Damn…did I miss the flag-waving somewhere?? I HATE when that happens…
Good grief…where to start? Let’s see…taxes. You seem to be unaware that the CURRENT oil drilling pays a rather high percentage of the state taxes in Alaska (it’s in the billions IIRC). Additionally, there are various federal taxes that are involved. You figured it was all profit or something? As for the leases, from memory it’s something like $10/acre…something like that. Not a lot of money, to be sure…but we ARE talking about millions of acres and that’s an annual lease (plus I think there is a one time fee when you initially bid on it as well…that’s why the price is variable, depends on who is bidding and how sought after the land is).
I’m not even going to get into the ridiculous part of your statement about selling oil on the open market…if you don’t like an open market far be it from me to tell you why this is a feature, not a bug. I’ll just say that nearly EVERY commodity is sold that way (many of then grown or mined on leased government land) and leave it at that…if you think this is a bad thing, what can I say?
As for the jobs…well, it IS in Alaska after all. While I’m sure there will be some of the labor force that comes in from outside, many of the workers are already there…you know, from the OTHER fields we ALREADY have there? I’d say a large percentage of them are American’s, if not perhaps native Alaskans.
So…that take care of what America gets out of the deal? Taxes (LOTS of them) and jobs, potentially lower price on oil (more supply, ehe? More slack in the system if there are disruptions elsewhere?) and there is the bonus of driving the eco types nuts over it to. Hell, I’m actually starting to get on board with this idea just thinking about all those exploding heads!
How very reassuring. We all know how much our government will ignore the lobbyists from the oil companies to protect the interests of the common people, judging from past experience. I’d rather have the whole deal out on the table before any decision is made.
Who says we should approve it sight unseen, or with terms that allow no benefit for the USA? I don’t care how deep you are in Big Oil’s pockets, creating jobs for “blue collar americans” is campaigning gold.
I’m also wondering who you expect these companies expect to hire, if not Americans. It’s not like you’re going to go down to the Home Depot and pick up a few Guatemalans to drill an oil well in the middle of Alaska for $50/day.
Ok damn you! You owe me a new monitor AND keyboard!! Sheesh, give a guy some warning before you spring something like that on us. I nearly choked to death there!
I think it would be a great idea to hire Americans. I think it would be a great idea to get fair return for allowing the drilling. I think it would be a great idea if we knew that drilling in this area would benefit us directly without undue harm to the environment.
And I think it would be a great idea if all this were put in writing and signed by the parties involved, so that we would have more than vague promises to fall back on if things go wrong.
I guess it all boils down to the fact that I have just a bit of trouble believing that multinational oil corps and the government officials they have in their back pockets have our best interests at heart. Blame my rampant paranoia, blame the vast left-wing media owned by humoungous left-wing multinational corporations, blame 100 years of past history-it’s my little quirk, sorry about that.
Well then you should be happy Czarcasm…'cause that’s exactly what the government does! I mean, hey…I’m the first to admit the government is stupid. But we are talking about MONEY here…TAXES! No way are politicians going to miss a chance go get their hands on that kind of stuff. Not happening. Now…are pockets going to be lined? Ab-So-Fucking-Lutely! But that is going to happen any way you slice it. However, as with all things government, after you get by the pork there is usually some actual meat under there somewhere. Alaskan jobs pay very well. That taxes we are talking are big time. And many of those ‘multi-national’ oil companies have big headquarters here in the states (Shell I believe is one of the major players and they have a huge investment here in the US). And while in the larger scheme of things a million or so additional barrels a day isn’t all THAT much, consider that the current slack (i.e. what can be ramped up in a short period) is only something like 4 million barrels (mostly from the Saudis)…so, it’s not like it’s completely useless.
As for the harm to the environment stuff…well, there are all kinds of regulations pertaining to that today, especially in that region (they still haven’t forgotten about Purdhoe Bay). After all the region is already being exploited and the infrastructure for the logistics is mostly already in place…from what I recall this would really just be an extension and addition to the existing infrastructure from that perspective. Obviously it would be new wells and such, but the oil is still going to go out the same way we’ve been doing it for decades now…and things seem to be safe enough, no?
I think from an environmental perspective we are well covered…the companies currently doing the work in the region (who would most likely be doing any expansion) have a LOT of experience and corporate knowledge on how to do it, and do it right.
For the right amount of pocket change or the promise of a future cushy job, the type of government official that is in a position to approve deals like this would probably be willing to pawn their own sainted grandmother-that’s usually the reason they vie for such jobs in the first place.
But don’t you see? They believe that their interests and ours are the same. The record profits shown recently by oil companies are just the scorecard that show how effectively they are meeting our desire for their products. All suffering, all need, all want will be eliminated as soon as they’re making a trillion dollars a year.
