One of the relevant moments of the Republican debates at the beginning of this presidential race has been the energy plan Texas Governor Perry put forward. In it, he actually gets specific about where most of the projected 1.2 million oil patch jobs he anticipates adding to the American economy will be located -- even though that detail has not received much publicity.
About 15 percent of those jobs are expected to be in Alaska, where Perry foresees considerable development. He assumes that Congress will open the ANWR coastal plain 1002 area to exploration and production. Other jobs are in the National Petroleum Reserve Alaska and the Alaska Outer Continental Shelf in the Beaufort and Chukchi seas. The total 175,000 Alaska jobs that Perry forecasts break down this way – 100,000 in ANWR; 55,000 in the Beaufort and Chukchi seas; 20,000 jobs in NPRA.
Perry's plan projects nearly as many jobs in Alaska as the entire Gulf of Mexico region (230,000).
"We will unleash exploration in our Western states, which have the potential to produce more energy than what we import from Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Kuwait, Venezuela, Columbia, Algeria, Nigeria and Russia combined," Perry said in a statement announcing the plan.
Currently, Perry said, U.S. consumption is roughly 19 million barrels a day, with domestic supplies producing less than 40 percent of that total.
In looking at Alaska, Perry sees the opportunity to develop the National Petroleum Reserve with its 896 million barrels of oil and 53 trillion feet of natural gas, as well as the Outer Continental Shelf beneath the Chukchi and Beaufort Seas, which may contain as much as 10.2 billion barrels of oil.
The Perry campaign anticipates the increased production will fill the Alaskan pipeline again, with jobs being generated to make the connections.
Overall, Perry's high-end estimate of 1.2 million new jobs nationwide wouldn't be reached until 2020.
Approval of the Keystone Gas Pipeline from Canada to the Gulf Coast -- a topic of current debate -- is expected to add 20,000 new jobs. Increased development of the Marcellus and Eagle Ford shales, dependent on the allowed use of fracking the shale, would add 250,000 jobs in the New York, Pennsylvania, Ohio region. Another 68,000 would be created in Southwest Texas.
While the governor is largely discussing his plan in terms of jobs, let's look at the anticipated change in oil production that is those jobs would create. If it happens as his plan forecasts, about 60 barrels of oil would be added to the national reserve. Some 10.8 billion barrels would come from ANWR and 2.1 billion from NPRA and the Chukchi.
Dave Summers, one of the founders of the website on the petroleum industry, The Oil Drum, is a professor emeritus of mining engineering at Missouri University of Science and Technology. He retired in 2010. http://www.theoildrum.com/