Oil Production Key to Prosperity : Fracking To Prosper

Oil production is on the rise as new technology comes on line. Still, the bottom line is we do not have enough oil production to meet our domestic needs AND the needs of the rest of the world. With the price of oil heading up again all over the world, the market tells the oil companies to export as much as possible.

But to take advantage of this market we need more domestic production. XL pipeline?

What this means is we can become a net exporter of oil. Not only can we stop the billions of dollars flowing overseas to buy what we need, but we can start bringing in billions through exporting the oil that is right here plus bring the price of gas down in this country, and according to this article, we have untold amounts of it. Just think what this new found income could do to bring us back to prosperity.

There is a problem here though that will stand in the way of any real increase in production and that is the Democrats and their eco-nut job environmentalist buddies. If you really want to see America back on the way to solvency, vote out as many progressive socialist Democrats as possible. This will be the best way and the quickest to stop our slide into oblivion.

U.S. Oil Gusher Blows out Projections
Source: Simone Sebastian, "U.S. Oil Gusher Blows out Projections," Houston Chronicle, February 19, 2012.

As oil prices have risen around the world, domestic production of crude in the United States has increased rapidly. More companies are shifting their focus to deep-water deposits in the Gulf of Mexico as new technologies and higher prices have made extraction more feasible. Additionally, breakthrough processes have made land extraction from shale sources more viable, says the Houston Chronicle.

The level of domestic oil production decreased over time to a level not seen since the 1940s, before making a complete about-face and increasing rapidly since 2009. The number of rigs in U.S. oil fields has more than quad­rupled in the past three years to 1,272, according to the Baker Hughes rig count. Including those used to extract natural gas, the United States now has more rigs than the rest of the world combined.

Whereas the Energy Information Agency had previously projected that U.S. production would peak at 6 million barrels in 2022, it adjusted this estimate upwards last month to 6.4 million barrels per day by 2025.

Increased production throughout the United States is a function of two important factors: new methods and technology that have lowered costs, and increasing demand worldwide that has driven up prices. The combination of these two forces has made many production options more profitable.

Demand continues to increase in the short-term due to conflicts in some oil-producing countries, but also in the long-run because of increasing demand for oil in rapidly developing nations.
This has kept oil prices high, with the domestic benchmark West Texas Intermediate price reaching $103.24 per barrel last week. Additionally, land production has increased, due in large part to breakthroughs in the extraction of crude from shale.

Two new techniques, horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing, have allowed three shale sites (two in Texas, one in North Dakota) to constitute 40 percent of the nation's land-based production.

Though consensus has not been reached as projections are difficult to verify, some believe that this increased production will allow the United States to challenge Saudi Arabia for the top producer of all forms of petroleum.