Not that this is transferrable to this situation, but it I was surprised to find out the following…
As my location says, I live in a rural part of central WA state. Many businesses around here depend on seasonal tourism for their existence. As it turns out, some businesses actually hire people from other countries (Thailand and Russia are two that I know of), flying them in at the start of the season and back at the end. Since I haven’t spoken with the owners, I have no idea how this can be financially feasible, but I do know that it’s done.
So what you suggest may not be as far-fetched as it seems on first consideration. I’m still trying to wrap my head around it.
It has nothing to do with anyone having your best interest at heart. YOU don’t have my best interest at heart at your job. You could give a rats ass how it affects me beyond basic concerns as a citizen. You work to earn money for yourself.
It’s a function of a need for energy. We NEED the oil. It’s as simple as that. We need the oil. I don’t know how to explain it any other way. I watched California politicians screw around with their electric grid until they had brown outs. They predicted it a year in advance. The short-term solution was simple, they had to build peak-use generators to bridge the gap until they ramped up the grid. I know for a fact that it only takes 6 months to build them because they did exactly that in my area. A year went by and they had brownouts which triggered the building of……. peak-use generators. The governor stood in front of one of them and declared they were building new power plants. Either he didn’t know it was a peak-use generator or he was having a senior moment. Regardless, the reality of the situation wasn’t diminished because politicians took no action.
I’m not sure how to address your desire for American owned, American made, heavily taxed oil that is only sold in America. That’s not how the market works. We either drill for oil or we don’t. Demand will continue to increase whether we increase supply or not. This same argument has played out for years while we have done nothing. The past policy of doing nothing has produced nothing while demand has continued to rise. This isn’t a function of getting $3.50/gallon. If we don’t improve our energy resource management we will be begging to pay $6/gallon in a couple of years. The time to drill is not now, the time to drill was last year, and the year before that. We are paying for the policies of inaction at the pump now, and we will pay more for it in the future.
There is nothing in ANWAR that sets it apart from the oil fields to the West. We have the Trans-Alaska pipeline in place to move the product to market. The same thing applies to other untapped wells. They are no different than all the other wells in production today. We have to drill, and we have to innovate. The first is a short-term solution, the second is a long-term solution. Extracting taxes from the first one to pay for the second one is the only thing that makes sense.
If you poke around enough you’ll find a picture of Caribou along the coast trying to get away from the Spitfire sized mosquitoes.
I found the Sierra Club website a good source to see where all the oil fields are located (go to #5 and click on Drilling Across Alaska - this will download the info into Google Earth). It’s not hard to see where ANWAR starts. You also can get the sense that the Alaska Pipeline was set up to serve ANWAR as part of the whole North Slope field. It was an executive wave-of-the-hand that suddenly made the coast-to-coast pipeline less efficient by cutting off part of the North Slope.
I figure there’s a much bigger issue than environmental impact or corporate profits or gas prices. I look at the untapped Alaskan oil fields as a strategic asset. If there’s ever a major crisis in the Middle East (and what are the odds on that?) having a source of oil that we control may be the difference between defeat and victory. Why waste that asset by pumping it dry now?
Alaska isn’t going to solve any long term oil problems. The best estimates are there’s enough oil to supply the United States for about sixteen months. After that, we’re back to our dependency on foreign oil. Except that we’d be a lot more vulnerable to oil suppliers because we’ve have used up our reserve.
That’s kind of how I see it to, Little Nemo. Though as I said, I’m of two minds about it and pretty much (as with much of my personal politics ) on the fence here. While I DO see this as a strategic asset to be used at a time of maximum benefit to the US (in terms of jobs, taxes, maximum leases and even in terms of an injection of capital into our economy…even if at the expense of profits to those evil Big Oil barons ), I can also see why bringing on a million plus additional barrels a day will help increase the slack in production world wide. I saw an estimate a few days ago that world wide production is something like 73 million barrels a day (from memory so take with large grain of salt)…so, an additional million is not a huge injection of oil into the system. However, I also saw that the current short term increase (slack) is down to something like 3-4 million barrels…IOW, if world wide production needed to turn up the spigots so to speak it could only be increased with the current infrastructure something like 3-4 million barrels (mostly from the Saudis btw). That’s pretty close to the edge there if there is a short term shortfall for some reason…and it’s one of the many factors that have increased speculation on oil futures. This would ease somewhat however if the US began further exploration (to find out exactly what is out there) and exploitation…even if we are talking 5+ years to bring those fields on stream.
Like I said, I’m on the fence here…I wish I knew what was best but I’m just a network engineer, not an oil specialist. My gut feeling is that we should wait, should hold those fields in reserve a couple more years and THEN start to really develop them (while right now fully exploring exactly what is out there, both there and or offshore reserves…really nail it down).
