At what price will Americans be ready to drill for oil in this country?

[mjshira]

According to Bloomberg today, China is now drilling for and looking for more oil. We know they are locking up relationships with future oil producers. My question for you guys, at what point in price will we drill for oil in the US? We know we can get our oil without damage to the environment, we know we have lots of it, our friends in Mexico and Canada are getting oil to market (selling most of it to us...).

So why won't we do this? More jobs for Americans, lower prices, etc.

I know why, I know it is due in large measure to two issues: regulatory and tax burdens that drive exploration outside the US & liberal policy makers who want to force us out of our cars.

What do you guys think? If gas is 10 bucks a gallon, we will turn our American 'can do' attitude toward getting our own oil?

[Rick Lee]

It'll be tougher to build more refineries, which we need before we can handle any more oil supply.

[mjshira]

so..o you are saying it will never happen?

[pwd72s]

I figure 6-7 bucks per gallon of gas before people scream...

[BGCarrera32]

For some odd reason I was thinking $7 as well.

[Porsche-O-Phile]

I'd say at least $10 a gallon before the NIMBYs start rolling over and allowing new construction.

[Rick Lee]

$7 will make people change their habits and start the push for alt. energy and fuel-efficient vehicles far more than anything politicians could come up with. I don't necessarily think it's a bad thing. The biggest whiner about gas prices I know has two monster SUV's, a boat and drives from his garage to get his mail from his front yard a few hundred feet away.

[Jim Sims]

If the price stays up there will be plenty of exploration and drilling in US territory even with all the regulations and areas off limits for environmental or political reasons. Plus renewed production in older fields using tertiary recovery methods such as steam injection, CO2 injection, caustic polymer injection, etc. It is critical the price remain high for oil (and hence also for gasoline and diesel fuels) for this to happen. However, this will not significantly lessen the US dependence on foreign oil; there are few places left in our territories to find giant oil fields and probably no places to find the super giants. These are the types of fields that can make a meaningful increase in reserves and production, I recall the last giant field discovered (1999?) and developed in the US was in the Gulf of Mexico and it is in water four miles deep. The only way to lessen our dependence on foreign oil is to use less oil period. Drilling in the US will not bring back the days of $2.50-$3.00/gallon gasoline; if gasoline/oil again becomes that cheap there will not be much incentive to drill and produce the hard to find and extract oil that remains in the US. I suggest we will have to get familiar with $4 to $6 per gallon gasoline plus increases due to inflation/declining value of the dollar. The US car/suburban culture may be on the cusp of significant change. We live interesting times.

[Porsche-O-Phile]

Only if the prices go to $7 a gallon quickly. If it happens over a year or two, most people probably won't bother doing anything more than b*tching about it. It's the "frog in the boiling water" scenario. if the prices jumped to $7 tomorrow, there'd be riots in the streets, but do it over the next 6-12 months and people will suck it up and still keep buying and driving those big SUVs and pick-em-up trucks and jacked-up 4x4s because it makes 'em think their penises get bigger.

[woodman]

I'm ready to drill now...

I don't have SPS, but do have a nice big GMC Diesel and love it. I needed a quality truck and got one. But I do admit hating to look at the cost of fuel.
I've been researching kits for running veg and also hydrogen. I am certainly interested in alternatives now since we're getting it stuck to us. China will pay for our goods including our diesel, much more than we are apparently willing to.
I would love to burn veg oil from some greasy mex restaurant. My exhaust would smell like a chimmy chonga.

[Jim Sims]

"I've been researching kits for running veg and also hydrogen. I am certainly interested in alternatives now since we're getting it stuck to us. China will pay for our goods including our diesel, much more than we are apparently willing to.
I would love to burn veg oil from some greasy mex restaurant. My exhaust would smell like a chimmy chonga."

I suspect this "home brew" diesel will soon become illegal due to failure to pay fuel road taxes (there's a reason there's dye in tractor fuel) and the process produces caustic waste effluent that has to be dealt with. Plus diesel and petroleum derived fertilizers were used to grow the feed to raise the cows, chickens, or oil crops that are the source of this waste oil and fat so I suspect in the end one the net gain for the system is pretty small. Further if the rendering industry's raw material gets diverted to vehicle fuels on a large scale this will further drive up the cost of food.

Good luck with the hydrogen; most current supplies are made from natural gas and then shipped and stored at significant cost.

