Oil prices: Wall Street's game - Page 3 - New England Patriots Forums

***patsfan13*** · 05-17-2008, 08:08 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by PressCoverage

I assume you're talking about your own poorly researched declaration...

Before I continue, what specific biodeisel source are you referring to? Are you talking about algae?

What's your panacea, Mr. Nothing to see Here, Repub optimist guy?

And for both of you, where is this "plenty of oil" coming from to hold us over before this savior alternative comes to the fore?

Algae, cellulose, biomass, given the next 50 yrs of so all these sources should be viable and cheap.

Let's see 80bbl in the continental shelf, 30 bbl Anwar, 300bbl+ under the arctic ocean, 200bbb+ in the Bakken deposit, not to mention the oil shale and tar sands......

The only thing missing is the political will to drill our own resources. Too bad the dems are hell bent on not working towards energy independence in the short and long run.

otis p. driftwood · 05-17-2008, 08:15 PM

You forgot to mention political will to build new refineries.

***PressCoverage*** · 05-17-2008, 11:08 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by patsfan13

Algae, cellulose, biomass, given the next 50 yrs of so all these sources should be viable and cheap.

When you post here about a topic like this, and expect to carry any weight -- especially considering your oft-debunked post history -- you really would be better served bringing a bit more to the table than "should be"... How about a link? A snippet from a respected periodical? A book reference? You're really given not much to go on here besides what sounds like your curious opinion.

Algae based biofuels would be "viable" when oil reaches $800/barrel... While it is the most promising and interesting of the biofuel realm, it is untested and the long-term logistics hard to fathom. It may be a nice addition to a series of alternative pie pieces that may save mankind from darkness, but it will never -- in the best case scenario of it's potential -- substitute for crude oil in any real capacity on its own.

Here's a man who knows as much about this subject as anyone in the world. And he bears bad news for those who had visions of driving around in algae-fueled transportation. Dr. John Benemann has many years of expertise in biomass conversion, and previously co-wrote a guest piece on cellulosic ethanol. On the subject of biodiesel from algae, he literally wrote the book. In short, algae-based biofuel development is a nice find, but not nearly enough:

Even if R&D proves successful and we can actually produce algae
biofuels (maybe even biodiesel) economically (whatever the economics
may be a decade or so from now), even then, I am sorry to say that
due to resource (land, water, etc.) limitations, algae will not
replace all our (or their) oil wells, cannot solve our entire global
warming problem, or make me rich quick, at least not honestly. But
maybe this technology could be developed in the next few years so
that in the future it can make a contribution to our energy supplies,
our environment and human welfare.

We will in the future need all such technologies and must in the
present study and develop all those that appear at least on their
face plausible. But we also must reject those, as in the present
case, that are based on absurd claims (such as in this case of
productivity) and bizarre contraptions (e.g. closed photobioreactors).

There are no silver bullets, no winner-take-all technologies, no
technological fixes, the solution to our energy and environment
crisis can only come from, in order, 'demand' management, efficiency
improvements, and new energy supplies, to which, maybe, algae
processes can contribute.

Quote:

Originally Posted by patsfan13

Let's see 80bbl in the continental shelf, 30 bbl Anwar, 300bbl+ under the arctic ocean, 200bbb+ in the Bakken deposit, not to mention the oil shale and tar sands......

Those numbers are highly exaggerated. Are we talking about extractable, recoverable crude? As for shale and sands, that's been covered.

Quote:

Originally Posted by patsfan13

The only thing missing is the political will to drill our own resources. Too bad the dems are hell bent on not working towards energy independence in the short and long run.

There's a bit more missing than that, simplistic one. But, leave it to you to pretend it's an issue the Dems are thwarting all on their own. Good one.

***patsfan13*** · 05-17-2008, 11:11 PM

Well of course the biodeisel may take a couple of decades to develop, which is why it is good we have more than enough oil reserves for the economy of rthe foreseeable future.

So if it takes 20 for algae or cellulose or biomass, well no problem if the dems would only thake their heads out of their butts.

The dems have fillibustered every drilling, nuke or refinery proposal for the past 30 years, that is the record.

***patsfan13*** · 05-17-2008, 11:30 PM

This is in addition to ANWAR

Quote:

The Arctic Ocean Basin was once one great-fresh-water matted Azolla-rich pond, capturing untold billions of tons of organic sediments. It is believed to hold vast reserves of untapped oil and natural gas, which is expected to become accessible as new deep-sea drilling and hydrocarbons production technology becomes available.

