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Obama & DOI impose 5 yr drill ban on most offshore areas

November 8, 2011 By Carol Greenberg

Offshore oil rig

Yep, while many of us in the country are voting today. When Ohio is caught up in a battle to pass Issues #2 & 3, which could have a major impact on the rest of the country. When Arizona is trying to fight the recall of the courageous senator who wrote Arizona’s immigration law. While Holder is testifying before Congress on his role in the Fast and Furious scandal. While all this is happening Obama and Department of the Interior secretary Ken Salazar pulled another fast one on the ability of American people to create new jobs and move the U.S towards energy independence.

They imposed a 5-year ban on most drilling in offshore areas. Until 2017. A real stunner and a betrayal of the American people as far as this writer is concerned. So a long, last look at the picture of that offshore rig on the right because according to Obama’s plan it will be pretty much non-existent.

Information below is from House Natural Resources Chair Rep. Doc Hastings (R-WA).

WASHINGTON, D.C. – After imposing a nearly three-year moratorium on new offshore drilling by discarding the 2010-2015 lease plan that allowed for new development on the Outer Continental Shelf (OCS), the Obama Administration announced a draft plan today that closes the majority of the OCS to new energy production through 2017 [emphasis mine]. The Administration’s draft five-year plan prohibits new offshore drilling and only allows lease sales to occur in areas that are already open. The draft plan includes lease sales in the Gulf of Mexico and the Arctic – leaving portions of Alaska and the entire Atlantic and Pacific Coasts off-limits to new energy production and job creation.

“In 2008, a bipartisan agreement was reached to lift the decades-long ban on new offshore drilling and open new areas off the Atlantic, Pacific and Arctic coasts. Since President Obama took office, he has systematically taken steps to re-impose an offshore drilling moratorium and today he is one step closer to making that a reality for the next five years,” said House Natural Resources Committee Chairman Doc Hastings. “The Obama Administration’s draft plan places some of the most promising energy resources in the world off-limits and indefinitely abandons the scheduled lease sale off the coast of Virginia that was supposed to take place last year.

“No new drilling or new lease sales will occur during President Obama’s term in office – despite the overwhelming support of the American people for new offshore energy production. The President’s plan is to simply say ‘no’ to new energy production and ‘no’ to new American jobs created by new offshore drilling. It’s a plan that is sending American jobs overseas, forfeiting new revenue, and denying access to American energy that would lessen our dependence on hostile Middle Eastern oil.

Below is a picture of offshore areas open to drilling when Obama took office. Lots of green:

Areas available pre-Obama

And the picture below is the area of drilling blocked under Obama’s draft 2012-2017 plan:

Areas open after Obama

See all that red? All those areas will be “off limits.” Costing millions of jobs, and billions of dollars in lost revenue.

BOEM is supposed to have a copy of the *draft plan* on its website. But alas, when one clicks on the link for the 2012-2017 *plan* we get page not found. Ineptness of a webmaster or deliberate *failure to disclose.* Take your pick.

For those of you interested in the timeline of all these developments it is below.

Beginning in 1981-

Congress annually passes a moratorium on new OCS development.

1990 -

President George H.W. Bush institutes an Executive Moratorium on OCS leasing (overlapping the annual moratorium imposed by Congress).

July 14, 2008 -

President George W. Bush lifts the Executive ban on OCS leasing.

July 30, 2008 -

President George W. Bush announces the beginning of a new “five-year plan” to provide a blueprint for OCS leasing in the 2010 to 2015 period. This would replace the five-year plan for the 2007-2012 period, which did not provide for any lease sales in areas that were covered by the moratorium.

October 1, 2008 -

Responding to public outcry over high gas prices and mounting pressure from Republican lawmakers, Congress lifts the ban on new oil and gas leasing in the OCS.

January 16, 2009 -

Bush Interior Department issues a Draft Proposed OCS oil and gas leasing program, and solicits comments on all aspects of the plan. The proposal includes 31 OCS lease sales in all or some portion of 12 of the 26 planning areas—4 areas off Alaska, 2 areas off the Pacific coast, 3 areas in the Gulf of Mexico, and 3 areas off the Atlantic coast.

February 10, 2009 -

Secretary Salazar announces he will delay the Bush Administration 5-year plan for oil and natural gas development on the U.S. Outer Continental Shelf for six months. He begins a “listening tour” in spite of the fact that the Bush Administration had already solicited public opinion on this plan.

September 17, 2009 -

Secretary Salazar states that the Administration may not complete a new OCS lease plan until 2012.

