5 item(s) were returned.
Denbury, a small energy resources firm focused on oil and natural gas, sees a bright future in enhanced oil recovery (EOR), a process that pumps CO2 into oil wells to release hard-to-reach oil. EOR has been promoted as a way to simultaneously address climate change and improve recoverable oil reserves. The company surprised many recently after it traded its Bakken Shale assets – some of the most productive in the country – to Exxon Mobil in exchange for $1.6 billion in cash and parts of Exxon Mobil’s Texas and Wyoming stakes. Denbury will instead focus on utilizing EOR in its… [more]
View InsightAccording to data collected and reported by Bloomberg News, the “U.S. is the closest it has been in almost 20 years to achieving energy self-sufficiency”. In the first 10 months of 2011, 81% of U.S. energy demand was met by domestic sources, up from a record low of 70% in 2005. If the 2011 numbers are accurate, this would be the highest proportion of U.S. energy demand met by domestic sources since 1992. This upward trend in energy self-sufficiency is due in large part to increased oil and natural gas development, and low natural gas prices. “Domestic oil output is… [more]
View InsightThree House bills that would greatly expand U.S. oil and gas development – H.R. 3407, H.R. 3408, and H.R. 3410 – were approved by the Natural Resources Committee on February 1, 2012. H.R. 3407 would open up vast areas of Alaska’s coastal plain to oil leasing. H.R. 3408 would expand shale oil development in several Western states. Many Democrats opposed the bill, arguing that the environmental, social, and geologic risks of shale oil development are not yet well understood. The committee voted down a Democratic amendment that would have required the USGS to study oil shale development impacts on water… [more]
View InsightJ.C. Ward Jr. Professor of Nuclear Energy Engineering
Cornell University
The President said in his State of the Union Address, “And nowhere is the promise of innovation greater than in American-made energy.” He then talked about opening federal land for oil and gas exploration, implied that relying on foreign oil is not a good thing, and stated, “This country needs an all-out, all-of-the-above strategy that develops every available source of American energy a strategy that’s cleaner, cheaper, and full of new jobs.” Considering the President’s all-of-the-above platform, and the goals implicit in it, we’d be wise to evaluate our national relationship to oil. The U.S. currently produces around 7.6 million… [more]
View Insight[Note: The statements below are intended solely to stimulate discussion among the Expert community, and do not represent the position of OurEnergyPolicy.org. Text in italics indicates clarification or expansion.] The main issue here is hedging our bets and securing our oil supply in case of a global war on resources. Why do we need to hedge? We cannot “drill” our way out of the oil problem. Relying on drilling as a solution is like placing a coin bet on the life of our children. It is too risky. We cannot be sure that our policy to move away from oil… [more]
View Insight