employee over 9 million people and invest about $300 billion each year in capital projects that benefit local communities and our struggling national economy.
Instead of limiting regulations and punishing taxes, the Administration should encourage and unleash the industry, just as Bush did. Instead of declining revenue to the U.S. Treasury, there would be more, and we might get a little relief at the pump, too.
Ronald Reagan reminded us that you get more of what gets incentivized, and less of what is penalized, and his economic policies proved it. So did the Kennedy and Bush tax cuts. But, Obama and the Democrats seem obsessed with defying history, as well as common-sense, by pillorying oil and gas with more taxes, regulations, and punishing rhetoric.
Capital is fungible- that is, it can move from one place to another quickly- and energy production is the prototypical global industry. Plenty of nations around the world are providing a far more welcoming business environment for energy production than the U.S. where the corporate tax rate is the highest in the world and more than 81,000 pages of federal regulations control every move.
While Obama's policies were busy choking off domestic production and driving up prices at the pump, his administration agreed to underwrite a $2 billion off-shore project in Brazil. In March he flew to Rio de Janeiro to announce the deal, and rubbed salt in the wound of U.S. energy workers when he told the Brazilians, "When you're ready to start selling, we want to be one of your best customers." That likely didn't set well with workers idled by the moratorium in the gulf.
The U.S. has also loaned $2.84 billion for upgrades to an oil refinery in Cartagena, Columbia. Because the permitting regulations are so excessively onerous and radical environmentalists keep proposed projects tied up in litigation, there has not been a new major refinery built in the U.S. in 35 years, so increasingly we are forced to not only import crude oil, but refined gasoline, as well.
By now, the White House must be tracking jobs "saved or created" in foreign nations, too.
The President likes to demonize the oil-and-gas industry for what he says are $4.3 billion of "tax giveaways". He's referring to various tax credits and deductions also available to every other business in America, like Microsoft, Coca-Cola, and Ford.
While he pours out his venom against what he calls the oil and gas companies "huge profits," he doesn't bother to point out that the energy industry's profit margin (5.7%) is nearly identical to manufacturing, aerospace and food, and only about one-third as much as the beverage industry (21.7%), pharmaceuticals (19.4%), and computers (17.3%).
For a President that seems obsessed with being "fair" his hypocrisy knows no bounds.
While Obama rails against the energy companies, he is strangely silent about companies like General Electric that reportedly paid no taxes at all in 2010; in fact GE scored a $3.2 billion tax benefit. But, then GE plays Obama's favored "green" energy game and applies a lot of grease to the Obama campaign machine, so "subsidies" and special favors for them are just fine.
GE's complete tax avoidance is because of "fierce lobbying for tax breaks and innovative accounting that enables it to concentrate its profits offshore," according to the New York Times. Obama even rewarded Jeff Immelt, the CEO of General Electric, by choosing him to lead his Council on Jobs and Competitiveness.
Immelt was a curious choice for a post supposedly to address "U.S. job growth" because GE not only concentrated profits offshore, their jobs have gone there, too. Over the last decade, GE's overseas workforce increased to 154,000 even through the recent global recession. However, their domestic labor force declined by 16%. So, Obama put an American jobs slasher, Immelt, in charge of job creation. Understand?
If Obama were really concerned about addressing the price of gas, job creation, or getting our economy back on its feet, instead of attacking U.S. companies with more taxes, regulations, and his white-hot rhetoric, he'd give them some relief and breathing room. He could really champion reducing the corporate tax rate, as he has intimated he might support.
He could remove Lisa Jackson at the EPA who has turned a "regulatory firehose" on the energy industry and U.S. business according to the Wall Street Journal. In just two years, Jackson has proposed or finalized 29 major regulations and 172 policy rules. A new Secretary of Interior that would actually issue drilling permits, offer new leases, and bring an end to what Steve Forbes called the "most anti-oil and gas record in American history" would be helpful, too.
But, Obama is more focused on campaigning for re-election than doing something really helpful for Americans struggling though the recession and the impact of his failed policies. He has no real intention of doing something right for America; he's just looking for enough votes to keep his job. He'll continue to employ Saul Alinsky's "Rules for Radicals" strategy creating divisions, inciting class warfare, and tearing down the great American free-market economy.
Such is the truth of the Hope-and-Change fraud that was perpetrated on America in 2008.
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You know 333... I'm on board man... I don't think he wants "to destroy america" exactly... But Obama is a fucking moron... I hate to say it, but I kinda' miss Bush.
Damn it all to hell.
:(
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Good article.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704904604576332991749967626.html?mod=WSJ_Opinion_MIDDLETopOpinion
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Despite Opec’s Viennese whirl, the dollar is what determines oil prices
Seldom has Vienna witnessed such a tense opening to a meeting of the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (Opec).
Despite Opec?s Viennese whirl, the dollar is what determines oil prices By Damian Reece, Head of Business
6:21AM BST 08 Jun 2011
In the long history of troubled Middle Eastern politics, today's gathering of the region's most powerful countries comes at a unique time.
The session takes place as the world's most important oil-producing region is fraught with the tension caused by unprecedented popular uprisings which began in Tunisia and Egypt but which continue in bloodier and more brutal forms in Libya, Syria and Yemen.
This Opec meeting is not simply about whether to raise oil production but threatens to reveal the deep-seated political friction at play within the region.
Libya will be sending a new delegate, Omran Abukraa, who is still loyal to the Gaddafi regime following the defection of Shokri Ghanem last week.
There's no seat across the table from Abukraa for Libya's Western-backed rebels, but Qatar will be there, having helped shift oil on behalf of the rebels in recent months.
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And then there's Shi'ite Iran, holder of Opec's rotating presidency. Will it resist production changes that might help the US and the rest of the West? If so, that would mean picking a fight with the Sunni delegation from Saudi Arabia which is likely to push for production increases – the first official ones since 2007.
At a meeting notable for the number of new faces round the table, the Saudi's status of primus inter pares will be more important than ever, with an expectation that most countries will fall in behind the Saudis.
But while the political backdrop to today's event could not be worse, it's worth reflecting on just how long Opec has survived. Decades of war, conflict and antagonism in the Middle East have come and gone but Opec remains.
This reflects first and foremost the ability of large oil-producing nations to put political differences aside, just about, and do what's best for their long-term economic interests. Acting to boost supply to try to dampen oil price inflation as global economic recovery stutters into life would be sensible.
In fact, countries such as Saudi have, informally, been pumping more to try to stabilise the market for some time. The official influence of Opec can be overstated. But making higher production quotas official policy would be welcomed, not least by all those dovish economists on our own Monetary Policy Committee still praying for some kind of relief in the price of oil over the next 18 months to help deliver their long-promised fall in inflation.
But even they may be disappointed. There are plenty of factors affecting the price of oil other than Opec's production targets. Chief among them is the fate of the dollar, the currency in which oil is priced. When the dollar weakens, as is happening now thanks to concerns over the US's fiscal position, oil becomes a more attractive asset to hold for buyers in the UK or Europe, so forcing the price of oil up. This is one of the factors that's been driving oil prices higher for so long, despite the rather patchy outlook for large oil-consuming economies in the West.
So while the eyes of the world are focused on Vienna today, hoping to hear good news on oil supply from Opec countries, it is worth bearing in mind that over the next six months the dollar is more likely to have a greater impact on the oil price than anything the Saudis, Iranians, Qataris or Libyans are able to agree this week – however encouraging such a show unity might at first appear.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/comment/damianreece/8562514/Despite-Opecs-Viennese-whirl-the-dollar-is-what-determines-oil-prices.html
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Exxon, U.S. Government Duel Over Huge Oil Find
By RUSSELL GOLD
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424053111903596904576514762275032794.html?mod=WSJ_hp_LEFTWhatsNewsCollection
Exxon Mobil Corp. is fighting with the U.S. government to keep control of one of its biggest oil discoveries ever, in a showdown where billions of dollars hang in the balance for both sides.
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.The massive Gulf of Mexico discovery contains an estimated one billion barrels of recoverable oil, the company says. The Interior Department, which regulates offshore drilling, says Exxon's leases have expired and the company hasn't met the requirements for an extension. Exxon has sued to retain the leases.
The court battle is playing out at a time in which the Obama administration has made an issue of unused leases, which deprive the Treasury of valuable taxes. It also comes as regulators are being careful not to be seen as lax in their dealings with large energy companies in the wake of last year's BP PLC spill.
The stakes are high: Under federal law, the leases—and all the oil underneath—could revert to the government if Exxon doesn't win in court.
The loss of the leases would be an enormous black eye for Exxon. The company hadn't previously disclosed the size of the discovery in what is called the Julia field until it was mentioned in the suit Exxon filed against the Interior Department last week in federal court in Lake Charles, La.
The Texas behemoth faces the sobering prospect that it may have made the largest discovery ever in the Gulf of Mexico only to lose it. Tens of billions of dollars of oil could slip through its hands because it failed to follow federal rules for getting a lease extension while it moved forward with plans to get the oil out of the ground.
Exxon spokesman Patrick McGinn said the company expected to get the extension, which he said was traditionally granted as a matter of course. "You state your case and you got it. [This] was unexpected."
This high-stakes standoff is likely to spark a political, as well as legal, showdown between the federal government and the nation's largest oil company. It has also roped in Norway's Statoil ASA, which owns 50% of the Julia find. Statoil said it filed its own suit Monday in the same Louisiana federal court against the Interior Department to preserve the leases. Exxon is the field's operator and lease holder.
A spokeswoman for the Interior Department said, "Our priority remains the safe development of the nation's offshore energy resources, which is why we continue to approve extensions that meet regulatory standards."
The Interior Department, which oversees offshore oil development and collects royalties, has been trying to show that it has become a tougher, but still fair, regulator of the Gulf of Mexico's oil riches. Its reputation was battered during the massive Deepwater Horizon well blowout and oil spill last year, when BP sought—and the government approved—last-minute changes to the well design, which some investigators say contributed to a chaotic environment aboard the drilling rig. The government was roundly criticized for weak oversight of safety rules.
Now the department must decide whether to fight Exxon in court or settle and allow it to develop the oil. Turning the leases over to another company would mean further delays to the tax royalties that would go to government coffers. At current prices, potential royalties paid to the government over the lifetime of a one billion-barrel field would be about $10.95 billion.
The oil industry, led vocally by Exxon, has said that developing oil fields in the deepest reaches of the Gulf takes time to do safely. And by threatening to take away a massive discovery, the industry says that the government is sending the message that oil companies need to be in a rush to produce.
The possibility that Exxon could lose this oil will likely send shock waves through the industry. "This is unprecedented," said Amy Myers Jaffe, associate director of the Energy Program at Rice University in Houston. "The question is: Do our offshore rules allow for flexibility? You don't want to let companies sit on a discovery…We definitely don't want to send the industry a message that you need to be in a rush or we'll take the oil away from you."
Exxon's lawsuit said the government has granted "thousands" of extensions over time. It said the government's denial of its extension relied on legal interpretations that it "had never before applied and had never before articulated." Statoil asserted in its lawsuit that no request for an extension for a deep-water development "had ever previously been denied." The Interior Department couldn't comment on this.
The Exxon discovery is believed to be the largest in the Gulf of Mexico since BP found the Thunder Horse Field in 1999, and it could be larger. The find also cements the Gulf of Mexico as a rich exploration area with large amounts of undiscovered oil that may keep oil companies active for years to come.
"This is very deep water, very complex structures and difficult-to-produce oil," said Exxon's Mr. McGinn.
The dispute over Exxon's plans for the Julia field began in October 2008—about a month before its 10-year leases expired—when it applied for a five-year "suspension of production."
Such extensions are "fairly common," said Elmer P. Danenberger III, a former federal official who oversaw U.S. offshore-drilling rules until he retired in 2009.
"I can honestly say that people who manage that program are really strict, which they need to be or it will be abused. If you don't have a commercial discovery and a plan for moving ahead at the end of the lease term…that's it."
In February 2009, the government denied Exxon's request for an extension and after a brief appeal denied it again that April. Exxon said in a letter at the time that it was "committed" to producing the oil, but the government said it didn't present a specific plan. The government contended this didn't meet legal requirements and denied the application.
More appeals followed, but Exxon lost its final appeal in May. The final decision hinged on whether Exxon had a concrete "commitment" to produce the oil in December 2008, when its lease expired. The director of the Office of Hearings and Appeals at the Interior Department ruled that it didn't.
Exxon is known in the industry for moving slowly and studying all options exhaustively before committing billions of dollars. But even if it loses this court case, all might not be lost. The Julia field consists of five leases—or square blocks in the Gulf of Mexico—and only three are being disputed. The other two aren't set to expire until 2013.
—Deborah Solomon
and Angel Gonzalez contributed to this article.
Write to Russell Gold at russell.gold@wsj.com
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BUMP
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It's great for the people of America if this is found in favor of the US government.
Oil is such an important resource, for now, the logical step is to gather as much as possible under government control. At least then we have some stability regarding supply.
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It's great for the people of America if this is found in favor of the US government.
Oil is such an important resource, for now, the logical step is to gather as much as possible under government control. At least then we have some stability regarding supply.
Thank you Comrad Lenin.
WTF is wrong with you?
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In their June report, the IEA warned that unless OPEC could increase production by at least 1.5 million barrels a day, world oil demand is going to surpass available supply during the second half of the year.
What happens when demand exceeds supply? Do prices go up or down?
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In their June report, the IEA warned that unless OPEC could increase production by at least 1.5 million barrels a day, world oil demand is going to surpass available supply during the second half of the year.
What happens when demand exceeds supply? Do prices go up or down?
You go find more supply we know exists but are trapped by the disgusting govt we have.
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Thank you Comrad Lenin.
WTF is wrong with you?
There is nothing wrong with protecting American interests. If the lease expired it belongs to the US government and i for one like that. Having the ability to either sell it to the highest bidder, or as a strategic reserve is a great plan. The fact we don't have a lot of government controlled oil fields is as dumb a move as possible. Right now the government has little to no control over supply and market prices. Gain some ownership and perhaps next time gas rises, we can pump a little more from our OWN reserves to drop local prices, or sell it off and pay off the deficit.
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You go find more supply we know exists but are trapped by the disgusting govt we have.
Oh you mean the supply that is only affordable with high prices like shale? Or has a huge environment cost and leads to little long term price benefit like ANWAR?
Or are you implying that the US is apart of OPEC now?
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There is nothing wrong with protecting American interests. If the lease expired it belongs to the US government and i for one like that. Having the ability to either sell it to the highest bidder, or as a strategic reserve is a great plan. The fact we don't have a lot of government controlled oil fields is as dumb a move as possible. Right now the government has little to no control over supply and market prices. Gain some ownership and perhaps next time gas rises, we can pump a little more from our OWN reserves to drop local prices, or sell it off and pay off the deficit.
Are still so freaking oblivious to the damage $4 a gallon is doing to this nation?
Well, maybe not - since you delusional communists are never concerned with the destructive impact of your ideas.
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Are still so freaking oblivious to the damage $4 a gallon is doing to this nation?
Well, maybe not - since you delusional communists are never concerned with the destructive impact of your ideas.
You idiot centralized control over some oil can lower the cost for all americans. It's then no subject to market prices but to the price of extraction and refining only.
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Just paid $4 in NY.
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Easy prediction here: oil companies about to be accused of gouging
February 17th, 2012, 12:42 pm · · posted by Mark Landsbaum
http://orangepunch.ocregister.com/2012/02/17/easy-prediction-here-oil-companies-about-to-be-accused-of-gouging/67603
Gasoline prices are on their way up again.
So too is the ire of gasoline purchasers who skipped Econ 101 in school.
Retail gasoline prices rose in California and most of the nation during the last week, according to the Energy Department. Average prices for California and the U.S. are well above records for January set last year.
Can you hear it now? Can you already envision the investigations launched by politicians in this election year?
Sure to aggravate the aggravated even more is the fact that the price spike is happening even weeks before refineries shut down for routine maintenance, including switching over to more expensive fuel blends for the summer when demand peaks.
“This definitely sets the stage, potentially, for much higher prices later this year,” said Brian Milne, refined fuels editor for Telvent DTN, a commodity information services firm. “There’s a chance that the U.S. average tops $4 a gallon by June, with some parts of the country approaching $5 a gallon.”
What dour-faced analysts predicted months ago might reach $4.00 a gallon nationally, may now go as high as $5.00 a gallon.
It’s noteworthy, perhaps, that when Barack Obama took office a gallon of gas cost $1.89. It’s about doubled and going up. Remember when he took office he canceled many drilling leases? What happens to prices when you reduce supply?
Republicans, who apparently know that answer, passed a bill this week to expand offshore drilling, allow more exploration in Alaska and authorize construction of the Keystone XL pipeline. A no-brainer, no? House Republicans supported it with 89 percent in favor. House Democrats opposed it with 86 percent opposed.
Which ones do you expect to clamor for price gouging investiations?
Another Republican, Newt Gingrich, reminds everyone that “the United States is sitting on enough technically recoverable oil to power us at current rates of consumption for over 250 years. We are estimated to have 1.4 trillion barrels of oil—or 1.7 trillion, adding in the resources of Canada and Mexico.”
That is more than the world has used since the first oil well was drilled over 150 years ago and 6 ½ times the proved oil reserves of Saudi Arabia.
But heck, it’s an election year. Let’s find out who is gouging. How have past investigations on gouging gone, by the way?
Energy Forum Director Amy Myers Jaffe of the Baker Institute for Public Policy at Rice University says so-called price-gouging investigations are a political shell game: “That’s just camouflage. That’s just ‘I want to pretend I’m doing something even, though I’m doing nothing.’”
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Ridiculously High Gas Prices Expected To Hit Major US Cities By Memorial Day (OBAMA'S FAULT!)
business Insider ^ | 2/19/2012 | staff
Posted on February 19, 2012 11:35:27 AM EST by tobyhill
From the Mercury News: Gas prices surging beyond $4 a gallon -- and they will go higher
Gasoline prices are rising at an almost unheard-of pace, and painfully so in California, where the cost for a fill-up now exceeds $4 a gallon in five cities and is approaching that dreaded mark in numerous others, including San Jose and Oakland.
The statewide average of $3.96 on Friday is 25 cents higher than just a month ago and 46 cents more than this time last year. ... Some oil analysts predict $4.50 a gallon or more by Memorial Day on the West Coast and major cities across the United States such as Chicago, New York and Atlanta.
(Excerpt) Read more at businessinsider.com ...
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Ridiculously High Gas Prices Expected To Hit Major US Cities By Memorial Day (OBAMA'S FAULT!)
business Insider ^ | 2/19/2012 | staff
Posted on February 19, 2012 11:35:27 AM EST by tobyhill
From the Mercury News: Gas prices surging beyond $4 a gallon -- and they will go higher
Gasoline prices are rising at an almost unheard-of pace, and painfully so in California, where the cost for a fill-up now exceeds $4 a gallon in five cities and is approaching that dreaded mark in numerous others, including San Jose and Oakland.
The statewide average of $3.96 on Friday is 25 cents higher than just a month ago and 46 cents more than this time last year. ... Some oil analysts predict $4.50 a gallon or more by Memorial Day on the West Coast and major cities across the United States such as Chicago, New York and Atlanta.
(Excerpt) Read more at businessinsider.com ...
You do realize that the (Obama's Fault!) doesn't show up in the article at all right?
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You do realize that the (Obama's Fault!) doesn't show up in the article at all right?
that was addded by the poster by FR. However, Obama is greatly at fault for high prices. he single handily is mostly responsible for this.
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that was addded by the poster by FR. However, Obama is greatly at fault for high prices. he single handily is mostly responsible for this.
I'm not saying he is not... However... Let's say he is.
What did Obama do to cause this? You believe that because he is not willing to drill for more oil that he is responsible for this high cost?
If so, then how can that be when the Drilling wouldn't take place for another 5 years at the earliest... That certainly wouldn't help the pump this year or for the 4 upcoming next.
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I'm not saying he is not... However... Let's say he is.
What did Obama do to cause this? You believe that because he is not willing to drill for more oil that he is responsible for this high cost?
If so, then how can that be when the Drilling wouldn't take place for another 5 years at the earliest... That certainly wouldn't help the pump this year or for the 4 upcoming next.
reappointed bernake, banned drilling in the gulf, violated the F'ed judge orders to approve drilling leases, cut off supply in many areas in the nation, vetoed keystone, banned drilling off shore, has EPA mandates on fuel blends spkining costs, refineries shutting down due to EPA regs, devaluation of the dollar, etc etc etc.
Obama is the mullahs best friends ever.
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reappointed bernake, banned drilling in the gulf, violated the F'ed judge orders to approve drilling leases, cut off supply in many areas in the nation, vetoed keystone, banned drilling off shore, has EPA mandates on fuel blends spkining costs, refineries shutting down due to EPA regs, devaluation of the dollar, etc etc etc.
Obama is the mullahs best friends ever.
But if he immediately said, ok... All of that stuff is allowed. Do you believe that the OPEC machine would lower the cost per barrel or would they just slowly reduce their output to keep gas as high as they want to?
I think OPEC is the problem.
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You know 333... I'm on board man... I don't think he wants "to destroy america" exactly... But Obama is a fucking moron... I hate to say it, but I kinda' miss Bush.
Damn it all to hell.
:(
if you agree with 333 you are a moron as well
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if you agree with 333 you are a moron as well
lol. Andre - do you. Think Obama wants lower prices?
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if you agree with 333 you are a moron as well
He can be right about some things and wrong about others.
Even though I do not dislike Obama as much as many others, if you can not see where he has made mistakes or are unwilling to admit to his problem areas, then you are part of the problem and not part of the solution.
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He can be right about some things and wrong about others.
Even though I do not dislike Obama as much as many others, if you can not see where he has made mistakes or are unwilling to admit to his problem areas, then you are part of the problem and not part of the solution.
first off, what exactly has 3333 been right about????...and what are the problem areas that you talk about concerning Obama???
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first off, what exactly has 3333 been right about????...and what are the problem areas that you talk about concerning Obama???
My problem areas are.
His lack of reigning in his own party when it comes to liberty.
His resigning of the patriot act. His defense spending bill item that lets him detain a US citizen indefinitely.
He won't reign in spending.
He fucked up the healthcare bill. (should have offered Medicare for all and eliminated the "mandate"
He should have allowed drilling again.
I do not like how he's asking for more money for another stimulus. (I had no issue with the first one)
Those are things I don't like.
I probably could come up with others but this is what just pops off the top of my head.
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Obama to Talk About Gasoline Prices on Thursday (Obama to talk more lies and excuses)
wall street journal ^ | 2/21/2012 | Carol E. Lee
Posted on February 21, 2012 8:54:55 PM EST by tobyhill
President Barack Obama plans to step into the political debate over rising gasoline prices on Thursday, when he kicks off the first of a series of events focused on his energy plans, senior administration officials said.
During an event at the University of Miami, Mr. Obama will discuss the steps the country can take to tackle what the White House sees as an annual cycle of spikes in gas prices, the officials said. At the same time, these officials, who briefed reporters Tuesday on the president’s plans, acknowledged that there is almost nothing the president can do in the near term to lower gas prices.
But rising gas prices are a threat to the president as he runs for re-election this year. It’s one of the issues of chief concern to Mr. Obama’s political advisers and has become the subject of criticism of Mr. Obama on the campaign trail.
Mr. Obama’s speech Thursday will call for a diverse energy plan and lay out his efforts to boost domestic production of oil and gas. His defense comes as Republican presidential candidates blame him for the rise in gasoline prices and cast him as unfriendly to domestic oil production, particularly his administration’s decision to postpone the construction of the Keystone pipeline. The administration officials pushed back against the GOP criticism, arguing that Americans don’t trust Republicans on energy issues because their plans focus narrowly on production, which has been rising.
(Excerpt) Read more at blogs.wsj.com ...
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February 22, 2012
Aren't High Gas Prices What Democrats Want?
By David Harsanyi
Gas prices are spiking. That's great news, right? We have to wean ourselves off the stuff. At least that's what we've been hearing for years. Oil is dirty. We import it from nations that hate our guts (like Canada!). And moreover, we're running out. Oil is "finite." Finite much in the way water is finite.
So why aren't Democrats making the case that the spike in prices is a good thing? Isn't this basically our energy policy these days? How we "win the future"? If high energy prices were to damage President Barack Obama's re-election prospects, it would be ironic, considering the left has been telling us to set aside our "dependency" -- or, as our most recent Republican president put it, "addiction" -- for a long time.
If Democrats had their way, after all, we would be enjoying the economic results of cap-and-trade policy these days -- a program designed to increase the cost of energy by creating false demand in a fabricated market. As the theory goes, if you inflate the price of fossil fuels, the barbarians might finally start putting thought into how peat moss might be able to power a toaster.
In 2008, Steven Chu, Obama's (and, sadly, our own) future secretary of energy (sic) lamented, "Somehow we have to figure out how to boost the price of gasoline to the levels in Europe." The president, when asked whether he thought $4-a-gallon gas prices were good for the American economy, said, "I think that I would have preferred a gradual adjustment."
How gradual? Like, what, four years? Or is it eight?
Part of "figuring it out" surely had something to do with the recent decision by Obama to nix the Canadian Keystone XL pipeline project that would have pumped 700,000 barrels of oil per day into the United States. More oil just means more excessive, immoral, ugly energy use.
Well, get used to it. You can't take three steps without stepping over some potential 10-billion barrel reserve of dead organisms.
According to the Institute for Energy Research, there is enough natural gas in the U.S. to meet electricity demand for 575 years at current fuel demand, enough to fuel homes heated by natural gas for 857 years and more gas in the U.S. than there is in Russia, Iran, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and some place called Turkmenistan combined. Oil? The U.S. Energy Information Administration estimates that the United States could soon overtake Saudi Arabia and Russia to become the world's top oil producer. There are tens of billions of easily accessible barrels of offshore oil here at home -- and much more oil around the world.
Yes, gas prices have spiked an average of 14 cents a gallon in the past month and about 30 cents a gallon since last November, according to AAA. Oil prices jumped to a nine-month high -- more than $105 a barrel -- after the Iranians shut down their own energy exports to Britain and France so they could start a much-needed nuclear program, which is, no doubt, for wholly peaceful purposes.
Given the fundability of commodities and the track record of civilization in the Middle East, we'll likely always have to deal with occasionally painful fluctuations in the price of energy, regardless of what we do at home -- drilling and new pipelines included. Still, fluctuations have a lot better track record than price controls.
Subsidizing quixotic green companies or creating carbon credits won't stop the rules of basic economics. If the gas crunch starts hitting the economy, it's doubtless that we will get an earful of populist hand-wringing and that we'll hear the administration once again blame wealthy speculators and nasty oil companies.
Yet in the end, high gas prices are part of the plan. This is what the administration wants.
Copyright 2012, Creators Syndicate Inc.
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Obama's Double Talk on Sky-High Gas Prices
Posted 02/21/2012 06:37 PM ET
http://news.investors.com/article/601827/201202211837/obama-shifting-talk-on-high-gas-prices.htm
Energy: When gas prices hit $4 a gallon in 2008, candidate Barack Obama said it was due to previous failed energy policies. Now that prices are heading still higher, President Obama calls it progress.
Already, pump prices are higher than they've been in previous years, suggesting they will top $4 soon and possibly reach an unprecedented $5 this summer.
President Obama is starting to notice the political implications. So he sent Robert Gibbs — now a top campaign adviser — out to tell the public not to worry.
"Just on Friday, the Department of the Interior issued permits that will expand our exploration in the Arctic," Gibbs said Sunday. "Our domestic oil production is at an eight-year high, and our use of foreign oil is at a 16-year low. So we're making progress."
"Progress" isn't exactly how Obama described the country's energy picture in 2008, when gas prices were closing in on $4 a gallon. Then, it was a clear sign of "Washington's failure to lead on energy," which was "turning the middle-class squeeze into a devastating vise-grip for millions of Americans."
"For the well-off in this country," Obama said in May 2008, "high gas prices are mostly an annoyance, but to most Americans they're a huge problem, bordering on a crisis."
