Save the Dinosaurs
The environmentalists keep insisting that we must curb our ever-growing demand for more energy. The problem is, in the world in which we live, all forms of progress are dependent on energy. The rate of industrial and technological progress has increased exponentially over the last century. So has the demand for energy. It’s not a coincidence.
We could reduce our energy demands by renouncing progress and going back to doing things the way people did them in the “good old days.” We could give up cars and airplanes and electricity, central heat and air conditioning, computers, etc., slowing any future progress to a the same plodding pace it was a century ago. But in what way would that be a good thing? — Except in that we would use less energy. But is using less energy really intrinsically good? And is it so good that it’s worth giving up all kinds of benefits man has striven to achieve over the last couple of centuries?
Of course, that isn’t what the environmentalists have in mind. They don’t want to completely curtail the use of energy. They just want to control it to make sure it’s only used in acceptable ways for acceptable purposes. The question is, who defines what’s acceptable? — The answer is them, of course.
On a personal level, they want people to use less electricity, less gasoline, less toilet paper, etc. And it’s true that some people do waste a lot of energy. Personally, I abhor waste. I admire efficiency. I would love to see more efficient forms of energy, and I certainly would love to see less gratuitous waste. However, different people define waste differently.
I enjoy driving. I do it for pleasure. If I were confined to my home, or wherever I could propel myself by foot or by bicycle, I wouldn’t be a very happy camper. Sure, I could sit at my desk all day and cruise the Internet, but that uses energy, too. Is there anything truly wrong with driving out into the country, up in the mountains, to enjoy the natural beauty? It isn’t necessary to my survival. So here I am, wasting a limited natural resource for my own selfish gratification. But, somehow, it doesn’t seem to me like an intrinsic evil. I realize I could significantly reduce my carbon footprint by never leaving my house. I could reduce it even more by never getting out of bed. I could reduce it even more by dying. But what exactly is the point?
There’s a lot of research going on in the field of alternative energy. By the time fossil fuels actually do start to run out, I expect at least some of these “new” forms of energy will be viable. Today, they’re even more expensive than fossil fuels. That’s why so few people use them. If they were less expensive, and more practical to use, everybody would be using them already. But there’s still a ways to go before they’re competitive in the marketplace. I’m all for alternative energy. The sooner it becomes viable, the better. But, in the meantime, I’m not going to stop living my life to save the dead dinosaurs for future generations.
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Once upon a time, there was a government-owned, local utility in the largest “city” in VT (Burlington) that started an energy conservation program in the 1990s. Ten years later, the city was using 10% LESS energy than it was before the start of the program, and no…the city didn’t shrink or turn pitch-black at night.
Once upon around-about the same time, a former co-worker of mine built himself a house up along the New York/Quebec border…mostly with his own labor and time. He super-well insulated it, and he added both solar panels & a small wind turbine to his property. He’s never paid a NYSEG electricity bill to my knowledge, ever. He was even “off-the-grid” for the first decade or so that he lived in his new house…not by choice either, but that’s a longer story.
There is no large majority of the environmental movement in this country that is looking to take us back to the Stone Age. Quite the contrary…what a lot of us would like is if we used energy more efficiently now and developed renewable, sustainable alternative energy sources as quickly as possible that can replace our dependance on finite forms of energy that are usually highly pollution-prone. These forms of energy will get cheaper the faster that we put money and effort into developing them.
It’s not about giving up things…like more efficient & alternatively fueled cars & airplanes, electricity from clean energy sources, highly efficient central heat/air conditioning & computers…we want MORE of those things. What’s so hard about getting behind that??
No one that I know of is out to confine you to your home…lol…
“By the time fossil fuels actually do start to run out”
Hello? They are running out now and have been for quite a few years now…remember those high energy bills that you and I (and likely everyone else) have been paying? Yea, buckle up for a LOT more of that unless we do something different.
I’m all for alternative energy. As I said, when it’s cost-effective, I’ll use it. But I can’t afford the cost of setting up solar panels for my house, and a hybrid car is so much more expensive than a comparable dinosaur-powered vehicle, the savings in fuel over the lifetime of the car won’t make up the difference.
We’re not quite running out of dinosaur goo yet. There’s a whole lot of it sitting under us that we’re not drilling. There’s a bunch of it Alaska that we’re not drilling. A good friend of mine opines that that’s because we’re saving it for the end-game, when everybody else runs out. Maybe so. Or maybe the environmental lobby is so powerful that our politicians can’t afford to offend them.
But the environmentalists don’t seem too fond of alternative energy, either, once it’s actually implemented. They protest to shut down wind farms and demand the removal of hydro-electric dams. Don’t even get them started on nuclear energy. They don’t like that at all. Nor are they fond of coal. They loved the idea of biofuels, but ethanol has been a disaster, both from a humanitarian and ecological perspective. What the environmentalists don’t seem to understand, or be willing to accept, is that every form of energy comes at a cost, and only part of that cost is economic. They don’t seem willing to make any tradeoffs. So, as long as they’re driving the agenda, we’ll always end up at a stalemate.
“Of course, that isn’t what the environmentalists have in mind. They don’t want to completely curtail the use of energy. They just want to control it to make sure it’s only used in acceptable ways for acceptable purposes.”
What is your point? That’s a pretty broad brush your painting with. Your goal appears to be to simply frame the arguments of those you disagree with in a ridiculous manner. Therefore making your case without really making your case. You have been trained to counter the arguments of those you disagree with by dismissing them in the simplest of terms.
To even consider the concept of reducing your usage by “never leaving my house” as part of your argument is silly. Many hardcore right-wingers have difficulty seeing beyond black and white. So you are not alone there. It is not a question of ‘to consume’ or ‘not to consume’. It is a matter of being a responsible adult and being mindful of your actions.
Also, keep in mind that the combustion engine has seen very little advancement since it’s inception. If the computer industry moved that slow you would need a machine the size of a large room to enlighten us with your stellar blog entries.
“I’m all for alternative energy.”
Given some of the other postings on this site about alternative energy & fossil fuel companies, I don’t believe this statement for a second, but whatever. You’re also missing the point…for example, the point of getting a hybrid now is so that in the future you can easily convert it to a plug-in hybrid & be done with gasoline entirely (that’s what I plan to do).
“We’re not quite running out of dinosaur goo yet.”
Ever hear of Peak Oil?? Peak of oil extraction will occur in 2020, and the world’s “proven” oil reserves are expected to last a maximum less than 50 more years…that’s, of course, assuming that you believe the past suspicious official estimates of oil reserves from OPEC countries like the UAE, Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, and Venezuela. They’ve been cooking those books to make it seem like they have more oil than they actually do for decades now.
“They protest to shut down wind farms and demand the removal of hydro-electric dams. Don’t even get them started on nuclear energy.”
When it comes to wind and hydro power, these are fringe elements of the environmental movement, period. Uranium resources will be exhausted within 70 years, and coal will be exahausted within 160 years. The sooner we start fixing our crazy energy useage & source problems…the less likely we’ll all experience more pain and hardship IMO.
Yes, it is silly, Kenny. Sometimes I make little jokes. You don’t have to laugh if you don’t feel so inclined. (I do have a peculiar sense of humor.)
Mr. Guy, why would you not believe me? I really do want alternative energy sources to become viable. Oil is too darned expensive. I’m hoping that, once they work the kinks out, alternative energy sources will ultimately be cheaper as well as cleaner. Who would not desire that?
But then you come around and say all energy sources are ultimately doomed, and the only solution is to curb our demand. I live very modestly, and am not wasteful by nature. But I do use energy for non-essentials, like driving up into the mountains for pure sensory gratification. I’m sure some would consider that wasteful. I’m not sure where you stand on it.
The problem, from my perspective, always comes down to people trying to control other people. You seem to see government as a tool to legislate your will upon those to whom you feel morally superior. I see the (legitimate) role of government as protection from those who wish to impose their will on others.
Well, people that are genuinely in favor of alternative energy usually don’t spend their time thinking up excuses for big oil and thinking of any way that they can criticize the utility of alternative energy in the first place.
“But then you come around and say all energy sources are ultimately doomed, and the only solution is to curb our demand.”
I never said that all energy sources are doomed…it’s just the ones that we are, unfortunately, mostly relying on now that are doomed…lol… Why is conservation such a dirty word with you guys? It actually works in making our limited resources last longer. The reason that the Bush Regime and a lot of other “conservatives” poo-poo conservation, I think, is because it does cut into the bottom line of their buddies in the energy industry. For instance, my local electric company certainly is getting less money from me because I use CFLs now, but screw them!
If you want to go for a ride in the country, then go for a ride in the country. Just don’t complain to us about the extra cost in gas and wear-and-tear on your vehicle.
“You seem to see government as a tool to legislate your will upon those to whom you feel morally superior.”
Now you’re getting philosophical on me. You want free markets…and to hell with everyone else that doesn’t want them everywhere and anywhere. You guys on the Right *love* to force your own ways on the rest of us. I’d simply prefer that we use alternative energy sources that will basically never run out, and, in the meantime, conserve as much of the finite energy sources that we still have so that they will last longer for ALL of us. These aren’t Gestapo tactics that we’re talking about here…
Mr. Guy, I’m not against conservation — as long as it’s by choice. Personally, I’m very conservative in my energy usage. (It’s too expensive not to be, and I’m fiscally conservative by nature.) However, just because I’m conservative myself, I don’t try to force that on other people. What I do is my business; what they do is theirs.
