EPA to Shell Oil: on second thought, no you can’t drill in Alaska
Don’t pay any attention to what the young president says, watch what he’s doing and what he’s doing is choking off oil exploration in the United States slowly and deliberately. If the lefties win on this one America is not doomed to second place, America is doomed to be in last place.
The EPA, the new EPA that can regulate greenhouse gas emissions, has decided not to grant Shell Oil air permits that would allow it to drill off the coast of North Alaska. And when you read the reason why and how much oil was at stake, why, you’ll be as angry as some members of Congress. Unfortunately not enough members of Congress. From Fox News.
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. That’s how much the U. S. Geological Survey believes is in the U.S. portion of the Arctic Ocean. For perspective, that represents two and a half times more oil than has flowed down the Trans Alaska pipeline throughout its 30-year history. That pipeline is getting dangerously low on oil. At 660,000 barrels a day, it’s carrying only one-third its capacity.
It’s about as flimsy and excuse that I can think of and still meet the standards of the federal government’s permitting process. According to the Fox news report Shell oil has already spent five years and $4 billion developing the site, including more than $2 billion in leases from the government. So when the young president says oil companies have leases but they’re not drilling, well I guess we know why.
The left of course is delighted.
“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.
All of this comes at a time when the president’s policies have already clamped down on oil production in the Gulf of Mexico. President Obama has tried to take credit for increased oil production in the Gulf, but the facts tell a different story as told concisely here by politifact.com.
In May 2010, production in the Gulf peaked and then continued to decline for the rest of the year. And the Energy Information Agency expects this decline to continue for at least two years more — by about 240,000 barrels per day in 2011 and by an additional 200,000 barrels per day in 2012.
“Since there is a lag time from the time an exploration permit is approved to the time of actual production, and since only a handful of permits for new wells have been granted since April of 2010, it is likely that Gulf of Mexico production will continue to be hit hard in 2012 and beyond,” wrote Kyle Isakower, the vice president of regulatory and economic policy at the American Petroleum Institute,in a recent blog post.
In an interview with PolitiFact, Isakower added that “while the administration is correct” in its statistics, EIA found that “Gulf production peaked in May of 2010, due in large part to permits awarded three or more years earlier, and has been decreasing ever since. This matters because markets don’t look backward, they look forward.”
If you want to know why gas prices are high, as I’ve said many times the last two weeks on my show, look no further than the White House. Between the declining value of the dollar, declining production of oil, and no interest in new oil exploration from this president, it’s no wonder commodities traders are pushing the price of oil higher. Every time you pump a gallon of gas there is only one person to blame for higher and higher prices and that President Obama.
My guess is president Obama is perfectly happy with rising gasoline prices, Especially if it means people driving less and yearning more for mass transportation. It’s a lefty’s utopian dream. On the other hand if it looks like it could cost him the election in 2012, and make no mistake $5-$6 a gallon gasoline prices would indeed cost him the election, then be prepared for another of him a flip, turning him into a bigger oil president than W.
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Why don’t you talk about the oil boom in North Dakota. Ahh, sorry, it is a success story that does not fit in the agenda.
I love the oil boom there; now we need it to be everywhere.? This price rise is psychological, and ?bama is feeding the beast.
Yes, the ND boom is promising. Way back when oil was between $20 and $30 a barrel I had a discussion with my democrat mother about the oil potential in the upper mid-west states. I remember saying that they would not? vigorously persue the oil there until it became profitable. Guess what…They are saying the high oil prices of today are the reason for the drilling boom. See this from the Wall St. Journal,
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703795004575087623756596514.html
“That has opened up new areas that weren’t previously worth drilling in and made wells profitable at prices as low as $50 a barrel, down from $80 three years ago, according to analyst Mike Jacobs of investment firm Tudor Pickering Holt & Co.”
But?then there is this. Beware the Frackin’ monster. The left is already on record claiming fracking causes earthquakes. Might the EPA stick it’s nose here.? ?
http://money.cnn.com/2011/03/04/news/economy/oil_shale_bakken/index.htm
Don’t worry, the new envirosocialists will be going after the oil shale and gas fracking before too long.
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sammy22 just how much oil is comming out of ND. The point is the EPA does not have the constitutional?authority to do this and?hold the?US hostage to Foreign oil. Green house gases from a Cutter, be real!??If it was not that they would find something else to show us just how intellectually advance they think they are.