Within an area approximately ten times larger than Iraq, recent scientific drilling and seismic testing found indications that oil source rocks containing large percentages of organic rich sediments cover the entire Arctic Ocean seafloor.

A preliminary assessment by the US Geological Survey suggests the Arctic seabed may hold as much as 25 percent of the world's undiscovered oil and natural gas reserves. By one estimate, 400 billion barrels of oil might lie beneath the Arctic seabed.

Provided the Company's claim tenure, legal issues and government negotiations are managed properly, the Arctic Commons Deeps basin area could become the world's largest independently owned offshore oilfields; safely beyond the reach of self-serving governments.

The Bakken reserve in North Dakota

Quote:

America is sitting on top of a super massive 200 billion barrel Oil Field that could potentially make America Energy Independent and until now has largely gone unnoticed. Thanks to new technology the Bakken Formation in North Dakota could boost America’s Oil reserves by an incredible 10 times, giving western economies the trump card against OPEC’s short squeeze on oil supply and making Iranian and Venezuelan threats of disrupted supply irrelevant.

In the next 30 days the USGS (U.S. Geological Survey) will release a new report giving an accurate resource assessment of the Bakken Oil Formation that covers North Dakota and portions of South Dakota and Montana. With new horizontal drilling technology it is believed that from 175 to 500 billion barrels of recoverable oil are held in this 200,000 square mile reserve that was initially discovered in 1951. The USGS did an initial study back in 1999 that estimated 400 billion recoverable barrels were present but with prices bottoming out at $10 a barrel back then the report was dismissed because of the higher cost of horizontal drilling techniques that would be needed, estimated at $20-$40 a barrel.

It was not until 2007, when EOG Resources of Texas started a frenzy when they drilled a single well in Parshal N.D. that is expected to yield 700,000 barrels of oil that real excitement and money started to flow in North Dakota. Marathon Oil is investing $1.5 billion and drilling 300 new wells in what is expected to be one of the greatest booms in Oil discovery since Oil was discovered in Saudi Arabia in 1938.

The US imported about 14 million barrels of Oil per day in 2007 , which means US consumers sent about $340 Billion Dollars over seas building palaces in Dubai and propping up unfriendly regimes around the World, if 200 billion barrels of oil at $90 a barrel are recovered in the high plains the added wealth to the US economy would be $18 Trillion Dollars which would go a long way in stabilizing the US trade deficit and could cut the cost of oil in half in the long run.

Then there is oil shale

Quote:

The Bureau of Land Management issued leases for five oil shale research projects. These are the first federal oil shale leases issued in over thirty years. Increasing demand for energy and increasing oil prices have spurred a renewal of interest in oil shale.

Oil shale is a rock that is rich in an organic material known as kerogen. If it is heated in the absence of air the kerogen will yield liquid oil. The Green River Formation, which underlies large portions of Wyoming, Utah and Colorado contains the world’s largest oil shale resource. According to BLM this deposit could contain over 800 billion barrels of recoverable oil - more equivalent oil than the Middle East. However, this resource has not been developed because the cost of extracting oil from the shale has historically been too high.

Oil Shale - Image by US DOE.
Recent increases in oil prices and demand have spurred a renewed interest in oil shale research. These new BLM leases grant rights to develop the oil shale on 160-acre tracts for a period of ten years. The leases can be extended in time and expanded to up to 5000 acres if specific commercial production levels have been met.

Then there are the deposits in the continental shelf......

Hey PC can you ever get through a post without a personal insult?

***PressCoverage*** · 05-18-2008, 12:45 AM

where were you "insulted?" because I asked for a link, or because I reminded you of your post history?

anyhow, i'll address the rest of your "everything is fine" platform tomorrow...

otis p. driftwood · 05-18-2008, 09:04 AM

Problem with the oil shale is the environmental damage done extracting it. Although I did read they were working hard on a system to almost boil the oil out of the shale, leaving the shale beds largely intact.

No, PC, I don't remember where I read it.

***PressCoverage*** · 05-19-2008, 03:43 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by a.paul

Problem with the oil shale is the environmental damage done extracting it. .

that is precisely correct... it completely scars HUGE swaths of landscape and there's a high risk of water contamination... oil shale and tar sands is far far off from being viable, if ever...