Energy – The Month in Charts

Mark Green
Posted December 28, 2012

At year’s end it’s customary to put together “best of” lists – sometimes because there’s not much else to talk about. Not so with energy. In fact, there’s so much good news on the energy front we didn’t even have to go beyond the past 30 days to assemble a good list of information-delivering charts and graphs (and the blog posts that featured them). So here it is: “Best Energy Charts – (December) 2012.”

1. Lease Auction: There’s More Where That Came From

Following the federal government’s November lease sale in the western Gulf of Mexico that generated more than $133 million, we pointed out that the revenue stream for government could be so much larger if there was access to the more than 80 percent of our available offshore acreage that’s closed to energy development.
  
2. Lease Auction: There’s More Where That Came From

In the same blog post we included the above chart to show that an estimated $800 billion could be generated for governments by 2030 with more access to oil and natural gas resources, as part of a pro-energy development policy approach.

3. Behind EIA’s Energy Forecast

A big takeaway from the U.S. Energy Information Administration’s new Annual Energy Outlook 2013 is that U.S. energy demand will grow between now and 2040 and that 60 percent of that will be supplied by oil and natural gas – led by a rise in affordable, plentiful (thanks, fracking!) natural gas.

4. 2.9 Trillion Reasons to Support Fracking

More from the EIA 2013 report: Tight oil production (thanks again, fracking!) between 2013 and 2040 will represent energy sales of more than $2.9 trillion – cash that will not go out of the country because of this domestic energy production.

5. Judging the Cellulosic Mandate

The mandated use of biofuels by the Renewable Fuel Standard is a critical issue – because of the zeroes you see in the chart above. They represent actual production of cellulosic biofuel – as in, there isn’t any. Yet, U.S. refiners and importers still must buy waiver credits to comply with the law – basically, paying for not using a product that doesn’t exist. No, it doesn’t make much sense.

6. ExxonMobil Outlook: Matching Energy Supplies With Rising Global Demand

ExxonMobil’s annual long-term forecast included this chart, showing that by 2040 about 55 percent of the world’s liquid supply will come from conventional crude oil production – a big part of our energy reality: Economic viability and modern standards of living are possible because of oil and natural gas.

7. Report: Industry’s $252 Billion Environmental Investment
 

This chart, from an API report detailing the U.S. oil and natural gas industry’s spending on improving the environmental performance of its products, facilities and operations since 1990, shows that about 65 percent of it has been directed toward cleaner air and water.

8. Report: Industry Bests Private Sector in Workplace Safety, Health

Here’s a chart from another report, showing that the oil and natural gas industry’s rate of job-related nonfatal injuries and illnesses per 100 full-time works was 2.3 in 2011, compared to the U.S. private sector as a whole (3.5). Moreover, the graph shows the rate falling since 2005 – a credit to the workers themselves and to efforts to provide safe and healthy working conditions.

9. Choose the Energy Solution

This one’s a favorite of ours, because it shows the kind of job-creation the oil and natural gas industry could generate with pro-growth policies – 1.4 million new U.S. jobs by 2030, according to Wood Mackenzie. Our industry can be a big part of meeting our country’s economic and fiscal challenges.

10. Domestic Energy, Manufacturing Competitiveness and Trade

The converging domestic oil production (blue) and oil imports (red) lines reflect the rise in oil output here at home (thanks one more time, fracking!) as well as other factors, such as increased efficiency. The fall in imports means more than $120 million a day – $44 billion a year – that would have left the country is staying right here at home. 

So there you have it. Makes us pretty excited to see what develops in January!