text:
Energy Policy & the
Environment Report
No. 12 April 2013
Innovation in Oil and
Natural Gas Production
Assures Future Supplies
Robert Bryce, Senior Fellow, Manhattan Institute
Executive Summary
In 2012, U.S. oil production rose by 790,000 barrels per day, the biggest annual increase since U.S. oil production began
in 1859. In 2013, the Energy Information Administration expects production to rise yet again, by 815,000 barrels per
day, which would set another record. Domestic natural gas production is also at record levels.
What has allowed such dramatic production increases? Innovation in the drilling sector. The convergence of a myriad of
technologiesranging from better drill bits and seismic data to robotic rigs and high-performance pumpsis allowing
the oil and gas sector to produce staggering quantities of energy from locations that were once thought to be inaccessible or bereft of hydrocarbons.
The dominance of oil and gas in our fuel mix will continue. The massive scale of the global drilling sector, combined
with its technological prowess, gives us every reason to believe that we will have cheap, abundant, reliable supplies of
oil and gas for many years to come.
The key findings of this paper include:
Between 1949 and 2010, thanks to improved technology, oil and gas drillers reduced the number of dry holes
drilled from 34 percent to 11 percent.
Global spending on oil and gas exploration dwarfs what is spent on "clean" energy. In 2012 alone, drilling expenditures were about $1.2 trillion, nearly 4.5 times the amount spent on alternative energy projects.
Despite more than a century of claims that the world is running out of oil and gas, estimates of available resources
continue rising because of innovation. In 2009, the International Energy Agency more than doubled its prior-year
estimate of global gas resources, to some 30,000 trillion cubic feetenough gas to last for nearly three centuries
at current rates of consumption.
In 1980, the world had about 683 billion barrels of proved reserves. Between 1980 and 2011, residents of the
planet consumed about 800 billion barrels of oil. Yet in 2011, global proved oil reserves stood at 1.6 trillion barrels,
an increase of 130 percent over the level recorded in 1980.
The dramatic increase in oil and gas resources is the result of a century of improvements to older technologies such
as drill rigs and drill bits, along with better seismic tools, advances in materials science, better robots, more capable
submarines, and, of course, cheaper computing power.
Between 1949 and 2010, thanks to improved technology, oil and gas drillers reduced the number of dry holes
drilled from 34 percent to 11 percent.
Global spending on oil and gas exploration dwarfs what is spent on "clean" energy. In 2012 alone, drilling expenditures were about $1.2 trillion, nearly 4.5 times the amount spent on alternative energy projects.
Despite more than a century of claims that the world is running out of oil and gas, estimates of available resources
continue rising because of innovation. In 2009, the International Energy Agency more than doubled its prior-year
estimate of global gas resources, to some 30,000 trillion cubic feetenough gas to last for nearly three centuries
at current rates of consumption.
In 1980, the world had about 683 billion barrels of proved reserves. Between 1980 and 2011, residents of the
planet consumed about 800 billion barrels of oil. Yet in 2011, global proved oil reserves stood at 1.6 trillion barrels,
an increase of 130 percent over the level recorded in 1980.
The dramatic increase in oil and gas resources is the result of a century of improvements to older technologies such
as drill rigs and drill bits, along with better seismic tools, advances in materials science, better robots, more capable
submarines, and, of course, cheaper computing power.
About the Author
ROBERT BRYCE is a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute's Center for Energy Policy and the Environment. He has
been writing about energy for two decades and his articles have appeared in numerous publications ranging from
The Wall Street Journal to The New York Times and the Atlantic Monthly to the Washington Post. Bryce's first book,
Pipe Dreams: Greed, Ego, and the Death of Enron, was named one of the best nonfiction books of 2002 by Publishers Weekly. In 2008, he published Gusher of Lies: The Dangerous Delusions of "Energy Independence". A review of
Gusher of Lies in The New York Times called Bryce "something of a visionary and perhaps even a revolutionary." His
fourth book, Power Hungry: The Myths of "Green" Energy and the Real Fuels of the Future, was published in April
2010 by PublicAffairs. The Wall Street Journal called Power Hungry "precisely the kind of journalism we need to hold
truth to power." The Washington Times said Bryce's "magnificently unfashionable, superlatively researched new book
dares to fly in the face of all current conventional wisdom and cant." Bryce appears regularly on major media outlets
including CNN, FOX News, PBS, NPR, and the BBC. He received his B.F.A. from the University of Texas at Austin in 1986.
Advocates of solar, wind, and other renewable technologies like to claim that the innovation occurring in that
sector will transform the energy landscape. For instance,
outgoing energy secretary Steven Chu recently claimed
that new batteries will "revolutionize the electrical distribution
system and the use of renewable energy." He also claimed that,
thanks to federal spending, significant progress was being made
in solar cells and electric cars.
Environmental groups like to point out that in 2012, some $268.7
billion was spent globally on "clean energy."[2] But many of those
same advocates for renewables ignore the innovationas well as
the staggering sums of money being spentin the oil and gas sector. In 2012 alone, global spending on oil and gas drilling totaled
more than $1.2 trillion, more than four times the amount being
spent on "clean energy." Of that sum, approximately $400 billion
was spent in North America alone.[3]
The vast amount of money
being spent in the drilling sector, combined with the ongoing innovations, has had a clear result: over the past century or so, oil
and gas drilling has been transformed from an industry dominated
by hunches and wildcatters to one that is more akin to the precision manufacturing that dominates aerospace and automobiles.
Despite the advances in oil and gas production,
government policies continue to be skewed toward
renewable energy. In 2011, according to the Congressional Budget Office, federal tax preferences for
the energy sector totaled $20.5 billion. Of that sum,
$2.5 billion was allocated to the hydrocarbon sector.
Producers of (non-hydro) renewable electricitythe
vast majority of which came from wind energy
received production tax credits worth $1.4 billion.
Non-hydro renewable-energy projects also got $3.9
billion in federal stimulus funds, and producers of
ethanol and biodiesel got an additional $6.9 billion
in the form of tax credits.[4]
In total, the non-hydro
renewable-energy sector got tax preferences worth
$12.2 billion, or nearly five times as much as those
provided to the hydrocarbon sector. And the renewable sector got those tax preferences despite providing about 2 percent of America's total energy needs.
Hydrocarbons provide about 87 percent, and oil and
gas together provide nearly 60 percent.[5]
We're NOT Running Out of Oil and Gas
We're running out of oil and natural gas. And we
always have been. For more than a century, various
prognosticators have repeatedly told consumers that
the world's supplies of oil and gas are limited and will
soonvery soonbe completely exhausted.
In 1914, a U.S. government agency, the Bureau of
Mines, predicted that world oil supplies would be
depleted within ten years. In 1939, the U.S. Department of the Interior looked at the world's oil
reserves and predicted that global oil supplies would
be fully depleted in 13 years.[6]
In 1946, the U.S. State
Department predicted that America would be facing
an oil shortage in 20 years and that it would have no
choice but to rely on increased oil imports from the
Middle East.[7]
In 1951, the Interior Department said
that global oil resources would be depleted within 13
In 1972, the Club of Rome published The
Limits to Growth, which predicted that the world
would be out of oil by 1992 and out of natural gas
by 1993.[9]
In 1974, population scientist Paul Ehrlich and his wife, Anne, predicted that "within the next quarter of a century mankind will be looking
elsewhere than in oil wells for its main source of
energy."[10] In the 1980s, Colin Campbell, one of the
most vocal of the peak oil theorists, predicted that
global oil production would peak in 1989. Or consider James Howard Kunstler's 2005 tome, The Long
Emergency: Surviving the Converging Catastrophes of
the Twenty-First Century, which declared that the U.S.
was teetering on the precipice of disaster because of
energy shortages: "We will have to downscale every
activity of everyday life, from farming, to schooling,
to retail trade," said Kunstler. "Epidemic disease and
faltering agriculture will synergize with energy scarcities to send nations reeling."[11]
We've also heard plenty of warnings about natural
gas shortages.
In 1922, the U.S. Coal Commission, an entity created by President Warren Harding, warned that "the
output of [natural] gas has begun to wane."[12] In 1956,
M. King Hubbert, a Shell geophysicist who became
famous for his forecast known as Hubbert's Peak,
predicted that gas production in the U.S. would peak
at about 38 billion cubic feet per day in 1970.[13] In
1977, John O'Leary, the administrator of the Federal
Energy Administration, told Congress that "it must
be assumed that domestic natural gas supplies will
continue to decline" and that the U.S. should "convert to other fuels just as rapidly as we can." That
same year, Gordon Zareski, of the Federal Power
Commission, testified before Congress and declared
that U.S. policies "should be based on the expectation of decreasing gas availability." He went on to say
that annual production of natural gas "will continue
to decline, even assuming successful exploration and
development of the frontier areas."[14]
In 2003, Matthew Simmons, a Houston-based investment banker for the energy industry who was
among the leaders of the "peak oil" crowd, predicted
that natural gas supplies were about to fall off a "cliff."
