We all know the concept of self-sufficiency, and practice it to varying levels of intensity. This concept stretches from our home life and career to our governments. While our government has made a recent step to ensure our self-sufficiency, the folks across the Atlantic are feeling the pain of not preparing properly. We can look at a real-life example of what I’ve said multiple times—we must keep drilling and producing oil and natural gas domestically.
In the United States, U.S. District Judge Terry Doughty put in place a permanent injunction against an executive order pushed through by President Biden in 2021. This paused the leasing of lands to oil and gas companies for exploration and production.
In Europe, countries are going through an energy crisis due to the actions of Russian politicians. Russia has been choking off supply of oil, natural gas, and coal to Europe, leading to low supply and high prices. It is becoming difficult for the European government and business to keep up with the prices to keep their homes, offices, and businesses warm.
What we see here is a quite the juxtaposition: one country’s government past actions could potentially hurt their own citizens in certain industries or at large in the worst case scenario versus one malevolent country hurting the government and citizens of several others.
We can look at Germany as an example of a victim in the energy crisis. Germany, who once produced 80% of its own domestic oil in a village, is now importing 70% of the oil and gas necessary to meet their energy needs. Russia has been lowering their exports to Germany, and has threatened to complete close the valve on Germany by the end of the year. Germany’s limited domestic production could be boosted and optimized to give them some breathing room—but due to political and public view on optimization methods like fracking, it seems this will not be a real option for Germany in the near future. They will have to continue to find new channels to keep up with their energy needs.
The United States is in a great place to not fall victim to the energy crisis. With the size of our country, and the technologies we have available to us, there is no reason why we can not and should not be 100% energy independent. When our government tries to block new exploration, or optimization process, or supply chain and logistics, the ultimate outcome is that we are put in a vulnerable spot.
We should never find ourselves in a position where an unfriendly nation can shut our lights off or drive up the price of energy to unreasonable and unaffordable levels. We should never let our own government consider putting us in that position, or make unreasonable laws which would do no good except the wealthy. Looking at you, California, with your grudge against gas vehicles.
Sources:
https://time.com/6209272/europes-energy-crisis-getting-worse/
https://www.dw.com/en/energy-crisis-what-role-can-germanys-oil-and-gas-sector-play/a-61545432
Bayou Observant 