The Denver Post gave Gary Wockner of Clean Water Action prime newspaper real estate in Sunday’s perspective section. Wockner’s guest editorial “Is Colorado Addicted to Oil?” was nothing more than a list of typical anti-fossil fuel questions that he tried to associate to Colorado’s and Weld County’s economic struggles as a result of the Great Recession.

Clean Water has a clear mission of advancing global warming hysteria to scare voters and policy makers away from reliable, affordable, and abundant fossil fuels and towards the economically unsustainable and environmentally unfriendly world of renewable energy.

Wolkner used 20 question marks in his column. For that reason, I cannot answer every question in one post. Over the next few days, I’ll answer most. Some, such as whether or not Governor Hickenlooper and the rest of Colorado are “thrilled” about the discovery of additional BOE (barrels of oil equivalent) in Weld County, are subjective and will be ignored.

The first question, contained in the headline, is Colorado addicted to oil? The answer is only to the extent that Colorado is addicted to a modern, civilized lifestyle and the economy needed to maintain it. Rankin Energy Corporation, an energy exploration and production company out of Oklahoma, provides a partial list of the products made with petroleum. One 42-gallon barrel of oil produces 19.4 gallons of gasoline. The rest, which is more than half the barrel, is used to make more than 6000 different products including:

Also, petroleum is needed to make solar panels and wind turbines. A little factoid from Rankin, “Americans consume petroleum products at a rate of three-and-a-half gallons of oil and more than 
250 cubic feet of natural gas per day each! But, as shown here petroleum is not just used for fuel.”

Are we addicted oil? Only if you enjoy and are “addicted” to a modern lifestyle made possible by the discovery of fossil fuels. I’ll revisit this question at the end of this series of blog posts.

Next up, the role of oil and gas in Colorado’s and Weld County’s economy. I’ll address the following questions from Wockner, “What is the actual role that oil and gas plays in our economy? Where do all the billions of dollars go?”