In Part I, readers were confronted with some of the mythology surrounding the made-for-propaganda fantasy of “U.S. energy independence.” It primarily dealt with the demand-side of the energy consumption equation.

The basic dynamic of our oil-dependent economies was presented: for industrialized economies to grow there must be growth in oil consumption. What this means is that the steadily shrinking U.S. demand which has allowed the U.S. to somewhat narrow its gigantic oil-deficit has come at the cost of the U.S. economy continuing to shrink – irrespective of what is claimed in absurd, official statistics.

Presumably no rational American is interested in achieving “energy independence” at the cost of the continued disintegration of the U.S. economy, and what that implies: even more-massive unemployment, and even further deterioration in what is already a 50%+ collapse in the U.S. standard of living.

This brings us to the colossal oil-deficit itself. The propaganda machine regularly trumpets the news that U.S. oil production has now “risen all the way” to an estimated 7 million barrels a day (after ending 2012 at 6.5 mbpd). Yes, “risen” all the way to the same level of production as what the U.S. produced 20 years ago.

Does this mean the U.S. oil-deficit is ‘only’ as bad as it was 20 years ago? Of course not. Twenty years ago, U.S. oil imports had just climbed higher than U.S. oil production for the first time in history (i.e. it produced about half as much oil as it used).

Today, even after the collapse in U.S. oil demand it remains well above 18 million barrels per day (as of the end of 2012). This puts the U.S. oil-deficit at well above 11 mbpd – an oil-deficit more than 50% larger than 20 years ago. So in some perverse “Back To The Future” moment; the propaganda machine is urging Americans to celebrate the fact that the U.S. oil-deficit is more than 50% worse than it was a generation ago.

Actually, things are much worse than that. Twenty years ago, Big Oil still produced oil relatively efficiently; meaning that in producing a barrel of oil it only consumed a small fraction of that barrel in the process (as explained via the research/presentation of energy expert, Chris Martenson). Today, in producing its oil from “non-conventional” sources (like shale oil); Big Oil consumes more than half of every barrel of oil it produces.

As noted in Part I; this represents a 98% plunge in efficiency from when we first began producing oil at a large scale (and supplies were abundant). While Big Oil engages in environmental destruction/devastation on an ever more-appalling scale; its net harvest of oil from this raping-and-pillaging has collapsed. Let’s crunch the numbers.

With an oil-deficit which still exceeds 11 mbpd; the U.S. oil-deficit is larger than the total consumption of the world’s second largest economy: China. Given that the shale-oil industry consumes more than half of all the oil it produces; what would it take to close the 11+ mbpd deficit (keeping demand constant)?

U.S. oil production would need to increase by approximately 23 mpbd; or in other words it would have to more than quadruple from present production levels, all the way up to 30 million barrels per day. Let’s put this into context.

Currently Saudi Arabia is the world’s leading oil-producer at roughly 9.3 mbpd. Thus to achieve “energy independence” the U.S. wouldn’t simply have to equal the output of Saudi Arabia; it would have to more than triple it.

However, the energy-independence Zealots never let anything like “facts” get in the way of their claims. Indeed, they now simply make-up numbers. Witness the brand-new claim that U.S. oil production has now “topped” its total imports.

Read more: The U.S. Energy-Independence Fantasty, Part II: Supply