One article you listed from ’03 had estimated numbers for the foreseeable future with technology development. That one had the most credibility to me. It didn’t mention Arctic sources, just offshore estimates. According to it, mean estimate is about 89.5 bbl. Interestingly, it showed a marked increase from the ’01 numbers in the same article.

You use a figure of 7.68 bbl/yr and rising. Because of the “rising” part, you change the value of deposits regarding how long they’d last. So, 26 bbl in AK only lasts 2-3 yrs. I find that premise false. P&Q shows that price affects demand. We’ve seen that these past few months. American consumption has decreased due to price, so oil has come down in price as demand versus production has improved.

Looking through that stuff doesn’t seem to give the underlying data of whence they obtained the numbers, i.e., surveyed when. The AEO2007 is a case in point. It’s the government prediction of reserves and how long it’d take to develop them. These are the numbers Dems use to discredit drilling.

However, these are the same numbers I’ve seen for years. They seem to have never changed, except to go down based on production. This is what I mean about old numbers. I really don’t think the government went out of its way to get a new base of numbers. That would’ve required new surveys… in the face of drilling bans. It looks wipped together. “Hey, Sam, do a quick spreadsheet for Congress, wouldja?”

The development timeframe is based on government doing nothing to lift the moratoria early. For example, they’ll all expire by 2012, then production can begin no sooner than 2017. What?!? We can’t prepare ahead of time? Uh, no. Oil companies can’t trust Congress not to screw them by extending the moratoria. That’s true now. Some bans have expired, but companies haven’t just rushed out to drill, because they’re waiting on the election results. Also, they may need incentives.

Definitive action by the new Congress can change things drastically. The bans are ridiculous to be maintaining. These are artificial limits. They need premanent lifting.
The oil companies have stated publicly in recent months that they can expand production in short order in the areas where they already have infrastructure. Other places will take longer.

If we combine new production with development of new technologies (clean coal, shale oil, nuclear, renewables), the drilling will act as a fine bridge to get us to the future. Not drilling is unacceptable. The effect of doing all this development, on our economy, and its ability to rein in the power of the foreign oil producers, is simply inestimable.

But, I’m no expert. So, despite my really high IQ, what do I know? Nice yakkin’ atcha.

I agree “support” may have been too positive a word for Obama’s position on offshore oil drilling. Maybe he’s just willing to compromise to improve his political position. I’m really not sure about the details of that.

So, where do you get your data? Numbers I can find all say that 100B barrels is for ALL the arctic, and only about 1/3 of that is around Alaska. Most sources say 26-27B MAY BE off Alaska. Here are a few sources:
http://www.mms.gov/alaska/lease/hlease/PLANMAP.HTM
http://www.mms.gov/alaska/re/reports/rereport.htm
http://www.mms.gov/alaska/re/about/refocus.htm
http://tonto.eia.doe.gov/dnav/pet/pet_sum_crdsnd_adc_mbbl_m.htm
http://www.aspo-usa.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=398&Itemid=91
…
and search for this excellent PDF on mms.gov:
“Assessment of Undiscovered Technically Recoverable Oil and Gas Resources of the Nation’s Outer Continental Shelf, 2006″ Dude – it even has a “bar and whiskers” type graph! figure 5. Gotta love those.

Lower 48:
http://www.eia.doe.gov/oiaf/aeo/otheranalysis/ongr.html

Are you saying all these sources are “old” even with current dates? Are you in the oil industry that you have different info? My brother used to work on offshore rigs in the far east and in S. America for NL/Baroid.

Even if we got ALL 100B barrels and exported NONE, it is maybe 8 years worth of oil (current consumption is 7.6B barrels annually for U.S., and rising). Figure we only get Alaska’s 26B barrels and keep it all for ourselves (unlikely), how many years of consumption does that benefit us? 2? 3 at most? Do you consider it worth any environmental impact to prolong the agony of oil dependence for a few more years? Why not spend the exploration/extraction/production/distribution dollars on renewables with potential for growth instead of on a dead-end fossil fuel?

So, it’s really not significant in the big picture. And almost certainly won’t make any difference at the gas pump. Or in our dependence on imports. Like I said – it’s a distraction!

http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/story?id=5921494&page=1 is one of MANY articles in the MSM.