September 21, 2009 -

The Administration’s extended public comment period on the draft proposed 2010-2015 Outer Continental Shelf plan comes to an end – yet the Administration still makes no announcement regarding the future of offshore drilling.

January 26, 2010 -

The Department of the Interior announces it will delay the Virginia offshore lease sale scheduled for November 2011.

January 27, 2010 -

President Obama mentions offshore drilling in his State of the Union address – leading many to believe he is open to expanding drilling in the OCS.

February 1, 2010 -

President Obama releases his FY 2011 budget proposal that shows revenue from new Outer Continental Shelf (OCS) leasing declining from $1.5 billion in 2009 to only $413 million in 2015. The only way revenue would decline is if less of the OCS is offered for leasing for energy production.

February 4, 2010 -

The Wall Street Journal reports that public comments collected by the Department of the Interior ran 2-to-1 in favor of the new 2010-2015 lease plan.

March 3, 2010 -

Secretary Salazar confirms that the Administration will not put a new OCS lease plan in place until 2012, which means no new drilling will take place during President Obama’s term in office.

July, 2010 -

The date new areas would be available for leasing under the original 2010-2015 lease plan if it were not for the “Obama Moratorium,” which has delayed implementation of a new lease plan until 2012.

December 1, 2010 -

Effectively reinstated the ban on offshore drilling, placing the entire Pacific Coast, the entire Atlantic Coast, the Eastern Gulf and parts of Alaska off limits to future energy production until 2017 at the earliest.

November 8, 2011 -

Announces a new draft 2012-2017 lease plan that closes the majority of the OCS to new energy production. The draft plan prohibits new offshore drilling and only allows lease sales to occur in areas that are already open. It includes lease sales in the Western Gulf of Mexico and Alaska – leaving portions of the Arctic and the entire Atlantic and Pacific Coasts off-limits to new energy production and job creation.

Rep. Hastings said in conclusion:

“Developing the United State’s offshore resources would create over a million jobs, generate billions in revenue and significantly reduce foreign oil imports. It’s been six months since the House has passed bipartisan bills to reverse the Obama moratorium and allow new offshore drilling and the Democrat-controlled Senate has failed to act.”

Another stunning, albeit seeing the track record of this administration, not a real surprising blow to the American people.

FYI I spoke with Spencer Pedersen in the House Natural Resources Committee office today. He tells me there is supposed to be a 90 day *public comment* period, and that Rep. Hastings is working on a course of action to employ.

Related stories: Obama betrays America people with intent to buy oil from Brasil.

30-40 new permits needed in the Gulf each month to keep up with demand.

Three bills to increase offshore energy production introduced.

Voices from the Gulf: stop the energy freeze.

Crossposted at Unified Patriots

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Filed Under off shore oil drilling moratorium Tagged With BOEM, Dept. of Interior, engery, gas, Gulf of Mexico, House Natural Resources Committee, Ken Salazar, Obama, offshore drilling ban, oil, Rep. Doc Hastings

Greenwire: U.S. losing $4.7M a day from permitting lag, group says

April 27, 2011 By Carol Greenberg

Natural Resources Committee The following information was received via email from House Natural Resources Committee Chair Doc Hastings. The article sited and written by Phil Taylor at Greenwire requires a subscription.

Research by a Dallas-based research group found that declining oil and gas production in the Gulf of Mexico and a lull in new drilling permits is costing the United States $4.7 million a day in mineral revenues.

The briefing released today by the National Center for Policy Analysis blames the losses on declining production at existing wells and bureaucratic delays on new exploration but warns that the losses will increase the longer the United States waits to issue new offshore leases.

The group cites estimates by the federal Energy Information Administration that Gulf oil production will decline by 240,000 barrels a day this year. With oil selling at $100 a barrel and producers typically paying an 18.75 percent royalty, the United States is losing $4.7 million a day, which would amount to $1.7 billion over the year, the group found.

“While President Obama says he supports deficit reduction, his administration’s policies are only contributing to the country’s deficit problem,” report author and NCPA adjunct scholar Rob Bluey said. “Every day the Obama administration delays new oil drilling, the federal government loses more oil company revenue that could be used to reduce state, federal and local deficits.”

Bluey is also director of the Center for Media and Public Policy at the Heritage Foundation.

The report also warns that the lack of new leases means the government will collect less in rent payments, which generate more than $200 million a year.

The Interior Department since February has issued at least 10 new deepwater permits for exploration activity that was banned under a now-lifted moratorium imposed in the aftermath of last April’s BP PLC Deepwater Horizon disaster. The moratorium allowed Interior to establish critical safety regulations to protect workers and the environment from another blowout, officials have said.

