Dead turtles aren't so unusual, and ducks. This is what drill baby drill looks like. I don't know if you get out in the country much, but in oil producing areas, it's not uncommon, leaking collection tanks and dead animals in the oil and saltwater mess.
Obama had decided we should sell more permits, drill more wells to solve our energy problems and reduce imports. It is true domestic oil could reduce imports. So could shifting to transportation, buildings, neighborhoods, factories that use less fuel.
It turns out, oil companies are sitting on the lease, or rights, to drill more wells now than they have equipment to drill in the next several years. Not only that, much equipment is idle, unused when it could be drilling (weekly drill rig count is available in oil industry news). They want more permits for what, to hold as assets? The biggest players are importing Saudi oil when they could have been drilling here on permits they have held for years. This is what corporations do for us, send our money offshore rather than make production here, and speculate. Our situation with imports is the fault of the oil companies, our situation of consumption is our own problem, and this can be fixed by us, if we will. In fact, you could turn the brightness down right now on your computer screen, and save a couple of watts.
About 3 years ago a tornado hit Greensburg Kansas, town of about 1,000, it killed a few but knocked down every tree, home and almost every business. They rebuilt as a green city. The greenest in the nation, all the buildings built have been far above standards for conservation of energy, many are Leed certified, even homes. The John Deere dealer's building is LEED certified and his energy bills are $30,000 less a year than before. For homeowners and firms, the payback is 2 to 5 years, fter that, it puts money in their pocket. The city put up windmills, and there are a few solar panels about, energy stingy lighting on the streets and in public buildings. It's very encouraging what can be done without oil corporations. Greensburg officials are often contacted by cities after a disaster, they want to know how to rebuild quickly, and as a green community.
What do you think, should we ask oil companies to drill or give up leases after a few years? Should we just bypass and ignore the oil corporations and go to a less oil dependent economy?
If the oil companies want to drill, they already have more than enough places to drill without obtaining new leases.
ReplyDeleteBush said that we are addicted to oil. It's time for some serious rehabilitation, don't you think.
Whit,
ReplyDeleteWe got a monkey on our back as the old timers called those addicted.
Fringe,
ReplyDeleteI'm not sure how it is now, but back in the 1980s I worked for an oil and gas leasing outfit. We were mainly concerned with finding natural gas. At the time, we paid a few dollars per acre per year to landowners for a fixed term - three to five years, if memory serves - after which the leases had to be rebid unless the company had commenced drilling operations.
Mister O,
ReplyDeleteThis is correct, and still how it works. What I was talking of here, and what Obama was also, is the leasing of public owned or regulated land, in parks, on national wilderness or regulated lands, and offshore in sensitive areas. This is where these corporations amass hugh tracts of land and have done very little.
Conserve, baby, conserve! Just doesn't have any punch, does it?
ReplyDeleteI think the use it or lose it is the way to go. This stockpiling of leases and equipment resting is ridiculous. Reminds me of 10 or 15 years ago when area codes were being added because the phone companies were grabbing up blocks of 10,000 numbers at a time like bargain hunters at a garage sale. Cost a lot of money to change area codes, and much of it was unneeded.
ReplyDeleteSkinny
ReplyDeleteIf a corporation does not act on a public land or territory lease within a few years it should go back for possible re-bidding to another interested group. AT&T I suppose was in the think of your example?
NAC,
ReplyDeleteConserve has the wrong meter when repeated, too long, and not hard enough in sound to mesh well. Save baby save comes closer but has no ring or catch to it, and it smells like the other one of that which we hate, delayed reward. Instead of trying to come up with an opposite positive phrase, I would settle for a redefining of the action described, a full disclosure chant. Waste baby waste, or spill baby spill.