No, his 10 year claim is based on how long it takes to lease the land and set up the infrastructure to drill for and transport the oil. You've got to lease the land, figure out where you're going to drill, set up the equipment, etc. The offshore oil deposits are something like 2 miles beneath the ocean floor, and that's 8-10k feet below the surface of the ocean. You can't just shoot your gun at the ground and move to Beverly Hills. :)

In fact, the oil companies are getting flack from anti-offshore drilling folks because they've already leased all sorts of land that they're not currently drilling. Their response? "We're working on it, it takes time to develop the land."

Now, when the drills are finally operational, they're not going to produce oil at an astounding rate or anything. And the oil goes straight into the world oil market, so it ends up having only a small impact on prices. Oil we drill here goes for the same price as oil drilled anywhere else.

The only *real* reason for offshore drilling is to maintain our production rate. The big draw for drilling in ANWR is that, by the time those fields are producing, the Alaskan oil pipeline will be paid off and its use will be free, making that investment all the more profitable.

Maybe these are good enough reasons for you. I'm not terribly concerned either way, because I think both sides are exaggerating the costs and benefits.

Oh, I should provide a reference. I finally found the one I saw referenced several places, which is from the Energy Information Administration.

http://www.eia.doe.gov/oiaf/aeo/otheranalysis/ongr.html

It's last year's analysis of the impact of increased access to oil and natural gas in the outer continental shelf. According to their data, it takes about 5 years from leasing to production.

Anyway, their projections say that if leases began in 2012 (when the moratorium was set to expire) then oil production would be about 7% above where it would have been otherwise, and, "Because oil prices are determined on the international market, however, any impact on average wellhead prices is expected to be insignificant."

So, if you can't trust the experts Bush's administration is paying, who *can* you trust? In any case, this is clearly not a short-term fix for high gas prices, though some might still argue that it's worthwhile.

There are many capped oil wells where fields have already been explored, excavated, etc. but have since been capped because of congressional and/or presidential bans or other legislation. In may cases, the oil companies have gotten leases from the federal government to do everything BUT pump oil. As a result, a lot of the preliminary legwork has been done and all the oil companies need is for the government to get out of the way and let them drill or pump.

There are many areas, like the shallow waters off the coast of California, where there is a large known quantity of oil ready to be taken, but state and federal regulations prevent it.

Levi, I hate to say it, but your description of how difficult it is to get to offshore oil deposits is a bit of an exaggeration or, at least, a worst-case scenario.

Your right about offshore drilling as a means of maintaining our production rate. We currently have the refining capability to meet our own domestic demand. More refineries isn't really the answer although we may need those in the future. Offsetting imported crude product with domestic crude product is what will ease the current cost frustrations.

Levi said:

In any case, this is clearly not a short-term fix for high gas prices, though some might still argue that it's worthwhile.

Since the price at the pump is based partly on the traded price of oil futures stocks, anything that makes futures traders (AKA "evil speculators") downgrade the price will affect the price at the pump. The US increasing domestic production, or even saying we're going to increase domestic production, is likely to do exactly that.

The description I gave was for a particular deposit in the Gulf of Mexico that is apparently one the oil companies are planning on going after. Frankly, when I heard about it, I thought it was pretty amazing that we have the means to actually get to oil there.

Anyway, how does offsetting imported crude product with domestic crude product ease cost frustrations? It's all priced the same, because it's all part of the global oil market. We could use it more cheaply if we forced the oil companies operating here to sell it to us cheaper, but that's not very free-market-like.

And if the only short-term effect of this is due to speculators and oil futures market fluctuations, it's not a real short-term solution in my book. Is there a real short-term solution? I don't know, but I don't think so.

I completely agree with you there is no good short-term solution. Sitting on our hands and saying "Well, there's no good short term solution so we shouldn't bother drilling for oil" is just irresponsible.

I do believe if the congress and the president show the world that we're serious about going after our own oil, it will affect prices at the pump in the short term, even if new oil product isn't actually in the system for a while (whether it be weeks, months, years, or decades).

The United States is the only major country that isn't actively pursuing harvest of its own natural resources. Instead, we've got the leader of the House saying she wants to save the planet with no regard for what makes this country tick. If there's any country that can "save the planet" and still find a way to safely exploit its own natural resources, it's the United States!

Heck, Vietnam and China have made deals to slant-drill for oil off the Florida coast, possibly tapping into reserves that would probably be ours if we were going after it.

I know we probably wouldn't follow China if it decided to jump off a cliff, but given China's record on environmental issues, don't you think a U.S. oil company could go after that oil right off our coast in a more environmentally friendly fashion?

Well, in any case, I still think your original post was off the mark in a few places. Obama still doesn't think drilling is actually a good idea, but he is willing to compromise in order to get legislation passed that will include things that he does think are good ideas.

I think whether it's a good idea or not is still up in the air (even modern wells have little spills, and definite environmental impact), but there's not a lot of hard information out there detailing what the costs/benefits are. Most of my googling turned up articles reporting on opinion polls, which show that a majority of respondents believe that drilling for oil will reduce gas prices in the short-term. This, frankly, disgusts me. We're not lemmings, we should get facts and draw our own conclusions, not get our coverage of the issue solely based on some vague percentage of support in the polls. What a tremendous failure of the media!

Most articles that actually tried to find some factual basis as to what effect drilling would have referenced the EIA document I linked to earlier (from last year), which clearly suggests that it would take at least 5 years from the lifting of the ban on drilling for any change in supply at all to occur. This is definitely shorter than the 10 year quote from Obama, but then I haven't seen the references his people are working from either, and there may indeed be a good reason for that figure, e.g. the ban may not be lifted immediately, or something like that. In any case, it's a lot more than the 'weeks or months' figure you mentioned in the original post. If you've got references supporting that, I'd like to see them, because I'd like to be well-informed on this issue.

Finally, your ending paragraph seems to tie the possibility of $2.50 or $3.00 gas to the lifting of the ban on drilling. I don't think that's realistic, considering the EIA's conclusions that the effect of the less-diminished domestic supply on average wellhead prices will be insignificant. Elsewhere, I saw estimates of perhaps a few cents per gallon.