The high cost of oil and gasoline is a political football. The players include Bush, Congress, Obama, McCain, Venezuela, Russia, and the Middle East.
Gasoline is more than four dollars a gallon and there is an energy crisis in a historic election year. Presumptive presidential candidates, Senators Barack Obama and John McCain both have plans to solve the problems. In fact, each of their respective political parties have numerous ideas and various bills swirling about in both Houses of Congress. Who has the correct answer, Democrats or Republicans? Actually, everyone does. None of the proposed solutions are bad, but some need more examination and reworking.…
Article comments
26 - Sam weaver
Dan, Congress has agreed something has to be done concerning the high cost of oil and gasoline, but everyone is creating energy clicks within both Houses. If nothing else, they need to at least agree on a deadline for implementation of a unified solution. Everyone has a piece to the puzzle. Congressional leaders need to drop the political party posturing and get busy.
27 - Dan Miller
Sam,
I wish I could think of some reason to think that what you suggest might happen, but I just can't.
There is far too much pressure for simple but inconsistent fixes to an extraordinarily complex and serious problem which has taken years even to be recognized. The religious type debate over anthropomorphic global warming makes the problem even more complex.
Our friends on the Hill will continue to make silly "bumper sticker" promises which even they realize are impossible to keep, making the problem even worse than it already is.
Dan
28 - Franco
[Franco, I'm not sure if you intended to publish the comment that appeared here on two different threads. We usually delete dupes, but this one was a tough call because it was germane to both articles. To keep things tidy, I've removed your comment here and left it up on the other thread, where it seemed to me to be somewhat more in sync with the current discussion there. My apologies if I've stepped on your toes.
Dr Dreadful
Assistant Comments Editor]
29 - Franco
#27 â€" Dan Miller
"The religious type debate over anthropomorphic global warming makes the problem even more complex."
You said it brother.
But there is light forming at the end of that dark and confusing tunnel.
Recently the Germans prudently declared a ten-year hold on non-stop global warming. What with a flip in the Gulf Stream they realized that the numbers weren't going to look too good for the alarmists in the next few years. "There is a long-periodic oscillation that will probably lead to a lower temperature increase than we would expect from the current trend during the next years," they wrote. Clearly, more research is needed.
But the most fascinating and encouraging news for the deniers is from Australian astrophysicists I.R.G. Wilson, B.D. Carter, and I.A. Waite. They have developed a theory that the sunspot cycle and its intensity is driven by the gravitational relationships between the Sun and the Jovian planets Jupiter and Saturn.
The Sun wobbles a bit around the center of the Solar System. Sometimes the center of the Solar System lies outside the surface of the Sun, only 1,000 times heavier than Jupiter and 3,000 times heavier than Saturn. All that wobbling seems to affect the behavior of the Sun.
Here is the nub of the paper, as explained by author Ian Wilson to Andrew Bolt.
It supports the contention that the level of activity on the Sun will significantly diminish sometime in the next decade and remain low for about 20 - 30 years. On each occasion that the Sun has done this in the past the World's mean temperature has dropped by ~ 1 - 2 C.
Wilson and Co. should talk to the Germans who think that the cooling will only last for 10-15 years and try to come up with a cooling consensus. Either way, it adds up to a comfortable truth for Al Gore who can now feel virtuous about warming up the planet with his mega-mansion and his compulsive jet-travel habit.
It's all so confusing.
Liberals tell us that we mustn't develop energy resources because of the impact on the polar bear -- even though polar bear numbers are on the increase. We shouldn't develop oil resources in ANWR because it is a pristine wilderness. We shouldn't develop offshore oil resources because 40 years ago there was an oil spill in the Santa Barbara Channel. Anyway there's no point in developing oil and gas resources because it won't make any difference to the price of gasoline. Anyway we are running out of oil and gas so there isn't any point in developing any more oil and gas resources. We shouldn't mine coal because coal creates global warming. We shouldn't develop nuclear power because Jane Fonda once made a scary movie about it. We should develop solar and wind power, "renewables," even though both are extremely expensive right now. But we shouldn't build wind farms where Ted Kennedy could see the wind turbines from his window.