Interior last week said it plans to hold its first lease sale after the BP spill in the western Gulf by the end of the year (E&ENews PM, April 19).

The NCPA briefing also takes a swipe at an Obama administration proposal to raise inspection fees and charge nonproducing lease holders to raise money for more inspectors and agency resources.

The group suggests additional revenue from expanded production would be ample to cover the costs. “The income from new lease sales, rents and royalties would be more than enough to pay for new offshore oil rig inspections,” the group notes. “President Obama’s 2012 budget proposal estimates the fees would generate about $65 million — significantly less than the amount the federal government could collect by simply boosting Gulf of Mexico production to last year’s levels.”

Crossposted at Unified Patriots

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Filed Under off shore oil drilling moratorium Tagged With BP, budget, Deepwater Horizon, Dept. of Interior, Doc Hastings, drilling, drilling permits, Greenwire, Gulf, Heritage Foundation, House Natural Resources Committee, National Center for Policy Analysis, NCPA, Obama, oil, oil & gas leases, Phil Taylor, Rob Bluey

Shocker: 30-40 new permits needed in Gulf per month just to keep up with demand

April 8, 2011 By Carol Greenberg

As we near the first anniversary of the BP Deepwater Horizon oil disaster, April 20, 2010, here are some other points to take into consideration. The BP disaster was a deep-water rig which is much more difficult to operate than a shallow-water rig. Below is a picture of the difference:

Shallow water v. deep water drilling

The Shallow Water Energy Security Coalition (SWESC) explains even though BP’s Horizon was a deep-water rig:

Unfortunately, the federal officials at the Department of the Interior and the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) has imposed a “one size fits all” approach to permitting that ignores the strong track record of the shallow water drilling industry. The recent history of shallow water permitting in the U.S. Gulf of Mexico is a cautionary tale for those who profess optimism about the end of the deepwater drilling moratorium. Although the moratorium on shallow water drilling was lifted in May 2010, permit approvals have been nominal.

Below is an illustration of how many jobs are at stake because of Obama’s de facto moratorium on shallow water drilling in the Gulf because of slow-walking of permits:

Shallow water jobs

As you can see there are many other ancillary and related jobs which “keep the rig afloat”: food suppliers, repairmen, shipyards, supply boats, trucking and more.  Approximately 40,000 jobs. Every 100 jobs on one of these “floating factories” creates 400 jobs. But because of Obama’s de facto moratorium rigs are leaving the Gulf for sunnier shores in other parts of the world. Below is an illustration from page 14 of a study commissioned by SWESC showing rigs which have left the Gulf:

Rigs leaving

Since the moratorium began on May 6th, 5 jack-up rigs have announced they will leave the Gulf of Mexico.  13 total rigs (shallow and deep) have left, and many others have been mothballed.

Several days ago Jim Noe of SWESC made the stunning revelation the US will need to have 30-40 new permits approved  PER MONTH just to significantly boost our production.  He discusses this with Neil Cavuto:

Not too likely this is going to happen. Points Noe makes:

  • only 22 deep-water permits have been approved by BOEMRE since Oct. 12, 2010.
  • production is on the decline, the EIA or Energy Information Administration (the government’s own agency) has said that oil production in the Gulf will decrease this year and next by 250,000 barrels a day.
  • we will have 1/3 less oil coming from our own soils than we have today.
  • many of the new permits released since the BP spill are for rigs already in operation that will just be resumed.
  • the deep-water, if it were a country, would be the world’s 4th largest reserve.
  • the US was the third largest oil producing country in the world last year and Obama is trying to take credit for that however this was actually the result of policies changed under Clinton and GWB.

And in case you missed it, yesterday Obama was in Pennsylvania touting “green energy” aka solar and wind. In a “let the masses eat cake“ moment Yahoo news reported this quote from him:

“If you’re complaining about the price of gas and you’re only getting 8 miles a gallon, you know,” Obama said laughingly. “You might want to think about a trade-in.”

And what mpg does the Obamamobile get? I’m betting about 8mpg if that.

A while later the quote was scrubbed from Yahoo. However CNS news got it on video. Ah, nothing better than seeing it and hearing it right from the horse’s mouth.

Carol Greenberg

Crossposted at Unified Patriots

Related articles:

Sen. David Vitter (R-LA) blasts the Import-Export Bank for loaning $2 billion to Brazil for their drilling.

Hot Air Alert: when Democrat rhetoric and reality collide.