Are we going to define it within the realm of the Euro-American view of lush gardens, productive crops and any other location that serves the personal pleasures and exploitation of the human occupiers?
Or is it defined in the greater sense of an ecosystem that is a negative drain upon the larger system where its impact has the potential to bring down the entire system?
The Great Plains were once a “wasteland” and a barrier to connect East and West. Today the area is exploited for its vast food resources feeding the world. But at the same time, the exploitation of the Ogallala Acquifer to maintain this food production will ultimately doom, if not destroy, the greater ecosystem. Not only will food production suffer but the environmental damage will cascade into other areas. The subsidence of the land in the Central Valley of California is caused by exploitation of the acquifer beneath, and this exploitation will ultimately destroy the food production within. So our current society is overweight and wasteful. We are killing the goose laying the golden egg.
ANWR may be a stopgap, temporary “solution” until we go hog wild into alternative, sustainable energy sources, combined with energy efficiencies and energy conservation.
Bullshit.
ANWR will be exploited for its oil and nothing more. When that oil is “exhausted” it will be on to the next oil field. Business exists to provide a return to its shareholders, with the least expenses involved, and nothing more. If a business “gives back” to the larger system, that comes out of its profits. If businesses do it at all, it’s a marketing ploy to win more customers and create pretty commercials making us feel all warm and fuzzy. But the real purpose of the television commercial is for us to part with our dollars into that business. If there is an honest “give back” benevolence in a business, it’s because its core values that define the business have the larger view and the future in mind for all. Not just the here and now for its shareholders.
The greater society must define the parameters, and not business. Will Congress decide ANWR for the greater society for the longer term (aka, the “Greatest Good”) or will it get bought off for short-term, personal gain? Is your personal desire for cheap gas in a fuel-inefficient vehicle hauling your lazy ass around town more important than the future of your grandchildren?
I think this is the best argument that can be made against drilling in ANWR, but it’s an expensive choice. ANWR is worth hundreds of billions of dollars. You could pay for 5 moon programs with the money. You could pay for a hell of a lot of energy research.
Yes, it will be corporations doing the heavy lifting and earning some profit. But most of the economic benefit will remain in the United States.
Just look at Alberta. We have America oil companies drilling up here. Are they raping us? Not a chance. Most of the employees of these projects are Albertans or other Canadians who come to Alberta for work. Our government is awash in money - we just posted another record surplus. We’re the only province in Canada that doesn’t have a sales tax. We can thank oil for that.
The environmental argument against drilling in ANWR is exceedingly lame. Have you seen the damage the tar sands are doing? Or any open-pit mining, of which much is carried out in the U.S.? All of these places have ecosystems as well. The only difference is that they didn’t get declared national parks, so the feds couldn’t stop them.
The 2000 acre drilling area in ANWR is an extremely small footprint. Drilling is not that damaging to the surface environment. And the drilling area is fairly barren permafrost. In this map, the little red square is the area of ANWR that would be affected. Note that it’s on the ANWR coastal plain. This is the coastal plain in summer. And here.
The coastal plain is mostly tundra over permafrost - home to birds and insects in summer, and caribou amd some other large mammals like bears in the winter. None of these creatures have been shown to be particularly affected by drilling activities. Of course there will be some damage - that’s unavoidable. But no more so than at any of the other zillion drilling sites around the world.
Any damage to ANWR is going to be a hell of a lot less problematic than the damage to our country that will occur when terrorists set off a nuclear bomb that was funded by us because we can’t stop sucking on that Arab oil pump.
The less oil we buy from the Middle East, the better, and if that means we have to drill for oil in any part of this country, that’s still preferable to the alternative, in my opinion.
What we really need is to get off oil permanently. If ANWR is drilled it should be seen as a temporary hold-off until we can achieve that goal.
) on the fence here. While I DO see this as a strategic asset to be used at a time of maximum benefit to the US (in terms of jobs, taxes, maximum leases and even in terms of an injection of capital into our economy…even if at the expense of profits to those evil Big Oil barons 
), I can also see why bringing on a million plus additional barrels a day will help increase the slack in production world wide. I saw an estimate a few days ago that world wide production is something like 73 million barrels a day (from memory so take with large grain of salt)…so, an additional million is not a huge injection of oil into the system. However, I also saw that the current short term increase (slack) is down to something like 3-4 million barrels…IOW, if world wide production needed to turn up the spigots so to speak it could only be increased with the current infrastructure something like 3-4 million barrels (mostly from the Saudis btw). That’s pretty close to the edge there if there is a short term shortfall for some reason…and it’s one of the many factors that have increased speculation on oil futures. This would ease somewhat however if the US began further exploration (to find out exactly what is out there) and exploitation…even if we are talking 5+ years to bring those fields on stream.
