Originally Posted by
fdxflyer
Impossible for a thread like this to stay away from politics. 67% of americans are now in favor of drilling and / or exploration if it will bring down price (heard on the news anyway). Importantly, however, the oil companies currently have drilling rights on 91 million acres of federal land that they currently are not using. Haven't heard the why to that part. But, I did hear a Senator claim that an oil CEO recently testified that if oil prices were reflective of supply/demand curve, then oil would be 55 per barrel.
Leases only last a certain amount of time and many times legal obstacles lie in the way of renewing leases. This makes drilling there not profitable because of the amount of time it takes to drill exploratory wells and such. This may not always be the case but many times it is.