8 ms·

US oil lobby launches ad campaign to promote oil as 'vital' to global security

86 points by Crunsher 3y ago

AlgorithmicTime 3y ago
Are they wrong? I would say they're right, oil is in fact vital to global security.
- edgyquant 3y ago
  No they definitely aren’t wrong at this time. Don’t know that it requires an ad campaign though.
  - hellotomyrars 3y ago
    They’re not wrong and it’s a timing thing. It isn’t as if this is a new message for them. But a big ad spend reinforcing their talking points during an election year is how they try to move the needle to protect their interests politically.
  - AnimalMuppet 3y ago
    Yeah, because if it is in fact vital, then it's vital whether or not there's an ad campaign saying how vital it is.
  - bluescrn 3y ago
    There's a surprising number of people who think 'Just Stop Oil' is a reasonable slogan, so maybe it does. (If the slogan was 'Gradually Replace Oil', almost everybody would agree, there'd be no excuse to block roads, throw paint around though, and earn attention and social media cred, though)
    - kcplate 3y ago
      > there'd be no excuse to block roads, throw paint around though, and earn attention and social media cred, though No, there wouldn’t be the oil excuse, there would be something else that riles people up to create chaos
- BirAdam 3y ago
  They are most definitely correct. If, right now, all oil stopped flowing, many people would die. Oil is needed for bulk transport across the seas, in the air, and over land. It is needed for agricultural production, and a decent amount of electrical generation. Adding to that, almost all war machinery requires it in rather large quantities. Then, there's plastic. I hate the use of plastics for many things, but there are some things for which it is absolutely essential. For example, there are many medical uses of plastics that save lives and restore bodily function.
  - kube-system 3y ago
    > For example, there are many medical uses of plastics that save lives and restore bodily function. Plastics also are very useful for mundane health and safety type items, because they can be low cost, impermeable, and durable. Plastic medical equipment is often safer than glass because it can be thrown away instead of reused. It also makes the equipment more accessible in lower income areas. Eliminating all oil is just as silly of an idea as using oil for everything. There are some things it does well and some things that we can do better a different way.
- jmarbach 3y ago
  There's a term for this: an inconvenient truth. Cheap and abundant energy is strongly correlated with prosperity. Every barrel of oil produces roughly 1,700 kWh of thermal energy. In countries with low cost of oil production like Saudi Arabia and Iran, that means electricity generation for less than $0.01/kWh. The only viable technology to compete with oil and gas over the long term is Nuclear.
ok_dad 3y ago
This isn’t news, big oil has been bankrolling lobbyists across the globe to maintain their position via fear mongering about “global security”. There were several wars fought over oil in the past three decades, in fact.
- llsf 3y ago
  As of now, fossil fuel is crucial for national security. The whole economy runs on fossil fuel. But fossil fuel has 2 main drawbacks: 1. Contribute to global warming 2. It takes millions of years to produce, and few days to consume (aka limited resource) So, we need to adapt the economy to those 2 drawbacks. Even if one thinks that global warming is not an issue, then the fact that it is a limited resource is going to eventually kick in (coal, oil and gas peak). In the current economy, any drastic change of fossil fuel price would end in chaos. That is the threat. The sooner we minimize our dependance on fossil fuel, the better. In some industries, we would need fossil fuels for a long time as it is difficult to replace them (e.g. fertilizers, plastics). in some other industries (transportation, heating), we can substitute fossile fuels with other energies (e.g electricity generated using renewable or nuclear). So, yes it is a matter of national security, and that is why we need to adapt our economy to use less fossil fuel. And obviously we need to extract fossil fuel, as long as we can, during that transition.
  - ok_dad 3y ago
    National security or global security just means it’s necessary to maintain the status quo. If needed, in sure we could get off oil in a matter of a decade or less, but it’s just easier to use oil and not work so hard to get off of it. You don’t have to explain how we’re dependent on oil to me, anyways, dependencies being a national security threat is a failure of political leadership for decades and decades now. We should have been off oil in the 80s or 90s after the crisis in the 70s, but instead we just paid off powerful men in the Middle East with weapons and kicked the can.