Obama wants to cut foreign oil dependency by 1/3 but at the expense of Americans.

3 bills to increase off-shore energy production introduced.

Obama betrays the American people with intention to buy oil from Brazil.

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Filed Under energy, off shore oil drilling moratorium Tagged With BOEMRE, Dept. of Interior, EIA, energy, Gulf drill moratorium, Jim Poe, Obama, oil, oil permits, Shallow Water Energy Security Coalition, SWESC

Obama’s Betrayal of America

February 24, 2011 By gamecock

The promise that the Bush-McCain weary heard was that there were no red states and no blue states, but just the United States. The stimulus would arrest the recession and keep unemployment under 8%. ObamaCare would lower the deficit and you could keep your own insurance if you wanted. Foreign nations would love the anti-cowboy, and oh yes, anyone that was saddled with white guilt would have it instantly purged.

Two years later down the yellow-brick road, the curtain has been rent and revealed, not a wizard, but rather a lawless, arrogant alien in the White House that is not just presiding over American decline but actually egging it on.

He is not alien because he wasn’t born in Hawaii, but, rather because he doesn’t love America and what it is and has stood for. Rather, he loves the Obama-nation he is in the process of building in which he issues waivers to those that tickle the King’s fancy and organize communities for his Democrat like the hordes of spoiled public sector union brats in Wisconsin.

obama-wright

But what to expect from a man raised by proud Marxists; educated by those that deem Bill Ayers a colleague; and preached to for 20 years in a church that honors a racist that our President Obama always calls “Minister” Farrakhan (and with whom his Most Reverend Wright traveled to Libya to honor a tyrant that survived Reagan’s bombs and surrendered his WMD to Dubya but who recently finally found a U.S. Chief Executive he could praise in B. Hussein).

On Day One of the Obama Era, the dreams from his UK-hating Kenyan father prompted him to remove the post-911solidarity gift of Winston Churchill’s bust from the Oval Office. To make amends he gave the Queen of England a CD of his speeches, slapped her on the back and gave Russia Britain’s nuclear secrets. All before bowing until his ears hit the floor to every two-bit Muslim potentate during two Apologize for America tours.

In further efforts to secure the love of the “international community” it equates the death cult in Gaza with the building of apartment buildings in East Jerusalem and sides with Iran’s mullahs over those innocents mowed down in Teheran streets. The result? Saudi Arabia mocks him in public, Pakistan tries a diplomat for murder despite immunity, Mexican soldiers treat the Arizona as grounds for maneuvers and China plays anti-American ditties in the White House to polite applause as Attorney General Eric Holder exonerates billy club-wielding New Black Panthers and sues Mexico’s Arizona territory.

Have we discovered any High Crimes or Misdemeanors yet, because it’s about to get worse?

Reform instead of recovery

How is ObamaCare working out for the nearly 20% of Americans that are either out of work or so under-employed that they can’t pay for necessities at Fed-inflated prices, much less consume any wants greater than Le Seuer brand-peas. Things are so bad that stories of proposed municipal laws banning roosters in backyards fill newspapers.

John Maynard Keynes complained of FDR’s misplaced focus on NRA price-fixing reforms while the nation cried out for recovery, but at least he put some folks to work through the WPA.

Obama delayed public works until his second year and then claimed there never was any such thing as “shovel-ready” projects. Has he even seen Hoover’s Dam or FDR’s TVA?

As senator and president he supported and fostered a TARP for Paulson, Geithner & Company that hasn’t even protected banks when one out of every nine of those that haven’t already closed are at risk of failure. No troubled assets have been recovered and no small business loans are being made since there are no expected profits with which to pay back said loans from a stimulus that only saved state and local government jobs and created federal regulators that kill jobs.

While star-struck Americans gazed upon the underside of Obama’s skyward-pointing chin and exposed nostrils, and so missed his promises to bankrupt the coal industry and have us learn a lesson from skyrocketing oil prices, now, thanks to lawless violations of court orders denying oil-drilling moratoriums, followed by lawless EPA attacks against oil drilling on Texas fields and denials of permits for power plant construction after even a Democrat Congress refused his cap-and-trade attack on the poor and middle class; when it snows in New Mexico, we have to beg Old Mexico for heat.

The left-hand touts the Muslim Brotherhood as part of the “host of important non-secular actors” in Egypt while the right hand deems them not very religious. The MUSLIM brotherhood are not very religious? He must be referring to his own not very religious, and rare darkenings of churches or to the irreligious audacities issued from Wright’s pulpit about the CIA’s conspiracy to infect Blacks with AIDS.

