Ruppert-You Bet Your Life..Katrina, Peak Oil, and Dark Days Ahead

YOU BET YOUR LIFE
By Michael C. Ruppert
http://fromthewilderness.com/free/ww3/090205_bet_life.shtml
September 2, 2005

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What is not being discussed rationally by the mainstream media is Katrina’s impact on energy production. They don’t dare. By my calculations and those of oil energy expert Jan Lundberg, the United States has just lost between 20% and 25% of its energy supply. My projection is that it’s not coming back — at least not most of it. As a result of Katrina, Saudi Arabia has finally admitted that it cannot increase production. Many of us knew they’ve been lying for at least two years. The Energy Information Administration has just admitted that global demand has been outstripping supply for several months before Katrina. Nice time to start telling the truth. Nature is finally calling everybody’s bluff. The liars, deniers and mentally ill will be exposed soon enough and they will pay their own price. Daniel Yergin will finally get his comeuppance. FTW’s race is to reach as many people as possible who want to prepare and are willing to prepare for this in local community settings.

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Gulf energy production has four main components: drilling and production, pipeline delivery to shore, refinery capacity, and then delivery to the rest of the nation. We have heard precious little about the damage to Louisiana’s Port Fourchon which is the largest point at which energy passes from sea to land in the region. It is heavily damaged and mostly inoperable for now, despite optimistic financial reports, intended to calm the markets, stating that “damage is minimal.” I am quite sure that I speak for the maybe 250,000 New Orleans residents who couldn’t or wouldn’t get out when I say, “Screw the markets!”

Production, if and when it starts trickling again, will most likely shift to Port Murphy or to Lake Charles. Sounds easy in the abstract, but the corporate headquarters at which to make and implement those decisions were mostly located in New Orleans. Shifting energy flows will never replace what was lost because those two facilities already face the daunting task of restoring their own output. They can’t handle the additional burden of compensation for what has been lost. As one astute and great researcher put it, “How will the oil companies even find their workers or tell them where to report for work?” Where will the workers live? Where will they buy groceries? How will they get to and from work if the gasoline they’re supposed to produce isn’t there? The Louisiana Offshore Oil Port (LOOP) is also much more seriously damaged than press accounts disclose. It’s here that supertankers from overseas (used to) offload. They have no place else to do it. They’re too big. I have seen video of LOOP damage which doesn’t look anything like the minimal damage that’s been reported. OK, so when the port is fixed what about the damaged pipelines running to shore? How many boat anchors have been dragged over them? In how many places are they ruptured, crushed or broken? As many as twenty offshore rigs have now been confirmed as adrift, capsized, listing or sunk. Each rig may have as many as eight wells. Where’s the money coming from to replace them? How long will that take?

Bottom line: my assessment is that New Orleans is never going to be rebuilt and that US domestic oil production will never again reach pre-Katrina levels. The infrastructure is gone, the people are gone, and the US economy will be on life support very, very quickly. If people are griping at $5.00 gasoline what will they do when it’s $8.00? $10.00? Start shooting (the wrong people)? How difficult is it to rebuild in that kind of social climate? And if US oil production does not soon exceed pre-Katrina levels then the US economy is doomed anyway. It’s a catch-up game now. I think it’s quite likely that the Bush administration is responding so ineptly in part because it is in a complete crisis mode realizing that the entire United States is on the brink of collapse and there’s very little they can do about it. The Bush administration doesn’t know how to build things up, only blow them up. They aren’t worrying about New Orleans because they’re frantically triaging the rest of the nation and deciding what can be saved elsewhere.

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is now back online. Fuel prices are heading down in some areas.
IMO although I recognize there are problems that must be dealt with articles like Ruppert's are why we are labeled "doom and gloom" liberals.

I think thats a bit of a quibble. I think he's spot-on with his oil production predictions.

When Doom and Gloom are on the horizon, I'd rather be labelled as such, than be a "head in the sand" republican or a democrat following the president's lead.

will we allow the change to overwhelm and destroy us, or will we manage it? . . . it all depends on our leadership, and right now we don't have any . . .

if this nation is to survive, BushCo must go . . . and soon . . . and that's not hyperbole . . .