    - llsf 3y ago
      > If needed, in sure we could get off oil in a matter of a decade or less... I would be less optimistic as 80% of the energy used is fossil fuel (source: https://www.spglobal.com/commodityinsights/en/market-insights/latest-news/oil/062623-fossil-fuels-stubbornly-dominating-global-energy-despite-surge-in-renewables-energy-institute https://www.spglobal.com/commodityinsights/en/market-insight...). Everything that we wear (plastic) or eat (fertilizers, and farming, trucking) comes from fossil fuel. Oil is everywhere. It is going to take a while to withdraw from our addiction. > We should have been off oil in the 80s or 90s after the crisis in the 70s... Oil is a fr(e)aking miracle. It is virtually free (just drill), it is energy dense, easy to transport, it makes fertilizers which allowed to fed the planet with less fields, it makes plastic, etc. The countries fortunate enough to have some in their underground, have a natural printing money machine. But, it is a limited resource, and using it at the scale we have been doing in the past 100 years, is impacting the environment. > but instead we just paid off powerful men in the Middle East with weapons and kicked the can. I agree that we kept kicking the can. But fortunately (or unfortunately if we are not prepared) it will eventually come to an end. It takes million of years to produce oil, and we consume it faster and faster. There will a time, where we would not find the easy oil, and it would become more and more expensive to find. If we are not prepared, then chaos will follow (wars as the last countries that have access to oil will keep it for them, economies will collapse as worldwide trade will break, etc.) Clearly the past 100 years have been golden thanks to oil. We need to build a future where oil would be less abundant and more expensive.
AnEro 3y ago
How long before we diversify our technology to not be ham strung by oil anymore? If it's a security risk to not have it then it's a security risk relying on it so heavily.
- dr-detroit 3y ago
  [dead]
- georgeecollins 3y ago
  I agree completely. But our infrastructure, particularly agricultural infrastructure in the US and around the world, depends on a lot of fossil fuels. We should reduce that risk as soon as possible. But electric cars and wind plants aren't enough to do it alone.
- kredd 3y ago
  Best we can do is diversify it to… more RE!
- Arrath 3y ago
  Petrochem is an economical hydra, with heads in just about every industry imaginable from agricultural to pharmaceutical to packaging. It will be one hell of an endeavor to wean ourselves off of oil, but it needs to be done.
anovikov 3y ago
One thing is true: U.S. natural gas production was critical for EU survival after Russian gas cuts and is still critical for survival of EU support for Ukraine. If not the increase in U.S. supplies, EU won't hold out for long having to buy gas elsewhere as prices won't at all be affordable. I don't think it makes sense intentionally suppressing fossil fuels production. The way renewables are developing now, they'll start seriously displacing fossil fuels by themselves. The green mania must be over, renewables are at a point they can survive and grow by themselves without being artificially propped and prioritised. >“Renewable sources have a role to play, but oil and natural gas will be needed for decades,” Which is true. Coal won't. It's time to end coal. It is possible and beneficial both economically and politically. Oil will stay around for decades no matter what; natural gas for the time being is even beneficial for energy transition and suppressing it is the last thing we need to do. >“But [the industry] is trying to expand the fossil fuel system, expand pipelines, expand fracking, and make more of our economy and our existence dependent on fossil fuels, even though clean energy is advancing at a rapid rate.” So good, let them both advance at a rapid rate and see who wins.
- NickC25 3y ago
  >renewables are at a point they can survive and grow by themselves without being artificially propped and prioritised. Yet oil was at that phase over a hundred years ago.....and we still to this day prop up O&G companies with massive tax breaks and other benefits. I'm all for cutting resources to Green Energy to make it more able to stand on its own economically. But we MUST do that for Oil as well, and thinking that we don't spend insane amounts of money securing oil (think wars) and developing its efficiency is just crazy. I'm all for spending the same amount $$-wise on Green energy as we have oil. Oil was given plenty of time and money to develop into the industry it is. Green energy should be given the same.
