KR: Administration backs off Bush's vow to reduce Mideast oil imports
Posted by Prof. Goose on February 2, 2006 - 2:30am
WASHINGTON - One day after President Bush vowed to reduce America's dependence on Middle East oil by cutting imports from there 75 percent by 2025, his energy secretary and national economic adviser said Wednesday that the president didn't mean it literally.
(link) Discuss. Open thread here, but this seemed a good conversation starter to carry over from the thread below.
“If kindness and comfort are, as I suspect, the results of an energy surplus, then, as the supply contracts, we could be expected to start fighting once again like cats in a sack.”
—George Monbiot
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"We need an energy bill that encourages consumption."
-President Bush
Sept. 23, 2002, Trenton, New Jersey, speech
Really. How much gasoline has this administration been huffing when they thought up this brilliant addiction analogy?? W and company are as clueless as ever. Either that or have something up their sleeves. At this point I cant figure that one out. Proposing a few hundred million dollars of expenditures on "solutions" that focus mainly non-transportation applications of energy when we continue to expend billions trying to protect access to oil currently being produced shows a real lack of conviction in moving forward with a post petroleum future. Kicking the oil habit, this most certainly is not.
One thing is for sure. Come 2025 we WILL be consuming less ME oil. Heck, we will most likely already be well on our transition out of oil altogether. Depletion will assure us of that. The only question of any importance on this subject is: Will the decline be peaceful and orderly or chaotic and abrupt?
Yeah, the Energy Sec's point was perfectly correct -- there's no practical way to reduce imports from the Middle East by 75% while keeping everything else the same. And so it's a good thing he pointed this out, though I doubt many people who haven't been paying attention to oil will get the point.
But it's still dishonest for Bush to say this, since it conflates two different problems: oil dependence and the geopolitical misfortune of where we have to get it. It's a very short-sighted way to make a rather modest alternative-energy proposal more palatable to gung-ho SUV-driving jingoists.
By the way, he seems to have stuck to this conflation on the first stop of his most recent road show.
http://news.ft.com/cms/s/8d5c9580-9368-11da-a978-0000779e2340.html
The Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries on Wednesday warned that President George W. Bush's proposal to reduce US dependence on Middle Eastern oil could badly jeopardise needed investment in Gulf oil production and refining capacity.
Oh my god, we'd have the 101st airborne raining out of the skies over Riyadh within three hours!
So why is it okay for the USA to announce that we are going to cut down how much oil we buy from them? Are we really so arrogant that we believe they are grudgingly selling us this oil and trying to keep us addicted???
Perhaps we can expect a reduction in the oil price or a special deal somewhere along the line.
But we as a society are so used to the constant barrage of lies called advertising, that we don't expect anything more - we're not alarmed by it at all. When you combine this with the lack of education and curiosity of the public, you get situations like this - where the POTUS can stand before the nation and say something preposterous, and then the next day his staff can retract it, and no one will care.
Do not listen, watch the actions instead.
Looks like the oil and gas traders see something positive in all of this.
Beats me if I know what it is!
http://www.energybulletin.net/147.html
Published on 3 May 2004 by Oil & Gas Journal. Archived on 3 May 2004.
World oil production capacity model suggests output peak by 2006-07
by AM Samsam Bakhtiari
Excerpts (regarding Russia):
In the 21st century, Russia has taken over from the North Sea as non-OPEC's new champion. Unlike the North Sea, however, Russia is not a new province but a very mature one. Moreover, it is a region over which the defunct Soviet Union had ridden roughshod, especially during the 1980s (with the battering of the supergiant Samotlor field a case in point).3
During 2003, Russia achieved an average output of 8,460,000 b/d. The latest Wocap base-case scenario for Russia forecasts an oil production plateau of just under 8.5 million b/d during 2004-06.4 Under no Wocap scenario could Russian output edge over the 9 million b/d mark.
This is in stark contrast with many other forecasts, especially those issued by Edinburgh-based consultants Wood Mackenzie (WoodMac), which sees Russia's crude output going from strength to strength before reaching 10.4 million b/d in 2010.5 WoodMac Director Tim Lambert summarized his consultancy's findings on Russia's future oil production: "Russian production has been growing rapidly in recent years, and many observers consider that it should exceed 10 million b/d in 2010. On an unconstrained basisassuming that all required investment was put in placewe believe that production could reach 12 million b/d in 2010 and 2011."6
Both Wocap and WoodMac cannot be right, and undoubtedly one is totally wrong. The question remains which one is wrong.
