Attempt to rekindle Domestic Oil Drilling...

Desh said:
Trog why the hell do you think government makes mistakes?
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"There is a lot of pressure being put on back home," he said. "I don't care if you're from a Republican state, a Democratic state, or a mixed state. Everybody is hearing, 'By golly, we need you to do something.' "

By Golly they're doing... SOMETHING!... just in time for elections. A politically driven solution.

Desh said:
The only reason they want to more land under drilling rights is to control the oil that comes from these lands wether they drill or not.

Why do you refuse to see the reality of the situation?
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How many years of development and BILLIONS of dollars does it take to place a new drilling rig on the OCS? It's not like you row out there, drop anchor, insert a straw, and start sucking. If all of the area under lease could somehow have a rig available tomorrow in an "I dream of Jeannie" - like poof!, how many $billions / $hundreds of billions would it take? Any idea? Where is that money going to come from? I am sure that in the doing of the SOMETHING!, our leaders determined the answer to this and other pertinent questions...

Underwater seismography experts - a dime a dozen. Ordinary seismography experts are even cheaper and more plentiful. You can get a boxed set at WalMart... while you're there, you can pick up a fully rigged survey ship, too.

What about the computational requirements needed to analyze the seismic data? Seismic data is typically run on the same types of large mainframe computers used to simulate nuclear weapons explosions - rare and tremendously expensive! What is the availability of this resource? If we had ALL the data needed from all of the fields available RIGHT NOW, how long would it take to get it all crunched? If we wanted to get it all crunched in one year, how many of these systems would we need? Probably more systems than exist on earth right now. So how long and how many $billions would it take to get them built and on-line? Is it even possible to meet something like a one-year time line if there was $infinite?

Transport and storage facility capacity? Is there enough to handle the increase? Can we even get the product from point A to point B? Lifting (pumping out of the ground) capacity in the Russian oil fields is TWICE what they export. So WHY don't they run at full capacity? Because they could get the crude out of the ground, but not out of the field. The transport infrastructure doesn't have the capacity to match. It is the bottleneck in the process.

How about refinery capacity? We currently import distilled product from Venezula because we do not the domestic refining capacity needed to meet our demand. So are the oil companies to ship the oil to places were refining capacity does exist and then have to ship it back? Added transportation cost and an increased risk of spills!

How much slack is there in global refining capacity anyway? Do you realize that a refinery is not a refinery is not a refinery? The refineries that crack North Sea crude are optimized for that feedstock. Take a look at oil futures markets do you notice that there are different feedstocks - light sweet, West Texas Intermediate, heavy crude? You'd have a hell of a mess if you tried to crack heavy crude in a refinery set up for light sweet feedstock; doing so would likely destroy the refinery. So the very idea of spending massive dollars to pump crude that you have no ability to refine is STUPID! It's stupid to the point that if you do it a few times, it bankrupts your company.

But you could refit a light sweet refinery to refine heavy (or vice versa)! Yes, BUT since there is insufficient excess refining capacity, even on a global basis, all that would happen would be a shifting of the bottleneck from one feedstock to another. You would be making some other product LESS available. In addition doing so would cost $billions and would have the refinery off line for an extended period of time.

Is anyone so naive as to believe that Congress knows the answer to ANY of the questions above? The scale of dollars, scope, and time needed to resolve this issue is HUGE! A lot of complex things that require FORETHOUGHT have to ALL go 'right' to get oil from the ground into a car as a usable fuel. It's NOT as simple as pencil-whipping SOMETHING! into law time for election day.

God Damn it! Congress is going to push some piece of crap legislation into enforceable LAW OF THE LAND to look good. And the real kick in the head is that it probably won't fix the problem.

So with regard to your closing question above: I clearly see the reality of the situation. How 'bout you?

(Subject to future addition)
 
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Troglodyte27 said:
"There is a lot of pressure being put on back home," he said. "I don't care if you're from a Republican state, a Democratic state, or a mixed state. Everybody is hearing, 'By golly, we need you to do something.' "

By Golly they're doing... SOMETHING!... just in time for elections. A politically driven solution.