And now with a straight face liberals are trying to tell us we'll have to starve the people in order to save the planet. Now who's in denial?
30 - bliffle
Condor, in his naivete, conveniently states a common misconception, so this is as good a place as any to deal with it:
#12 â€" July 10, 2008 @ 06:53AM â€" Condor
All said an done... it takes energy to produce energy. Hydrogen fuel cells offer no savings as the energy output to produce hydrogen cancels out any savings that would be realized... except for emissions.
But... here's the rub: Pound for pound, dollar for dollar... petroleum is the MOST efficient energy source.....
Efficiency is simply not much of a consideration, except for small-scale phenomena. All the energy the USA needs falls on the state of North Dakota every day. Gratis. Free. Courtesy of the Sun. No payment necessary, return not required. And if we required more, there is plenty stored in the geothermal energy available from the heat in the earths core, should we need it. It is almost impossible to think of any scheme, no matter how profligate and inefficient, that could waste a significant portion of that abundance.
Naive humans, hypnotized by the (non-renewable) nature of petroleum and atomic radiation can be forgiven for extrapolating the need for efficiency in the use of such rare energy sources to other sources.
Well, actually, petroleum IS renewable but it takes 100 million years to ferment a dinosaur to order!
Sometimes people complain that their solar panels are only 10% efficient! So what? That's just for local solar-electric conversion, which would just be one component of a multi-conversion energy scheme. In fact, all required electrical energy can be obtained from 'waste' sunlight that goes to heat up parking lots now. Auto batteries would be recharged from the waste sunlight that now goes to deteriorate the painted finish and to destroy the fabric interiors of cars. And it's all free.
Hydrogen can be developed from sunlight and water. Hydrogen is mentioned as a fuel for automobiles because it is a good lightweight way to carry energy around and it is easily converted to motive power in a portable vehicle.
"Efficiency" is only a consideration when you are focused on traditional fuels, and then mostly because we are running out of them. Even with traditional fuels there was a time when no-one cared about fuel efficiency.
31 - Sam weaver
Biffle, I am with you, coal, solar, and other forms of energy seem to take a backseat to the proponents of nuclear power. Obviously, the other answers to our crisis do not spend as much money on lobbyist.
32 - Clavos
There is more energy stored in the coal deposits within our own borders than exists in all the world's known oil deposits, but the Greens and other environmentalists are standing in the way of it being exploited.
It's not about energy, or even environmentalism; it's about power.
And control.
33 - Cannonshop
Blittle, how much do you know about cracking hydrogen and containing it for transport and use?
Seriously. How much? Do you know what chemicals and compounds are involved in the manufacture of Solar Panels, what the waste byproducts are, and what the feedstock chemicals and compounds are? Do you even know the average life-span of a solar panel?
And then, there's windmills. What are you making them from? Do you know what the waste byproducts of, for instance, the carbon-fibre and Resin are? (they're SCARY toxic.) or what you get when you work Carbon-Fibre? (you need a micron filter mask with full protection to work it, btw. The dust is supremely ugly, makes the shit Aesbestos does to you look like a kindergarten kiss.) Or how much loss you get in terms of maintenance?
Let me lay it out for you in layman's terms: To protect the Environment, you MUST HAVE AN ECONOMIC SURPLUS. This isn't "print more money", this is the same kind of Economic Surplus that allowed agricultural cultures to develop writing and math that counts past the fingers and toes, and belief systems beyond "Thunder god demands virgin sacrifice".
In terms of OUR civilization, it demands energy that is high-output-for-effort. The best non-nuclear, non-fossil sources we have are being torn out to make paths for non-endangered SPECIES (salmon runs here in the NW)-that's Hydro. Windfarms require far more maintenance on a continuing basis than you seem to think, and that maintenance in turn demands manpower, equipment, and...things that burn fossil fuel (trucks, because to be economically viable, you have to have a LOT of windmills, and a LOT of high-lines, and electric vehicles just can't do the job.)
