But with the drilling on already approved land, that’s a red herring. The vast majority of the land that has been already approved is so mired in regulation or does not have sufficient oil to justify the cost of drilling that companies have found it thus far cheaper to import.

Just the thought of Off-shore drilling has scared OPEC enough that within 8 days of Bush ending the Presidential ban on off-shore drilling, the cost of gas at the pump fell 10%.

Imagine what would happen if ANWR were opened…

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I had my Chevy venture van up to 30.5 MPG for about a week…but I just dont drive that much, and I drive mostly the same routes, so I am able to time the hills pretty good. Plus, I live in an area with a lot of what I call “schwoop-and-yeild” turns…wheree you can make a right hand turn on red without stopping if there is nobody coming, and you dont really have to slow down much so you can merge without haveing to jackrabbit.

Im pretty sure that the politics of the last eight years have conclusivly proven that “the people” don’t want their leaders “bitch slapping” ANY industry to do ANYTHING in the public interest. That’s communist.

And I guess everyone’s milage varies, but I didn’t interpret Obama’s statement as an order…but as an illustration of the amount of gas he believes we will get from drilling in the disputed areas.

Now…if industry actually starts drilling in the places they ALREADY have the go-ahead, we might see some releif down the line…in five-ten years.

I heard at a family reunion lately there’s some talk about the company that owns the right to drill on some property owned by memebers of my family that are finally going to start drilling there again after a couple of decades of just hoarding the option…so maybe they’ll get off their butts and start using what they’ve got rather than demanding more first.

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I simply cannot always drive within 50 feet of the back end of a semi, going a constant 60 mph, and without A/C or heat. Life doesn’t work like that.

While it would benefit people to reduce their gasoline consumption, there’s a lot of evidence that we are well into the realm of inelastic demand, without a concurrent drop in gasoline prices. Also, it’s a world economy: India subsidises gasoline for its citizens, which reduces the supply available to Americans.

Now, if I may rant about this some more: Instead of telling Americans to inflate their tires (good for a mile per gallon, maybe) Obama should be bitch-slapping Detroit - if he really cared about fuel efficiency. They don’t make fuel efficient cars, save the Ford Focus, which aren’t pieces of garbage. Their SUVs get about an inch to the gallon, while Toyota and Honda manage to make SUVs that get mileage similar to minivans and mid-sized sedans. There is a waiting list for Priuses and a two-day supply of Toyota Camrys in America, and Detroit fights any mandates to increase fuel economy.

One set of numbers says one thing, one set of numbers says another. I’ve heard everything from assertions that it wouldn’t last six months assuming our demand doesnt increase, to it will last 200 years even if we continue to increase our demand at the current rate.

Obama illustrating the small size of the smaller estimates doesn’t seem like that big of a deal to me. For whatever reason, a lot of smart people seem to believe the smaller numbers, and a lot of idiots (like MNs Michele Bachmann) seem to bellieve the bigger numbers.

I have no way of knowing, since I havn’t had a chance to olook at any primary data.

That said, I just implemented several gas-saving techniques, and raised my milage from 21.3 to 29.4 MPG. If everyone in the coutnry did that, you’d have to drill a lot of oil to make up for it.

Teresa’s last blog post..The Rainbow Connection

Drilling in the disputed areas in combination with increased scientific advancement in alternative fuels would absolutely divert the oil crisis. Heck, America using our own resources — even if for a short 10 years or so — would divert the oil crisis.

Sort of illustrating that drilling in the desputed areas alone will do nothing to divert the oil crisis.

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