BigOilFields.com Announces OPERATION WILDCAT Petition Drive

 To Increase Tax Incentives for Oil & Gas Investors

(Houston, TX) BigOilFields.com has begun collecting petition signatures online for what the website hopes is an eventual change in tax laws pertaining to write-offs of 100% of the cost of drilling and testing wildcat oil and gas wells. A wildcat has been defined in the petition as an exploratory well drilled at least 2 miles from existing production or drilled to a deeper potential producing horizon.

“It only makes sense; the drill bit is the only sure way of finding new oil and gas supplies, investors and oil companies need to put their exploration money back into the ground quicker if we’re to cleanup this energy mess”, stated Dean Philpot , owner of BigOilFields.com. “If the federal government is only going to give tax breaks to windmills and solar farms we’ll all be sitting in the dark soon”, Philpot concludes.

In 1929 wildcatter Marion “Dad” Joiner drilled 2 dry holes before he drilled the well that brought in the legionary East Texas Oil Field. The East Texas Field provided much of the fuel that won World War 2, and drove oil prices down to 10 cents a barrel. The Barnett Shale, home to the United States largest known gas field was penetrated for 50 years before geologist and engineers at Mitchel Energy discovered how to properly complete the illusive shale formation. Advances in drilling technology brought on land by offshore drillers has allowed for rapid expansion and reserve growth. New oil & gas plays such as the Haynesville and the Bakken are bright spots in recent U.S. exploration successes and are benefiting from technology.

Tax laws of the United States drove off the Majors years ago to develop reserves for other counties rather than spending their money in the US. As a result of Congress’ action and lack of a prudent energy policy Exxon Mobil the nations largest oil and gas company is ranked 17^th in world wide reserves. The National Iranian Oil Company is currently ranked #1. “Operation Wildcat goal is to encourage exploration and lessen the nation’s dependence on foreign sources of energy and do it quickly” Philpot ended.

The petition can be found at www.bigoilfields.com/operationwildcat .

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For additional information contact Dean Philpot, 713-208-4196, deanphilpot@bigoilfields.com

A Wildcat Well is defined  as a new well 2 miles from existing oil & gas production or that penetrates a untested or unproduced geological zone located at least 2 miles from existing production in that zone.

We propose to modify the tax laws to allow a 100% immediate (both tangible & intangible) tax write- off for these exploratory tests well s in the year they are drilled. This modification would only be extended to Wildcat Wells as defined above.

"The unnecessary refrigeration of America has become a chronic disease," said Klein. "Air conditioning is bad for the planet, and for national security, and for our balance-of-payments deficit."

Just how bad it is for these things, he doesn't say. But so sure of his point is he that he even included a fact that refutes his entire premise: At 4%, cooling is but a small part of our energy use.

Predictably, Klein believes Americans should sacrifice. Sounds noble, but he leaves out the part in which sacrifice slowly mutates into government rationing.

Klein might not know any members of the California Energy Commission, but it's a good bet he'd get along well with them. This group has also written a chapter in the left's book of silliness, suggesting that homes and businesses in the state should be equipped with thermostats that the government can control.

Though the proposal was dropped in January, it revealed the left's thinking process about energy issues.

While that idea — temporarily — failed, California keeps churning out the absurd. Beginning with the 2009 model year, new cars sold in the state must have a label showing that automobile's global warming score. New York will have the same requirement in 2010.

Then there's the scientist who links flat-screen televisions to global warming.

Michael Prather of the University of California, Irvine, says the greenhouse gas nitrogen triflouride used in the making of flat-screen TVs should be regulated by a global climate treaty such as the Kyoto accord.

Across the Atlantic, the British government has told people to stop wasting food, not just to help deal with higher food prices, but to blunt global warming.

Last year Environment Minister Joan Ruddock asked Britons to do their part in "averting climate change" by ending their "wasteful habits with food" and "buying less and eating leftovers."

Remember, this is the country in which the media so gleefully covered a scientific report that said eating insects is good for the environment.

Back home, NASA scientist James Hansen wants oil executives put on trial for distributing "misinformation" about his global warming theory. We have to assume that he wants them eventually imprisoned, thereby removing from society the very people who are providing the fuels that keep civilization moving ahead.

Perhaps the best example of the left's worst excesses is No Impact Man. He describes himself as a "guilty liberal" who has sworn off plastic, gone organic, become a bicycle nut, turned off his power and "composts his poop" while living in New York City. His goal: to try to save the planet from environmental catastrophe — one man at a time, we presume.

No Impact Man's project would be fine if he were content to leave alone those who don't share his vision. But the self-described megalomaniac is not.

This "tree-loving lunatic," previously known as Colin Beavan, husband and father of one, is politically active, supporting energy-restrictive initiatives that would have negative effects on others.

He seems convinced his mission is to "try to help change the cultural current and make it easier for everyone" to live as he does.

It all seems so laughable — until we realize that, given an opportunity to run our lives, environmental activists, who clearly have no sense of proportion or respect for liberty, would set back human progress by decades, if not centuries. Failing to take the threat they pose seriously will have heavy consequences.

