Don't you think we need this oil [from the Bakken oil shale deposit]?? Why pay the bad guys for their oil if we can use our own.
My answer:
We do need this oil and then some.It's just hard to squeeze oil out of rocks. Because it's hard, there's only so much we can practically get out, even according to the USGS and the link provided in the message you forwarded to me. The USGS article says we can only get out around 4 billion barrels, which is about a 6 month US supply.Incidentally, there's one congressman, a Republican, who understands our (civilizational) dilemma more than most, Roscoe Bartlett. I'd recommend you view Congressman Bartlett's speech to the House in:
The article that is referred to by Dr. Bartlett and others is viewable here. It quotes:
"The least-bad scenario is a hard landing, global recession worse than the 1930s," says Kenneth Deffeyes, a Princeton University professor emeritus of geosciences. "The worst-case borrows from the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse: war, famine, pestilence and death."
Here's a USGS article on oil shale worldwide, with reference to the U.S. Green River Formation.