In August that year, he declared rising energy costs to be "one of the most dangerous and urgent threats this nation has ever faced" and that gas prices "are wiping out paychecks and straining businesses."
While Gibbs is right that domestic production has climbed in the past three years, Obama's policies had nothing whatsoever to do with it.
Subscribe to the IBD Editorials Podcast Oil coming from offshore wells was in the pipeline, so to speak, during the Clinton and Bush years, when those permits were issued. And the oil pouring out of North Dakota is the result of drilling on private lands.
Obama, in fact, has made it clear for years that he has no real interest in boosting domestic production.
When President Bush announced plans in 2008 to lift the moratorium on offshore drilling, Obama dismissed it, saying "it would merely prolong the failed energy policies we have seen from Washington for 30 years."
"Offshore drilling," he said, "would not lower gas prices today, it would not lower gas prices next year and it would not lower gas prices five years from now."
In a big energy speech he gave in August 2008, Obama argued that "if we opened up and drilled on every single square inch of our land and our shores, we would still find only 3% of the world's oil reserves."
And while in office, Obama's done everything he can to limit production — slow-walking offshore permits, killing the Keystone XL pipeline, making it even harder to get oil out of federal lands.
Instead of aggressively expanding oil production, he offered a set of ridiculous alternatives — hugely wasteful "green" energy subsidies, a call for a million electric cars by 2014 and costly fuel economy mandates that won't make a dent in consumption for decades.
With gas prices up 93% since Obama took office, we're seeing just how well this approach works.
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http://tampa.cbslocal.com/2012/02/22/florida-drivers-shelling-out-nearly-6-a-gallon-at-some-gas-stations
Good - let those idiots and morons who voted for obama suffer the pain of the ignorance of their vote first.
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Networks Hype Rising Gas Prices 4 Times More for Bush, Than Obama
Media Research Center ^ | 2-22-12 | Julia A. Seymour
Gas prices mentioned in 97 stories in one month of 2008 coverage, compared to just 21 in 2012.
Rising gas prices used to be big news, but not so these days. Although the national average climbed to $3.56 on Feb. 20, setting a February record after going up nearly a month straight, there was far less coverage than in 2008. Broadcast networks repeatedly covered the rise under the Bush presidency. Gas prices bounced around eventually reaching $3.56-a-gallon on April 24, 2008.
The Business and Media Institute analyzed broadcast network news references to gas or fuel prices between Jan. 20 and Feb. 20, 2012 and from March 24 and April 24, 2008. BMI found that in the 2008 period there were more than 4 times as many gas prices stories, news briefs or news headlines on ABC, CBS and NBC as there were in 2012 (97 to 21).
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Dismal broadcast network reports about “skyrocketing” gas prices filled the newscasts in 2008. There were reports about businesses closing, airlines struggling and truckers protesting -- all because of the high prices. One ABC report said families were facing the “tough choice” between food or fuel. Others said that “wallets were running on empty” and consumers were told over and over that there was no relief in sight. But by the end of November 2008, prices had collapsed to $1.82.
SNIP------
But now, in 2012, gas prices stories are very different. “[W]e’re seeing gas prices creep up every single week,” said one ABC reporter after delivering a positive economic report about the Dow Jones Industrial Average closing in on 13,000 for the first time since 2008. One CBS story just pointed out that if certain steps are taking against Iran, gas prices everywhere could move sharply higher.
(Excerpt) Read more at mrc.org ...
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Florida Drivers Shelling Out Nearly $6 A Gallon At Some Gas Stations
CBS Tampa ^ | 2/22/2012 | Matthew L. Higgins
TAMPA (CBS Tampa) — Talk about pain at the pump! Some Florida drivers are spending nearly $6 a gallon to fill up their gas tanks.
According to GasBuddy.com, motorists are shelling out $5.89 for a gallon of regular gas at a Shell station in Lake Buena Vista, topping out at $5.99 a gallon for premium. It doesn’t get better at a Suncoast Energy station in Orlando, where drivers are paying $5.79 for a gallon of regular.
“Prices over in the Disney World area are much higher than any other place in Florida,” Jessica Brady, AAA spokeswoman, told CBS Tampa, adding that people regularly complain about gas prices in that area.
The Sunshine State is opening up its wallet, paying an average of $3.67 a gallon of unleaded gas, 12 cents more than the national average. And it’s only expected to go up.
“It doesn’t look like we will have relief at the pump anytime soon,” Brady told CBS Tampa. “I do think we will see prices surpass $4 a gallon. I think we will see that closer to spring time.”
(Excerpt) Read more at tampa.cbslocal.com ...
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Oil and gas leaders slam Obama
http://www.chron.com/business/article/Oil-and-gas-leaders-slam-Obama-3354377.php
By Simone Sebastian
Updated 10:12 p.m., Wednesday, February 22, 2012
Oil and gas industry leaders lobbed criticism at the Obama administration Wednesday, using the stage of an annual industry conference in Houston to assert that the domestic energy boom has occurred in spite of what they call a corrosive energy strategy out of the White House.
Energy executives and other industry players took President Barack Obama to task during the Winter NAPE Conference, an annual expo of oil and gas prospects, technology exhibits and industry networking.
They said the White House has limited the availability of federal land for drilling and created an atmosphere of uncertainty over future regulations and taxes, reinforcing the nation's tether to oil imports and keeping gasoline prices high.
"These have been the most difficult three years from a policy standpoint that I've ever seen in my career," said Bruce Vincent, president of Houston-based oil and natural gas producer Swift Energy. "They've done nothing but restrict access and delay permitting."
"The Obama administration, unfortunately, has threatened this industry at every turn."
White House defense
But White House press secretary Jay Carney, discussing gasoline prices Wednesday, said Obama has "put in place policies that will dramatically expand the amount of exploration in the Gulf of Mexico, will expand the amount of exploration in Alaska, will expand the amount of natural gas production here in the United States."
The Winter NAPE Conference at the George R. Brown Convention Center this week serves as a marketplace for buying, selling and trading land for oil and natural gas production.
More than 14,500 people pre-registered to attend, organizers said Wednesday, and an additional 2,000 were expected to sign up on-site. The conference, formerly called the North American Prospect Expo, also attracted about 1,000 exhibitors.
The convention's theme for the day was "The Oil and Gas Supply Renaissance: Delivering on the Promise." The U.S. has seen a surge in fossil fuel production in recent years, so intense that the nation is considering exporting its natural gas surplus. But some at the conference said the industry reached those milestones in spite of an oppressive energy policy.
Former Shell executive John Hofmeister said the nation has to adopt a more aggressive domestic drilling policy as developing countries like China demand more oil.
"The administration has done everything but support drilling," he said. "We are on the verge of slipping into an energy abyss."
Others criticized the Environmental Protection Agency's studies of hydraulic fracturing and voiced suspicions that the studies could lead to heavy federal regulations on the technique that has been central to the production boom.
Critics of the technology say it threatens water supplies and can trigger localized earthquakes.
"The science that has been used there is appalling," said Lee Fuller, vice president of government relations for the Independent Petroleum Association of America. "The tone is to always cast the study as addressing environmental risk, though there is no evidence of systemic problems."
Increased scrutiny has come as the rush to shale drilling has taken the industry to areas having little history with the oil patch. The traffic and environmental concerns that come with oil field activity have created consternation in some towns.
'We have a frontier'
Robert Ryan, Chevron Corp.'s vice president of global exploration, said improved community relations and efforts to address the environmental concerns can ease the industry's growing pains.
"What we can do better is to make sure we operate transparently," he said. "We have a frontier here a little bit different than what we are used to. It's up to us to cross it."
simone.sebastian@chron.com
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Obama Administration Spins U.S. Oil Production Numbers, Takes Credit for Predecessors’ Pro-Energy Policies
Obama Administration Actions Decrease U.S. Oil Production
WASHINGTON, D.C., March 10, 2011 - This week, under mounting public pressure as gasoline prices near the $4 mark, the White House published a blog post touting increased domestic oil production. The Administration was in full SPIN mode, taking credit for actions that were put in place before they took office and ducking forecasts of declining U.S. oil production caused by their own actions that have blocked American energy production.
SPIN: “Oil production last year rose to its highest level since 2003.”
RINSE:
•The Obama Administration’s actions have caused domestic energy production to decrease.
•In 2007, the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) projected total 2010 U.S. oil production on federal lands to be 850 million barrels. Today’s actual production on federal lands is 714 million barrels, a 16 percent decline from what was projected. If it wasn’t for the Obama Administration, the U.S. would be producing more energy.
•This is why FUTURE projections show a decline in U.S. production and an increase in imports. On March 8, 2011 the EIA published new projections that show a decline in total U.S. crude oil production of 110,000 barrels per day in 2011 and 130,000 barrels per day in 2012.
•Finally, the White House does not explain that the vast majority of increased production is occurring on private lands, not public. For example, North Dakota alone produced almost 120 million barrels of oil in 2010, compared to just over 20 million in 2003. The majority of North Dakota’s production is on private land. This begs the question, why are we not using our federal lands to create American jobs and produce American energy resources to lower prices?
SPIN: “Onshore oil production from public lands has also increased over the last year, from 109 million barrels in 2009 to 114 million barrels in 2010.”
RINSE:
•The slight increase in onshore production from federal lands is due to lease sales approved by previous Administrations—not the Obama Administration.
•Since taking office, the Obama Administration has slowed onshore energy development on public lands and issued fewer leases.
•In 2008 there were 2,416 new oil and natural gas leases issued on Bureau of Land Management (BLM) land spanning 2.6 million acres. In 2010, under the Obama Administration, the number of new leases issued dropped to 1,308 and acres leased dropped to 1.3 million.
•The total onshore acreage leased under the Obama Administration in 2009 and 2010 are the lowest in over two decades, stretching back to at least 1984.
SPIN: “From 2008 to 2010, oil production from the Outer Continental Shelf increased more than a third – from 446 million barrels in 2008 to an [sic] more than 600 million barrels of estimated production in 2010.”
RINSE:
•Once again, the Obama Administration is attempting to take credit for actions they had nothing to do with. The strong production in the Gulf was due to leases issued in 1996-2000 under the Deepwater Royalty Relief Act – long before President Obama took office.
•The Obama Administration’s actions, such as imposing a de facto moratorium, are causing energy production to decline in the Gulf of Mexico. EIA shows a 300,000 barrel per day decline in current Gulf production and a projected Gulf decline of over 150 million barrels of oil in 2012.
###
Printable PDF of this document
Contact: Jill Strait, Spencer Pederson or Crystal Feldman 202-226-9019
http://naturalresources.house.gov/UploadedFiles/03.10.11-WHDecreasesOilProduction.pdf
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Ok...333. in your own words, how is Obama responsible for the spike in oil prices. No articles, no slant and rant either. Just the opinion from you based on what you know.
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Ok...333. in your own words, how is Obama responsible for the spike in oil prices. No articles, no slant and rant either. Just the opinion from you based on what you know.
get ready for a blast from you tube :D
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Ok...333. in your own words, how is Obama responsible for the spike in oil prices. No articles, no slant and rant either. Just the opinion from you based on what you know.
Very very simple.
1. Weak Dollar policy w the Fed and Bernake inducing inflation. (continued the Bush policies)
2. EPA mandates on refineres driving up the cost.
3. No drilling in Gulf
4. No drilling in Alaska
5. No pipeline
6. Non-renewal of gas leases despite court order.
7. Banning drilling on many areas.
8. Obama fomented and helped cause chaos in the ME with his backing radical islamist revolutionaries across the ME
Just to name a few. He owns this 100% with his treasonous policies.
And spare me the fake bullshit about speculators. Had obnama thought it important, he would have dealt with it in Dodd Frank or at least made an attempt to reform the CFTC where his big donor buddy from Goldman Sachs who actually helped create the speculators mess sits pretty.
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More drilling happening under Obama than last three administrations
October 14, 2011 Leave a Comment
It’s official. There is now more oil and gas drilling occurring under the Obama administration than under the administrations of George W. Bush, Bill Clinton, George H.W. Bush, and the second half of the Reagan administration.
Salem Gebrekidan at Reuters has the story:
“The number of rigs drilling for oil in the United States this week reached a record high in at least 24 years as producers scrambled to tap resources in unconventional oil fields in North Dakota, Texas and other states, data from an oil services firm showed on Friday.
“U.S. oil rigs rose to 1,080, the highest number on Baker Hughes’ data, which goes back to 1987. The oil-directed rig count this week is 55.4 percent higher than a year ago, when 695 rigs were operating.”
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http://news.investors.com/articleprint/602069/201202231805/energy-abyss-caused-by-obama-policies.aspx
Obama is to energy what Jaba the hut is to broccoli.
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More drilling happening under Obama than last three administrations
October 14, 2011 Leave a Comment
It’s official. There is now more oil and gas drilling occurring under the Obama administration than under the administrations of George W. Bush, Bill Clinton, George H.W. Bush, and the second half of the Reagan administration.
Salem Gebrekidan at Reuters has the story:
“The number of rigs drilling for oil in the United States this week reached a record high in at least 24 years as producers scrambled to tap resources in unconventional oil fields in North Dakota, Texas and other states, data from an oil services firm showed on Friday.
“U.S. oil rigs rose to 1,080, the highest number on Baker Hughes’ data, which goes back to 1987. The oil-directed rig count this week is 55.4 percent higher than a year ago, when 695 rigs were operating.”
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Do you not read anything at all? Thugbama had nothing to do with that all and is a result of pre-bama policies.
Everything this freak show has done has been to stop drilling.
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http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2012/02/23/krauthammer_on_obamas_algae_policy_i_think_hes_on_to_something.html
Owned!
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'Stupid' and Oil Prices
Obama's Forrest Gump analysis of rising gas prices.
www.wsj.com
'The American people aren't stupid," thundered President Obama yesterday in Miami, ridiculing Republicans who are blaming him for rising gasoline prices. Let's hope he's right, because not even Forrest Gump could believe the logic of what Mr. Obama is trying to sell.
To wit, that a) gasoline prices are beyond his control, but b) to the extent oil and gas production is rising in America, his energy policies deserve all the credit, and c) higher prices are one more reason to raise taxes on oil and gas drillers while handing even more subsidies to his friends in green energy. Where to begin?
It's true enough that oil prices can't be commanded from the Oval Office, so in that sense Mr. Obama's disavowal of blame is a rare show of humility in the face of market forces. Would that he showed similar modesty in trying to command the tides of home prices, car sales ("cash for clunkers"), or the production of electric batteries.
The oil price surge has several likely sources. One is the turmoil in the Middle East, especially new fears of a supply shock from a conflict with Iran. But it's worth recalling that Mr. Obama also blamed the last oil-price surge, in spring 2011, on the Libyan uprising. Moammar Gadhafi is now gone and Libyan oil production is coming back on stream, yet oil prices dipped only briefly below $90 a barrel and have been rising since October. Something else must be going on.
Mr. Obama yesterday blamed rising demand from the likes of Brazil and China, and there is something to that as well. But this energy demand is also not new, and if anything Chinese and Brazilian economic growth has been slowing in recent months.
Another suspect—one Mr. Obama doesn't like to mention—is U.S. monetary policy. Oil is traded in dollars, and its price therefore rises when the value of the dollar falls, all else being equal. The Federal Reserve throughout Mr. Obama's term has pursued the easiest monetary policy in modern times, expressly to revive the housing market. It has done so with the private support and urging of the White House and through Mr. Obama's appointees who are now a majority on the Fed's Board of Governors.
Oil staged its last price surge along with other commodity prices when the Fed revved up its second burst of "quantitative easing" in 2010-2011. Prices stabilized when QE2 ended. But in recent months the Fed has again signaled its commitment to near-zero interest rates first through 2013, and recently through 2014. Commodity prices, including oil, have since begun another surge, and hedge funds have begun to bet on commodity plays again. John Paulson says he's betting on gold, the ultimate hedge against a falling dollar.
Fed officials and Mr. Obama want to take credit for easy money if stock-market and housing prices rise, but then deny any responsibility if commodity prices rise too, causing food and energy prices to soar for consumers. They can't have it both ways, as not-so-stupid Americans intuitively understand when they buy groceries or gas. This is the double-edged sword of an economic recovery "built to last" on easy money rather than on sound fiscal and regulatory policies.
As for domestic energy, Mr. Obama rightly points to the rising share of U.S. oil consumption now produced at home. But this trend began in the late Bush Administration, which opened up large new areas on and offshore for oil and gas drilling that are now coming on stream. Mr. Obama sneered at expanded drilling as a candidate in 2008 and for most of his term has done little to expand it.
In early 2010, he proposed to open some new areas to drilling but shut that down after the Gulf oil spill. According to the Greater New Orleans Gulf Permits Index for January 31, over the previous three months the feds issued an average of three deep-water drilling permits a month compared to the historical average of seven. Over the same three months, the feds approved an average of 4.7 shallow-water permits a month, compared to the historical average of 14.7.
Approval of an offshore drilling plan now takes 92 days, 31 more than the historical average. And so far in 2012, an average of 23% of all drilling plans have been approved, compared to the average of 73.4%.
Oh, and don't forget the Keystone XL pipeline, which would have increased the delivery of oil from Canada and North Dakota's Bakken Shale to Gulf Coast refineries, replacing oil from Venezuela.
The reality is that most of the increase in U.S. oil and gas production has come despite the Obama Administration. It is flowing from the shale boom, which is the result of private technological advances and investment. Mr. Obama has seen the energy sun rise and is crowing like a rooster that he made it happen.
Mr. Obama yesterday also repeated his proposal that now is the time to raise taxes on oil and gas companies, as if doing so will make them more likely to drill. He must not believe the economic truism that when you tax something you get less of it, including fewer of the new jobs they've created.
***
We'd almost feel sorry for Mr. Obama's gas-price predicament if it weren't a case of rough justice. The President has deliberately sought to raise the price of energy throughout the economy via his cap-and-trade agenda. He is now getting his wish, albeit a little too overtly for political comfort. Mr. Obama has also spent three years blaming George W. Bush for every economic ill. If Mr. Obama now feels frustrated by economic events beyond his control, perhaps he should call Mr. Bush for consolation.
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Do you not read anything at all? Thugbama had nothing to do with that all and is a result of pre-bama policies.
Everything this freak show has done has been to stop drilling.
your the one that says he not drilling, :D :D :D :D :D :D more half truths,but that's what your known for :D
More drilling happening under Obama than last three administrations
October 14, 2011 Leave a Comment
It’s official. There is now more oil and gas drilling occurring under the Obama administration than under the administrations of George W. Bush, Bill Clinton, George H.W. Bush, and the second half of the Reagan administration.
Salem Gebrekidan at Reuters has the story:
“The number of rigs drilling for oil in the United States this week reached a record high in at least 24 years as producers scrambled to tap resources in unconventional oil fields in North Dakota, Texas and other states, data from an oil services firm showed on Friday.
“U.S. oil rigs rose to 1,080, the highest number on Baker Hughes’ data, which goes back to 1987. The oil-directed rig count this week is 55.4 percent higher than a year ago, when 695 rigs were operating.”
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your the one that says he not drilling, :D :D :D :D :D :D more half truths,but that's what your known for :D
More drilling happening under Obama than last three administrations
October 14, 2011 Leave a Comment
It’s official. There is now more oil and gas drilling occurring under the Obama administration than under the administrations of George W. Bush, Bill Clinton, George H.W. Bush, and the second half of the Reagan administration.
Salem Gebrekidan at Reuters has the story:
“The number of rigs drilling for oil in the United States this week reached a record high in at least 24 years as producers scrambled to tap resources in unconventional oil fields in North Dakota, Texas and other states, data from an oil services firm showed on Friday.
“U.S. oil rigs rose to 1,080, the highest number on Baker Hughes’ data, which goes back to 1987. The oil-directed rig count this week is 55.4 percent higher than a year ago, when 695 rigs were operating.”
Hey jackass - most of those are on private lands and have nothing to do with obama who himself cut off millions of acres from drilling. Its part of it asshole. Read above and i explained it for you.
Oilbama is going to get destroyed on this.
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:D :D :DMore drilling happening under Obama than last three administrations ,fact you can try to spin it but those are the facts :'(
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Dana Perino: Media Blamed Bush for High Gas Prices But Gives Obama a Pass
By Doug Powers • February 20, 2012 01:36 PM **Written by Doug Powers
Former Bush Press Secretary Dana Perino has noticed the press handling their duties differently when it comes to reporting high gas prices. This isn’t surprising. Back when it was clear the MSM was in the tank for Obama, there was no reason to assume that wouldn’t also include the gas tank:
“Do you see a complete difference in the way we’re looking at it now?” anchor Gretchen Carlson asked Perino.
“Sure, because if you look at that commentary, the gas prices we’re dealing with now have been more gradual. When it’s more — when it happens over a month or two-month long period — that hurts more. Families adjust when it’s gradual. All of a sudden the media is talking about the laws of supply and demand and putting things in context. When President Bush was President, they talked about oil speculators. Who were friends of President Bush? They would put it together like that.”
Perino criticized The New York Times for pushing the narrative as Gas Prices Give Republicans Something To Attack, rather than framing it as Obama’s problem. “The GOP is now going to attack him!” Perino exclaimed. “This good man who has done nothing wrong!”
Duelin’ headlines:
NYT March 2011 ($3.57 a gallon): US better prepared for rising gas costs
NYT August 2005 ($2.55 a gallon): Economy shows signs of strain from oil prices
*****
Another example can be found in this CNN piece from last year:
Washington (CNN) – President Barack Obama confronted two political realities this week:
– Rising gas prices are bad for a politician’s poll numbers
– There is almost nothing a politician can do about it, at least in the short run.
Compare that to this CNN article from mid-2008 entitled “President, Congress offer no immediate help on gas prices”:
“A lot of Americans are concerned about our economy,” Bush said. “I can understand why. Gasoline prices are high, energy prices are high. I do remind them that we have put a stimulus package forward that is expected to help boost the economy. And of course, we’ll be monitoring the situation.”
Americans are looking for more action, though, than monitoring the situation.
No mention back then that there’s almost nothing a politician can do about gas prices in the short run?
In 2008, ABC News reported that Bush was “in the dark” about gas prices:
While I’ve found plenty of ABC articles about high has prices hurting Obama’s approval rating, I’ve yet to run across one that flat out calls him clueless or implies that he just doesn’t care.
According to Newsbusters, network newscasts linked Bush to “skyrocketing” gas prices 15 times more than Obama.
But it wasn’t just the media. Here’s then Speaker Pelosi during the Bush presidency when gas prices got to be over $3 a gallon. Back then it was the fault of reckless administration policies from those two oil men in the White House:
*****
Here’s Perino talking about it on Fox News:
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:D :D :DMore drilling happening under Obama than last three administrations ,fact you can try to spin it but those are the facts :'(
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That is but one component moron!
again - you far leftists are simply incapable of logic.
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That is but one component moron!
again - you far leftists are simply incapable of logic.
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Very very simple.
1. Weak Dollar policy w the Fed and Bernake inducing inflation. (continued the Bush policies)
2. EPA mandates on refineres driving up the cost.
3. No drilling in Gulf
4. No drilling in Alaska
5. No pipeline
6. Non-renewal of gas leases despite court order.
7. Banning drilling on many areas.
8. Obama fomented and helped cause chaos in the ME with his backing radical islamist revolutionaries across the ME
Just to name a few. He owns this 100% with his treasonous policies.
And spare me the fake bullshit about speculators. Had obnama thought it important, he would have dealt with it in Dodd Frank or at least made an attempt to reform the CFTC where his big donor buddy from Goldman Sachs who actually helped create the speculators mess sits pretty.
Bump for the 95ers, the leftist communists, the obamabots, and the rest of shills.
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Very very simple.
1. Weak Dollar policy w the Fed and Bernake inducing inflation. (continued the Bush policies)
2. EPA mandates on refineres driving up the cost.
3. No drilling in Gulf
4. No drilling in Alaska
5. No pipeline
6. Non-renewal of gas leases despite court order.
7. Banning drilling on many areas.
8. Obama fomented and helped cause chaos in the ME with his backing radical islamist revolutionaries across the ME
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LOL. I hope thugbama keeps repeating this nonsense!
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$5 or even $10 gasoline is well worth the price to get rid of obama. Bring it on.
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$5 or even $10 gasoline is well worth the price to get rid of obama. Bring it on.
put americans in financial trouble to get your way,wow your a real American ::)
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put americans in financial trouble to get your way,wow your a real American ::)
Looks like obama already took care of that. I would gladly ride my mountain bike to work for a few months to get rid of Obama.
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so you and obama have something in common,i should have known you and obama are the same >:(
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Video: Why gas prices are so high (hint: it’s not the evil oil companies)
Hotair ^ | 02/24/2012 | Tina Korbe
To listen to the president talk, you’d think federal government policy had nothing to do with the high gas prices we face at the pump. Oh, no; Middle Eastern instability or the greed of big oil companies are to blame. Unfortunately for the president, that doesn't square with his energy record, which has --- at every turn --- created obstacles to American energy production and, in effect, driven gas prices higher. House Speaker John Boehner has released a timeline that captures Obama’s deleterious impact on the oil and gas industry — and, consequently, on gas prices. The timeline extends to the beginning of Obama's term in office, but, as a sample, take a look at just the five most recent decisions the administration has made:
CLICK ABOVE LINK FOR THE VIDEO
JANUARY 2, 2011 – TIME reported that the Obama administration issued the first in a series of regulations on January 2 designed to unilaterally impose a national energy tax. Gas is $3.05 a gallon.
MAY 5, 2011 – The White House issues a formal statement opposing House-passed Restarting American Offshore Leasing Now Act (H.R. 1230) and Putting the Gulf of Mexico Back to Work Act (H.R. 1229), legislation designed to jumpstart American energy production, address rising gas prices, and help create new jobs. Gas is $3.96 a gallon.
JUNE 21, 2011 - The White House opposes the House-passed Jobs & Energy Permitting Act that would unlock an estimated 27 billion barrels of oil and 132 trillion cubic feet of natural gas. Gas is $3.65 a gallon.
NOVEMBER 8, 2011 – The Obama Administration releases a plan for a five-year moratorium on offshore energy production, placing “some of the most promising energy resources in the world off-limits,” according to the House Natural Resources Committee. Gas is $3.42 a gallon.
JANUARY 18, 2012 – President Obama rejects the bipartisan Keystone XL pipeline and the more than 20,000 jobs that would come with it. Gas is $3.39 a gallon, and rising faster and earlier than ever before.
Yesterday afternoon, Fox Business Network’s Gerri Willis interviewed Gulf Oil CEO Joe Petrowski, who confirmed what Boehner’s timeline suggests. The government has an inordinate amount of influence over the energy industry and has repeatedly proved itself adept at picking losers to subsidize and winners to penalize.
It makes no sense, this administration’s endless war on energy. It makes even less sense when you consider Candidate Obama’s stated promises to achieve energy independence. If that’s his goal, he has a funny way of showing it. When he ran for president, he even shilled for the Alaska pipeline — a project that, under his actual administration, has met with significant regulatory hurdles and is not slated to begin construction until 2015.
At some point, the president will have to accept that the American public can see through his rhetoric. He might say he wants a clean and secure source of energy, but his actions repeatedly say otherwise. According to a recent AP/GFK poll, 58 percent of Americans disapprove of his handling of high gas prices. What’s up with the other 42 percent?
CLICK ABOVE LINK FOR THE VIDEO
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LMFAO!!!!!!
[ Invalid YouTube link ]
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http://hotair.com/archives/2012/02/24/video-why-gas-prices-are-so-high-hint-its-not-the-evil-oil-companies
Good video. F U B O !!!!!
