Surviving Capitalism (Not) : Does the U.S. Really Have More Oil than Saudi Arabia?

We’ve lived so long under the spell of hierarchy—from god-kings to feudal lords to party bosses—that only recently have we awakened to see not only that “regular” citizens have the capacity for self-governance, but that without their engagement our huge global crises cannot be addressed. The changes needed for human society simply to survive, let alone thrive, are so profound that the only way we will move toward them is if we ourselves, regular citizens, feel meaningful ownership of solutions through direct engagement. Our problems are too big, interrelated, and pervasive to yield to directives from on high.
—Frances Moore Lappé, excerpt from Time for Progressives to Grow Up

Sunday, April 8, 2012

Does the U.S. Really Have More Oil than Saudi Arabia?

Click here to access article by Robert Rapier from The Oil Drum.

The issue that the author raises in this article is the semantic problem with the term "shale oil". He describes several types of shale oil that require very different amounts of water and energy to process, and insists that they should be referred to by different names. Regardless of the semantic issue, what is really important is that pronouncements about US having more oil than Saudi Arabia are grossly misleading.