- bdcravens 3y ago
  The issue isn't the role oil plays in society, but the financial effect changes have on publicly traded oil companies. After all, horseshoers still exist, but that career path was mostly obliterated by the automobile.
- 3y ago
JohnFen 3y ago
I think the opposite -- that oil is one of the larger factors that endangers global security.
- robotnikman 3y ago
  Agreed, even more so when you look at some of the countries a lot of the oil comes from...
- llsf 3y ago
  The global economy is addict to fossil fuel. So fossil fuel like any powerful drugs that is in limited supply (limited resource), it is threatening the global economy, if we continue to use it OR if we stop to use it. We need a withdraw plan. Where we shift usage from fossil fuel to other energies (hopefully less damaging for environment, and more sustainable). People asking to cut the production without a plan are as dangerous than people who are asking to keep using fossil fuel.
- MBCook 3y ago
  What happens when the wealth ends for the Middle East? That could go very very badly. It’s going to happen though. Even if climate change and pollution and all other ill effects didn’t exist we’d run out at some point and be in the same place.
  - gyudin 3y ago
    Depends, United Arab Emirates nowadays makes more money from tourism than oil. Oil is like 1% of their GDP. Climate change is accelerated, but it’s a natural process. We are literally still in Ice Age, just in interglacial period.
    - theandrewbailey 3y ago
      One of the things keeping Saudi Arabia together is oil welfare payments. If that ever goes away, things could unravel quickly.
    - rib3ye 3y ago
bdcravens 3y ago
Who would imagine that the industry that has pushed propaganda about the recyclability of oil-derived plastic would push propaganda about alternative fuel sources?
sixothree 3y ago
The most unfortunate thing about oil in the US will be that these companies will eventually go bankrupt and tax payers will be left to clean up the environmental mess the leave behind at the wells.
- anon84873628 3y ago
  Which is really the same as tax payers cleaning up the mess they failed to prevent by regulating these companies and our impact on the environment in the first place.
- scottyah 3y ago
  It's interesting to see the perspective divide. The other perspective I often see is generational, The Boomers are out making tons of money ruining the environment and Gen Z+ will have to spend their lives undoing the harm caused.
  - mensetmanusman 3y ago
    There won't be enough Gen Zers to get close to that with the coming population collapse.
nielsbot 3y ago
All the more reason to not need oil anymore.
- kube-system 3y ago
  Unfortunately oil is not just an energy source, and it is required for a lot of industrial chemistry that we don't yet have alternatives for.
  - nielsbot 3y ago
    But what's the main use of oil? Energy, right?
    - kube-system 3y ago
      About 2/3 of it. About 1/3 of the oil we use in the US is for industrial uses.
  - ed_balls 3y ago
    yep, but w burn 90% of it and we don't have to.
- carbine 3y ago
  sent from my iPhone
mensetmanusman 3y ago
Oil wouldn't be so vital if we had massive numbers of nuclear power plants generating excess energy that could be used to form long carbon chain materials for plastics etc.
sigspec 3y ago
The real threat to global security is single-focus energy plans formulated by oligarchs.
ThinkBeat 3y ago
Oil is without a doubt vital for parts of the world today. I would say a large part. Which is probably why Biden, (who signed the Paris agreement again and supported COP28) has the US is producing more oil than any other country on the planet. Given that 2/3 of the oil production in the US comes from fracking it is one of the worst ways to produce oil that is in current use. If not the worst. "No more drilling no more on federal land" Except when there is money to be made. https://www.statista.com/chart/16274/oil-productin-countries/ https://www.statista.com/chart/16274/oil-productin-countries... https://usafacts.org/articles/how-much-oil-is-produced-in-the-us/ https://usafacts.org/articles/how-much-oil-is-produced-in-th... https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/apr/16/public-lands-reopen-oil-gas-drilling-joe-biden-government https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/apr/16/public-lands...
badpun 3y ago
Without oil and gas and coal (meaning - if they all disappear today), modern world as it looks today ceases to exist. The death toll would probably be in the billions, and standard of living for people who survive could be potentially worse than in middle ages. So yeah, fossil fuels are essential to our security.

