Posted on 05/10/2006 6:51:16 AM PDT by unionblue83
With higher gasoline prices a continuing political concern, it's high time somebody placed the blame where it belongs -- and high time that somebody recognizes that while there are few short-term solutions that can immediately alleviate the cash crunch, it's worth realizing that today's long-term solutions will one day make a difference in some future year's short-term. In other words, even long-term plans do, at some point, bear results that at some point seem immediate.
Today's problems would be better at the not-inconsequential margins, for example, if drilling in the Alaska National Wildlife Refuge had been approved 25 years ago when that state's Sen. Ted Stevens first brought it up.
Congress and various bureaucracies have messed up this nation's energy policies for decades -- and it is the liberals, which means almost all Democrats, who have been responsible for the mess. One big problem, for instance, is not with the oil supply but with refining capacity. No new refineries have been built in three decades. Why? Because they aren't profitable. Why? Because environmental regs have skewed the market too much, at least until last year's Energy Bill (a mix of good policies and horrible ones) provided new incentives for refineries that soon should catalyze investment in new plants.
(Excerpt) Read more at spectator.org ...
If every SUV buiot during the SUV craze would have been deisel instead of gas, America would not have to import one drop of Saudi oil!! [Will post source later]
We need to diversify our means of energy production.
2. The workers must seize the means of production.
If every SUV bought during the SUV craze had run on diesel fuel instead of gasoline, we'd still be importing just about the same amount of oil from Saudi Arabia -- and we'd be importing less oil from places like Canada and Mexico (and extracting a lot less right here in the U.S.).
116 BILLION BARRELS OF CRUDE OFFSHORE ENOUGH FOR 16 YEARS OF TOTAL ENERGY INDEPENDENCE.
The answer to energy independence is not to infringe on our "quality" of life.
Energy = quality of life.
High cost energy make transportation, production etc expensive. Don't think like a European. If you do that, our economy will look like that in France and Germany where they also play games with energy policy to manipulate consumer behavior.
Been a user of IC engines for 50+ years and love the freedom they allow. And, yes, I DO understand that the statist utopian idiots would prefer we be totally dependent on PUBLIC transit in order to keep better track of us all. That's why the HATE our automobiles and would, if they could, take them from us.
And no voodoo science from here. Just stark realities, to wit:
The refinery shortage (thank the NIMBYs and ecofreaks) IS a big part of the problem as well as the wildly diverse local CLEAN AIR regs which require the refiners to produce multiple blends.
The current OIL PRODUCTION level is around 84 million barrels per day. Current world DEMAND is 87 million barrels per day -- and rising (thanks to the Chinese and others swapping their bikes and motorbikes for CARS).
We have at least a 3 million barrel per day shortfall.
The oil being taken from the ground today is from strikes discovered over 30 years ago: Very few NEW oil deposits are being found. ONE oil geologist (I THINK his name is Fox) has raised the prospect that geological forces are producing NEW oil and gas all the time and it is either forming NEW deposits or migrating thru fractures in the rock to the existing fields. That makes some sense but has yet to be confirmed by his peers. Even if true, it's hard to imagine that those replacement stocks can keep up with the growing demand.
What all this means is that we're headed toward ever-higher prices. That's the bad news.
The GOOD NEWS is that those higher prices are pushing us back toward some modicum of ENERGY SANITY where we will have no choice but to get on with NUCLEAR for stationary energy production. The Japanese SAFELY produce most of their power with nukes. Their plants are cookie cutter designs, making it easy to THOROUGHLY train their people in their safe operation. Even our good friends the French produce 80% of their juice with nukes!! And if THEY can do it, we sure as hell can.
One of the reasons electric rates in Georgia have remained some of the lowest in the nation is our half dozen or so NUCLEAR PLANTS. Many OTHER states NOT using nukes have switched from dirtier coal-fired plants to NATURAL GAS (NG)! It is absolutely NUTS to be burning a perfect – and finite -- mobile power fuel for a stationary application!
Even so, many power producers are using PEAKING PLANTS to cope with the summer air-conditioner demand. Those are generally jet engines strapped to a slab and coupled to an AC generator. They come up to speed and on line quickly when demand peaks. Those jet turbines burn FOSSIL FUEL (often NG).
What the move to nukes will do is free up the FOSSIL FUELS we DO have for MOBILE power applications (our vehicles). ANY internal combustion engine can be converted to run on NG or propane once a new tank is installed and (this is WHY the US hasn’t moved on this earlier) a CONSUMER SUPPLY INFRASTRUCTURE (GAS STATIONS!) is in place. NG also burns a hell of a lot cleaner and is easier on an IC engine than gasoline.
A few years ago, it was projected that there was around a 1,000 year supply of NG available under the GULF OF MEXICO at then current consumption. That was in the days when most major generating plants were coal fired. Even so, once we can get the nukes on line, that NG will become available for MOBILE applications. We need to get the nukes on line safely, of course, but 12 to 15 years to permit a new plant is just crazy! The technology proposed in the application is probably OBSOLETE by the time the thing is off the ground, adding countless millions to the project to bring it up with all the retrofits.
The concern about nuclear waste disposal is very real – but it is one we can and will solve. We MUST. If we are to maintain our living standard here, we have no choice. Even my bride – who is VERY vocal with her concerns on this topic – becomes silent when I ask her to imagine the lights going out and the A/C shutting down and remind her that the A/C here is almost certainly coming from a NUCLEAR PLANT up the road! The ladies LOVE their home A/C in August. So do I.
And, not incidentally, these current higher energy prices will put new legs under the quest for ALTERNATIVE fuel sources. We’re learning more and more about the physics of these new systems every day. I’m confident that our grandkids will be sitting behind the wheels of vehicles powered by systems we cannot even envision today. That has been the history of mankind – especially in the West -- throughout history.
And we can tell the Saudis and Venezuelans to DRINK the oil they have left – because we no longer need it!
Sorry for the ramble but I really have a burr under by blanket on this one.
At what price level can biodiesel compete effectively with gasoline?
Exactly what I said almost wor-for-word =-)
If..if...can find or remember that source, you will be thinking, "Something is rotten in the state of Denmark."
Well said. No worries, I "ramble" on issues that I feel strongly about, too. LOL!
I'm also not sure nuclear energy is the most practical method for producing power in this country -- at least not at this time. It's ideal for a country that has limited natural resources and therefore doesn't have direct access to fossil fuels (Japan is a good example of this), but I suspect that the most economically feasible means of producing power in this country over the next 50 years will be that old "friend" that can be found in abundance all over the United States -- coal.
Nuclear is cheap, clean, runs 24/7, makes us energy independent and does all this using a small space.
Pushing some of the today fossil fuels based consumers to electric and then adding more nuclear power plants to the net helps us become more energy independent. Example: Heat a home electrically not with gas.
I agree that diversification is a good thing. But nuclear power became very unpopular years ago and the tree hugging community and our empty suits (AKA politicians who pander) made very bad decisions as in California where they now have to buy their power from as far as Texas since they lack production capacity adequate to cover their need. But hey, at least they didn't build any of those evil nuclear power plants.
My only point is that nuclear power could do “a lot” more for us if added to the mix and this source has been largely neglected since it’s politically a charged topic just like ANWR drilling is. Nuclear power is not the cure all. I know this. But it's part of the solution.
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