How many years of development and BILLIONS of dollars does it take to place a new drilling rig on the OCS? It's not like you row out there, drop anchor, insert a straw, and start sucking. If all of the area under lease could somehow have a rig available tomorrow in an "I dream of Jeannie" - like poof!, how many $billions / $hundreds of billions would it take? Any idea? Where is that money going to come from? I am sure that in the doing of the SOMETHING!, our leaders determined the answer to this and other pertinent questions...

Underwater seismography experts - a dime a dozen. Ordinary seismography experts are even cheaper and more plentiful. You can get a boxed set at WalMart... while you're there, you can pick up a fully rigged survey ship, too.

What about the computational requirements needed to analyze the seismic data? Seismic data is typically run on the same types of large mainframe computers used to simulate nuclear weapons explosions - rare and tremendously expensive! What is the availability of this resource? If we had ALL the data needed from all of the fields available RIGHT NOW, how long would it take to get it all crunched? If we wanted to get it all crunched in one year, how many of these systems would we need? Probably more systems than exist on earth right now. So how long and how many $billions would it take to get them built and on-line? Is it even possible to meet something like a one-year time line if there was $infinite?

Transport and storage facility capacity? Is there enough to handle the increase? Can we even get the product from point A to point B? Lifting (pumping out of the ground) capacity in the Russian oil fields is TWICE what they export. So WHY don't they run at full capacity? Because they could get the crude out of the ground, but not out of the field. The transport infrastructure doesn't have the capacity to match. It is the bottleneck in the process.

How about refinery capacity? We currently import distilled product from Venezula because we do not the domestic refining capacity needed to meet our demand. So are the oil companies to ship the oil to places were refining capacity does exist and then have to ship it back? Added transportation cost and an increased risk of spills!

How much slack is there in global refining capacity anyway? Do you realize that a refinery is not a refinery is not a refinery? The refineries that crack North Sea crude are optimized for that feedstock. Take a look at oil futures markets do you notice that there are different feedstocks - light sweet, West Texas Intermediate, heavy crude? You'd have a hell of a mess if you tried to crack heavy crude in a refinery set up for light sweet feedstock; doing so would likely destroy the refinery. So the very idea of spending massive dollars to pump crude that you have no ability to refine is STUPID! It's stupid to the point that if you do it a few times, it bankrupts your company.

But you could refit a light sweet refinery to refine heavy (or vice versa)! Yes, BUT since there is insufficient excess refining capacity, even on a global basis, all that would happen would be a shifting of the bottleneck from one feedstock to another. You would be making some other product LESS available. In addition doing so would cost $billions and would have the refinery off line for an extended period of time.

Is anyone so naive as to believe that Congress knows the answer to ANY of the questions above? The scale of dollars, scope, and time needed to resolve this issue is HUGE! A lot of complex things that require FORETHOUGHT have to ALL go 'right' to get oil from the ground into a car as a usable fuel. It's NOT as simple as pencil-whipping SOMETHING! into law time for election day.

God Damn it! Congress is going to push some piece of crap legislation into enforceable LAW OF THE LAND to look good. And the real kick in the head is that it probably won't fix the problem.

So with regard to your closing question above: I clearly see the reality of the situation. How 'bout you?

(Subject to future addition)
Click to expand...

HaHa, you had to resort to this talking point???
 
Troglodyte27 said:
"There is a lot of pressure being put on back home," he said. "I don't care if you're from a Republican state, a Democratic state, or a mixed state. Everybody is hearing, 'By golly, we need you to do something.' "

By Golly they're doing... SOMETHING!... just in time for elections. A politically driven solution.


How many years of development and BILLIONS of dollars does it take to place a new drilling rig on the OCS? It's not like you row out there, drop anchor, insert a straw, and start sucking. If all of the area under lease could somehow have a rig available tomorrow in an "I dream of Jeannie" - like poof!, how many $billions / $hundreds of billions would it take? Any idea? Where is that money going to come from? I am sure that in the doing of the SOMETHING!, our leaders determined the answer to this and other pertinent questions...

Underwater seismography experts - a dime a dozen. Ordinary seismography experts are even cheaper and more plentiful. You can get a boxed set at WalMart... while you're there, you can pick up a fully rigged survey ship, too.

