Last week, Exxon Mobil Corp. reported its first-quarter profit rose 17 percent from a year ago, buoyed by soaring crude oil prices.
According to news reports, "The Irving-based oil giant earned $10.89 billion, or $2.03 per share, for the quarter, compared with $9.28 billion, or $1.62 per share, a year ago. Revenue jumped to $116.85 billion from
$87.22 billion last year."
Also last week, a coalition of farm and ranch organizations strongly defended the biofuels revolution against attacks that it's responsible for the increasing cost of food.
The coalition said that skyrocketing oil prices, hedge fund commodity speculators, growing worldwide demand for grain and severe droughts are major factors underlying rising food prices and not biofuel development.
The pointed to a study by Merrill Lynch analyst Francisco Blanch who estimated that oil and gasoline prices would be about 15 percent higher, or
$4.14 a gallon at today's prices, if biofuel producers weren't increasing their output.
But how deep does the roots of the oil crisis go? Part of the answer can be explained by the fact that the United States produces 10 percent of the world's oil, but consumes 24 percent.
A new Energy Information Administration (EIA) educational series gives the public a clear picture of how deep the roots of our oil dependency are.
According to EIA, the United States imported about 60 percent of the oil consumed during 2006. About half of these imports came from the Western Hemisphere.
As the U.S. seeks out alternative sources of oil, U.S. dependence on foreign oil is expected to decline in the next two decades.
According to EIA, the United States consumed 20.7 million barrels per day
(MMbd) of petroleum products during 2006 making the U.S. the world's largest oil consumer.
The United States was third in crude oil production at 5.1 MMbd. In addition to crude oil, significant contributions to U.S. petroleum supplies came from natural gas plant liquids, refinery gain, and alcohol fuels.
However, EIA said the U.S. still needed 13.7 MMbd of imported crude oil and petroleum products to meet U.S. demand. The United States also exported 1.3 MMbd of crude oil and petroleum products during 2006, so net imports (imports minus exports) equaled 12.4 MMbd.
EIA said that petroleum products imported by the United States during 2006 included gasoline, diesel fuel, heating oil, jet fuel, chemical feedstocks, asphalt, and other products.
"Still, most petroleum products consumed in the United States were refined here," EIA reported. "Net imports of petroleum other than crude oil were 17 percent of the oil consumed in the United States during 2006." According to EIA, about Half of U.S. oil imports come from the western hemisphere during 2006.
The U.S. imported only 16 percent of its crude oil and petroleum products from the Persian Gulf countries of Bahrain, Iraq, Kuwait, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and United Arab Emirates. During 2006, the U.S. five biggest suppliers of crude oil and petroleum products were:
‹Canada (17.2 percent)
‹Mexico (12.4 percent)
‹Saudi Arabia (10.7percent)
‹Venezuela (10.4 percent)
‹Nigeria (8.1 percent)
The EIA projects U.S. crude oil and petroleum products imports will hold approximately steady in the next two decades. Total U.S. oil consumption is expected to increase 2.1 MMbd by 2030.
Meanwhile, EIA said that U.S. crude oil production increases in the Gulf of Mexico and elsewhere, combined with increasing biofuel and coal-to-liquids
(CTL) production, are expected to eliminate the need for increased imports over the longer term.
"Assuming moderate price increases, U.S. net imports of crude oil and petroleum products will decrease slightly to 12.3 MMbd to meet demand of
22.8 MMbd by 2030. In this case, U.S. oil import dependence will fall from nearly 60 percent in 2006 to 54 percent by 2030," according to EIA.
But how much is renewable energy helping to wean our dependency on foreign oil?
According to EIA, Americans used renewable energy sources‹water (hydroelectric), geothermal, wind, sun (solar), and biomass‹to meet about 7 percent of our total energy needs and 9.5 percent of total U.S. electricity generation in 2006.
According to EIA, electricity producers consumed 63 percent of total U.S.
renewable energy in both 2005 and 2006 for producing electricity.
Most of the remaining 37 percent of renewable energy was biomass consumed for industrial applications (principally paper-making) by plants producing only heat and steam. Biomass is also used for transportation fuels (ethanol) and to provide residential and commercial space heating.
The largest share of the renewable-generated electricity comes from hydroelectric energy (75 percent), followed by biomass (14 percent), wind (7 percent), geothermal (4 percent), and solar (0.1 percent).
Wind-generated electricity increased by almost 21 percent in 2007 over 2006, more than any other energy source. Its growth rate was followed closely by solar, which increased by 19 percent in 2007 over 2006.5 EIA said that China leads the world in total renewable energy consumption for electricity production due to its recent massive additions to hydroelectric production, followed closely by the United States, Canada, and Brazil.
However, EIA said, the United States consumes the most non-hydro renewable energy for the production of electricity. The United States consumes twice as much non-hydro renewable energy for electricity production as Germany and more than three times as much as Japan.
EIA projects that renewable-generated electricity will account for 12.6 percent of total U.S. electricity generation in 2030.
This growth (from 9.5 percent in 2006 to 12.6 percent in 2030) is fueled by the rapid expansion of non-hydro renewable generation technologies that qualify to meet state mandates for renewable energy production.
However, EIA projects renewable energy's share of total worldwide electricity generation will decrease slightly: from 19 percent of generation in 2004 to 16 percent in 2030.8 Although worldwide renewable energy is expected to increase, it will be outpaced by growth in other electricity generation source