Biofuels have forced global food prices up by 75% - far more than previously estimated - according to a confidential World Bank report obtained by the Guardian.

The damning unpublished assessment is based on the most detailed analysis of the crisis so far, carried out by an internationally-respected economist at global financial body.

The figure emphatically contradicts the US government's claims that plant-derived fuels contribute less than 3% to food-price rises. It will add to pressure on governments in Washington and across Europe, which have turned to plant-derived fuels to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases and reduce their dependence on imported oil.

Senior development sources believe the report, completed in April, has not been published to avoid embarrassing President George Bush.

"It would put the World Bank in a political hot-spot with the White House," said one yesterday.

The news comes at a critical point in the world's negotiations on biofuels policy. Leaders of the G8 industrialised countries meet next week in Hokkaido, Japan, where they will discuss the food crisis and come under intense lobbying from campaigners calling for a moratorium on the use of plant-derived fuels.

It will also put pressure on the British government, which is due to release its own report on the impact of biofuels, the Gallagher Report. The Guardian has previously reported that the British study will state that plant fuels have played a "significant" part in pushing up food prices to record levels. Although it was expected last week, the report has still not been released.

"Political leaders seem intent on suppressing and ignoring the strong evidence that biofuels are a major factor in recent food price rises," said Robert Bailey, policy adviser at Oxfam. "It is imperative that we have the full picture. While politicians concentrate on keeping industry lobbies happy, people in poor countries cannot afford enough to eat."

Rising food prices have pushed 100m people worldwide below the poverty line, estimates the World Bank, and have sparked riots from Bangladesh to Egypt. Government ministers here have described higher food and fuel prices as "the first real economic crisis of globalisation".

President Bush has linked higher food prices to higher demand from India and China, but the leaked World Bank study disputes that: "Rapid income growth in developing countries has not led to large increases in global grain consumption and was not a major factor responsible for the large price increases."

Even successive droughts in Australia, calculates the report, have had a marginal impact. Instead, it argues that the EU and US drive for biofuels has had by far the biggest impact on food supply and prices.

Since April, all petrol and diesel in Britain has had to include 2.5% from biofuels. The EU has been considering raising that target to 10% by 2020, but is faced with mounting evidence that that will only push food prices higher.

"Without the increase in biofuels, global wheat and maize stocks would not have declined appreciably and price increases due to other factors would have been moderate," says the report. The basket of food prices examined in the study rose by 140% between 2002 and this February. The report estimates that higher energy and fertiliser prices accounted for an increase of only 15%, while biofuels have been responsible for a 75% jump over that period.

It argues that production of biofuels has distorted food markets in three main ways. First, it has diverted grain away from food for fuel, with over a third of US corn now used to produce ethanol and about half of vegetable oils in the EU going towards the production of biodiesel. Second, farmers have been encouraged to set land aside for biofuel production. Third, it has sparked financial speculation in grains, driving prices up higher.

Other reviews of the food crisis looked at it over a much longer period, or have not linked these three factors, and so arrived at smaller estimates of the impact from biofuels. But the report author, Don Mitchell, is a senior economist at the Bank and has done a detailed, month-by-month analysis of the surge in food prices, which allows much closer examination of the link between biofuels and food supply.

The report points out biofuels derived from sugarcane, which Brazil specializes in, have not had such a dramatic impact.

Supporters of biofuels argue that they are a greener alternative to relying on oil and other fossil fuels, but even that claim has been disputed by some experts, who argue that it does not apply to US production of ethanol from plants.

"It is clear that some biofuels have huge impacts on food prices," said Dr David King, the government's former chief scientific adviser, last night. "All we are doing by supporting these is subsidising higher food prices, while doing nothing to tackle climate change.

Don't you get it ?

 Global warming and the environmental movement has been used to steal your freedoms away from you. They took property rights away from landowners. Now they have taken your ability to travel and work by shutting down the engine of our economy with promises of windmill farms and solar power mini-cars. Peak Oil and Global Warming are outright lies to scare you into giving up your heritage as free people engaged in the free enterprise system.

It's taken them years to kill off the energy supply with restrictions on offshore drilling, drilling in public lands like ANWR, the development of Oil Shale and Heavy Oil. Our politicians from both parties along with well funded public interest groups have created a crisis that may end our forefathers dream and the best hope of free men everywhere.

Global Warming is a hoax, the Energy Crisis is real and I'm sure it's manmade.

There’s more oil in the United States than in the entire Middle East. We know where much of it is and we know it can be recovered at current prices. What we have is richer than the Alberta, Canada Tar Sands and we can use similar processes to recover it. We have the reserves to supply our needs with no decline curves for maybe 200 years.

The Oil Shale reserves of the U.S. are just a part of the oil and gas trapped in the United States and could produce trillions of barrels of the fuel that runs the world’s economic engine. We don’t need a government program. We need the government to get out of the way, to allow the private sector build the machine that will take us away from the terrorist threats.

With the long July Fourth weekend, you might get a chance to see your senator or representative. If so, you should be ready to dispel a few myths politicians now have about drilling for more oil.