I know this is getting way off the thread of the original post, but oh well.

And finally: We do need all stakeholders in on the decision process, absolutely correct. Multiple viewpoints and opinions. I’m one of those folks who can take technical abstracts and break ‘em down for Joe Six Pack and his neighbor Jane Nickel Bag. I used to have that for a job, in fact, and it still comes in handy as I provide technology training to average end-users.

Down With Smart Scumbags!

The oil out there is NOT a thimbleful. There’s an estimated 100 Billion barrels of oil off AK in the arctic. The last surveys of ANWR showed some 13 Billion barrels, but that was done in the 70′s with old tech! Same goes for offshore of the continental U.S. The oil companies say they can start tapping the stuff offshore within months in the areas where they’re already drilling and have the infrastructure. Developing new areas won’t take 10 years… like it used to. The government uses old info to make their calculations, because of the drilling ban making new info unnecessary.

Yes, I want intellectuals in on the dissection of the problems (guys like me), but I also want some non-intellectuals in on the decision process. Too often the intellectuals get too far from what really works. It’s called ivory-tower thinking, and it’s to be guarded against.

Besides, you have to be able to SELL the solution to the public. Guys like me are terrible at talking to average Joes. So, what I want is someone who’s bright enough to get it, but not so bright as to be unable to communicate it to “Joe”. That said, I care first about the guy’s values before his other qualifications. I don’t want a smart scumbag.

But it is stretching a bit to try to pin it on ACORN and by association, Obama. Sure, ACORN promoted loans for low-income urban minorities, but according to Bush, that’s just working toward a goal that he strongly supported: http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2005/07/20050714-4.html
see paragraphs 27-28

See, my post isn’t summed up by “Eat the rich!” You know as well as I that greed is not based on political party affiliation. My point is summed up by “look at the big picture” and “don’t be a ranting ideologue” and mainly that We, The People need to THINK HARDER about this country and it’s policies. Gut instinct is fine. Emotion based decision making is reality. But complex systems are not comprehensible without applied brain power and broad vision. Our government and economy are the most complex social systems on Earth.

It is a broad characteristic of conservatives/republicans to bash and mock “effete intellectual elitist snobbery,” but do you really want a complex system managed without intellectual elitism? Strong thinkers are needed. Look up the definition of “elite” – it’s not a bad thing. Does anyone mock the Rangers or Seals for being an “elite” fighting force? Not to their faces, I bet!

Before anyone assumes I’m a ranting liberal ideologue myself, I’m not a supporter of unlimited social welfare, or eliminating free market principles in favor of government regulation. I promote balance, sorely needed as our country swings between extremes of so-called conservative and liberal views.

Another way of making my point: Obama and McCain both support offshore drilling and link it to economic relief for “people at the pump.” However, any halfway serious investigation of the economics of this concept quickly reveals it’s a red herring – a distraction. It’s a thimble-full in a swimming pool, insignificant in the scope of US demand and consumption. Not to mention the infrastructure, extraction and distribution issues that stand between “drill here drill now” and “$4 per gallon this week.”

See, complex issues. No help from anyone who isn’t willing to think harder about them. Now, most Americans aren’t willing. Who has time? It’s always the case that there are “elitist thinkers” and “the general populace.” Sure, Obama may be an elitist intellectual but that doesn’t make him immune from self-interest or corporate influence. He’s not “The One” (have you actually seen the use of that term by actual liberals? Probably, but I don’t know anyone who thinks that).

So, to bring it all around to the top of this post – Obama Didn’t Address Middle America in the Debate. Well, sure! He’s an intellectual. Most people aren’t. It takes a rare individual that can be so AND be in tune with the needs and concerns of Middle America – the general populace.

The general populace needs to bite the bullet and buckle down and think harder and generally raise standards of discourse. The current political ads should make us all sick, they are so low brow. The ones who do think need to stop applying their skills to deceit through playing on emotion and fear, misdirection and blame. That’s only going to drag us down further!

I mean, c’mon, you trying to say ACORN is the root cause of our country’s financial quagmire? Get real.

