The footprint for the STATE OF THE ART, WORLD-CLASS proposed oil drilling facility in ANWR is 2,000 acres. That's sounds big, but it isn't as big as it sounds. That's 1/8000ths of ANWR'S total area!
PUT IT INTO PERSPECTIVE: The NEVERLAND RANCH - Michael Jackson's ranch in California is 2744 acres - that's about 40% BIGGER than the proposed oil facility. (And what allegedly goes on in Neverland is more disgusting than what goes on in any an oil facility anywhere!)
By the way: Canada - our #1 foreign source for oil - currently extracts oil from an area in Canada right near ANWR, and just like ANWR - with the approval of the Native Americans who live there. If they can do it safely, so can Americans! ALSO: if Norwegians and Brits can safely extract oil from the dangerous North Sea, then we Americans can certainly extract oil safely from good old terra-firma!
And to those who claim that the ONE MILLION BARRELS P/D that ANWR might produce is a paltry amount which not worth the risk I say: When Iraq's oil production went UP to one-million barrels it was an important and positive milestone for Iraq and the global oil markets. Now, Iraq produces 2 million barrels a day. If ANWR produces 50% of what Iraq produces, then I'd say we were doing ALL RIGHT! The U.S. Geological Survey, updated May 2000, estimated that the area might contain up to 16 billion barrels of oil — five years of U.S. imports. That's nothing to sneeze at!
THEREFORE: Opposition to drilling in ANWR is irrational. Which is probably why it fits right in with Leftist policies.
More HERE (facts from the DOI), and HERE (why Canadian Native Americans favor drilling for oil in Canada, but oppose it in the USA).
WELCOME VIKINGPUNDIT READERS! And if your not one yet, you should be - at least twice a day!
**** UPDATE 3/14 --- MORE HERE.
THE 2000 ACRES YOUR'RE TALKING DOESN'T HAVE TO BE CONTIGUOUS.
ReplyDeletecontiguity is a phony complaint: no oil developer would scatter sites all over the 16 million acres - it wouldn't be feasible.
ReplyDeletealso, remeber that it was Jimmy Carter who set aside the area FOR DRILLING AND OIL EXPLOITATION!
also, IMHO: the whole concept of "prostine nature" is bogus. what is pristine? to the leftist anti-industrialist, it is anywhere there is no trace of humans! AS IF WE WERE NOT PART OF NATURE!
LOOKIT: life-spans and health of humans - BY ANY MEASURE - are better in INDUSTRIALIZED nations, than in non-inductrialized nations; industry is what allows us to LIVE WELL.
Energy is necessary for our inductry and for our sociuety and civilization.
The unwillingness to allow for increased mining of energy is irrational and INHUMANE!
16 billion barrels is an overestimate. That was the upper limit of the 1998 USGS study, with only a 5% probabililty of being true. Moreover, the figure you're quoting is only the "technically recoverable" amount oil, without regard for the cost of recovery. Including economic factors, and using the most reasonable estimate (50% probability of being true), we can recover and sell 5.2 billion barrels of oil.
ReplyDeleteThe U.S. uses 20 million barrels of oil PER DAY. So the ANWR can meet U.S. petroleum demand for less than a year.
Then it's gone. Then we have to look somewhere else.
See my blog for more of this analysis.