But the Wocap-WoodMac discrepancy is not the only gap on Russian forecasts. Even in the short term, there is an abyss between the prediction of 2.2% growth in 2004 by Russian experts and the 8.6-10% rise forecasted by international analysts, translating into a difference of 550,000-670,000 b/d by yearend.
However, there is little doubt that Russia will be the oil industry's ultimate supply-side litmust test. And this year's output results might settle the short-term (and maybe even long-term) differences once and for all. And it goes without saying that as fares non-OPEC champion Russia, so will fare the whole of non-OPEC in 2004.
As I said in the original post, if you extrapolate the last segment of the graph (2004-2005) over the next two years you get decreases in production of about 5% in 2006 (down to about 8.8mbpd) and about 13% in 2007 (down to about 7.8mbpd).
And with the cold temperatures shutting in a lot of oil production (which is highly understandable with high water cuts), this year's decrease does not seem too far-fetched.
http://www.theoildrum.com/story/2006/1/27/14471/5832
Bringing facts and logical arguments to that group is a waste of effort. Every action from them is calculated to gain them their end goal. I am convinced by their actions that the ends justify any means. These include ommission, obfuscation, fear, deception, personal attacks, subject changing, false premises, and even outright lies. You can spend all you time and energy clarifying all these incorrect points only to have the administration shift the argument once again so that you have to start all over without ever making a dent on there direction or focus.
They are very careful (clearly by design) to craft communication so that it is difficult to cite them in an outright lie within a short time period. Any time span longer than a week gets considered as "under different circumstances" and previous statements are curiously no longer valid in any rebuttal argument.
This behaviour is not usually acceptable between individuals or businesses because it destroys trust in any future dealings. But for some reason this has become the dominant political model in the U.S. and we allow it to exist at our peril.
we are.
Problem-you can only lie for so long until you have to start
believing your own propaganda.
Self Deception, then Confusion and Insanity soon follow.
http://dnr.louisiana.gov/images/conservation-daily-prod-update-location-map.gif
Note from this map that everything east of Katrina's track is now
under water and the majority west to NO is also under water.
From David Gergen on Lou Dobbs yesterday:
170 miles of NO levees have still not been repaired.
A CAT 3 in May will finally be the wake up call.
Physics does not care what the monkey king says. It does not care how you vote or what invisible sky being you beg and worship. It does not care what spiffy brand of clothing or cologne or sneaker you wear. It is just the very fabric of existence.
Keep using the oil and it will go away. Use less, for whatever reason, it will last longer. Use none, it sits.
End of discussion.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/4652534.stm
The list goes on and on and depressingly on. This is why I have lost ALL respect for the retards who call themselves citizens of the United States. They buy into this insane bullshit. Quite frankly we deserve to be overun by Al Quaida.
The only way I will regain an iota of respect for the consensus-trance, monkey-butt-kissing, NASCAR watching, abortion diverted rubes is their suddenly tossing out of office the entire monkey circus, the arrest and torture of the morons who advocated torture and the execution of those idiots who support capital punishment.
Please invisible sky being of your choice, I beseach thee. Please dry up the oil today and let the cull begin.
I looked at these guys in depth a few months ago for personal reasons (my wife wants us to move to the Denver area.)
I could not in good conscience align myself with NREL in any way.
As to Bush's speech, equating switch grass and nuclear power was pure Rovian politics designed to make Bush appear bipartisan. I was disappointed with that as an engineer but I understand his political reasoning.
Top 5 countries by volume importing oil into the United States in June 2005
- Canada 64,652,000 barrels
- Mexico 52,379,000 barrels
- Saudi Arabia 48,689,000 barrels
- Venezuela 47,794,000 barrels
- Nigeria 32,659,000 barrels
The only nation in the Middle East on that list is Saudi Arabia.Now take a look at all the oil the United States imported from the Middle East during that same month- 96,905,000 barrels. This equals only 23% of the oil imported in that month. President Bush wants to replace 75% of ME oil in the next 20 years. That is equivalent to reducing our overall import of oil by only 0.87% per year if you use June '05 as a percentage guide. Wow what a goal.
My real point is that the average American doesn't know where his or her energy comes from. The average American doesn't understand that in the short run an ever-increasing amount of oil will be flowing from the Middle East to the America because we have already peaked in production. The average American is giving little thought to what will happen when the world peaks, because in the long run George Bush may well be right about a reduction in Middle East oil. It won't be because of conservation or technological advances or drilling in the Arctic though. It will happen because of Global Peak Oil. And it won't happen at a measly 0.87% per year. We should be that lucky.
