Chevron just posted a major, major find in deep waters in the Gulf of Mexico. They estimate that they've found a 3- 15 Billion Barrel field; this discovery could easily be equivalent to the entire state of Alaska. (OK, Alaska doesn't have hurricanes, but besides that...) The better news is that this is only one oil field, and it's possible- even likelier now- that there are others out there.

For comparison, the U.S. has about 30 Billion in proven reserves. Based on the most pessimistic assumptions, the oil out there could be producing 400 kbpd for the next 20 years starting maybe 2010. More optimistically, it could be 2,000 kbpd. For reference, the U.S. consumes about 20,000 kbpd of oil, and a 2% change in supply has, previously, been enough to drive gas prices up 30 cents/gallon.

Here's a quick snippet from an AP report (full version at http://biz.yahoo.com/ap/060905/major_oil_d...ry.html?.v=24):


So, here's what I think this means:

1.) Combined with increasing ethanol production and increases in average fuel economies of cars, this discovery's going to help stabilize gas prices.

2.) This discovery isn't cheap, and it won't be cheap to produce this oil. Don't expect oil prices to fall below $40/barrel, or gas prices to fall much below $2.00/gallon.

3.) ANWR seems unlikely for another five years. Ted Stevens (R-Alaska) is probably crying himself to sleep tonight. The loser has it coming. (He tried to put ANWR into a defense budget.)

4.) Peak Oil's going to hit the U.S. just a little more gently than it was going to, yesterday. My estimate has just changed Peak Oil from a really bad case of the '70s to just the plain ole' '70s. Gas prices will probably stay below $10.00/gallon, and there won't be any horrible and widespread shortages. This new discovery buys us at least five more years to develop ethanol, renewables, and nuclear/ PHEVs; maybe even ten.

5.) Hurricanes will factor into oil prices a little more; third world politicians, a little less.

In all, this is amazing news for the three oil companies that own this discovery (Chevron owns 50%, Devon owns 25%, and Statoil owns 25%). This is also great news for the U.S; a boost to our economy, energy security, and the feds get 15% in oil royalties (that's going to be about $25- $100 Billion over the next 20 years at $60/barrel). Finally, this isn't all bad news for the environment. This discovery may mean more CO2 emissions, but it might mean we get to dodge drilling in ANWR.

It'll take 5 years for minimal production, a lot longer for anything approaching 2-3% of what we use (estimates are ALWAYS at LEAST double what reality turns out to be), special rigs, only one in the world, will be built one at a time at least 3 years each. Each rig has to stay long enough to go down 7,000 feet then drill 20,000 more feet, not a short drilling time.

Ignoring things like hurricane damage it doesn't buy us any time, a bit more security maybe 20 yrs down the road. That's offset by if OPEC thinks we'll be able to produce 10 times that down the road they'll use all the muscle they can in the meantime.

I think we ought to sit on it until when the Middle East runs dry then sell the rest of the world $700 a barrel oil. That'd teach em to screw around with us.

If it weren't for "The China Syndrome" Hollywood hysteria generated after the Three Mile Island non-event (probably financed by Big Oil), we would have 10,000 Generation III or IV nuke power plants up and running by now.

And we could tell the Arabs to f*ck off.

Exactly.

TMI was sort of like a car going at 10 mph down the street getting a flat tire. It wasn't like a near-miss for a car crash. TMI was shaping up to be a below-ground breach of containment, meaning that it would have turned the groundwater radioactive and increased background radiation levels modestly for 40 years or so.

It was a disaster for the company that had just built the $1.5 Billion reactor, but it really wasn't much of a disaster for anyone else.

But, yeah. Nukes are going to get us out of the energy mess we're in right now. Hopefully, we can throw economical renewables like wind, biomass/biofuels, and (maybe, eventually) solar in there. Eventually, we will hit peak uranium, even if it's several thousand years off if we continue increasing energy consumption at the rate of 2-3%/year.


You see, that would actually involve caring about tomorrow 1/10 as much as today. I doubt such a move would be politically feasible anywhere, let alone America.

America has never, will never, build an RMBK reactor. That design was done to allow the USSR to process weapons grade uranium WITHOUT shutting down the powerplant. In otherwords, they did not use WATER as a modulator.

The USA has never, will never, do that.

Our designs are safe safe safe.

Lord knows, we have lots of nuke material we need to get rid of.

If not for BIGOIL, we would be there by now.