Shell Oil’s plan to acquire a junior water right for eight percent of Colorado’s Yampa River average April-to-June flow for oil shale development has been opposed by some twenty-five parties, all submitting letters of opposition to the Colorado Water Court in Steamboat Springs.
A vocal opponent of the Bush administration’s push for oil shale development, Salazar, a former water lawyer spoke of the tremendous water and energy requirements to develop oil shale using current best practices.
While some companies are backing off the development of shale oil due to the economic crisis, there are still those who are cautiously continuing with the development of this domestic energy source.
In his weekly radio address on Saturday, President Bush said Congress was ignoring the American public’s wishes by not expanding offshore drilling on the outer continental shelf.
A story in this week’s Department of Energy office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy’s (EERE) weekly electronic newsletter, the EERE Network News, that touted the benefits of oil shale. This begs the question: is the extraction of oil from solid either efficient or renewable?
The poll finds, the American public overwhelmingly believes (76% to 19%) that policymakers should focus on investing in new energy technologies including renewable fuels and more efficient vehicles rather than expanding exploration and drilling for more oil.
Tuesday’s release of proposed rules for oil shale exploration across the Rocky Mountain West by the Bureau of Land Management was merely another shot across the bow in the political blame game over $4-per-gallon gas.