Word: shale
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...Government stands ready to help because shale oil is an important part of Jimmy Carter's energy program. The Administration is more optimistic than oilmen: it envisages the production of 400,000 bbl. a day by 1990. Carter wants Congress to grant shale developers a tax credit of $3 a bbl. to make shale oil prices competitive with those of conventional petroleum. In addition to the Senate's $20 billion program, the Administration is providing $2.2 billion in fiscal 1980, largely for shale...
...energy companies and Washington policymakers are sold on shale, others are not. Colorado Governor Richard Lamm protests that any crash development program "could do irreparable damage to our water supply, to our communities, to our environment." State officials, local representatives of the Environmental Protection Agency, the Sierra Club and similar groups are allied to stop or at least to stall shale development. Water, a precious resource in the tri-state region, is one of their greatest concerns. Conservationists claim that shale extraction could use from one to five barrels of water for each barrel of oil, but company officials maintain...
Nonetheless, opponents are willing to permit small test projects of the new energy so that the impact of unknown technologies can be fully measured. Says Terry Thoem, a director of the Denver EPA: "We have been studying shale for years, and now we would like to see some further development on a limited scale to get further data on a shale industry's impact-on water tables, on soil, on just about everything...
They claim that their water requirements would be reasonable. Company officials also say that the underground cooking process seals the chambers, actually fuses the rock, and prevents salts from leaching into ground water. Firms plan to contour the piles of leftover shale rubble and to plant them with local wild flowers and grasses; tests have shown good results...
Although the first shale patent was granted in England in 1694 and called for distilling "oyle from a kind of stone," oil from the dark, veined rock so far has not been developed primarily because conventional petroleum has always been cheaper. Now, at last, economic necessity and innovative technology may lead to tapping the vast potential of shale...