Exactly how long would the US of A last without oil?

[SunnyD]

Driving to work this morning, looking at gas at $3.44/gallon, it made me wonder how easily the world could gang up and cripple the US by saying, "No soup for you!!!" and cutting off the supply of oil. Obviously the strategic reserve would only help a very minimal bit, since that will be first and foremost designated for military assets.

But how quickly would the economy hit the shitter given our limited ability to produce crude nationally? I think it's what, something like 20% tops of our yearly gross oil consumption can be handled by domestic oil? A full cutoff would instantly drive prices through the roof, grinding most of the US to a standstill economically. It's scary to think about how precarious of a position we're in. I know I can't afford $5+/gallon gasoline, let alone the other 80% of products that use some form or other various petrochemical on a daily basis.

 

[sdifox]

Canada would never cut off USofA... Nor would Saudi Arabia and Mexico. And those 3 make up half of USA's import

http://www.eia.doe.gov/pub/oil_gas/...ons/company_level_imports/current/import.html

 

[Specop 007]

Well, oil is a global commodity so it would be virtually impossible to "cut off the USA".

 

[Jeeebus]

Canada would never cut off USofA... Nor would Saudi

Well, oil is a global commodity so it would be virtually impossible to "cut off the USA".

This always pissed me off in school and also when we do Ethics CLEs now. Someone gives a hypothetical and rather than actually respond, people refuse to and just invent their own tangent.

 

[BeauJangles]

It would be impossible for the world to cut off the US from oil for a number of reasons, but assuming they did, it would be catastrophic. Just like it would be catastrophic for any country. Sure, Europe and a bunch of other places boast about their rail lines and alternative forms of transportation, but oil powers most of that, too.

 

[sdifox]

This always pissed me off in school and also when we do Ethics CLEs now. Someone gives a hypothetical and rather than actually respond, people refuse to and just invent their own tangent.

If Canada and Mexico tried to cut off USA, USA would invade.

Thus those 2 will not do it.

Saudi leadership is propped up by USA, again, they won't do it.

Hypothetically speaking of course.

There is oil in USA, it just prefers to use up other people's reserve.

 

[JTsyo]

If oil was cutoff, I would imagine we would get rationing while the government scrambles to exploit domestic oil sources. I wonder if the government would be willing to "free countries of oppressive regimes" and place more friendly ones in place to ensure oil sales or if we would just take our lumps.

If the Navy wants to go privateer and capture oil tankers, not sure who could stop them. US could probably sink every other navy combined.

 

[SunnyD]

If Canada and Mexico tried to cut off USA, USA would invade.

Thus those 2 will not do it.

Saudi leadership is propped up by USA, again, they won't do it.

Hypothetically speaking of course.

There is oil in USA, it just prefers to use up other people's reserve.

That's the thing, the USA doesn't have the balls to invade, especially not this close to home. Otherwise we'd already have dropped Lybia and Iran years ago.

 

[sdifox]

That's the thing, the USA doesn't have the balls to invade, especially not this close to home. Otherwise we'd already have dropped Lybia and Iran years ago.

More like USA has no need to invade. Our government is happy to sell all our oil to USA, then import it back after it has been processed...

facepalm (on us)...


Now look at these numbers

2010 US Military budget $663.8 billion
2010 Canadian Budget C$280.5 billion

That's right, the US Military Budget is more than twice the entire Canadian Federal Budget.

 

[Zargon]

I heard that our domestic storage for our reserves are full. they need to open that pipe up so prices will drop

 

[bobdole369]

Driving to work this morning, looking at gas at $3.44/gallon, it made me wonder how easily the world could gang up and cripple the US by saying, "No soup for you!!!" and cutting off the supply of oil.

OPEC tried it in the 70's and it didn't work. It would take a serious collaboration, the likes of which hasn't been seen since what we did to spark the pacific theater of WWII.

 

[0roo0roo]

the countries selling oil tend to need to sell it.

it would be suicide to try that.

 

[Texashiker]

Driving to work this morning, looking at gas at $3.44/gallon, it made me wonder how easily the world could gang up and cripple the US by saying, "No soup for you!!!" and cutting off the supply of oil.

People living in Florida, East coast and the West coast would rather look at a horizon free of drilling rigs, then have to worry about national security.

The point being - we have plenty of oil, we just can not drill for it due to people not wanting to see the offshore rigs. People would rather pay $3 - $4 a gallon for gas, then to see a offshore drilling rig in their sunset and sunrise.