If we would have listened to the Village Idiot from Texas several years ago the US would have been much closer to providing our own fuel for our economic engine. ?Oil is here, it is now and we need it no matter how much the left would like to wish it away.
The United States has the largest oil reserves of any country in the world, and yet we don’t take advantage of this position. We’d rather allow a minority of whackos dictate the energy future and needs of this great nation. We elect politicians who are more interested in power and money then anything else. We’ve just put a President into office who has no real world ? experience, no private sector experience and absolutely no idea what his responsibility is to the country he serves. Our Congress allows an out of control agency like the EPA dictate policy instead of following the law of the land. We’re going to hell in a hand basket and the only people who seem to care are the clowns who call themselves Progressives. A progressive is a parasite that lives off it’s host until the host is no longer viable, and then they then move on to their next victim. This is our future America… unless a lot of people wake up and recognize the true fruits of their ignorance.
Shell Oil pays 2 billion for leases from the U.S. government…now they can’t drill.? Hmmmmm…Will they be reimbursed because this administration reneged on the deal?? 2 billion isn’t pocket change.? Is this the Obama way of doing things?? “Sure, pay us for the permits…we’ll let you labor under the false belief that anything will come of it.”
It’s outright theft, and this whole situation disgusts me.? Obama has managed to decimate every U.S. agency he’s touched and pervert each ones’ original purpose.
The four people on the appeals board that decided this case were in place before obama was president. They presided over a case in 2007 and ruled (predictably) in favor of the Sierra Club. What they did in this case was still wrong, but to call them Obama’s EPA is more than a bit misleading.
I? left to wonder about the appeal board. Are they appointed or are they federal employees and who do they answer to. Perhaps? to the head of the EPA. It’s going to take some time to find out but I’ll try and research it tonight.
The EPA is the enforcement arm of the leftist Democrats and the environmental nazis who got their roots back in the early ’70’s when William Ruckelshaus was the first appointed head of the EPA.? It was that very same EPA that banned DTD over trumped up accusations of its effects on birds, which by the way, Ruckelshaus never even attended the very hearing that ultimately decided the fate of literally millions of third world country people who subsequently died from malaria due to the ignorance and lies of our very own EPA………..
The EPA accounts to no one and has unlimited power unrivaled in American history.?? Like it or not, your EPA has the ability and the power to turn your very own house and lot into a bug sanctuary and have you evicted under the ultimate threat of death should you object ………
Sorry for the typo, DTD was supposed to read DDT……..
Hey, Eric; who are the “we” which elect those politicians etc. Are not one of them? As to the Progressives being parasites, well….a bit over the top. So oil is it? Nothing else matters? Japan does not have any, neither does Italy, France, Germany and so on, they are not exactly 3rd World countries.
How about saying that the progressives represent the parasitical contingent in our society?
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But Japan, Italy, France and Germany use oil, don’t they?? Sure, they are heavily into nuclear, but the same greenies that object to oil and other fossil fuels are against that as well.? I suspect that they would drill for it if they had it.
Dims, keep saying that the rise of the price of oil is psychological, eventually some people will think so too. Meanwhile the price is set on a global scale and priced in US dollars instead of say Swiss Francs? or gold or other “currency” that is not losing value because of the fiscal policies of the US.
The CAUSE is psychological when you consider that it is being caused by events in the ME that are driving the price up, and resistance in OPEC of course.?? There is no shortage; you can buy as much as you want, no?? As for US dollars being the currency of oil pricing, that may change soon, according to the IMF….
Shell Oil should sue to reclaim the expended funds.? Hinderacker on Powerlineblog has an excellent post on this, well worth the read.? To summarize: when prices go up due to government policy (read it: taxes), libs will wax eternal about the justice and fairness of doing so, but when the oil companies raise prices, invariably for reasons beyond their control, it is “gouging”.
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Funny word to come from the government, who collects more per gallon than the dreaded oil companies…
I agree, there is a psycological effect.? Even with OPEC.? If they believe they control a larger percentage of the comodity, they can choose to increase the price and “get away with it”.? A new supply found outside their jurisdiction would put pressure on them to be competative.? I agree the falling value of the dollar is also to blame.? As for North Dakota oil,?the?large deposit (80 mill. barrels/yr in 2009)?was discovered 3 years ago in a known oil field (wsj.com).? It produced less than 5% of the U.S. production and was already figured in prior to Obama taking office.?
