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In the opinion piece “Running Out of Oil?” (Virginian Pilot, June 11, 2011), the author uses literary repetition of one fact to make the point that a recent 700-million barrel oil field discovery in the Gulf is sufficient to meet only 28 days of United States oil consumption. While this is great theatre, it is a meaningless argument.
First, one oil well never has and never will provide sufficient oil supply to meet United States oil demand for an extended period of time. That’s why the oil industry is called the oil industry: it’s in the business of drilling more than one oil well at a time.
Second, the author provides no alternative to oil drilling, but leaves that to the reader’s imagination: sort of like “hope and change.” According to the Energy Information Administration, about two-thirds of oil consumption in the United States is used for transportation, where little substitution is possible from other energy sources. In other words, the planes, trains, trucks, and automobiles that drive our economy use oil-based fuel sources, and for the foreseeable future cannot be powered—neither technologically or economically – by relatively-low energy density, unproved, alternative energy sources.
Third, it is true that Americans, who represent about 5% of the world’s population, consume approximately 25% of the world’s oil. What is left unstated is that America produces 25% of the world’s gross domestic product. In other words, economic prosperity is directly correlated to energy consumption per capita. I guess that might be one of many reasons that Obama’s economic recovery plan is not working: anti-growth energy policy necessarily limits economic growth.
Last, today (June 23, 2011), the administration announced that it will release 30-million barrels from the 727-million barrel strategic reserve (only about 28 days of national supply, as the Virginian Pilot repeatedly points out), and oil prices dropped 4% immediately. So much for that liberal argument that drilling for oil, even in small amounts, will not affect global price. But then again, progressives never have been big on supporting their "beliefs" with historical fact.
