Are High Fuel Prices necessary – No
It seems like a simple enough question. The simple answer, of course is no. The simple solution to out of control oil speculation is domestic drilling. Just the simple threat of it in 2008 was what started the price of fuel to return to sane figures once again.
There is enough oil on our own soil to provide for domestic needs for at least 49 years, from one source in the northern U.S. The Hakken has the potential to produce up to 500 billion barrels of oil. A source below the Rocky Mountains has the potential to produce up to 2 trillion barrels of oil.
Think about this for a minute. The United States uses about 7.5 billion barrels of oil per year. Senator Orrin Hatch sais "The amounts of oil are staggering. Who would have guessed that in just Colorado and Utah, there is more recoverable oil than in the Middle East?"
None of these figures take into account that we are already pulling millions of barrels of oil per year out of Alaska, and the oil available offshore. Imagine oil at 16 dollars a barrel? Gas at 50 cents a gallon. If gas was that cheap, the government could tax it at 100%, and nobody would mind.
Even lands that are already open to drilling are at the mercy of environmentalists. A recent land lease sale was held in New Mexico for 78 parcels of land, and all 78 were immediately protested by anti-energy activists. Without solid evidence, they protest drilling sites on flimsy arguments and emotion.
The latest generation drill site is less than 10 acres, and mud and chips are disposed of in disposal wells underground. The environmental impact is about as much as a building a Home Depot. Anti-energy pundits latch onto the first bogus information that fits their agenda, much like the ethanol issue.
One of their biggest scare tactics is global warming. While the evidence that the earth is warming is questionable at best, the evidence that it is caused by man is non-existent. Some of the latest evidence suggest that the earth is cooling.Does anyone remember the climate scientists claims of the seventies about global cooling? One of their plans was to darken the polar ice caps so they would melt and slow the impending ice age.
The Mercedes Smart car is a wonderful little vehicle, and it gets around 30 or 35 mpg. In Europe, the same car gets closer to 55 mpg. Why the discrepancy? It is due to all of the U.S. emissions requirements. So now this vehicle spews more pollutants into the air, thanks to pollution control. Doesn't make much sense, does it?
Another way to save fuel, and drop prices is nuclear power. This is another area where environmentalists cringe, and for no real reason. They say it is too dangerous with a possibility of a melt down. The worst nuclear accident in history was Chernobyl, and it didn't melt down.Their arguments are not based in fact, but in a twisted pseudo religion, where in spit of the facts, they hang on to their faith.
And politicians gladly follow the money. If they were following the will of the people, then the rich anti-energy minority would not have as much power in Washington as it does. It is all leading us down the path of socialism as politicians seize on opportunities to take more power and expand the government with more regulations.
Regulations is part of what is driving the Big 3 auto makers out of business, even though a new car runs 95% cleaner than a new car in 1970.
The high price of fuel is the result of hysteria, power grabs and pushing a Utopian green society on a public that neither needs nor wants it, so is the high price of fuel necessary? Absolutely not!