Hydrogen's pretty much out of serious consideration for a few reasons you folks like to pretend don't exist- it requires insulated storage vessels capable of maintaining cryogenic temperatures-which will outgas around seals, it requires massive pumping systems that devour energy and require all sorts of fun lubricants along with extensive, intensive maintenance just in order to work-which ends up costing you more in energy than you're 'bottling'. (Don't beleive me, go to a welding supply shop,and buy a cylinder of Hydrogen. Compare the price to a similar value of useable energy in oil or propane.)
to power a "Hydrogen" economy, you need cheap energy-energy that is cheap because you're not trying to run it off the product it supplies. Trying solar? you've got to cover an enormous area in solar collectors (mirrors) or solar panels- on the micro-scale it works, but you greens have been pushing to concentrate everyone into your Human-Hive cities-which require more energy to run per cubic foot, than a single family home out in the sticks.
As a policy matter, taking into account all of various externalities imposed by folks on your side, the micro-scale vanishes in a sea of red tape and social engineering.
with all the "Greenbelt" and "Protected" areas, there's just not enough to use that plan either-at least, not enough unless you're willing to sacrifice the wild places to feed New York's energy needs.
there's also probable impacts to solar collectors (ground based) and I can just imagine the protests and lawsuits if someone suggested orbital systems transmitting microwave power to ground-stations, or building a beanstalk, and that doesn't include the bird-strike problem with windmills either-or the endangered species activists among your allies that will scream as soon as it's put into large-scale practice...and the lawsuits, making an already expensive system even MORE expensive. (gotta feed them Trial Lawyers, after all...)
then, there's the NIMBYs in the so-called "green" movement, who'll invent/come up with/'discover' some health/environmental reason why your vast wind-farm can't be built in their area- and believe it, they will appear.
If you want to break OPEC for REAL, you have to find something that works as well, is as easy to contain, transport, store, and use, and carries the same energy-density or better, than fossil fuel for the same energy input to process and concentrate into a useable form. Cracking water for hydrogen's easy. Making Hydrogen useful?
That requires energy and equipment that's a bit more powerful than you seem to think it is, and employs materials you're clearly unfamiliar with (KAOWool, for instance, high-pressure vessels and cryogenic pumps. Heavy industries that the LEFT has worked for the last forty or so years to rid America of, through combinations of envirosadofascist regulations, Knee-Jerk Litigation-until-poverty-is-reached, zoning laws, constant infringements and indoctrination, and the support of NIMBY "Civil" actions and raising armies of protestors...)
Simply put, Blittle, your plan's major flaws, even solved by techonology, are among your fellows in your "movement", Clavos is right, it's about POWER, it's about INFLUENCE, and it's about MONEY. Money for groups like Greenpeace, Power for sympathizers of Earth First, Influence for guys who wept when the Soviet Union fell apart and the environmental disaster Stalin's iron dream wrought leaked through on radioactive clouds from Tchernobyl (a copy of the Hanford N reactor that was designed during WWII.)
34 - Sam weaver
Everyone that has commented has made excellent points. However, there is a down side to every form of energy. Regardless, decisions have to be made or the American way of life will take a serious detour.Like some of you have indicated, Congress can complicate simple things. Pardon the pun, but the political process can take the energy out of anyone. We the people have to continue to bombard our leaders so they understand that this is not a problem that can stall in congressional committee. Like Clavos, Dan Miller, Franco, and Cannonshop have said, it is about power. The energy problem is bigger than any election. Someone has to get Congress to compromise the compromising in a timely fashion. It will take someone with Lyndon Johnson type balls to do this.
35 - Franco
#28 â€" Dr. Dreadful
"[Franco, I'm not sure if you intended to publish the comment that appeared here on two different threads. We usually delete dupes, but this one was a tough call because it was germane to both articles."
Yes. I too thought it germane to both articales and so posted it. I would have prefered it left up, but thank you for your note.
36 - Sam weaver
I wish President Bush would put pressure on the oil companies to drill on the existing leased lands.
