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Shell Oil’s plan to acquire a junior water right for an 8% stake of Colorado’s Yampa River average April-to-June flow for oil shale development has been opposed by some twenty-five parties, all submitting letters of opposition to the District 6 Colorado Water Court in Steamboat Springs.

Among those opposing the plan were a bevy of federal, state, and local governmental agencies, a coal company, and several environmental organizations.

“Colorado’s future is the issue here,” said Roger Singer, the Sierra Club’s western regional representative, in a statement. “Do we commit this dwindling resource to energy development?”

The Yampa River is the only river left in Colorado with unappropriated water.

Shell’s plan would divert up to 375 feet per second in spring runoff months and pump the water into a new 1,000 acre, 15 billion gallon reservoir. But the viability of oil shale development in the west depends on water and energy - energy that would most likely be provided by new coal-fired generation

Shell’s application and the opposition letters will be reviewed by the water court, a process that could take up to a year and a half, considering the high number of dissenters.

Image: CC Licensed by s_medgah at flickr

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Salazar said his first order of business would be to clean up an Interior Department troubled with ethical lapses, in particular, the Minerals Management Service which was rocked by a sex, drugs, and corruption scandal last year.

But Salazar also described his vision for an agency that would look as hard (or harder) at developing wind farms and solar thermal plants as it has looked at developing coal, oil and gas in the past.

When pushed about the specifics of his policy positions, Salazar didn’t let on too much. He did not say, for example, whether he would support a reinstatement of the ban on oil and gas drilling off the Pacific and Atlantic coasts, which Congress allowed to expire last year. But it is quite likely that Salazar would, in fact, support limited offshore drilling in certain areas, as the senator signed on to the bipartisan “Gang of Ten” compromise proposal in the Summer of 2008 that would have allowed drilling off the coast of certain Southeastern states.

But Salazar was not completely opaque.

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“Negotiations with Shell to sign a deal to process oil shale in Jordan are nearing an end,” said Maher Hjazin, head of the state-run Natural Resources Authority.

If our plans succeed, it would be one of the country’s largest projects to help the Jordan become energy self-sufficient, with a possibility to export oil in the future.

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The latest in a flurry of environmentally-devastating, last-minute rule changes from the Bush administration will give the go ahead for coal mining companies to fill valleys with the mining debris left over from lobbing-off mountaintops.

Earlier this week, the EPA and the White House Council on Environmental Quality approved a rule change that will allow coal mining companies to lawfully bury stream valleys and fill them with the tops of mountains that have been carved off for the coal they contain.

For years, coal mining companies were allowed to file for exemptions to a 25 year-old rule prohibiting the dumping of fill from mountaintop removal mining within 100 feet of streams and were granted them the vast majority of the time. In practice, the government had essentially been ignoring the rule for years; now they have codified that ignorance into a regulatory standard.

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Earlier this year excitement and promise surrounded the possibilities of developing a domestic oil source through shale oil. Due to the current economic crisis much of these plans have been put on hold. The companies that were initiating these efforts are finding it difficult to borrow funds for their projects. In a November 10th EarthNews article Louis D’Amico, executive director of the Independent Oil and Gas Association of Pennsylvania states:

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“The energy bill puts us onto that path of independence by having a comprehensive legislation which is the result of a bipartisan compromise in favor of sweeping innovation solutions for America’s energy future,” said Pelosi in a press conference today. “It is imperative that we are energy independent, so we can enhance the prospect for a great future of renewables and creating good paying jobs.”

The bill passed in the House by a vote of 236-189, with ten Republican’s supporting the bill and thirteen Democrats opposing it. It includes measures to “extend the tax credits for renewables, curb energy speculation, establish a national renewable electricity standard, release 10 percent of the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, repeal subsidies to oil companies, and force oil companies to explore on the land already under lease (”use it or lose it”).” It also comes with provisions on efficiency and public transit. And there are even incentives for “clean coal.”

The act allows drilling 100 miles off the Atlantic coast and Florida’s Gulf coast, but that buffer zone could be reduced if a state’s government allows. It will also let state’s decide on whether or not to permit oil-shale development on federal lands within their borders. Here are some videos from the floor debate:

This post contains additional media. Click here to view the full post.

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“If members of Congress do not support the American people at the gas pump, then they should not expect the American people to support them at the ballot box,” Bush warned.

President Bush said before members of Congress begin their heavy campaigning, they shouldn’t leave Washington without addressing high gas prices. “At the very least,” the President suggested, “Congress should take action on three common sense energy solutions that enjoy bipartisan support.” Those are:

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From Senator McCain blaming Barack Obama for high gas prices, to the House GOP’s recent (and ongoing) faux-libuster demanding an up-or-down vote on increasing domestic oil drilling, there’s no doubt that the Republican Party is pulling out all the stops to make oil the wedge issue in the upcoming election.

But speaking today at Michigan State University, Barack Obama revealed his “New Energy Plan For America,” which he said would create 5 million new jobs and eliminate our need for Middle Eastern oil in 10 years.