86 points by Crunsher 3y ago

AlgorithmicTime 3y ago

Are they wrong? I would say they're right, oil is in fact vital to global security.

edgyquant 3y ago
No they definitely aren’t wrong at this time. Don’t know that it requires an ad campaign though.
- hellotomyrars 3y ago
  They’re not wrong and it’s a timing thing. It isn’t as if this is a new message for them. But a big ad spend reinforcing their talking points during an election year is how they try to move the needle to protect their interests politically.
- AnimalMuppet 3y ago
  Yeah, because if it is in fact vital, then it's vital whether or not there's an ad campaign saying how vital it is.
- bluescrn 3y ago
  There's a surprising number of people who think 'Just Stop Oil' is a reasonable slogan, so maybe it does. (If the slogan was 'Gradually Replace Oil', almost everybody would agree, there'd be no excuse to block roads, throw paint around though, and earn attention and social media cred, though)
  - kcplate 3y ago
    > there'd be no excuse to block roads, throw paint around though, and earn attention and social media cred, though No, there wouldn’t be the oil excuse, there would be something else that riles people up to create chaos
BirAdam 3y ago
They are most definitely correct. If, right now, all oil stopped flowing, many people would die. Oil is needed for bulk transport across the seas, in the air, and over land. It is needed for agricultural production, and a decent amount of electrical generation. Adding to that, almost all war machinery requires it in rather large quantities. Then, there's plastic. I hate the use of plastics for many things, but there are some things for which it is absolutely essential. For example, there are many medical uses of plastics that save lives and restore bodily function.
- kube-system 3y ago
  > For example, there are many medical uses of plastics that save lives and restore bodily function. Plastics also are very useful for mundane health and safety type items, because they can be low cost, impermeable, and durable. Plastic medical equipment is often safer than glass because it can be thrown away instead of reused. It also makes the equipment more accessible in lower income areas. Eliminating all oil is just as silly of an idea as using oil for everything. There are some things it does well and some things that we can do better a different way.
jmarbach 3y ago
There's a term for this: an inconvenient truth. Cheap and abundant energy is strongly correlated with prosperity. Every barrel of oil produces roughly 1,700 kWh of thermal energy. In countries with low cost of oil production like Saudi Arabia and Iran, that means electricity generation for less than $0.01/kWh. The only viable technology to compete with oil and gas over the long term is Nuclear.

ok_dad 3y ago

This isn’t news, big oil has been bankrolling lobbyists across the globe to maintain their position via fear mongering about “global security”. There were several wars fought over oil in the past three decades, in fact.