Empty Promises

Restructured underwater mortgages never materialized while policies prevented the reaching of the necessary bottom to a housing market, when all the while 1000-page Dodd-Frank financial “reforms” paid off revolving door Democrat pals at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac that blew the bubble up to bursting size in the first place.

Meanwhile, middle class taxpayers subsidize vanity GM cars for the rich as its stock dips below the IPO price.

He promised to end the running up of debt like Bush. He delivered on that one, as he ran up the debt at a currency-threatening rate three times the Bush rate and nearing post-WWII levels.

Promises were forthcoming that you could keep your own health insurance while attacking the very foundations of risk assessment and pricing with demands to cover “children” as old as 26 and pre-existing conditions on the day after cancer is diagnosed.

When all else fails, just take the painkiller and go home. Your life is no more precious at age 95 years than those 95+ day-old born alive infants he refused to protect from the floor of the Illinois Senate.

A Stranger in our Midst that chooses American decline

He seems a stranger in our midst that seems to get every issue not just wrong, but exactly wrong. He is no Jimmy Carter. No, Obama seems to choose American decline as a choice with no paean to “human rights” unless it is the right of humans to do right by his decrees. He takes apologize-for-America tours abroad to accept Nobel prizes while his rib-eating wife lectures the obese in a nation growing in numbers of those who will soon be able to see their own ribs if the great recession doesn’t abate.

Many of us are not surprised. We didn’t put our hands over our ears to drown out Rev. Wright or Obama’s musings on the flawed Constitution and Founders. Many of us were not so anxious to purge misplaced white guilt and give this stranger in our midst the nukes.

Must we endure two more years of this near-dictator while he continues to systematically dismantle the economy at home and our alliances over seas? While he defies court orders and “evolves” away defenses of traditional marriage?

Can he be stopped before the deluge? What will be left of America on Inauguration Day, 2013 if he remains our Chief Magistrate and Commander in Chief for another 23 months?

Democrats, have you no shame at what you foisted on this great country?

Mike DeVine

“One man with courage makes a majority.” – Andrew Jackson

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Filed Under China, Dodd, energy, EPA, Fannie & Freddie, fossil fuels, Iran, Obama, Obamacare, off shore oil drilling moratorium, off-shore drilling, Stimulus, TARP Tagged With Jeremiah Wright

103 new drilling permits await approval in the Gulf

February 5, 2011 By Carol Greenberg

At a time when we have crisis in the Middle East and should be looking for ways to achieve higher energy independence, this from the Heritage Foundation:

Permitorium: 103 Gulf of Mexico Drilling Plans Await Government Approval

As oil prices continue to climb, a backlog of more than 100 offshore drilling plans for the Gulf of Mexico are awaiting approval from the Obama administration, according to federal data.

The federal government has not approved a single new exploratory drilling plan in the Gulf of Mexico since lifting its deepwater drilling moratorium on Oct. 12. There are currently 103 plans awaiting review by the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, Regulation and Enforcement.

The information reveals that the Obama administration — not the oil industry — is the culprit for the slowdown of drilling activity in the Gulf. The Gulf of Mexico accounts for more than 25 percent of domestic oil production.

“These new findings prove that BOEMRE cannot claim it isn’t receiving job-creating plans from oil exploration and production companies,” said Gregory Rusovich, chairman of the Business Council of Greater New Orleans and the River Region. “The plans are there. Until BOEMRE reviews the 103 plans awaiting approval, our economy’s stability remains in jeopardy.”

Every two weeks Greater New Orleans Inc. releases a Gulf Permit Index based on publicly available federal data. Thursday’s index revealed an 88 percent decline in deepwater permits compared to the historical average. Not a single deepwater permit was approved in January.

Even shallow-water permits have taken a hit in the Gulf, despite not being subject to the administration’s moratorium last year. Only two new shallow-water permits were approved by BOEMRE in January. Permit issuance is down 30 percent from the historical average.

The decline in drilling is having an economic impact on the Gulf region and also threatens to exacerbate the problems with rising oil prices.

It also means less money for the federal government. With production in the Gulf of Mexico expected to drop this year by 220,000 barrels per day, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, that equals about $3.7 million in lost revenue each day (based on the $90/barrel oil and the royalty rate of 18.75 percent).

**************

Several days ago a US District Judge in New Orleans declared the Department of Interior in civil contempt for continuing their drill moratorium against his orders.

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Filed Under off shore oil drilling moratorium Tagged With BOEMRE, Dept. of Interior, Gulf of Mexico, Gulf Permit Index, oil drilling moratorium