Thank you for permission to go for a ride in the country. Who’s complaining? Not me.
I don’t think you understand the free market. The whole idea of the free market is that nobody forces their will on anybody. Everybody is free to make their own choices. If you value a commmodity or service more highly than the price that’s asked for it, then you buy it. You’re happy. The seller is happy. If not, you don’t buy it. It’s all about free will. In what way do you see that as coercive?
Except for the tiny fact that we don’t *have* a truly free market in this country…we have a mixed economy. Your side basically wants more of the market in just about everything because of a blind belief that free markets solve anything. Our side basically realizes that history shows a us a different story…that mixed economies are best, but the facts don’t matter I guess…ideology does…
Facts do matter, Mr. Guy. But you have to back them up with evidence. Saying something doesn’t make it a fact.
The facts were discussed in another thread when, I think Jackson and I, were going back and forth on what turned out to be highly sucessful mixed economies…like the USA and some countries in Europe.
Sometime in the distant past the hippicrits repealed the law of supply and demand. Politicians of all stripes have encouraged population growth, mostly through immigration. More people means more cars and houses. Guess what, more demand. At the same time, the green crowd has strangled increases in energy supply. I wonder who really is to blame for high oil prices?
Am I the only person who remembers the mid 1980’s. After years of high prices and shortages, oil became cheap. WHY?? It was not because of alternatives.
Ah, the 1980s, you mean when:
-U.S. oil production rose (for the very last time in history) in the early 1980s…kiss those days goodbye BTW, then U.S. oil imports rose for the latter half of the decade…right through today
-there was more turmoil in the Middle East (sound familiar?)…the Iran hostage crisis, the U.S. boycott of Libyan oil, and the Iran-Iraq War (where we were helping both sides, but mostly the Iraqis)
-the *Windfall Profits Tax* was enacted for 8 years (sound familiar to something that you may have heard of recently??)
-the Exxon Valdez tanker spill took place
The price of oil did mostly fall throughout much of the decade despite all this happening.
Now imagine if during the same time-frame that fuel economy standards weren’t basically stagnant due to undue pressure from the oil & auto industry, and alternative fuel wasn’t surpressed by those same two entities. There have been plenty of ways out of the mess that we’ve gotten ourselves into, but we’ve been listening to the wrong people for waaaay too long IMO. It’s time to learn from the past once and for all…
Mr. Guy,
Like most liberals you take historical facts, put them in a blender and poor out what ever conclusions fit your pre-conceived notions. Bear with me, stay focused, keep your eye on the ball.
Let’s just stick with the period of 1981 through 1985. Riddle me this Batman. Why did gas lines go away? Why did crude oil prices drop so much that many oil drilling workers in the US had to find new occupations?
One word—–and I will repeat it so that you will understand, actually you won’t, but the word is supply,supply,supply.
When I hear demagogues like Senator Schumer say that all the oil in Anwr would only drop the price of gasoline 1 cent per gallon and that we can’t drill our way out of high prices, I fondly recall all of the misery during the reign of Jimmy Carter.
Sane energy policy could not be enacted until the pain got so bad that Carter was thrown out of office. It occurs to me that history has to repeat itself. We will again have to go through a series of expensive mistakes such as ethanol ,before the green pied pipers are finally laughed out of power. I wonder if that misery threshold is $5 per gallon or $10 per gallon.
Care to dispute my facts?
Ah, OK, forget “the mid 1980’s” then…it’s really all about 1981-1985…OK then, that would be when:
-U.S. oil production rose (for the very last time in history)…kiss those days goodbye BTW due to Peak Oil (see below), which occured in the U.S. back in 1970…ooppps…
-there was more turmoil in the Middle East with the U.S. boycott of Libyan oil & the Iran-Iraq War
-the Windfall Profits Tax was in effect
So, the price of oil indeed dropped during this time-frame when there was a shift from oil consumption to alternate energy sources in this country. New passenger car fuel economy rose from 17 mpg in 1978 to more than 22 mpg in 1982, and the CAFE standards stopped rising back in…the mid-1980s!
Peak Oil, which occurred in our allies in:
Japan: 1932
Germany: 1966
France: 1988
New Zealand: 1997
UK: 1999
Norway: 2000
Mexico: 2003
Australia: 2004
and which will occur (if you believe their claims about “proven” oil reserves, which are false BTW) in:
Iraq: 2018
Kuwait: 2013
We consume more oil in the U.S. right now than Japan & most of Europe *combined* BTW. Ethanol is merely a stop-gap measure until *real* alternative energy sources can be exploited…you know, those ones like electric cars that were squashed in part by Big Oil & the car companies.
ANWR (you know, the place that Eisenhower orginally protected?) only contains about a few months worth of oil in it. All of our remaining oil reserves in the U.S. only contain about a year or two of oil supply in them as well. Drilling for more of a small, finite resource is only putting off the envitable…we need to get off the oil habit & fast!
Keep moving that threshold for the debate on the issues BTW…
Mr. Guy, do you have sources for your claim that ANWR only contains a few months worth of oil, and all of our remaining oil reserves in the U.S. only contain about a year or two supply?
This is not consistent with what I’ve heard, though I don’t have sources off hand to support the figures I’ve heard, either. I’d like to compare data sources to analyze the discrepancies.
Alan, do you by chance have any sources on the quantities of oil available in untapped U.S. oil reserves? (Otherwise, I’ll have to look them up, myself… =:[] )
Mr. Guy,
Please, please, stop I’m laughing so hard I might burn the dinner I’m in the middle of cooking. I have to keep this short right now.
I will just address one of your talking points .You say Anwr only has a few months of supply. You are not talking to one of your green zombies. In case you don’t know, we would not be only pumping out of Anwr. It would supplement our other supplies. Depending on how much is really there, we would be pumping for 2 or 3 decades. Over that time I am quite sure the savings would be more than 1 cent per gallon.
Believe it or not,I do agree that in the very long run we will transition out of oil. It’s just that intentionally restricting supply as you will force us to do is economic suicide. I predict that Obama’s green collar economy will be a bust. Unfortunately, at present more Americans agree with you than me. I WISH you were right and I was wrong.
Not Your Daddy,
I do not have good sources on untapped oil reserves. It’s hard to find ‘good’ sources on anything in this field. I did a fast search for estimates on ANWR and found this. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arctic_Refuge_drilling_controversy
“A 1998 United States Geological Survey (USGS) study indicated at least 4.3 billion (95% probability) and possibly as much as 11.8 billion (5% probability) barrels (0.9 to 2.5 km³) of technically recoverable oil exists in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge 1002 area, with a mean value of 7.7 billion barrels”
http://www.sibelle.info/oped15.htm
“95% probability of being able to technically recover 4.254 billion barrels of oil, and a 5% probability of recovering 11.8 billion barrels of oil.”
According to my math that is 531.75 billion to 1475 billion dollars that we would not be sending to OPEC.
Now there might be no oil in ANWR at all. However since the evil oil companies would pay to find out, it would cost us nothing. The environmental impact would be minimal.
Sometimes I think that the whole environmental movement in Western society is funded by OPEC.
I haven’t had time to search on http://tonto.eia.doe.gov/oog/info/twip/twip.asp which is the US gov. site to see their figures. Their price predictions on oil for the recent past have been terrible. I’ve looked on the American Petroleum Institute’s site, but can’t find it.
Thank you, Alan.
Your turn, Mr. Guy.
Mr. Guy,
If they would pay me to shoot holes in your arguments I could make a career out of you. I started reading your earlier posts and this comment struck me, “You’re also missing the point…for example, the point of getting a hybrid now is so that in the future you can easily convert it to a plug-in hybrid & be done with gasoline entirely (that’s what I plan to do).”
Why would you invest in a transitional technology, when you could buy a new “plug-in hybrid” if that becomes the dominate technology?
Frankly I would not hold my breath waiting for that anyway. Since you are against nuclear power the electricity to charge your “plug-in hybrid” will cost more than the gasoline you used to buy when you were still melting the polar ice caps.
The U.S.’s proven oil reserves are a little less than 21 gigabarrels as of 2007, a 46% decline from the 39 gigabarrels it had in 1970. These reserves *alone* could satisfy U.S. demand for only three years.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oil_reserves#United_States
https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/rankorder/2178rank.html
The key part to these numbers is how much they would statisfy U.S. demand (which will likely continue to increase with time) alone. That’s *real* energy independance IMO.
There are presently no roads within or leading into ANWR.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arctic_National_Wildlife_Refuge
Having total oil independence and using all the oil in ANWR would only supply the United States for 525 days.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arctic_Refuge_drilling_controversy#Estimates_of_oil_reserves
“Why would you invest in a transitional technology, when you could buy a new ‘plug-in hybrid’ if that becomes the dominate technology?”
Well gee, if the powers that be hadn’t killed the electric car (it may be making a comeback soon BTW), then I wouldn’t have to buy a hybrid at all after I’ve saved enough money to buy a new car!! Also, if you buy a hybrid now and make the transition to it being a plug-in, it apparently voids the warranty, so it’s better to wait until the warranty runs out IMO.
Nuclear power is a dead end…solar, wind, hydro, tidal, etc….renewable, SUSTAINABLE energy sources are the only way to go at this point IMO.
