From: Standard Examiner
If you want to shake up a hard-core environmental activist, sneak up behind him or her and fiercely whisper … oil shale!
The activist will jump two or three feet in the air, recover his or her composure, and provide 20 reasons why oil shale is not an energy alternative for the United States.
Nevertheless, it ought to be an alternative. It’s time for oil shale to be a top agenda item as an energy source. There is more oil shale — that can be developed into oil — in the western United States than there is oil reserves in the Middle East.
With the price of oil so high, it’s no longer a viable argument that oil shale development would necessarily be more expensive than traditional ways to gather and sell oil products such as gasoline.
We agree with a host of interested parties, including industry firms, the Government Accounting Office, researchers and others who complained to a congressional subcommittee that there are too many roadblocks to trying to uncover the potential of oil shale, which is estimated to have 4.3 trillion barrels in Utah, Colorado and Wyoming. There should be a program focused on finding ways to develop oil shale in the western states. If funding is necessary, that would also be a good idea but we suspect the private sector can handle those needs if potential lawsuits and other blocking measures were lessened.
We are aware that there are environmental concerns with oil shale development. We know that lots of water will be required in the process, which involves heating the shale to release oil.
However, allowing more research into oil shale increases the odds that an environmentally safe manner of utilizing oil shale will be discovered. If that is ignored, we suspect that the shale will be exploited in the future, most likely without an agenda that includes protecting the environment.
We face tremendous challenges with energy. One of those challenges is the U.S. being energy independent. As the global market for oil gets more dysfunctional, oil shale will become an alternative, whether we like it or not.
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