Off shore or On Shore?

Okay, so we need oil, but where would you prefer the oil drilling? On shore or off shore? And why?

You need a both selection. And a neither for some too.

The Viking, I thought about that but I didn't want to do add those options because everyone would be selecting no drilling or both. If you have to choose which one do you "prefer?" This is what I am curious about.

I am for more off shore drilling, but with the stipulation that prior to a well being productive, a relief well needs to be in place. Kind of seems like basic common sense in hindsight.

I really don't have a preference. We need more of both. The Gulf has more oil than we could use in a very long time and places like the Northern Slope in Alaska really need to be drilled more too. It may hold enough reserves for up to 100 years too. There are also up to 11 billioin gallons off the coast of Calif and Oregon so there is probably a lot more offshore overall, but we really need to tap into both and get off of our dependence on foreign oil. Not only that, but then we could export more and actually have people rely on us and use it to maybe someday get out of this huge deficit we have.

towermonkey wrote: I am for more off shore drilling, but with the stipulation that prior to a well being productive, a relief well needs to be in place. Kind of seems like basic common sense in hindsight.

That will NEVER fly. First you do not know that a well will or will not be productive. Every exploration well is in a frontier area, so you have no idea of what you will encounter. Each offshore well can cost 4 to 10 million dollars if I recall correctly. There is NEVER any guarantee that a well will actually encounter an oil reservoir, so to drill a "relief" well is simply not a viable practice.

I do not think there is any insight into how much money goes into locating and drilling a well. Before the site is even identified, seismic must be shot over a large area, then mapped and interpreted, the geology must be integrated, nearby wells and fields analyzed, then preparations made for lease sales followed by construction of the drilling rig, actual drilling and then maybe a payout. If not a post mortem analysis is done and I've done a few of those that Shell drilled off the Maryland coast in 7 thousand feet of water. Seismic acquisition, processing and interpretation can run into 20-30 million dollars. Lease sales is like a silent auction where companies submit bids for a given piece of acreage. Ideally, companies like to be bidding similar amounts, but there are times when a company will leave tens of millions on the table relative to others. Lease sales can cost another 5-30 million depending upon the potential. We'll lump rig and drilling costs together at 10 million so a single well may cost up to 70 million dollars that are simply risked with the hope the analysis is good and a oil reservoir will be encountered. That is one well folks. Granted a relief well is not going to involve all the up front money, but it still will be a multimillion dollar investment. A company is not going to drill a relief well when they don't know if the exploration well will even be productive. There is much bitching and moaning about oil companies and their huge profits, but take a good look at BP now and you realize how quickly their profits and much more have gone up in smoke. Oil companies take huge risks to get oil.

The Viking wrote: I really don't have a preference. We need more of both. The Gulf has more oil than we could use in a very long time and places like the Northern Slope in Alaska really need to be drilled more too. It may hold enough reserves for up to 100 years too. There are also up to 11 billioin gallons off the coast of Calif and Oregon so there is probably a lot more offshore overall, but we really need to tap into both and get off of our dependence on foreign oil. Not only that, but then we could export more and actually have people rely on us and use it to maybe someday get out of this huge deficit we have.

That dear friend is a myth. THose kinds of estimates are made by the USGS and are pure guesses. You are right about one thing though, the POTENTIAL for oil discovery is offshore. Onshore areas are mature and there are no BIG oil reservoirs left to be found. Large companies no longer explore there because the cost of exploration is greater than any potential return. Onshore exploration is for small independent companies who can eek out a profit, but they will never even replace the reserves being used by us on a daily basis, nor will the offshore drilling ever enable us to become independent of oil imports. I do believe we have or are about to reach peak oil, meaning our reserves will continue to decline in the years ahead. When you talk about reserves lasting 100 years, you can not consider that as a possibility given current consumption rates. The only way that will happen is if we begin to use alternative energy and cut global consumption rates drastically.

Onshore seems to be easier to regulate spills, especially on super deep oil wells like BP's. Although the Denver Post has an article about it today that says there are plenty of ground oil spills too.

Rockdoc Franz wrote:

towermonkey wrote: I am for more off shore drilling, but with the stipulation that prior to a well being productive, a relief well needs to be in place. Kind of seems like basic common sense in hindsight.

That will NEVER fly. First you do not know that a well will or will not be productive. Every exploration well is in a frontier area, so you have no idea of what you will encounter. Each offshore well can cost 4 to 10 million dollars if I recall correctly. There is NEVER any guarantee that a well will actually encounter an oil reservoir, so to drill a "relief" well is simply not a viable practice.

I do not think there is any insight into how much money goes into locating and drilling a well. Before the site is even identified, seismic must be shot over a large area, then mapped and interpreted, the geology must be integrated, nearby wells and fields analyzed, then preparations made for lease sales followed by construction of the drilling rig, actual drilling and then maybe a payout. If not a post mortem analysis is done and I've done a few of those that Shell drilled off the Maryland coast in 7 thousand feet of water. Seismic acquisition, processing and interpretation can run into 20-30 million dollars. Lease sales is like a silent auction where companies submit bids for a given piece of acreage. Ideally, companies like to be bidding similar amounts, but there are times when a company will leave tens of millions on the table relative to others. Lease sales can cost another 5-30 million depending upon the potential. We'll lump rig and drilling costs together at 10 million so a single well may cost up to 70 million dollars that are simply risked with the hope the analysis is good and a oil reservoir will be encountered. That is one well folks. Granted a relief well is not going to involve all the up front money, but it still will be a multimillion dollar investment. A company is not going to drill a relief well when they don't know if the exploration well will even be productive. There is much bitching and moaning about oil companies and their huge profits, but take a good look at BP now and you realize how quickly their profits and much more have gone up in smoke. Oil companies take huge risks to get oil.

How do you explain the fact that Canada requires this, and yet the oild companies are still drilling there?

Was told by top retiring Standard Oil exec in 1970's. That
they alone have enough Capped wells in U.S. to last 400years!
And population growth considered ie: number of vehicles.

But why use our oil when we can make big profits brokering
for middle east countries + others. If they go dry we(oil
companies) have the capped wells/producers. This was told
to me during the "shortages".