When asked about the future of natural gas supplies,
Simmons (who died in 2010) said that "the solution
is to pray
. Under the best of circumstances, if all
prayers are answered there will be no crisis for maybe
two years. After that it's a certainty."[15]
In 2005, Lee Raymond, the famously combative
former CEO of ExxonMobil, declared that "gas production has peaked in North America."[16] Raymond,
who retired from the oil giant in 2006, said that his
company was intent on building a new pipeline that
would bring Arctic gas from Canada and Alaska south
and that more natural gas supplies would be needed,
"unless there's some huge find that nobody has any
idea where it would be."[17]
Many more examples of doomsday energy predictions could be cited here. But let's forgo those and
instead consider what has actually happened. Between 1980 and 2011, global natural gas production increased by 129 percent, and oil production
jumped by 33 percent.[18] What happened? Why
were so many forecastersincluding the chairman of Exxon, one of the world's biggest and
most technically savvy companiesso wrong? The
answer: all of them underestimated innovation in
the Oil Patch. Today, drillers are so precise that
they can drill wells that are two miles deep, turn
their drill bit 90 degrees, drill another two miles
horizontally, and arrive within a few inches of the
targeted pay zone.
Innovation occurs for many reasons, but a quick look
at the history of the U.S. oil and gas sector helps
explain why America continues to lead the world in
oil-field technology. The U.S. has long been the most
innovative country for drilling technology because
it has drilled more oil and gas wells than any other
country on the planet. No other country comes
remotely close. Between 1949 and 2011, more than
2.6 million oil and gas wells were drilled in the U.S.,
and that number has been increasing by about 41,000
new wells per year.[19]
The cost of drilling an average well is about $3 million.[20] Thus, every year, the U.S. oil and gas sector
is spending more than $120 billion drilling new
wells. Given that level of spending, the industry has
huge incentives to improve its processes, hardware,
training, and personnel. And decades of economic
motivation have resulted in continuing innovations
that have, over time, unlocked ever-increasing quantities of oil and gas.
Recall that M. King Hubbert claimed that U.S. natural gas production would peak back in 1970 at about
38 billion cubic feet per day. That didn't happen. In
2011, domestic gas production hit a record 63 billion
cubic feet per day.[21] That production was a 7.7 percent
increase over the amount produced in 2010, and it
easily eclipses the previous record-high level, achieved
back in 1973, of 59.5 billion cubic feet per day.[22] Furthermore, U.S. oil production, which had long been
on a downward slope, is risingand not by a little.
In 2011, domestic production was 7.8 million barrels
per day, the highest level since 1998. And numerous
analysts are predicting that America's oil output could,
within a few years, surpass that of both Russia and
Saudi Arabia, the world's two biggest oil producers.
Better seismic analysis, harder and more durable drill
bits, better drill rigs, real-time telemetry systems, and
more powerful pumps have all combined to improve
our ability to find and produce oil and gas. That is
easily shown by the dramatic reduction in the number of dry wells that has occurred over the past six
decades. Between 1949 and 2010, the percentage of
wells drilled that were dryknown in the industry
as "dusters"has been cut from 34 percent to 11
percent. This dramatic reduction in dry holes is the
result of continuing innovation in everything from
drill rigs to drill bits.
Opposition to Hydrocarbons, Bias toward Innovation in "Clean" Energy
Although ongoing innovation in the drilling industry
is obvious, the "clean" energy sector is the one that
gets most of the attention from politicians, political
appointees, and environmental groups. In 2011,
in his State of the Union speech, President Barack
Obama called oil "yesterday's energy." He went on to
claim that spending more federal tax dollars on "clean
energy technology" would "strengthen our security,
protect our planet, and create countless new jobs for
our people
. With more research and incentives, we
can break our dependence on oil with biofuels, and
become the first country to have a million electric
vehicles on the road by 2015."[23]
Obama's sound bite may appeal to certain elements
of the Green Left, but here's the reality: oil has been
"yesterday's energy" for more than a century. Yet it
persists. Why? Oil is a miraculous substance. If oil
didn't exist, we would have to invent it. No other
substance comes close to oil when it comes to energy density, ease of handling, and flexibility. Those
properties explain why oil provides more energy to
the global economyabout 33 percentthan any
other fuel.[24] They also explain why, despite a century
of effort, oil still dominates the transportation sector,
with more than 90 percent of all transportation being
fueled by petroleum products.[25]
Those facts haven't stopped Obama, or his political
appointees, or leading environmentalists from demonizing oil at every opportunity.
Obama's outgoing energy secretary, Steven Chu, has
frequently lauded the development of "clean" energy
technologies. In a February 1, 2013, letter to the employees at the Department of Energy in which he announced that he would not be serving another term,
Chu declared that there was "innovation revolution"
happening at the agency. He said that "the batteries
developed for plug-in EVs [electric vehicles] will
also revolutionize the electrical distribution system
and the use of renewable energy." He also said that
the Department of Energy is helping give "America's
innovators and entrepreneurs a competitive edge in
the global marketplace. We have held workshops with
industry in materials, computation, solar PV, plug-in
electric vehicles, and many other areas."
The only mentions of oil in Chu's parting letter to the
employees at the Energy Department were made in
reference to the Deepwater Horizon accident in the
Gulf of Mexico in 2010, or to America's "dependence
on foreign oil" or to "oil addiction." Chu said that in
2012, the U.S. spent about $430 billion on imported
oil, an expenditure that, he said, is "a direct wealth
transfer out of our country." Although Chu rightly
pointed out that "our oil imports are projected to fall
to a 25-year low next year," he didn't mention the
innovations in the drilling sector that have allowed
those imports to decline. Instead, he concluded his
brief discussion on petroleum by saying that "we still
pay a heavy economic, national security and human
cost for our oil addiction."
Chu's letter mentions natural gas just two times, both
occurring in reference to making solar-generated electricity cost-competitive with natural gas. The
word "solar" appears 15 times.[26]
In February 2013, Bob Deans, the associate director of communications for the Natural Resources
Defense Council, appeared on PBS's NewsHour to
express his group's opposition to the Keystone XL
pipeline. Deans declared that "we need to turn away
from the fossil fuels of the past, invest in efficiency
and renewables and build a twenty-first century
economy on new fuels."[27] Deans did not specify what
those fuels might be.
In a March 2013 speech, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., president of the Waterkeeper Alliance, an environmental
group, said that "we need to free ourselves from the
tyranny of oil." Kennedy claimed that the U.S. could
quit using all forms of hydrocarbonscoal, oil, and
natural gasif only it would agree to spend $3 trillion on alternative energy sources.[28] (Kennedy has
been among the most strident opponents of Cape
Wind, a large offshore wind project that has been
proposed for Nantucket Sound, near the Kennedy
family's property in Hyannis Port.)[29]
In February 2013, Michael Brune, executive director
of the Sierra Club, called shale gas "an extreme fossil
fuel." He stated: "Natural gas is not a bridge; it's a
gangplank to a destabilized climate and an impoverished economy."30 He also said that "the potential to
develop renewable energy is limitlessif we don't allow ourselves to be seduced by the false economies of
cheap shale gas."[31] The Sierra Club2011 revenues:
$43 millionisn't just opposed to natural gas, the
cleanest of the hydrocarbons.[32] The group also has
a "beyond oil" campaign and a "beyond coal" campaign. The group claims that "we have the means to
reverse global warming and create a clean, renewable
energy future."[33]
Better Rigs
Drilling rigs are relatively simple devices. Of course,
they can range in size from small truck-mounted
units that drill water wells to massive 100,000-ton
ships that can drill wells in 10,000 feet of water. But
the principles are basically the same. They must be
stable, powerful, and capable of producing the torque
needed to punch a deep hole into the earth.
The latest, most important innovation in onshore
drill rigs is the AC top-drive rig. The technology
first deployed offshoreis now gobbling up the
onshore market. The AC top-drive's key innovation:
moving the rig's main drive mechanism from the
floor of the rig onto the mast. Doing so has allowed
a major step forward in the digitization of the drilling
process. With the AC top-drive, silicon and software
have replaced key inputs that required the judgment
of humans. Although many of the operations on the
AC top-drive rig still must be done by humansincluding connecting pipe, bits, and other equipment
onto the drill stringan automatic-drilling system
manages key data points: rate of penetration, flow
rates, and other information. It feeds those data into
an automated controller that then operates the drill
rig at maximum efficiency, with optimum weight on
the drill bit, mud-flow rates, and rotational speed.
Let me divert here for a moment to explain some
basics of drilling technology.
Older rigs use what is known as a "kelly" drive, a
rotating table that spins on the floor of the rig deck.
That spinning table grips the pipe and drives the
entire length of pipe and bitknown as the drill
stringinto the earth. The pipe is added to the drill
string in 30-foot sections and is connected to a series
of high-pressure pumps that push fluid, known as
mud, from the top of the well downward. The drilling mud exits the pipe at or near the tip of the bit.
The mud lubricates the bit and captures the rock
cuttings and returns them to the surface, thereby
allowing continuous drilling. If the cuttings are not
removed quickly enough, they can accumulate in
the well bore and cause the drill string to get hung
up inside the well.
