As the world grapples with the existential crisis of climate change, environmental activists want President Joe Biden to phase out the oil industry, and Republicans argue he’s already doing that. Meanwhile, the surprising reality is the United States is pumping oil at a blistering pace and is on track to produce more oil than any country has in history.
The United States is set to produce a global record of 13.3 million barrels per day of crude and condensate during the fourth quarter of this year, according to a report published Tuesday by S&P Global Commodity Insights.
Last month, weekly US oil production hit 13.2 million barrels per day, according to the US Energy Information Administration. That’s just above the Donald Trump-era record of 13.1 million set in early 2020 just before the Covid-19 crisis sent output and prices crashing.
That’s been helping to keep a lid on crude and gasoline prices.
only ~9% of passenger cars in the US are EVs. so, as much as people may wish that oil production would suddenly just stop, it’ll be around as long as demand is, and unless you want to pay $5+/gallon again while hearing people screech “ThAnkS BidEN!11!!!”, well, this is what you get.
don’t blame him, blame people buying ICEs and EV manufacturers charging so much for them.
mandate WFH wherever possible, institute generous EV tax rebates, etc etc
That takes care of a small fraction of oil.
Plastics production makes up ~45% of all petroleum production.
Then you have shipping. Aircraft. Trucking. Then you have passenger vehicles.
Aircraft are the exact reason we need to figure out how to restrict production enough to raise prices. New non-fossil fuels have been “almost here” for decades, but somehow never actually get adopted. It’s time to push airlines with the prospect of more expensive jet fuel.
And lead too. I used to fly so I understand a little about the difficulties the general aviation industry has in switching to an unleaded fuel for prop planes, and have even defended the industry for it. And it’s small and shrinking. But lead has really got to go and if it takes more serious price increases to encourage it, so be it
Where are you getting the 45% number? I am seeing petrochemicals (plastics, resins, and petroleum based feedstocks) @12.12% of total oil demand in 2022. I see that road (all forms of shipping and transport on roads/care with petroleum products like tar/asphalt) is 49.24% of demand.
Diving deeper into the transportation sector, light trucks + other trucks make up 57% of the transportation sector’s petroleum usage. Following with cars/motorcycles @21%.
I agree with the sentiment you raise, that industry accounts for a very large portion of crude oil consumption, and that isn’t going anywhere anytime soon. I just am unsure where you saw your data or if its perhaps looking at a different region specifically?
Sources for my figures: -total demand%: https://www.statista.com/statistics/307194/top-oil-consuming-sectors-worldwide/
-Transport sector breakdown: https://www.eia.gov/energyexplained/use-of-energy/transportation.php
Calculate the difference in what it costs to maintain the highway system and what is brought in by the gas tax, and then charge that amount of money to every employer but offer them a tax credit that offsets this new tax if they can prove their Worker Works from home at least 90% of the time, and there will be Financial incentives for employees to report their employers for violating this rule
And they’ll absolutely eat that cost while mandating “reTURN to OFficE oR else!” if the amount they’d lose in real estate is greater than the amount they’d be charged.
yes, there are things congress could do to greatly improve the situation, but that takes time. and, ya know, congress not wasting all their time trying to expel and elect another speaker or trying to distract the country from the Trump show with their own Biden revenge impeachment and actually doing their jobs.
as a side note, tax rebates are not very helpful when people need to wait until the end of the year (or the middle of the next) for their savings. why not instant tax rebates/saving at the time of purchase?
I believe that’s happening in 2024
I had my state tax rebate immediately applied to my purchase this year (actually somewhat annoying because I found out too late to adjust my loan and would have preferred borrowing Less rather than getting part of my down payment back)
The air in my area was so clean during that first month of covid. Traffic would also be a lot better for blue collar people if all the office workers weren’t fighting them for road space.
in NYC, New York Harbor and the East and Hudson Rivers got so clean that Humpback whales and dolphins came swimming up the rivers again for the first time in almost a century. it was awesome!
unfortunately, so did the sharks around Coney Island and Rockaway Beach, lmao
Oil production will not stop until we have alternatives to other items oils helps produce. I.e. plastics, latex, etc.
Edit: all of you saying it comes from trees might want to check again. Synthetic rubber is used as it can prevent allergic reactions from the natural protein of the plant. Also synthetic rubber is used a little more than natural rubber.
link
Latex is produced from rubber trees, not petroleum.
