Oil supply is limited, but we aren't doing anything about it

Capital Times ^ | 12-4-06 | Mark L. Hendrickson

[freeforall]

This article fails to note the price system will deal with shotages better than conservation laws.

[LeGrande]

Hydrogen sounds nice, but the problem is storage. It leaks out of containers like a sieve and it takes a lot of energy just to compress it.

The best short term solution is to put nuclear reactors near our shale and coal reserves and produce both electricity and oil (use the excess hot steam to turn the shale into oil). That would provide all the oil and electricity we need for a few thousand years.

Here's another thought. If an oil rich country declares war on us or attacks us, why don't we seize their oil fields?

[umgud]

Hydrogen could work with nuke power, but only if the nuke power is cheap. Even if it were cheap, hydrogen has a lot of other issues it must overcome (infrastructure, storage, etc.). Hydrogen is a potential longterm solution.

Coal and oilshale gassification is viable now but, isn't being persued because gov't is pushing ethanol and bio fuels.

You are correct however, we are immediately dependent on foriegn oil and that is not good.

[Diana in Wisconsin]

Dang! I gotta dig my 1/4 acre garden by hand this spring versus using my fossil-fueled tiller, a big, black Toro named 'Darth Vader?'

I don't think so, Sparky, LOL! I'll conserve on gasoline, natural gas and electricity, but only because I'm CHEAP. I don't care what the rest of the idiots on this planet get conned into by the EnviroWackos. ;)

[MarkeyD]

How many times have I heard dems say (Ted Kennedy comes to mind) that ANWAR would only supply 18 months worth of oil, he knowing full well that his legions of dumbocrats will interpret this as 18 months after production starts.

[bpjam]

And THAT is the sole reason that domestic production peaked in the 70s. The enviro-wackos and Jimmah Carter cut off our ability to further extract and explore.

The US is an amazing piece of real estate. We actually have more resources than places two and three times our size. The only reason we have shortages is that we refuse to actually create our own supply. Its like growing your own vegetables but refusing to eat and then calling yourself starved. Cuba, Mexico and Canada all will be drilling oil which runs under US soil or coastlines and we are letting them take it from us without a fight or even a protest. As dumb as we are as a country, we deserve high oil prices and all the extortion we suffer.

[Diana in Wisconsin]

"Let's use the world supply first, then our domestic supply."

Amen! And the likes of a future Fat Teddy and a John F'n Kerry will be the FIRST to do something about it when it actually effects THEIR lives...like Ted can't get his case of Scotch delivered via taxi to the hotel he's crashing in that night, or Kerry can't get on a friggin' airplane fast enough to get away from his screeching wife for the weekend, LOL!

[mysterio]

If an oil rich country declares war on us or attacks us, why don't we seize their oil fields?

Because the rest of the world would probably align against us if we did that, and a world war would follow.

I like the idea of the nuclear plant / gasoline from coal, at least in the short term.

[Eric in the Ozarks]

Price will extend the supply indefinitely. Substitute products will expand the volume from many supply points (ethanol and biodiesel plants all over the country, oil shale, tar sands,) cars will get smaller and be used less by an aging population...
I just can't get worked up about the "running out" hoax when the global warming hoax is taking so much of my time...

[denydenydeny]

This is more of that "peak oil" nonsense. Whenever anyone mentions Hubbert with reverence as this guy does, it's a big red flag.

[hinckley buzzard]

If we changed our electric power generation from NG to nuclear, we could change our transportation to NG and hydrogen could wait. It is so simple really, like eating lower on the food chain. Without fuel cells or any other exotica, long proven technology could alleviate the problem of reliance on foreign petroleum. The obstacles are all political.

[Logophile]

"Even when you are running for your life, with no fuel supply in sight, people do not make the connection with the fact that their fuel tank contains a finite amount," says Tadeusz W. Patzek, an engineering professor at the University of California-Berkeley.

Talk about hyperbole: I daresay that every motorist is aware that the fuel tank needs to be refilled occasionally.

[TexasTransplant]

http://www.unh.edu/p2/biodiesel/article_biodiesel_vs_hydrogen.html

[Logophile]

This article fails to note the price system will deal with shotages better than conservation laws.

Exactly. Moreover, the price system does a much better job than any "energy policy" of ensuring that scarce resources will be used wisely and not wasted.

In other words, if the environmentalists really want conservation, they should simply make sure that reasonable laws are in place to prevent pollution and other externalities, then stand back and let the market do its magic.

It makes sense to use petroleum so long as it is cheaper than the alternatives. Indeed, using more expensive fuels likely means that resources are being wasted.

[mysterio]

Price will extend the supply indefinitely.

True, but when we serfs can't afford to get to work any more, how do you think that might impact the economy?

[AnalogReigns]

As economist Julian Simon bravely contended in the '70s the only actual resource we have is between our ears...in the form of technology. Any other commodity is useless unless we know how to use it...as was oil, until about 150 years ago.

The best way to develop and use technology is through the free market of demand and supply. As we use up the oil...and/or demand becomes greater than production (as it has in recent years) prices will rise, and with that incentive, inventors will develop new oil-free technologies.

Fear of running out of fossil fuel, or anything else for that matter, is born of ignorance of basic economics. Far from government intervention, market forces should be allowed to work--without artificial suppressions of price.

[mysterio]

Great (possibly biased, though) link. I'm definitely pro-biodiesel. I hope we can make enough of it without really causing the price of food to skyrocket. If the numbers in your link are right, it's a much better bet than ethanol.

[Paladin2]

I have run a few gallons of BioDiesel, both straight and as a mix with PetroDiesel. Seems to work fine except it solidifies in the winter. 20% biodiesel seems to be OK at 20 deg F so far. 40% is marginal and 60% & 80% are also frozen solid. (I have some sample mixtures in bottles on the back porch to check it out.)

[AnalogReigns]

Not to mention biodiesel...which would be a much better product from all that corn than ethanol.

[AnalogReigns]

I'm sure the technology exists, with additives and/or processes, to render biodiesel which works as well or better than fossil diesel in the cold.... we'll work it out!