President Obama has said the U.S. possesses just 3 percent of the world's oil reserves, or about 22.3 billion barrels, writes Investor's Business Daily's John Merline.

However, this figure represents just proven reserves.

But one analyst believes he could be off by almost a trillion.

According to the Institute for Energy Research's calculations, the U.S. actually sits on 1.442 trillion barrels of recoverable deposits.

That's over 60 times the amount we usually hear about.

Merline writes that this larger number would be enough to meet all U.S. oil needs for about the next 200 years.

Most of that — an estimated 1.4 trillion barrels — is locked into shale deposits in the Green River Formation in Wyoming. The U.S. recently began holding public hearings about issuing permits to drill there.

One caveat is that refining capacity is nearly full-up; no new refineries have been built in the U.S. in 35 years, although that could soon change.