Should We Drill A N W R?

[XIX]

Discuss.

[fides quarens intellectum]

[url="http://www.phatmass.com/phorum/index.php?showtopic=79576&hl=anwr"]we have[/url]

[Veridicus]

We can, but that isn't the solution to our energy problems so I don't want to hear people argue that as a good reason. As I mentioned in another post. It is silly and hypocritical for Americans to get so bent out of shape about the potential ecological affects of drilling ANWAR. We don't want to hurt the isolated Alaskan environment...but we are all perfectly content to let Russia and other foreign countries drill and ruin their own local environments and ecosystems so long as it is on THEIR soil...we then turn around and buy their oil without ecological or moral concern...

The reality is that we need to be energy independent. Drilling in could provide a temporary boost in petrol supply while we switch to more renewable and ecologically sound infrastructre. There is no reasonable environmental argument (that isnt' hypocritical) for where the oil is coming from...at least if it comes from ANWAR its on our own grounds with our own drilling standards and the environmental damage is under our control...God only knows how the Chinese or Russians would destroy their environments drilling for oil to turn around and sell to us.

Sorry for the rant.

Edited July 2, 2008 by Veridicus

[CatherineM]

As long as they build the pipes differently. The ones now are being compromised because they were built right onto the permafrost, and now it's melting. Some people's houses are sinking, and road ways are cracking. They would need to anchor the pipes to bedrock.

[peach_cube]

I would be fine with it as long as it is not seen as some saving grace, at current barrel prices there are less remote and controversial areas to exploit that were not seen as economically viable in the past, but once oil cracked the 100 dollar a barrel mark are very interesting indeed and being explored. A big part of the problem is the lack of refineries in the U.S.

[dairygirl4u2c]

[quote]it really depends on a lot.

there's so much stuff, with offshore drilling etc.... that most of it should be drilled.

a significant amount, like a year's worth, should not be drilled. not bc of enviro concerns but bc of the idea that..... a gallon of gas when gas is worth 10 dollars, which it will eventually or at least approach that ie be worse than now.... is much more valuable than a gallon when gas is only 5 dollars.
eg. a ten tank at ten is 100, but at four is 40. five gallons off is a savings of fifty dollars instead of twenty.

we're going to get worse than we are now, that's why we save.

we should only drill that final bit, when times are super bad, or we see that a new technology has better infiltrated society. at that point... it's going to take time to finalize infiltration, and then we're going to be hurting in the mean time. pretty much the situation we are in now... except there are no longer any other places to drill.

i'd say, just save ANWR for that final moment but drill everything else. doens't have to be ANWR though, whatever is saved as long as somehting is for later.

there's no techincolgies that are too prevanlent right now. and there won't be until we hurt more, and then it will take time. that's why we dont go all for it right now.

we don't count on thigs like coal, and electicity etc.... at least at this point... bc it's not infiltrated society enotugh. we only look at teh fact taht so much is out there to drill right now.

also... things like correl reefs... i mean if there's ways to get to the oil without hurint it.. then by all means take it. if htere's no way to get it without hurting... then we have to weight the costs, ie, correls are good for medicine etc i think like rain forests.... and thei nherent value of them.... and then balance that with things like that idea that we're going to have to switch eventually to somehting else, and maybe we shouldn't be getting rid of good things for the sake of short term finanical gains, shortsighedtly.
it depends on the numbers.[/quote]
[quote]there are people who wanted to drill ten years ago. which, to a degree would have postponed all this... but if it only postpones it till like a couple years away... and then we're back in this situation.... we have nothing to relieve us as we make a transition.

we'd have gotten gas for fifty cents a gallon instead of a dollar, ten eyars ago. that'd save us five dollars in a ten tank, instead of fifty at times of need.that wouldn't have been not wise,[/quote]

[Winchester]

We should just launch an attack on people buying oil futures. There's no less oil available now, nor has it gotten harder or more expensive to drill. The current prices are a creation of the manipulated market. It's bullpoo.

[Veridicus]

[quote name='Winchester' post='1588952' date='Jul 2 2008, 04:50 AM']We should just launch an attack on people buying oil futures. There's no less oil available now, nor has it gotten harder or more expensive to drill. The current prices are a creation of the manipulated market. It's bullpoo.[/quote]

That's an interesting thought....

[picchick]

Everyone should buy bikes I did...rode 10 miles yesterday to bring it home. THen the US should make commuting more bike friendly like with trains and buses. Less gas fuel used up that way.

[Lounge Daddy]

When I was a teen and in my 20s I rode my bike more. Now I have gotten lazy.
Oh, and it's cold 1/3 of the year many years.

[hoosieranna]

[quote name='picchick' post='1589033' date='Jul 2 2008, 09:48 AM']Everyone should buy bikes I did...rode 10 miles yesterday to bring it home. THen the US should make commuting more bike friendly like with trains and buses. Less gas fuel used up that way.

[/quote]


There's a trend in urban planning called New Urbanism which aims to cut existing sprawl and prevent future messes by encouraging infill and mass transit, as you suggest.

edit: And no, we shouldn't drill. It's a very, very short-term solution to a problem we actually have existing alternate solutions to. It's disseminating the alternatives that remains the problem. (I'm a little bit tree hugger, sorry.)

Edited July 2, 2008 by Nadezhda

[CatherineM]

T Boone Pickens was at a conference recently in Calgary, and he said the prices aren't about speculators, but supply. He said the Saudis don't have as much oil as they want us to think they do, and that he thinks oil will hit $200/barrel at some point before the end of the year. He also thinks that $150 will do major damage to the global economy, so I don't know what he thinks $200 will do.

Here's a link to his testimony before the Senate about peak oil. [url="http://www.cnbc.com/id/25212752"]LINK[/url]

[Lounge Daddy]

[quote name='Winchester' post='1588952' date='Jul 2 2008, 05:50 AM']We should just launch an attack on people buying oil futures. There's no less oil available now, nor has it gotten harder or more expensive to drill. The current prices are a creation of the manipulated market. It's bullpoo.[/quote]
You don't think it has anything to do with government regulation, bans on drilling, and taxes?

Supply and demand. The demand is up, and we create an artificial shrinkage in supply--we have the oil, as you mentioned, and we can safely and easily get to it, as you also mentioned. But we have a government that says that using our own oil resources it is off limits.

[Veridicus]

[quote name='Lounge Daddy' post='1589054' date='Jul 2 2008, 10:20 AM']You don't think it has anything to do with government regulation, bans on drilling, and taxes?

Supply and demand. The demand is up, and we create an artificial shrinkage in supply--we have the oil, as you mentioned, and we can safely and easily get to it, as you also mentioned. But we have a government that says that using our own oil resources it is off limits.[/quote]


If our government says using our own oil resources is off limits, these regulations are the result of environmentalist lobbying not economics.

[Apotheoun]

I think we should use whatever energy resources that we have available to us.