Why Isn't Big Oil Drilling More? Look At The Profits.

Today, ExxonMobil reported that it broke its own record for highest corporate profit in a quarter: [1] $11.68 billion. The rest of the Big Oil posse is rocking and rolling [2] as well: Shell's profits are up 33%, BP is up 28% and ConocoPhillips is up 13%.

So in case you didn't understand why Big OIl isn't drilling in the 68 million acres where they already have leases [3], now you can see.

Why ramp up production, invest in more refinery capacity [4], and rush more oil on to the market in hopes of lowering prices for consumers, when you're already making as much money as ever has been made in history.

As I said earlier in the week: tight supply + high gas prices = good times for Big Oil. [3]

So long as we consumers don't have any other energy choices except for buying huge amounts of increasingly expensive oil.

So, we can keep starving investment in clean energy. We can keep propping up Big Oil with tax giveaways [5]. We can give them more leases off our coasts -- where there's so little oil it can't do anything to significantly lower prices. [6]

But don't expect Big Oil to do anything different to help us out. Don't expect Big Oil to quickly use those leases, and rush to get those drops of coastal oil.

Because they're doing just fine as things are.

We can keep our energy policy in Big Oil's hands, or we can force Big Oil to compete with clean energy so we'll have real choices.

And that's our choice.