|
Oil Shale Pushed as Domestic Oil Source, but Many Doubts Remain
With the fate of domestic oil production promising to spill over into a new administration, oil companies in northwestern Colorado are steadily pushing ahead with projects to develop the American West's vast deposits of oil shale, estimated to contain the equivalent of more than 800 billion barrels of oil--three times more than Saudi Arabia's proven oil reserves.But they are also among the first to caution against premature exuberance by lawmakers, saying that commercial production, despite some progress, is still years away. Such disparities between political rhetoric and on-the-ground reality are a common theme among national proposals for new sources of energy, but in the case of oil shale, the gap is particularly stark. By most accounts, oil shale's proponents scored two big victories this fall. A congressional ban against oil shale leasing on federal land expired in September while, in the same month, the Interior Department issued guidelines for opening up about 2 million acres in Colorado, Utah, and Wyoming to potential commercial-scale oil shale drilling. If nothing else, the changes are "psychologically important," says Glenn Vawter, executive director of the National Oil Shale Association, because existing restrictions "were sending a message to companies that the government was really skeptical of oil shale or didn't want oil shale." But recent progress on the regulatory front is now colliding with the slow pace of research and testing. Observers say commercial oil shale development probably won't take place until at least the middle of the next decade. ... Meanwhile, falling oil prices this fall are once again raising concerns about oil shale's future, since oil prices in the $70 to $100 range are needed for oil shale to be profitable. Insiders say that big companies aren't too worried by the downward trend, since they expect prices to climb back upward over the next few years. But smaller companies looking to raise capital may find it increasingly hard to attract investment. Posted by: ed 2008-11-09 |
| http://www.rantburg.com/poparticle.php?ID=254750 |