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Video: Why gas prices are so high (hint: it’s not the evil oil companies)
Hotair ^ | 02/24/2012 | Tina Korbe
To listen to the president talk, you’d think federal government policy had nothing to do with the high gas prices we face at the pump. Oh, no; Middle Eastern instability or the greed of big oil companies are to blame. Unfortunately for the president, that doesn't square with his energy record, which has --- at every turn --- created obstacles to American energy production and, in effect, driven gas prices higher. House Speaker John Boehner has released a timeline that captures Obama’s deleterious impact on the oil and gas industry — and, consequently, on gas prices. The timeline extends to the beginning of Obama's term in office, but, as a sample, take a look at just the five most recent decisions the administration has made:
CLICK ABOVE LINK FOR THE VIDEO
JANUARY 2, 2011 – TIME reported that the Obama administration issued the first in a series of regulations on January 2 designed to unilaterally impose a national energy tax. Gas is $3.05 a gallon.
MAY 5, 2011 – The White House issues a formal statement opposing House-passed Restarting American Offshore Leasing Now Act (H.R. 1230) and Putting the Gulf of Mexico Back to Work Act (H.R. 1229), legislation designed to jumpstart American energy production, address rising gas prices, and help create new jobs. Gas is $3.96 a gallon.
JUNE 21, 2011 - The White House opposes the House-passed Jobs & Energy Permitting Act that would unlock an estimated 27 billion barrels of oil and 132 trillion cubic feet of natural gas. Gas is $3.65 a gallon.
NOVEMBER 8, 2011 – The Obama Administration releases a plan for a five-year moratorium on offshore energy production, placing “some of the most promising energy resources in the world off-limits,” according to the House Natural Resources Committee. Gas is $3.42 a gallon.
JANUARY 18, 2012 – President Obama rejects the bipartisan Keystone XL pipeline and the more than 20,000 jobs that would come with it. Gas is $3.39 a gallon, and rising faster and earlier than ever before.
Yesterday afternoon, Fox Business Network’s Gerri Willis interviewed Gulf Oil CEO Joe Petrowski, who confirmed what Boehner’s timeline suggests. The government has an inordinate amount of influence over the energy industry and has repeatedly proved itself adept at picking losers to subsidize and winners to penalize.
It makes no sense, this administration’s endless war on energy. It makes even less sense when you consider Candidate Obama’s stated promises to achieve energy independence. If that’s his goal, he has a funny way of showing it. When he ran for president, he even shilled for the Alaska pipeline — a project that, under his actual administration, has met with significant regulatory hurdles and is not slated to begin construction until 2015.
At some point, the president will have to accept that the American public can see through his rhetoric. He might say he wants a clean and secure source of energy, but his actions repeatedly say otherwise. According to a recent AP/GFK poll, 58 percent of Americans disapprove of his handling of high gas prices. What’s up with the other 42 percent?
CLICK ABOVE LINK FOR THE VIDEO
you think if he passed everyone of those, gas would be 1.50 a gallon,you live in dream land
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Obama's stated goal is to SKYROCKET energy prices for the average guy. He should not complain when his policies have and reach their intended outcome.
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3 dollar plus gas is here to stay know matter who's in office or if they open a million new oil wells
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3 dollar plus gas is here to stay know matter who's in office or if they open a million new oil wells
$3 would be fine, under Oilbama - he wants it to go to 7-9 dollars a gallon.
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Sarah Palin: Obama’s Anti-American Energy Policies Invite the Next Crisis
Facebook ^ | 02/24/12 | Sarah Palin
Posted on Friday, February 24, 2012 3:55:16 PM by American Dream 246
President Obama doesn’t have an energy plan. He has an energy speech that he continues to give regardless of the facts or his obvious failures. He likes to take credit for actions initiated by the last administration (without telling you that he’s reversed or stymied many of those successes).
We should not be surprised by his detached attitude about America’s pain at the pump. He’s not interested in lowering the price of gas because exorbitantly high gas prices are one of his campaign promises. In September 2008, candidate Obama’s Energy Secretary in-waiting said: “Somehow we have to figure out how to boost the price of gasoline to the levels in Europe.” That’s one campaign promise they’re working hard to fulfill!
President Obama notes that instability in the Middle East causes short-term spikes in the price of oil. But that is precisely why we should take every opportunity to drill here and drill now to lessen our dependence on these dangerous foreign regimes. President Obama’s lack of action simply invites the next oil crisis. It’s as if the White House is purposefully making us more dependent on foreign countries – from running up an unsustainable debt that must be financed by foreign debtors, to constantly apologizing and walking on eggshells around dictators who control oil supplies.
When it comes to our energy security, the only thing holding us back is the lack of political will. We have the resources, the ingenuity, and the manpower. And we need the jobs! Any economic recovery will be hampered by these rising gas prices. And I guarantee the rising prices will only get worse and will halt job growth further.
We must never forget that energy development, job creation, and national security are inextricably linked. Access to affordable and secure energy is the key to economic growth, which is the key to job growth. Securing a stable domestic supply of energy will lead to a more peaceful and prosperous America – an America that’s not subject to the whims of dictators who can cut off energy supplies or shut down the Strait of Hormuz to exports passing through. President Obama repeatedly claims that there is no “silver bullet” to lower gas prices. But, in fact, we do have proof that the promise of future drilling does lead to immediate price relief as oil producers plan to expand their production.
So what are Obama’s solutions? As luck would have it, they coincide with subsidizing his friends and campaign donors. What a fortuitous coincidence in an election year! While you’re paying $5-a-gallon for gas, President Obama has been picking “winners” and “losers” in the free market. He’s decided that conventional resource development that produces the fuel we use to drive our cars and power our economy are “losers.” His “winners” are the bankrupt green energy companies that his campaign donors invest in. Unfortunately his real “losers” are the American public who are once again hit with massive gas prices (at least those who can’t afford luxury electric cars like the Obama-subsidized Volt that gets 40 miles per battery charge, or like the Obama-subsidized Tesla that turns into a “brick” when the battery completely discharges and then costs $40,000 to repair.)
What are the real solutions? Well, whether you support Newt in 2012 or not, he makes a lot of sense in this video, which is why President Obama targeted it for mockery yesterday. Newt is right that we need to “stop bowing and start drilling.” And not only can’t a gun rack fit in a Volt, but the government will take away our pick-up trucks when they pry the steering wheel “from our cold, dead hands.”
In this video, Newt explains some commonsense, pro-American solutions to the problems President Obama causes with his terrifyingly naïve assault on U.S. energy production.
With just the stroke of a pen, President Obama could lead us in the direction of real energy security and reduce our oil imports threatened by Iran’s threats to shut down the Strait of Hormuz and. Here are just a few commonsense measures we can do right now and most of them don’t require any new legislation or regulations:
Open Alaska to drilling. Billions and billions of U.S. crude (and hundreds of trillions of cubic feet of clean natural gas) sit untapped up here in the far north, my friends. We have the TAPS pipeline and infrastructure; we invite the development! Open ANWR. Think of how much safer and secure we would be if we had done this decades ago.
Build the Keystone Pipeline. President Obama doesn’t understand we live in a land woven with untold miles of pipe to carry safe energy supplies to protect and prosper America. Common sense dictates we need another one now to secure our energy future. It is key. It is the Keystone. If we’re worried about instability in the Middle East, it makes no sense to shun safe and reliable oil from Canada. Obviously, China understands this, and we should too. Drill for natural gas. Natural gas is the future. It’s clean, it’s green, and we’ve got lots of it. Whether we use it to power natural-gas cars or to run natural-gas power plants that charge electric cars – or ideally for both – natural gas can act as a clean “bridge fuel” to a future when more renewable sources are available.
There are many more steps we need in order to establish a true energy plan to secure our future. But these three steps, plus increased resource development in the Lower 48 and reversing President Obama’s nonsensical, knee-jerk, anti-American energy shut down of off-shore developments would create hundreds of thousands of jobs as millions of barrels of oil every single day would flow under American control, and lessen our dependence on the Persian Gulf.
It’s time our country had a real energy plan that include a genuine all-of-the-above approach that doesn’t ignore conventional resource development. We need the jobs, we need the energy, and we need the security.
- Sarah Palin
________________________ ________________________ __
Sarah would have been a drastically better POTUS than the communist tyrant and ghetto rat Obama, piss and puke be upon him.
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http://www.zerohedge.com/news/what-rising-gasoline-prices-do-economy
wow. Not good, but of course Imam Obama loves this.
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Return to the Article
February 24, 2012
Obama's oily deception
Steve McCann
Once again the nation is experiencing gas prices exceeding $4.00 per gallon and as predictable as the sun rising in the East, Obama claims there are no easy fixes and that the real solution is the forced development of alternative energy -- after all the United States has only 2% of the world's oil reserves. This is not only demagoguery of the worst sort but an outright lie.
The United States is, for the second time in less than three years, being reminded of its absurd dependence of foreign sources of energy, most notably, oil. The upheavals in the Middle East have driven up the cost of a barrel of oil into triple digits as it was in 2008 and 2010. However were there stability in this region the long-term price of crude would still be at or near this price range due to the increasing demands of countries such as China and India and the deliberate devaluation of the dollar by the Federal Reserve and the Obama administration.
In 1982 China oil consumption was 1.7 million barrels per day; in 2010 it had increased to nearly 10.0 million barrels per day. India, also in 1982, consumed .7 million barrels per day, today India is using 3.0 million barrels per day. The United States increased its consumption by 3.6 million barrels per day during this same period. (http://www.eia.gov/forecasts/ieo/index.cfm)
In the meantime America has decreased its domestic production by nearly 3.0 million barrels per day.
The country's dependence of foreign sources has increased to 54% of the daily requirement as compared to 45% just 15 years ago. Over half of that amount comes from countries that are inherently unstable or ruled by despotic regimes whose interest it is to de-stabilize the United States. (http://www.eia.doe.gov/emeu/steo/pub/contents.html)
Yet the United States is sitting on the world's largest untapped oil reserve. A natural resource that would not only mitigate the over $400 Billion sent overseas to other countries but could create untold millions of jobs and put the country on a sound financial footing.
The untapped reserves are estimated up to 2.3 Trillion barrels, nearly three times the reserves held by the OPEC countries and sufficient to meet 300 years of demand, at today's levels -- for auto, truck, aircraft, heating and industrial fuel, without importing a single barrel of oil. (http://kiplinger.com/businessresource/forecast/archive/The_U.S._s_Untapped_Bounty_080630.html)
Here is a look at some of the largest untapped reserves:
The Bakken Fields in North and South Dakota. New drilling and oil recovery technology is making the capture of this oil feasible and some development is now underway. It is estimated that there is at least 200 Billion barrels of oil in this region. At a price of $100 per barrel the value of this find is $20 Trillion.
The Outer Continental shelf. It is estimated that around 90 billion barrels of oil sit beneath the ocean bed 50 to 100 miles off the shore of the Atlantic, Pacific and Gulf coasts. The value: $9 Trillion.
The Alaska National Wildlife Refuge. About 10 billion barrels are locked up here with a current value of $1 Trillion.
Tar Sands: Around 75 Billion barrels of oil could come from these areas which are similar to the Canadian tar sand fields and which now produce about 2 million barrels per day. The value: $7.5 Trillion
Oil Shale. This is the most massive area of potential oil production in the world with an estimated 1.5 Trillion barrel potential. The technology necessary to extract this oil is now in place and being operated on a pilot project basis. The value of this resource: $150 Trillion
There also the very real potential that further finds will be discovered as technology continues to improve.
In total the value of the potential oil reserves of the United States listed above exceeds $187 Trillion. The current national debt is $14.2 Trillion or less than 8%.
Despite the protestation of President Obama and the environmentalists the world and particularly the United States is not running out of oil. Their foolish tilting at windmills and solar will never produce energy sufficient to operate a $15Trillion and hopefully growing economy. It will be decades if not the rest of the 21st Century before any meaningful substitute for fossil fuels will be developed and additional time and investment will then be necessary to distribute the product.
Mankind's ingenuity has and will continue to develop technology to safely extract process and market fossil fuels (which is a naturally occurring resource). But the United States must begin now to open the areas for exploration, and permit the construction of refineries and pipelines.
It is beyond absurd that a country sitting on so much natural wealth refuses to exploit it for the benefit of its citizens and instead deliberately puts the nation in the position of being subjected to the whims of others and face national insolvency. This can only be a deliberate strategy by those determined to destroy the basis of the American free-market economy.
Page Printed from: http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2012/02/obamas_oily_deception.html at February 24, 2012 - 10:39:28 PM CST
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http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/carbon-emission-policy-could-slash-debt-improve-environment/2012/02/13/gIQAQ0LZWR_story.html?wprss=rss_opinions
WWWTTTFFFF!!!!
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Staggering Idiocy on Oil
Townhall.com ^ | February 25, 2012 | Mike Shedlock
Posted on February 25, 2012 8:56:49 AM EST by Kaslin
Bernanke is hell bent on producing price inflation. He has succeeded, just not where he wants most. What Bernanke desperately wants is for housing prices to rise because that more than anything will help the banks and all the foreclosed properties they are sitting on.
The Bernanke Fed has certainly assisted the stock market, as intended, but that is not doing the average Joe much good in the face of soaring oil prices, soaring food prices, falling home prices, and zero% interest on savings.
Oil Shock Coming
As a direct consequence of Fed policy, in conjunction with an inane US and European oil embargo on Iran, Europe (already in the midst of what is going to be a long and deep recession) will be hit with an oil shock on top of it.
Record Price of Oil in British Pounds
On Wednesday the Financial Times reported Record sterling oil price sparks fears
Oil prices have soared to a record high in sterling terms and are approaching euro highs, raising fears that European countries struggling with heavy debts will face further barriers to economic recovery.
“This is a regional oil shock,” said Amrita Sen, commodities analyst at Barclays Capital in London.
Brent rallied to £78.48 a barrel, passing the previous all-time high of £77.71 a barrel set in April last year at the peak of the Libyan civil war supply disruption. In euro terms, the oil benchmark reached a three-year high of €92.70 a barrel, a fraction below the peak of €93.50 a barrel set in July 2008.Record Price of Oil in Euros
It took precisely one more day for the Financial Times to report Euro denominated oil hits record
Oil prices soared to a record high in euro terms, surpassing the peak touched in the 2008 price spike and posing a fresh problem for eurozone economies already struggling under the weight of the region’s debt crisis.
The euro-denominated price of Brent crude, the global benchmark North Sea crude, rose to a peak of €93.63 a barrel on Thursday, surpassing the previous high hit on July 3, 2008. The new euro record comes just a day after Brent hit a record in sterling terms.Nancy Pelosi Blames Speculators
The Hill reports Dem leader Pelosi blames Wall Street for spike in gas prices
Oil speculators, not a lack of domestic drilling, are to blame for the nation's rising gas prices, the top House Democrat argued Wednesday.
House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi said unscrupulous Wall Street investors have artificially inflated prices at the pump, which are climbing toward $4 per gallon.
The California Democrat called on Congress to take "strong action" to rein in the allegedly excessive speculation, and accused Republicans of protecting Wall Street profits at the expense of consumers.
"Wall Street profiteering, not oil shortages, is the cause of the price spike," Pelosi said in a statement. "Unfortunately, Republicans have chosen to protect the interests of Wall Street speculators and oil companies instead of the interests of working Americans by obstructing the agencies with the responsibility of enforcing consumer protection laws."Irony of it All
No one gives a rat's ass if speculators drive up the price of houses or the stock market to absurd heights. Indeed, Congress goes out of its way to actively promote rising home prices.
The Greenspan and Bernanke Fed did the same. Now Bernanke openly takes credit for the rising stock market and encouraging speculation.
And where the hell is the blame for this absolutely inane embargo on Iran?
No Iranian Nuclear Weapons Program
As a matter of record, Israeli intelligence concluded in January of this year, there is No Iranian Nuclear Weapons Program!
As Gen. Martin Dempsey, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, arrived in Israel Thursday, the left-leaning Haaretz newspaper dropped its own atomic bombshell.
Israeli intelligence agencies have worked up an intelligence assessment that Iran has not yet decided whether to begin a military program to construct a nuclear warhead. Put in other words, Mossad believes that there is no current Iranian nuclear weapons program. Haaretz writes:
“The intelligence assessment Israeli officials will present later this week to Dempsey indicates that Iran has not yet decided whether to make a nuclear bomb. The Israeli view is that while Iran continues to improve its nuclear capabilities, it has not yet decided whether to translate these capabilities into a nuclear weapon – or, more specifically, a nuclear warhead mounted atop a missile. Nor is it clear when Iran might make such a decision.”
This is the same conclusion to which the 16 US intelligence agencies have come in 2007 and 2010. It is also consistent with what the Iranian government itself says, which is that the Iranian nuclear enrichment program is a civilian one and that Iran is not trying to construct a nuclear weapon. Likewise, the International Atomic Energy Agency, which continues to inspect Iranian nuclear facilities, has repeatedly and consistently stated that no nuclear material has been diverted from the civilian program.
Haaretz says that Israeli Minister of Defense Ehud Barak gave an interview with the Army radio, in which he come to another surprising conclusion. Asked if Israel plans a military strike on the Iranian nuclear facilities in Natanz near Isfahan, Barak replied: “We haven’t made any decision to do this . . . This entire thing is very far off.” ZeroHedge properly blasted Pelosi two days ago in his take Nancy Pelosi Issues Statement On Soaring Gas Prices
Speculators? Such as the Federal Reserve and other central banks who have pumped $2 trillion of "liquidity" into the capital markets in the past 3 months just so Italian BTPs don't implode to fair value and so Europeans can continue living in a socialist "paradise" even as the bankers steal their gold?
Or is it the same congressional speculators who until recently had every right to front run the public on advance knowledge that the SPR would be tapped due to Democrat insistence to sacrifice America's last energy backstop only to win the election?
Whatever the reason for the gas surge, with these idiots in charge, one thing is certain - the situation is about to get far, far worse.Staggering Idiocy
The idiocy of this government and central bank created mess is staggering. The Fed is actively encouraging speculators and the Obama government is angling for another Mideast war over weapons of mass destruction that once again do not even exist.
Instead of placing the blame on the Fed and on the warmongers, Pelosi is enough of an outright idiot to demand Congress do something to rein in speculators.
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0bama, the Democrats and RINOs are leading us into a real war for oil.
A war we won't have the energy to fight.
A war we don't need to fight because we have our own resources.
It Begins… First Oil Rig Relocates From Gulf to Foreign Waters
"As a result of the uncertainties surrounding the offshore drilling moratorium, we are actively seeking international opportunities to keep our rigs fully employed," Dickerson said. "We greatly regret the loss of U.S. jobs that will result from this rig relocation."
Idled Gulf Rigs Head For Africa
It is not just Gulf operations that are being effected either.
Wait and see for Shell {Shell puts Arctic drilling plans on hold, waiting on feds}
Let's not leave the refineries out.
EPA gives final "no" to Texas refinery permits
Then there are the land-based oil leases.
Judge Grills Feds on Pulling Drilling Leases
"A federal judge on Wednesday questioned Interior Secretary Ken Salazar's justification for canceling 77 drilling leases sold by the Bush administration around national parks in Utah."
U.S. Saw Drill Ban Killing Many Jobs [ie. Obama KNEW he was destroying jobs, kept it secret]
Obama and O'Malley are Hurting the Poor in Md by Shutting Down Nuclear Power
Obama Administration Blocking 103 Gulf Drilling Permits February 03, 2011
Obama Clears the Way For America's 2 Largest Oil Wells to be Shutdown in Texas April 25th, 2011 (to "save" an "endangered" lizard)
EPA threatens Utah with air quality sanctions
Energy in America: EPA Rules Force Shell to Abandon Oil Drilling Plans
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Democrats to Obama: Tap strategic oil reserve
Politico ^
Posted on February 25, 2012 8:03:50 PM EST by Sub-Driver
Democrats to Obama: Tap strategic oil reserve
By: Darren Goode February 25, 2012 06:26 PM EST
Gasoline prices are on a dramatic rise, and everybody's got advice for the White House.
No surprise, Republicans are reviving their "Drill, Baby Drill" catcalls from 2008, but liberals in Washington are getting nervous and asking President Barack Obama to tap into the Strategic Petroleum Reserve as a potential panacea for escalating gasoline prices.
Picking up on the themes of a speech he gave Thursday at the University of Miami, Obama used his weekly radio address Saturday to remind Americans of his view that if prices at the pump rise as expected in the coming months, “there are no quick fixes to this problem, and you know we can’t just drill our way to lower gas prices.”
He also warned that rising gas prices could hurt any economic recovery. While there is “no silver bullet that will bring down gas prices or reduce our dependence on foreign oil overnight … what we can do is get our priorities straight, and make a sustained, serious effort to tackle this problem,” Obama said.
The potential danger to the economy — and the president's reelection chances — have liberals urging the White House to unleash the SPR now, before it's too late. The national average for a gallon of unleaded gasoline was $3.65 on Friday, according to AAA.
“Selling reserve oil on the open market is the one step that we know will reduce oil and gasoline prices in the immediate term,” said Daniel Weiss of the Center for American Progress Action Fund. “Every time we sold reserve oil it has lowered oil and gasoline prices. We know it works.”
(Excerpt) Read more at politico.com ...
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As gas nears $5-a-gallon out west, the president, who has cancelled a key pipeline and frozen federal leases from Alaska to the East Coast, teaches us about American algae potential, in the way he used to emphasize the importance of tire pressure and “tune-ups.” He castigates the opposition for making political hay out of bad news, in the way he routinely did as a senator in compiling the most partisan voting record in the Senate. Energy Secretary Chu cannot and will not say a word about soaring gas prices, since he is on record not so long ago hoping that they might double — that is, get to $8- to 10-a-gallon as they are in Europe. The Energy Department can do almost everything Americans don’t want, but not the single thing they do want.
The more Afghans kill Americans, the more the president seems to apologize for our troops disposing of confiscated Korans, desecrated by Muslim-terrorist detainees. Would that Obama talk so deferentially to Americans instead of serially emphasizing their laziness, their nativism, and their past transgressions in the Middle East. The treasury secretary who oversaw $5 trillion in new debt, and who oversees an IRS that he himself not long ago tried to short, lectures us that a premium in taxes must be paid for the fact of our being born American. The first lady, who cannot keep from vacationing at Costa del Sol, Vail, Aspen, and Martha’s Vineyard, keeps reminding us, who do not go to those tony retreats or $30,000-a-plate fundraisers, that we must pay our fair share to a nearly insolvent government to help it help the less fortunate, 50 percent of whom pay no income taxes. Secretary of State Clinton, who not long ago declared Bashar Assad a “reformer” now says the thug must go, with State Department subordinates warning about Syrian “WMD.” If true, one wonders where Assad got them. If our allies were in crises — Israel with Iran, Britain with Argentina, Poland or the Czech Republic with Putin’s Russia — no one quite knows what America would say or do.
And always, in the midst of these problems, we hear of a “they” who caused all of the above.
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Obama's Favorite Algae Company
The Obama Solution?
President Obama’s reference to algae in his Thursday energy speech drew flak over the weekend from Newt Gingrich, who called it “weird” before calling algal biofuel “a terrific concept.” But Obama had political reasons to promote algae in Florida, the sunny, swampy, politically-volatile state he carried in 2008.
The Obama Administration has already sunk $25 million into a Florida company—Alganol Biofuels—that is building an algae biorefinery using a patented technology that promises to streamline the process of extracting oils from algae so they be converted to ethanol.
In remarks at the University of Miami, Obama highlighted two domestic energy sources more than any other—natural gas and algae. After the speech, the Administration announced $30 million in grants to develop natural gas as a vehicle fuel, $14 million for algae.
“We’re making new investments in the development of gasoline and diesel and jet fuel that’s actually made from a plant-like substance — algae,” Obama said in Miami. ” You’ve got a bunch of algae out here, right? If we can figure out how to make energy out of that, we’ll be doing all right.”
Gingrich mocked Obama during an appearance in Idaho, calling a hypothetical bottle of algae “the Obama solution.” Then, more seriously, praised the concept but said it will take 20 to 40 years to develop.
Obama’s remarks rest on a 2011 study by the Energy Department’s Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, which found that 17 percent of U.S. oil imports could be displaced by domestic biofuels from algae.
“Believe it or not, we could replace up to 17 percent of the oil we import for transportation with this fuel that we can grow right here in the United States,” Obama said. “And that means greater energy security. That means lower costs. It means more jobs. It means a stronger economy.”
Obama used the study’s more conservative number. The authors found that algae has the potential to replace up to 48 percent of fuel imports for transporation—but that level of production would require vast amounts of fresh water and land: 5.5 percent of the land area in the conterminous United States and nearly three times the water currently used for irrigated agriculture.
The authors consider 17 percent a viable number based on optimal land and water and geographic placement of algae farms.
They did not propose a timeline for development of an algal energy industry, but they identified a potential Achilles’ Heel of algal biofuels: up to 350 gallons of fresh water would be needed to produce one gallon of oil from algae.
That’s where Florida’s Alganol Biofuels comes in: its biorefineries grow algae in saltwater and can sequester carbon dioxide that would otherwise be released to the atmosphere from industrial or power plants.
The Energy Department study did not consider saltwater production. Alganol broke ground in October on a 36-acre facility in Lee County, Florida that will use 3,000 “bioreactors” to produce ethanol from algae. The project is expected to create 130 jobs.
The company had originally partnered with Dow Chemical to build a demonstration plant at a Dow facility in Freeport, Texas, but Dow withdrew from the project—except as a supplier of plastics and potential purchaser of ethanol. Alganol shifted the facility to Florida adjacent to laboratories it also developed with the $25 million stimulus grant.
“The Dow Chemical Company supports the decision to build one larger facility in Lee County, Florida,” Alganon announced in a 2010 press release. “A Bio-Refinery located next to Algenolʼs new state-of-the-art laboratories will have greater capabilities and be more effective and efficient.”
A year later Alganon announced its development collaboration with Dow had come to an end.
Applications are due April 18 for the Energy Department’s new $14 million in grants, with the funding subject to Congressional approval.
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This article is available online at:
http://www.forbes.com/sites/jeffmcmahon/2012/02/26/obamas-favorite-algae-company
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BUSINESS EPA PENALIZES REFINERS FOR FAILING TO USE FUEL THAT ‘DOES NOT EXIST’
http://www.theblaze.com/stories/epa-penalizes-refiners-for-failing-to-use-fuel-that-does-not-exist
Sunday, February 26, 2012 12:18:52 PM by kcvl
Companies supplying motor fuel will have to pay approximately $6.8 million in fines to the Treasury because they failed to “mix a special type of biofuel into their gasoline and diesel,” writes Matthew L. Wald of the New York Times.
However, the fine isn’t the worst part. The worst part is the fact that the refiners could have tried everything in their power to remain in compliance with standards set by the 2007 Energy Independence and Security Act, and it might not have mattered.
Why? Because there is not enough of this “special type of biofuel” to go around. In fact, with the exception of some scattered workshops and laboratories, “the ingredient, cellulosic biofuel, does not exist,” according to the Times report.
And by 2012, these companies are expected to pay even higher penalties for failing to include cellulosic biofuel in their product. Refiners were required to blend 6.6 million gallons into gasoline and diesel in 2011 and face a quota of 8.65 million gallons this year, according to the Times.
(Excerpt) Read more at theblaze.com ...
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On Gas, Cars And Bernanke ($5 Gas, Anything Can Happen)
My Take On Financial Events ^ | 2-25-2012 | Bruce Krastering
Posted on Sunday, February 26, 2012 11:31:17 AM by blam
On Gas, Cars And Bernanke
Bruce Krastering
Febuary 25, 2012
Everyone is talking about gas this past week, and for good reason. The price at the pump has been tearing higher. According to the papers this morning the national average price for regular gas is $3.65. Unfortunately for me, the price the media is spouting has nothing to do with my cost. As of this morning, my local gas guy is charging $4.85 for premium fuel, and that’s the stuff my car uses.
I doubt the numbers being bandied about regarding prices at the pump actually reflect the real economic consequences.
I'll probably take some flack for this, but I believe it's true. The only thing that matters is the price of gas in California and New York.
The USA has evolved into a two-tier gas market. The supply of crude from Canada and the Bakken fields has created a lower cost of supply for the central portion of the country. This differential is most notable in the market spread between WTI (a futures contract that settles physical delivery in Oklahoma) and LLS (Louisiana Light Sweet Crude) - the pricing of crude for the big Gulf refineries.