[nostatic]

Originally Posted by mjshira

We know we can get our oil without damage to the environment

I don't necessarily agree with this statement. What do you base this on?

[stomachmonkey]

Move to TX.

Watched two rigs go up, tap and cap in month right around the corner from me.

They drill here like a manic dentist.

[woodman]

Originally Posted by stomachmonkey

Move to TX.

Watched two rigs go up, tap and cap in month right around the corner from me.

They drill here like a manic dentist.

I see oil rigs every day here in the LBC, Signal Hill and other spots here and there. Quite exciting. up, down, up, down...

[jyl]

Don't overlook this - The USA is the third largest oil producer in the world.

We produce 5.14MM bbl/day, only Russia and Saudi Arabia are larger, appx 9.2MM bbl/day each. We produce considerably more than Mexico or Iran or China; 2X more than Canada, Kuwait, UAE, Venezuela, Iraq; and multiples more than any other oil-producing country. We produce 7% of the world's daily oil. (2006 numbers from http://www.eia.doe.gov/aer/txt/ptb1105.html )

Well, you say, we could increase our production, and become an even bigger producer.

Indeed, until 1976, the USA was the #1 oil producer in the world. We were larger than Saudi Arabia or anyone else. We produced 14% of the world's daily oil in 1976.

And, in the 1970s when we were the world's #1 producer, accounting for 14% of global production, was the USA "energy independent"? No, not by a long shot, as two severe oil shocks and recessions the in 1970s proved.

So is it realistic to think that drilling more wells in 2009 can make us "energy independent"? Obviously not. The USA cannot under any scenario ever be 14% of the world's production again, can't even be 8% - even if every single field in the lower 48, in Alaska including ANWR, off the CA and FL coasts, etc, is drilled. Because the US does not have enough oil reserves left, after 100 years of intensive exploring and producing, period. No matter how much we drill in the US, we will still import roughly 2/3 of the oil we use.

And we wouldn't impact the price of oil much either. The US Energy Dept (under the Bush Administration) has estimated that drilling in ANWR would reduce the price of oil by only about 50 cents. So drilling in all the other places (FL coast, etc) would have a 50 cent or less impact.

Thus all the domestic drilling in the world will not make the US "energy independent", or reduce our economy's vulnerability to oil shocks, or even bring down the price of oil by much or for long.

The only way to reduce the USA's dependence on, and vulnerability to, "foreign oil" is to be less dependent on "oil, period". To use less oil and more of other energy sources.

[Rodsrsr]

We must be getting close, because this topic is beginning to come up on a regular basis.

[Mule]

Drill for oil? You must be one of those right wing maniacs who thinks there is some down side to giving up our cars for bicycles!

http://www.businessandmedia.org/articles/2008/20080521145247.aspx

[m21sniper]

Originally Posted by Porsche-O-Phile

Only if the prices go to $7 a gallon quickly. If it happens over a year or two, most people probably won't bother doing anything more than b*tching about it. It's the "frog in the boiling water" scenario. if the prices jumped to $7 tomorrow, there'd be riots in the streets, but do it over the next 6-12 months and people will suck it up and still keep buying and driving those big SUVs and pick-em-up trucks and jacked-up 4x4s because it makes 'em think their penises get bigger.

Actually, not so. SUV sales are plummeting, as are their resale values. In most cases used real world SUV values are down 20% since this time last year.

[dd74]

Originally Posted by mjshira

drilling for and looking for more oil...our friends in Mexico...

...no longer. Evidentially Pemex will go belly up in about ten years. Why? Mexican taxes is killing the company, making it so that they can't repair existing refineries and/or build new refineries. The socialist-democrat party in Mexico, plus the government, will not allow foreign countries, particularly the United States, to help Pemex restructure its oil/fuel production.

What sucks about this is Pemex is the 10th largest oil producer in the world, and third largest supplier to the United States.

As far as drilling in Alaska or offshore in U.S. waters. Even if discovery of oil occurred in these places, I think the time to extraction after discovery is something like 35 years.

So we'll have to wait 'til about 2043, before we pull oil up from in front of Brad and Angela's in Malibu.

[K. Roman]

Originally Posted by Mule

Drill for oil? You must be one of those right wing maniacs who thinks there is some down side to giving up our cars for bicycles!

http://www.businessandmedia.org/articles/2008/20080521145247.aspx

Why is it that Mule is ALWAYS divisive?