This is especially true of Democrats. Many in Congress seem either disconnected from reality or intentionally disingenuous about our energy crunch. They have well-honed negative responses to common-sense ideas about solving our energy crisis, particularly drilling for more oil.

These responses are based on a number of widely held myths. Sadly, they've become the backbone of the Democrats' energy policy. They include:

• "We can't drill our way out of our energy crisis."

Actually, we can. As we've noted before, conservative estimates put the total amount of recoverable oil in conventional deposits at about 39 billion barrels. Offshore, we have another 89 billion barrels or so. In ANWR, 10 billion barrels.

In oil shale deposits, we have more than 1 trillion barrels of oil. In perspective, that's about four times the total reserves of Saudi Arabia. And if estimates of shale reserves as high as 2 trillion barrels prove true, we'll have about a 300-year supply of oil just from shale. This compares with current estimated total U.S. oil reserves of about 21 billion barrels.

ANWR alone is expected to yield 1 million barrels of oil a day. Now make the highly conservative assumption that we're able to get a like amount of oil from the other sources — for a total increase of 3 million to 4 million barrels of oil a day.

That's an enormous rise in oil output. Today, we produce just under 8 million barrels of oil a day from domestic sources. So we could, in effect, boost our energy output 50%, and thus our energy independence, by bringing an additional 4 million barrels of oil to thirsty world markets each and every day.

By the way, those calculations don't include the trillions and trillions of cubic feet of natural gas found in the same locations, which, along with nuclear power, could be used to fire our power plants.

By 2030, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, we will need at least 30% more energy to fuel our economy. Nearly 85% of that increase will come from oil and gas, even with expected gains for alternative energy. Can't drill our way out? In fact, it's the only way out of our energy crisis.

• "Oil companies are sitting on 68 million acres of oil leases and refuse to drill."

This is yet another slander of "Big Oil" by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi — one that has become a major talking point for Democrats in Congress. It's completely dishonest.

Oil companies have spent billions of dollars for those leases. Drilling has increased by more than 66% since 2000. They are searching for oil even as you read this. Some parts of those 68 million acres will have oil, some won't. But at $145 a barrel, you can bet oil companies have plenty of incentive to find it.

That said, 68 million acres is in fact a minuscule amount. Some 94% of federal lands — 658 million acres — remains off-limits to exploration. Another 97% — or 1.7 billion acres — of federal offshore properties likewise remains off-limits. These lands contain tens of billions of barrels of recoverable oil. It's there for the taking, now.

How much energy is there? Federal lands, according to the American Petroleum Institute, hold 651 trillion cubic feet of natural gas, enough to fuel 60 million households for 160 years. They hold at least 116 billion barrels of oil, maybe more. That's enough to fuel 65 million cars and provide fuel oil for 3.2 million homes for 60 years.

As such, it's the height of irresponsibility for Congress to leave these lands off the table. It ensures we remain vulnerable to pariah petrostates like Venezuela, Saudi Arabia, Libya, Iran and others who wish us ill.

• "Even if drilling works, it'll take a decade or more for the oil to flow."

This is quite an argument coming from the Democratic Party, which has made keeping oil off the market a linchpin of its energy policy for decades.

If President Clinton hadn't vetoed the idea of drilling in ANWR back in 1995, we'd have that oil on the market today. Ditto if Congress had approved ANWR drilling in 2002, when President Bush requested it.

Even so, the larger point is false anyway. New oil will be flowing in some cases within three to four years, according to industry estimates. But the impact on prices will be immediate. Why? Because markets would suddenly have to discount future oil prices for the expected gain in oil supply. That would cause oil prices, especially in futures markets, to drop.

By the way, this isn't just conjecture. President Reagan, within a week of his inaugural in 1981, removed domestic controls on oil. Energy prices began tumbling almost immediately, with oil falling from $34 a barrel in early 1981 to just $11 by 1986.

It worked before, and it'll work again.

• "Record profits by big oil companies are the reason for soaring prices."

It's true that oil company profits have never been higher. But put into perspective, oil company profits are high because the price is high. As a share of revenue, profits aren't so high.

The average profit, as we've noted before, is around 8 to 9 cents to the dollar. That compares with about 7 cents to the dollar for manufacturers and more than 15 cents to the dollar for computer makers.

In short, oil profits aren't out of whack with the rest of industry.

What doesn't get said is that while oil companies have profit margins of about 8%, about 12% of the price of a gallon of gas goes to the government in the form of taxes. When indirect taxes are included, the share is even higher.

So who are the real price-gougers?

From 1981 to 2006, the oil industry made $867 billion in profits. Yes, that's a lot. But over that same time, they paid total taxes of $1.2 trillion, Energy Department data show. And that doesn't include taxes of $519 billion paid to foreign countries.

Please remember that the next time a politician vows to hit "Big Oil" with a windfall profits tax or some other idea. The tax won't be paid by the oil company; it will be paid by you, the consumer.

In coming weeks, we'll try to look at some of the other myths surrounding America's energy. The problem is, there are so many that dispelling the falsehoods about energy can become a full-time occupation for a newspaper.