another indication of Dubya taking care of his major financial backers -- Democrats R Us Returns

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Date Posted: 16:10:30 10/21/09 Wed
Author: Bob
Subject: another indication of Dubya taking care of his major financial backers

from today's NY Times: "The Interior Department said Tuesday that it would investigate a decision made by the Bush administration to grant low royalty rates for oil shale development in the Rocky Mountains. Ken Salazar, the secretary of the interior, expressed 'serious concerns' about changes made without public notice to six leases on Jan. 15.

The announcement came as Mr. Salazar said he would resume a research program for oil shale development* on federal lands in Colorado, Wyoming and Utah. Mr. Salazar had frozen oil shale developments within weeks of his appointment last February, saying more research was needed into the technology. The investigation will focus on a decision taken by the Interior Department in the final days of the Bush administration to lock in a royalty rate of only 5 percent on 30,000 acres of existing oil shale leases for oil companies, Mr. Salazar said. By comparison, royalty rates, which are payments to the government for the right to operate, in the Gulf of Mexico are 16.7 percent. 'Taxpayers deserve answers to serious questions about why these lease addenda were granted at the eleventh hour, under what circumstances, and at what potential expense to the federal treasury,' Mr. Salazar said.

Oil shale is a sedimentary rock that can release oil when heated. But while the potential reserves are considerable, the current technology remains too expensive to produce at current oil prices. Environmental groups also consider oil shale among one the dirtiest fossil fuels to produce because of the energy that is required to heat the rocks and unlock the trapped liquids.
Oil shale deposits in the Green River formation in Colorado, Wyoming and Utah hold an estimated 800 billion barrels of potential resources, or more than three times the total known oil reserves of Saudi Arabia. More than 70 percent of American oil shale lie on federal land.

Under the new program, oil companies will be allowed to bid for 160-acre leases to demonstrate whether they can produce oil shale in an economic manner, and will then be able to add an additional 480 acres to their leases, substantially less than in the Bush-era program. Their bids will be reviewed by a team of federal and state officials. 'We have a duty to ensure that potential oil shale development is done responsibly,' Mr. Salazar said.

*In the energy crisis during the Carter administration, Carter wanted to fund an experimental program to extract oil from oil shale. That went nowhere.

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