Offshore oil

In the wake of the disastrous oil leak in the Gulf of Mexico, visitation to my website’s oil pages has spiked to over 1000 unique visitors a day, as it does when the price goes up or hurricanes or wars interrupt our guzzling. There is plenty of information out there, so I see no need for me to expound on much about the problem. But I need to address one issue, the demand from some that we put an end to offshore drilling and production because it is so dangerous.

I’m as much or more of an “environmentalist” as many are. Most geologists are, because they love the earth. That does not mean we reject the value of earth products, whether oil or copper or neodymium. But those who would eliminate offshore oil exploration and production need to realize one thing.

More than a third (37% in December 2009) of U.S. domestic oil production comes from offshore wells.

Federal offshore areas (mostly in the Gulf of Mexico) produce more oil than any state. More than Texas, more than Louisiana, more than Alaska. More than 2,000,000 barrels a day in December 2009. Shut it off – and replace it how? There is no replacement source that can be tapped economically, if at all. By the time any new discoveries come onstream, in seven to 15 years from now, existing production will have declined by that much or more: we will only maintain the status quo if (IF) we discover and develop that much production. The only significant possible locations for those high-volume discoveries are offshore, and there is no guarantee that it exists at all.

To quote a fine summary (available here), “America simply doesn’t get it.”


Public domain image of offshore platform. Credit: NASA.