Obama’s plan would release light oil from the emergency oil stockpile and replace it later with heavier crude. Light crude oil is easier to refine into gasoline than heavier oil. In 2000, President Clinton used a similar tactic to make oil available at a time of rising oil prices. Obama’s new plan would also create a windfall profits tax on oil companies and a $1,000 energy rebate for families (read it here: Barack Obama’s New Energy Plan For America).

Obama’s remarks today in Michigan are part of a coordinated push-back against his Republican opponent. As part of that push, the Obama camp released a new television commercial linking McCain to Bush, Bush to McCain, and both of them to Big Oil. This post contains additional media. Click here to view the full post.

“Our dangerous dependence on foreign oil has been 30 years in the making and was caused by the failure of politicians in Washington to think long-term about the future of the country.”

“What Senator McCain neglected to mention was that during those 30 years, he was in Washington for 26 of them.”

Related Posts:

• Why Liberals Should Be Happy Obama Changed His Position On Offshore Drilling
• 5 Reasons Why We Don’t Need a Windfall Profits Tax on Energy Firms
• Poll: Americans Don’t Think More Drilling Will Lower Gas Prices
• Obama Campaign Seeks To Make Oil Prices Irrelevant

Photo: Transplanted Mountaineer via flickr under a Creative Commons License

In the wake of this week’s unexpected resignation of EERE chief Andy Karsner, I find the below excerpt from the newsletter more than just a little interesting. Was Karsner resigning in protest to the Senate GOP’s blockage of renewable energy tax credits? Or was Karsner recognizing that all of his efforts with renewable energy were going to be all for not, because he was employed in an administration hell-bent on petroleum? Whatever the answer is, it is hard to believe all of these events are merely coincidental.

From the EERE newsletter:

U.S. Agencies Look to Oil Shale and the Arctic for Petroleum

With world oil prices near record levels, the United States is investigating ways to increase domestic petroleum production. According to DOE’s Energy Information Administration (EIA), the United States currently consumes 24% of the world’s oil but produces only 10% of it, causing us to import about 60% of the oil we consume. One potential new source of domestic petroleum is oil shale, a fine-grained sedimentary rock containing organic matter from which oil can be produced. The largest known deposits are located in a 16,000-square-mile area covering parts of Colorado, Utah, and Wyoming, of which about 72% is on federal lands. Last week the Bureau of Land Management published proposed regulations for establishing a commercial shale oil program. Commercial development is not expected for several years, but the U.S. Department of Interior estimates that Western oil shale potentially holds 800 billion barrels of recoverable oil. The United States consumed about 20.7 million barrels per day in 2006, so that’s more than a century of current U.S. oil consumption. See the Interior Department press release and the EIA’s “Energy in Brief” on U.S. oil consumption.

Meanwhile, the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) has completed its assessment of the undiscovered, technically recoverable oil and natural gas that exists north of the Arctic Circle, an area that includes the northern one-third of Alaska. According to the USGS, about 90 billion barrels of undiscovered oil lie north of the Arctic Circle, including about 30 billion barrels of oil in the “Arctic Alaska” region, which extends to the north, east, and west of Alaska. That sounds like a lot, but it’s barely four years of U.S. oil consumption. With a decreasing amount of sea ice in the Arctic, many Northern nations are now considering the future possibility of offshore oil exploration in the Arctic Circle. See the USGS “ Circum-Arctic Resource Appraisal.”

Of course, other options available in the United States are increased drilling of conventional resources and reduced petroleum demand. According to the American Petroleum Institute (API), domestic oil and gas drilling is already up, with 50% more exploratory well drilled in the second quarter of 2008 than in the corresponding period a year ago. While most of that drilling is targeting natural gas, an estimated 5,219 oil wells were completed in the second quarter, marking the highest number of second-quarter oil well completions since 1986. The API also notes that U.S. oil demand was down significantly for the first half of 2008, with deliveries of all oil products down by 3%, for an average demand of 20.08 million barrels per day. As a result, U.S. oil imports sank to their lowest first-half level since 2003, at less than 13 million barrels per day. See the API press releases on the drilling activity and the petroleum demand.

Doesn’t it seem to you that it is outside the office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy’s scope of responsibility to be preaching about the benefits of developing oil-shale and drilling in the arctic?

Related Posts:

• Assistant Secretary of Energy Andy Karsner Announces Resignation
• Bush Administration Proposes Fire Sale of Rocky Mtns. for Oil Shale Development
• Billions of Barrels Under the Bakken Shale

In fact, the poll finds, the public overwhelmingly believes (76% to 19%) that policymakers should focus on investing in new energy technologies including renewable fuels and more efficient vehicles rather than expanding exploration and drilling for more oil.

When asked the question: “Looking to the future, which one of the following do you think should be a more important priority for government: Investing in new energy technology including renewable fuels and more efficient automobiles, or expanding exploration and drilling for more oil?”, more than three-quarters of respondents favored new technology and renewables.

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