Last winter, fossil-fuel enthusiasts began trumpeting the dawn of a
new “golden age of oil” that would kick-start the American economy,
generate millions of new jobs, and free this country from its dependence
on imported petroleum. Ed Morse, head commodities analyst at
Citibank, was typical. In the Wall Street Journal he crowed,
“The United States has become the fastest-growing oil and gas producer
in the world, and is likely to remain so for the rest of this decade
and into the 2020s.”
Once this surge in U.S. energy production was linked to a predicted
boom in energy from Canada’s tar sands reserves, the results seemed
obvious and uncontestable. “North America,” he announced, “is becoming
the new Middle East.” Many other analysts have elaborated similarly on
this rosy scenario, which now provides the foundation for Mitt
Romney’s plan to achieve “energy independence” by 2020.