Not Your Daddy,
I have to apologize for taking up so much of your thread, but I truly love to argue with nice folks such as Mr. Guy. If I become tedious just throw me out.
Mister Guy,
You have an irrational hatred towards energy sources that actually work. I on the other hand do not have an irrational love for those same energy sources. I am perfectly willing to go green when green becomes more than an empty promise.
I am not forcing you to use non-renewable energy. If you want to wrap your home in solar panels, kill birds with windmills in your front yard, and drive a hybrid, go for it. Just stop forcing me to over pay for fuel, and pay a carbon tax.
By the way you do know that you are killing both the trucking and airline industries. Wait, those workers will all get green collar jobs inspecting homes to make sure no one is using incandescent light bulbs.
Alan, you’re welcome to take up as much of any thread on this blog as you like. As is Mr. Guy.
I’m happy to provide a forum for debate on interesting and controversial issues. I find these discussions very informative and I appreciate all substantive contributions!
Mr. Scott, I’m sorry, but your posts here so far have been short on facts and long on mouth. First you want to talk about the mid-1980s, then the early 1980s, then ANWR, and now you’re just rambling & repeating GOP talking points (windmills killing birds & shilling for completely inefficient & archaic light bulbs)…yawn…who the hell mentioned anything about a carbon tax here?? Your constant bobbing & weaving is boring the hell out of me…
The powers that be for the last 40 years or so have worked *damn* hard to get those oil prices through the roof…dismissing alternative energy sources & energy conservation/efficiency efforts, causing continuous instability in the Middle East, and giving tax breaks to companies & industries that didn’t need them in the first place. How does it make sense to give a larger tax break to someone that wants to purchase a Hummer instead of a hybrid? Where have everyone’s long-term planning skills gone??
What I have sir is a rational argument that says that we shouldn’t continue to focus on finite energy resources that are going to go away VERY soon, and instead we should try & focus on renewable energy sources that will never fade away, period.
Imagine if someone told you with “great certainty” that there was a $100 bill buried several hundred feet under the ground in your backyard. Would you spend the time, money, and effort digging it up? I certainly hope not, because you’d be wasting your time…and in that time that you’d waste in that endeavour you could be out making several times that amount of money out in a real job. Drilling for more oil is the same thing…we’re waaaay past the point that either ourselves or our allies can drill ourselves out of the mess that we’re in.
Why send more money & troops to the Middle East when there are viable energy sources available right here in our own backyards?? Wake up…
Mr.Guy,
I can match you fact for fact, because I have researched everything I’ve said. I even know the history of the competition between alcohol fuels and petroleum going back to the late 1800’s and the first internal combustion engines. Modesty and the fact that I would bore everyone here to death, keep me from expounding on this.
You are the one who is all over the map. You can’t stick to one train of thought. I even know more about your side than you do because I truly was trying to see if any of the new technologies were soon to be practical. Do you even know which of the alcohol fuels is most compatible with current gasoline engines? Here is a hint, it ain’t ethanol.
You have thrown out so many facts that are not facts, it’s hard to know where to start. Let’s pick an easy one. “Nuclear power is a dead end”
You have heard of France, have you not? It’s a country in the very heart the eco-crazy European Union. Here is an article on what the French are doing with your ” dead end”. http://www.acdis.uiuc.edu/research/OPs/Pederson/html/contents/sect2.html
Granted towards the end of the article it says that the French have to constantly find new uranium sources, but they seem to be able to manage that.
Here is a new wrinkle. The Senate has just voted to tell President Bush to stop filling the Strategic Oil Reserve. Presently 70,000 barrels per day is going in there. http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,355256,00.html
Could someone explain to me why the Senators that say 5 to 12 billion barrels of oil in ANWR is so insignificant that drilling for it is not worth it, then suddenly these same wise men and women think that adding 70,000 barrels per day to the market IS significant???
Is the US Senate now ready to unrepeal the law of supply and demand?
Yea, France gets a lot of their energy from nuclear. They also recycle at least some of the waste that they generate…we apparently don’t. Nor can we widely match their claim that: “The average age of a French reactor is only thirteen years.” I *wish* that were the case in this country. It also sounds like they are coming to the end of the line in terms of their home-mined uranium, which is bad given the fact that uranium resources will be *exhausted within 80 years*.
Nuclear energy is not only a dead end…it’s a dead end that leaves us with hazardous nuclear waste dump sites in this country at every nuclear power plant for many, many centuries to come….forget that fact that they are ALL terrorist targets.
“Do you even know which of the alcohol fuels is most compatible with current gasoline engines?”
Now you’re going to switch the conversation AGAIN to something else? I’m in favor of ANY fuels that can be used as a stop gap measure to displace oil & gas use in this country so that we can stretch out the dwindling supply of oil at our disposal and give us more time to develop energy alternatives. How hard a concept is that to understand??
Moves with the Strategic Oil Reserve are mostly symbolic since it only stores around 60 days worth of oil in it. Any amount of release from the U.S. Strategic Oil Reserve would do some good for short-term oil & gas prices in our country.
Let me spell it out for you on ANWR since your head appears to be thicker than most nuclear plant containment shields. The oil that is or isn’t under ANWR hasn’t been drilled out of the ground yet…the oil in the Strategic Oil Reserve has! In the DECADES that it would take to get the roughly one year’s amount of oil out of ANWR (make note of the fact that there is completely and totally ZERO infrastructure there right now) we could have made a HUGE amount of progress in terms of getting our country off of oil dependance entirely. Heck, if we had started doing this 35 years ago when it was originally proposed, we might be done by now!!
“Modesty and the fact that I would bore everyone here to death, keep me from expounding on this.”
“I even know more about your side than you do”
Sure, sure…lol…you seem to be nowhere near as smart of you might think you are Mr. Scott…
Mr. Guy,
You said, “we could have made a HUGE amount of progress in terms of getting our country off of oil dependance entirely. Heck, if we had started doing this 35 years ago when it was originally proposed, we might be done by now!!”
We proved that you cannot just conserve your way out of an energy crisis during the late 70’s. No matter how much we conserve, our population continues to grow. Give me one place in the world where your solutions are working with a growing population and economy.
You said,”I’m in favor of ANY fuels that can be used as a stop gap measure to displace oil & gas use in this country so that we can stretch out the dwindling supply of oil at our disposal and give us more time to develop energy alternatives. How hard a concept is that to understand??”
I seek clarity. I find contradictions with in your arguments. You talk about our dwindling supplies of oil and natural gas yet you are in favor of making them dwindle as fast as possible by restricting new supplies. These new supplies will buy us time until your pie in the sky solutions work. How hard a concept is that to understand??
I not only can match you fact for fact, if I want to I can bury you in them, but in the spirit of trying to understand your side maybe you could distill your position down to a couple of core beliefs.
Is it global warming? Is it a hatred for American capitalism? Is it guilt for American prosperity? Is it the balance of payments deficit?
I can summarize my position down to 2 or 3 basic ideas , can you?
More hot air and NO facts from you Mr. Scott. This is fun, but you’re making it too easy for me though.
“We proved that you cannot just conserve your way out of an energy crisis during the late 70’s.”
Oh? So, of course, you must not remember the following being implemented (mostly in the mid-1970s):
-the national maximum speed limit of 55 mph to help reduce consumption
-daylight savings time
-utilities providing residential consumers with energy conservation audits & other services to encourage slower growth of electricity demand
-the implementation of CAFE regulations, which caused automakers to downsize existing automobile categories as mandated by the U.S. DOT and phase out the traditional front engine/rear wheel drive layout in favor of the more efficient front engine/front wheel drive
-NASCAR reduced all race distances by 10%, at the Indianapolis 500…qualifying was reduced from 4 days down to 2 & several days of practice were eliminated
What do you think the 80s “oil glut” was caused by? This was, in part, due to reduced demand through energy conservation that was spurred by high fuel prices! The U.S. imported 28% of its oil in 1982-1983, which was down from 46.5% in 1977, due to lower consumption.
“yet you are in favor of making them dwindle as fast as possible by restricting new supplies.”
Apparently, you don’t know how to read either…so let’s review…employing energy efficieny and conservation techniques allows us to use LESS energy, which allows our limited, finite energy reserves to last *longer*. You refuse to acknowledge that the days of drilling for more oil and massively boosting supplies are gone, which is fine…ignore the reality of Peak Oil…it’ll get you a long way for sure…lol…
“These new supplies will buy us time until your pie in the sky solutions work”
LOL…these “new supplies” that you keep talking about are buried deep in the ground and can’t be extracted for DECADES…lol…there’s almost no time left to continue the same ole same ole…wake up!
“Give me one place in the world where your solutions are working with a growing population and economy.”
Just one…how about 5 or 6 instead? If you learned to read, you could just scroll up and look at what’s already been done at several places in the Northeast USA.
Or, you could look to (of all places) the UAE emirate of Abu Dhabi. The UAE does not believe that relying on oil revenues is sustainable (sound familiar?), and they are moving to diversify their economy. Besides allotting land for solar power plants & partnering with MIT to build an alternative energy research institute, they are building a new city (Masdar) near Abu Dhabi which will rely entirely on solar energy with a sustainable, zero-carbon, zero-waste ecology. By relying on sustainable energy sources, keeping cars out of the city, returning to older architectural conventions (such as reducing air conditioning costs with large tents & narrow spaces between buildings), using sewage to produce energy & create soil, taking advantage of all recycling opportunities (including for & from construction), and reusing gray water, Masdar is designed to be a city which will consume NO OIL.
