By accessing this website, you acknowledge that Edmunds and its third party business partners may use cookies, pixels, and similar technologies to collect information about you and your interactions with the website as described in our
Privacy Statement, and you agree that your use of the website is subject to our
Visitor Agreement.
Comments
As you can see that in a manner of speaking the biggie 2.5 all came to the same blank sheet- diesel for that 1.5 Bllion R & D project. Of course it was shelved.
In fact diesel really has the capability to be refined from crude AND from alternative processes. A good reason to almost BAR it all together in passenger vehicle fleets.
Indeed much has been made of no unleaded gas refinery being constructed in the last generation in the USA. Of course it does take literally BILLIONS to construct a new one (that is given an almost impossible to get permit to do so).
Yet $1.5 M or less is about what it takes for a bio diesel processing plant so called, close to the raw materials.
That's brilliant. While $80/barrel oil won't devastate our economy $300 oil just might. New's flash, that's Bin Laden's motivation, he probably isn't an environmentalist. In a free market bidding war the difference between $80 and $300 probably isn't as great as it seems. The thing about the $70 oil we had recently is that while it didn't have a huge impact on our economy it clearly was enough of an annoyance to alter public sentiment regarding fuel consumption. That's what I'd like to see. If this price is artificially accomplished by a tax then this annoyance can be maintained at a manageable level. If its caused by a razor thin margin between supply capacity and demand then the result will be extreme volatility that is less manageable.
Al Qaeda has made a couple attempts to disrupt Saudi oil in the last 5 years. So their intent should be taken seriously, its just a matter of whether their capability should be.
While new refineries haven't been built existing ones have been expanded. What's the difference?
How much will bio-diesel sell for? What will the price of unleaded gas have to be for the bio-diesel to be cost competitive? I'm all for bio-diesel. I think it will be a long time before truckers can go electric and the airlines have really got a problem in that regard. So bio-diesel will really come in handy as part of the energy independence solution. If the government needs to step in to speed its development/adoption I think the effective approach is to make unleaded gas more expensive rather than to subsidize bio-diesel.
The only scenerio that oil can be $300/bbl is when the US$ is worth substantially less than what it is today. Government messing with economy trying to "manage" it just might accomplish that.
That's what I'd like to see. If this price is artificially accomplished by a tax then this annoyance can be maintained at a manageable level. If its caused by a razor thin margin between supply capacity and demand then the result will be extreme volatility that is less manageable.
The innerchild control-freak cries out loud and clear ;-) What you have stated was the exact rationale given when the UK government introduced their massive fuel tax in the 1975's . . . as a shock absorber in case of import disruption. Since the exploration of North Sea in the 1980's, the UK not only became oil-independent; it became a major oil exporter, yet the exorbitant fuel tax has stayed. Why? Because new spending programs were set up to spend the money.
I'll admit that I am not knowledgeable when it comes to making oil out of coal. We import 12 million barrels of oil per day. Let's say we lost 3 million barrels of that. How long would it take for this coal to oil solution to make up the deficit? I'm guessing that you don't know the answer to that. In the meantime how painful would this oil shortage be for our society?
I think that the UK is once again an oil importer. Norway is a major oil exporter yet gas costs around $6/gallon there. Does this make sense? I think so because the less oil they use domestically the more they can export. Venezuala's Chavez is even starting to see the flaw in his country's current policy of providing cheap gas to the citizens.
Do each of us really have more control over the US government than the Brits have over theirs? I doubt it, largely because the UK, after the loss of its empire, is much smaller and there are less tiers to go through before any voice is heard. Yet, the fuel tax instituted when the UK was dependent on oil import has stayed long after the country became an oil exporter. How do you explain that in a democracy?
Simple formula here: our dependence on oil will continue until mitigated by either devastating market fluctuations, caused by whatever conditions one wants to cite, or by representative action of public sentiment.
I wish oil could gush from the ground just by the public "sentiment" about it :-) Our dependence on oil will continue until a less expensive source of energy is found. Just like the UK, when domestic source was found to be less expensive than imports, it slowed down importing then became an exporter of oil. The result of collectie sentiment (read: tax) however has a habit of lingering on for much longer after the reason for its existence has long expired.
People vote in the market place every minute of the day. Collective "representive actions" however have a tendency to benefit the "representatives" instead of the people in general.
What we do know is that, we are not importing 12mbbl from Bin Laden's basement in a cave. 3 million barrles a day don't just disappear overnight. Where would the oil go? So long as the dollar is still worth something, we will get that 3mbbl, at least the bulk of it, at the expense of Japanese, Europeans, Chinese, and Indians, by bidding price incrementally higher until production from coal makes up the difference. The German experience in WWII seems to indicate that the transition can be done very rapidly and without much disruption, even at time of war. Germans actually kept building consumer cars till 1943, four years into the war, whereas the US shut down consumer car building shortly after US entry.
