Things looked a little precarious there for a while, folks. For the thousands of Americans who make up the US oil and gas industry, the 2018 midterm elections served up more than their fair share of anxiety as the oil and gas industry found itself on the receiving end of a tidal wave of negative attention across the country.
Newspapers online outlets across the country ran a serious campaign in support of several ballot initiatives supposedly aimed at helping the environment. In the end, however, the intellect of the average voter prevailed, and several anti-fracking, anti-extraction measures were soundly defeated.
That legislative victory has cleared the way for the United States to take complete control of its energy future.
A Study in Extremity
When November 6 rolled around, the voters entered the nearest booth and decided en masse to kill several initiatives aimed at curbing oil and gas production. In Colorado, Proposition 112 stopped an attempt to kill new oil and gas projects in the state. Washington state voters said a flat “no” to a potential carbon pricing proposal. Arizona voters nixed a measure to ditch renewables in favor of oil and gas development.
Across the country, US oil and gas won several decisive victories, securing the economic security of the nation for years to come.
United States Is Becoming the World’s Supplier
The United States doesn’t have the world’s most plentiful supply of oil or natural gas. We’re number 11 and number 4, respectively. What we do have that several other countries aren’t fortunate enough to possess is a stable means of production and export. It’s our infrastructure that provides a competitive edge.
That efficiency in production is the reason that the International Energy Agency recently predicted that US oil and gas could account for 20 percent of production by the year 2025.
Per the IEA: “The shale revolution continues to shake up oil and gas supply, enabling the U.S. to pull away from the rest of the field as the world’s largest oil and gas producer. By 2025, nearly every fifth barrel of oil and every fourth cubic meter of gas in the world come from the United States.”
It seems as though there’s nowhere to go but up for the United States oil and gas industry.