I would also say that if the UK, Sweden, and Cuba can plan to be more efficient and phase out the old ways of doing thing with respect to energy, so can we.
I LOVE how I own you on issue after issue and then you keep switching the argument that you want to have with me…LOL…it’s hillarious!
“I can summarize my position down to 2 or 3 basic ideas, can you?”
I can summarize *your* argument in 4 WORDS…more of the same…lol…good luck with the same failed policies…
I don’t believe in global warming. Mixed economies are proven to work the best. I’m not against prosperity either, but more of the same rich getting richer and poor getting poorer isn’t the way that I’d prefer to go tuvm. The “balance of payments” (or as I would call it…our trade deficit) doesn’t really bother me too much. What does any of that have to do with the discussion that we were having though? LOL…
“I not only can match you fact for fact, if I want to I can bury you in them”
No you can’t, and you know it…
I wanted a short and sweet answer from you. It certainly wasn’t short. I learned one new thing, you are not a global warming nut. I find it useful to strip away all of the secondary issues that my opposition uses as a smoke screen and try to find what they are really after.
You mentioned the poor getting poorer and the rich getting richer. This makes me believe that you have certain socialist leanings such as the Robin Hood syndrome so popular with today’s politicians. Instead of enabling the poor to rise, the rich must sink to achieve equality.
This is relevant because solving the energy question has always been more of a political problem than a technical one.
On my next post I hope to rip your green energy success examples to shreds.
“I find it useful to strip away all of the secondary issues that my opposition uses as a smoke screen and try to find what they are really after.”
Let me translate that for you…you like to change the subject when it’s apparent that you are losing an argument. It’s not like I haven’t seen these tactics employed before yanno.
“This is relevant because solving the energy question has always been more of a political problem than a technical one.”
Baloney…energy issues are issues of science and facts, period. The fact that we desperately need to move away from finite sources of energy is politically undebateable IMO.
Supply-side economics is a dead issue now. It hasn’t worked under several different administrations and under *both* party’s control of Congress over the last 35 years or so. There is no “trickle down”, period.
“On my next post I hope to rip your green energy success examples to shreds.”
I’ll be waiting with bated breath to hear some more of your GOP talking points…lol…
Mr. Guy,
Do you even have a sense of humor? You should be happy because the country is going your way right now and even Senator McCain sounds like a left wing hippie when it comes to energy and saving the planet.
I find it instructive that you point to the period of 1982-83 and note that oil imports had dropped from 46.5% in 1977 to 28% in 83 because of less consumption. You also realize that the one sure cure for cancer is to shoot the patient in the head.
During 1982-83 I happened to be out of work. I was fortunate, because many of my friends were unemployed for 3 years during and after your golden age of conservation.
You mentioned 55 mph, energy conservation audits,”-NASCAR reduced all race distances by 10%, at the Indianapolis 500…qualifying was reduced from 4 days down to 2 & several days of practice were eliminated”. Those are acts of desperation. Those days sucked. What you conveniently leave out is all the people who reduced their petroleum usage by switching to the greatest alternative fuel in the universe, to heat their homes, namely COAL.
You say that increased drilling for domestic oil and let me add natural gas, had a very minor role in reducing energy prices in 1985. Actually let me correct myself, oil prices crashed in 1986.
All of the conservation in the world would not have mattered if US oil and natural gas production had not remained steady during the period of 1980 to 85. That would not have happened with out massive drilling. You keep pointing out that US oil production will never reach previous levels, so you conclude that drilling is useless. The country will just return to your glorious days of yesteryear and find out the hard way AGAIN. We will have to drill massively again just to maintain our existing production. Do you really think that conservation and solar cells can replace 20,000,000 barrels of oil per day??????
Since your side forbade drilling in ANWR and off the coasts of Oregon, Caleefornia, and Florida it sure has not worked or I could still afford to take that vacation I’m not taking this year.
I asked you for examples of where your alternatives were working. Again you failed miserably. You mention what’s been done in NE US but, I admit I can’t find it.
Abu Dhabi may be doing all you say but they ain’t off oil right now are they? They sure aren’t givin up drillin are they?
Now lift yourself off of the canvass and answer the bell for the next round.
Well, just to add insult to injury in terms of the early 1980s, not only did U.S. oil imports decline rapidly during that time-frame, U.S. oil production looks to have been nearly flat as well:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:US_Oil_Production_and_Imports_1920_to_2005.png
Sorry to hear that you were unemployed then, but long-term recessions tend to have that effect on people though.
“Those are acts of desperation.”
No, those were sane acts taken to reduce energy consumption, period.
There certainly is more coal left on our planet than there is oil or uranium left. Last time I checked though…you can’t run a car on coal.
“oil prices crashed in 1986″
No, they didn’t…they started to fall way before that, and they actually started to *rise* around-about 1986:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Oil_Prices_1861_2006.jpg
“You keep pointing out that US oil production will never reach previous levels, so you conclude that drilling is useless.”
And you keep denying the *reality* of Peak Oil without providing any facts to back your side up, which is just plain silly IMO.
“Do you really think that conservation and solar cells can replace 20,000,000 barrels of oil per day?”
Did anyone ever say that solar power and energy conservation alone would wipe out where currently 40% of the nation’s energy comes from?? Heck the rest of the world only gets 37% of their energy from oil, and they get roughly 8 times as much energy from biomass (where countries like Germany, Hungary, the Netherlands, and Poland are leading the way). We need to take the lead from other countries around the world that are getting more of their energy from wind (like Spain & Denmark), hydro (like Canada, China, Brazil & India), solar (like Japan & Portugal), and geothermal.
LOL…the fact that the U.S. hasn’t started to waste its time drilling for the roughly year’s worth of oil that we *might* be able to get out of ANWR several DECADES from now has nothing to do with your vacation plans. Bushy Boy has mismanaged our economy so badly that the country is teetering on (if not already in) a recession…that’s why. Lay the blame where the blame belongs…
As far as Oregon, California, and Florida go, you might want to lay some of the blame on the state govt.’s of those states as well for the lack of drilling off their coastlines.
“I asked you for examples of where your alternatives were working. Again you failed miserably. You mention what’s been done in NE US but, I admit I can’t find it.”
That’s simply because you don’t know how to read, and you are just plain lazy:
“Once upon a time, there was a government-owned, local utility in the largest ‘city’ in VT (Burlington) that started an energy conservation program in the 1990s. Ten years later, the city was using 10% LESS energy than it was before the start of the program, and no…the city didn’t shrink or turn pitch-black at night.
Once upon around-about the same time, a former co-worker of mine built himself a house up along the New York/Quebec border…mostly with his own labor and time. He super-well insulated it, and he added both solar panels & a small wind turbine to his property. He’s never paid a NYSEG electricity bill to my knowledge, ever. He was even ‘off-the-grid’ for the first decade or so that he lived in his new house…not by choice either, but that’s a longer story.”
Cuba:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special_Period
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_Crisis_and_The_Power_of_Community:_How_Cuba_Survived_Peak_Oil
Sweden:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oil_phase-out_in_Sweden
the UK:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_use_and_conservation_in_the_United_Kingdom
The point is you idiot that the UAE has roughly *5 times the amount of oil* at its disposal than we do right now, and they are taking real steps NOW to become less dependant on oil! Wake up!!!
“Now lift yourself off of the canvass and answer the bell for the next round.”
Enjoy living in your fantasy world Mr. Scott…lol…the bout is already over…you lost…ding ding…
Mr. Guy,
I see that my joke about the cure for cancer went right over your head. Sure your stuff will work, as long as you don’t mind severely lowered living standards. You might enjoy living in a cave, cooking over a solar stove, or better yet since you cited that socialist paradise, living as a slave of the Castro brothers. I want a better life.
If you are going to cite examples of green success, please give me some references from reputable sources so that I can independently check out what you say. Not that I don’t trust your word, but I fear you may have been brain washed, ahh sorry I mean mislead by your handlers. I have a rather large book myself with many pages that begin with “Once upon a time”, it is called Grimm’s Fairy Tales.
Now just to show you how it should be done I leave you with this modest effort on my part. This site is referencing a Wall Street Journal article,you may have heard of that little paper, comparing government subsidies of competing electricity sources.
http://www.ncpa.org/sub/dpd/index.php?Article_ID=16532
Excerpts: ” * For electricity generation, the EIA concludes that solar energy is subsidized to the tune of $24.34 per megawatt hour, wind $23.37 and “clean coal” $29.81.
* By contrast, normal coal receives 44 cents, natural gas a mere quarter, hydroelectric about 67 cents and nuclear power $1.59.”
Mr.Guy,
I ran a little long on my last post and I regretfully neglected to address some points which evidently are vitally important to you.
You said “Last time I checked though…you can’t run a car on coal.” True but we may be able to run our trucks on it. There is a pilot program in Schuylkill County, Pa to turn coal waste in to diesel fuel. No wait the environmentalists have it tied up in lawsuits even though it is backed by the Democratic Governor. Sorry.