37 - Clavos
"I wish President Bush would put pressure on the oil companies to drill on the existing leased lands."
If we're going to drill, wouldn't it be better to start with the areas where we know there's oil, rather than waste time, money and energy trying to find it on the leased lands, most of which have not been explored for oil?
As the Union Leader in New Hampshire mentioned in a recent editorial:
38 - bliffle
So then, as I understand it, they want to drill on coastlines because it's easier and more certain? Cheaper?
39 - Clavos
"So then, as I understand it, they want to drill on coastlines because it's easier and more certain? Cheaper?"
First of all, in the Gulf, the new rigs won't be anywhere near the coastline; they're already there, and have been for decades. What they're looking at is proven deposits lying about 250 miles south of NOLA and 150 miles west of Florida. Nobody but ships will even see them out there.
"Easier?" No. "More certain?" exactly. "Cheaper?" Than what? Dry holes on land? No, but certainly more productive.
40 - Sam weaver
Clavos, The oil companies have never said that the existing leased lands have not been drilled because studies show no oil in those areas. The companies never address the issue. It is my understanding that they never lease any land unless calculations indicate the possibilities of oil. I would like it if they would say something concerning this topic. If they would, everyone would stop the assertions that the oil companies are just sitting on oil producing land. It is a simple question that requires a simple answer.
41 - bliffle
I'm guessing that the Oil Cos.simply want to extend their oil leases to cover everything immagineable and they see exploiting current leases as being Strategically Suboptimal. After all, if abundant oil is found on current leases then it argues against giving them new leases.
42 - Sam weaver
Finally, something that might lead to the easing of tensions and affect oil prices in a positive way. Apparently without preconditions, the U.S has agreed to meet with Iranians concerning their nuclear plans. It is being billed as a one time meeting and not a negotiation. Talk about semantics, somebody had to negotiate to get the meeting. Regardless, if this leads to a discussion process; it might give a boost to the stock market and assist in lowering the price of oil. I thought Bush said something like this would be appeasement? Let's cross our fingers.
43 - bliffle
Looking for misinformation in the above comments is like looking for straw in a haystack. I don't have time or interest in exposing all of it, but here's some obvious ones:
Hydrogen does not have to be handled only as a cryogenic liquid. It can be handled as a gas and as a hydride. The latter provides greater hydrogen density than cryogenic and is easily liberated from the matrix with a little heat. I have seen automobiles adapted for both forms many years ago.
Solar power is current technology. Ten times as much power came online last year from solar panels as from all the nuclear power around the world. One reason is that municipalities often require new municipal buildings to have solar panels in order to reduce their high electric bills. They easily pay for themselves.
Not one nuclear power plant has been built by private capital. Not one investor is interested in capital investment for nuclear power. They simply can't justify it. Aside from the capital cost, the operating cost of nuclear electricity is twice that of other generators.
44 - bliffle
I think meeting with the Iranians is a good idea, especially if we go in better prepared than I expect that we will. We need better objectives, and the only objective that is apparent to me is that we want to stifle Iranian nuclear development. So what arguments can we offer? Threats? Embargoes? Bribes?
It's curious that Iran says it needs nuclear power when they sit on top of huge oil reserves. You'd think they have enough. But I suppose they want to sell that oil to get foreign money as capital for national projects, thus the need for nuclear power to offset what the sell to the Chinese, Americans, etc.
I suppose that the Iranians see themselves as needing nuclear weapons as protection against USA and Israeli invasions, as we are always threatening, and they figure to hide the weapons program inside the power program.
Seems to me that if the USA could approach the Iranians with a good case for lowered oil consumption through conservation, efficiency and alternate power sources, that we could undercut their whole argument.
And we would be able to make that argument if we have a powerful program of conservation and alternative energy going right here in the USA.
There's no doubt that we COULD have such a program if we want it. The Rocky Mountain Institute proves that every day. They are capitalists who consultant with companies and government agencies to reduce consumption in massive ways. They have proven that conservation works. As if we needed more proof. In the 70s we proved that conservation works. In the California power crisis engineered by the Enron monopoly we proved that 10% savings was easy.
