Word: petroleum
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...Understand the real problem. The "energy crisis" confronting us is not Saddam Hussein, or OPEC, or even high gasoline prices. The problem is the natural scarcity of petroleum; we are fast running out of our primary energy source. According to Department of Energy figures, the U.S. has already extracted about 121 billion barrels of the 148 billion accessible with current technology. With improvements in extraction techniques, we can get at an additional 18 to 53 billion barrels. That's it. Even Saudi Arabia, with by far the largest proven reserves in the world, has only 165 billion barrels left...
...Despite the popular perception that OPEC is no longer capable of enforcing price discipline on its members, a barrel of oil traded at more than twice its free-market price even before Iraq's invasion of Kuwait. With two simple tools--stand-by gasoline rationing authority and the Strategic Petroleum Reserve--the U.S. could use its weight in the world petroleum market to bust OPEC once and for all. By merely threatening to curtail drastically its consumption and flood the world market with cheap oil, the U.S. could force the oil-fattened Gulf kingdoms to play by the rules...
...enough natural gas in the ground to last 60 years at the current rate of consumption. Right now the fuel supplies about 24% of daily U.S. energy use, vs. 42% for petroleum products. Only a modest increase in gas production would be needed to replace the 750,000 bbl. a day of interrupted oil supply from Iraq and Kuwait. Gas already has many applications: heating, cooking and generating electricity. But energy experts are working on new ways in which the fuel could replace oil and gasoline, most notably in powering vehicles. Predicts Michel Halbouty, a Houston wildcatter: "Gas will...
...methane and other hydrocarbons -- was long considered worthless and burned off at the wellhead. In the postwar years, its price was so tightly regulated by the Federal Government that producers were discouraged from searching for the fuel. After prices were deregulated in the 1980s, the low cost of petroleum helped keep gas prices depressed. Wholesale natural gas sells for about $1.50 per 1,000 cu. ft., the equivalent of $9 per bbl. for oil. Observes T. Boone Pickens, a major oil-and-gas producer: "At that price, there's no way that exploration will ever start again...
...array of other prominent citizens praised Milken's charitable contributions and personal interest in medical research, anticrime programs and other causes. Among his advocates: police chief Daryl Gates and Archbishop Roger Mahony of Los Angeles, California superintendent of education William Honig, Israeli Deputy Foreign Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Occidental Petroleum chairman Armand Hammer. But is Milken a Johnny-come-lately to good works? Not so, according to his friend, attorney Richard Riordan. "This isn't like he began doing good because he felt the heat," says Riordan. "He's been doing this for years...