Further you said, “And you keep denying the *reality* of Peak Oil without providing any facts to back your side up, which is just plain silly IMO.”
I don’t out right deny it, I just question whether anyone can truly know that. You are obviously very young. When you have lived as long as I have, you’ve see a lot of fads, so called FACTS come and go. As an example I submit the following excerpt:
New York Times
Published November 20, 1921
” While alcohol may not be used directly in the manufacture of textiles,automobiles or sugar, any chemist can draw a flow sheet to show its relation to some to some of the contributing industries. Furthermore, petroleum experts issued a warning at the last meeting of the American Chemical Society in Rochester ( April, 1921 ) in regard to the visible supply of liquid fuels. They pointed out that, in fifteen to twenty years, the rapidly diminishing supply of petroleum will compel the world to turn to some other source for liquid fuel. The only possible solution of the problem in this distressingly short time is alcohol. ”
http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?res=980DE6DB1539E133A25753C2A9679D946095D6CF
I’m really sorry to have to say this Mr. Scott, but we have a word that is used quite frequently on the Internet to describe people like you…*troll*. You start shooting your mouth off about a topic that you obviously do not want to be educated about, and you don’t even bother to read the *entire thread* (who knows if you even read the original posting from NYD) before you start to run your mouth! The second link that you tried to post doesn’t even go anywhere! I could give you a couple of dozen more real links to real information that would make your face pucker, but what’s the point, since you never even bother to read anything?? Give me a break…but by all means…don’t bother to read any of the following:
http://www.eesi.org/programs/Smartgrowth/cs.stdy.burl.vt.htm
http://www.burlingtonelectric.com/bed/perfmeas.htm
“Sure your stuff will work, as long as you don’t mind severely lowered living standards.”
Another hollow GOP talking point…NO ONE is saying that we need to go back to the good ole days of the Middle Ages before electricity and mass transit, period. No one that is serious is advocating for a communist takeout either you dolt. The point of the Cuban experience is that they have roughly 21 times *less* oil resources at their disposal than we do, and the main source for their oil fix went belly up a while back. What’s going to happen to us when our main sources of oil go belly up as well?? Have you ever heard of planning for the future?? I guess not…
Ah, so you use an editorial from the Right-wing WSJ that apparently originated from a Right-wing think tank as unbiased “evidence”. I see how your mind works…not very well, which is why Peak Oil is just a “fad” to you.
It’s called science you buffoon! I mean sure, Hubbert first used the Peak Oil theory in *1956* to accurately predict that U.S. oil production would peak between 1965-1970, and the Hubbert peak theory has since been used to predict the peak petroleum production of many other countries…but I’m sure that it will just go the way of the hula hoop.
Seriously though…I think that I’ve humored you enough now…you obviously have nothing to contribute to this discussion. Go back to your cave troll…
Mr. Guy,
I do apologize for the bad link. It is however a real article published in 1921 saying that oil would run out
in the late 1930s- early 40s. It was of course by that right wing think tank the New York Times.
You said “You start shooting your mouth off about a topic that you obviously do not want to be educated about,”. Gee that sounds like the education camps that Joe Stalin used to run in the good old days. And I’ve been called far worse than a troll.
The writing on your links is even fuzzier than what you write.
Now for some useful and clear information. Can you tell me why Brazil, the only country that produces mass quantities of alternative fuel in an economically viable way (ETHANOL), would bother to look for oil?????
http://www.brazzilmag.com/content/view/8998/54/
Excerpts: “Petrobras has also just announced that it will invest US$ 54.8 billion in exploration, production, commercialization and refinement of oil and natural gas in the first year of its Business Plan for the five-year period from 2008 to 2112.”
That’s a lot of money to waste in a dead end energy source.
Excerpt: “The finding contains light petroleum and is located 280 kilometers (174 miles) from the shore at a depth of 5,350 meters (17,552 feet).”
Not many countries have the engineering ability to drill at 17,000ft. Wouldn’t they do better using that genius to build state of the art , I don’t know ,uhh wind farms?
Mr. Guy,
I am guilty of not fully reading the articles in your links. I find them loaded with irrelevant material. I at least have had the courtesy to excerpt the important points from my links. Through sheer force of will I read the articles that you posted. They are incredibly boring.
When I asked you to give me examples of where green was currently working, that is what I expected. I find a lot of references to urban sprawl, future energy savings, carbon emissions. The only legitimate example of renewable energy in quantity I could glean was of a wood burning plant in Vermont.
Wood is a renewable resource. However, if you think 300 million people should go back to wood, I can give you links to the deforestation that was rampant in the 1850s. Guess what brought back the trees, coal? For that matter, what saved the whales back then, Mr. Greenpeace? Can you say Petroleum?
This is just silliness.
“Gee that sounds like the education camps that Joe Stalin used to run in the good old days.”
Is all that you have to offer…more (literal) red herrings??
“Can you tell me why Brazil, the only country that produces mass quantities of alternative fuel in an economically viable way (ETHANOL), would bother to look for oil?”
For the same reason that they are looking into joining up with OPEC…to export it & make money off all those countires out there (ourselves included) that aren’t planning for the future and are still using massive quantities of oil, period. This would be along the same lines as to why the oil companies suppress the development of real alternatives to their product. The fact is that even though oil supplies worldwide are dwindling rapidly…there still are *trillions & trillions* of dollars left to be made in selling oil. Do you think they really care that the oil will run dry within this centiry? Of course not…all they see is dollar signs. The fact is that your side wants to coddle the oil industry and play right into their greedy, lil hands, period. Science doesn’t matter…facts & figures don’t matter…all that matters on your side is blind ideology that sez that things must be done this way because that’s the way that they’ve always been done. What’s good for a small set of big businesses is what’s fine with you, period.
It is indeed true that Brazil is the world’s largest ethanol producer. Brazil’s ethanol fuel is produced from sugar cane, the world’s largest crop in both production & export tonnage. With the 1973 oil crisis the Brazilian government initiated in 1975 the Pró-Álcool or Programa Nacional do Álcool (National Alcohol Program), which was a nation-wide program financed by the govt. to replace automobile fuels derived from fossil fuels in favor of ethanol. The program successfully reduced the number of cars running on gasoline in Brazil by 10 million, thereby reducing the country’s dependence on oil imports. Brazil is also the third largest hydroelectricity producer in the world after China & Canada. In 2004, hydropower accounted *83% of Brazil power production*. Brazil co-owns the Itaipu hydroelectric power plant on the Paraná River, which is the world’s largest hydroelectric power plant by energy generation. Imagine if we had learned our lessons from the 1970s and done even *some* of what a country like Brazil has done in the last quarter century!
Of course, you gloss over the fact that for the city of Burlington, VT:
“Overall electricity use in 2007 was only 1% greater than in 1989. Thus, we are meeting the needs of a growing local economy with about the same amount of electricity as we used 18 years ago. Without energy efficiency, Burlington’s (electricity) load would have been 17% more in 2007 than it was in 1989.”
So much for conservation being a waste of time & money eh? And so much for you having anything meaningful to say. I’ve wasted over a week dealing with the likes of you…go back to your closed minded way of thinking.
Mr. Guy,
Since you are incapable of showing me any examples of green power actually producing energy in large quantities and at reasonable costs, I will give you an example of green failure. Unlike the junk that you post, this is readable. Pay close attention to how a bunch of green idiots took a 900 megawatt nuclear plant and converted it to a 4 megawatt solar plant and then wondered why their electric rates are among the highest in the country and why they had rolling black outs. You are really going to have to spin fast to answer this.
http://www.manhattan-institute.org/html/_wsj_californias_energy_colonialism.htm
Mr. Guy,
I forgot to answer this, you said. “So much for conservation being a waste of time & money eh? And so much for you having anything meaningful to say. I’ve wasted over a week dealing with the likes of you…go back to your closed minded way of thinking.”
You have as yet gotten nothing straight that I have tried mightily to pour in to your head. I am all for conservation. I am all for alternative energy. What I am not for is restricting energy supplies. We have not found any intelligent life on Planet Green.
“Since you are incapable of showing me any examples of green power actually producing energy in large quantities and at reasonable costs”
Talking at you is like talking to a brick…only bricks can read & comprehend things better than you apparently do.
“I am all for conservation. I am all for alternative energy. What I am not for is restricting energy supplies.”
News flash…you’re NOT in favor of conservation then. Conservation involves doing things more efficiently and using LESS energy in the process. No, that doesn’t mean living in the dark and cooking by candlelight either you moron.
Yet again, you try and pawn off an opinion piece from the Right-wing WSJ penned by none other than some Right-wing flunkie that hangs out with the likes of Glenn Beck & Neil Cavuto from FOX “News” and who was involved in developing GWB’s “National Energy Policy in 2001″…yawn…
The Rancho Seco Nuclear Generating Station had a lifetime capacity average of only 39% of those potential 913 MWe BTW. On March 20, 1978, a failure of power supply for the plant’s non-nuclear instrumentation system lead to steam generator dryout, which was the third highest ranked failure at a U.S. nuclear facility (second highest if one omits the actual disaster at Three Mile Island).
“The degree to which rapacious power-company executives and traders were responsible for the shortages remains open to debate.”
