In a box advantages and disadvantages

Shale:
Advantage:
- Large domestic reserves
- Existing oil infrastructure can be used
- Easy to transport as solid or oil

Disadvantage:
- Low net energy because of energy and water required to separate oil from work
- High disturbance of land similar to coal mining
- CO2, NO2, SO2, emitted when shale oil is burned


Tar sand:
Advantages:
- Very large potential reserves
- Current oil infrastructure can be utilized
- Tar sand can be easy to transport

Disadvantages:
- Very low energy to extract bitumen
- Large volumes of water are used in process of extracting bitumen
- High land disruption, which leads to habitat loss from surface mining of tar sand
-CO2, NO2, SO2 is emitted into the atmosphere


Oil:
Advantages:
- High net energy
- Although supply is declining, there is still ample supply for the immediate future
- Infrastructure is already in place
- Domestically available
- Little land disruption in mining process

Disadvantages:
- CO2, NO2, SO2 is emitted when burned
- US is dependent on oil imports
- Potential oil spills
- Net energy decreases as energy invested increases


Natural gases:
Advantages:
- Larger reserves remain
- Less air pollution
- High net energy compared to other fossil fuels

Disadvantages:
- Low net energy when converted to LNG
- Releases CO2 when burned
- Difficulty and costly to transport
- Pipeline infrastructure is underdeveloped