An interview with Arthur Berman

James Stafford:Energy became a big part of the election race, but what did you make of the energy policies and promises that were being made by both candidates?

Arthur Berman:Mitt Romney, particularly, talked about how the United States would be able to achieve energy independence in five years. Well, that's garbage.

Anybody who knows anything about oil, gas and coal, knows that that's absurd. We were producing a little over 6 million barrels a day thanks to an all-out effort in the shale oil play. We consume 15 million barrels of oil a day and that leaves the gap of 9 million barrels per day. At the peak of U.S. production, in 1970, the U.S. produced 10.6 million barrels per day. Like I said, either the guy doesn't know what he's talking about, or is making a big joke of it.

Obama didn't talk so much…He's a hugely green agenda kind of president and I'm not opposed to that, but he's certainly not for the oil and gas business. It wasn't until he got serious about thinking about his re-election that he decided to take credit for what really happened.

James Stafford:Japan recently announced that they are going to be phasing out nuclear power. What are your views on nuclear? Are we in a position to abandon this energy source?

Arthur Berman:No. Japan is a special case. The disaster at Fukushima, the nuclear reactor, was right on top of a major fault. So, that was a dumb place to put it.

To wholesale abandon nuclear power because one reactor was incredibly stupidly planned, to me seems like a bit of a…well, I can't tell people how they should react, but if I were a Japanese citizen, and the truth was that we have no oil, we have no coal, we have no natural gas, the next question is, "Well, if we get rid of nuclear, what are we going to do?"

It's a really good question to ask. If you don't have anything of your own, how are you going to get what you need? The answer is that they have to import LNG and that's very expensive.

Right now, natural gas is selling in Japan for $17 per million BTUs. You can buy the same BTUs in Europe for $9 today, or in the U.S. for $3.25

James Stafford:What about Germany's decision to also phase out nuclear power?

Arthur Berman:For Germany to abandon nuclear…that decision is truly delusional because they haven't had any problems over there. Nor is Germany particularly earthquake prone or tsunami prone. They have forced themselves into a love relationship with Russia.

James Stafford:What are your views on Canada's tar sands? Are they a rich source of oil that the U.S. needs to exploit? Or do you think they're a carbon bomb, which could do irreparable damage to the climate?