LOL!!! The CA electricity crisis (also known as the Western Energy Crisis) of 2000-2001 resulted from the gaming of the partially deregulated CA energy system by energy companies such as Enron & Reliant Energy, period. CA was the first state to deregulate its energy market. In a market technique known as “megawatt laundering”, wholesalers bought up electricity in CA to sell out of state, creating shortages. In some instances, wholesalers overscheduled power transmission to create congestion and drive up prices. Many trading strategies employed by Enron & other companies violated the anti-gaming provisions by economic withholding & inflated price bidding. GOP-backed electricity deregulation in action baby!! You haven’t learned a thing from history…man, are you stupid…
Mr. Guy,
What kind of work do you do? Most of us have our opinions shaped by out occupations. I am always curious as to how a mind set such as yours evolved.
As for occupations, I’m glad that I’m not in the heating oil business. Along with the truckers they are being hurt by your foolishness.
http://tonto.eia.doe.gov/oog/info/twip/twip.asp
Excerpt: ” The latest data shows that the number of households using distillate fuel oil (also known as heating oil) for their main space heating fuel has declined steadily from its peak of 17.2 million homes in 1973. By 1980, EIA estimated that 13.4 million homes (16 percent) of U.S. homes were heating with fuel oil; 8.2 million were in the Northeast Census Region, which comprises the New England and Middle Atlantic Census Divisions. Data from the 2005 Residential Energy Consumption Survey (RECS) now show the number of U.S. homes heating with fuel oil has fallen by more than half to 7.7 million homes (6.9 percent of the U.S.).”
Mr. Guy,
The California electrical mess is a reflection of what your ideology has been doing to MY country. Pretend that you are replacing existing energy resources with renewables that do not fill the gap. Fill the gap with imports from other areas and then complain when charlatans from those other states or other nations royally screw you over.
When you act stupid the world lines up to help you on your way.
Mr.Guy,
As I reread our conversations I find little revelations which confirm my suspicions that you are a anti-capitalist. You care more about promoting green political control than the well being of your fellow American citizens. I refer to this exchange.
I said,
““I am all for conservation. I am all for alternative energy. What I am not for is restricting energy supplies.”
You answered,
“News flash…you’re NOT in favor of conservation then. Conservation involves doing things more efficiently and using LESS energy in the process. No, that doesn’t mean living in the dark and cooking by candlelight either you moron.”
Let’s see, you called me a Troll, a Brick, and now I’m a Moron.
Again I find so many inconsistencies in your positions that I question your ability to reason. Since you believe in cutting domestic oil production in order to spur conservation, why not just ban the importation of 14 million barrels per day of oil. By your logic wouldn’t that work even better??????????
[...] presents Save the Dinosaurs posted at Government is not your Daddy., saying, “The environmentalists keep insisting that [...]
Just keep right on changing the subject after I own on topic after topic…lol…
I’m a scientist, therefore I am swayed by facts & figures, and I try real hard not to cling to half-truths & falsehoods like you do.
Heating oil businesses & truckers are being hurt just like everyone else is in the joke that our Bush economy has become. Do you know why less people use oil to heat their homes now? It’s because they can get a better deal using other types of energy, period. I’m sure the horse trolley industry suffered a lot in the days gone by…so what?
Keep sticking your head in the sand on the CA crisis, and by all means don’t read up on anything to learn more about it:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_electricity_crisis
BTW, I am anti-capitalism, and I’m pro-mixed economy, which is what most (if not all) of the sucessful world economies are these days. Even the good ole USA is a mixed economy…wake up fool…
If you really think that continuing more of the same failed policies on energy that this country has been doing for decades is good for “your fellow American citizens”, then you must be dumber than I originally thought.
“Since you believe in cutting domestic oil production in order to spur conservation, why not just ban the importation of 14 million barrels per day of oil. By your logic wouldn’t that work even better?”
LOL…domestic oil production is doomed…just like oil production across the rest of the world. Peak Oil is real & not just some fad that will go away because you want to wish it away. The only thing that is needed to “spur” conservation is for the govt. at all levels to embrace it & encourage others to do things more efficiently. As I’ve pointed out before, this works, not that you & Dick Cheney would admit that though.
We “only” use about 20 million barrels of oil per day, the maximum that we can refine is about 17 million barrels per day, and we only import around 12 millions barrels of oil per day (mostly from Canada, Saudi Arabia, Venezuela, Mexico, Nigeria, Iraq, Norway, Angola, and the UK).
http://thirdworldtraveler.com/Oil_watch/World_Oil%20_Table.html
http://www.eia.doe.gov/emeu/aer/txt/ptb1109.html
GREEN CONSERVATION
I hope Mr. Guy and his friends are happy with all of the conservation they are causing. If they can just put a few more truckers out of business by idling their rigs, maybe the polar bears will smile.
http://www.usnews.com/blogs/beyond-the-barrel/2008/3/27/fuel-pain-prompting-some-truckers-to-park.html
Hmmmm…I wrote a response to most of the above the other day, but it doesn’t seem to have showed up yet. Maybe I’ll try again later…without any weblinks this time…oh well…
As for those truckers potentially going on strike, I say more power to them. The Bush administration has worked awfully hard to get those gas prices up so high. I support suspending “all state and federal fuel taxes” BTW…as long as we find a way to do that without blowing a huge whole in our federal & state transportation budgets, which our Senator Sanders has a plan for.
Mr. Guy, there’s a problem with the Akismet spam filter that WordPress uses. It automatically marks anything with more than 3 links as “potential spam,” and potential spam is supposed to sit in the moderation queue until I approve it. Unfortunately, there seems to be a bug in Akismet that deletes spam (and apparently also “potential spam” ) much too frequently. I usually check the spam filter at least once a day, but often the spam count shoots up and, when I check it, there’s nothing there.
I recently changed the parameter to allow the maximum number of links (10) without triggering the “potential spam” queue, but I don’t know if that worked, and it may even have had the opposite effect. I’ve complained to WordPress about the buggy Akismet spam software, but they say there’s nothing they can do about it.
I apologize if your post was deleted. Data loss sucks. I just checked the spam filtere and it’s empty. The buggy spam filter is the only thing I don’t like about hosting my blog on WordPress.
That’s OK…I know that managing spam can be a pain in the butt. I’ll try & post again later today.
Mister Guy,
Please,please tell me that even you think this is stupid!
” House passes bill to sue OPEC over oil prices ”
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20080520/pl_nm/congress_opec_dc
So, let’s try this again. I’m a scientist, which means that facts & figures are more important to me than half-truths & falsehoods.
As far as the heating oil business and the trucking industry, pretty much *all* sectors of the Bush economy have been hurting due to massive mismanagement by his govt….lay the blame where the blame belongs. Why have more & more households trended away from heating oil? Because they can find better deals using other types of energy sources to heat their homes, period. I’m sure a while back the horse-drawn trolley industry took a massive hit for the same reasons…I thought you were *for* progress?
By all means, don’t bother to read up on the CA electricity crisis (or the Western Energy Crisis as it’s known)…you might actually learn something about what *really* happened back in 2000-2001…lol…
I am anti-capitalism, and I’m pro-mixed economy, which has proven to be the most successful type of economy to date…even the good ole USA has one!
“Since you believe in cutting domestic oil production in order to spur conservation, why not just ban the importation of 14 million barrels per day of oil?”
LOL…domestic oil production is *doomed*…just like foreign oil production…that’s why plenty of countries have already started to move away from basing a huge portion of their energy consumption on a finite resource like oil. Do you really think that the “well being of your fellow American citizens” is being helped by continuing down a path to nowhere?
BTW, the NYT recently had an article about how the city of Juneau, AK has cut its electricity use by more than 30% in a matter of weeks. How did they do it? Conservation! Don’t tell Dick Cheney that though.
The USA consumes about 20 million barrels of oil per day, and our maximum refining capacity is about 17 million barrels of oil per day. We consume more oil than any other country in the world (actually, we consume more oil than Japan & most of Europe *combined*), and our production of oil has been outpaced by our oil imports since the early 1990s. We currently import about 12 million barrels of oil per day (mostly from Canada, Saudi Arabia, Venezuela, Mexico, Nigeria, Iraq, Norway, Angola, Algeria, Russia, and the UK). Let me spell that out for you, since you appear to be mentally challenged…even if the USA could drill enough oil out of the ground per day (which it NEVER has been able to do to satisfy this current level of demand), we couldn’t refine it all! The only way forward is to conserve what we have and use it more efficiently.
I laughed when Huckabee in a GOP Presidential debate a while ago said that the govt. should offer a $1billion prize for the design of a car that would get 100 miles/gallon. A car like that was developed (that produced NO emissions) well over a decade ago in CA I believe, and the big car companies bought it up & we never heard about it again! CAFE standards need to be raised drastically IMO. We should at least incentivize being more efficient in energy use and not do the opposite with our public policy…like has been the case in recent years. Breaking OPEC up? Sounds like a great idea to me…
Mister Guy,
I beg your pardon, even though we are on opposite sides of this and other issues, I had reason to believe you were rational. My mistake.
You said “I am anti-capitalism, and I’m pro-mixed economy, which has proven to be the most successful type of economy to date…even the good ole USA has one!”
The anti-capitalism is obvious, but what does pro-mixed economy mean.
You said “I’m a scientist,” What kind, and from what University do you hold your credentials? Mail order and online do not count.