These charts show the WTI and the LLS pricing over the past year.
While both crude prices have risen significantly of late, what jumps out is that the LLS pricing broke through the highs of ten-months ago, while WTI has not.
Consider this map of the country. The green area is where the Canadian crude is helping to keep prices lower. The dark red areas are those that are dependent on the high-priced, imported crude.
Gas prices are north of $5 in southern California today, but they are as low as $2.95 in Ft. Collins Colorado.
While this may make the folks in Colorado and North Dakota happy, it will crush the national economy. It doesn’t matter what happens in Co. or N.D., they have (relatively) no cars.
A few years ago, the Highway Transportation Department put out a report on registered vehicles by state. The total of all registered vehicles was 244,000,000. Of that total, 33 million were on the roads of California (13%), only 1.8 million (0.75%) were in Colorado, and a measly 700k (0.25%) are in North Dakota. The total of vehicles on the road in the states that are in red in the above map comes to 137 million. Fully 56% of all vehicles are in high cost states. Only 15 million vehicles (6% of total) are registered in the green states!
State GDP is directly correlated with vehicle registrations. The red-colored states, paying the highest prices today, represented 57% of 2010's GDP. Green states, contributed only 8% GDP.
My thoughts:
-Crude prices in Louisiana hit their highest in a year on Friday. If this level is sustained (or heaven forbid increases), the price of fuel in the red states will go up by 50 cents in the next few weeks. Forget about $4, start worrying about $5.
-California and NY will be hit the hardest. These two states represent 21% of GDP. It will be a big burden for the NY economy. For California, it could be a crushing blow. The national economy cannot expand without California growing. Cali is a very big portion of the pie.
-Given these facts, I wonder if the Administration is planning to release more oil from the Strategic Reserve. I bitched and moaned about this last July when the SPR was tapped. Following the June SPR sales, there was a multi-month drop in crude prices.
The SPR sales had little consequence; the drop in crude reflected a slowdown in global growth and an easing of concerns regarding Libya.
The Administration may look at the same charts as I did and conclude that it was the SPR sales that broke the market for a while. Folks who like to intervene in markets are biased to believe their intervention "works". This Administration would love to push down crude prices for another three months. It would take the gas story off the front page. It would help the economy from running into a wall.
This being an election year, it's possible that Obama will try an SPR sale. If gas is $5 in November, anything could happen.
If there were an SPR sale, any beneficial impact on prices would have a half-life of about 48 hours. This ain’t June 2011. If we should we see an SPR sale (low probability), buy that dip.
-The LLS crude price tracks Brent crude. (A tanker can go to Rotterdam or Louisiana, it will go to where the price is the highest.) If there is a Middle East supply disruption, it will affect Brent more than WTI. But for the red states, gas prices will track Brent.
-Greenspan remarked in July of 2010, “The economy appears to have hit an invisible wall”. Bernanke reacted a few months later with his Jackson Hole speech that brought us QE2. In the Summer of 2011 the economy hit another of those “invisible walls”. Bernanke delivered TWIST and Perpetual ZIRP. I wonder if Ben will try QE3 if the economy hits another those walls due to rising gas prices.
The thing is, if Ben tried another form of QE/LSAP the price of crude would be up $20 in a week. Bernanke is another of those who likes to intervene in markets. He also thinks it “works”. It won’t work this time; it will blow up in his face.
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The latest USA Today says it will be over 4 but most analysts say 5 is not likely.
I'm sure it could happen though.
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February 27, 2012
Mr. President, Oil Drilling Could Make a Big Difference
By Peter Morici
When Barack Obama assumed the presidency, gas prices were less than $2 a gallon. He proceeded to shut down deep-water drilling in the Gulf, tightened other federal restrictions on petroleum development, and vetoed the Keystone Pipeline. Now, even with Americans driving not a lot more than three years ago and global growth slowing, gas is nearing $4 a gallon.
The liberal theocracy in academia, the media and the Democratic Party leadership relentlessly expounds that drilling for oil in the United States won’t much affect U.S. gas prices, because petroleum prices are set in global markets. And, more domestic oil production or U.S. access to Canadian petroleum won’t much change global supplies, or the pace of economic recovery and unemployment.
Balderdash!
Oil prices paid by U.S. refineries in the Gulf do move with global prices but not in lockstep. Increasing North American production would lower U.S. refinery acquisition costs, because U.S. refineries, like others around the world, are built to handle the special characteristics of oil produced by their primary sources supply. And gasoline produced by individual refineries is not wholly fungible either—differing fuel characteristics are required across the United States and Europe to meet environmental standards
Although tensions with Iran are growing and pushing up oil prices everywhere, prices have diverged between, for example, U.S. and European markets. For years, prices for West Texas Intermediate and North Sea Brent moved closely, but now WTI is selling for $17 less than its North Sea counterpart. This indicates the U.S. market is becoming somewhat separate and less wholly determined by global conditions; hence, more domestic production and increased access to Canadian oil would lower U.S. oil and prices—more drilling in the Gulf and elsewhere in North America, and the Keystone pipeline would significantly affect gas prices and employment.
More importantly, whether Americans pay $115 a barrel for oil from Saudi Arabia and Nigeria or obtained from the Gulf of Mexico and other domestic deposits makes a huge difference. The annual trade deficit on petroleum is about $300 billion. Raising U.S. oil production to its sustainable potential of 10 million barrels a day would cut import costs in half, directly create 1.5 million jobs, and applying Administration economic models for stimulus spending, create another 1 million jobs indirectly.
Overall, attaining U.S. oil production potential would boost GDP about $250 billion. Not bad, because it could be accomplished by increasing federal revenues from royalties and reducing the federal deficit, instead of adding to it through additional stimulus spending and subsidies to questionable solar and wind projects.
Recently, the President ridiculed GOP presidential candidates for urging more domestic petroleum development stating, “Anyone who tells you we can drill our way out of this problem doesn’t know they’re talking about—or just isn’t telling you the truth.”
That’s simply not so—drilling for more oil in the United States could make a big difference.
Under Mr. Obama’s stewardship, the U.S. economy is not recovering as it should. As per usual, the President distracts public attention from poor policy choices by blaming and ridiculing others.
After three years, the President, who promised Americans millions of clean energy jobs in place of a thriving petroleum industry and much lower unemployment, should own up to his mistakes. Most Americans are needlessly paying too much for gas and foreign oil, while federally subsidized solar and wind projects are filing for bankruptcy.
This November, poor judgment and weakness of character—such as the President’s repeated attacks on the petroleum industry and failure to take responsibility for the consequences of his actions—make the most compelling case for change.
Americans should not expect a perfect president but at least one who bases decisions on facts not whimsy, and learns from mistakes. Americans are simply not getting fact-based leadership and good judgment from President Obama.
Peter Morici is a professor at the Smith School of Business, University of Maryland School, and former Chief Economist at the U.S. International Trade Commission.
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:D :D :DMore drilling happening under Obama than last three administrations ,fact you can try to spin it but those are the facts :'(
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This should be good Gasoline news.
TransCanada touts oil pipeline from Okla. to Texas
By MATTHEW DALY, Associated Press – 1 hour ago
WASHINGTON (AP) — A Canadian company said Monday it will build an oil pipeline from Oklahoma to Texas after President Barack Obama blocked the larger Keystone XL pipeline from Canada.
Calgary-based TransCanada says the new project does not require presidential approval, since it does not cross a U.S. border. The shorter pipeline is expected to cost about $2.3 billion and be completed next year, the company said.
The Obama administration had suggested development of an Oklahoma-to-Texas line to alleviate an oil glut at a Cushing, Oklahoma, storage hub.
Press secretary Jay Carney said Obama welcomed the announcement.
"Moving oil from the Midwest to the world-class, state-of-the-art refineries on the Gulf Coast will modernize our infrastructure, create jobs, and encourage American energy production," Carney said in a statement. "We look forward to working with TransCanada to ensure that it is built in a safe, responsible and timely manner, and we commit to take every step possible to expedite the necessary federal permits.
TransCanada said Monday it still hopes to build the full 1,700-mile (2,735-kilometer) Keystone XL pipeline, which would carry oil derived from tar sands in Alberta, Canada to refineries along the Texas Gulf Coast. The proposed $7 billion pipeline would run through Montana, South Dakota, Nebraska and Kansas before reaching Oklahoma.
The company is working with Nebraska officials to find a route that avoids the environmentally sensitive Sandhills region.
Obama rejected the Keystone XL pipeline last month, in large part because of the uncertainty over the Nebraska route. Obama said there was not enough time for a fair review before a looming deadline forced on him by Republicans. The action did not kill the project but — for the second time in three months — put off a tough choice on the pipeline project, which has become the focus of a heated political fight.
Pipeline supporters — including congressional Republicans and many business and labor leaders— call the project a key job creator, while opponents say it would transport "dirty oil" that requires huge amounts of energy to extract. They also worry about a possible spill.
Carney said that Obama's Jan. 18 decision "in no way prejudged future applications" by TransCanada for the full, 1,700-mile project.
"We will ensure any project receives the important assessment it deserves, and will base a decision to provide a permit on the completion of that review," he said.
Russ Girling, TransCanada's president and CEO, said the Oklahoma-to-Texas pipeline will transport growing supplies of U.S. crude oil to meet refinery demands in Texas.
"Gulf Coast refineries can then access lower cost domestic production and avoid paying a premium to foreign oil producers," he said, adding that the project should reduce U.S. dependence on crude from outside North America.
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LOL at Carney! ! ! ! !
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LOL at Carney! ! ! ! !
I don't understand what you find so humorous.
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I don't understand what you find so humorous.
Had this been under their control - they would have vetoed it and demonoized it.
Now that the gas prices are going up just as that communist thug obama wanted and still wants, they act like they give a damn.
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Had this been under their control - they would have vetoed it and demonoized it.
Now that the gas prices are going up just as that communist thug obama wanted and still wants, they act like they give a damn.
Politicians (all) only give a damn when it can potentially hurt their re-election bids.
I do agree that it should have been done from the get go, but any good news is good.
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Politicians (all) only give a damn when it can potentially hurt their re-election bids.
I do agree that it should have been done from the get go, but any good news is good.
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As Gas Prices Spike, Obama May Tap Oil Reserve
By Alexis Simendinger - February 28, 2012
Expectations are high that President Obama will tap the nation's oil reserves by this summer to respond to rising gasoline prices as he seeks a second term, according to analysts who stand on all sides of the question.
Because the administration released 30 million barrels from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve into world oil markets last summer during the Libyan uprising, the president has ample precedent -- his own and predecessors' -- to do so again if he believes gasoline prices in the United States threaten economic growth, or if oil supplies are disrupted by world events, observers suggest. The law permits release of reserves under either of those conditions.
Although some Republicans say they would oppose “raiding” the nation’s reserves for reasons other than supply emergencies, history offers election-year models that could help shield Obama from accusations of political maneuvering, should he opt to sell reserve petroleum this year to try to tamp down gas prices.
“The conditions are right for doing so,” said Daniel Weiss, senior fellow and director of climate strategy for the Center for American Progress Action Fund, “because we’re having high oil prices, in part because speculators are bidding up the price to take advantage of people’s fears about a supply disruption.”
In 1996, President Clinton and House Republicans, including former Speaker Newt Gingrich, agreed to sell oil in two waves from the Strategic Reserve as part of a budget deal to raise nearly $500 million in revenues to lower deficits. At the time, the reserve was not as full as it is today. In 2000, another election year, there were three emergency exchanges of reserve petroleum, followed by other such exchanges during presidential election years 2004 and 2008, related to concerns about supply disruptions.
Last Friday, Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner said the administration would consider tapping some of the 696 million barrels of oil currently stored deep in manmade caverns in Texas and Louisiana. And on Capitol Hill, some House Democrats recently urged the administration in writing to take such action to curb the price of gasoline, which has risen on average 13 percent per gallon nationwide since this time last year.
“Obviously Iran can do a lot of damage to the global economy,” Geithner told CNBC. “And we're working very carefully to try to minimize that risk. Make sure there are alternative sources of supply from Saudi Arabia and others that help compensate for reduced export from Iran. That's an important part of our strategy. …There's a case for the use of the reserve in some circumstances, and we'll continue to look at those and evaluate that carefully.”
Supporters of the move argue that the Strategic Reserve is at 96 percent capacity, meaning the president could opt to draw down tens of millions of barrels of oil and still have plenty on hand for future supply disruptions. Last summer’s contracts, which released more than 30 million barrels of oil over several months, helped lower gas prices between 5.9 percent and 8 percent, according to various studies. Because the contract sale prices exceeded $100 a barrel for oil that cost the government less than a third of that to stockpile, the return to the Treasury was lucrative.
Whoever is elected president this fall is likely to face energy decisions with long-term consequences in a world increasingly pressured to balance supplies of petroleum against global demand. Some energy analysts predict the United States will experience even higher price pressures as early as 2014 and 2015. Higher energy prices mean slower economic growth -- and Americans, barely acknowledging the recovery, have been squeezed as gasoline prices inch toward $4 a gallon -- and beyond that in parts of the country.
Obama warned in a speech in Miami last week that there is no “silver bullet” to fix rising gasoline prices in a world marketplace. He advocated an “all of the above” energy policy -- meaning more domestic oil and natural gas production, increased conservation measures, plus investments in alternative sources of power, especially for transportation. U.S. oil production has been up, and U.S. consumption has been down, but gasoline prices still have been climbing.
White House sensitivity about the president’s support for increased oil drilling came back into sharp relief Monday as an Obama’s aide commended TransCanada’s decision to build a stretch of the proposed Keystone XL oil pipeline between Cushing, Okla., and Texas. That segment will alleviate a “bottleneck” in Oklahoma caused by increased oil production, the administration said. In a written statement from White House Press Secretary Jay Carney, the administration emphasized that Obama supports the company’s “interest in proceeding with this project,” and noted the company’s decision to submit another application for the portion of the project that would run from Canada to Nebraska. That’s the stretch of pipeline that gave Obama political heartburn in January.
Republicans on Capitol Hill and in the presidential race, including Rick Santorum, have accused Obama of rejecting an important project that would create thousands of construction jobs because he is bowing to his environmentalist base. The president’s explanation is that he denied a permit request in January because it did not allow enough time to complete an appropriate assessment, and because the governor of Nebraska raised objections to the project’s proposed pathway through his state. “We will ensure any project receives the important assessment it deserves, and will base a decision to provide a permit on the completion of that review,” Carney wrote.
The administration’s sudden enthusiasm for a Midwestern segment of the Keystone project did not particularly worry some Democrats.
“What it shows is that the president is running and will continue to run a fair, unbiased process, and that process needs to include an evaluation of the pipeline route through Nebraska, which hasn’t even been identified yet,” Weiss said. “Not only is the northern part of the Keystone pipeline not shovel-ready, but it’s not even map-ready.”
Alexis Simendinger covers the White House for RealClearPolitics. She can be reached at asimendinger@realclearpolitics.com.
Page Printed from: http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2012/02/28/as_gas_prices_spike_obama_may_tap_oil_reserve_113277.html at February 27, 2012 - 08:35:28 PM PST
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Meanwhile in West Covina:
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No Easy Fix for Gas Prices
Peter Schiff, Euro Pacific Capital | 5 hours ago | 117 | 1
By: Peter Schiff Tuesday, February 28, 2012
This month, as unleaded gasoline prices increased for 17 consecutive days (to a national average of $3.647 per gallon - up 11% thus far this year) and West Texas Intermediate crude joined Brent crude in breaking through a $100 per barrel level, energy prices emerged as a full blown political issue. While President Obama conveniently claimed that rising prices were the consequence of an improving economy (they're not, and it isn't) Republican fingers began to point sanctimoniously at current drilling policies. And while none of the accusers had any idea why prices were actually going up, the award for the most dangerous 'solution' must go to Bill O'Reilly at Fox News. The master of the "No Spin Zone" announced that high pump prices could be permanently brought down by a presidential order to restrict exports of refined gasoline. Not only does Mr. O'Reilly's idea demonstrate contempt for the U.S. Constitution but it also displays a thorough lack of economic understanding.
Oil and gas prices are high now for a very simple reason: the U.S. Federal Reserve has gone on an unapologetic campaign to push up inflation and push down the value of the U.S. dollar. Just last week on CNBC James Bullard, the President of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, stated this unequivocally. What is somewhat overlooked is the degree to which an inflationary policy at home creates inflation abroad. Many countries who peg their currencies to the U.S. dollar need to follow suit with the Fed. As China, for example, prints yuan to keep it from appreciating against the dollar, prices rise in China. This is especially true for commodities like crude oil.
Many critics, such as Mr. O'Reilly, have relied on a limited understanding of the supply/demand dynamic to question why gas prices are currently so high at home. With domestic gasoline production at a multi-year high and domestic demand at a multi-year low, he logically expects low prices. But he fails to grasp the fact that the price of gasoline is set internationally and that U.S. factors are only a component.
O'Reilly's loudly proclaimed solution is to limit the ability of U.S. refiners (and drillers) to export production abroad. If the energy stays at home, he argues, the increased supply would push down prices. Although O'Reilly professes to be a believer in free markets he argues that oil (and gasoline by extension) is really a natural resource that doesn't belong to the energy companies, but to the "folks" on Main Street. What good would "drill baby drill" do for us, he argues, if all the production is simply shipped to China?
First off, the U.S. government has no authority whatsoever to determine to whom a company may or may not sell. This concept should be absolutely clear to anyone with at least a casual allegiance to free markets. In particular, the U.S. Constitution makes it explicit that export duties are prohibited. Furthermore, energy extracted from the ground, and produced by a private enterprise, is no more a public good than a chest of drawers that has been manufactured from a tree that grows on U.S soil. Frankly, this point from Mr. O'Reilly comes straight out of the Marxist handbook and in many ways mirrors the sentiments that have been championed by the Occupy Wall Street movement. When such ideas come from the supposed "right," we should be very concerned.
But apart from the Constitutional and ideological concerns, the idea simply makes no economic sense.
In 2011 the United States ran a trade deficit of $558 billion. For now at least America has been able to reap huge benefits from the willingness of foreign producers to export to the U.S. without equal amounts of imports. China supplies us with low priced consumer goods and Saudi Arabia sells us vast quantities of oil. In return they take U.S. IOUs. Without their largesse, domestic prices for consumers would be much higher. How long they will continue to extend credit is anybody's guess, but shutting off the spigots of one of our most valuable exports won't help.
In recent years petroleum has become an increasingly large component of U.S. exports, partially filling the void left by our manufacturing output. According to the IMF, the U.S. exported $10.3 billion of oil products in 2001. By 2011, this figure had jumped nearly seven fold to more than $70 billion. How would our trading partners respond if we decided to deny them our gasoline?
Keeping more gasoline at home could hold down prices temporarily, but how much better off would the "folks" be if all the prices of Chinese made goods at Wal-Mart suddenly went up, or if such products completely disappeared from our shelves because the Chinese government decided to ban exports that they declared "belonged to the Chinese people?" What would happen to the price of energy here if Saudi Arabia made a similar decision with respect to their oil?
But most importantly, limiting the ability of U.S. energy companies to export abroad will do absolutely nothing to improve the American economy. As a result of our diminished purchasing power, American demand for oil has declined in relation to the growing demand abroad. Consequently, we are buying a continually lower percentage of the world's energy output. Consumers in emerging markets can now afford to buy some of the production that used to be snapped up by Americans. If U.S. suppliers were limited to domestic customers, then prices could drop temporarily. But what would happen then?
With the U.S. adopting a protectionist stance, and with gasoline prices in the U.S. lower than in other parts of the world, less overseas crude would be sent to American refineries. At the same time lower prices at home would constrict profits for domestic suppliers who would then scale back production (and lay off workers). The resulting decrease in supply would send prices right back up, potentially higher than before. The only change would be that we would have hamstrung one of our few viable industrial sectors. (For more about how diminishing supplies could exert upward pressures on a variety of energy products, please see the article in the latest edition of my Global Investor newsletter).
Mr. O'Reilly can spin this any way he wants it, but he is dead wrong on this point. It is surprising to me that such comments have not sparked greater outrage from the usual mainstream defenders of the free market. To an extent that very few appreciate, America derives a great deal of benefits from the current globalization of trade. Sparking a trade war now would severely reduce our already falling living standards. And given our weak position with respect to our trading partners, such a provocation may be the ultimate example of bringing a knife to a gun fight.
Rather than bashing oil companies, O'Reilly, as well as other frustrated American motorists, should direct their anger at Washington. That is because higher gasoline prices are really a Federal tax in disguise. The government's enormous deficit is financed largely by bonds that are sold to the Federal Reserve, which pays for them with newly printed money. Those excess dollars are sent abroad where they help to bid oil prices higher.
For years, mainstream economists argued that as long as unemployment remained high, the Fed could print as much money as it wanted without worrying about inflation. The argument was that the reduction in demand that results from unemployment would limit the ability of business to raise prices. However, what those economists overlooked was the simultaneous reduction in domestic supply that results from a weaker dollar (the consequence of printing money).
I have long argued that neither recession nor high unemployment would protect us from inflation. If demand falls, but supply falls faster, prices will rise. That is exactly what is happening with gas. The same dynamic is already evident in the airline industry. Fewer people are flying, but prices keep rising because airlines have responded to declining demand by reducing capacity. Since seats are disappearing faster than passengers, airlines can raise prices. At some point Americans will be complaining about soaring food prices as much more of what American farmers produce ends up on Chinese dinner tables. Because the Fed is likely to continue monetizing huge budget deficits, Americans are going to be consuming a lot less of everything, and paying a lot more for those few things they can still afford.
For full access to the March 2012 edition of the Global Investor Newsletter, click here
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License. Please feel free to repost with proper attribution and all links included.
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LOL...
Hey lets start at square 1.
What factors determine the price of Gas...
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LOL...
Hey lets start at square 1.
What factors determine the price of Gas...
I already told you moron many times, each of which obama has made drastically worse with his horrendous agenda.
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I already told you moron many times, each of which obama has made drastically worse with his horrendous agenda.
aye chill with the name callin bitch.. ill fuck you up... fully... i aint ask for all that...
now..
you tell me what fuckin factors determine the fuckin price for fuckin gas. Answer that without using Obamas name fuck face
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aye chill with the name callin bitch.. ill fuck you up... fully... i aint ask for all that...
now..
you tell me what fuckin factors determine the fuckin price for fuckin gas. Answer that without using Obamas name fuck face
1. Price of oil
2. Refining cost
3. Govt EPA mandates
4. Taxes
5. Value of the currency relative to the commodity
6. Extraction and production cost
7. Supply and Demand
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1. Price of oil
2. Refining cost
3. Govt EPA mandates
4. Taxes
5. Value of the currency relative to the commodity
6. Extraction and production cost
7. Supply and Demand
What sets the price of Oil, as that is by far the most important determing factor when the price of gas is set.
So what sets the price of crude oil
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Bernie Sanders is an independent senator from Vermont. He was elected to the U.S. Senate in 2006 after serving 16 years in the House of Representatives and is the longest-serving independent member of Congress in American history.
(CNN) -- Gas prices approaching $4 a gallon on average are causing severe economic pain for millions of Americans. Pump prices spiked 5% in the past month alone. Crude oil prices stood at $108 on Friday, up from only double digits at the beginning of the month.
What's the cause? Forget what you may have read about the laws of supply and demand. Oil and gas prices have almost nothing to do with economic fundamentals. According to the Energy Information Administration, the supply of oil and gasoline is higher today than it was three years ago, when the national average for a gallon of gasoline was just $1.90. Meanwhile, the demand for oil in the U.S. is at its lowest level since April of 1997.
Is Big Oil to blame? Sure. Partly. Big oil companies have been gouging consumers for years. They have made almost $1 trillion in profits over the past decade, in part thanks to ridiculous federal subsidies and tax loopholes. I have proposed legislation to end those pointless giveaways to some of the biggest and most profitable corporations in the history of the world.
But there's another reason for the wild rise in gas prices. The culprit is Wall Street. Speculators are raking in profits by gambling in the loosely regulated commodity markets for gas and oil.
A decade ago, speculators controlled only about 30% of the oil futures market. Today, Wall Street speculators control nearly 80% of this market. Many of those people buying and selling oil in the commodity markets will never use a drop of this oil. They are not airlines or trucking companies who will use the fuel in the future. The only function of the speculators in this process is to make as much money as they can, as quickly as they can.
I've seen the raw documents that prove the role of speculators. Commodity Futures Trading Commission records showed that in the summer of 2008, when gas prices spiked to more than $4 a gallon, speculators overwhelmingly controlled the crude oil futures market. The commission, which supposedly represents the interests of the American people, had kept the information hidden from the public for nearly three years. That alone is an outrage. The American people had a right to know exactly who caused gas prices to skyrocket in 2008 and who is causing them to spike today.
Even those inside the oil industry have admitted that speculation is driving up the price of gasoline. The CEO of Exxon-Mobil, Rex Tillerson, told a Senate hearing last year that speculation was driving up the price of a barrel of oil by as much as 40%. The general counsel of Delta Airlines, Ben Hirst, and the experts at Goldman Sachs also said excessive speculation is causing oil prices to spike by up to 40%. Even Saudi Arabia, the largest exporter of oil in the world, told the Bush administration back in 2008, during the last major spike in oil prices, that speculation was responsible for about $40 of a barrel of oil.
Just last week, Commissioner Bart Chilton, one of the only Commodity Futures Trading Commission members looking out for consumers, calculated how much extra drivers are being charged as a result of Wall Street speculation. If you drive a relatively fuel-efficient vehicle such as a Honda Civic, you pay an extra $7.30 every time you fill your tank. For larger vehicles, such as a Ford F150, drivers pay an extra $14.56 for each fill-up. That works out to more than $750 a year going directly from your wallet or pocketbook to the Wall Street speculators.
So as speculators gamble, millions of Americans are paying what amounts to a "speculators tax" to feed Wall Street's greed. People who live in rural areas like my home state of Vermont are hit harder than most because they buy gas to drive long distances to their jobs.
It doesn't have to work this way. The current spike in oil and gasoline prices was avoidable. Under the Wall Street reform act that Congress passed in 2010, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission was ordered to impose strict limits on the amount of oil that Wall Street speculators could trade in the energy futures market. The regulators dragged their feet.
Finally, after months and months of law-breaking delays, the commission in October adopted a rule. It was a weak version of a proposal that might have put meaningful limits on the number of futures and swaps contracts a single trader could hold. Even the watered-down regulation adopted by the industry-friendly commission was challenged in court. The Financial Markets Association and the International Swaps and Derivatives Association wanted free rein to continue unregulated gambling in the oil markets.
So today, Wall Street once again is laughing all the way to the bank. Once again, federal regulators should move aggressively to end excessive oil speculation. We must do everything we can to lower gas prices so that they reflect the fundamentals of supply and demand and bring needed relief to the American people.
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HUH?????? I thought Obama dealt with that in Dodd Frank?
Another FAIL
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In what is becoming a troubling pattern, financial regulators have yet again delayed a vote on a crucial provision of the Dodd-Frank Act.
The Commodity Futures Trading Commission again put off voting on a rule that would more strictly regulate the massive swaps market, which is used by firms to fix or lock in their energy costs, more clearly defining which banks and energy companies would be subject to costly regulations. Major commodity companies, such as BP, Shell and Cargill have vigorously argued that they should be exempt from the new regulations because their use of swaps is necessary to insulate themselves from major changes in prices and currency values.
stay up with the news
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Guess who runs the CFTC? Obama's corrupt hack donor Gary Gentlser.
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What sets the price of Oil, as that is by far the most important determing factor when the price of gas is set.
So what sets the price of crude oil
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Thank you Barack Obama for hinging your reelection efforts on Bernanke's ability to print. Now you're reaping what you sowed in your attempts to revive the housing market. Congrats, douche bag!
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Same thing that set gold, silver, copper, platinum food, etc through th roof.