llsf 3y ago
As of now, fossil fuel is crucial for national security. The whole economy runs on fossil fuel. But fossil fuel has 2 main drawbacks: 1. Contribute to global warming 2. It takes millions of years to produce, and few days to consume (aka limited resource) So, we need to adapt the economy to those 2 drawbacks. Even if one thinks that global warming is not an issue, then the fact that it is a limited resource is going to eventually kick in (coal, oil and gas peak). In the current economy, any drastic change of fossil fuel price would end in chaos. That is the threat. The sooner we minimize our dependance on fossil fuel, the better. In some industries, we would need fossil fuels for a long time as it is difficult to replace them (e.g. fertilizers, plastics). in some other industries (transportation, heating), we can substitute fossile fuels with other energies (e.g electricity generated using renewable or nuclear). So, yes it is a matter of national security, and that is why we need to adapt our economy to use less fossil fuel. And obviously we need to extract fossil fuel, as long as we can, during that transition.
- ok_dad 3y ago
  National security or global security just means it’s necessary to maintain the status quo. If needed, in sure we could get off oil in a matter of a decade or less, but it’s just easier to use oil and not work so hard to get off of it. You don’t have to explain how we’re dependent on oil to me, anyways, dependencies being a national security threat is a failure of political leadership for decades and decades now. We should have been off oil in the 80s or 90s after the crisis in the 70s, but instead we just paid off powerful men in the Middle East with weapons and kicked the can.
  - llsf 3y ago
    > If needed, in sure we could get off oil in a matter of a decade or less... I would be less optimistic as 80% of the energy used is fossil fuel (source: https://www.spglobal.com/commodityinsights/en/market-insights/latest-news/oil/062623-fossil-fuels-stubbornly-dominating-global-energy-despite-surge-in-renewables-energy-institute https://www.spglobal.com/commodityinsights/en/market-insight...). Everything that we wear (plastic) or eat (fertilizers, and farming, trucking) comes from fossil fuel. Oil is everywhere. It is going to take a while to withdraw from our addiction. > We should have been off oil in the 80s or 90s after the crisis in the 70s... Oil is a fr(e)aking miracle. It is virtually free (just drill), it is energy dense, easy to transport, it makes fertilizers which allowed to fed the planet with less fields, it makes plastic, etc. The countries fortunate enough to have some in their underground, have a natural printing money machine. But, it is a limited resource, and using it at the scale we have been doing in the past 100 years, is impacting the environment. > but instead we just paid off powerful men in the Middle East with weapons and kicked the can. I agree that we kept kicking the can. But fortunately (or unfortunately if we are not prepared) it will eventually come to an end. It takes million of years to produce oil, and we consume it faster and faster. There will a time, where we would not find the easy oil, and it would become more and more expensive to find. If we are not prepared, then chaos will follow (wars as the last countries that have access to oil will keep it for them, economies will collapse as worldwide trade will break, etc.) Clearly the past 100 years have been golden thanks to oil. We need to build a future where oil would be less abundant and more expensive.

AnEro 3y ago

How long before we diversify our technology to not be ham strung by oil anymore? If it's a security risk to not have it then it's a security risk relying on it so heavily.

dr-detroit 3y ago
[dead]
georgeecollins 3y ago
I agree completely. But our infrastructure, particularly agricultural infrastructure in the US and around the world, depends on a lot of fossil fuels. We should reduce that risk as soon as possible. But electric cars and wind plants aren't enough to do it alone.
kredd 3y ago
Best we can do is diversify it to… more RE!
Arrath 3y ago
Petrochem is an economical hydra, with heads in just about every industry imaginable from agricultural to pharmaceutical to packaging. It will be one hell of an endeavor to wean ourselves off of oil, but it needs to be done.

anovikov 3y ago

One thing is true: U.S. natural gas production was critical for EU survival after Russian gas cuts and is still critical for survival of EU support for Ukraine. If not the increase in U.S. supplies, EU won't hold out for long having to buy gas elsewhere as prices won't at all be affordable. I don't think it makes sense intentionally suppressing fossil fuels production. The way renewables are developing now, they'll start seriously displacing fossil fuels by themselves. The green mania must be over, renewables are at a point they can survive and grow by themselves without being artificially propped and prioritised. >“Renewable sources have a role to play, but oil and natural gas will be needed for decades,” Which is true. Coal won't. It's time to end coal. It is possible and beneficial both economically and politically. Oil will stay around for decades no matter what; natural gas for the time being is even beneficial for energy transition and suppressing it is the last thing we need to do. >“But [the industry] is trying to expand the fossil fuel system, expand pipelines, expand fracking, and make more of our economy and our existence dependent on fossil fuels, even though clean energy is advancing at a rapid rate.” So good, let them both advance at a rapid rate and see who wins.

NickC25 3y ago
>renewables are at a point they can survive and grow by themselves without being artificially propped and prioritised. Yet oil was at that phase over a hundred years ago.....and we still to this day prop up O&G companies with massive tax breaks and other benefits. I'm all for cutting resources to Green Energy to make it more able to stand on its own economically. But we MUST do that for Oil as well, and thinking that we don't spend insane amounts of money securing oil (think wars) and developing its efficiency is just crazy. I'm all for spending the same amount $$-wise on Green energy as we have oil. Oil was given plenty of time and money to develop into the industry it is. Green energy should be given the same.
bdcravens 3y ago
The issue isn't the role oil plays in society, but the financial effect changes have on publicly traded oil companies. After all, horseshoers still exist, but that career path was mostly obliterated by the automobile.
3y ago