We WOULD have such a system in place today if the federal energy policy had not been systematically and aggressively changed from conservation to consumption in the 1980s.
We know it can be done. And it will be done even if GM and Ford both have to fail first, thus in one stroke ending the domination of their gas guzzlers.
We should have a conscious national policy instead of letting things stumble forward to large-scale failure and catastrophic failure.
45 - Sam weaver
Listening to Iran could not be any worse than North Korea. However, the Chinese assisted the Korean deal. Maybe the Russians could help with Iran. They are the ones building the reactor for them. I have noticed that no one ever mentions the Russian nuclear assist. They are getting one billion to complete the task.
46 - bliffle
All the problems mentioned in the original article were enabled and encouraged by the fact that we turned away from conservation and towards consumption in the 1980s, thus reversing 1970s policies and programs that had a track record of reducing consumption and foreign dependence by 5% a year. How stupid we were. Will we be smarter in the future?
Here are the original cited problems:
A number of contributing factors have brought the United States to this point:
1.Oil speculators
2.Weakening U.S dollar
3.Unstable European economy
4. Increased oil demands in the Middle East, China, Japan, and India
5.Potential U.S or Israeli war with Iran
6.Greed of the oil companies
47 - Sam weaver
There is much work to be done, but at least everyone realizes this is something that can not be ignored. Each point listed in the original article is an outline that can be observed during the process of energy advancement and a reduction of U.S dependency on foreign oil. The good thing is that congressional disagreement will turn into workable solutions. Hopefully, with minimal pork barrel.
48 - Dave Nalle
You're funny, Sam.
Dave
49 - Sam weaver
Dave, I know that pork barrel and congressional politics go hand in hand. I said minimal. Yes I know, wishful thinking.
50 - Conrad Dalton
Bliffle:
"Will we be smarter in the future?"
It's doubtful.
If the stagflation following the 1973 oil embargo didn't do it, why should it happen now?
The country has had 35 years to change course.
For the past 35 years there have been too many special interests controlling Congress to make meaningful changes.
The special interests in control of Congress now are more powerful and there are more of them.
And the MSM and the American public is as ignorant as ever and more divided than ever.
51 - Dan Miller
If only we believe, everything will be OK. Thus saith Peter Pan. "Every time a child says, 'I don't believe in fairies,' there is a fairy somewhere that falls down dead."
There is Hope for Change we can believe in; if we don't, millions of fairies will fall down dead.
Dan
52 - bliffle
You're right, Conrad. For a new technology to play on an even playing field it must get the same level of government subsidy as sunset technologies like coal and oil. So all that the coal and oil monpolists need do to kill wind power and solar is to make sure they don't get commensurate subsidies. And that's what they've been doing with great success. There's a tax credit bill for solar power (I believe it's HR6049) which, if it doesn't pass will end the solar tax credit which will kill solar power and doom billions of dollars in private capital that have been invested in solar. Meanwhile, massive subsidies continue for coal and oil. How can an unsubsidized source compete with industries getting 10s of billions every year in subsidies?
Check out how your congress critter voted on that bill.
There's an interesting report on NPR.org for todays "Science Friday" program on "Talk of the nation".
53 - bliffle
Yesterdays "Science Friday" on NPR has an interesting discussion about drilling the OCS for oil, and some of the problems:
OCS oil drilling
IIRC it's not as easy as it sounds.
54 - Cannonshop
"...Not one nuclear power plant has been built by private capital. Not one investor is interested in capital investment for nuclear power. They simply can't justify it. Aside from the capital cost, the operating cost of nuclear electricity is twice that of other generators..."
Of course not-because of the LIABILITY ISSUES. forget accidents when you talk about those-think "Lawsuits before you've even finished speaking the proposal" liability issues.