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Worried Dems pressing Obama on gas prices
The Hill ^ | 2/28/12 | Alexander Bolton
Posted on February 29, 2012 1:01:17 AM EST by Libloather
Worried Dems pressing Obama on gas prices
By Alexander Bolton - 02/28/12 09:45 PM ET
Congressional Democrats are ramping up pressure on President Obama to tap the Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR) to prevent rising gas prices from threatening the economy and their election-year prospects.
They are growing anxious that the price of fuel could reverse their political fortunes, which had been improving due to signs of growth in the economy.
Republicans have hammered Democrats on the price spike, repeatedly noting that gas prices — now at $3.72 per gallon for regular — have doubled since Obama won the White House.
House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) on Tuesday blamed Obama and “radical environmental groups” for fuel prices and said it was “about damn time” the nation developed a comprehensive energy policy.
Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.) said the price increase “isn’t simply the result of forces we can’t control. It is to a large extent the result of a vision that this president laid out even before he was elected to office.”
Democrats argue the price surge reflects the gathering strength of the economy, which has boosted demand for fuel. Still, they worry the issue could become a liability in the fall.
Senior Democratic lawmakers and vulnerable incumbents want Obama to consider releasing tens of millions of barrels of oil stored in the SPR’s special salt caverns along the Gulf Coast.
“We may need it because this is a central issue to economic recovery. I don’t rule that out if there isn’t a move in the right direction,” said Sen. Dick Durbin (Ill.), the second-ranking Democratic leader in the upper chamber.
“If it’s going to jeopardize economic recovery, the president should seriously consider it,” Durbin added.
Sen. Jon Tester (D-Mont.), who is facing a tough reelection race, said Obama should consider tapping the reserve along with other strategies to boost domestic oil supplies, such as approving construction of the Keystone XL oil sands pipeline from Montana to Texas.
Another vulnerable incumbent, Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio), said, “I’m OK with that” when asked about the president tapping the emergency stockpile.
Last year, Obama released 30 million barrels of oil from the reserve as part of an international agreement to compensate for the disruption of oil production in Libya.
Democrats say the president should act again because uncertainty over Iran’s supply threatens to create another price spike.
“I think they should consider that as they did under Libya where there was an international effort with our allies. That has to be an option on the table,” said Sen. Jack Reed (D-R.I.), a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, who added that uncertainty about a possible Israeli strike against Iran has increased “geopolitical risk.”
Republican leaders pushed back, arguing it would be irresponsible to use oil that is set aside for national emergencies.
“The [SPR] is there for an emergency situation. You have to ask the question: If there were release from the [SPR], would it have the desired effect, and how long would it have the desired effect?” McConnell said.
Republicans say Obama should lift restrictions on domestic oil-and-gas drilling if he’s serious about lowering prices.
Obama tried to pre-empt the GOP attack last week as oil surged above $109 a barrel. Speaking at the University of Miami on Thursday, Obama dismissed the Republican claim that expanded drilling would lower prices at the pump.
“You can bet that since it’s an election year, they’re already dusting off their three-point plan for $2 gas. And I’ll save you the suspense. Step one is to drill, and step two is to drill. And then step three is to keep drilling,” Obama said.
“First of all, while there are no silver bullets short term when it comes to gas prices — and anybody who says otherwise isn’t telling the truth — I have directed my administration to look for every single area where we can make an impact and help consumers in the months ahead,” he added.
Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner told CNBC on Friday that the administration could tap the reserve, and a White House spokesman said nothing is off the table when it comes to reducing high gas prices.
Some Democratic leaders, however, have declined to push the administration.
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) hedged when asked about pulling from the reserve.
“We know that that’s to be used in case of an emergency,” Reid said. “As the president said in his remarks just the other day, there’s no easy fix. There’s no easy fix. We’re going to do anything that we can that’s reasonable to try to lessen our dependence on foreign oil.”
In June, Reid applauded Obama’s decision to use emergency oil reserves to keep prices in check.
“This decision should calm the markets, lower prices and provide some relief for Americans whose wallets are already strained by record prices at the pump,” he said.
Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.), the third-ranking member of the Senate Democratic leadership, last year pushed Obama to release oil from the reserve, but now has taken a different tack. He wants Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to press Saudi Arabia to boost its production in case Iran cuts supply.
“The SPR is not as good a solution as the Saudi solution, and that’s for a couple of reasons. First, it’s limited,” he said on CNBC Tuesday. “The Saudis and the Gulf states could produce an additional 2.8 million barrels of oil way on into the future. The SPR is somewhat limited. And the SPR works better when there’s an immediate crisis.”
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Chu: DOE working to wean U.S. off oil, not lower prices
Politico ^ | 2/28/2012 | By ALEX GUILLEN
The Energy Department isn’t working to lower gasoline prices directly, Secretary Steven Chu said Tuesday after a Republican lawmaker scolded him for his now-infamous 2008 comment that gas prices in the U.S. should be as high as in Europe.
Instead, DOE is working to promote alternatives such as biofuels and electric vehicles, Chu told House appropriators during a hearing on DOE’s budget.
But Americans need relief now, Rep. Alan Nunnelee (R-Miss.) said — not high gasoline prices that could eventually push them to alternatives.
“I can’t look at motivations. I have to look at results. And under this administration the price of gasoline has doubled,” Nunnelee told Chu.
“The people of north Mississippi can’t be here, so I have to be here and be their voice for them,” Nunnelee added. “I have to tell you that $8 a gallon gasoline makes them afraid. It’s a cruel tax on the people of north Mississippi as they try to go back and forth to work. It’s a cloud hanging over economic development and job creation.”
(Excerpt) Read more at politico.com ...
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The largest component is the cost of crude oil, which is 76 percent of the cost of gasoline. The price of crude is volatile; a barrel of crude oil in 2004 was an average of $37, according to the Atlantic. In April 2011, it was about $111.
On Feb. 24, 2012, according to MarketWatch, crude oil hit $109.77 per barrel. The cost of crude oil is set by markets and suppliers, not the president. The other components of the cost are refining, marketing and distribution, which account for 12 percent in total. Those also have nothing to do with who’s in office.
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http://bud-meyers.blogspot.com/2012/02/profits-drive-gasoline-prices-not.html
Profits Drive Gasoline Prices, not Obama's Energy Policy
Sunday, February 26, 2012
Profits Drive Gasoline Prices, not Obama's Energy Policy
CNN - Newt Gingrich has been promising to get gasoline prices down to $2.50 per gallon (and also to build a colony on the moon). The sad thing is, many Republicans believe him.
"This is absurd," said Paul Bledsoe, a Bipartisan Policy Center scholar who spent more than 20 years working on energy policy in Washington. "Obviously the price of oil is set on a global market. In the immediate term there is almost nothing you can do."
For decades oil companies have always done what any corporation does, maximize its profits. That's no secret, and the fact that they have resorted to almost any measure possible to increase the cost of a barrel of oil is no secret either. To say that Obama's energy policy has something to do with the price of gasoline is just plain ignorant.
America could be the only producer of crude oil in the entire world, and if ExxonMobil can extract it for $11 a barrel with cheap leases on U.S. federal lands, and then sell it to China for $100 a barrel, they would...and we would still pay higher prices at the pump because of the "global economy". Unless of course, you think like me and Oliver Stone, and just blamed Obama for NOT nationalizing the energy industry.
From www.oil-price.net - "Though demand and supply is responsible for substantial hikes, "free enterprise" is to be blamed at all other occasions. And how? The moment there is speculation that crude will be trading higher, retailers usually increase their prices in an attempt to keep their margins intact for future purchases. Contrarily, when the price of the crude decreases, retailers are not inclined to lower rates as fast as they have raised it in order to maximize profits."
There also have been reports that some oil companies stockpile crude instead of sending it to the refineries when the prices are low. The logic is to make profits when the prices rise further in the global market.
DailyMail, November 2009 - "These tankers have been parked off our shores for months, refusing to unload their oil until prices have risen even higher. The delay makes millions for speculators... and keeps your petrol costs soaring."
Telegraph, February 2010 - "Oil stored at sea could mean bigger problems and prices in the future. "The use of temporary floating tankers has become so popular that even the investment banks had begun to charter ships, leaving the market with a shortage of vessels for transporting other commodities."
Under George W. Bush (on July 17, 2008) the average cost for a gallon of gasoline was at it highest level ever in U.S. history (at $4.11 a gallon). This was after the record peak of $145 for a barrel of West Texas Intermediate crude oil (WTI).. Where was all the Republican outrage then? They weren't crying about the Keystone pipeline in those days.
And then 5 months later on December 23, 2008, the WTI crude oil spot price fell to $30.28 a barrel, and the oil companies were still making profits.
Business Insider now makes the case that simple "supply and demand" drives the price of oil, but not based on the U.S. economy, but because of the global economy. "Demand is booming in Asia and the Former Soviet Union, offsetting mediocre demand in the U.S. and Europe."
Is it different today than during the 1979-1980 period of rapidly increasing prices? Saudi Arabia's oil minister Ahmed Yamani had repeatedly warned other members of OPEC that high prices would lead to a reduction in demand. His warnings fell on deaf ears. Surging prices caused several reactions among consumers: better insulation in new homes, increased insulation in many older homes, more energy efficiency in industrial processes, and automobiles with higher efficiency. These factors along with a global recession caused a reduction in demand which led to lower crude prices.
But it seems that now, no matter how efficient American cars become, or how low we turn our thermostats, or how depressed the demand for home heating oil is in the U.S., the price for oil and gasoline will still rise. Not because of how much we might drill, pump from Canada, or extract in cheap leases on domestic federal land, but the price is determined by how much the market can bear - by how much the oil companies can profit from the global economy.
Despite higher domestic oil production under Obama than under George W. Bush, and the lowest domestic demand for oil in the last 15 years, and one of the warmest winters on record for over 40 years, we still have higher gasoline prices. Why? Profits.
We also have less oil refineries processing the less profitable sweet crude oil (Brent). There's also the increased betting by hedge fund speculators. There was also a rising demand for oil to meet Brazil's and China's growing economies. And there is also Obama's expressed desire to raise taxes on oil companies (and cut their taxpayer subsidies).
Iranian threats is at the bottom of the list because all throughout history the domestic oil companies have always had the benefit of the U.S. military protecting their interests abroad (and the U.S. doesn't import Iranian oil).
Some argue that the Keystone XL pipeline, which would have increased the delivery of oil from Canada and North Dakota's Bakken Shale to Gulf Coast refineries could replace oil from Venezuela. But that would have little to no affect on world market prices, and what would it matter if that oil is sold to China anyway?
But many people will always find criticism for President Obama, "The reality is that most of the increase in U.S. oil and gas production has come despite of the Obama Administration."
Prices are high for no other reason than to keep the margin of oil profits high. Some suggested that a tighter monetary policy is the best choice under the current economic circumstances (the high cost of oil in relation to the value of the dollar), but that has also been dismissed out of hand.
The current run-up in prices comes despite sinking demand in the U.S. - “Petrol demand is as low as it’s been since April 1997,” says Tom Kloza, chief oil analyst for the Oil Price Information Service. “People are properly puzzled by the fact that we’re using less gas than we have in years, yet we’re paying more.”
Kloza believes much of the increase is due to speculative money that’s flowed into gasoline futures contracts since the beginning of the year, mostly from hedge funds and large money managers. “We’ve seen about $11 billion of speculative money come in on the long side of gas futures,” he says. “Each of the last three weeks we’ve seen a record net long position being taken.”
It appears that speculation in oil futures (by those who never actually take delivery) is the biggest driving force of oil prices. Goldman Sach’s alone has huge blocks of stock in oil companies and trades vast quantities of oil futures.
Forbes reported last year: "Rex Tillerson, the boss of ExxonMobil admitted last week that the price of oil (based purely on supply and demand) should be in the $60 to $70 a barrel range. The reason it’s above $100 a barrel, Tillerson explained, is due to the oil majors using futures contracts to lock in current high prices, and speculation that is engineered by the high-frequency trading of quantitative hedge funds."
Forbes also reported that "the average cost of producing 1 barrel of oil was $11...and that "the profits for the big 6 oil companies was $36 billion in the year’s first quarter. A large part of the $36 billion was used to buyback shares or pay dividends to shareholders."
Buying back shares increases share value with less outstanding shares, also increases the value of stock options paid as executive compensation for "performance" to oil executives. CEOs like Rex Tillerson, who are shareholders with stock options, can get paid more when they can sell their oil for more. And Tillerson also pays Mitt Romney's tax rate - - 15% on capital gains made on his stock options.
Refineries have also been getting squeezed by higher crude prices over the past several months, forcing some of them to shut down rather than operate at a loss, says Stevens.
The more likely reason behind the price increase for gasoline is the recent spate of refinery closures in the U.S. Over the past year, refineries have faced a classic margin squeeze. Prices for Brent crude have gone up, but demand for gasoline in the U.S. is at a 15-year low. That means refineries haven’t been able to pass on the higher prices to their customers. As a result, companies have chosen to shut down a handful of large refineries rather than continue to "lose money" on them. (To mean, earn less profit.)
The U.S. refining industry is being split in two. On one hand are the older refineries, mostly on the East and Gulf Coasts, that are set up to handle only the higher quality Brent “sweet” crude—the stuff that comes from the Middle East and the North Sea. Brent is easier to refine, though it’s gotten considerably more expensive recently. (Certainly another reason for higher gas prices.)
Then there are the plants able to refine the heavier, dirtier West Texas Intermediate (WTI), the stuff that comes from Canadian tar sands, the deep water of the Gulf of Mexico, and the newer outposts in North Dakota, which just passed Ecuador in oil production. These refineries tend to be clustered in the Midwest - - places such as Oklahoma, Kansas, and outside Chicago.
While the price of Brent crude has closed at over $120 a barrel in recent days, WTI is trading at closer to $106. That simple differential is the reason older refineries that can handle only Brent are "hemorrhaging cash" and shutting down, while refineries that can handle WTI are on markets (greater profits).
And then there's Obama repeated proposal that "now is the time to raise taxes on oil and gas companies."
America is pumping more oil out of the ground now than it has in years, thanks to a surge in onshore drilling - - and U.S. refineries are producing more gasoline and diesel than ever. But Americans’ gasoline consumption is at an 14-year-low.
So with all that supply and not much demand, why have gasoline prices risen high enough this year to resurface as a national political issue? The short answer, experts say, is that the "global economy and geopolitics", not the U.S. industry or economy, are driving gasoline prices. (profits)
The Wall Street Journal's Tom Fowler tries his best to explain why gas prices balk supply and demand. Download MP3. But between now and Election Day, gasoline prices will be most influenced by the price of oil, traded in global markets, not U.S. supply and demand.
In the past, the price of U.S. oil at a key storage hub in Cushing, Oklahoma, most directly influenced U.S. gasoline prices. But that price of U.S. crude, known as West Texas Intermediate, has strayed far below crude from other parts of the globe that is actually used by many U.S. refineries, particularly along the coasts.
Thus the price of oil from the North Sea, known as Brent, has become the benchmark most tied to U.S. retail gasoline prices. About half of the U.S.'s gasoline is refined from overseas crude oil.
Some argue that an unstable situation in the Middle East, especially the turmoil over Iran tensions, has sent global crude prices surging. "There's a war risk premium that is weighing heavily on the markets," said Amy Myers Jaffe, senior energy adviser at Rice University's Baker Institute.
But for whatever reasons, the oil companies never suffer for inflation or the higher cost of production. Any "perceived threat" in the Middle-East or elsewhere is just used as another reason to raise prices...to stuff more profits into the pockets of the oil executives and the investment bankers.
Forbes reports that ExxonMobil's CEO Rex Tillerson has a 5-year compensation plan earning him $40.2 million, while half of all working Americans earn less than $27,000 a year - - when the poverty line for a family of four is $22,314. These are the people that the Republicans chastise and falsely accuse* for not paying federal taxes.
Cheap leases, scant royalties, taxpayers' obligations, and environmental hazards - the burden to American citizens for gas and oil profits that still exist in Obama's energy policy.
The Institute for Policy Studies: Although Obama's Interior Department budget proposal refers to reforms in royalties paid for private companies to use public lands and the collection of $3 billion over 10 years, this does not go far enough. Revenue could be far greater and the costs to the taxpayer far lower if the 1872 mining law, which allows mining companies to stake a claim on public lands for a mere $5 an acre (still!), while mining for highly lucrative oil, gas, gold and other minerals, were brought into the 21st century.
Environmental protections are non-existent in these claims, resulting in the headwaters of roughly 40 percent of Western U.S. watersheds being polluted, according to the EPA, and the taxpayer picking up the bill for cleanup, estimated by Earthworks and others at roughly $32-72 billion. An amendment to this law could generate income on the order of $122 billion for U.S. taxpayers on public lands, discourage wasteful, hazardous and speculative investment on public lands, and ensure that highly profitable mining companies are forced to clean up their own messes.
A new study shows that fracking for natural gas causes 8 percent of the gas to escape into the atmosphere, where it is 105 times more potent than CO2 over its 20-year lifespan.
Chemicals considered "trade secrets" for the gas industry (thanks to an energy policy developed in secret meetings by former Vice President Dick Cheney) have residents living near fracking wells complaining of health problems. In some cases, they can literally light the water coming out of their taps on fire.
In addition, scientists have started to link earthquakes — such as the rare ones that have been shaking Ohio, New York, and Arkansas — with fracking.
* Any "surplus" in the domestic production of oil and gas will be sold at "market value" in the global economy, and won't necessarily reduce energy costs to American businesses and for American citizens. "Energy independence" is a myth so long as oil and and gas corporations are allowed to continue to exploit America's natural resources for personal financial gain.
* The Heritage Foundation, a right-wing think tank, boldly claims: Nearly Half of All Americans Don’t Pay Income Taxes. But these figures also include children, the retired, and others who do not participate in the labor force. In one sentence the Heritage Foundation explains: "That means 151.7 million Americans paid nothing in 2009. By comparison, 34.8 million tax filers paid no taxes in 1984."
How can 151.7 million not pay any taxes when that is about 100% of our work force? It’s a myth that those Americans don't pay taxes. In truth 86% pay federal income taxes. Here is the full quote from the Tax Policy Center,
"The fraction of tax units paying no income tax varies widely by filing status and type of unit. About 47 percent of single filers will owe no tax, compared with 38 percent of joint filers and 72 percent of heads of household. More than half of elderly tax units and tax units with children will pay no income tax this year."
But unlike most of those poor people, CEOs like Rex Tillerson, and politicians like Newt Gingrich and Mitt Romney, don't worry about the price of a gallon of gasoline - - or the cost of home heating oil.
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http://www.examiner.com/economic-policy-in-national/republicans-blame-obama-for-gas-prices-are-they-right
Republicans blame Obama for gas prices; Are they right?
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Robert Bowen
Economic Policy Examiner
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0 0Submit0redditPrintEmail StumbleUponredditPrintEm ail.Republicans have been slipping in the polls for months especially since the debacles over the debt ceiling and pay roll tax cut last year. Congress is at an all time low in popularity. Obama has been rising in the polls and his favorability numbers are improving as the economy recovers. Republicans now blame President Obama for rising gas prices. Do they have a legitimate case?
Republicans know that no President has much to do with the price of oil or the price of gasoline especially in the short term. The fact of the matter is, the price of oil is set by a global market, not the US market, and the price of gasoline is as much affected by Wall Street speculators as it is by anything else.
It is not true, however, the Obama is to blame, or that any Republican President could do much about it short term.
The inconvenient truth (for Republicans) about gas prices
There are several facts about gas prices that Republicans are not telling you in their naked political attacks.
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First, they accuse Obama of “stopping domestic oil production.” This is a lie. The facts are that under the Obama administration, domestic oil production is up to levels higher than under Republican Presidents. According to The Progress Report, the number of oil drilling rigs in the U.S. hit a record last week, having quadrupled in number over the past three years . Between oil and gas drilling rigs, the U.S. now has more rigs at work than the rest of the world combined.
The US Energy Information Agency statistics show that domestic oil production peaked during the Carter administration and declined steadily under all Presidents from Reagan through George Bush.
Production has increased under Obama, however. In 2008, the last year of the Bush Administration, domestic oil production had fallen to 1,811,819,000 barrels of oil. In 2011, domestic oil production increased to the level in 2005, and is on pace to reach a higher level than when Bush took office in 2000.
Drill baby drill? We have been drilling and pumping like crazy for the last three years, but despite that, gas prices have gone up from $1.79 a gallon to the high $3 dollars a gallon. Drilling does not affect gas prices.
Secondly, gas prices are going up despite declining demand by American consumers. The demand for oil on a global basis is sky rocketing. China and India are driving huge increases in global demand for oil. Oil prices are driven by this market, not the domestic market, and this trend will only continue since the populations of those two countries dwarf ours.
Thirdly, there is a lot of Republican clap trap over the Keystone XL pipeline. Truth of the matter is it would do nothing to lower gas prices if it were opened today. The refiners in the gulf are running at capacity now. All the pipeline would do is substitute Canadian oil for the oil they now use to refine. It would not increase gasoline supply. Only building new refineries would do that.
Oil companies do not automatically lower gas prices when crude oil goes down. They don’t however increase prices when they think crude oil will go up.
The reason gas prices are high now is that commodity speculators are causing crude oil prices to increase over “concerns” about disruptions in future global oil supply. Iran has stopped selling oil to Britain and France over sanctions, and this has the affect to increasing prices. Iran has threatened to block the Straits of Hormuz which would disrupt oil shipment.
For these reasons, they are bidding up the price of oil. Gas companies are taking advantage of that to increase prices even though there has been no decline in US oil supplies. This has nothing to do with Obama.
Oil companies are making huge profits while taxpayers subsidize them billions of dollars a year. Republicans want to increase the subsidies. Oil companies could take less profit and keep gas prices down if they chose to. They want Obama out of office, and would rather pocket the windfall than help consumers. They love the excuse to increase gas prices at the pump.
So, it is perhaps good politics for the GOP to blame Obama, but it is not factual
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Continue reading on Examiner.com Republicans blame Obama for gas prices; Are they right? - National economic policy | Examiner.com http://www.examiner.com/economic-policy-in-national/republicans-blame-obama-for-gas-prices-are-they-right#ixzz1nmT20jLA
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LOL!!!!
Obama has done everything to skyrocket energy prices and should rejoice in this instead of blaming everyone else.
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LMFAO at the obama drones and 95ers seeking cover for obamas bullshit policies coming home to roost.
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http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics/2012/02/jennifer-granholm-blaming-obama-for-gas-prices-like-blaming-giuliani-for-911/
Feb 26, 2012 1:39pm
Jennifer Granholm: Blaming Obama for Gas Prices Like Blaming Giuliani for 9/11 Email
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As gas prices rise to record levels for this time of the year, former Democratic Michigan Gov. Jennifer Granholm said it is “totally ridiculous” to blame President Obama for the spike.
“I think blaming the president for high gas prices is like blaming Rudy Giuliani for 9/11,” Granholm said today on the “This Week” roundtable. “It’s totally ridiculous.”
“If you opened up every single potential drilling opportunity in the United States, it would have the effect of lowering gas prices three cents, maybe,” Granholm added. “And that’s because, of course, oil is traded on a global market.”
Former Republican Michigan Gov. John Engler countered that the Obama administration has not done enough to open public lands for drilling as prices have soared in the last three years. He said the high prices will be a key election issue.
“It’s real simple. I mean, gas prices have gone up 100 percent basically from his inauguration day to present time,” Engler said. “It’s not the only issue, but it is a marker.”
But ABC’s George Will said anger over high gas prices will not lead to an easy victory for Republicans in November.
“Right now, they think they’re going to float in on high gas prices,” Will said of the GOP field. “And that’s just preposterous.”
“Newt Gingrich said the American people have a right to demand $2.50 gas,” Will added. “They have the right to demand that lobsters grow on trees, but I mean, this is economic nonsense.”
ABC’s Cokie Roberts said the economy and job creation will be the driving issue in the general election once the Republican nominee is settled.
“Do people wake up the day before the election and say, ‘I want this guy who’s in the White House now to stay there for four more years because I trust him more than the other guy to make my job situation better?’ That’s the fundamental question,” Roberts said.
Engler agreed, saying voters will focus on leadership on the economy.
“Voters aren’t analysts,” he said. “Voters are emotional, and it’s about leadership. And they know what they’ve got. If they like that, they can vote to keep it.”
Granholm, host of Current TV’s “The War Room,” said the contested Republican race has been “amazing” for Democrats, as Mitt Romney and Rick Santorum battle each other — potentially damaging each other in the process.
“Democrats are hoping this lasts for a while,” Granholm said. “Even someone who came into this as perceived to be somewhat moderate, which was Mitt Romney, he’s had to move so far to the right, I don’t know how he walks it back.”
Engler, now president of the Business Roundtable, still backs Romney to win the critical Michigan primary this week, and to continue on to the nomination.
“Mitt Romney’s on message in the state and I think he has, sort of, righted himself and is edging ahead,” Engler said. “And I still think he’s the only one who’s prepared to go the long, long distance.”
And Engler said he believes Romney can compete with Obama once the focus turns to the economy in the general election battle in the fall.
“Most of the American electorate are still disapproving of the performance of the president on the economy,” Engler said. “The Obama record now comes into sharp focus, and I think that’s where the debate comes down.”
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http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/opinion/readersrespond/bs-ed-gas-prices-20120227,0,7783961.story
Gas prices went up more under Bush than Obama
Comments 10Share192
12:45 p.m. EST, February 27, 2012
Letter writer Ron Wirsing seems to have a conveniently short memory when it comes to gas prices ("Obama's policies mean we will soon see $5 gas," Feb. 24). He wants to "go back to 2008 prices."
I remember 2008 gas prices well, as I had a service business at the time. Gas was $4.20 a gallon for regular. This was duringGeorge W. Bush's presidency. When President Bush came into office in 2002, gas was only $1.40 a gallon.
So gas tripled in price during the time Mr. Bush was in office. In order for President Obama to match Mr. Bush's record, gas would have to go to $12.60 a gallon. Oddly, I don't hear any Republicans boasting about tripling gas prices when they last occupied the White House.
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Why can't Obama do something about high gas prices?
Obama's policies mean $5 gas
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Barack Obama The same is true of the national debt. Mr. Bush doubled it from $5 trillion to $10 trillion. Mr. Obama still has a long way to go to equal that record, too.
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Everyone knows, but conveniently ignores, the fact that Republicans have always raised the national debt more than Democrats. In fact, at least two-thirds of the national debt was added during Republican presidencies, and most of that was added by Ronald Reagan and Mr. Bush.
David Liddle, Pasadena
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Jennifer Granholm? ? ? ? ? LMFAO ! ! ! ! !
Ha ha ha h - are you fucking kidding? Why not get a piece from that cvnt pelosi while you are at it?
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tell me youre joking... as much partisan shit that you put on here... get the fuck out of here
And please dispute the overwhelming majority factor for the price of gas is the price of crude which is set on a world market that obama has no control over.. please... i think you do know that but you just play dumb like you do on so many other issues.. you go hard at it.. play dumb when your sensational rhetoric is debunked by boring ol facts, then you just let it die down and you never post in said thread again.. that is your calling card, its what you do. You never let a thing like real facts and figures and root cause get in the way of a good dust up filled with half facts and bull shit to get people riled up. You are Anti-Science. You my friend.. are a joke
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tell me youre joking... as much partisan shit that you put on here... get the fuck out of here
And please dispute the overwhelming majority factor for the price of gas is the price of crude which is set on a world market that obama has no control over.. please... i think you do know that but you just play dumb like you do on so many other issues.. you go hard at it.. play dumb when your sensational rhetoric is debunked by boring ol facts, then you just let it die down and you never post in said thread again.. that is your calling card, its what you do. You never let a thing like real facts and figures and root cause get in the way of a good dust up filled with half facts and bull shit to get people riled up. You are Anti-Science. You my friend.. are a joke
Please dispute this you shill. Obama very much has the power to help with prices of crude through his policies. Whether its creating more supply or refining, whether its stopping the spending spree, whether its stopping the war mongering across the ME, Obama has a lot of influence.