What about the computational requirements needed to analyze the seismic data? Seismic data is typically run on the same types of large mainframe computers used to simulate nuclear weapons explosions - rare and tremendously expensive! What is the availability of this resource? If we had ALL the data needed from all of the fields available RIGHT NOW, how long would it take to get it all crunched? If we wanted to get it all crunched in one year, how many of these systems would we need? Probably more systems than exist on earth right now. So how long and how many $billions would it take to get them built and on-line? Is it even possible to meet something like a one-year time line if there was $infinite?

Transport and storage facility capacity? Is there enough to handle the increase? Can we even get the product from point A to point B? Lifting (pumping out of the ground) capacity in the Russian oil fields is TWICE what they export. So WHY don't they run at full capacity? Because they could get the crude out of the ground, but not out of the field. The transport infrastructure doesn't have the capacity to match. It is the bottleneck in the process.

How about refinery capacity? We currently import distilled product from Venezula because we do not the domestic refining capacity needed to meet our demand. So are the oil companies to ship the oil to places were refining capacity does exist and then have to ship it back? Added transportation cost and an increased risk of spills!

How much slack is there in global refining capacity anyway? Do you realize that a refinery is not a refinery is not a refinery? The refineries that crack North Sea crude are optimized for that feedstock. Take a look at oil futures markets do you notice that there are different feedstocks - light sweet, West Texas Intermediate, heavy crude? You'd have a hell of a mess if you tried to crack heavy crude in a refinery set up for light sweet feedstock; doing so would likely destroy the refinery. So the very idea of spending massive dollars to pump crude that you have no ability to refine is STUPID! It's stupid to the point that if you do it a few times, it bankrupts your company.

But you could refit a light sweet refinery to refine heavy (or vice versa)! Yes, BUT since there is insufficient excess refining capacity, even on a global basis, all that would happen would be a shifting of the bottleneck from one feedstock to another. You would be making some other product LESS available. In addition doing so would cost $billions and would have the refinery off line for an extended period of time.

Is anyone so naive as to believe that Congress knows the answer to ANY of the questions above? The scale of dollars, scope, and time needed to resolve this issue is HUGE! A lot of complex things that require FORETHOUGHT have to ALL go 'right' to get oil from the ground into a car as a usable fuel. It's NOT as simple as pencil-whipping SOMETHING! into law time for election day.

God Damn it! Congress is going to push some piece of crap legislation into enforceable LAW OF THE LAND to look good. And the real kick in the head is that it probably won't fix the problem.

So with regard to your closing question above: I clearly see the reality of the situation. How 'bout you?

(Subject to future addition)
Click to expand...

Yep so how is this offshore drilling going to help us short term ? As I have said we have no short term fix other than conservation. and start working fast on alternatives.

And why do we have a refiner shortage. oil cos have actually shut down refineries in recent years. and I know of only one scheduled to be built.
Sure you can blame that on environutz, but how many applications have been attempted ?

I recall Bush promising to expedite refineries to be built on govt bases a few years ago. What ever happened with that ?
 
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The thing that gets me, and you all know I am a big proponent of new domestic drilling, is the interesting factoid I read the other day. Do you realize American oil companies have a number of oil wells in several states, capped and are not pumping the oil from them? Not because of some regulation or environmental mandate, but simply because it would increase supply and lower the price. An increased supply would also kill this growing sense of urgency to drill domestically, and they want to have new reserves opened. The best way to get there, is continue the 'shortage' until Congress acts to ease restrictions. It's really a sorry-ass trick to pull in the midst of Americans struggling to pay for fuel.

I hope that any new legislation to open up domestic drilling in Alaska and off the coast of California and Florida, also includes a mandate for these companies to tap the resources they already have available, and are just not pumping. These wells would be an immediate influx, we would see almost immediate results, not the 3~10 year timetable for new drilling operations in new areas.

The other issue that needs to be addressed is refinery capacity, after Katrina wiped out several key refineries, and with no new ones having been built in the past 20 years, we don't have as much of a problem with oil supply as we have with ability to refine it. All the oil in the world does us no good, if we are unable to turn it into gasoline to meet the demand.
 
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Onceler said:
Might be. Nice to see that he's calmed down from his frothing at the mouth "you're all a bunch of commies" rants from earlier today...
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Correction....you are all a bunch of "Pinheads" rants....lol

and I agree with you and uscit, good post of Dixie's....and I DID NOT KNOW that there were actual wells that they are not tapping...I knew that they had leases on land and seas that they were not even exploring......