Until then (and probably for some time after) all our government officals will provide in the way of information will come via of smoke and mirrors.
Please run the numbers and point out errors or changes that would affect this anylsis; as if you needed my permission.
Since you are pushing numbers, did you pick up on the link that stated that the US imports 10.062 million barrels a day? If this is true where is the other 10.00+ million barrels a day coming from that the US uses if America has already peaked in production? I had no idea that we were still producing over 10 million barrels a day from the Gulf and other sources. That is a lot of oil.
i've got these guys http://www.aceee.org/transportation/oilsecurity.htm
saying we imported 63% of our oil in 2004. That still leaves me about 9% short based on June 2005 numbers. Could we have increased our imports by 9% from 2004 to June 2005 or more likely my numbers are a bit outta wack. anybody know a good place for straight forward info on the percentages of oil imports? specifically graphs for us visual folks?
What the electronic copy of the story does not show you is that the Merc (Knight Ridder, publisher) pretended to be "fair and balanced" by posting a side bar on the same page showing samples of how much oil USA imports per day from various countries.
They used a spin-doctor font with spiralling 2's to tilt the message. They threw in confusing OPEC and Middle East totals in between the countries. Nonetheless, they did, to their credit, post Canada as being the number one source of US imports. I suspect that only sophisticated readers, such as TOD readers, would see through the numbers spin game they pulled off on their side bar.
I didn't bring my copy with me, but if memory serves, the Merc admitted in the right hand side bar that only 42% of US daily imports are from OPEC countries, meaning 58% comes from non-OPEC. They also admitted that only half of OPEC is Middle East (ME). Therefore only about 20% of USA daily imports is from ME and 80% is from non-ME sources.
So DoE chief Bodman says picking on the ME was "purely" for purpose of example --had nothing to do with the terrorism angle, the "us" versus "them" fear factory angle-- right !
<<Many economists contend that a significant increase in the gasoline tax could lead to sharp changes in American behavior, because it would give consumers strong reasons to drive more efficient vehicles and give manufacturers incentives for innovative cars, including hybrids that run on gasoline and electricity.>>
I agree, and I suggest that we replace the payroll (Social Security + Medicare) tax with a much higher petroleum fuel tax.
Elizabeth Bumiller can't form meaningful sentences very well, can she? "Weaning the US off oil" is NOT accomplished by "increasing domestic production."
And yes, it could be said that she just left out the crucial word "imported", but the Freudian slip is just too precious to ignore.
Guess what, people? You could lessen your "sacrifice" by moderating your unquenchable consumption of oil.
"ALL the news that's fit to print"?
Ha.
NYT motto should be changed to: "Just the news they let us print".
(http://www.energybulletin.net/12556.html)
http://www.worldchanging.com/archives/004062.html&cid=0
Good words about Stuart's work.
http://www.worldchanging.com/archives/004062.html
http://www.worldchanging.com/
The middle of the page.
To put it in another way: suppose that Mr. Bush, together with his staff, is aware that peak oil is looming what would he do ?
- Say: "Houston, we have a problem, we are going out of oil soon", (consequence: immediate market turmoil)or
- Say: "We must reduce our dependance from oil and increase the use of alternative renewable energy"?
Maybe Mr. Bush is not turning into a green activist...By chance (or not ?) 20 years is the reasonable time requested by the Hirsch report to adapt the US economy to the peak of oil production.
I would like to share with you something I do whenever the president is speaking. Whenever I see him on television, I turn down the volume on the set, and play the soundtrack of some Warner Brothers cartoon, usually Road Runner. I think Wiley E Coyote captures the personification of GWB fairly well. Particularly, the super genius part, just before an Acme anvil falls on his head.
Subkommander Dred
I mean "Equivalent to most of what America is expected to import" ...
Now with the bizarre feedback we're getting from Saudi Arabia it is becoming even more of a comedy. No one clears SOTU addresses with their own Energy Secretary? No one thinks to touch bases with the Saudi ambassador?
Is this a sitcom?
... but sometimes you can only laugh.
"It's important for Americans to remember that America imports more than 50 percent of its oil -- more than 10 million barrels a day. And the figure is rising. [..]this dependence on foreign oil is a matter of national security. To put it bluntly, sometimes we rely upon energy sources from countries that don't particularly like us." - George W. Bush, February 25, 2002
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/news/archive/2006/02/02/national/a101608S46.DTL
What we need is energy from silt.