That smell
The title of Randy Kuhl’s latest release is, I kid you not, “Kuhl Outlines Plan For $2 A Gallon Gasoline”. It gets worse — the name of the bill that purportedly will do this is “The No More Excuses Energy Act, H.R. 3089.” Just because it’s a good slogan for a diet plan doesn’t mean it’s a good name for a bill.
Here’s the Kuhl analysis:
The cost savings for adding American made energy into the market would bring the cost of oil down considerably. If onshore oil online was brought online (ANWR, Shale) we could decrease the cost of gas per gallon by $0.70 - $1.60. Add deepwater oil (OCS) to the market and decrease the cost by $0.90 - $2.50 per gallon. Bring new refineries into the picture and take another $0.15 - $0.45 off the price. If the No More Excuses Energy Act was signed into law and implemented Americans would be saving at least $1.98 per gallon.
Let’s just pick one of these claims apart, the one about ANWR and Shale. The Department of Energy makes the following estimate about allowing drilling in ANWR:
If Congress were to open up the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to drilling, crude oil prices would probably drop by an average of only 75 cents a barrel, according to Department of Energy projections issued Thursday.
A gallon of crude oil gives rise to about 20 gallons of gasoline in addition to other products (such as heating oil), so that comes to a savings of less than four cents a gallon by drilling in ANWR.
Did Kuhl confuse barrels with gallons here?
Kuhl has spoken before of having a “smell test”. I think we all know that his claims here smell like.
Obviously, this is what John R. Kuhl (JRK for short) has learned from his tax-payer funded junket to Brazil. He learned that the solution to our energy problems isn’t to provide more efficient vehicles, or alternative energy sources. He obviously learned that the solution is to find more sources of oil.
In addition to my discomfort to JRK taking this taxpayer funded trip, in addition to my discomfort that American scientists could have told JRK everything that he would see in Brazil without taking such a trip, now I have the increased discomfort that JRK wasn’t paying attention at all in Brazil.
Maybe JRK was drinking caiparinhas there, at least that would have made the trip valuable to the local bartenders, as it doesn’t seem to have any other value whatsoever. Oh, nevermind, probably doesn’t tip well…
By the way, good catch. I think JRK did confuse gallons and barrels.
Thanks. I wonder how many of his bogus calculations here involve some sort of mistake along those lines.
Yglesias confirms what you pointed out, JRK confused gallons with barrels.
I wish he’d just stick with switch grass and wood chips. Perhaps he needs to go back to Brazil - this time on a one-way ticket.
I would support the one-way ticket plan
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