You might want to check again. Synthetic rubber is used a little more than natural rubber.
stats
Synthetic rubber and latex are different things. Your sentiment isn’t wrong, just that specific example.
A huge chunk of plastics come from natural gas, not oil. Latex comes from a tree. As does natural rubber, which some tire manufacturers are returning to.
PE, PP, PVC, polyacrylonitrile, butadiene rubber can come either from gas or oil, but oil can be more convenient. PS, nylons, PET, polycarbonates, epoxy resins, PMMA, phenolic resins require components derived from oil
this is a more specific extension of what i was talking about, but that amount of oil used for that dwarfs in comparison to the amount burned as fule and isn’t nearly as destructive to the environment.
but you’re not wrong.
Personal passenger EVs won’t do much to dent global climate change. Gotta build mass transit and rail shipping, and clean up the electricity grid.
Carnival Cruises (63 ships) emits as much as 300,000,000 cars, and electricity generation and shipping are even more insane. All transportation combined is only 27% of our emissions. And EVs still need a lot of oil for tires and asphalt.
EVs are definitely better than ICE, especially for local air quality, but for global climate they’re like deleting a text file to clear up hard drive space, instead of looking at the 400GB rip of LOTR.
No one single thing is gonna make the difference. It’s really the combination of everything together sustained overtime. I mean, you’re not wrong, but it’s really everything working together that’s gonna be the trick.
I agree. My bad I took your comment as that being the only thing we need to do. Apologies
Yeah, no, it’s fine. I was just speaking within the context of why ramping up oil production in the US is important to the administration, for the sake of offsetting increasing costs from organizations, such as OPEC. If you recall, people in this country have been screaming about gas prices, and blaming Biden for it. Well, it shouldn’t be a surprise that he actually did something about it.
Ah nah sorry I don’t recall. I’ve intentionally cut myself off the news and most social media. It’s made me happier but it can bite me in the ass, like in this thread 😅
oh, well, now you have some context. I hope it makes more sense to you now ;)
This is my argument for restricting supply enough to increase prices. Higher prices are incentive for every usage to find alternatives. Most of the alternatives do already exist but will never be adopted when fossil fuel solutions are cheaper
Yep. As much as individuals may care, and corporations may give lip service to the environment, large scale usage patterns are still dictated by economics.
We’re all going to die lmao
Everybody dies
There’s better and worse ways to go out.
Surrounded by loved ones in a comfy bed and high on drugs? Or in twisted shrieking agony because a natural disaster collapsed your house on top of you? Or being vaporized during the nuclear war caused by the tropics becoming uninhabitable?
Luckily most countries in the tropics are not nuclear powers. We can exploit them at will and condemn their future without any threat of reprisals. /s obviously
And by “we,” you mean the billionaires like Steve Huffman (spez) that are setting themselves up to be the new feudal lords.
And no “/s” for me.
I don’t know. Dying instantly by being vaporized in a nuclear blast doesn’t sound so bad, although the absolute terror immediately proceeding, it probably would suck. As a New Yorker, I’d probably do something stupid like trying to hide in a subway tunnel, so I wouldn’t be vaporized instantly, but rather die in the immediate aftermath of horrible radiation poisoning, or be turned into a ghoul and live forever looking like beef jerky.
Right, much worse would be close enough to the blast to be horribly burned but not close enough to die instantly.
Just hang on for hours or days.
But everybody dies, right? No big deal! 🫠
If you can hang on for days, the burn wasn’t that bad
I’m praying for an asteroid
Given the massive size of related industries and dependencies, “sudden” was never on the table. However we should be ramping down. The industry should already know that long term investments such as new pipelines will never pay off.
Gasoline/oil should be getting more expensive, or we’re doing it wrong. The best incentive to figuring out how to switch to options kinder to our environment, is higher prices with the promise of more increases. That doesn’t only apply to gasoline/oil, but heating oil, jet fuel, deisel for farming, construction and heavy trucks, marine deisel, plastics of all types, etc. Holding these prices low may help the economy in the short term but means we’re not going to switch to better choices and the impact will be more serious when it finally hits
Ten percent is still a nice chunk. Especially for just getting started. Add in hybrids to that, and it’s even better.
I’m not trying to impugn the progress made with EVs, I’m just saying that we’re not really there in terms of ending our dependence on oil as a fuel source.