While the kelly drive rigs provided a big breakthrough
in drilling technology when compared with the older,
more dangerous, cable-tool rigs, they had limitations.
A key limit: the ability to add new pipe to the drill
string. With a standard kelly drive, only one 30-foot section of drill pipe can be added to the drill string
during the drilling process. If you are drilling a well
that is 10,000 feet deep and has a 10,000-foot lateral
section, for a total depth of 20,000 feet, that is 667
sections of pipe.
By contrast, the AC top-drive rig is much faster at
getting pipe into the ground, thanks to its ability to
use "threefers": 90-foot stands of pipe that have been
put together in racks on the drill-rig floor, where they
can easily be added to the drill string during drilling.
Whereas the kelly-drive rig has to stop for every 30
feet of drill string being inserted into the well, the
AC rig only stops for every 90 feet of drill string. The
time savings obtained by using threefers is obvious
and quickly adds up.
The AC rigs are also easier to move than older rigs.
For instance, in many shale formations, companies
drill multiple wells from a single location, known as
a pad. In western Oklahoma's Cana Woodford Shale,
Devon Energy often drills three wells per pad. The
wells are drilled in a line and are spaced about 15
feet apart. When drilling is completed on the first
well, the entire intact rig is scooted to the next well
by deploying hydraulic pistons or by dragging it
with bulldozers. Some of the latest designscalled
"walking" rigsare even more advanced and can
move the entire intact rig by as much as 40 feet per
hour.[34] And because the rig's key components don't
have to be disconnected, drilling on the next well can
resume far more quickly.
The AC top-drive designs are excellent for moving
short distances on individual pads, and they are also
easier to move longer distances via the highway. Older
rig designs required as much as eight days to turn
aroundthat is, to go from fully set up and ready to
drill to complete breakdown and back again. The AC
rigs can do the same turnaround in about three days.
While all those factors are important, the most crucial
capability of the AC top-drive design, one that is not
available in kelly-drive rigs, is their ability to keep
optimum pressure on the bit at all times. Prior to the
AC top-drive rig, the driller on the rigthe man who
acts as crew foreman and is in charge of what happens
on the rig floormonitored the amount of weight
on the bit, and did so by hand. That meant that one
of the most critical inputs on the rig, the amount
of pressure being applied to the bit, depended on
"feel" rather than on hard operational data. Anyone
who has drilled a hole in sheetrock or wood knows
that application of proper pressure is key. Press too
hard, and the drill freezes or gets stuck. Not enough
pressure or insufficient speed, and the drill bit makes
little progress. The same factors are at play on a drill
rig that is boring a four-mile-long well.
The AC top-drive rig's ability to keep the bit spinning within optimum parameters assures that the
machine is achieving the maximum rate of penetration at all times. Adding that key breakthrough to
the rig's ability to use longer sections of pipe and be
moved more quickly than older rig designs assures
that more wells get drilled in less time. And when
more wells are drilled, more hydrocarbons can be
produced more cheaply.
Better Drill Bits
A century ago, long before bits and bytesdescribed
in all manner of peta, giga, mega and kilowe had
the fishtail bit. And it wasn't good at cutting holes
into the earth.
The business end of the bit did look somewhat like
a fish's tail. It also looked somewhat like the business
end of a very wide screwdriver. It was a solid piece of
steel with curved, sharpened edges. The fishtail bit's
limitations were many. The bits tended to wander
off course and couldn't drill effectively in hard-rock
formations. Whenever it struck hard rock, the bit
would dull quickly, and crews would have to pull
the entire drill string out of the well and replace the
bita costly and time-consuming process. Those
limits meant that wildcatters were limited to looking
for oil deposits that lay close to the surface. For instance, the famous gusher at Spindletop, just outside
Beaumont, Texas, came from a well that was drilled
to just 1,160 feet.[36]
The breakthrough technologyintroduced in
1908was the twin roller-cone bit created by
Howard Robard Hughes, Sr., and his partner, Walter
Sharp. Hughes's son, Howard Hughes, Jr.known
to modern readers as the eccentric, reclusive playboy
who loved fast airplanes and faster womengained
fame as an aviator and moviemaker, but his fortune
was based on drill bits.
The Hughes bit was vastly superior to the fishtail
design. Instead of scraping rock like the fishtail,
Hughes and Sharp designed a rolling-cone mechanism that chipped, crushed, and powdered the rock.
That allowed the cuttings from the well to be easily
removed by the drilling mud. The bit was easier to
control in the well and had less tendency to deviate.
The earliest tests of the roller bit immediately proved
its superiority. On a well drilled in Humble, Texas, a
crew using a fishtail bit was able to bore just 38 feet
over 19 days, or two feet per day. When the same
crew used one of Hughes's new roller bits, they were
able to drill 72 feet in six days, or 12 feet per day.[37]
In 2009, the American Society of Mechanical Engineers named the Hughes two-cone drill bit a "historic
mechanical engineering landmark." The group said
that Hughes's bit and the rotary drilling system "were
pioneering inventions that paved the way for the
development of technologies and processes still used
in the oil field today."[38]
It is difficult to overstate the importance of the
Hughes bit. Henry Ford began manufacturing the
Model T on October 1, 1908.[39] Hughes filed for
a patent on his drill bit less than eight weeks later,
on November 20.[40] Without the Hughes bit, there
would not have been enough oil productionand
therefore enough gasolineto fuel all the cars that
Ford was building. The proof of the importance of the
Hughes roller bit can be seen by looking at the history of U.S. oil production. Throughout the 1890s,
and during the first decade of the 1900s, production
growth was slow. In the decade from 1890 to 1899,
production grew from 126,000 barrels per day to just
156,000 barrels per day. By 1909, when Hughes was
granted a patent for his design, U.S. oil production
was at 502,000 barrels per day. A decade later, it had
doubled. By 1929, it had doubled again. Forty years
later, in 1969, when Neil Armstrong walked on the
moon, domestic production of oil was 9.2 million
barrels per day18 times as large as it was in 1909.[41]
While the Hughes-style bit dominated the drilling
sector for decades, many drillers now prefer PDC
(polycrystalline diamond compact) bits. The Hughes' style roller-cone bits grind and crush the rock. PDC
bits shear it because diamond is ten times harder than
steel. The key technology in the newer bitspolycrystalline diamond compact cutterswas developed
by General Electric in 1973. But it has taken decades
of investment and experimentation to find the optimum blend of synthetic diamonds with metals such
as cobalt and tungsten carbide.[42] That innovation
has paid off. By 2010, PDC bits were being used to
drill about 65 percent of all the footage in oil and gas
wells. PDC bits are critical enablers of faster drilling.
In some cases, drillers are able to drill 8,000 or even
9,000 feet while using just one PDC bit.[43]
The results of optimized drill rigs and better drill
bits can be seen in the drastic reduction in the time
needed to drill wells. In 2007, Devon Energy needed
about 60 days to drill an average well in the Cana
Woodford Shale in western Oklahoma. By 2012, a
well of similar depth could be drilled in about 30
days. Devon is not alone in showing major speed
improvements. Southwestern Energy is a Houstonbased company that has pioneered the development
of the Fayetteville Shale in Arkansas. Between 2007
and 2012, the cost of an average well that Southwestern drills in the Fayetteville has stayed fairly
constant, at about $3 million per well. But over that
same period, Southwestern reduced the number of
days needed to drill a well in the Fayetteville from 17
days to just seven days. In addition, the average initial
production ratethe amount of energy produced
from the well over the first month of operationon
the wells being drilled has more than doubled. When
costs stay flat, drilling times fall by half, and production doubles, it's easy to understand why American
natural gas production has soared.
Remarkable speed improvements can be seen in the
oil-rich Eagle Ford Shale in Texas. In February 2013,
an executive with Houston-based Baker Hughes, a
large oil-field services firm, said that drillers working
in the Eagle Ford have cut the number of days needed
to drill an average well by half, to about 16 days, and
they have done so in a span of just two years.[44]
Drillers are relentlessly focused on cutting the time
needed to drill wells because of the enormous costs
involved. The total cost of operating an onshore rig
in one of the shale plays like the Barnett, Marcellus, Fayetteville, Eagle Ford, or Haynesville may be
$4,000 per houror more. Given that expense, the
ability to drill wells faster is imperative.[45] The recent
record shows that the remarkable advances in speed
are likely to continue.
The Dynamic Offshore
In 1947, the oil industry drilled its first offshore oil
wellthe Kermac 16out of the sight of land.[46] The
well, located off the Louisiana coast, was drilled in
20 feet of water, and all the machinery used on the
project was on the cutting edge of technology.
Today, about 100 rigs are capable of drilling wells
in more than 7,000 feet of water.[47] The capability
to drill in even deeper water continues to grow each
year. While many consumers love to hate the energy
industry, the reality is that some of the world's biggest companies (Shell, BP, Exxon Mobil, Chevron,
and others), by drilling in the deepwater offshore,
are conducting the marine equivalent of the space
programand all their efforts are privately funded.