Even if (by some freak miracle) Pile Power (a hypothetical outfit) managed to get ALL the permits necessary to break ground, bought the property (well and truly away from any large cities or important agricultural regions-we'll use, say, the middle of the Nevada Desert, where all the toxic-waste is being shipped) They aren't going to have enough money, after the court-fees, nuisance suits, and class-action lawsuits to protect the sand fleas are over, to hire a guy with a shovel to start digging, much LESS afford to refine Uranium into fuel, store the bits, assemble the bits, buy the concrete and the steel, hire the weldors, the Electricians, and the ex-Navy Nukees, run the lines...
The ONLY reason the Navy can do it, with Ships, is that they can use the National Security Act to block nuisance lawsuits. Private outfits and Private finance don't have a chance when put up against big-name and small name eco-nazis and their many, many, many, friends in Government (along with the fairly hefty contributions those groups get from... yup. Big Oil. BP, Gulf Oil, and other multinational petroleum outfits send a LOT of money to Greenpeace and other anti-nuclear activists.) and that doesn't account for the other issues-
Bush ain't the only guy who says "Nukular". I had a Poly-Sci professor who used it too-difference being Bush mispronounced it because he's Bush, and talks/plays up the phake redneck gag like any good Texas Politician should, and this guy did so because the only thing he needed to know was "Nukular Bad".
Earth First! these dickweeds very existence means that anyone stupid enough to try building a plant without Government backing them in a way that makes the cops hang out nearby is rushing for a neat combination of physical liability due to threats of sabotage and real-live domestic terrorism, and the threat of people actually getting hurt by said real-life domestic scum. Then, there's the dipshits who hear "Nukular" and think "Gee, we can steal that stuff an' really teach those (insert favourite target of bigots here) a REAL lesson." (Dickhead scumbags come in all stripes of americana. the only thing they share is a desire to steal from someone to hurt someone else.)
Then, there's the ones that think they can replicate the movie "The Manhattan Project" (the eighties teen thriller version, not the historical), but for profit. So you've got security liability issues because not everyone knows that just having some radioactives isn't enough for a bomb...and did I mention the NIMBYs who'll move into the area just so they can bitch about it to the press, driving down stock prices and ripping up value for any company STUPID enough to step into the game?
All of that factors into your Operating costs, Blittle. if you could magically remove it all, you'd find out what the USN already proved-you can run bigger generators for a hell of a lot less using Pitchblende than Coal or Oil.
55 - troll
(personally I don't find punk energizing)
56 - bliffle
Cannonslop is wrong two ways one one assertion.
"Of course not-because of the LIABILITY ISSUES. "
First of all, the Price-Anderson act limits liability and passes it on to the federal taxpayers, thus socializing the risk. The industry fund only paid out $70million for TMI.
Second: there are REASONs for liability suits. Peopla are injured and they sue for compensation. It's difficult enough to do, and during the ensuing struggle a person may well die.
Are you suggesting that noone be allowed to sue someone who damages them?
Do you always just whip out a traditional rightwing doctrine to deal with every situation? Maybe you should try doing your own research and thinking for yourself.
57 - bliffle
A nuclear generator occupies about 1 square kilometer of land and puts out about 1 gigawatt of power. So does a solar plant.
Physics Prof. Muller at UCB has a book out called "Physics for future Presidents" and has regular lectures available in laymans terms.
58 - superman
Global warming is just bull$hit... every one with a half a brain knows it..
59 - Superman
Nice Fairy Tail Dan... (The King Fairy)
60 - El Bicho
So you have half a brain, superman?
61 - silver
so we cant refine oil as fast as we can pump it but what we can do is store it until we ether need it or we are able to refine it. as far as i know crude oil does not have a shelf life if it did we would all be in a world of hurt. far worse than the world of hurt we are already living in. so i say pump it store it refine as needed. but thats only a small part of what its going to take to fix the problem. what i would like to see is a wind mill in every backyard in the contry churning out power into the grid and solar pannels on every roof natural gas running cars and a natural gas compressor in every driveway. also i would like to see the federal goverment to get a brain instead of using the brain of whoevers pocket its attached to at the time. to much greed and to much coruption IT HAS TO STOP AND STOP NOW!!! and we need to get energy under control and i think we can do it without alot of goverment if we were allowed to do it without corupt goverment control