Expanded Oil Drilling Helps U.S.Wean Itself From Mideast

reply to post by Southern Guardian

. In North America, tight shale oils are being fracked in the northern Bakken (spanning North Dakota, Montana, Saskatchewan, and Manitoba); in Eagle Ford, Barnett, and the Permian basin in Texas and

According to your link and the graph on it, tight shale oil is not "oil shale- kerogen" it is a transitional oil type, not an unconventional type. but whatever man, argue all you want idc.
And yes I do work for an oil company but like I said I am in IT,

As conventional crude oil supplies have peaked and leveled off globally in recent years, oil has begun to transition, as shown in figure 2. Many current forms of oil that were once considered unconventional are now grouped into the conventional category, from ultra-deep oil in the Gulf of Mexico to Maya heavy oil in Mexico. These and other new transitional oils are being developed as well—from shale rocks saturated with oil over a broad, continuous area, with the fabric of the rock itself trapping the hydrocarbons in place. This oil transition is in turn giving way to an oil transformation. N

reply to post by Juggernog


See, I agree with the fact that shale oil and oil shales, unconventional oils, are the only realistic alternatives at this point. What gets me is when anti-peak oil theorists come out insisting there was never an energy issue and the two are the same, they aren't. There's a reason why we're still highly dependable on crude, because we're not the point of technology to use oil shale and shale oil's at the same capacity. Now we have no choice.

During the campaign Newt Gingrich commented that we have plenty of crude oil left in the United states, twice that of Saudi Arabia. Only problem is, we don't, he was mistakenly talking about crude oil. He was talking about an alternative, a substitute.

reply to post by Southern Guardian

There's a reason why we're still highly dependable on crude, because we're not the point of technology to use oil shale and shale oil's at the same capacity.

But we are at that point man, thats what I am trying to say. The Eagle Ford fields here in S Texas are already producing wells and theres already a line straight to the Valero refinery near where I live.
Valero said just the other day that it would be able to produce more domestic oil, as apposed to imported oil, for the first time in x amount of years. I forgot the details but i can look it up if needed. Kinda tired though and have a few shots of Jaiger

If the US really wanted to wean itself permanently off of Arab oil we could. It would probably require a Manhattan Project/ Apollo type of endeavor though. The most promising idea I've heard is drill as much as you can while at the same time developing Thorium fueled reactors and use the process heat from the TLSR (thorium liquid salt reactors) to convert the US's most abundant energy resource (coal, which conveniently enough includes thorium) into synthetic gasoline.

There are plenty of good reasons to try this:

1. We have lots of coal.
2. Coal includes Thorium
3. TLSR's are much safer than Uranium/Plutonium reactors.
4. The waste products from a TLSR are much smaller in mass and half-life than Uranium/Plutonium reactors.
5. Proliferation risks of a Thorium as opposed to Uranium fuel cycle are lower.

Originally posted by Juggernog
But we are at that point man, thats what I am trying to say. The Eagle Ford fields here in S Texas are already producing wells and theres already a line straight to the Valero refinery near where I live.

Well to be honest I'd hope you're right juggernog. They've been researching unconventional oils and other crude substitutes since the 70's. We'll just have to wait and see though for time to come. I understand that Exxon threw a couple of million at the rockies investing in shale oils etc, they packed up afew years later with no success.

Originally posted by Juggernog

Originally posted by spyder550
Curse you Obama for not letting drilling happen and double curse you for bringing gas prices down!!!!

Down, wtf are you smoking? Gas was 1.85/gallon when he took office and now its at 3.35

Ohhh, you mean its "down" from the high of 3.79?

edit on 27-6-2012 by Juggernog because: (no reason given)

The Captain and crew of the clown car have been blaming Obama for the increase for the the last 6 months I just figured that when gas is down a dollar or so than Obama gets the credit -- am I not understanding how that works??

reply to post by Southern Guardian


just a quick search.

link

For the first time since 1949, the United States exported more gasoline, heating oil and diesel fuel last year than it imported, the Energy Department reported today. Bloomberg writes that to offset weak U.S. demand, refiners exported 439,000 barrels a day more than were imported the year before. In 2010, daily imports averaged 269,000 barrels, according to the Petroleum Supply Monthly report.

Originally posted by spyder550

Originally posted by Juggernog

Originally posted by spyder550
Curse you Obama for not letting drilling happen and double curse you for bringing gas prices down!!!!

Down, wtf are you smoking? Gas was 1.85/gallon when he took office and now its at 3.35

Ohhh, you mean its "down" from the high of 3.79?

edit on 27-6-2012 by Juggernog because: (no reason given)

The Captain and crew of the clown car have been blaming Obama for the increase for the the last 6 months I just figured that when gas is down a dollar or so than Obama gets the credit -- am I not understanding how that works??

pfft, did you even read my post? Do you even buy gas or do you take the metro rail?
Gas was under 2 bucks when Obama took office, now its at about 3.25.
Put the straight pipe down plz.

Speculative oil pricing does affect gas prices, however, the NUMBER of oil refineries in the US that produce gasoline by refining oil has a bigger effect on gas prices. We only have so many refineries and new ones are not being built. It is all a great big scam. Name one part of your life not affected by oil? From the water you drink to the toilet paper you use, at some point, something that uses an oil product or byproduct was involved.

I would like to see the US wean itself entirely from OPEC. No need to secure the flow of oil in the Middle East means no US troops in the middle east. I am all for that.

reply to post by Juggernog


Yes, oil corporations are exporting more American crude than ever before. I don't see this as a solution at all, more of a sign that oil corporations don't have a care in the world concerning American needs.

reply to post by Southern Guardian


Well, I agree with you there. I never claimed that they were working for "our" best interest (the ordinary citizen)
I was just trying to say that domestic production is rising and imo will continue to rise.
I would say that in the next decade, we will become the top oil producer in the world but you have to take into consideration, that Russia and Saudi Arabia will probably also find these types of fields.

My family in the US sat on a oil and gas reserve for a long time and it was not considered viable. Now the checks are coming in their mail boxes due to more efficient methods of production. 10 years ago this mineral right was seeing no play at all. It was not interesting enough to develop. Now it is and it changed the lives of everyone in that rural area of Texas. Nice to have some unexpected revenue going out into the US economy. It will help the US recover a lot quicker I think. Just my 2 cents.