JohnFen 3y ago

I think the opposite -- that oil is one of the larger factors that endangers global security.

robotnikman 3y ago
Agreed, even more so when you look at some of the countries a lot of the oil comes from...
llsf 3y ago
The global economy is addict to fossil fuel. So fossil fuel like any powerful drugs that is in limited supply (limited resource), it is threatening the global economy, if we continue to use it OR if we stop to use it. We need a withdraw plan. Where we shift usage from fossil fuel to other energies (hopefully less damaging for environment, and more sustainable). People asking to cut the production without a plan are as dangerous than people who are asking to keep using fossil fuel.
MBCook 3y ago
What happens when the wealth ends for the Middle East? That could go very very badly. It’s going to happen though. Even if climate change and pollution and all other ill effects didn’t exist we’d run out at some point and be in the same place.
- gyudin 3y ago
  Depends, United Arab Emirates nowadays makes more money from tourism than oil. Oil is like 1% of their GDP. Climate change is accelerated, but it’s a natural process. We are literally still in Ice Age, just in interglacial period.
  - theandrewbailey 3y ago
    One of the things keeping Saudi Arabia together is oil welfare payments. If that ever goes away, things could unravel quickly.
  - rib3ye 3y ago

bdcravens 3y ago

Who would imagine that the industry that has pushed propaganda about the recyclability of oil-derived plastic would push propaganda about alternative fuel sources?

sixothree 3y ago

The most unfortunate thing about oil in the US will be that these companies will eventually go bankrupt and tax payers will be left to clean up the environmental mess the leave behind at the wells.

anon84873628 3y ago
Which is really the same as tax payers cleaning up the mess they failed to prevent by regulating these companies and our impact on the environment in the first place.
scottyah 3y ago
It's interesting to see the perspective divide. The other perspective I often see is generational, The Boomers are out making tons of money ruining the environment and Gen Z+ will have to spend their lives undoing the harm caused.
- mensetmanusman 3y ago
  There won't be enough Gen Zers to get close to that with the coming population collapse.

nielsbot 3y ago

All the more reason to not need oil anymore.

kube-system 3y ago
Unfortunately oil is not just an energy source, and it is required for a lot of industrial chemistry that we don't yet have alternatives for.
- nielsbot 3y ago
  But what's the main use of oil? Energy, right?
  - kube-system 3y ago
    About 2/3 of it. About 1/3 of the oil we use in the US is for industrial uses.
- ed_balls 3y ago
  yep, but w burn 90% of it and we don't have to.
carbine 3y ago
sent from my iPhone

mensetmanusman 3y ago

Oil wouldn't be so vital if we had massive numbers of nuclear power plants generating excess energy that could be used to form long carbon chain materials for plastics etc.

sigspec 3y ago

The real threat to global security is single-focus energy plans formulated by oligarchs.

ThinkBeat 3y ago

Oil is without a doubt vital for parts of the world today. I would say a large part. Which is probably why Biden, (who signed the Paris agreement again and supported COP28) has the US is producing more oil than any other country on the planet. Given that 2/3 of the oil production in the US comes from fracking it is one of the worst ways to produce oil that is in current use. If not the worst. "No more drilling no more on federal land" Except when there is money to be made. https://www.statista.com/chart/16274/oil-productin-countries/ https://www.statista.com/chart/16274/oil-productin-countries... https://usafacts.org/articles/how-much-oil-is-produced-in-the-us/ https://usafacts.org/articles/how-much-oil-is-produced-in-th... https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/apr/16/public-lands-reopen-oil-gas-drilling-joe-biden-government https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/apr/16/public-lands...

badpun 3y ago

Without oil and gas and coal (meaning - if they all disappear today), modern world as it looks today ceases to exist. The death toll would probably be in the billions, and standard of living for people who survive could be potentially worse than in middle ages. So yeah, fossil fuels are essential to our security.