The innovative nature of the offshore oil exploration
business was clearly demonstrated in September
2006 when Chevron, Devon Energy, and Norway's
Statoil ASA announced a major discovery with a
well called the Jack No. 2. The three companies
found a huge oil field in the deepwater of the Gulf
of Mexico, about 270 miles southwest of New
Orleans.[48] The Jack well, drilled in 7,000 feet of
water, found a huge hydrocarbon deposit in what
is known as the Lower Tertiary trend. That formation may hold up to 15 billion barrels of oil. Drilled
to a depth of more than 20,000 feet below the sea
floor, that single well cost more than $100 million
to drill.[49] Developing the resources at Jack and a
related prospect called St. Malo will cost Chevron
and its partners about $7.5 billion. A production
platform now being built for Jack and St. Malo will
have the capacity to handle 177,000 barrels of oil
equivalent per day.[50]
In March 2013, Anadarko Petroleum Corp. and four
partner companies announced another major discovery of oil in the Lower Tertiary. The Shenandoah-2
appraisal well found a deposit that may contain as
much as 3.7 billion barrels of oil equivalent. The well
was drilled to a depth of 31,000 feet below the ocean
floor in 5,800 feet of water.[51]
Back in 1947, all that oil potential in the Lower
Tertiary may as well have been located on the dark
side of the moon.[52] The industry simply did not
have the technical ability to tap the potential. With
Jack, Shenandoah, and other discoveries like it, the
oil industry has succeeded in drilling for oiland
finding itin locations that require the extensive
use of submarines, robots, and a host of other expensive technologies that continue to be improved
and refined.
The deployment of better robots, platforms, and
submarines has allowed unprecedented growth in
offshore oil and gas development. In 2012 alone,
global offshore oil discoveries totaled some 25 billion
barrels. Among the biggest discoveries: the Johan
Sverdrup field in the North Sea, one of the world's
most-prospected regions. The Sverdrup field alone
contains up to 3.3 billion barrels of recoverable
hydrocarbons, making it the largest discovery in the
North Sea since 1980.[53]
The innovations in offshore drilling technology can
easily be seen in the production numbers. In 1990, oil
production from the deepwatergenerally defined as
locations that are more than 1,200 feet of waterin
the U.S. Gulf of Mexico was less than 800,000 barrels
per day. In 2012, it was nearly 1.2 million barrels per
day, and projections from the Energy Information
Administration show that production from those
deepwater regions should hit 1.5 million barrels per
day by 2014.
Of course, the gains in offshore production are not
limited to the United States. The North Sea, offshore
Africa, offshore Australia, and other locations have
long been hotbeds of offshore exploration. A recent
report by the Boston Company estimated that between 2002 and 2012, more than 100 billion barrels
of new oil resources were discovered in offshore locations around the world. Few countries provide a better
demonstration of offshore oil innovation than Brazil.
In 1990, Brazil, the largest country in South America,
was producing 650,000 barrels of oil per day. In 2011,
production had increased to nearly 2.2 million barrels
per day.[54] The vast majority of that production was
coming from deepwater offshore wells.
The push to drill in even deeper water is continuing, and the industry is using new materials,
cheaper computers, sensitive subsea sensors, and
other technologies to allow that to happen. It is
also developing drilling equipment that can handle
extremely high pressures and temperatures. One
recent offshore project in the Gulf of Mexico required equipment able to handle pressures of 25,000
pounds per square inch and temperatures of higher
than 130 degrees C.[55]
Given the remarkable achievements that have occurred in the offshore drilling sector over the past
few decades, it is reasonable to assume that the sector
will continue innovating. As those innovations occur,
we can assume that offshore oil and gas production
will continue rising.
Technological Advancement Unlocks Resources
For decades, various prognosticators have been claiming that we will exhaust our supplies of oil and gas.
Much to their chagrin, that hasn't happened. Instead,
reserves of both fuels continue to grow. Although
we cannot know which technologies will prove to
be most important in the future, we can look at two
promising innovations that may affect future hydrocarbon development.
One of those innovations is "smart dust"the name
that researchers at the Advanced Energy Consortium
have given to tiny devices that could amplify the
electromagnetic, acoustic, and seismic signatures
that are used to map hydrocarbon reservoirs. The
devices could help expose oil and gas deposits that
cannot be "seen" with existing seismic technologies.
The Advanced Energy Consortium, an affiliate of
the Bureau of Economic Geology at the University
of Texas, has allocated about $40 million to 34
projects at more than two dozen universities around
the world to develop nanotechnologies that can
be used in the drilling process. In addition to the
seismic-enhancing nanoparticles discussed above,
the consortium is developing an electronic sensor
with an expected volume of one cubic millimeter.
For reference, one million of those devices could fit
into a one-liter bottle. The idea is to pump the micro
sensors into an oil or gas well, circulate them through
the hydrocarbon reservoir, and then "interrogate"
them when they are pumped back to the surface. The
information derived from that interrogationon
temperature, pressure, chemistry, and so oncould be used for more accurate exploration and production. Similar devices could also be dropped into a
pipeline to detect variations in pressure over a given
length of pipe.
The other promising innovation is drones. Although
drones are usually associated with the war in Afghanistan and other conflicts, the unmanned aircraft may
be used by energy companies drilling in the Arctic.
The aircraft could be used for mapping and to locate
small icebergs, which can be hazardous to ships. The
machines could also be used to monitor for spills and
to locate marine life, such as whales and seals.
While smart dust and drones could be added to the
technology portfolio, it is readily apparent that the
industry will continue improving the tools that it has
always used: drill rigs and drill bits. As the industry's
ability to produce hydrocarbons from shalethe
world's most common form of sedimentary rock
improves, there is good reason to assume that oil
and gas production will continue apace.[56] Indeed,
as technology advances and unlocks more resources,
industry analysts are having to rethink their assumptions about the future availability of oil and gas.
In February 2013, the consulting firm PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) released a report that estimated
that global shale oil resources could be as much
as 1.4 trillion barrels. Several countries, including
Mexico, Argentina, Russia, China, and Australia,
are known to have significant shale deposits.[57] PwC
is predicting that as new drilling technologies are
deployed around the world, shale oil and shale gas
will claim a bigger share of the world energy market.
The consulting firm believes that global production
of shale oil could reach 14 million barrels per day
by 2035. If that occurs, shale oil could be providing
about 12 percent of the world's supply. Even more
remarkable is PwC's estimate that shale oil production could reduce oil prices in 2035 by 25 to 40
percent. "In turn, we estimate this could increase
the level of global GDP in 2035 by around 2.33.7
percent (which equates to around $1.7$2.7 trillion
at today's global GDP values)."[58]
Perhaps the most striking reexamination of global
energy resources occurred in 2009, when the International Energy Agency more than doubled its prioryear estimate of global gas resources to some 30,000
trillion cubic feetenough energy to last for nearly
three centuries at current rates of consumption. In
2008, the agency had estimated global gas resources
at about 14,000 trillion cubic feet. The IEA changed
its estimate in response to the soaring production of
gas from shale deposits, coal-bed methane deposits,
and other so-called tight gas locations.[59] The impact
of the surge in natural gas production was so profound that in 2010, the Paris-based IEA was openly
discussing the "global oversupply" of natural gas and
the "duration of the gas glut."
Or consider what has happened with regard to global
proved oil reserves. In 1980, the world had about 683
billion barrels of proved reserves. Between 1980 and
2011, global oil consumption totaled about 800 billion barrels, an amount well in excess of the provedreserves estimate in 1980. Yet in 2011, despite that
enormous amount of consumption, global proved oil
reserves stood at 1.6 trillion barrels, an increase of 130
percent over the level recorded in 1980.[60]
The punch line here is apparent: the more oil and
natural gas we find, the more oil and natural gas we
find. And that ability to find more has been due to
technological improvement.
Cheap, abundant, reliable energy supplies are essential for economic development. Despite many
decades of dire predictions of energy shortages, along
with the calamity and economic problems that would
come from such shortages, the world continues to
increase production of hydrocarbons. Those increases
are a direct result of continuing innovation in the
drilling sector, and those innovations provide plenty
of reason to assume that oil and natural gas will remain dominant players in the global energy market
for decades to come.
1. Department of Energy, "Letter from Secretary Steven Chu to Energy Department Employees Announcing His Decision
Not to Serve a Second Term," February 1, 2013, http://energy.gov/articles/letter-secretary-steven-chu-energydepartment-employees-announcing-his-decision-not-serve.
2. Bloomberg New Energy Finance, "New Investment in Clean Energy Fell 11% in 2012," January 14, 2013, http://about.
3. IHS, "Total 2012 Upstream Oil and Gas Spending to Reach Record Level of Nearly $1.3 Trillion; Set to Exceed $1.6
Trillion by 2016, IHS Study Says," April 30, 2012, http://press.ihs.com/press-release/energy-power/total-2012-upstreamoil-and-gas-spending-reach-record-level-nearly-13-tri.
4. Congressional Budget Office data, http://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/cbofiles/attachments/03-06-FuelsandEnergy_Brief.pdf, 3.
5. BP Statistical Review of World Energy, 2012.
6. Richard Heinberg, The Party's Over: Oil, Water and the Fate of Industrial Societies, Gabriola Island: New Society
Publishers, 2003. 105.
7. Los Angeles Times, "U.S. Warned Oil Shortage Due in 20 Years," August 18, 1946, 6.
8. Heinberg, The Party's Over, 106.
9. Robert L. Bradley, Jr., and Richard W. Fulmer, Energy: The Master Resource, Dubuque: Kendall/Hunt Publishing
Company, 2004, 81.
10. Quoted in ibid, 81
11. James Howard Kunstler, The Long Emergency: Surviving the Converging Catastrophes of the Twenty-First Century, New
York, Atlantic Monthly Press, 2005, First edition, jacket flap.
12. Matt Ridley, "Apocalypse Not: Here's Why You Shouldn't Worry about End Times," Wired, August 17, 2012,
13. Ibid.
14. Robert A. Hefner, The GET: The Grand Energy Transition, Oklahoma City, GHK Exploration LLC, 2008, 35.
15. Mike Ruppert, "Interview with Matthew Simmons," August 18, 2003, http://www.oilcrash.com/articles/blackout.htm.
16. Reuters, "Exxon Says N. America Gas Production Has Peaked," June 21, 2005,
17. Ibid. For Raymond's retirement, see ABCNews.com, "Oil: Exxon Chairman's $400 Million Parachute," April 14, 2006,
18. BP Statistical Review of World Energy, 2012.
19. EIA data.
20. The $3 million-per-well figure squares with estimates from a number of industry players. E.g., Chesapeake Energy
estimates its per-well costs in the Fayetteville Shale at about $3 million (personal communication by the author with
Danny Games, Chesapeake's government affairs director, November 4, 2010). Southwestern Energy, another major
player in the Fayetteville, also publishes a $3 million-per-well figure. Historical data support the $3 million figure as a
reasonable average. Advanced Resources International (using American Petroleum Institute data) has reported that in
2007, the U.S. oil and gas sector spent $226 billion drilling and equipping some 54,300 wells. That is an average of
$4.16 million per well.
21. BP Statistical Review of World Energy, 2012.
22. Ibid.
23. Transcript of State of the Union address, http://www.npr.org/2011/01/26/133224933/transcript-obamas-state-of-union-address.
24. BP Statistical Review of World Energy, 2012.
25. EIA data.
26. Department of Energy, "Letter from Secretary Steven Chu to Energy Department Employees Announcing His Decision
Not to Serve a Second Term," February 1, 2013, http://energy.gov/articles/letter-secretary-steven-chu-energydepartment-employees-announcing-his-decision-not-serve.
27. PBS NewsHour, "Proposed Keystone Pipeline Prompts Protest March, Heated Debate," February 18, 2013, http://
28. Steve DeVane, "Environmental Lawyer Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Says the U.S. Should Wean Itself from Dirty Energy
Sources and Subsidies for Them," Fayetteville Observer, March 2, 2013,
29. Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., "Nantucket's Wind Power Rip-off," Wall Street Journal, July 18, 2011,
30. Michael Brune, "Fracking: Statements," February 5, 2013, http://www.economist.com/debate/days/view/934/print.
31. Ibid., February 13, 2013, http://www.economist.com/debate/days/view/936/print/all.
32. Sierra Club, 2011 Annual Report,
http://www.sierraclubfoundation.org/sites/sierraclubfoundation.org/files/2011-TSCF-Annual-Report.pdf, 35
33. Sierraclub.org, "The Goals of the Sierra Club's Climate Recovery Partnership," undated, http://www.sierraclub.org/ goals. See also John M. Broder, "Sierra Club Leader Will Step Down," New York Times, November 18, 2011,
34. Cactus Drilling is deploying its design, called the "rocket rig"; see http://cactusdrilling.com/rig-tech.
35. Southwestern Energy data, http://www.swn.com/investors/LIP/latestinvestorpresentation.pdf.
36. American Society of Mechanical Engineers, "Hughes Two-Cone Drill Bit," August 10, 2009,
http://files.asme.org/MEMagazine/Web/20779.pdf, 1.
37. Ibid., 5
38. Ibid., 2
39. Ford data, http://media.ford.com/article_display.cfm?article_id=858.
40. U.S. Patent Office, patent no. 930,759.
41. EIA data, http://www.eia.gov/dnav/pet/hist/LeafHandler.ashx?n=PET&s=MCRFPUS2&f=A.
42. Federico Bellin et al., "The Current State of PDC Bit Technology," World Oil, September 2010,
43. Oil & Gas Journal, "Roller Cones vs. Diamonds: A Reversal of Roles," February 20, 2006, http://www.ogj.com/articles/
44. Jennifer Hiller, "Eagle Ford Crude Selling for Far above Threshold," February 28, 2013, http://fuelfix.com/
45. The operating cost for land rigs varies widely. But the rental rate for a top-drive rig is about $25,000 per day. When
all other costs, including fuel, consulting firms, and other items, such as drill bits, are added in, the total cost can be
$100,000 per day, or $4,166 per hour
46. That well was drilled about 43 miles south of Morgan City, La. See Joseph A. Pratt, Tyler Priest, and Christopher J.
Castaneda, Offshore Pioneers: Brown & Root and the History of Offshore Oil and Gas (Houston: Gulf Publishing
Company, 1997), back cover
47. Andrew Callus, "Offshore Rigs Drilling Deeper than Ever," Globe and Mail, August 14, 2012, http://www.
48. Joe Carroll, "Chevron Postpones $3 Billion Jack Prospect in Gulf," Bloomberg.com, June 13, 2007,
49. Steven Mufson, "U.S. Oil Reserves Get a Big Boost," Washington Post, September 6, 2006, D1,
50. Ben Lefebvre, "Deep-Water Oil's Lasting Allure," Wall Street Journal, February 19, 2013, http://online.wsj.com/article/
51. Dow Jones Newswires, "Anadarko, Partners Announce U.S. Gulf of Mexico Oil Find, March 19, 20913,
Note that the 3.7 billion barrels of oil equivalent estimate comes from Tudor, Pickering, Holt & Co., a Houston-based
investment banking firm.
52. Halliburton, "Brown & Root and Kerr-McGee Celebrate 50th Anniversary of First Producing Offshore Oil Well Out-ofSight-Of-Land," November 14, 1997, http://www.halliburton.com/news/archive/1997/bresnws_111497.jsp.
53. Boston Company Asset Management, "End of an Era: The Death of Peak Oil," February 2013,
http://www.thebostoncompany.com/assets/pdf/views-insights/Feb13_Death_of_Peak_Oil.pdf, 3.
54. BP Statistical Review of World Energy, 2012.
55. Callus, "Offshore Rigs."
56. Geology.com, "Shale," undated, http://geology.com/rocks/shale.shtml.
57. PricewaterhouseCoopers, "Shale Oil: The Next Energy Revolution," February 2013,
58. Ibid., 1.
59. Robert Bryce, "The New Natural Gas Paradigm: 30,000 Trillion Cubic Feet (and Counting)," Energy Tribune, November
13, 2009, http://www.robertbryce.com/articles/207-the-new-natural-gas-paradigm-30-000-trillion-cubic-feet-andcounting.
60. BP Statistical Review of World Energy, 2012.
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Ask us! We're here to help. You'll find mountains of info online plus email addresses and phone numbers if you need to connect with a human. More...
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text: Berkeley Harris | IBDB: The official source for Broadway Information IBDB: The official source for Broadway Information Official Broadway League sites: - sites - broadway.org broadwayleague.com broadwayfanclub.com kidsnightonbroadway.com stagespecs.org tonyawards.com Quick Search For: In This Category: All Show People/Org. Theatre Season Berkeley Harris Performer Male Productions ProductionsDate of ProductionsDevour the Snow[Play, Drama, Original] Standby: Berkeley Harris [James Reed, Bill Foster]Nov 07, 1979 - Nov 10, 1979 Find out where Berkeley Harris and are credited together © 2001-2015, The Broadway League, All Rights Reserved. (Copyright and Disclaimer)


text:
Disability Insurance Articles
Does My State Offer Disability Insurance?
Even though federal social security disability benefits are offered in every state, there are a few states that provide residents with benefits of their own exist as well. These benefits are meant for a short-term disability, while federal benefits are for the long-term. For those with a private insurance policy, the benefits received under state laws are far less substantial. The five states offering their own disability insurance are California, New York, New Jersey, Rhode Island and Hawaii. State disability can help get you through difficult times while waiting for something else to kick in and provide youwith the extra money you desire.
California State Disability
If you live in California, regardless of whether you are out of work from an illness, injury or pregnancy, you are covered under the California state disability insurance benefits. Most of the employees in California are covered under this plan, so they won't have to worry about being without any income while they are ill. Anything from a mental to a physical ailment that prohibits you from being able to perform your regular job duties enables you to receive disability benefits.
Hawaii Disability Insurance
Eligible employees receive a portion of their wages for any injury or illness that is unrelated to work. If an employee cannot work because they are sick or injured, and they meet the conditions for qualification under the law, they would be eligible for Hawaii disability insurance benefits. Even though they will receive a portion of their wages to help pay for their lost income, they will not be eligible for medical care benefits. To be eligible, you must have worked at least 14 weeks of 20 hours or more. Earnings must total at least $400 within the last year before your disability began. You will also need to be currently employed for eligibility.
In addition to California and Hawaii, there are 3 other states which currently offer state sponsored Disability benefits similar to those in California and Hawaii. New York State disability, New Jersey state disability and Rhode Island temporary disability insurance are also options to help cover you if you reside in one of those states. Even though it is nice to have the state you live in provide you with the benefits you desire, it is nice to know there are other options available from which you can choose.
If your state does not offer disability insurance benefits, you have the option of looking into a private benefits plan on your own. Some employers are willing to provide you with disability insurance as part of their benefits plan. The amount of money you will have to pay for this benefit will depend largely on the benefits your employer offers. Purchasing private disability insurance will help protect you in the event something happens. In most cases the amount of coverage received through a private disability policy are far superior to those that are received via the State sponsored DI programs. It is important to talk with an agent to at least hear your options. The last thing you want is to be stuck with absolutely no protection when disabled by injury or illness.


text:
- Infowars - http://www.infowars.com -
MI6 and British Government worked closely with Gaddafi's regime (and even helped him write his speeches)
Posted By kurtnimmo On September 3, 2011 @ 9:13 am In Old Infowars Posts Style,World at War | Comments Disabled
Daily Mail
September 3, 2011
British intelligence co-operated closely with Muammar Gaddafi's regime, according to reports based on documents found in Libyan government offices.
The papers allegedly show that MI6 gave the Gaddafi regime information on Libyan dissidents living in the UK.
The documents were discovered in the Tripoli offices of former head of Libyan intelligence Moussa Koussa and also include talks between the CIA and the Gaddafi regime.
They also contain communications between British and Libyan security ahead of then prime minister Tony Blair's desert tent meeting with Gaddafi in 2004.
It gives details about Mr Blair's visit and mentions the visit was requested by Britain.
A letter from an MI6 official to Mr Koussa said 'No 10 are keen that the Prime Minister meet the Leader in the the tent. I don't know why the English are fascinated by tents. The plain fact is that the journalists would love it.'
Britain is also said to have helped the Libyan dictator with his speech-writing.
The discovery, by The Independent newspaper, will no doubt raise questions about the relationship between Mr Koussa, who fled Libya for London in March, and the British Government.
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text:
i think its basicly any module
Hi All,
Yesterday I used up2date to upgrade my Redhat 8 kernel to 2.4.18-18.8.0 from 2.4.18-17.8.0. Upon reboot, choosing the new kernel X wouldn't load. I have a feeling this is because the nvidia drivers haven't been compiled with this kernel. I expect that ntfs read support will need to be recompiled soon. And anything else I might have forgotten. I'm using the previous kernel version at the moment.
I was wondering if there are any best practices I'm missing for keeping a list (other than pen and paper) of the 'extras' that will need recompiling each time I upgrade the kernel. Or is there even a way of getting this done automatically?
Any suggestions on kernel/system housekeeping greatly appreciated.
Cheers ...... Pete
i think its basicly any module
well, anything by nvidiot is gonna need help :. But other than that, the things that need to be compiled from kernel to kernel are the newest techonlogies, since most distros won't include stuff that is proven yet. btw, isn't ntfs READ already compiled in, and the write disabled?
ntfs read is NOT comiled in as default by RH8. I followed the OMP and have it as a module.


text:
The Office: Chairmodel - VIDEO
For everything that happened this week -- a return to form for those of you who were upset that the previous two episodes strayed from the confines of Dunder-Mifflin -- I believe it's that question (and Pam's reaction to it) that will set up the conflict over the remaining episodes of the season. I'm about as good at reading female facial signals as Rain Man, but even I could tell that Pam's face during the "proposal" wasn't exactly filled with the kind of joy you'd expect it would be. Maybe the producers are just giving us a red herring and Pam's reaction tonight will be the equivalent of Lost's four-toed statue (interesting for a blip, then forgotten about) or maybe things are not all that well in JAM-land.
But, I'm getting ahead of myself. Let's talk about the rest of the episode first...
After last week's "most uncomfortable dinner party in the history of the universe," Michael and Jan are officially broken up. This, of course, is calamity for Michael, whose biological clock is ticking louder than Marissa Tomei's in My Cousin Vinnie. He wants kids while he's "still young enough to play catch with them" -- just the idea of Michael Scott playing catch with a young child makes me want to call Scranton Child Services -- and as such he needs a lady.
This is going through his head at the same time he needs to pick out a new chair for himself. Pam is desperate for him to make his choice as she'll inherit his old chair (her description of why she wants it -- the "whoosh" sound it makes when you lower it -- will soon be a part of my new book, 6000 Reasons Why Jenna Fischer is the Cutest Woman on Earth: A fascinating look at one man's battle with Los Angeles county restraining orders).
Michael has become obsessed with the model in the chair catalog, though, and instead of making his choice, he is inspired by her to declare to the office that he wants to be set up on a date. This is met with the usual enthusiasm (Stanley can't think of a single person he hates enough to set up with Michael) as well as results in the usual actionable HR violations from Michael. My favorite? Trying to get Phyllis to admit her potential set-up was fat: "I'm just asking if she would capsize a rowboat." I hereby nominate "capsizing a rowboat" to become 2008's new euphemism for packing on a few extra pounds.
I've been a vocal critic of the Michael Scott episodes this season because whenever we have a Michael-centric plot, it seems to give the writers license to bend all the laws of reasonable behavior. As a fan of the show, I often fear that one day we'll be talking about how The Office was great until that one fifth season episode where Michael decided to knife fight a monkey because Jim dared him to. B.J. Novak, however, found the right balance tonight, grounding Michael's increasingly obvious sociopathy in a believable reality. This was exactly what we'd expect from Michael following a break-up.
While Michael deals with his broken heart, Kevin and Andy are left to figure out the parking crisis gripping the rest of the office. See, W.B. Jones are renovating their offices and the construction vehicles are taking up many of the usual spaces at the Scranton Business Park. This is forcing people to park in a satellite lot, which means, of course, that they have to walk.
I loved this B-Story! What more could you want? You had Bob Vance (of Vance Refrigeration). You had Andy and Kevin working together (a team with more comic potential than Turtle and Johnny Drama, if you ask me). You had a sweet Godfather reference. And you had it ending with Andy breakdancing by himself in the parking lot. You can't call yourself an Office fan if you didn't enjoy all of that.
The eye for detail we saw in this sequence could single-handedly serve as a counter-point to anyone who says that all people in Hollywood are out of touch with mainstream America. It was so dead-on in capturing the kind of small business owners who populate an office park, so perfect a satire of the kind of trivial problems that office workers blow-up into world-threatening catastrophes, that you have to think that at least some of the writers spent some time at a real office. Either that or they "majored in life experience" at Harvard, like the writers on Itchy and Scratchy. Regardless, it was pitch-perfect.
Dwight promises Michael to track down the chair model for him ('I swear, she will bear your fruit"), only to find out that she died in a car accident. Michael is so heartbroken that Pam is finally moved to set him up with a real prospect: her landlady. A quick coffee-date is made, and Michael is off to meet her.
Now, a lot of you said that last week's episode turned the uncomfortable-comedy screws so tight that you were almost unable to enjoy it. While I agree that last week had its share of painful-to-watch moments, I contend that Michael's reaction to seeing who Pam had set him up with -- a stunningly plain woman -- outdoes the entirety of the dinner party when it comes to discomfort. Seriously, I had to pause the TiVo and wait for the the scene to play out a little bit, just so I could fast-forward through it.
I felt so bad I even felt bad for the woman playing the landlady. Could you imagine that ad in the back of Variety? "NBC is looking for an actress for their popular late night comedy, The Office. Needs to be attractive enough that female friends upon hearing that you're single will make that sound women make (you know kind of like 'awwwwww', but trying to hold the pity back) and then say, 'you're too pretty to be single!' BUT, also needs to be UNattractive enough that when the men with whom you have blind dates actually SEE you, they are visibly disappointed." I mean, who reads that and is excited that it describes them? So, so uncomfortable.
It's the disastrous date that leads to the situation I talked about at the beginning of this review: Pam and Jim and marriage. Jim quips that after the date, Pam is going to need a new place to live and he, of course, offers his place. She tells him that she doesn't want to live with anyone until she's engaged (which is either quaintly old-fashioned or another a painful reminder of the breakdown in young-people's morals, depending on your point of view), which leads to some awkward marriage talk.
I say "awkward" not because of the content of the conversation: that was actually pretty sweet. My wife hasn't seen this episode yet, but I imagine that when she watches Jim smile and say that his proposal is going to "Kick your ass, Beasley," her crush on John Krasinski will grow so powerful that it will actually gain sentience and apply for U.S. citizenship.
No, it was awkward for little reasons: Pam's fading smile at the end of the conversation, her look of consternation during the "fake proposal," the fact that Jim bought the ring "a week after they started dating," which is right up there with "I think the stripper really likes me" on the list of "Top 10 Things your Friend Tells You that Makes You Think He's about to Get Hurt." It's entirely possible that I'm reading too much into this -- I've certainly done that before -- but did anyone else get the sense that a happy wedding without any drama is not in the cards for Pam and Jim?
We end the episode at the cemetery, with Michael and Dwight paying their final respects to the chair model by way of a ridiculously chomped-up version of "American Pie." It was wonderful, but watching it got me mad at NBC. See, if you TiVo The Office normally (without padding in a few extra minutes at the end of the episode's recording time), you would have missed the very funny "American Pie" sequence. I understand that programming a network in this day and age is increasingly complicated, but is pissing off the people who TiVo your episodes really the right way to go? The running time of each episode is 22 minutes; there's no reason why it can't fit in the neat little half-hour block that my TiVo says it's going to fit in. C'mon NBC, do the right thing here.
Other stuff:
-- We really need more Creed! I am desperate to know what he means to do with two chairs and why a third one seems integral to his plans. Consider the gauntlet thrown: Creed needs his own spin-off!
-- How great was Toby's face when Michael declared to the office that he "needed to get laid"?
-- The Five Families of Scranton Business Park: There's Michael Scott, Bob Vance (Vance Refrigeration), Paul Faust (they call him "Cool Guy Paul"), W. B. Jones (Grade A badass), and Bill Cress (super old and really mean). If that's not a crew to rival the Corleones, the Tattaglias, the Barzinis, the Cuneos, and the Straccis, then I don't know what is.
-- It was nice to see Kevin win one. Really, it was.
-- A banner day for Michael's unwitting gay-bashing: "My little Oscar-Meyer Weiner... Lover" and referring to Oscar's homosexuality as a "condition."
-- This is our third Michael-centric plot in a row. Coincidence? Or do you think the producers might be doing anything they can to keep Steve Carell from jumping ship at the end of his contact?
Tonight's episode was solid, if a peg or two lower than the brilliance of the two episodes that preceded it. What's your take on it? As always, tell me how wrong I am in the comments!
|Oh, she obviously wants it!
|316 (27.6%)
|She doesn't KNOW she wants it yet, but she wants it.
|354 (31.0%)
|I don't think she even knows what she wants.
|347 (30.4%)
|She doesn't want it.
|36 (3.1%)
|Are you stupid? She wants ME!
|90 (7.9%)


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The Ethiopian Orthodox Church was established by the monks Frumentius and Aedissius in the fourth century, during the reign of King Ezana of Axum, who converted to Christianity along with many of his people.
The Ethiopian Church exists today as self-governing, though it shares the same faith with Egypt's Coptic Church. Until 1955, the Patriarch, a Coptic bishop, was sent from Alexandria.
The Council of Chalcedon separated the Coptic Church from the early Orthodox Church in AD 451 and the resound was doctrinal differences.
This issue revolved around the Person of Christ –obviously an important matter to Christians– which Orthodox Christians believe to have two distinct natures, one divine and one human, whereas the Monophysites believed Christ has a divine nature in which the human nature is contained.
During the time, most Christians were Orthodox; the Patriarchate of Rome was not yet alienated from the Eastern patriarchates. Coptic liturgical and sacramental practices stay similar to Orthodox ones, though the usage follows the ancient Alexandrian rite rather than the Byzantine rite.
The historical heritage and theology of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church tradition has had its own appealing developments. Many practices related to ancient Judaism –such as veneration for a representation of the Ark of the Covenant in every Church– are unique to the Ethiopian Orthodox Church.
On the altar of Ethiopian Orthodox churches there is a miniature facsimile of the tabot, one of the tablets of the Ark of the Covenant, which Ethiopians consider is preserved in their country. Ethiopian icons are colorful works of art showing traditional Orthodox saints, such as early martyrs.
The Ethiopian Orthodox Church enjoyed a great deal of independence even when its Patriarch was sent from the Coptic Church of Egypt. Though the Ethiopian Orthodox Churches are not in direct canonical communion with the Orthodox of Greece, Constantinople, Russia, Ukraine, Antioch, and other jurisdictions, they are embraced fraternally to the extent that some of these churches allow their priests to administer the sacraments to the Ethiopian Orthodox.


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Traveling Mercies: Some Thoughts on Faithby Anne Lamott
Staff Pick
Readers of Traveling Mercies: Some Thoughts on Faith, Lamott's previous book on spirituality, will find here the same thoughtfulness and humor we've come to love. Whether writing about battles with her son, her mother's death, the church she's found to be home, or her loathing of George W. Bush, Lamott's irreverence and wit doesn't disappoint.
Synopses & Reviews
Publisher Comments:
Anne Lamott claims the two best prayers she knows are: "Help me, help me, help me" and "Thank you, thank you, thank you." She has a friend whose morning prayer each day is "Whatever," and whose evening prayer is "Oh, well." Anne thinks of Jesus as "Casper the friendly savior" and describes God as "one crafty mother."
Despite — or because of — her irreverence, faith is a natural subject for Anne Lamott. Since Operating Instructions and Bird by Bird, her fans have been waiting for her to write the book that explained how she came to the big-hearted, grateful, generous faith that she so often alluded to in her two earlier nonfiction books. The people in Anne Lamott's real life are like beloved characters in a favorite series for her readers — her friend Pammy, her son, Sam, and the many funny and wise folks who attend her church are all familiar. And Traveling Mercies is a welcome return to those lives, as well as an introduction to new companions Lamott treats with the same candor, insight, and tenderness.
Lamott's faith isn't about easy answers, which is part of what endears her to believers as well as nonbelievers. Against all odds, she came to believe in God and then, even more miraculously, in herself. As she puts it, "My coming to faith did not start with a leap but rather a series of staggers." At once tough, personal, affectionate, wise, and very funny, Traveling Mercies tells in exuberant detail how Anne Lamott learned to shine the light of faith on the darkest part of ordinary life, exposing surprising pockets of meaning and hope.
"Squeezing every last drop of meaning out of even the smallest things, Lamott writes agilely about such watershed events as the deaths of her father and closest woman friend, and the birth of her son and life as a single mother, all the while tracing her slow crawl back to faith with wonder, gratitude, and an irrepressible love of a good story." Booklist, Donna Seaman
"Hallelujah...a refreshing sense of humanity that has you guffawing on one page and bawling on the next." Thomas Fields-Meyer, People Magazine
"...[C]ontributes to a growing literature of self-disclosure by women that unites the worlds of feminism and addiction..." Women's Review of Books
"[She is] sidesplittingly funny, patiently wise, and alternately cranky and kind." Seattle Times
"Anne Lamott is a cause for celebration. [Her] real genius lies in capturing the ineffable, describing not perfect moments, but imperfect ones...perfectly. She is nothing short of miraculous." The New Yorker
"Lamott writes about subjects that begin with capital letters (alcoholism, motherhood, Jesus). But armed with self-effacing humor and ruthless honesty?call it a lower-case approach to life's Big Questions?she converts potential op-ed boilerplate into enchantment." Newsweek
"Smart, funny, and comforting...Lamott has a conversational style that perfectly conveys her friendly, self-deprecating humor." The Los Angeles Times
"Lamott's greatest gift is making [readers] feel their own imperfect lives are worth salvaging, that it's okay to be bitchy, confused and selfish." Book Magazine
"Like many in her boomer generation, Lamott doesn't hold much truck with churches but has found a meaningful congregation all the same....Nothing here is self-indulgent. An anguishing account that also heals." Kirkus Reviews
"Exuberant and captivating....Shifts from laugh-out-loud wisecracks to heart-wrenching poignancy. At one point she seems a reincarnation of Erma Bombeck; at other, she could be Annie Dillard or Kathleen Norris." Chicago Tribune
"Even at her most serious, she never takes herself or her spirituality too seriously. Lamott is a narrator who has relished and soaked up the details of her existence, equally of mirth and devastation, spirit and grief, and spilled them onto her pages." The New York Times Book Review
"You'll love Traveling Mercies for Lamott's unblinking confrontation with God's love, and you'll buy copies for all your friends struggling with faith." USA Today
"Compares with the witty and moving Christian apologetics of C. S. Lewis.... Lamott is a fine writer who combines theology with humor, compassion, and practicality." The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
"Applies passion, wisdom, and intensity to a scorchingly personal look at the road from spiritual apathy to ardent belief.... Traveling Mercies, like Ms. Lamott herself, is a consistent delight." Dallas Morning News
"Lamott has developed an entirely new genre of religious writing. Gritty, stark, and humorous, she catches the reader by surprise when she points her pen heavenward.... Anne Lamott [is] the patron saint of struggling sinners, a woman who loves God enough to be divinely human." Religion News Service
A chronicle of faith and spirituality that is at once tough, personal, affectionate, wise, and very funny. Anne Lamott claims the best two prayers she knows are "Help me, help me, help me" and "Thank you, thank you, thank you." Despite — or because of — her irreverence and wit, faith is a natural subject for Lamott. With an exuberant mix of passion, insight, and humor, in Traveling Mercies she takes us on a journey through her often troubled past to illuminate her devout but quirky walk of faith. In a narrative spiced with stories and scripture, with diatribes, laughter, and tears, Lamott tells how, against all odds, she came to believe in God and then, even more miraculously, in herself.
Whether writing about her family or her dreadlocks, sick children or old friends, the most religious women of her church or the men she's dated, she shows us the myriad ways her faith sustains and guides her, shining light on the darkest part of ordinary life and exposing surprising pockets of meaning and hope.
My coming to faith did not start with a leap but rather a series of staggers from what seemed like one safe place to another. Like lily pads, round and green, these places summoned and then held me up while I grew. Each prepared me for the next leaf on which I would land, and in this way I moved across the swamp of doubt and fear. When I look back at some of these early resting places--the boisterous home of the Catholics, the soft armchair of the Christian Science mom, adoption by ardent Jews--I can see how flimsy and indirect a path they made. Yet each step brought me closer to the verdant pad of faith on which I somehow stay afloat today.
That One Ridiculous Palm
The railroad yard below our house was ringed in green, in grass and weeds and blackberry bushes and shoulder-high anise plants that smelled and tasted of licorice; this wreath of green, like a cell membrane, contained the tracks and the trains and the roundhouse, where engines were repaired. The buildings rose up out of the water on the other side of the bay, past Angel Island, past Alcatraz. You could see the Golden Gate Bridge over to the right behind Belvedere, where the richer people lived; the anise was said to have been brought over at the turn of the century by the Italians who gardened for the people of Belvedere.
Tiburon, where I grew up, used to be a working-class town where the trains still ran. Now mostly wealthy people live here. It means shark in Spanish, and there are small sharks in these parts. My father and shy Japanese fishermen used to catch leopard sharks in the cold green waters of the bay.
There was one palm tree at the western edge of the railroad yard, next to the stucco building of the superintendent--one tall incongruous palm tree that we kids thought was very glamorous but that the grown-ups referred to as "that ridiculous palm tree." It did not belong, was not in relationship to anything else in town. It was silent and comical, like Harpo Marx with a crazy hat of fronds.
We took our underpants off for older boys behind the blackberry bushes. They'd give us things--baseball cards, Sugar Babies. We chewed the stems off the anise plants and sucked on them, bit the ends off nasturtiums and drank the nectar.
When I was five and six, my best friend was a Catholic girl who lived about fifteen minutes away, on foot, from our house--kids walked alone all over town back then. I loved the Catholic family desperately. There were dozens of children in that family, or maybe it just felt that way, babies everywhere, babies crawling out from under sofas like dust bunnies. We only had three kids in our family; my brother John, who is two years older than me and didn't like me very much back then, and my brother Stevo, who is five years younger than me, whom I always adored, and who always loved me. My mother nursed him discreetly, while the Catholic mother wore each new baby on her breasts like a brooch. The Catholic mama was tall and gorgeous and wore heels to church and lots of makeup, like Sophia Loren, and she had big bosoms that she showed off in stylish V-necked dresses from the Sears catalog. My mother was not much of a dresser. Also, she was short, and did not believe in God. She was very political, though; both she and Dad were active early on in the civil rights movement. My parents and all their friends were yellow-dog Democrats, which is to say that they would have voted for an old yellow dog before they would have voted for a Republican.
I was raised by my parents to believe that you had a moral obligation to try to save the world. You sent money to the Red Cross, you registered people to vote, you marched in rallies, stood in vigils, picked up litter. My mother used to take the Greyhound out to Marin City, which was a terrible ghetto then, and volunteer in an after-school program for boys and girls from impoverished families. She tutored kids in reading while other grown-ups worked with them in sports. My mother majored in the classics in college. She always brought along little paper candy cups filled with the fanciest candies from Blum's or the City of Paris to give to the children after their lessons. It used to make my father mad that she'd buy such expensive candies, but this didn't stop her.
My Catholic friend and I used to spend hours sitting on the couch with the latest Sears catalog spread across our knees, pretending that we got whatever was on our side of the page. I played this game with anxiety and grief, always thinking that the better dresses and shoes were on my friend's pages and that I would have been OK if they had just been on mine--and if I'd had her tall stylish mother, with the wonderful cleavage showing like the bottom of a baby in her low necklines. I knew I was not pretty because people were always making jokes about my looks. (Once, at a pizza joint, a stranger had included me in a collective reference to the Catholic children, and you would have thought from the parents' outrage that he had included a chimpanzee.) And I knew I was not OK because I got teased a lot by strangers or by big boys for having hair that was fuzzy and white. Also, I got migraines. I got my first one midway through kindergarten and had to lie down with my face on the cool linoleum in the back of the room until my father could come get me.
My friend and I gathered blackberries from the bushes in the train yard, and her mother made pies. She made apple pies too. We peeled each apple with precision, aiming for one long green spiral of peel, and my first memory of watching someone be beaten was on a night after we'd prepared apples for pie. My Catholic friend and I had been left with a baby-sitter and all those babies, and after we had sliced up and spiced the apples, we'd gone to bed without throwing out all those green snakes of peel, and I awoke with a start in the middle of the night because my friend's father was smacking her on the face and shoulders, fuming alcohol breath on the two of us in our one twin bed, raging that we were slobs, and I don't know how he knew to beat her instead of me because I don't remember there being any light on. We both cried in the dark, but then somehow we slept and in the morning when we woke the mother was frying up bacon, a baby slung over her shoulder, and the dad was happy and buoyant, thunderous in his praise of the pie now in the oven.
It was Sunday morning and I got to go to church with them. All the children got dressed up. The parents looked like movie stars, so handsome and young, carrying babies, shepherding the bigger kids, smooching in the car.
I loved every second of Catholic church. I loved the sickly sweet rotting-pomegranate smells of the incense. I loved the overwrought altar, the birdbath of holy water, the votive candles; I loved that there was a poor box, and the stations of the cross rendered in stained glass on the windows. I loved the curlicue angels in gold paint on the ceiling; I loved the woman selling holy cards. I loved the slutty older Catholic girls with their mean names, the ones with white lipstick and ratted hair that reeked of Aqua Net. I loved the drone of the priest intoning Latin. All that life surrounding you on all four sides plus the ceiling--it was like a religious bus station. They had all that stuff holding them together, and they got to be so conceited because they were Catholics.
Looking back on the God my friend believed in, he seems a little erratic, not entirely unlike her father--God as borderline personality. It was like believing in the guy who ran the dime store, someone with a kind face but who was always running behind and had already heard every one of your lame excuses a dozen times before--why you didn't have a receipt, why you hadn't noticed the product's flaw before you bought it. This God could be loving and reassuring one minute, sure that you had potential, and then fiercely disappointed the next, noticing every little mistake and just in general what a fraud you really were. He was a God whom his children could talk to, confide in, and trust, unless his mood shifted suddenly and he decided instead to blow up Sodom and Gomorrah.
My father's folks had been Presbyterian missionaries who raised their kids in Tokyo, and my father despised Christianity. He called Presbyterians "God's frozen people." My mother went to midnight mass on Christmas Eve at the Episcopal church in town, but no one in our family believed in God--it was like we'd all signed some sort of loyalty oath early on, agreeing not to believe in God in deference to the pain of my father's cold Christian childhood. I went to church with my grandparents sometimes and I loved it. It slaked my thirst. But I pretended to think it was foolish, because that pleased my father. I lived for him. He was my first god.
My mother and her twin sister had come over from Liverpool with their mother after their father died, when they were twelve. My mother had a lifelong compassion for immigrants; she used to find people waiting for boats to their homeland or waiting for money to be wired from the East so that they could catch a bus home, and she'd bring them to stay with us until everything was straightened out. She and my aunt Pat had been confirmed as Episcopalians in England--I have their confirmation picture on my mantel, two dark-haired beauties of twelve or so in long white baptismal-style dresses. But that was the last of their religious affiliation. My aunt Pat married a Jew, with a large Jewish family in tow, but they were not really into Moses Jews; they were bagelly Jews. My closest cousin was bar mitzvahed, but other than accusing you of anti-Semitism if you refused second helpings of my uncle Millard's food, they might as well have been Canadians.
None of the adults in our circle believed. Believing meant that you were stupid. Ignorant people believed, uncouth people believed, and we were heavily couth. My dad was a writer, and my parents were intellectuals who went to the Newport Jazz festival every year for their vacation and listened to Monk and Mozart and the Modern Jazz Quartet. Everyone read all the time. Mt. Tamalpais loomed above us, and we hiked her windy trails many weekends, my dad with binoculars hanging around his neck because he was a serious bird-watcher. He worshiped in the church of Allen Ginsberg, at the Roger Tory Peterson Holiness Temple, the Tabernacle of Miles Davis.
We were raised to believe in books and music and nature. My mother played the piano most weekend nights, and all of us kids knew the words to almost every song in the Fireside Book of Folk Songs. When my parents' friends came over on the weekends and everyone had a lot to drink, my mother played piano and everyone sang: English ballads, spirituals, union songs, "The Golden Vanity," "Joe Hill," "Bread and Roses."
About the Author
Anne Lamott is the author of Operating Instructions and Bird by Bird, and of five novels, including Rosie and Crooked Little Heart. She lives in northern California with her son.
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