More bullshit excuses from the obamabots
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Please dispute this you shill. Obama very much has the power to help with prices of crude through his policies. Whether its creating more supply or refining, whether its stopping the spending spree, whether its stopping the war mongering across the ME, Obama has a lot of influence.
More bullshit excuses from the obamabots
Oh wow.. you really think that Obama Sets The price of Crude... Which is a Global Comidity? Traded on a World Market. WOW...
I swear i know you know this but youre playing dumb.. No one can be that dumb.. they just cant.
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i don't think he's playing anymore
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And those prices are impacted by our policies just like food, gold, silver, platinum, etc.
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And those prices are impacted by our policies just like food, gold, silver, platinum, etc.
Ok... seems to me you dont really give a shit about facts or reality, so its no reason to argue or present them to you. You just dont care.
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Ok... seems to me you dont really give a shit about facts or reality, so its no reason to argue or present them to you. You just dont care.
Whatever - keep making excuses for the messiah. Everything is always an excuse, blame someone else, etc when it comes to obamas horrible policies resulting in a mess or making an existing mess even worse.
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he's the poster boy of the dumbing down of the republican party ;D
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he's the poster boy of the dumbing down of the republican party ;D
Was pelosi and obama wrong in 2007 when they blamed Bush?
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Whatever - keep making excuses for the messiah. Everything is always an excuse, blame someone else, etc when it comes to obamas horrible policies resulting in a mess or making an existing mess even worse.
Ok.. so just forget the fact that ive listed the shit im not agreeing with.. The fact that i am an independent and ive voiced my dismay for Obama and my intensions to vote for Paul.. That shit goes out the window because i dont suscribe to your total bullshit and lies.
Ive said before, Bush had no control over the world price of Oil.. and he had no control over the gas being $4.60 a gal in summer of 2008.... So.. again.. try to understand how the market works. What really drives the prices and take off the "i hate obama" specs every time you attempt to discuss a topic.
Im almost positive you have no clue what the term Objective is. So you can keep saying that "ohh youre a 95% er and you cover for obama" but its not true and you know it as it has been well documented for about 3 years now. So stop trying to deflect and pick an isolated line out of my post to attack, and get some non partisan facts to back up what ever youre talking about. And just because no one drinks your spiked kool aid and jump on the i hate obama band wagon on every topic doesnt make them an Obamabot. It makes them a rational American that knows the difference between facts and Rhetoric.
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Ok.. so just forget the fact that ive listed the shit im not agreeing with.. The fact that i am an independent and ive voiced my dismay for Obama and my intensions to vote for Paul.. That shit goes out the window because i dont suscribe to your total bullshit and lies.
Ive said before, Bush had no control over the world price of Oil.. and he had no control over the gas being $4.60 a gal in summer of 2008.... So.. again.. try to understand how the market works. What really drives the prices and take off the "i hate obama" specs every time you attempt to discuss a topic.
Im almost positive you have no clue what the term Objective is. So you can keep saying that "ohh youre a 95% er and you cover for obama" but its not true and you know it as it has been well documented for about 3 years now. So stop trying to deflect and pick an isolated line out of my post to attack, and get some non partisan facts to back up what ever youre talking about. And just because no one drinks your spiked kool aid and jump on the i hate obama band wagon on every topic doesnt make them an Obamabot. It makes them a rational American that knows the difference between facts and Rhetoric.
When Bush had two wars going on and appointed Helicopter Ben as Fed Chairman, the Keynsian bullshit started and spiking everything.
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When Bush had two wars going on and appointed Helicopter Ben as Fed Chairman, the Keynsian bullshit started and spiking everything.
As my 'Stupid and oil prices' article (as well as others) have pointed out, Obama has been encouraging Bernanke to QE to infinity. We're reaping the rewards of that. Too bad the Usurper never took an economics class.
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Gas Price Rise Tied to Obama Policy
http://www.usbcnews.com/gas-price-rise-tied-to-obama-policy.html
_ When he was still candidate Obama, he spoke at length to a reporter with the San Francisco Chronicle in January of 2008. On the topic of energy production, then-Senator Obama outlined his plans to reduce energy consumption by drastically increasing regulation and costs. “When I was asked earlier about the issue of coal… under my plan... electricity rates would necessarily skyrocket… coal power plants, natural gas… you name it… whatever the plants were, whatever the industry was...”
However today, the Democratic administration is trying to project a different image of being supportive of working class Americans. The White House and its allies in the press are presenting a narrative of being frustrated and confused about not being able to lower the price of gas for consumers. However not only was Obama clear about the intentions but his surrogates expressed identical sentiments.
Later in the same interview, he indicated it wasn't merely a question of regulating power companies to insure they operate in an environmentally-friendly manner. The plan was to insure they didn't operate at all: “...So if somebody wants to build a coal-powered plant, they can; it's just that it will bankrupt them...”The administration has since claimed to be in favor of lowering regulations but businesses are unhappy with the lack of action to back up the rhetoric.
In September 2008, Steven Chu, who is now President Obama's Energy Secretary, talked to The Wall Street Journal: “Somehow,” Chu said, “we have to figure out how to boost the price of gasoline to the levels in Europe.” At the time Mr. Chu said that, prices in Europe averaged $9 per gallon. Economists warned at the time that this approach could prove damaging to the economy and since Obama has become president the unemployment rate has indeed skyrocketed.
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The Obama Watch
Energy Will Be Obama's Waterloo
By William Tucker on 3.2.12 @ 6:09AM
And it will all be his doing -- blaming Bush won't cut it anymore.
When President Obama suggested last week that we might eventually be replacing oil with algae, Mark Whittington of Yahoo suggested that the President had reached his "lunar base moment." It was an apt analogy. Just as Newt Gingrich's musings about a moon colony finally made the public cock its head a little when listening to him, so the moment may have arrived when the environmentalism fantasies that inhabit the President's brain will finally be exposed to the light of day.
As things stand now, $5 gas may shift the entire focus of the election onto energy and what the Administration's faculty-lounge policies have been doing to America's industrial base. To the public, "clean, green energy" will no longer be a dreamy vision of windmills and solar collectors but the hard reality of spending $100 to fill your tank. There's one more thing as well. This will be the first issue in four years where President Obama won't be able to cast reflexive blame on George Bush.
The President began his term with an Inaugural Address promise that "We will harness the sun and the winds and the soil to fuel our cars and run our factories." He has kept that promise. Using the crowbar of the $1 trillion "stimulus," the Administration has shoehorned much of the country's energy investment into a Rube-Goldberg sector of the economy made up of the half-baked projects of armchair entrepreneurs plus the off-the-charts dreams of those wanting see the entire planet transformed into an environmental utopia.
Prompted by various federal and state government tax incentives plus market-obliterating "renewable mandates," hundreds of square miles of mountain and prairie have been covered with 45-story windmills that look like the archaeological remnants of a previous race of 80-foot giants. These "wind farms" generally produce electricity that is essentially useless. When the wind blows, windmills can force other forms of generation out of the market because they are free of fuel costs. But those other forms of generation have to be kept running just in case the wind dies down. Last year when temperatures rose to 110 degrees in Texas, that state's 7 percent "wind capacity" proved absolutely useless in the heat-induced doldrums.
And wind "farms," it should be noted, always talk in terms of "capacity" rather than output. That's because they only operate about 30 percent of the time. Nobody has yet invented a way to store commercial quantities of electricity and it may be impossible without building facilities of equally gargantuan dimensions -- say an entire city block of rechargeable batteries. Without any means of storage, wind power is essentially a nuisance.
Then there is solar electricity, which, in order to access, California is now planning to cover dozens of square miles of pristine desert (yes, there is already environmental opposition) in order to prove the world can run on sunshine. Solar energy is a bit more concentrated than wind so that it only takes about five square miles of highly polished collectors to produce 100 megawatts -- when the sun shines. In the desert environment, these solar panels will require constant cleaning and polishing to keep them from getting covered with dust and therefore becoming dysfunctional. It's a labor-intensive task that will require lots of water coming from who-knows-where.
And how about the electric car? Caught in the headlock of a government bailout, GM was forced to push its Volt out the door -- where it has sat on dealer lots ever since. Sales are miserable, except for the occasional government agency that drops by to place an order. Government patronage of the electric car industry has also produced the $104,000 Fisker Karma, made in Denmark but shipped to our shores so that Leonardo DiCaprio and a few others could buy first editions. Then there was the Bright, which went bankrupt last month, and the Asperta, which failed before that.
Now all this wouldn't be so bad if the Administration hadn't spent the other half of its time trying to put the fossil fuel industry out of business in order to clear the path for the Green Age. After spending a year failing to pass cap-and-trade, the Administration has doubled down with the Environmental Protection Agency, turning it loose on the nation's coal plants. The Sierra Club just celebrated the closing of the 100th coal boiler, with more to come. Just what this will mean for the reliability of the electric grid will be revealed this summer when electrical demand peaks. Last August, with temperatures at 110 degrees, Texas consumed a record 68,000 megawatts of electricity with only 76,000 MW of generating capacity on hand. Since then, the EPA has demanded the closure of 10,000 MW of Texas coal. The state has dodged the bullet only by going to court. Industrial states from Pennsylvania to Wisconsin are facing the same dilemma. If the region starts suffering power shortages this summer, will George Bush be there to take the blame?
Not that the President hasn't been playing both sides of the fence. With extraordinary chutzpah, Obama has claimed credit for the increase in oil and gas production through fracking technology. As Newt Gingrich pointed out last week (chronicled on this site by Peter Ferrara), the only reason fracking has succeeded is that all the new deposits are east of the Rockies and therefore beneath private land. In the Far West, where the federal government still owns up to 80 percent of the territory, the pace of exploration is slower than ever. The Institute for Energy Research has shown that drilling on land owned by the Bureau of Land Management is at an all-time low, only half what it was during the Clinton Administration.
How about offshore development? For a few brief months, the Administration actually talked about opening up new areas for exploration. Then came the BP oil spill and since then the Gulf of Mexico is becoming a backwater. Of 51 rig platforms stationed in the Gulf, only 21 are under contract and 15 actually drilling, a utilization of only 41 percent. The rate in rest of the world is 83 percent and in Europe and the Mediterranean 96 percent so there's plenty of demand out there. Fourteen rigs have left the Gulf over the last two years and the pace is accelerating. Since the Gulf provides 30 percent of our domestic production, this is bound to have an impact.
This bureaucratic foot-dragging is recognized all over the oil industry. "These have been the most difficult three years from a policy standpoint that I've ever seen in my career," Bruce Vincent, president of Swift Energy, told the annual meeting of the National Association of Petroleum Engineers last week. "They've done nothing but restrict access and delay permitting." And that doesn't even include the Keystone Pipeline, where the Administration kicked away 700,000 barrels a day, 4 percent of our total consumption. And all this isn't supposed to have an effect on gas prices?
In truth, though, all these considerations are long-range. What is having a more immediate impact is probably the easy money policies of the Fed. Oil isn't climbing so much as the dollar is depreciating. As the Wall Street Journal notes, if President Obama is ready to reap the reward of rising housing and stock prices, it's only fair that he accept rising commodity prices as well. This is treacherous territory. Every major downturn since the Arab Oil Boycott of 1973 has been preceded by a run-up in oil prices. It seems to signal an inflationary bubble in the economy that is about to pop.
So what can the Administration do between now and November? To be frank, they haven't a clue. President Obama is a lawyer, not an economist or a scientist. His knowledge of energy is drawn from the chitchat in the faculty lounge.
In any case, wherever supply and demand are concerned, Democrats are rarely willing to concede to reality anyway. Bernie Sanders is already yammering about "speculators" and the apologists in the press are lamenting that "the President isn't to blame for gas prices." There are even off-the-wall stories claiming that drilling and pipelines will only make things worse. "The Canadian plan [for building Keystone] was to use their market power to raise prices in the United States and get more money from consumers," proclaimed Bloomberg breathlessly -- just as every entrepreneur plans to acquire "market power" to "get more money from customers." Only to end up have the market end up claiming power over them. When defending something like the Obama Administration's energy policies, it's always important to make simple things sound complicated.
At bottom, the real problem is what Charles Murray describes in his new book, Coming Apart --the growing gap between college-educated people schooled in the wish fulfillment of "green energy" and the hard-won, hard-nosed wisdom of blue-collar America. To the elite in New York, Washington and San Francisco, energy generation is something we're trying to put behind us. It's déclassé. Only in blue-collar regions like Pennsylvania, Ohio and North Dakota do the realities of energy become visible, tangible, and audible -- and taxable.
The good news for Republicans is that the battle lines are drawn. After a summer of $5 gas plus power shortages in industrial regions, the results of four years of Obama energy policies will be hard to avoid. And there won't be any George Bushes around to take the blame.
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The Energy Snob
By Rich Lowry
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2012/03/02/the_energy_snob_113344.html
President Barack Obama looks down on drilling almost as much as he does on people clinging bitterly to their guns and religion.
At a recent campaign event, he mocked Republicans for their three-point energy plan, every point of which he said is a call for more drilling. When the hilarity died down, he assailed all this prospective oil and gas exploration as “not a plan,” but “a bumper sticker,” a cynical and witless attempt to demagogue soaring gas prices. Pity the fools who propose such asininity and the simple-minded souls who believe it.
In practically his next breath, though, the president bragged that “under my administration, America is producing more oil today than at any time in the last eight years.” The “under my administration” is particularly rich. It implies that the lights have been on late at night at the Department of Energy — compact fluorescents, no doubt — while bureaucrats figured out how to make the United States a pincushion for the great and good work of those much misunderstood oil companies.
While lamenting the bumper-sticker simplicities of his opponents, the president of nuance neglected to mention a few details. On federal lands, oil production declined 11 percent from 2010 to 2011, according to the pro-drilling Institute for Energy Research. On state and private lands, production increased 14 percent. Natural-gas production on federal lands dropped 27 percent from 2009, and increased 28 percent on state and private lands. The president took credit for a trend with which he had nothing to do and which he has tried to obstruct.Leases for onshore exploration under the Obama administration are down roughly 35 percent from the Bush administration and 70 percent from the Clinton administration. The Obama administration deigned to look at opening new offshore areas to exploration in 2010; then the BP oil spill hit, and the administration locked down again. When he wants to pose as pro-drilling, Obama essentially pretends that he’s the president of North Dakota.
If the sheiks who run OPEC prospected for new members in America’s heartland, they’d be trying to sign up the Peace Garden State. North Dakota’s oil production increased more than 50 percent during the past year, and tripled during the past five years. This has nothing to with the president. It is the work of old-fashioned ingenuity — innovations in hydraulic fracking and horizontal drilling that unlocked the Bakken formation — and the profit motive.
We should want to replicate North Dakotas everywhere we can. Yet we deny ourselves access to oil and gas off the Atlantic and Pacific coasts, off about half the Gulf Coast, and in and around Alaska. We could be sitting on as much as 1.4 trillion barrels of technically recoverable oil. That’s an enormous amount of wealth that we turn up our noses at. If nothing else, recovering our oil and gas would create thousands of the blue-collar jobs that Democrats — rightly — say we need more of.
And oil companies will pay the federal government for the privilege. Imagine if Solyndra had given the feds $500 million to build its solar-panel plant in California, rather than the other way around. At the same time the Obama administration has thrown billions of dollars at green energy — the president’s latest enthusiasm is algae — it has denied the government billions of dollars of revenue from new leases.
It also happens that fossil fuels actually work, and even have unexpected benefits. The always-fascinating energy experts Ted Nordhaus and Michael Shellenberger note that carbon emissions in the United States have been declining and are projected to continue to do so. The short-term decline is a byproduct of the recession, but the future decline will have to do with new supplies of cleaner-burning natural gas. Europe, meanwhile, hasn’t made progress on emissions despite its cap-and-trade system. Fracking is helping us do what Euro-regulations are failing at.
The president may snicker all he likes. But the first three points of any energy plan worthy of the name should be drill, frack, and repeat.
Rich Lowry is the editor of National Review.
© 2012 by King Features Syndicate.
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Skip to comments.
Obama's Energy Plan: Buy Fuel Efficient Cars
Townhall.com ^ | March 3 2012 | Kat Hicks
Posted on March 3, 2012 1:04:47 PM EST by Kaslin
Keystone pipeline? Nah. Just buy a Prius! Or better yet -- a Volt!
Yes, President Inflate-Your-Tires has once again found a real solution to America's energy problems: buy a fuel efficient car! In his weekly address this morning, Obama suggests that the remedy to rising gas prices is coming from Detroit -- but it won't actually be here until 2025.
In his weekly radio and online address Saturday, Obama said Detroit automakers are on track to build cars that average nearly 55 miles per gallon by 2025, doubling current mileage standards.
"That means folks will be able to fill up every two weeks instead of every week, saving the typical family more than $8,000 at the pump over time," he said. "That's a big deal, especially as families are yet again feeling the pinch from rising gas prices."
"What's happening in Detroit will make a difference. But it won't solve everything," Obama said. "There's no silver bullet for avoiding spikes in gas prices every year."
Why don't you tell that to President Bush? You blamed him for increased gas prices back in 2008, when it cost $2.50/gallon to fill up.
You know what we call that now, Mr. President? The good old days.
Now, here we are, facing $5/gallon, and not only does Obama refuse to take the blame, but the best answer he can offer is a car that won't even be built for another 13 years. No, we won't build a pipeline from Canada to reduce our dependence on Middle Eastern oil. No, we won't allow for increased extraction of domestic oil reserves. Apparently, we're not even relying on the search for new forms of fuel as the cornerstone of this administration's energy policy.
Apparently, he's given up. It's on you now, America. Just buy a new car.
Rep. Doc Hastings of Washington, who gave the Republican address in response, said it best: "The president, who campaigned on a promise to address rising gas prices, now talks as if they're largely beyond his control."
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Obama's Driving Americans Out of Cars
Townhall.com ^ | March 7, 2012 | Terry Jeffrey
Barack Obama is now achieving a vision that environmentalist ideologues could only dream about in the 1970s: He is driving Americans out of their cars.
In the three decades since American voters threw Jimmy Carter out of office, there have been only two years when Americans did not drive their cars and trucks more miles than the year before.
The first, according to the Federal Highway Administration, was 2008, when George W. Bush was president and the nation was in a deep recession.
The second was 2011, the third year of President Obama's term in office.
But Obama may be accomplishing something more significant than presiding over a single year when Americans decreased the miles they drove. Since 1970, the FHA has tracked the "vehicle miles traveled" by Americans each year. It peaked in 2007.
That year, Americans drove a record 3.031 billion miles. In 2008, as might be expected in a severe recession, American curtailed their driving, going only 2.976 billion miles.
But the American urge to drive has clearly decelerated since Obama took office. In 2009, Americans drove only 2.977 billion miles, virtually no change from the 2.976 billion in 2008. In 2010, they drove 2.998 billion, still less than the 2007 peak. And, in 2011, they drove only 2.962 billion.
That is the fewest miles Americans have driven since 2003.
One reason Americans are driving less is obvious. On Jan.19, 2009, the day before Obama's inauguration, the average price of a gallon of regular gasoline was $1.83 per gallon. Since then, it has more than doubled. On Monday, it was $3.71.
Do rising gas prices distress the leading intellects in the Obama administration? There is good reason to believe the opposite.
John Holdren is Obama's White House science and technology adviser. In 1973, he joined with population control advocates Paul Ehrlich and Anne Ehrlich in writing an environmentalist manifesto titled "Human Ecology: Problems and Solutions."
It called for government action to find "alternative activities" for the auto industry.
"In the transition from a cowboy economy to a spaceman economy, manufacturing industries will have to undergo vast changes," Holdren and the Ehrlichs wrote. "The largest manufacturing industry in the United States is the automobile industry, and its product is a dominant factor in the depletion of resources and the destruction of the environment. The industry therefore makes a particularly suitable case study for economic change."
"We believe a federal task force should be established immediately to do the planning and to lay the groundwork for dealing with the automobile problem without great disruption to the national economy," Holdren and the Ehrlichs wrote. "Such a task force might be part of a larger institution with the responsibility to devise policies for making the transition to a stable, ecologically sound economy. The task is enormous, but it is both possible and necessary. In the short term, alternative activities must be found for various industries, including those related to the automobile."
In the same book, Holdren and the Ehrlich's promoted economist Herman Daly's idea of imposing "depletion quotas" on natural resources -- which would drive up their prices.
"That is, upper limits would be placed on the total amount of each resource that could be extracted or imported by the United States each year," Holdren and the Ehrlichs wrote. "This would not only directly reduce the pressure Americans place on the resources of the planet, but would also automatically generate a trend toward recycling and pollution abatement."
"And depletion quotes on fossil fuels and fissionable materials would encourage the frugal use of energy," they wrote.
"Limiting the amount of energy available would, of course, also tend to limit the size and number of automobiles, encourage the use of mass transit and promote the substitution of efficient high-speed trains for energetically wasteful short- and medium-haul jet airplanes."
Obama's future science adviser was so taken with this idea that he suggested along with the Ehrlichs that prohibiting certain types of advertising would be justified.
"Both before and after depletion quotas are established," they wrote, "ways must be found to control advertising."
"Its most dangerous abuses might be halted by legislative action," they wrote. "For instance, it could be made illegal for any utility to advertise in such a way as to promote greater demand for power. Also, references to size, power or sexual potency (direct or implied) could be banned from automobile advertising."
Not long after Obama took office, Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood described a policy initiative that would encourage denser urban neighborhoods and mass transit systems as "a way to coerce people out of their cars."
Energy Secretary Steven Chu said last week his department's goal was not to reduce gas prices, but "decrease our dependency on oil."
As president, Obama has subsidized electric cars and mass transit and even bought General Motors -- while refusing to approve a pipeline to bring oil from Canada into the United States. His new energy plans calls for ending what he terms $4 billion in annual tax "subsidies" to oil companies. What he means is he wants to raise taxes on the source of gasoline.
At least he hasn't called for banning references to size, power or sexual potency in auto advertising.
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the right on gas prices in 08, do you see 333386 they're all the same,stop thinking one party is going to do anything differant :o
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::) ::)
Please show me one post kneepadding bush or the GOP
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don't care about bush,talking about now,you seem to think a repub gets in office and the prices come down.only in make believe land,weelll you do spend most of your time there ;D
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Here - just for you blackass you incompetent communist thug!
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Oil is ‘the fuel of the past,’ says President Obama
Yahoo! News ^ | March 7, 2012 | Olivier Knox |
President Barack Obama on Wednesday dismissed oil as "the fuel of the past" as he made an unapologetic election-year pitch for his alternative energy industry policies and sniped at Republicans over painfully high gasoline prices.
"They get out on the campaign trail—and you and I both know there are no quick fixes to this problem—but listening to them, you'd think there were," he said at a Daimler Truck manufacturing plant in the battleground state of North Carolina.
Obama said that because the United States accounts for 20 percent of the world's consumption of oil but has only 2 percent of its petroleum reserves, "we're not going to be able to just drill our way out of the problem of high gas prices. Anybody who tells you otherwise either doesn't know what they're talking about or they aren't telling you the truth."
"Here is the truth. If we are going to control our energy future, then we've got to have an all-of-the-above strategy," he said in his speech. "We've got to develop every source of American energy—not just oil and gas, but wind power and solar power, nuclear power, biofuels."
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
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OBAMA Oil sets $7 a gallon gas price target
MensNewsDaily.com ^ | March 3, 2010 | Roger F. Gay
To meet the Obama administration’s targets for increasing fuel taxes, researchers say that Americans will have to pay $7 for a gallon of gasoline; about 17 percent more than drivers in green-conscious and generally highly taxed Sweden.
In their study, researchers at Harvard’s Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs devised several combinations of tax increases to address 70 percent of the oil used in the United States. The combinations were selected to match fuel consumption reduction targets. Most of their models assumed an economy-wide carbon dioxide tax starting at $30 a ton in 2010 and escalating to $60 a ton in 2030. In some cases researchers also factored in tax credits for electric and hybrid vehicles, taxes on fuel or both.
Fuel Taxes Must Rise, Harvard Researchers Say
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Obama Digs In: 'Personally Lobbying Democrats to Reject' Keystone Pipeline (Senate to Vote Today)
The Weekly Standard ^ | March 8, 2012 | Daniel Halper
President Obama is digging in on the Keystone XL pipeline. He is "personally lobbying Democrats to reject an amendment calling for its construction," Politico reports.
The White House lobbying effort, including phone calls from the president to Democrats, signals that the vote could be close when it heads to the floor Thursday. The president is trying to defeat an amendment that would give election-year fodder to his Republican critics who have accused him of blocking a job-creating energy project at a time of high gas prices.
The amendment, proposed by Sen. John Hoeven (R-N.D.), states that Obama would have no role in such cross-border permitting decisions since, in this case, the pipeline would originate in Canada. The measure would need 60 votes to pass, and Obama has already lost two Democrats who back the proposal - Sens. Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Mary Landrieu - and is at risk of losing more moderates and vulnerable Democrats.
The Keystone XL pipeline would create an estimated 20,000 jobs and, likely, drive down the price of gasoline in the long run. It would seem to be a good move at a time of high unemployment and high gas prices.
And, in fact, most Americans like the idea of the Keystone pipeline. According to a November poll, of likely U.S. voters, 60 percent "at least somewhat favor building the pipeline which President Obama has delayed until at least 2013 because of environmental concerns."
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the right on gas prices in 08, do you see 333386 they're all the same,stop thinking one party is going to do anything differant :o
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Oreilly is clueless.
Next.
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Oreilly is clueless.
Next.
hahahaha oreilly is 30 seconds of the 5 minute video,and it was his guess not bill ??? ::) :D
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The news wires are reporting that President Obama actively lobbied Senate Democrats to defeat the Keystone pipeline yesterday. The effect of blocking the Keystone XL Pipeline is to defer 700,000 barrels of oil per day. And as I reported at The Weekly Standard recently, the president’s policy of choking off oil production under federal leases will prevent another 1 million barrels of oil per day this year, and even more next year.
Obama will soon be personally responsible for preventing some 2 million barrels per day of possible North American crude oil production from reaching the American economy. The U.S. currently produces only about 6 million barrels of domestic crude oil, so that would be more than a 30 percent increase in domestic production.
The president likes to say that America is producing more oil than ever before, but that’s due entirely to shale oil (e.g., fracking) and oil sands. The boom in production from private sources is currently shielding the administration from the political consequences of taking such a huge amount of oil off the market.
Two millions barrels per day of oil production would affect not just the price of gasoline in North America, but also the economics of world oil production: The president is preventing the U.S. from increasing oil production by an amount nearly equivalent to Iran’s total oil exports. He insists that gasoline prices are rising because of “fears” about a disruption in Iranian supply, but he wants you to believe that gasoline prices would be unaffected by a 30 percent increase in domestic U.S. oil production in the next two years.
If you’re gullible enough to believe that, consider this: The recession drove world oil demand from a peak of 86 million barrels per day in 2007 to a low of 85 million barrels per day in 2009. In the same period, the price of gasoline fell by half. We are once again entering a period of scarcity, where slight fluctuations in demand or supply will have a disproportionate impact on gas prices — but this time the scarcity is largely the product of Obama’s policies.
— Mario Loyola, a senior analyst at the Armstrong Center for Energy and the Environment, is director of the Center for Tenth Amendment Studies at the Texas Public Policy Foundation.
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Dem rep. rips Obama’s energy policy (Gene Green, RAT-Texas)
The Hill ^ | 3/09/12 | Josiah Ryan
Posted on March 11, 2012 4:19:43 PM EDT by Libloather
Dem rep. rips Obama’s energy policy
By Josiah Ryan - 03/09/12 03:47 PM ET
Rep. Gene Green (D-Texas) on Thursday bashed President Obama’s proposal to increase taxes on oil-and-gas companies, saying it would kill jobs and result in lower domestic energy production.