You said, “Let me spell that out for you, since you appear to be mentally challenged…even if the USA could drill enough oil out of the ground per day (which it NEVER has been able to do to satisfy this current level of demand), we couldn’t refine it all!”
You have a narrow mind that is incapable of understanding the most rudimentary aspects of an integrated energy economy. Oil is merely a part of the overall picture. All of the fossil fuels along with hydro and nuclear are part of the whole. As supply or cost in one of those parts becomes a problem, reliance shifts to another part. However, when political forces over rule market forces by restricting SUPPLY the process fails.
You said, “Do you really think that the “well being of your fellow American citizens” is being helped by continuing down a path to nowhere?”
I can only surmise that you are somehow shielded economically from the havoc, the policies of your fellow greens in Congress, have inflicted on the rest of us.
You said,” car that would get 100 miles/gallon. A car like that was developed (that produced NO emissions) well over a decade ago in CA I believe, and the big car companies bought it up & we never heard about it again!”
This comes under the category of , ‘why do I bother’ . In the 1970s, these idiotic stories that were never proven, were rampant. The guy that invented the 100mpg carburetor in his garage that was bought up by the oil companies.
Here is a newsflash Einstein, if any of these inventions had merit, the inventor/developer would be a multi-billionaire.
You said, “By all means, don’t bother to read up on the CA electricity crisis (or the Western Energy Crisis as it’s known)…you might actually learn something about what *really* happened back in 2000-2001…lol…”
I had this same argument 4 years ago with a gentleman who believed what you do. If I had saved the back and forth documentation and posted it now, I would probably crash this site. I’ve forgotten more than you will ever know.
Wow, your ignorance knows no bounds eh? It’s amazing…anyways…
A mixed economy is an economic system that incorporates aspects of more than one economic system. This usually means an economy that contains both private-owned & state-owned enterprises or that combines elements of capitalism & socialism, or a mix of market economy & planned economy characteristics. You know…”ratholes” like the USA, France, Germany, Australia, the UK…they have mixed economies.
“You have a narrow mind that is incapable of understanding the most rudimentary aspects of an integrated energy economy.”
That’s it…keep changing that subject after I completely & totaly own you on the subject of oil imports…lol…too funny…
“As supply or cost in one of those parts becomes a problem, reliance shifts to another part.”
Sure, but then why exactly were you whinning about your buddies in the heating oil industries again?? Oh, because you don’t know what the hell you’re talking about…that’s why… The market will solve everything…sure, keep worshipping at the alter of the market…it really will save your soul…for a price that is.
“I can only surmise that you are somehow shielded economically from the havoc”
Sure…right…let me tell you something…every single time that I begrudingly fill up my car with gas, I say out loud “Thank God we’re in Iraq”. I can’t think of that many people out there that aren’t feeling some pain right now…myself included…that’s what recessions do stupid.
The reality is that right now (not later) cars that are being manufactured in this very country can be easily modified to get 100+ mpg, period.
“If I had saved the back and forth documentation and posted it now, I would probably crash this site. I’ve forgotten more than you will ever know.”
More useless, idle threats from someone who doesn’t know that much in the first place…
Mister Guy,
You said “The reality is that right now (not later) cars that are being manufactured in this very country can be easily modified to get 100+ mpg, period.”
Prove it.
Sheesh…whatever you do, don’t Google “100 mpg car”, because you might find this:
“Steve Lapp, a professor from Ontario, says the moment has nearly arrived. ‘I’ve actually gotten over 100 mpg on some trips in my 2001 Toyota Prius,’ he says. The secret? He mounted solar panels on the car’s roof to keep the batteries charged when the sun is shining.”
http://www.popularmechanics.com/automotive/how_to/3374271.html?page=1
“The ES3, the initials stand for Eco Spirit, achieves 104mpg in the official European fuel consumption tests, a record for a four-seat car.”
http://www.wanttoknow.info/carmileage
“‘In 2001, we put a European Lupo3L (Volkswagen) hypereconomy car through the now-archaic EPA testing and got 80 miles per gallon in the city and 100 on the highway,’ says Keith Price, the public relations manager. ‘So in terms of the X Prize, we wish them well but from our perspective, we’ve been there, done that.’”
http://www.csmonitor.com/2008/0324/p01s14-usec.html?page=1
“If you want a car that will get 100 miles per gallon of fuel, you can build your own right now. … Start with a small car that weighs no more than about 2000 pounds. Many small sedans and hatchbacks from Honda, Toyota, Ford, Geo, Suzuki, Nissan, and the like are available. It must have a standard transmission and a good clutch. Next, throw out (remove and sell) the 80 hp engine it comes with and replace it with a 20 hp diesel engine. EPA certified engines in this range can be purchased from Yanmar. Then connect a belt-drive torque converter between the engine and the manual clutch. These simple transmission systems are used in snowmobiles, ATV’s and Jet-Ski water craft, and are available in power ranges up to 120 hp.
As odd as this may sound, this system will give the following performance. First, mileage will be above 60 mpg in the city and close to 100 mpg on the highway.”
http://www.zpenergy.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=2312
Hmmmm…maybe it wasn’t CA…maybe it was NM instead:
“In the Spring of 77, Mr. Ogle equipped a 1970 Ford Galaxy with his new invention. On less than 2 gallons of gas, Mr. Ogle and a friend drove from El Paso to Deming (NM); a distance of over 200 miles.”
http://www.kvia.com/Global/story.asp?S=4137051
Once again, you’re making this waaaay to easy for me, but it must be hard for you with all your handicaps…lol…
Mister Guy,
I went to your links and it was difficult to get hard information as to what your wonder cars actually looked like and why they are not in production. There must be some technical difficulties. If they were any good, they would be on the market,,period!!! Anyone can take a glorified motorcycle or cover a puddle jumper with solar panels to make a concept car and then coast it downhill to get fantastic results. It doesn’t automatically make it a good production car.
I personally would rather go with proven technology. I believe the Germans have the right idea. I was shown a FULL SIZE 2004 Volkswagon diesel sedan which the owner claims averages 50 mpg cruising at 80 mph. I believe him over you. That is my kind of CONSERVATION.
No solar panels, no kiddie car size, and no freakin hybrid batteries to replace after 5 years. Just high quality German engineering. Not bad for a $24,000 car.
You are living proof that you can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make him drink…or, in your case, a lead a donkey to water…
Never heard of a Toyota Prius eh? I’m not surprised. Still concerned on how “cool” the car looks eh? My 1975 Ford Grand Torino Elite sure looked cool when I drove it ages & ages ago, but it got 6.5 mpg in the city & 10 mpg on the highway. Cool doesn’t quite cut with me anymore. Exactly how often do you get a chance to go 80 MPH for prolonged length of time? LOL…
Mister Guy,
Toyota Prius “48 / 45 MPG” $21,300 ”
I know what they are. I just can never get anything useful out of the crap you link to. Where is the Prius that these people built??????I could not find it!!!!! I can only think that the article was written by a “scientist”.
Here are some snippets from your first link.
“The best choice for building a 100-mpg car would likely be a carbon-fiber composite, which can weigh less than half as much as steel.” “Low-volume production of such large automobile structures is expensive–up to $100,000 per copy-” “How many people would spend $200,000 on a car that would ultimately save them a few thousand dollars on fuel over the life of the car?”
It sure doesn’t sound like they have anything that is worth producing. Why don’t you try to link to ,,,I don’t know,,,information that is useful.
The problem basically is that you don’t know how to read troll…it’s sad. I highlighted the relevant text of that link above. You’ll obviously never learn though.
Mister Guy,
I went to your last link. It was like reading about area 51 in Roswell.
“In the Spring of 77, Mr. Ogle equipped a 1970 Ford Galaxy with his new invention. On less than 2 gallons of gas, Mr. Ogle and a friend drove from El Paso to Deming (NM); a distance of over 200 miles.
As the story goes, before crossing back into Texas, a rock flew underneath the car and punctured the gas tank. None-the-less, history was made. Newspaper articles that weekend quoted other engineers as saying: “this is the hottest thing of this century.” and “Is a young high school dropout the most important American inventor since Thomas Edison?”
ABC-7 has learned that the US Energy and Research Development Administration (now the Department of Energy) declared Mr. Ogle’s vaporized fuel system “not a fake.” Mack Massey thought he saw an opportunity of a lifetime. He immediately became a financial supporter of Mr. Ogle.
Massey tells ABC-7 that, “We took it to the manufacturers, we thought we’d change the world. So did Tom…but we ran into roadblocks. When we got to looking at it, it cost hundreds thousands of dollars.”
To add fuel to the fire, Mr. Massey says it was an invention that would have cost the oil and gas companies billions of dollars. Mr. Massey adds, “If it’s going to put them out of businesses, they’re going to fight!” ”
You are amazing. You post these little fairy tales that you can’t prove independently. This country could not keep the secrets of the atom bomb from the Russians in the 1940s and you want me to believe that car and oil companies were able to suppress the “this is the hottest thing of this century.”
You stated that you were a scientist. I again ask you, in what field and where did you study. I think you are a quack.
Mister Guy,
I’m sorry but you are just so full of,,how can I be tactful,,hot air.
You said, “The problem basically is that you don’t know how to read troll…it’s sad.”
The problem is I am going back through your links and I am actually rereading them. They are even worse the second time around.
I said,
“Sure your stuff will work, as long as you don’t mind severely lowered living standards.”