If our supply of oil were cut off, those offshore bans would have to be removed, and drilling rigs moved into location. We have plenty of rigs to drill offshore, and the ability to build more.

Some of the largest oil reserves are off the coast of Florida, but we can not drill for it due to Floridas ban on offshore rigs.

 

[Golgatha]

The national reserve would give the US 3-4 years to plan and execute a military invasion of the countries who cut us off. I imagine we would retaliate by cutting off all exports out of our country as well. The US economy would definitely go into the crapper quickly, but we'd be a stronger country in the end due to a necessitated resurgence of investment into alternative energy research.

 

[Texashiker]

I imagine we would retaliate by cutting off all exports out of our country as well.

The only thing we really export are jobs, weapons, mcdonalds, burger king, disney and wal-mart.

I imagine the rest of the world would be better off without our garbage.

 

[whistleclient]

People living in Florida, East coast and the West coast would rather look at a horizon free of drilling rigs, then have to worry about national security.

The point being - we have plenty of oil, we just can not drill for it due to people not wanting to see the offshore rigs. People would rather pay $3 - $4 a gallon for gas, then to see a offshore drilling rig in their sunset and sunrise.

If our supply of oil were cut off, those offshore bans would have to be removed, and drilling rigs moved into location. We have plenty of rigs to drill offshore, and the ability to build more.

Some of the largest oil reserves are off the coast of Florida, but we can not drill for it due to Floridas ban on offshore rigs.

I blame Sarah Palin for this "drill baby drill" stuff. It doesn't take into account that:

1) Oil field size estimates are just that. They can vary wildly because it's still not an exact science.

2) A lot of oil in the US reserves is more difficult to extract and will require greater expense, deeper wells, or even oil shale extraction.

3) Current estimates place the US as having 21.4 billion barrels of oil. The US uses 21 million of barrels of oil a day. That means just over 1000 days of oil if we can actually extract and process every single barrel estimated in our reserves.

 

[bobdole369]

People living in Florida, East coast and the West coast would rather look at a horizon free of drilling rigs, then have to worry about national security.

Did you forget about the massive oil spill thats destroyed practically all marine life?! THe one that is still washing up on Destin beach that BP said was "over"?

Yup, I would prefer that we not have to drill for oil at ALL - (as pointed out previously I live in a fantasy world filled with magic elves and fairy blow jobs). BUT how about not doing it haphazardly, and how about not doing so in a place or manner that can easily lead to a massive spill that can't be accessed.

Drilling in the gulf is like shooting in a gas filled room. One of these days - even though mythbusters "busted" it, its gonna blow.

 

[Texashiker]

Did you forget about the massive oil spill thats destroyed practically all marine life?! THe one that is still washing up on Destin beach that BP said was "over"?

There is a difference between shallow wells and deep wells. Shallow wells are safe, and can be capped in no time.

It was the depth of the BP well that caused the problems.

 

[rudder]

We would kick obama out of the white house and drill more in the gulf and anwar. Then look for sources other than corn for biofuels.

The Air Force has tested bio jet fuel and were successful without even having to modify the engines in any way.

 

[rsutoratosu]

Driving to work this morning, looking at gas at $3.44/gallon, .

Thats a good discount, i'm at 3.75, 3.83, 3.91(91), 3.95 (93)

 

[bobdole369]

There is a difference between shallow wells and deep wells. Shallow wells are safe, and can be capped in no time.

It was the depth of the BP well that caused the problems.

Like in 1979 right? 100' is a deep well?

 

[Texashiker]

Like in 1979 right? 100' is a deep well?

I'm pretty sure technology has come a long way since 1979.

Do you have anything besides an event that happened 30+ years ago?

 

[bobdole369]

I think we go nuke. The chinese are so far ahead of us here. They have reactors that cannot meltdown. The current tech in nuke is light years beyond what we use here.

 

[bobdole369]

I'm pretty sure technology has come a long way since 1979.

Touche'

 

[0roo0roo]

The national reserve would give the US 3-4 years to plan and execute a military invasion of the countries who cut us off. I imagine we would retaliate by cutting off all exports out of our country as well. The US economy would definitely go into the crapper quickly, but we'd be a stronger country in the end due to a necessitated resurgence of investment into alternative energy research.

america is the saudi arabia of coal.

i'm sure the environmentalists would go nuts if we went all out goal gasification and burning the stuff like there was no tomorrow lol.

we hold the planet hostage!