delawareonline: Shell Oil boss calls for new energy policy
On a day that oil futures touched a record $123 a barrel, John Hofmeister, president of Shell Oil Co., the U.S. division of Royal Dutch Shell, said oil companies need to find unconventional sources of oil as existing sources dry up.
The U.S. government should lift its 30-year moratorium on most domestic oil exploration to ease the countrys reliance on the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, or OPEC, Hofmeister said.
If were only allowed access to international sources, guess whats going to happen to the price of oil? he said. Its going to continue going up.
Hofmeister, who plans to retire in June after three years as the head of Shell, spoke to a packed auditorium at Mitchell Hall as part of UDs Global Agenda 2008 program. He laid out Shells 12-point plan for energy security, which includes cleaner power from a technology called coal gasification, more emphasis on non-corn-based biofuels, encouraging technological solutions for managing energy demand and increasing investments in natural gas, wind, solar and hydrogen power.
Hofmeister also called for the U.S. to implement a cap-and-trade system to control emissions of carbon dioxide, which many scientists blame for global warming.
Hofmeister said the supply of easy, convenient oil is peaking, but more oil remains to be tapped in sources like oil-rich shales in Colorado and oil sands in Canada. The U.S., he said, guzzles 21 million barrels of oil each day or about 10,000 gallons per second.
Thats a backyard swimming pool full of oil gone every second, Hofmeister said.
Largely ignored Wednesday were the record profits that oil companies have tallied during the run-up in oil prices. Shell, which supplies gasoline to nearly 14,000 U.S. stations, earned $7.8 billion in the first quarter of 2008, up 12 percent from the same period in 2007.
Today, Senate Democrats called for a temporary tax on windfall oil company profits and a rollback of $17 billion in tax breaks for the oil industry. Hofmeister did not address the proposal, but he did lament the paralysis of partisanship that has prevented the U.S. from developing an energy security strategy since World War II.
Hofmeister said higher oil prices would likely curb U.S. demand, but he couldnt say when. In the last two years, Hofmeister said, he has visited 50 major American cities, and one thing has been clear.
Americans, he said, are not interested in dramatic changes to lifestyle.
Contact Andrew Eder at 324-2789
or [email protected].
Royal Dutch Shell conspired directly with Hitler, financed the Nazi Party, was anti-Semitic and sold out its own Dutch Jewish employees to the Nazis. Shell had a close relationship with the Nazis during and after the reign of Sir Henri Deterding, an ardent Nazi, and the founder and decades long leader of the Royal Dutch Shell Group. His burial ceremony, which had all the trappings of a state funeral, was held at his private estate in Mecklenburg, Germany. The spectacle (photographs below) included a funeral procession led by a horse drawn funeral hearse with senior Nazis officials and senior Royal Dutch Shell directors in attendance, Nazi salutes at the graveside, swastika banners on display and wreaths and personal tributes from Adolf Hitler and Reichsmarschall, Hermann Goring. Deterding was an honored associate and supporter of Hitler and a personal friend of Goring.
Deterding was the guest of Hitler during a four day summit meeting at Berchtesgaden. Sir Henri and Hitler both had ambitions on Russian oil fields. Only an honored personal guest would be rewarded with a private four day meeting at Hitler’s mountain top retreat.
IN JULY 2007, MR BILL CAMPBELL (ABOVE, A RETIRED GROUP AUDITOR OF SHELL INTERNATIONAL SENT AN EMAIL TO EVERY UK MP AND MEMBER OF THE HOUSE OF LORDS: 
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A head-cut image of Alfred Donovan (now deceased) appears courtesy of The Wall Street Journal.