You said,
“Another hollow GOP talking point…NO ONE is saying that we need to go back to the good ole days of the Middle Ages before electricity and mass transit, period.”
You say that and then you post this.
“BTW, the NYT recently had an article about how the city of Juneau, AK has cut its electricity use by more than 30% in a matter of weeks. How did they do it? Conservation!”
You conveniently left out some facts. I independently checked it out and found this.
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=90755754
Excerpts:
“One month after an avalanche knocked out its connection to a hydroelectric dam, much of Juneau, Alaska, is still relying on diesel back-up generators. Residential electricity rates have gone up about 400 percent.”
“Now members of the Graves family eat dinner by candlelight, do dishes by hand, plan to dry their clothes on a rack by the wood stove, and limit their time on the computer.”
I doubt there is anything you could post that I could not find something misleading with in it.
More “leading a donkey to water” nonsense from you…it’s sad. You are shown the truth as confirmed by several different media sources *and* the U.S. govt., yet you deny the reality of it. You live in a fantasy world of your own making troll.
“I again ask you, in what field and where did you study.”
Why don’t I just post my name and address while I’m at it…no thanx troll…lol…
Read any of this?:
“Threatened with a fivefold increase in utility bills, Juneau quickly powered down.”
“In an effort to cut back on electric use during the energy crisis the department store shut off half of it’s overhead and parking lot lights, lowered the heat and shut off most of its displays according to director Don Bennett. Robertson, who lives in a University of Alaska dorm, said the school is also keeping lights off and heat down but won’t charge those living in student housing more for utilities if they do their part to conserve.”
“Energy conservation is a hard sell in much of the U.S., but Juneau has proved that people will change their ways if the financial incentives are big enough.”
The article also goes on to say how Brazil cut it’s electricity usage by 20 percent & never really returned to their former level of consumption after that.
And what’s wrong with that? They a made a choice…pay higher bills or conserve more. We can either conserve now and develop alternative energy sources (relying one just one source of power…oil, hydro, or otherwise is stupid) or do it all later. I’d prefer doing it now.
You must have attended a very exclusive university, and majored in a highly esoteric field, Mr. Guy, if telling where you went to school and what field you studied would reveal your identity…
Yea, something like that…the reality is that who I really am is completely irrelevant to this conversation. This topic comes up quite often though…usually when my opposition has gotten throughly schooled by me & then they start to wonder who this guy is that’s owning them at almost every turn. I’m no one from nowhere…
Mister Guy,
I only have an associate degree in electronics. I am not bragging that it is my education which entitles me to say what I do. It is my life experience and my wide range of reading and evaluating what has worked and failed in the past. You said you were a scientist, back it up. At least tell us your field of expertise. That surely would not unmask your true identity.
Unlike you, I do not limit my reading to sources that agree with me. I have read a great deal about renewable energy sources and I’ve hoped for them to be true. What I have inevitably found is that they are always long on promises and short on delivery.
I will read about some new solution to energy that is just around the corner and then I’ll remember that I read the same thing 5 years ago.
As far as conservation, you would be proud of me. My personal energy use is very small overall. Not because I believe anything you say, but because I am not a rich liberal ” scientist “. You know what, Mister Scientist Guy, though it has saved me money, it has not helped reduce energy consumption in my area one bit. All the energy that I have ” conserved ” has been ” consumed ” 10,000 times over by all of the new population that has arrived in my area over the last decade.
That is one of the many flaws your logic does not address, population growth.
I am eagerly waiting further schooling by you. All I ask is that you no longer post misleading and unclear garbage.
Since Mister Guy seems to have left with his tail between his legs, I feel I must pick up his side of the argument. I really am not at all against alternative energy, although I believe that wind and solar will never be more than 10% of any modern country’s energy supply.
My two favorite alternative energy sources are methane gas hydrates and butanol. Both have the potential to solve all of our energy needs. However both have big economic and technical hurdles which may never be overcome.
Gas hydrates
http://www.thestar.com/sciencetech/article/415215
Excerpt:”And gas hydrate fields are found in abundance under the coastal waters of every continent. Calculations suggest there’s more energy in gas hydrates than in coal, oil and conventional gas combined.”
Then there is Butanol.
http://www.energyrefuge.com/blog/butanol-the-next-generation-bio/
“Although the science behind this newly found bio-fuel is not fully complete and ready to implement, butanol leaves us with a hope greater than that of ethanol.”
On the minus side of this ever amounting to anything is the energy intensity problem of distilling the water out of bio-butanol.
http://i-r-squared.blogspot.com/2007/06/problem-with-biobutanol.html
“The Problem With Biobutanol”
Now all I have to do to be truly bipartisan is to take up the cause of conservation.
LOL!!! I just love how I get out and enjoy a Memorial Day weekend away from my computer and Mr. Troll declares “victory” here. Sounds like something that GWB did on an aircraft carrier a few years back.
Here’s a news flash for you troll, I’m not sitting at my computer wondering who the heck “Alan Scott” is, why he apparently went to college for 2 years vs. my 4 years, or anything else about what makes you spew the ridiculous Right-wing hot-air talking points that you do. I don’t need to do that…because you’re a troll (”someone who posts controversial & usually irrelevant or off-topic messages in an online discussion forum with the intention of baiting other users into an emotional response or to generally disrupt normal on-topic discussion”), period.
“though it has saved me money, it has not helped reduce energy consumption in my area one bit. All the energy that I have ‘conserved’ has been ‘consumed’ 10,000 times over by all of the new population that has arrived in my area over the last decade.”
Yea, you sound like a real, hard-core conservationist…lol…one that realizes that what they do individually multipled with other similiar actions by many other people can really change things. Our actions combined together can be greater than actions made by just one individual. But keep trying to change the subject there…lol…
“I feel I must pick up his side of the argument”
You haven’t even picked up YOUR side of the argument yet troll…which side are you really on again??
“I really am not at all against alternative energy, although I believe that wind and solar will never be more than 10% of any modern country’s energy supply.”
“Both have the potential to solve all of our energy needs. However both have big economic and technical hurdles which may never be overcome.”
And in just a few sentences, you prove that you’re really NOT in favor of alternative energy after all.
Sure, sure…solar lighting, solar heating & cooling, solar desalination & disinfection, solar electricity, solar chemical & mechanical, solar vehicles, and wind power (Denmark generates nearly one-fifth of its electricity with wind turbines, Germany is ahead of schedule to meet 12.5% of its electricity needs - Germany’s Schleswig-Holstein province generates 36% of its power with wind turbines, and Mexico will provide 13% of the electricity needs of the state of Oaxaca with wind power) will basically amount to nothing.
“Now all I have to do to be truly bipartisan is to take up the cause of conservation.”
Which you’ve already proven that you’re not really for in the first place…let us all know when you get around to twisting yourself into a knot over that one…lol…
“there are no automobiles in production right now that are ready for butanol”
This sounds to me like the pipe-dreams that the car & oil industry sells about hydrogen fuel cells, which have been a “decade or so away from being ready” for several decades now. The amount of infrastructure that would need to be put in place for that to happen is HUGE. Most butanol in the U.S. is produced commercially from fossil fuels BTW, and the feedstocks are the *same* as for ethanol.
“Getting that energy to flow consistently and predictably, however, has been the problem. Using heat to release the gas works, but requires too much energy to be useful.”
What we need are advancements & investments in *real* alternative energy sources…not more finite, fossil fuel sources like “gas hydrates”. These real technologies are here NOW, not later.
He’s back.
Mister Guy,
You said, “with the intention of baiting other users into an emotional response”.
So that’s what I’m doing. Seems to have worked.
You said, “Germany is ahead of schedule to meet 12.5% of its electricity needs - Germany’s Schleswig-Holstein province generates 36% of its power with wind turbines, and Mexico will provide 13% of the electricity needs of the state of Oaxaca with wind power”
You will forgive me, but with your current track record I will have to check on your facts when I get around to it. Wind power supporters have tended to, pardon the pun, ‘inflate’ the actual amount of power their toys deliver. I do know that the real problem with wind power is that you must have considerable conventional capacity in reserve, which adds to the true cost, because it is strictly a matter of chance that peak winds match peak demand. It’s all very technical and I would not expect a non troll to understand it.
You really have finite on the brain. Even the Sun is finite. Solar power will be a dead end if your time frame is long enough.
I have proven that I can argue even your side of the issue more competently than you. When time permits I will take up conservation. To start that topic I leave you with the following nugget, which I acknowledge I oringinally found on a board run by someone on your side of the fence. I am open to ideas from the other universe if they are offered by thinkers.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jevons_paradox
excerpt: “In economics, the Jevons Paradox is an observation made by William Stanley Jevons, that as technological improvements increase the efficiency with which a resource is used, total consumption of that resource tends to increase, rather than decrease.” ” improved efficiency lowers the relative cost of using a resource – which increases demand.”
“I do know that the real problem with wind power is that you must have considerable conventional capacity in reserve, which adds to the true cost, because it is strictly a matter of chance that peak winds match peak demand.”
It certainly is a minority view that wind power can take over entirely for our energy needs. Of course, a simple mind like yours won’t understand that a few fractions of 100% added together may very well equal the whole shebang. You let me know when you want me to stop feeding you troll. In the meantime, I wouldn’t want you to work your brain too hard: