a region that many geologists believe may have more untapped oil reserves than any other part of the world.
Read that quote carefully; there's weasel words in it. It "may" have more "untapped" reserves! Let's disregard the "may" and look at "untapped." My understanding is there are no "untapped" reserves which match the proven reserves of the Middle East, and so "untapped" ends up meaning "not huge."
why would the oil industry invest a lot of money in order to reduce the price of their product
Why do lumber companies keep cutting down trees when this only lowers the price of their product?
The problem is Russia and the Middle East control the bulk of the current supplies. They can move total production up and down (within limits). Given the usefulness of and demand for oil, the price moves dramatically with minor changes in production.
Now, let's say Chevron invests buckets of money to pump oil from a field at a cost which just let's them profit at $100/bbl. Then the others turn on the taps for a few years to push the price down to $50/bbl. Chevron looses, big time. If a field is expensive to extract, it won't be developed until the big oil companies are
certain there isn't enough supply somewhere that could push the price down.
nobody talks about the new oil find in the dakota's
I went searching and found this:
The oil reservoir was known to exist some time back, but drilling technology wouldn't allow for exploitation,
Supposedly, there's a big lake that's prevented drilling. Right. The Norwegians and others have been pumping oil out from under the North Sea for decades.
we can stop funding jihadis with our petro-dollars
Unfortunately, it's not that simple. If we had the oil and pumped it, there is no shortage of customers out there who will take the oil the jihadis offer, and they'll pay for it with dollars we sent them in exchange for the various poorly constructed products they sent us.
to crab about oil companies, as though we don't want or need or use their products, well, that's just childish
I'm with you 100% on that Grizz.
I believe there was a nationwide, industry wide conspiracy
Sigh. People are willingly paying $9/gal here in the UK for gasoline. As Grizz has pointed out, it's a wonderful fuel and worth even that. It takes a BIG jump in prices to lower demand a little. If supplies run even a little bit behind, the price skyrockets. Speculators believe such just a shortfall is near, and they are willing to bet their money the price will soon skyrocket.
idea of oil companies buying up alternative energy patents and then sitting on them
Please point to said patents. Patents are public information. They all expire in 17 years. Good grief!
the inventor was getting 100 miles on four ounces of water (3200 MPG!). Of course, that technology was bought up and never brought to market by the oil companies.
Groan. Water is burned hydrogen. Let's see, we can magically burn already burned hydrogen to propel a car! That's like saying we can burn CO2 to power a car. Even better, just connect the exhaust to the intake manifold! Perpetual motion, here we come!
As an example, running the oil through a reformate process to free the bound hydrogen whilst moving toward hydrogen based transportation
What!? Think about this! Gasoline is hydrogen and carbon bound together. Fuel cells oxidize only the hydrogen. This means all the potential energy liberated from oxidizing the carbon would be wasted. This will LOWER our energy reserves, not increase them!
I don't believe oil supplies will match demand for more than another 2 decades, and I think total production will decline slowly by mid-century. I am certain other countries will continue to industrialize, thus raising demand.
There's no sense whining about the price of gasoline. Clearly, new forms of energy are needed sometime this century. It will take big money to develop those, and high prices for fuel today simply take money from the hands of consumers and put it into the hands of investors, where it is needed.