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Congressman Would Open More National Parks To Drilling

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There are some units of the National Park System that allow oil and gas drilling, but very few. And that's wrong, believes a congressman from Texas.

Republican Rep. Pete Olson said there are energy reserves scattered across the country that can't be tapped because they lie within the National Park System.

"Guys on the West Coast ... west of the Mississippi, they know they've got oil and gas under the land that they can't touch because it's on a national park or some sort of federal land," he told Platts, a media outlet that covers the energy sector.

Energy development already exists at places such as Alibates Flint Quarries National MonumentAztec Ruins National MonumentBig Cypress National PreserveBig Thicket National PreserveBig South Fork National River and Recreation AreaCuyahoga Valley National ParkFort Union Trading Post National Historic SiteGauley River National Recreation AreaLake Meredith National Recreation AreaNew River Gorge National RiverObed Wild and Scenic RiverPadre Island National Seashore, and Tallgrass Prairie National Preserve.

Rep. Olson, who made his comments while attending the Texas Independent Producers and Royalty Owners annual convention, believes companies can safely develop oil and gas resources on National Park System landscapes.

"Working with the parks system, without destroying the parks' value, we can do both. We've proven that we can do that here in Texas," he said.

Comments

I won't presume to debate economics with a Wall Streeter, but will note that oil and gas prices often seem to operate independent of many principles of economics. Just one example: during several recent periods of reduced domestic demand and increased domestic production, prices at the pump continued to rise. The reason cited by the industry was that oil prices are set on a "global level," and changes in domestic demand and production weren't big enough to have an impact.

If that's the case, the same "big picture" argument would certainly apply to any small increases on royalties paid on oil and gas from public lands, and the result on world oil prices would be the same as you recently described efforts to save some oil via conservation efforts: "insignificant." The added revenue, however, could certainly be put to good use given our current federal budget situation.

Here's an interesting question: After Congress decided to bail out the industry and waive royalties for those offshore wells, industry costs went down, but did prices to consumers drop? "Economic principles" would suggest that should occur, but perhaps you could cite some evidence that prices fell as a result.

As to concerns about a "long-term" supply of domestic oil and gas, all the more reason to bankroll any reserves under NPS lands and similar protected sites for future urgent needs. Perhaps someday they'll be needed once other sources have been exhausted, but since you've previously said that won't happen for a very long time, there's no rush.

Perhaps you can cite some figures on how much oil and gas could be added to domestic supplies by drilling in NPS areas currently closed to such use - and how that would in turn impact the overall cost of oil and gas for consumers. To use an economic term, I'd predict the benefits to Americans would be marginal, but the costs in terms of loss of values in those special places would be enormous.


Jim is exactly correct -- and drilling in national parks would produce only an "insignificant" amount of oil. Perhaps a better word, however, would be "infinitesimal."

If drilling in the huge Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska (19 million acres) would produce enough oil to sate the United States' oil gluttony for only 836 days (less than 2-1/2 years), and might reduce oil prices by a whopping 75 cents per barrel (less than 1 percent), only a fool would argue that drilling for oil in the small number of acres in parks that MIGHT overlie oil deposits would provide any positive effect at all.

The numbers given above come from a report specially prepared for Senator Ted Stevens of Alaska. We might note that following release of this report, Stevens' propaganda machine shifted its emphasis from reduced oil prices to creation of a few hundred temporary jobs as the primary benefit of drilling ANWR.

http://usgovinfo.about.com/od/technologyandresearch/a/Can-ANWR-Oil-Lower...


I would be interested in hearing in how ec would define "long term" in the context of our national energy strategy - and how allowing drilling in NPS areas currently closed to that activity would fit into that equation.


Mtnliving--

Don't hold your breath.

Rick


If we put aside the incoherent nonsense about the U.N., etc., and have a serious conversation, there's an important subtext to Jim's narrative, which I think retrieves one of the main points of the article. If polled, most Americans are opposed (I imagine) to turning their national parks into oil fields, but to what extent are they aware of ongoing efforts to do just that? For example, I spent New Year's paddling through the Everglades but am just now learning of renewed pressures to open the park and Big Cypress to extensive oil exploration. And how widespread and serious are these pressures, beyond just a rep from TX-22 telling a room full of oil producers what they want to hear?


You have to keep paying attention. For example, here in Alaska we have a governor, Parnell - Sarah Palin's hand-picked choice- who is totally bought and paid for by the oil companies. Once that is identified, you have to look into everything he does and look for the little things. For example, he recently tried to appoint a former oil company executive from California to the board that determines the value of the trans-Alaska pipeline for taxation purposes. Public outcry daylighted the fact that it was constitutionally required that the appointment be an Alaskan. Oops!


Rick is exactly correct. Our state legislators and U.S. Congresscritters are experts at backroom, under the table, hidden dealings that will never see the light of day unless someone has the courage to shine a spotlight on them. They are sneaky as sneaky can be.


Here's a link to the minutes of the November 2012 City Council meeting in Manti, Utah. For readers who are not familiar with the inbred characteristics of remote small towns, this might be educational. For those who wonder how such things can possibly gain traction in any place, I'll point out that locals in these spots spend a lot of spare time gathered in one or two local eateries where subjects of great concern are chewed and re-chewed like cud. In southern Utah (and more than a few other American small towns) there are a couple of radio stations that broadcast constant streams of warnings and fears and fantasies that are readily accepted as gospel by their isolated listeners.

I actually heard a commentator on a station in Delta, Utah warning about the government's conversion of railroad boxcars into gas chambers. He also warned that the United States Coast Guard is moving in to begin patrolling the Great Salt Lake, Sevier Dry Lake, and other bodies of water in Utah. That is part of a plan for the Federal government to take control of Utah to prevent patriots like him from resisting them.

Concerns addressed in this council meeting originated when the Army's Special Forces announced a training exercise to be held in the Manti area. Its objective is to be learning how to deal with warfare in an area of mixed rural and small town environments. I guess they wanted a realistic scenario in which they'd also have to deal with locals who were members of the Taliban -- in this case, the Utah Taliban.

http://mantiutah.org/Resources/Manti%20City%20Forms/Council%20Minutes/20...


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