AAPG Explorer - American Association of Petroleum Geologists

Letters to the editor should include your name and address and should
be mailed to Readers’ Forum, c/o AAPG EXPLORER, P.O. Box 979,
Tulsa, Okla. 74101, or fax (918) 560-2636; or e-mail to forum@aapg.org.
Letters may be edited or held due to space restrictions.
READERS’FORUM
What’s In a Name?
A decade or more ago the topic
of renaming our Association was
considered, and at that time it was
decided then to keep our name as now
qualified.
It is timely that we revisit that
topic in the light of the many non-
American members and their technical
contributions. In addition, many of our
events are held outside of the Americas.
I believe that our Association would
be better received with a title like “IAPG”
(International Association of Petroleum
Geologists) or some such.
I also believe that it would improve our
growth potential.
John Treckman
(50-plus-year member)
Kingwood, Texas
BANANA Syndrome
Regarding your story (June
EXPLORER) on BANANA syndrome
(Build Absolutely Nothing Anywhere Near
Anything): I certainly agree that a cure
should involve “invest in education for
our future problem solvers.”
However, at universities such as
Lamar, where only a bachelor’s degree
is offered – and many students cannot
attend graduate school – people in the
petroleum industry are rarely heard from,
except for a few of our alumni.
I realize that 10 or fewer geology
graduates per year is not a large number,
but a number of universities of this size
amounts to a lot of geologists available
for work.
Donald E. Owen
Beaumont, Texas
(Editor’s note: Owen is a geology
professor with the Department of Earth
and Space Science at Lamar University.)
Critical Resource Shortages
Dianne Freeman’s short article on
resource depletion (June EXPLORER)
is most timely – though I fear it may be
largely unappreciated except by some
visionaries like Vince Matthews.
Having been in the oil patch for most
of my 40-year career, I understand the
omnipresent chant of find more, drill
more, produce more. But the stark truth
is that there is a limit, both physically and
economically, to all natural resources.
By a strange twist of fate, my
petroleum career took a wild turn and
I ended up performing terrorism risk
analysis for the Department of Homeland
Security. That conjunction of careers has
required me to see energy and other
natural resources in an entirely different
light – and not a particularly favorable
one.
The dawn of cheap energy at the
dawn of the 20th century allowed the
19th century’s colonialism to be replaced
by the 20th century’s globalization.
Resources, through cheap energy,
can come from anywhere and go to
anywhere. But that day is coming to
an end in the face of $100+/bbl oil;
globalization will also give way to
localization.
For readers interested in other’s
insights into some of the macro-scale
societal, economic and national security
issues related to this topic need look
no further than Michael Klare’s book
Natural Resource Wars, Peter Maass’
book Crude World or for a somewhat
more strident (but nonetheless very
informative) point of view, Michael
Ruppert’s Collapse. All of them go a step
or two further than Matt Simmons’ Twilight
in the Desert.
The solutions to the problems
presented are knotty at best, and it will
require all of our professional ability,
knowledge and creativity to help educate
the public and our too-often uninformed
lawmakers on what needs to be done to
keep the nation and the world in balance
with all the resources we use and cannot
replace.
Applause to the EXPLORER for
publishing this article, and please
consider doing more in this vein.
David M. Weinberg
Rio Rancho, N.M.
AAPG
EXPLORER
WWW.AAPG.ORG JULY 2011
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