“I oppose the president’s proposed tax increases on the oil and gas industry,” Green said Thursday, as reported by the Houston Chronicle. “An $85 billion tax hike would suppress our domestic production, stifle job creation, drive up imports of crude oil from nations that are hostile to us and increase the volatility of the gasoline markets.”
Obama outlined his vision for domestic energy in a speech Wednesday, arguing that the $4 billion in tax breaks that go to the energy industry are in part responsible for record profits they are reporting. He suggeted the money could be better deployed to incentivize the alternative energy industy.
“We’re giving them extra billions of dollars on top of near-record profits that they’re already making,” Obama said.
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Somehow we have to figure out how to boost the price of gasoline to the levels in Europe," Steven Chu, now the energy secretary, said in a 2008 interview with the Wall Street Journal.
A gallon of regular costs more than $8 there. The Oil Price Information Service thinks the average price here will rise to $4.25 a gallon by the end of April. That would exceed the record of $4.11, set in July 2008.
A gallon of regular cost just $1.85 the day before President Barack Obama was inaugurated. If the price were to double again during a second Obama term, Mr. Chu's goal could be achieved.
Sen. Obama expressed little concern when the price of gas was approaching the current record high.
"I would have preferred a more gradual adjustment," he told CNBC in a June 2008 interview. "But if we take some steps right now to help people make the adjustment ... then I think we can come out of this stronger and have a more efficient energy policy."
Earlier, Mr. Obama told the editorial board of the San Francisco Chronicle that "under my plan of a cap and trade system, electricity rates would necessarily skyrocket."
Secretary Chu has backed away from his infamous quote. But that was political expediency. Democrats want high energy prices, but not the blame for them.
"If you are a politician who wants to raise the price of gas, you have two choices," said Prof. Walter Russell Mead. "You can persuade the military leadership to install you in office through a coup d'etat, or you can lie to the voters and pursue your agenda on the sly."
Democrats want higher energy prices mostly to make alternative sources of energy seem economical. That's a tall order. The Energy Information Administration estimates the cost of generating a megawatt hour of electricity from a new plant would be 66 cents from plants powered by natural gas; 86 cents from hydro; 95 cents from coal; 97 cents from wind; $1.13 from biomass; $1.14 from nuclear, and $3.12 from solar thermal.
Only wind appears competitive. But industrial wind turbines are eyesores, they kill a lot of birds and bats, and -- as sweltering Texans and shivering Britons have learned -- tend not to work when it is very hot or very cold.
The Obama administration's massive subsidies to "green" firms have produced more embarrassment than energy. Solar panel manufacturer Solyndra, which went bankrupt last September after receiving $535 million, has left behind an environmental mess. Eleven other subsidized firms are having financial problems and five have filed for bankruptcy, CBS News reported in January.
In his state of the union address this year, President Barack Obama cited battery manufacturer Ener1 as a government investment success. Ener1 filed for bankruptcy two days later.
A few days after Mr. Obama said he planned to buy a Chevy Volt, General Motors announced it will suspend production of the electric car. About 1,300 workers will lose their jobs, at least temporarily.
The $38.6 billion in loan guarantees it provided to "green" firms created just 3,545 permanent new jobs, according to a Department of Energy estimate. That's an average cost of $5 million per job.
Mr. Obama's "investments" haven't been bad for all of us. Eighty percent of the firms that got DOE loans are run or owned by the president's financial backers, according to the Hoover Institution's Peter Schweizer. "Green Firms Get Fed Cash, Give Execs Bonuses, Fail," headlined an ABC News investigative report broadcast Tuesday.
In what was billed as a "major speech" on energy policy Feb. 23, the president pledged to make more such "investments."
The speech was remarkable for its mendacity. During the Obama administration, the time it takes to get a permit to drill in the Gulf of Mexico has nearly doubled. Leases to drill on federal lands in the West are down 40 percent. But Mr. Obama claimed credit for the recent rise in domestic production of oil and natural gas. This "couldn't be farther from the truth," said the president of the American Petroleum Institute.
We can't drill our way to lower gas prices, Mr. Obama said. The Institute for Energy Research says there are 1.4 trillion barrels of recoverable oil in the United States and offshore, "enough to last at least 200 years." But most are on public lands. Government policy keeps them locked up.
"The administration has done everything but support drilling," said retired Shell oil company executive John Hofmeister. "We are on the verge of slipping into an energy abyss."
Jack Kelly is a columnist for the Post-Gazette and The Blade of Toledo, Ohio (jkelly@post-gazette.com, 412 263-1476). More articles by this author
First published on March 11, 2012 at 12:00 am
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More green nonsense: Obama's 'investment' pitch
EDITORIAL
Published Mar 10, 2012 at 3:00 am (Updated Mar 8, 2012)
http://www.unionleader.com/article/20120310/OPINION01/703099991/-1/opinion
President Obama on Wednesday advocated increasing federal tax breaks for automobiles that run on electricity or natural gas, plus spending $1 billion to finance recharging stations for electric vehicles in 15 cities, plus $650 million to make electric cars more appealing to consumers. Maybe he forgot that his own budget projects that the federal debt (now at $15 trillion) will increase to $25 trillion in the next decade.
Instead of learning from his failures, the President is doubling down on them. Though his schemes to redirect cash from some economic sectors to those he personally or politically favors have proven ineffective at stimulating the broader economy, he proposes throwing more money down the same hole.
“We need to invest in the technology that will help us use less oil in our cars and our trucks, in our buildings, in our factories,” Obama said on Wednesday, “That's the only solution to the challenge. Because as we start using less, that lowers the demand, prices come down. It's pretty straightforward. That's the only solution to this challenge.”
Nonsense. The flaw is Obama's use of the word “we.” By that he means the government, at his direction. But how does Barack Obama know which “green” technologies are best, which are most viable, which are most promising? He doesn't. And yet he insists that “the only solution” to our high oil consumption is to let him and his team play tech-investor with our money. How completely absurd.
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Obama's Approval Rate Plunges Due To Gas Prices
Asia One News ^ | March 12, 2012 | AFP
WASHINGTON - US President Barack Obama's job approval rating, weighed down by soaring gas prices, has plunged below 50 per cent, giving his political opponents what appears to be an opening in the November election, a new opinion poll showed.
The survey by ABC News and The Washington Post indicated that only 46 per cent of Americans now approved of the way Obama is handling his job and 50 per cent disapproved.
The situation was a reversal from early February when 50 per cent approved of the president's performance and 46 per cent disapproved.
According to the survey, the drop was attributed to soaring gas prices threatening to crimp America's slow recovery from a recession.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.asiaone.com ...
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AFPM PRESIDENT TESTIFIES ON GASOLINE PRICES
AFPM ^ | March 07, 2012 | AFPM
American Fuel & Petrochemical Manufacturers President Charles T. Drevna told a House subcommittee today that high crude oil prices are the primary factor behind high gasoline prices, and said the most effective actions to help American consumers would be to increase U.S. oil production, increase oilimports from Canada and reduce overregulation.
Drevna said that according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, "only 6 cents of every dollar that Americans pay for gasoline goes to the refining industry that AFPM represents. The cost of crude oil accounts for 76 cents, followed by taxes at 12 cents, and distribution and marketing also at 6 cents
"Refiners, as well as petrochemical manufacturers, are the first customers of a barrel of oil and the first to be impacted when oil prices rise," Drevna said in written testimonyto the House Subcommittee on Energy and Power, which conducted a hearing ongasoline prices this morning.
"Refiners don't set the price of oil any more than automakers set the price of steel, bakers set the price of wheat or restaurants set the price of cattle," Drevna added. "Oil is an international commodity that trades in the free market and its price is not controlled by its purchasers."
Drevna called on the Obama administration to allow increased exploration and development of America's vast oil and natural gas resources on federal lands and in federally controlled waters tomeet America's energy needs, create jobs and improve America's economic and national security.
In addition, Drevna advocated approval of the Keystone XL pipeline to bring 700,000 barrels of oil a day from Canada to U.S. Gulf Coast refineries.
Drevna said overly burdensome and conflicting government regulations threaten American competitiveness. He said some regulations are not doing anything to protect the environment but only jeopardize American jobs and raise consumer costs further. Examples of these are Tier 3 regulations to reduce sulfur in gasoline, greenhouse gas regulations, lengthy permitting delays, and requirements under the Renewable Fuel Standard involving biofuels, Drevna said.
Oil prices have risen recently because of concerns about the future of Iranian oil production, increased oil demand in developing nations and the decline in the value of the U.S. dollar,Drevna said.
"Historically, the best mechanism available to address high crude oil prices has been to take actions to increase the global crude oil supply," Drevna said. "When America has taken such actions in the past, it has sent a message to the market that ourcountry is serious about meeting our energy and national security needs."
Drevna said U.S. exports of refined petroleum products -primarily diesel fuel because there is an excess domestic supply -are benefitting American consumers. He pointed out that America imports about 60 percent of the crude oil the nation needs and is not a net exporter of gasoline.
"Exports don't raise gasoline prices," Drevna said. "Rather,exports bring billions of dollars to America, preserve and create jobs, strengthen our economy and reduce our trade deficit. In fact,in allowing domestic refiners to run at higher utilization rates, exports are likely keeping consumer costs from rising further. If all American manufacturers and agricultural interests were prohibited from exporting their products, they would produce less -and that could actually raise consumer prices."
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Obama Makes 4 Misleading Gas Statements in One Week
www.breitbart.com
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by Wynton Hall 5 hours ago 17post a comment
President Barack Obama continues to struggle with Americans' growing ire over soaring gas prices--the highest ever at this time of year.
Part of Mr. Obama's challenge is that he continues to make misleading statements that only conflate his growing problems on gas policy. Here are at least four of them Mr. Obama made in the last week alone:
1. On March 7, 2012, Mr. Obama said this in a speech in Mount Holly, North Carolina:
PRESIDENT OBAMA: “Now, because of these new standards for cars and trucks, they’re going to — all going to be able to go further and use less fuel every year. And that means pretty soon you’ll be able to fill up your car every two weeks instead of every week — and, over time, that saves you, a typical family, about $8,000 a year.”
AUDIENCE MEMBER: “We like that.”
OBAMA: “You like that, don't you?”
AUDIENCE: “Yes!”
OBAMA: “Eight thousand dollars — that's no joke. … It looks like somebody might have fainted up here.”
REALITY: According to the Washington Post Fact-Checker, Mr. Obama's claim that Americans will save $8,000 a year isn't true. In actuality, they will save $8,000 over the life of a car--and that's only if government estimates hold accurate until 2025. One of those estimates assumes that the future price of fuel will be $3.42 a gallon--a full 33 cents lower than it is right now in the year 2012.
2. On March 10, 2012, Mr. Obama said this during his weekly address:
You and I both know that with only 2% of the world’s oil reserves, we can’t just drill our way to lower gas prices – not when consume 20 percent of the world’s oil.
REALITY: Tell that to the state of Colorado who is currently paying .50 cents less per gallon of gas than the rest of America. Why? Simple, says Professor of Economics Mark Perry: they get their oil from Rocky Mountain states. As theDenver Post explains:
Some of the cheapest gas prices in the country routinely are in the Rocky Mountain states. The reason is cheaper crude prices and refinery costs, according to the agency.
Refineries get most of their oil from within the Rocky Mountain states or nearby parts of the Midwest or from Canada....
"In general, gasoline prices in the Rocky Mountain area have been lower than the national average for much of the past year due to relatively low crude-oil input costs to refineries in a region that is fairly self-sufficient in meeting its demand for gasoline and other petroleum products; refineries within the Rockies supply most of the regional demand," the Energy Information Administration stated in its Feb. 14 report.
Minnesota and other parts of the Midwest are experiencing the same kinds of lower gas prices as the result of domestic and Canadian drilling.
3. On March 10, 2012, Mr. Obama said this during his weekly address:
Under my Administration, oil production in America is at an eight-year high. We’ve quadrupled the number of operating oil rigs, and opened up millions of acres for drilling.
REALITY: As Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchinson (R-TX) notes, "“Offshore drilling permits are being issued at less than half the rate of the previous administration. The average number of leases issued on public lands is less than half than during President Clinton’s term.”
4. Last week, at a presidential press conference, Mr. Obama said the following to FOX News reporter Ed Henry:
“Ed, just from a political perspective, do you think the President of the United States going into re-election wants gas prices to go up higher? Is there anybody here who thinks that makes a lot of sense? Look, here’s the bottom line with respect to gas prices: I want gas prices lower because they hurt families.”
REALITY: Mr. Obama appointed as his Secretary of Energy Steven Chu, a man who in 2008 admitted to the Wall Street Journal that the goal must be to raise gas prices: “Somehow we have to figure out how to boost the price of gasoline to the levels in Europe,” Mr. Chu said. And, indeed, in 2008, Mr. Obama himself also said he wanted higher gas prices to ween Americans off oil, but preferred a "gradual adjustment."
Again, all of these statements by Mr. Obama were made within just the last week.
One in five Americans now blame Mr. Obama for America's skyrocketing gas prices. If he doesn't speak squarely about why he personally lobbied Senate Democrats to oppose the Keystone Pipeline and why he appointed an Energy Secretary whose stated goal was to send gas prices soaring, many more voters will hold him responsible come November.
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http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/gas-prices-sink-obamas-ratings-on-economy-bring-parity-to-race-for-white-house/2012/03/11/gIQAuhYO6R_story.html
LOL at the kneepadders in meltdown
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U.S. must 'hustle' to reach 36 billion gallons of biofuels by 2022, ag secretary says
Kansas City Star ^ | March12, 2012 | by Cory Nealon
Posted on March 12, 2012 9:34:49 PM EDT by Oldeconomybuyer
The United States can meet President Barack Obama's goal of producing 36 billion gallons of biofuels by 2022, but it better get moving.
That's according to Tom Vilsack, secretary of the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
According to a 2010 Agriculture Department report, the agency plans for the U.S. to produce 13.4 billion gallons of biofuels from grasses and sugars. The rest would come from oil seeds, crop residues and wood waste.
The EPA is exploring other sources, such as animal fats, municipal solid waste and algae.
The push for more biofuels comes as other industries, such as commercial power companies, seek alternative fuel sources to comply with tougher pollution standards set by the Obama administration. For example, Dominion Virginia Power announced last year it would convert three coal-fired power plants to biomass.
Citing a Penn State University study that states the U.S. produces more than 1 billion tons of biomass a year, Vilsack said there is plenty to satisfy numerous industries. Environmental groups aren't so sure.
The Southern Environmental Law Center is concerned that companies will start removing healthy trees from forests to meet demands that are expected to grow.
(Excerpt) Read more at kansascity.com ...
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Obama's Pump Debacle
Townhall.com ^ | March 14, 2012 | Jonah Goldberg
As gasoline prices climb, President Obama's poll numbers plummet. In February, a Washington Post/ABC poll had Obama up 6 points against Mitt Romney. Monday's poll has him down 2.
According to the polls, gas prices are a huge part of the story, particularly given how the last 30 days or so have not exactly been great for the GOP.
No wonder Obama is desperate to get out in front of the issue. The dilemma is that he's invested so much of his prestige in his energy policies that he can't admit those policies have been an abject failure. But he also can't have people thinking his policies are responsible for the energy price Americans care about most: gasoline.
"Despite the gains we've made, today's high gas prices are a painful reminder that there's much more work to do to free ourselves from our dependence on foreign oil and take control of our energy future," the president declared Monday in a statement on the one-year anniversary of his "Blueprint for a Secure Energy Future."
Let's take the second proposition first. Obama often says, "Under my administration, America is producing more oil today than at any time in the last eight years." That's true: It's also true that under Obama's administration, Snooki from "Jersey Shore" got pregnant and Charlie Sheen lost his job. And he can take about as much credit for those developments too.
Never mind that if he'd gotten the cap-and-trade proposals he campaigned on, energy prices would be even worse. (He once acknowledged that under his plan, electricity prices would "skyrocket" and coal companies would go bankrupt. His Energy secretary, Steven Chu, admitted he wanted America to emulate European gas prices, when they were about $8 per gallon.)
The boom in oil production has taken place almost entirely on private and state lands, while on federal lands it's dropped (11 percent from 2010 to 2011 alone). The administration has also slowed the permitting of offshore oil and gas development to a trickle.
Another major factor is the development of new technologies that make it possible to extract ever more fuel from domestic sources. Instead of words of support, Obama keeps telling those companies they need to be taxed more and have their subsidies yanked, and he's touting the wonder-working power of algae (a possibly valuable fuel source by the middle of the century).
Ending subsidies to business entirely, including oil companies, is a good idea. But Obama's policy is completely different. He thinks he's smarter than the market and can pick winning industries and products.
It's an ugly record. Forget Solyndra -- and other solar and wind firms that have been going belly up like birds around a windmill -- that's old news. So is his decision to block the Keystone XL pipeline.
Last year, the Energy Department awarded a $10 million "L Prize" for development of an affordable and eco-friendly light bulb. Philips just put its winning model on the market, for $50 apiece. Meanwhile, GM has temporarily suspended production of the Volt because of lack of demand for the "affordable" electric car.
On the unaffordable end of the market, things are even worse. Consumer Reports tried to test drive the new $107,850 Fisker Karma, but it couldn't: "We buy about 80 cars a year, and this is the first time in memory that we have had a car that is undriveable before it has finished our check-in process."
There's actually plenty Obama could do to help with gas prices, but he's right not to do some of them. He shouldn't release oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, nor should he appease Iran on its nuclear program. But he could, for instance, suspend the Jones Act, which requires that all ships carrying goods between American ports be U.S. flagged. Doing so would dramatically lower the cost to distribute oil and gas (and outrage his union base).
Obama was recently asked by Fox News' Ed Henry whether high gas prices are a deliberate result of White House policies. His response was telling. "From a political perspective, do you think the president of the United States going into re-election wants gas prices to go up higher? Is there anybody here who thinks that makes a lot of sense?"
In other words, Obama desperately wants people to think he's against higher gas prices -- at least until he gets re-elected.
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Obama in Your Tank
Editorial of The New York Sun | March 12, 2012
http://www.nysun.com/editorials/obama-in-your-tank/87740/
“Obama Defends Energy Policies” is the headline over a Reuters dispatch in respect of gasoline prices. It reports on the president’s launch of what the British wire service characterizes as “the most comprehensive defense to date of his energy policies.” It says the president is “pushing back against election-year attacks from Republicans” who say his energy policies “are to blame for high gas prices that are eroding his popularity with voters.” The problem with all this is that it’s not the energy policies that are driving up gasoline prices. It’s the monetary policies, and if the Republicans can’t manage to get that point into focus, it’s hard to see how they can put the rest of the monetary debate to their advantage.
We’ve been making this point for months now. The fact is that priced in specie — gold or silver — the value of gasoline has been plunging. We made this point in April last year, after Mr. Obama used his weekly radio address to declare that to rectify rising gasoline prices there was, as he put it, “no silver bullet.” Our point was that a gallon of gasoline was selling at the time for fewer grains of silver than it was selling for when Mr. Obama (or, for that matter, Mr. Bush) had acceded to the presidency. Gasoline at the pump was selling for a sixth of an ounce of silver when Mr. Obama was sworn in. Today, the value of the same gallon of gasoline has fallen to less than a 10th of an ounce of silver. Measured in gold, the value of gasoline has also been plunging.
In other words, it’s not the gasoline that’s been going up. It’s the dollar that’s been going down. Americans, however, don’t hold their money in gold or silver. They generally hold their money in accounts denominated in dollars, and the dollar has been getting weaker. It is the view of the Sun that this fact lies at the bottom of the grim feeling that has swept the country under President Obama, the lingering sense that we are falling behind. We are all for energy policies that maximize the incentives to explore and produce our own oil and gas. But the it’s not going to bring relief to the misery Americans have felt during the Obama presidency until a restoration of sound money.
This is not the kind of issue that the Republican candidates can deal with in a glancing way. Mr. Romney has vowed to replace Chairman Bernanke at the Federal Reserve. Mr. Gingrich has vowed to establish a gold commission, chaired by no less a pair of luminaries than James Grant, who edits the Interest Rate Observer, and Lewis Lehrman, who, with Congressman Ron Paul, wrote a famous dissent from the recommendation of the Gold Commission of the 1980s to stick with fiat money. This issue, if it is to be made to resonate with the voters, will have to be pressed at ever turn, including every time Mr. Obama gets confused and tries to characterize the high number of dollars gasoline is fetching at the pump as a failure of energy policy.
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Mar 18th, 2012 @ 12:46 pm › Conservative Byte
↓ Skip to comments
In May 2009, four months into the Obama presidency, retail gasoline prices averaged $2.32 per gallon. Rep. Charles Boustany (R-LA) wrote Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner to express concern about the impact that the Administration’s budgeted changes in tax policy would have on the oil and gas industry. Secretary Geithner clearly laid out the Administration position in his letter of response (pdf link).
That was then, this is now.
In just three years’ time, retail gasoline prices are up 68%. $4.00+ gasoline prices loom as a key reelection vulnerability for the President; in response, the Administration’s rhetoric has shifted to “energy friendly”, but its original energy-hostile policies have not changed a whit.
From Secretary Geithner’s May 2009 letter:
The Administration believes that oil and gas preferences distort markets by encouraging more investment in the oil and gas industry than would occur under a neutral system. To the extent the credit (sic) encourages overproduction of oil, it is detrimental to long-term energy security and is also inconsistent with the Administration’s policy of reducing carbon emissions and encouraging the use of renewable energy sources through a cap-and-trade program. Moreover, the credit (sic) must ultimately be financed with taxes that result in underinvestment in other, potentially more productive, areas of the economy.
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Video: Biden Booed at St. Patrick's Day Parade ["A Chorus of Boos"!]
The Washington Examiner ^ | March 18, 2012
Posted on March 18, 2012 9:07:16 PM EDT by Steelfish
March 18, 2012
Video: Biden Booed at St. Patrick's Day Parade by Joel Gehrke
Vice President Joe Biden often touts his working-class background, but he got the cold shoulder from some St. Patrick's Day celebrants in the state where he was born, as the crowd booed Biden towards the end of a parade in Pittsburgh.
"A chorus of boos rained down on Biden and his supporters down the last stretch; stil, Biden kept smiling," said Brandon Hudson of the local NBC affiliate.
(Excerpt) Read more at campaign2012.washingtone xaminer.com ...
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With Gas Prices Rising, Smog Rules May Stall
Wall Street Journal ^ | March 18, 2012 | By Tennile Tracy
Posted on March 18, 2012 10:13:17 PM EDT by Oldeconomybuyer
The Obama administration, facing political heat over high gasoline prices, may delay new rules that would cut pollution from cars but also could bring higher prices at the pump, environmental and industry leaders said.
The rules would require refiners to make cleaner-burning gasoline and auto makers to build cars that emit fewer smog-forming pollutants. The Environmental Protection Agency was scheduled to roll out the rules before April, but it hasn't yet submitted them for White House review.
"We expect that timing will begin to slip, perhaps for political considerations" said American Petroleum Institute President Jack Gerard.
The new standards are known as Tier 3, following the Clinton administration's adoption of Tier 2 standards in 1999.
An EPA spokeswoman declined to confirm whether there would be a delay, saying only that the agency "continues to develop the Tier 3 vehicle and fuel standards" and is "engaging diverse stakeholders as part of that process."
(Excerpt) Read more at online.wsj.com ...
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Gas Prices Still Going Up, Refineries Shutting Down (should be front page but MSM supports Obama)
Boise Weekly ^ | March 18th | George Prentice
Energy industry analysts say there's no relief in sight at the nation's gas pumps.
While prices jumped 6 percent in February, market experts said many of the nation's refineries have been idled or shut down permanently because their owners claimed they were losing money on them. According to the Wall Street Journal, Sunoco is expected to close another of its large refineries this July, "taking another 335,000 barrels per day in production capacity off the market."
(Excerpt) Read more at boiseweekly.com ...
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Ok, now you have to explain to me what Obama has to do with Sunoco choosing to close a refinery.
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Ok, now you have to explain to me what Obama has to do with Sunoco choosing to close a refinery.
Refineries are being forced out of business due to EPA mandates on may types.
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Refineries are being forced out of business due to EPA mandates on may types.
Ah... I get it.
Ok... I was just wondering.
These are new mandates? If so, then yes, Obama is definitely to blame.
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NATIONAL REVIEW ONLINE www.nationalreview.com PRINT
The Corner
The one and only.
A Gasoline Nightmare
By Victor Davis Hanson
March 20, 2012 1:44 P.M. Obama is barnstorming the west — blasting oil companies, trying to convince voters that he supports an “all of the above” policy, and reminding them that drilling has increased since his tenure. But that won’t work for five reasons.
1) No one believes that Obama is sincere. In 2008, in the hope-and-change adulation days when he was running for president, he talked about skyrocketing energy prices as a necessary cost for his vision of a desired cap-and-trade law. Energy secretary–designate Chu talked about the desirability of high European-like gasoline prices. And soon-to-be interior secretary Senator Salazar infamously bragged that even $10-a-gallon gas would not change his mind about new offshore drilling. All that has been so widely reported that one can even hear it at the gas pump — where those filling up mumble that Obama wanted these high gas prices.
In response to that political problem, the Obama team has not yet explained why they no longer believe the above. Secretary Chu merely concedes that he’s changed his mind, but that was an embarrassingly political concession. In other words, the public believes that Obama and his associates privately still think that high gas prices help the environment, cool the planet, make preferred subsidized green energy viable, and curb the gas-guzzling culture of the American middle class, but with a wink and a nod simply cannot say that any longer since they are now in a reelection cycle. And because Obama does not now either defend or refute his embarrassing remarks about the price of power needing to “skyrocket,” or similar views of his subordinates, voters believe that he will probably go back to his earlier positions if reelected or out of office.
2) The argument that under Obama oil production is up has the same ironic twist, and is more likely to hurt than help Obama: American oil production is up despite Obama rather than because of him, given that he has radically cut exploration on public lands and has been unable to affect fracking and horizontal drilling on private lands. He said not a word from 2009–12 about the revolution in oil drilling at a time when he was monotonously bragging about “millions of green jobs” and pouring hundreds of millions of federal dollars into failures like Solyndra. The public also knows that. Obama more or less expressed an antipathy for new oil production when he once talked about “tuning up” cars and inflating tires in lieu of new drilling, and then trumped that with recent talk of uniquely American algae potential, a fuel resource unknown to most of us. Had Sarah Palin said that, well . . .
3) Even less appealing is Obama’s insistence that drilling has only long-term benefits and is no short-term remedy. If so, why then brag that oil production is up since 2009, when none of the increase is due to Obama’s own approval of new federal leases, but is instead due to both Bush’s approvals and the vision of private enterprise? This argument really works against Obama because of its inherent selfishness: “I will take credit for my predecessor’s investment that paid off on my watch, but will not make any commensurate investment by opening up federal leases for my successor.” Or “I will subsidize green power and ignore private oil concerns, but in a political pinch will go silent about what I was for and what failed, while bragging about what I was indifferent to or against — which succeeded.” People are not stupid and know all this.
4) Obama argues that more American oil won’t greatly affect a global market. Aside from the fact that in a tight market psychology rules and even a modest increase from a major producer in times of crises can lower prices, Obama himself does not believe this. We know that because his administration is pressuring the Saudis to pump more and wants to tap the strategic reserve. In other words, a million barrels here and there from the Saudis and the reserve will calm markets and lower prices in a way that fresh American oil would not have? To be consistent and honest, Obama would have to either push the reserve, the Saudis, and new drilling here, or admit that all three won’t do much in a vast global market, given their relatively small percentages of the global daily production.
5) Obama borrowed more in three years and two months than did Bush in eight years. The massive aggregate debt and gargantuan deficits depress the value of the dollar, and help to spike oil prices; a president by the very nature of his budget does have influence on how much oil a dollar overseas will buy.
I can understand why Obama is furious about the politics of oil, but frantically doing derrick photo-ops simply looks desperate and cynical. Far better would be to explain to the American people why his team once wanted higher fossil-fuel prices and why that was or is wise or is no longer true; and, why he has radically curbed new leasing on federal lands, and why that is wise or at least once was wise from 2009-12; and why tapping the reserve or getting other foreign nations to pump more is helpful in a way additional American production would not have been; and why he will insist on budget discipline and restore balance in the purchasing power of overseas dollars.