So now we learn that OPEC is setting the price of oil? You kidding? As Dims points out there is PLENTY of oil to be had. The supply/demand mantra has been set on its head. So now a new theory is proposed: supply and demand and psychology determine price.? Pres. Reagan, please chime in.
OPEC knows that there is a certain price threshold beyond which expensive, non OPEC controlled oil sources become practical, and they are not prepared to exceed that, at least not for a protracted period of time.? That threshold has been raised significantly by the actions (or inactions) of greenie sympathetic, economic incompetents like ?bama, who actually want “European style” fuel prices, and are determined to get them, by hook or by crook, “for our own good”.
WOW Dimsdale, Your replies are awesome. You did not miss one point that Sammy made. I think it was a KO or World Series? or Super Bowl. Thanks you made my day!
OMG! So you really believe that OPEC sets the price of oil on the world market? Pres. Obama is responsible for the rise in oil prices? Not the demands from China, India, the emerging markets AND the demands from the US? The world is awash w/ oil, you said so yourselves, but the price keeps going up. What happened to the laws of supply and demand??
India, China and, thanks to ?bama, the U.S. are not producers of oil, so the vagaries of the politics of the ME and their medieval theocracies are going to influence the price of oil, as the markets will predict a potential shortage, and prices rise.? Supply and demand will, and do, affect the price as well.? OPEC controls supply, and thus influences prices, as does ?bama to an extent, by messing with our ability to access our own resources, and driving the price up.? Do you think that if OPEC cut production today, it would have no effect??? Drilling in the US, an anathema to ?bama, in a comparatively stable political environment, would offset the ME influence to significant degree, immediately in a psychological way, and later, through actual production.
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Now also consider that ?bama’s and the Democrat’s wild spending, and its resultant devaluating effect on the US dollar, are making the price higher than it would actually be, and it will have the effect of crushing our economic recovery.? If ?bama would get the Gulf and the Arctic back on line, there would be a rapid effect.? But he won’t.? Feel good greenie oil drilling policies are for the good economic time, not now.
Again, OMG! BTW, the US produces roughly 50% of the oil it needs (and is not a member of OPEC). It also gets a big chunk from Canada and Mexico, so the ME must supply a lot of other countries (don’t you think?). I also seem to remember that oil hit $149/barrel before Pres. Obama took office.
And do you remember what President Bush did in response, causing the price to drop precipitously?
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Market price is market price.
Nice side move again. You think Pres. Bush was responsible for the drop in oil price? But then you add: market price is market price. Is the psychology in or out of the market price? Where is the cherished law of supply and demand?
It never left: it is right there.? World politics, as well as national politics, is piling on top of it,? usurping, actually parasitizing it.? The price would be less if left to supply and demand.? Why do you think fuel is so expensive in Europe or Canada, and so cheap in Kuwait or Mexico?? Supply and demand, or the government?? Or do you have a better explanation?? I see questions, but few answers…
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To answer your question and apparent implication with a question: do you think the policies of ?bama and the Democrats (sucking up to the greenies) is having no effect on oil prices.? If you accept one, you must accept the other.
I do not believe that the policies of Pres. Obama and the Democrats have any significant effect on the price of crude oil. When it gets to the price of gasoline, it’s another story. That price is NOT set at the global level. Europe, Canada, Kuwait, Mexico etc., etc. pay the same price for crude oil: that’s the stuff that comes out of the well. After refining, governments of all stripes: national, state etc. pile on taxes or give subsidies as they choose.
So, the price of crude is subject to the laws of supply and demand, with no influence from OPEC, governments or world events?? You mean telling investors that a huge resource is off limits, as ?bama did, or manipulating supply, as OPEC does, doesn’t affect the supply side of things, and with the help of the media, the demand?
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You can argue that the price of crude is what it is, but nobody buys crude: we only buy the final product.? Every time crude surges, the price surges, and government taxes pile on top of that.? And that is where the policies of Dear Leader affect us most directly.? He has said he wants higher prices, and this is a way to get them.? Presuming that it still takes 10 years to develop an oil resource, and ?bama gets reelected, that is another 8 years before the 10 year clock can start ticking.? I am sure that has no effect either.
I give up. You could try to get better informed instead of simply giving your opinions.
Well, if that is your retort, then giving up is your only resort.? Beliefs aren’t facts.