Care
 
Desh said:
Why the fuck are they not drilling in areas they already have the go ahead on?

Why do they always need NEW areas to drill?

You know why ? because its just a fucking ploy to get more approved.

When will you realize they will fight alternative energy with every little inch we give them?
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Applause...
 
Desh said:
These unused areas could produce an additional 4.8 million barrels of oil and 44.7 billion cubic feet of natural gas each day


when will you realize this industry doesnt give a rats ass about this country and is just using this oppertunity to get more under their control for the decades to come?

Im so tired of people buying their bullshit.
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Alaska's are starting to get very upset. They got these leases for bargain basement prices and have just sat on them until, like now, they are more profitable! It is a bunch of crap! Alaska should produce its own oil! Cut out the middle man!
 
Harry Ried was on CNBC calling for more Drilling.
Why??? 80% of non-partisan wingnuts want it.
Though he did and excellent Desh impression with those talking points.
I've got to say, this topic brings the funnies shit from educated people of any on the board.
 
uscitizen said:
Yep so how is this offshore drilling going to help us short term ? As I have said we have no short term fix other than conservation. and start working fast on alternatives.
Click to expand...

I have no disagreement with this point. Let's take the 'long view.' Will our oil demand be lower in 5 years? I seriously doubt. If we do not begin now, we will have the same / worse problem in 5 years. The path of inactivity has gotten us here, so obviously we should continue short-term focused failed policies.

uscitizen said:
And why do we have a refiner shortage. oil cos have actually shut down refineries in recent years. and I know of only one scheduled to be built.
Sure you can blame that on environutz, but how many applications have been attempted ?
Click to expand...

Refining capacity is up year over year, every year for the past ~20 years, in the U.S. Capacity is different than sheer number of refineries. Demand simply has outstripped these increases in refining capacity.

The number of applications could 1, 10, 100, 1000; I do not know the exact figure, but I do know that it is not zero. Nonetheless, the exact number does not matter. Because there have been ZERO approvals I can tell you that EVERY SINGLE APPLICATION has been rejected. THAT, not the number of apps, IS the problem.

uscitizen said:
I recall Bush promising to expedite refineries to be built on govt bases a few years ago. What ever happened with that ?
Click to expand...

As far as I recall, Congressional democrats managed to block the attempts to get this accomplished. Feel free to show otherwise.
 
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Dixie said:
The thing that gets me, and you all know I am a big proponent of new domestic drilling, is the interesting factoid I read the other day. Do you realize American oil companies have a number of oil wells in several states, capped and are not pumping the oil from them? Not because of some regulation or environmental mandate, but simply because it would increase supply and lower the price. An increased supply would also kill this growing sense of urgency to drill domestically, and they want to have new reserves opened. The best way to get there, is continue the 'shortage' until Congress acts to ease restrictions. It's really a sorry-ass trick to pull in the midst of Americans struggling to pay for fuel.

I hope that any new legislation to open up domestic drilling in Alaska and off the coast of California and Florida, also includes a mandate for these companies to tap the resources they already have available, and are just not pumping. These wells would be an immediate influx, we would see almost immediate results, not the 3~10 year timetable for new drilling operations in new areas.

The other issue that needs to be addressed is refinery capacity, after Katrina wiped out several key refineries, and with no new ones having been built in the past 20 years, we don't have as much of a problem with oil supply as we have with ability to refine it. All the oil in the world does us no good, if we are unable to turn it into gasoline to meet the demand.
Click to expand...

You need to retake economics 101. Even with gold at record prices, you know that some of the gold mines are not running at all! Why?
 
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uscitizen said:
Only thing on the nuke, we first need to establish what we are going to do with the radioactive waste. If we can't even agree on that ....
Also we need to ensure very stringent construction practices on nuke plants.
Cost cutting will not work very well on them.
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Damn you and your pussiness. What is with the obsessive nitpicking and hand wringing on anything that would help americans? We know you think americans deserve to die for ever voting for republicans, but that whole electoral thing is based on propaganda and manipulation. The american people are victims. Why are you so full of hate? Is it because you think you can finally be on the same page as people holding advanced degrees? You're better than that.
 
Who knew dixie would be for nationalizing the oil industry? If you're going pass laws micromanaging to the degree he seems to desire, we might as well just take them over ala hugo.
 
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