If he can’t do that, then he should not wonder why most fault him for their spiraling gas bills.
Permalink
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Ah... I get it.
Ok... I was just wondering.
These are new mandates? If so, then yes, Obama is definitely to blame.
There hasnt been a new refinery built since in 1970.
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None of this really matters.
All the new production/extraction that will be coming on line now and in the future will only be replacing declining production. The whole Peak Oil thing is true in regards to production, we will do all we can to maintain a plateau of production and then it will be a long, slow decline from there.
Worth mentioning that the new wells/production will be more expense per barrel when compared to the easier wells from long ago.
Higher prices are here to stay and it will only get more expensive in the future.
Only a decline in use of oil/gasoline and diversification away from it will help.
This is real talk, folks.
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None of this really matters.
All the new production/extraction that will be coming on line now and in the future will only be replacing declining production. The whole Peak Oil thing is true in regards to production, we will do all we can to maintain a plateau of production and then it will be a long, slow decline from there.
Worth mentioning that the new wells/production will be more expense per barrel when compared to the easier wells from long ago.
Higher prices are here to stay and it will only get more expensive in the future.
Only a decline in use of oil/gasoline and diversification away from it will help.
This is real talk, folks.
You gotta blame Obama in there somewhere
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You gotta blame Obama in there somewhere
Absolutely - he has made every existing problem drastically worse.
He is the worst piece of trash ever to hold office in this country.
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None of this really matters.
All the new production/extraction that will be coming on line now and in the future will only be replacing declining production. The whole Peak Oil thing is true in regards to production, we will do all we can to maintain a plateau of production and then it will be a long, slow decline from there.
Worth mentioning that the new wells/production will be more expense per barrel when compared to the easier wells from long ago.
Higher prices are here to stay and it will only get more expensive in the future.
Only a decline in use of oil/gasoline and diversification away from it will help.
This is real talk, folks.
It's all Obama's fault.
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None of this really matters.
All the new production/extraction that will be coming on line now and in the future will only be replacing declining production. The whole Peak Oil thing is true in regards to production, we will do all we can to maintain a plateau of production and then it will be a long, slow decline from there.
Worth mentioning that the new wells/production will be more expense per barrel when compared to the easier wells from long ago.
Higher prices are here to stay and it will only get more expensive in the future.
Only a decline in use of oil/gasoline and diversification away from it will help.
This is real talk, folks.
Agreed. One need only look at the tar sands economic viability to see this in action. The US has been using less oil for a few years now, the price is going up because China and India are picking up the slack. China's consumer car market is growing at insane rates. Oil is the fuel of the east, time to find something new for the west.
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Energy industry accuses Obama of misleading public about extent of untapped oil resources
foxnews.com ^ | 3/21/12 | Jim Angle
Posted on March 21, 2012 10:30:59 PM EDT by ColdOne
In almost every energy speech, President Obama makes this statement: "We've got 2 percent of the world oil reserves. We use 20 percent."
But there's more to those numbers than meet the eye.
"It's accurate but extremely misleading," says Dan Kish of Institute for Energy Research, which is supported by the industry. "What he is talking about is oil we already have found."
Misleading, he argues, because the president is pointing to "proven" reserves, which is some 21 billion barrels, but the U.S. is sitting on vast reserves of untapped energy that are far greater.
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
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Energy industry accuses Obama of misleading public about extent of untapped oil resources
foxnews.com ^ | 3/21/12 | Jim Angle
Posted on March 21, 2012 10:30:59 PM EDT by ColdOne
In almost every energy speech, President Obama makes this statement: "We've got 2 percent of the world oil reserves. We use 20 percent."
But there's more to those numbers than meet the eye.
"It's accurate but extremely misleading," says Dan Kish of Institute for Energy Research, which is supported by the industry. "What he is talking about is oil we already have found."
Misleading, he argues, because the president is pointing to "proven" reserves, which is some 21 billion barrels, but the U.S. is sitting on vast reserves of untapped energy that are far greater.
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
And cost far more to extract. So until oil rises higher, those "untapped" reserves will stay "untapped" because they aren't economically viable. If they were, they would have been tapped long ago.
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Video: Obama says we’re producing too much oil and gas
http://hotair.com/archives/2012/03/22/video-obama-says-were-producing-too-much-oil-and-gas
posted at 2:55 pm on
March 22, 2012 by Tina Korbe
President Barack Obama is in my home state of Oklahoma today, touting his tired talking points about energy in little Cushing, “the town that fossil fuel built.” For the record, most Oklahomans aren’t happy he’s here. The state administration will give him no official welcome and protesters have already gathered near the location of the president’s speech, which — predictably — was closed to the public.
First, listen to this portion of the president’s energy address (h/t Greg Hengler).
As usual, he uses “we” to refer to both the government and private energy companies and takes credit for an expansion of drilling and production that he didn’t do anything to facilitate. Oil and gas production, he brags, is at an eight-year high. Actually, on federal land, fossil fuel production is at a nine-year low.
Then, he actually has the audacity to suggest that we’re producing too much oil and gas. The problem, he says, is that we don’t have enough pipeline to transport all of that. Gee, you’d think the president had done all he could to fast-track the Keystone pipeline. What’s that, you say? He’s doing what he can now to fast-track the portion of the pipeline that runs through Oklahoma and Texas? Don’t buy that he’s the reason TransCanada is moving ahead.
If the president had an ounce of humility at all, he might recognize that he has something to learn from Oklahomans, who know the energy industry the way Obama knows critical race theory. We kinda just imbibe it from the people around us who know it better than we do. Even those of us whose families weren’t actually in oil grew up knowing drilling engineers, geologists and landmen. We drive by pumpjacks on our way to visit grandparents, spy the lights of a far-off rig on midnight drives and occasionally will see a car fuel up at — get this! — a natural gas pump that the government didn’t pay us to install.
We might not articulate it to ourselves — I didn’t, really, until the BP oil spill, which I mourned along with the rest of the nation — but we respect the oil industry for its commitment to safely extricating oil and gas from formations far below the surface of the earth. The nation never pays attention to oil and gas companies until they do something wrong or an accident occurs, but, in Oklahoma, we can’t help but pay attention. We value what the industry has brought to our state — including, I’m not ashamed to admit, the Oklahoma City Thunder.
That’s why we wish that, just once, Obama would admit he doesn’t know everything about oil and gas companies and listen a little more to those who do:
Approval of the entire Keystone XL pipeline should happen now — not after the election. Yes, we are pleased TransCanada decided to build a critical section of the project from Cushing to the Gulf Coast. We note that this section doesn’t require State Department approval. However, America’s greatest benefit will come when we can transport oil from our best energy partner, Canada, and oil-rich North Dakota and Montana.
Private-sector innovation led to the combination of horizontal drilling with hydraulic fracturing resulting in the most significant resource revolution in the nation’s history. The safe and responsible application of these technologies has added new proven gas and oil reserves once inconceivable, and it has made U.S. energy independence a distinct possibility in just the next 10 years. We have now safely and successfully fracture treated 1.2 million wells in the U.S. since 1948 and more than 45,000 wells in 2011 — a safety record that would be the envy of any industry in the country. …
Our industry invests billions of dollars to ensure our operations are conducted in an environmentally responsible manner. However, with more than a dozen federal agencies in your administration proposing, planning or implementing new regulations — for little or no environmental benefit — there is considerable risk that increased costs and bureaucratic delays will cripple America’s energy production and halt the renaissance under way in our nation’s steel, plastics, chemical and agricultural industries.
Mr. President, your words suggest you want the economic benefits American natural gas and oil can deliver. We hope your actions follow suit — to date they have not.
Oil and gas CEOs have the greatest incentives of all to discover and promote some new and better energy source than fossil fuels — before some government-subsidized start-up does. Why does Obama act like they’re the enemy?
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Obama's Keystone XL Visit A Potemkin Village Photo-Op
IBD Editorials ^ | March 21, 2012
Politics: The president stages a photo-op in Oklahoma to take credit for the portion of the Keystone XL pipeline that doesn't need his approval and for oil production on private and state lands beyond his jurisdiction.
If one of his aides some morning remarked on a particularly lovely sunrise, it wouldn't surprise us if President Obama responded with a "thank you," so gifted is he in taking credit for successes that he has nothing to do with and that occur despite, not because, of his policies.
So it will be Thursday, when Obama is scheduled to appear in Cushing, Okla., known as the pipeline capital of the world, to take credit for the southern half of the Keystone XL pipeline, a project announced weeks ago by TransCanada, the Keystone builder.
It's the section that doesn't need presidential or State Department approval since it does not cross an international boundary.
The part that does require State Department approval and a presidential blessing, and which holds as much as 24 billion barrels of oil, runs from the rich oil sands of Alberta, past the booming oil fields of the Bakken shale formation in North Dakota and down to Cushing. It is the portion Obama killed in January.
He killed it, Obama says, because those rascally Republicans tried to make a political issue out of gas prices and were trying to "rush" approval of a project without giving him time to study it further.
This, despite the fact that the project had already been studied for three years. Environmental concerns that had already been addressed by TransCanada's rerouting of the pipeline around sensitive aquifers needed to be addressed, Obama claims.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.investors.com ...
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And cost far more to extract. So until oil rises higher, those "untapped" reserves will stay "untapped" because they aren't economically viable. If they were, they would have been tapped long ago.
See, this makes sense. I have no problem with this or what Gigantor says, because that makes sense.
When you were trying to say that Canada would never sell that oil and that we would get 1st dibs in the end, made no sense, as China is already recieving it and we aren't.
But this makes perfect sense.
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http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/03/22/us-usa-campaign-obama-pipeline-idUSBRE82L0UU20120322
LMFAO!!!!! Who does obama think he is fooling! ! ! "Pipeline to nowhere"
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BUSTED! ! ! !
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Gasoline
Townhall.com ^ | March 23, 2012 | Rich Galen
Posted on March 24, 2012 10:33:26 AM EDT by Kaslin
Gasoline prices have climbed above $4 per gallon for regular at too many places across the nation. We know this because President Barack Obama has embarked on a four-day blitz to demonstrate his concern for high gasoline prices.
According to the U.S Energy Information Administration the average price for a gallon of regular gasoline in the country is $3.87 which is up about 30 cents from a year ago.
The highest prices are on the West Coast at $4.23. The lowest, next door in the Rocky Mountain region at $3.62.
Unemployment numbers are largely theoretical. At 8.3 percent (or 14.9 percent if you'd rather use the underemployed rate) we care more about whether it's going up or down. Either everyone in our family who wants job has one, or they don't.
Gasoline prices are different. Everyone with a car or truck has to fill his her or his tank on a regular basis. They know pretty much to the nearest dollar how much it should cost. When it costs more dollars, they notice. It is not theoretical, it is actual cash off the debit card.
Rising gasoline prices are a regressive tax on poorer Americans. They affect most those who can afford higher prices least.
My car has a 20 gallon tank. I generally fill it when I have about a quarter of a tank left. That means I need about 15 gallons about every two weeks. 30 gallons a month.
At $3.50 per gallon it will cost $105 per month for me to drive a normal pattern not counting trips to visit family and friends out of town.
At $4.00 per gallon I will spend $120 per month - 15 dollars more.
For me that is one fewer tall no-whip Starbucks mochas per week. Four morning mochas instead of five per week and I'm just about even.
But, for people on a fixed income or working at a close-to-minimum-wage job who are stretching the check to reach the end of the month is a struggle in the best of times. That $15 dollars is a big FIFTEEN dollars. It might well mean, not one fewer Starbucks a week, but one fewer meal for the family per week.
If I were advising the Republican National Committee - which I am not - I would be looking for a struggling family in every state, maybe in every Congressional district to tell the story of what $4 gasoline means to them. How they have to buy gas to get to work. They are trapped by higher prices.
I guarantee you if there were a Republican President the DNC would be doing just that.
This Administration has made some very bad bets that have made lowering prices more difficult.
Secretary of Energy Stephen Chu is a PhD and Nobel Prize winner in physics. He has been focused like a laser on ridding the nation, and the world, from the yoke of fossil fuels for cars and trucks by moving America's fleet to battery-powered vehicles.
There are 250 million cars and light trucks on America's highways. Even if we could get a million Americans to purchase a battery-powered car, that would amount to 1/250th of the fleet or four tenths of one percent.
Not exactly a game changer.
Not only that, but you have to have additional electricity production to have something in the socket when those million battery-operated cars are plugged in. In order to do that, without increasing the use of natural gas or coal, the Administration promoted more nuclear powered generation plants.
Nothing wrong with that on its face, but the Tsunami in Japan last year made it far more difficult to move out smartly on that front - at least for now.
Solar power and wind farms are pleasant thoughts as alternative sources, but (a) you have to build them somewhere where people aren't; (b) you have get the electricity from where they are to where it is needed; and, (c) the wind doesn't always blow, nor does the sun always shine.
So, battery-powered cars may have been a bad bet. After planning to sell 10,000 Chevy Volts in 2011, General Motors admitted it sold only about 6,200. As 2012 opened, Chevrolet had to bite bullet and shut down the Volt assembly line for at least five weeks until inventories are sold off.
I'm not cheering for the demise of battery-operate cars, but they are not a solution to $4 gasoline any time in the foreseeable future.
President Obama is correct when he says there is "no silver bullet" to quickly bring down gasoline prices. Fair or not, the guy behind that big desk in the Oval Office gets the blame.
This time, it's Barack Obama.
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Obama Kills Atlantic Offshore Drilling For Five Years
Breitbart ^ | 3/30/12 | John Sexton
Yesterday the Obama administration announced a delaying tactic which will put off the possibility of new offshore oil drilling on the Atlantic coast for at least five years:
The announcement by the Interior Department sets into motion what will be at least a five year environmental survey to determine whether and where oil production might occur.
Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell notes that a planned lease sale, which the administration cancelled last year, will now be put off until at least 2018. As you might expect, Republicans were not impressed with the decision:
"The president's actions have closed an entire new area to drilling on his watch and cheats Virginians out of thousands of jobs," said Rep. Doc Hastings, R-Wash., who chairs the House Natural Resources Committee. The announcement "continues the president's election-year political ploy of giving speeches and talking about drilling after having spent the first three years in office blocking, delaying and driving up the cost of producing energy in America," he said.
Finally, given that this is the Obama administration, you won't be surprised to learn that oil and gas exploration is not the only aim of the survey:
(Excerpt) Read more at breitbart.com ...
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China rejects Obama's Iran oil import sanctions (REJECTED!)
google ^ | 3/31/2012 | AP
Posted on March 31, 2012 6:57:23 AM EDT by tobyhill
China rejected President Barack Obama's decision to move forward with plans for sanctions on countries buying oil from Iran, saying Saturday that Washington had no right to unilaterally punish other nations.
South Korean officials said they will continue working with the U.S. to reduce oil imports from Iran, as other U.S. allies who depend on Iranian oil worked to find alternative energy supplies.
Obama announced Friday that he is plowing ahead with the potential sanctions, which could affect U.S. allies in Asia and Europe, as part of a deepening campaign to starve Iran of money for its disputed nuclear program. The U.S. and allies believe that Iran is pursuing a nuclear bomb; Iran denies that.
China is one of the biggest importers of Iranian oil, and its Foreign Ministry reiterated its opposition to the U.S. moves.
"The Chinese side always opposes one country unilaterally imposing sanctions against another according to domestic law. Furthermore it does not accept the unilateral imposition of those sanctions on a third country," the ministry said in a brief statement Saturday.
(Excerpt) Read more at google.com ...
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March 31, 2012
There Obama Goes Again
By Larry Kudlow
As Ronald Reagan famously said, “There you go again.”
Of course, Reagan was blaming Jimmy Carter for launching false attacks during a debate. And that line was so effective, it not only helped Reagan win the debate, but a presidential election that would change American history.
But “there you go again” can apply equally to President Obama. Once again this week, the president was out on the campaign trail bashing and oil and gas companies. And he continued to spread major falsehoods about this industry, which I guess is the polite way to put it.
Obama is obsessed with oil and gas. He is a prisoner of the left-wing environmental groups. And really, he’s extending his leftist class-warfare attack from rich people to successful oil and gas producers.
What seems to have Obama especially steamed is the fact that the conventional-energy companies are profitable. Especially the five largest. So he wants to tax them. He then wants to redistribute their income to his favorite green-energy firms. Sound familiar? I don’t know which is more important to the president -- the fact that he hates fossil fuel or the fact that he hates success. Or that he wants an energy-entitlement state.
But here’s what I do know, factually.
Oil companies have an effective corporate tax rate well above 40 percent. And they operate within one of the highest-taxed industries in America. According to the Tax Foundation, for more than 25 years, oil and gas companies have sent more tax dollars to Washington and state capitals than they earned in profits. That’s a fact.
Single-handedly, oil and gas companies finance over 10 percent of non-defense discretionary spending within the U.S. budget. According to The Wall Street Journal, ExxonMobil, the world’s largest energy firm, paid out $59 billion in total U.S. taxes over the five years prior to 2010 while earning only $40.5 billion in domestic profits.
And Obama wants to raise taxes on conventional-energy firms by somewhere between $40 billion and $80 billion? Whatever happened to the supply-side principle that if you tax something more, you get less of it?
But with gasoline prices headed towards $5 a gallon, and with oil prices over $100 a barrel, virtually the whole country outside of the White House wants more oil, more retail gas for the pump and more energy supplies everywhere in order to bring prices down. Raising taxes won’t do it.
Make no mistake about it: Fossil fuel is going to drive the American economy for decades to come. Green energy is not.
Obama’s other line of attack is that oil companies shouldn’t get any subsidies. They made too much money for that. Well, I’m against oil subsidies. There’s about $90 billion worth in the federal budget. Better to end them, slash corporate tax rates across the board and let the free market decide energy policy and production.
But on the subject of subsidies, so-called renewable-energy subsidies (think Solyndra) are 49-times greater than fossil-fuel subsidies, according to studies by the Congressional Research Service. And the Congressional Budget Office says renewable green energy received 68 percent of energy-related tax preferences in fiscal year 2011, while fossil fuels got only 15 percent. Additionally, oil, natural gas and coal received 64 cents per megawatt hour in subsidies, while wind power alone received $56.29 per megawatt hour. That’s nearly 100-times what fossil fuels got.
By the way, the so-called subsidies that Obama is talking about are really depreciation write-offs for investment. Oil companies get a 6 percent deduction from income. Most manufacturing industries get 9 percent. And every company in the economy is eligible for faster investment write-offs.
Frankly, the most pro-growth corporate-tax policy would be 100 percent cash-expensing for new investment, a slashed corporate tax rate, and no more subsidies, preferences and carve-outs. That would be an unbelievable job-creator.
But President Obama is too busy spewing falsehoods to support his ideological agenda than to take account of the facts. And while he’s at it, one of the greatest, pro-growth revolutions ever is taking place right under his nose. It’s the oil and gas shale miracle, which if left unfettered will turn America and Canada into an energy-independent New Middle East inside of 10 years.
In fact, the collapse of natural-gas prices brought on by this revolution could become one of the biggest tax cuts for the economy in history, making all our industries vastly more competitive, revolutionizing transportation and providing more consumer real income at home.
Obama should quit the demagoguery, stop bashing oil and gas, stop taxing success and let our ingenious, creative, free-enterprise private economy spur America to a new generation of prosperity.
Lawrence Kudlow is host of CNBC's The Kudlow Report and co-host of The Call. He is also a former Reagan economic advisor and a syndicated columnist. Visit his blog, Kudlow's Money Politics.
Copyright 2012, Creators Syndicate Inc.
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China rejects Obama's Iran oil import sanctions (REJECTED!)
google ^ | 3/31/2012 | AP
Posted on March 31, 2012 6:57:23 AM EDT by tobyhill
China rejected President Barack Obama's decision to move forward with plans for sanctions on countries buying oil from Iran, saying Saturday that Washington had no right to unilaterally punish other nations.
South Korean officials said they will continue working with the U.S. to reduce oil imports from Iran, as other U.S. allies who depend on Iranian oil worked to find alternative energy supplies.
Obama announced Friday that he is plowing ahead with the potential sanctions, which could affect U.S. allies in Asia and Europe, as part of a deepening campaign to starve Iran of money for its disputed nuclear program. The U.S. and allies believe that Iran is pursuing a nuclear bomb; Iran denies that.
China is one of the biggest importers of Iranian oil, and its Foreign Ministry reiterated its opposition to the U.S. moves.
"The Chinese side always opposes one country unilaterally imposing sanctions against another according to domestic law. Furthermore it does not accept the unilateral imposition of those sanctions on a third country," the ministry said in a brief statement Saturday.
(Excerpt) Read more at google.com ...
I kind of agree with China here... Who the fuck are we to go around to the rest of the world telling them they shouldnt engage in commerce with Iran because were upset with them?
Jesus Christ.
I think something needs to be done with Iran, but we cant expect the rest of the world to punish Iran with us. ::)
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:). Obama is trying to create a crisis to skyrocket energy prices and then blame someone else for it.
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:). Obama is trying to create a crisis to skyrocket energy prices and then blame someone else for it.
and just what would be his motive for that dickhead???
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and just what would be his motive for that dickhead???
His stated goal is t skyrocket energy prices.
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His stated goal is t skyrocket energy prices.
I cant believe people continue to ignore that video, where he actually says that word for word.
Not to mention the videos where he talks about oil going up to tansition to other forms of energy.
Instead of letting this be a natural transition, he seeks to force it, which is only going to bankrupt people and companies as they try and push for a technology before people are ready.
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I cant believe people continue to ignore that video, where he actually says that word for word.
Not to mention the videos where he talks about oil going up to tansition to other forms of energy.
Instead of letting this be a natural transition, he seeks to force it, which is only going to bankrupt people and companies as they try and push for a technology before people are ready.
Thugs like andre have a CT that the tape was doctored and Solyndrabama could not possibly havecsaid those words.
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Thugs like andre have a CT that the tape was doctored and Solyndrabama could not possibly havecsaid those words.
LOL, kind of like the "big oil" thread Benny made, where they were brushing off the Keystone pipeline and Solynda like they were nothing, even though there are 50123487017x more examples just like them.
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I'm not gonna raed through a 2 yr old thread, ...I just want to comment on the title.
ahem... Who told who so?
ps: If gas costs you $6.00 a gallon, grab it, and appreciate how cheap it is, 'cause it's gonna get a whole lot worse.
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President Obama’s offshore drilling moratorium following the 2010 oil spill caused widespread job losses and a significant drop in energy production in the Gulf of Mexico. Two years later, a U.S. House committee wants to know why the administration misled the public about the drilling ban.
The House Natural Resources Committee yesterday issued its first subpoena to the Department of the Interior after Secretary Ken Salazar refused to turn over documents related to the moratorium. At issue is why Salazar’s department suggested a panel of engineering experts supported the drilling ban when in fact they did not.
Despite the Obama administration’s transparency promises, Salazar has rebuffed the committee’s requests and stymied the department’s inspector general investigation. Salazar, who previously apologized, was defiant when asked about the subpoena:
The bottom line is I’m very comfortable with everything we did including the time out and reset button that we had to put in place in the Gulf of Mexico. What the House Natural Resources and energy committee is doing is simply a distraction in the name of politics.
Natural Resources Chairman Doc Hastings (D-WA) said it was important to understand what happened and why Salazar failed to conduct any technical, scientific or economic analysis prior to imposing the drilling ban. He gave the department one week to produce the documents. The subpoena was a last resort for the committee.
The administration’s controversial moratorium — and the subsequent permitorium that followed — caused economic hardships throughout the Gulf region and in communities across America. A recent survey of employers, conducted by Greater New Orleans Inc., revealed 41 percent of businesses are not making a profit and 76 percent have lost cash revenues.
One of the region’s business owners, Leslie Bertucci of R&D Enterprises, shared her story about the moratorium’s impact:
At the time Salazar imposed the drilling ban, he justified his action with a May 27, 2010, report that recommended a six-month drilling moratorium. That recommendation was allegedly supported by seven members of the National Academy of Engineering, who had peer-reviewed the report.
But only after Salazar imposed the job-killing moratorium did Americans learn the truth: Political appointees at the White House and Department of Interior inserted the moratorium recommendation without the knowledge of the seven experts. They subsequently rebutted the implication and went a step further to note the ban “will not measurably reduce risk further and it will have a lasting impact on the nation’s economy which may be greater than that of the oil spill.”
When the department’s inspector general sought information on the incident, administration official stonewalled investigators. That ultimately led to yesterday’s subpoena. The documents sought include:
All documents created, sent, or received by Steve Black, Neal Kemkar, Mary Katherine Ishee, David Hayes and Ted Strickland between April 26, 2010 and June 30, 2010 related to the development, editing, review, issuance, response, or reaction to the May 27, 2010 Department of the Interior report that included a recommendation for a six-month drilling moratorium in the Gulf of Mexico.
All 13 documents that the Interior Department has intervened to block the Acting Inspector General from providing to the Committee.
Rob Bluey directs the Center for Media and Public Policy, an investigative journalism operation at The Heritage Foundation. Follow him on Twitter: @RobertBluey
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Experts: Obama Oil Plan May Make Prices More Volatile
Money News ^ | Tuesday, 17 Apr 2012 12:29 PM
The White House unveiled a slate of legislative proposals on Tuesday aimed at cracking down on oil market manipulation, as the administration attempts to combat high gasoline prices. The plan calls for a tenfold increase in the maximum civil and criminal penalties that can be applied for the manipulation of oil futures markets, the White House said.
The Obama administration is also calling for Congress to provide more funding to the Commodity Futures Trading Commission to increase surveillance and enforcement staff for oil futures market trading. The proposal also calls on the CFTC to be given the power to raise margin requirements in oil futures markets.
The following are comments from oil analysts, politicians and traders on the Obama proposal.
AMY JAFFE, AT RICE UNIVERSITY'S BAKER INSTITUTE IN HOUSTON:
On expanding access to CFTC data: "People like me cannot analyze whether people are manipulating the market or not because they keep the data secret. Their whole rationale for keeping the data secret was that people need their commercial advantage — but people who trade know what everyone's positions are. It's the public who doesn't know.
"Given the financial climate experience we had in 2007 and 2008, wouldn't you want to know whether your bank is really long in the futures market or not?
"It's important in managing a financial crisis to know who is in the market or who isn't if suddenly there is a crisis in oil that is going to take down the banks."
On giving the CFTC power to change margin requirements: "The thing about margin requirements is that when markets are very volatile and they afraid about banks buying too much oil on leverage, it gives them a tool.
(Excerpt) Read more at moneynews.com ...
more bullshit from the imposter
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Obama's Crackdown On Speculators Won't Cut Prices
IBD Editorials ^ | April 17, 2012
Posted on April 17, 2012 8:07:07 PM EDT by Kaslin
Energy: President Obama's promised "crackdown" on speculators is another example of his using government to strangle markets and increase control over the private economy. Worse, it won't cut gas prices one bit.
President Obama knows that soaring gasoline prices are hurting his political chances in November. How else to explain his sudden decision to go after "speculators" — that is, investors — in the oil and gasoline markets for driving up prices?
Under his watch, gasoline prices have soared from $1.89 a gallon to nearly $3.90 a gallon — a 106% rise in just three years. No wonder he's in a political panic.
Standing with Attorney General Eric Holder, President Obama said Tuesday he wants to put "more cops on the street" to nab speculators who profit from rising oil prices. Cops? For people investing legally?
After ripping Congress for not imposing new taxes on oil companies, as he wanted, Obama on Tuesday called on lawmakers to spend $52 million to give bureaucrats expansive new controls over oil trading markets.
Specifically, he wants to increase penalties for market manipulation and give regulators power to require energy traders to have more collateral. But, as even Obama admits, it "will not bring down gas prices overnight."
Actually, it won't bring prices down, period.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.investors.com ...