What Happened to the Big Chevron Oil Discovery in the Gulf of Mexico?

The oil is still sitting there, waiting for the price to go up, so that Chevron can ’save the day’ by ‘going to extraordinary lengths’ to get it for us. That way an exorbitant amount of cash can be reaped from the public.

If you have never seen the movie “The Formula” with George C. Scott, Marlon Brando, and Marthe Keller, I would suggest it. It was made in 1980, but plays like yesterday.

BTW, I’m still waiting for all the kerogen (oil shale) that was supposed to be economical to produce when gas got to $2 / gallon. Same story, different day. (There is said to be enough kerogen in this country, mainly in the midwest, to run this nation for a century)

I used to work offshore in the Oil Industry. I’m not trying to defend the companies in any way, but here’s what little i know. Recently the federal government opened several million acres of area in the Gulf of Mexico for drilling. You can’t simply build an oil rig, stick a pipe in the ground and start getting it though. Allot of research has to be done first, including surveys that determine not only where the oil is but where the H2S (a very deadly gas) pockets are so they can be avoided. Then they have to plan the drilling, decide on the type of oil rig needed, get funding from investors to foot the initial huge bill for setup, hire the workers, most of which are specialized talents, get permits and inspections from the government, and allot more. All this can take several years. So oil that is discovered in 2006 may not be actually drilled untill 2010 or later.

People say that the price of oil is high now because we are running out. That future supplies aren’t looking so great. With these reports however, I would think we will have plenty of oil for years to come. I just thought the media would be following up on these stories being that oil is huge news these days. Instead of reporting “there is oil for the future” they seem to prefer to report “things look bleak!” instead.

We can’t drill it because all the eviromental greenie weenies are going to raise a stink about how we’ll damage the environment! And I’m being serious here!

As teddgem said, it does take years of surveys, building new platforms, and drilling to get it out.

I recently saw though, that oil may not exactly become scarce - some scientists are beginning to think that oil is actually a “renewable” resource - just like water is renewable by combining hydrogen and oxygen. There is now apparently evidence, that oil is actually produced by the earth itself through a process we don’t quite understand, like the way diamonds are produced through heat and pressure. Additionally, here’s a fact that scientists can’t explain: Most oil is located too deep underground to have come from fossilized remains of animals from millions of years ago… and there is also evidence that shows that oil actually has existed underground since before dinosaurs ruled.

BlackWolf

Leave your butt hanging out in the breeze (dependence on foreign oil) long enough, and someone will kick it. Whether the US has more oil or less of it available for the future, high fuel prices (with all their admitted downside) have had the good effect of finally stimulating real progress toward alternative sources. Greenhouse gas emissions are a double-edged sword too - fail to meet the challenge and we screw things up for our kids, but get it right and the US can sell leading-edge tech to the rest of the world. The lesson? Move beyond thinking of “energy” as “oil” - think of “energy” as having many forms and capitalize on creative thinking to capture it.

We could do this relatively easily. A tenth of the spending we’ve done in Iraq over the same period of time could put us on top and benefit the rest of the world too.

Have you ever noticed that the oil business is like a giant vacuum, or Neutral Zone, that nobody knows anything about? Oil is the dirtiest business in the world, and the dirt is not just on their boots. They keep themselves well hidden, not just so the putblic doesn’t find out about them, but also so they don’t lay themselves open to the lethal malice of their “sister” oil companies. It began on the oilfields more than a century ago, with the guns, the threats, the tricks, the greed, the selfishness, and it continued in the boardrooms and the trading centers, becoming ever more convoluted and tangled, and above all more greedy. Nowadays the oil business has reached its ultimate level of control and deception, with the oligarchs of the world, as well hidden as the oil companies, sitting in their gracious homes and office suites, controlling the filthy black crude by remote control and never once getting their hands dirty. Those who control the oil are notoriously blind to every other consideration and they pursue their profits, richer than anything ever imagined in all history, with zero regard for the struggle that their profit-taking and manipulating impose on the average person in the world. This gigantic, continuing oil scam really amounts to sucking the blood of the whole planet in one great act of vampirism. Protests in the media? Hardly, and the silence is deafening. They wouldn’t dare. Protests from national governments? No, because no matter how wealthy and smooth the manipulators of oil become, they still use exactly the same tactics that were used on the oilfields so long ago. If death threats don’t serve to intimidate, than death itself should do the job.

Getting the oil out of the ground is one thing but turning it into gas is another. The US has not built a refinery in 20+ years.

teddgcm is spot on of course.

Not only that, but do you know if it is the right sort of oil? Not all crude is the same, some is very thick and tarry *few volatiles in it), while the more valuable is the relatively “thin” crude with lots of volatiles in it.

The thick, heavy crude is not very useful for fuel, while the higher-value might make the most money if fractionated and cracked into light oils and high-value lubricants, again rarther than heating fuels.

The article reports that it will fulfill “50% of our oil needs”. I would assume this would mean gasoline too.

They are trying to get a refinery built out here in South Dakota, but the townies don’t like it because they fear pollution.

What I don’t understand,
Where are all the activists now?
I mean people who actually take matters into their own hands and do something drastic. See it’s moments like this that make wonder if Harvey Lee Oswald was innocent.

The only groups that have done the most damage the USA being energy independent is environmentalist wacko’s and the US Govt as a whole. As I heard Glenn Beck say about the plentiful in Anwar - “Drill through a Caribou’s head to get to it if you have to.”
This country is going to hang ourselves with our own noose.

First, the oil discovered by Chevron is part of a new frontier that if you combined all the new oil discovered in this area, it will increase US oil production by 50%. This is different than saying the Chevron discovery by itself will be able to supply 50% of US consumption.

Second, the oil field you are asking is called Jack field. They are planning to drill a third well to find out how much production they should get from this field. After completing this third well, they will have enough info to plan and design the platform to produce this oil. The well will be drilled in 2008. They are behind due to shortage of drilling rigs and the Tahiti field is more important than Jack field because Tahiti field is about to go into production. It was supposed to go into production in 2007, but now delay until 2009 due to bad design/materials.

There is your update regarding Chevron’s Jack field.

I just love how all the liberal socialist fascists seems to think private oil companies should produce oil for free.

The last thing we should do is listen to Peak Oil Theorists like Jeffery Brown…..who IMHO is no better than algore and global warming.

Peak Oil’s purpose is to generate fear, create wealth and put humans into bondage.