First of all, nobody knows that due to the enviro-wacko inspired laws to
prevent even exploration.  Then, of course, there's the fact that the oil
companies that are anxious to drill it aren't willing to do that for a
"negligible" amount of oil.  Its significant, or they wouldn't be willing to
spend millions drilling for it.

In a pinch, as in some disruption of middle eastern supply, it _could_ come
here, _if_ we can, again, sweep the enviro-wackos out of the way and build some
new refining capacity in _this_ country.

Agree.

ANWR might not, (but it might) but if we break thru the irrational resistence
to it so we can explore/drill the rest of Alaska, that might.

Its better to be attempting to solve our own problems with our own resources no
matter how small some people think the effect will be.  The telltale is that
the _oil companies_ think its a good idea.  Since its their money that is at
risk to do the drilling, that's a great indication that there's something
worthwhile there.  After all, they are the experts when it comes to where the
oil may be found.

Its rather the principle of the thing, plus the "foot in the door" of Alaska
exploration.

Yep - something we need to be doing at every opportunity.  You can't go around
punishing the same people you're counting on to get you/us out of this shortage
mess.  We have to help them help us.

Dave Head

That is correct - few people seem to know what ANWAR actually is or
when/why Congress protected it in the first place.

dunno about it all being sold to Asia, but yeah - it ain't gonna solve
the oil crisis.

You've got significant misinformation in this post, but amazingly
your final conclusions are not too far off.

Absolutely *no* oil from the North Slope is being sold to Japan.
It is *all* sold on the west coast domestic market.

Well, if that is bullshit then you'll have to explain it to
virtually *every* biologist that has ever worked with caribou on
the North Slope.  There is exactly one such biologist who says
it won't be a disaster, and the others find his statements
incredible.  Matthew Cronin claims that every other biologist
who has ever worked with caribou on the North slope is either
lying or has misunderstood the data they've collected over the
past 30 years.

Dozens of caribou biologists (every single one that is credible)
says drilling in ANWR would be an environmental disaster.

That is an hilariously ridiculous statement.  And it obviously
comes from someone who has never been there...

Wrong again.  It was in fact reserved, as is the land in three
parks and refuges on the Canadian side of the border, to
preserve the habitat of the Porcupine Caribou Herd, mostly
because it is essential to the Gwich'in people who live on both
sides of the border.  If you look at the southern boundaries of
ANWR you'll see that it was very carefully carved to keep the
Gwich'in villages just outside the refuge, while keeping the
areas used by the Porcupine Herd inside.

That is in fact a myth.  If the wildest predictions came true,
it would add about 1% to the world market and that would drive
the price of a barrel of crude down by perhaps as much as 50
cents a barrel.  The price of gasoline in the US would drop all
of 4 cents a gallon.  Whoop dee do.

Again, *none* of the crude oil from the North Slope is sold
anywhere except in the US.  Where *do* you get this garbage?

Exactly.  It would also be great for the State of Alaska, so you
don't find many Alaskan who aren't greedy enough to want it now.
We get taxes and jobs.  The rest of the country gets nothing.

So, you got a better reason why they're always opposing everything to do with
cars, and trying to promote public transport instead of cars.  Seems pretty
obvious even to the blind, I think. They'll tell you that's not what they're up
to, and Sarah Brady will tell you that she's not out to take away all the guns,
but both those groups lie like a rug...

DPH

 I'm not a scientist or engineer, but I'm not scientificly illiterate.  I
had a highschool year of chemistry, physics in college, and I got good
grades too.

 The abiotic hypothesis of oil's origin has very little evidence.  OTOH,
the fossil fuel theory has alot more evidence.  The current theory of oil is
that organic matter at the bottom of the ocean goes under layers of earth
due to tectonic subduction where it, in turn, is chemically altered through
thousands of years of high pressure (similar to the thermal
depolymerization, only much slower).   The abiotic theory of oil rests
purely on observations and hypotheses, many of them contrary to what is
known (magma doesn't have alot of carbon in it, for instance, and certainly
very little hydrocarbons), and many having alternative explanation (capped
wells getting more oil observed could simply be oil flowing from high
pressure to low pressure areas).

"Matthew Russotto" <russotto@grace.speakeasy.net> wrote in message

Abiotic oil, whether true or not, still doesn't solve the problem due to the
fact that the ONE documented case of A well "re-filling" itself shows that
the rate of replenishment cannot keep up with the rate of depletion
worldwide.

Gold uses obscure data on one well in the Gulf of Mexico to justify his
conclusions.  He extrapolates that well to the whole world.  Mexico
announced yesterday that its largest field, Cantarell, is in decline.
Where's the abiotic oil there?  Hmmm.

Here's a quote from Dick Cheney, taken in 1999 from a speech given to the
London Institute of Petroleum Autumn lunch in 1999 when he was the CEO of
Halliburton.:

"From the standpoint of the oil industry obvoiusly - and I'll talk a little
later about gas - for over a hundred years we as an industry have had to
deal with the pesky problem that once you find oil and pump it out of the
ground you've got to turn around and find more or go out of business.
Producing oil is obviously a self-depleting activity.  Every year you've got
to find and develop reserves equal to your output just to stand still, just
to stay even.  This is true for companies as well as in the broader economic
sense of the world.  A new merged company like Exxon-Mobil will have to
secure over a billion and a half barrels of new oil equivalent reserves
every year just to replace existing production.  It's like making 100
percent interest; discovering anohter field of some five hundred million
barrels every four months or finding two Hibernias a year.  For the world as
a whole, oil companies are expectecd to keep finding and developing enough
oil to offset our seventy one million plus barrel a day of oil depletion
(today that number is 84 mbpd), but also to meet new demand.  By some
estimates there will be an average of two percent of annual growth in global
oil demand over the years ahead along with conservatively a three percent
natural decline in production from existing reserves.  This means that by
2010 we will need on the order of an additional fifty million barrels a day.
So where is the oil going to come from?  Governments and the national oil
companies are obviously in control of about ninety percent of the assets.
Oil remains fundamentally a government business.  While many regions of the
world offer great oil opportunities, the Middle East with two thirds of the
world's oil and the lowest cost, is still where the prize ultimately lies,
even though companies are anxious for greater access there, progress
continues to be slow."

Harry J. Longwell, director and executive Vice-President of Exxon-Mobil,
later confirmed this number (World Energy, Vol5, No.3 2002): "The catch is
that while demand increases, existing production declines.  To put a number
on it, we expect that by 2010 about half the daily volume needed to meet
projected demand is not on production today - and that's the challenge
facing producers."

In short, a global energy crisis is coming, abiotic oil or not.

Try getting some news inputs from something other than the mainstream,
corporate owned, American Media. Then, being an intelligent guy, you can
start to form a coherent picture of geopolitical events that are pointing
toward said energy shortage.  Or, you can continue watching the crap on
American TV and you'll know everything there is to know about Terry Schiavo,
Lacey Petersen, Michael Jackson, Pope Benedict, et al.

Cheers,

Roy