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Is Drilling In Florida The Answer To Our Energy Requirements

By Patrick Howard


The everglades, a region of approximately 1,900 square kilometres of sawgrass prairie in the southern tip of Florida, is a World Heritage Site. Sawgrass is a type of wild sedge that grows naturally all over the world, particularly in tropical and temperate regions. World Heritage Sites are those places that the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organizaton deems to be of special cultural or physical significance. Despite the state not being the first place you think about in terms of oil exploration, companies are drilling in Florida. The scientific name for sawgrass is Cladium.

Exploring for fossil fuels in the Sunshine State has been going on for some time. In 1943, the Humble Oil Company drilled a couple of test wells in Southwest Florida. These were both less than 2,000 feet deep. Since neither of the holes was particularly exciting in terms of productivity, the project was abandoned and retains a mere footnote in history.

The appetite for exploring for oil in the Everglades is directly proportional to the price of oil. When the price is high, prospectors are willing to take bigger risks boring previously uneconomic reserves. When they are low, there is less interest.

Cheap oil is not necessarily a good thing. It is good in that there is less pressure to go nuts and drill everywhere, including delicate environments such as the Everglades. The problem is cheap oil does not mean infinite supplies of oil. It just means we are likely to burn through it that much faster.

When the day inevitably comes that oil reserves dwindle and prices soar into the ozone layer, we are going to be in trouble. Stop making fun of the preppers and start making friends with them and reading their material.

Vast reserves of previously unattainable gas and oil are opening up thanks to technological advancements in horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing of tight-fisted shale rock formations. The largest plays are in the states of Texas, Oklahoma, North Dakota, and Pennsylvania, although Florida is among the other states with supplies whose economic viability is ethereal and depends on the prevailing price of oil.

In 2014, the Miami Herald reported that there were around half a dozen oil and gas E&P companies that spent millions on plans to explore Southwest Florida. At that time, oil prices were high. Two years later, the price of oil was low and the dollar was sagging in value compared to other currencies like British Sterling. This gave the industry some breathing space and allowed the environmentalists time to regroup.

Eventually, whether we like it or not and whether we are ready or not, the supply of easy oil is going to dry up and prices are going to skyrocket. There may come a time when we will have to decide whether we really need the power that much to start destroying areas of exquisite natural beauty for the sake of a few more years of desirable lifestyle.




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