Your articulate-yet-faulty-logic post can be summed up by, “Eat the rich! Republicans are Fat Cats!”

If you wish to recommend that readers here “follow the money” regarding the “bailout,” I suggest you read the following:

http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=Mzk4MmVkNzA1NGQ2NGRkZjQ2YjNmYjdlODZkMmQ4N2I=

Excerpt:

“ACORN recognized very early the opportunity presented by the Community Reinvestment Act (CRA) of 1977. As Stanley Kurtz has reported, ACORN proudly touted “affirmative action” lending and pressured banks to make subprime loans. Madeline Talbott, a Chicago ACORN leader, boasted of “dragging banks kicking and screaming” into dubious loans.

Now you could make the case that before 2008, well-intentioned people were simply unaware of what their agitation on behalf of non-credit-worthy borrowers could lead to. But now? With the whole financial world and possibly the world economy trembling and cracking like a cement building in an earthquake, Democrats continue to try to fund their friends at ACORN? And, unashamed, they then trot out to the TV cameras to declare “the party is over” for Wall Street (Nancy Pelosi)? The party should be over for the Democrats who brought us to this pass. If Obama wins, it means hiring an arsonist to fight a fire.”

Conservative blogs are full of comments about liberals being all emotion-driven and brainwashed by Obama’s whatever-it-is-that-makes-him-popular. Liberal blogs are full of reasoned argument, references to source material, and specific issue oriented data. In short, conservative blogs are far more opinion/emotion-based and usually short on facts and references to original sources. They fail in exactly the ways they accuse liberals of failing, and do so far more often.

Conservative blogs tend to be vehement about not wanting their taxes raised and not wanting Democrats to decide how they will spend their tax money. This list of posts is a typical example of that. In an ironic lack of self-awareness, there is no mention of the fact that Republican officials just proposed spending $7BILLION of taxpayers’ money on a bailout that by all accounts favors the very same people at the root of the financial crisis, that the original Republican proposal left no room for oversight of any kind, and that the whole bailout is very unlikely to solve the crisis even if it does pass. Not to mention that economists of both political stripes point to deregulation as a prime cause of the mess. Deregulation = absence of government oversight. Has less government worked out better for the average American in the case of industry oversight? Clearly not for the taxpayers who paid for the S&L bailout (see McCain + Keating 5), not for the taxpayers who would have to fund the Lords of Finance if the bailout passes, and not for the deregulated energy workers that lost everything when Enron crashed and burned. I’d list some bad liberal examples here to balance this out, but there aren’t really any that are even close.

Conservative blogs are most definitely heavy on accusing Democrats of wanting to “socialize” America, that more government is bad for everyone, that liberals are all must be “sucking at the big government teat” and again conservative blogs seem to be unaware that the government led by Republicans over the past several administrations has increased spending and deficits by gigantic proportions, in essence doing exactly what conservatives claim to despise. This makes no sense no matter how you parse it. Socialism is used as a fear trigger word all the time. Here’s a challenge for you: look up the definitions for both socialism and fascism, and post your thoughts about which seems closer to current reality in this country.

Strangely, both conservative and liberal blogs accuse MSM as being the tool of the other side. The logical arguments, however, follow the money. Which individuals and corporations own (control) most of the Main Stream Media? Certainly not liberals. Bias is there, but it goes both ways and really MSM isn’t totally the tool of any one ideology, at least not quite yet.

Liberal blogs are definitely snooty and elitist when compared to Conservative blogs. Liberals use well-reasoned logic to explain why Conservatives are idiots, whereas Conservatives use less-reasoned but more gut-feeling to explain why Liberals are idiots. Neither approach is helpful to moving this country forward.

Liberals ignore the dangers of Islamic extremist thought and practice. Conservatives ignore the dangers of Christian extremist thought and practice. Both are hypocritical.

In closing, liberals/Democrats seem to be the lesser of two evils. But hey, “when you choose the lesser of two evils, you’re still choosing evil.” Both sides need to snap out of it and realize there is no one of these 2 parties/ideologies that is the “correct” one. We need a lot more than either to stay safe, relevant, respectable and dignified in these times and in the future.