Norway is a major oil exporter yet gas costs around $6/gallon there. Does this make sense? I think so because the less oil they use domestically the more they can export.
So the discussion is not about energy-independence at all. All that talks about your desiring a smaller government is just a lip-service. What you really want is more excuses to collect higher taxes. What other explanation can there be? Norway is energy-independent; heck, it's more than energy independent. It's one of the world's biggest oil exporters! Yet a gasoline tax on its own citizenry is desirable and justified in your view. So much for advocating gasoline tax in order to achieve energy-independence! Glad I saw through both that and the "revenue neutral" ruse from miles away.
Venezuala's Chavez is even starting to see the flaw in his country's current policy of providing cheap gas to the citizens.
In case it's not obvious, Chavez has been subsidizing gasoline to such a level that gas is about 15 cents a gallon in Caracas! It's excessive government intervention the other way . . . equally non-sensical.
Fuel taxes will help us because it will accelerate the change to more efficient cars and fuels.It will also reduce our huge deficit.
While we are looking for more excuses to have a fuel tax, why don't we throw in the kitchen sink too? Let's mandate a greese trap for all kitchen sinks, for conversion to bio diesel (which actually might have some hope of actually producing some useable fuel domesticly).
Seriously, is any of those personal choices such as high gas mileage cars vs. safe cars etc. really the domain of government decision making? If less energy consumption and reducing deficit are sufficient grounds for any law making, why don't we have a food tax? Farming consume a lot of petroleum products. And as tpe mentioned, the less we consume, the more is available for export :-)
There is absolutely nothing stopping you from voluntarily contribute 1 buck for each gallon of gas you purchase, to any cause of your choosing.
However, if I demand that you contribute 1 buck to a cause that I believe in, with a gun to your head, that's called robbery. Somehow, dressing myself up as a government tax collector makes it all okay with you?
The existing gasoline tax is for highway fund. There is no federal tax on fuel oil. If the goal for new tax is couched as for "oil independence," then gasoline tax alone wouldn't even make sense as fuel oil is just as dependent on oil import, so is off-road use such as farming and boating, both of which are currently exempt from gasoline (road) tax.
We have been through this several times already: if a gasoline tax indeed reduces gasoline useage, hence oil useage, the oil price will drop. When oil price drops, imports will account for an even higher per centage of our oil consumption. Why? We import oil not because there is no oil left in Texas but because imports are cheaper than domestic production. Guess what happens when oil price drops? High cost domestic wells get shut down first. So yes, gasoline tax and reduced consumption would make us more dependent on import, measured as per centage of total consumption, because more domestics would be put out of business.
We can do this ourselves on our own timetable or when can have it dictated to us by terrorists, which do you think might work out better?
Yet another half-baked theory couched in the "national seucrity" boogieman. Exactly how would terrorists dictate our oil consumption? We can turn coal into gasoline at $80 a barrel, and the supply of coal is practically unlimited domesticly. If anyone's thinking terrorists would disappear for lack of funding if we stopped using oil, they'd thoroughly mistaken. Islamic despradoes have a long history; terrorism as a means of achieving political and economic goals has a long history. The word "assassin" came from the Hashshashin sect of Islam of the 10th century.
The key to understand oil is this: it's not really gold despite the "black gold" moniker dreamed up by oil companies. It's the cheapest source of energy to burn, that's why we burn it. The only value of oil is the fact that it's the cheapest to use among all energy sources. If somehow coal were liquid and easy to burn in engines, we wouldn't be using any oil at all. If tree branches were liquid tubes containing hydrocarbon instead of stiff sticks containing high water content, we'd all be burning "fire wood/sawsage links" instead of oil. The only real value of oil is the fact that it's cheap. So keep it that way!
Your just one of those guys who doesn't like to pay anything,period. Seen 'em a million times.
No kidding. I happen to value my own liberty very much. Glad there are still millions like myself. Liberty comes in divisible quantities, one dollar at a time. The more the government takes from you, the less you have left. Ever wonder why, before the federal reserve notes started putting government buildings and edifices on the paper currency, gold and silver coins (the constitutionally defined money) had Lady Liberty on them?
If you are not currently donating $1 to "oil independence" for each gallon of gasoline you buy, you have no right demanding I or anyone else do that.
I hear that comment a lot. Apparently you don't grasp the concept of a fuel tax because if you did you wouldn't have made that statement. If I choose to give $1 to the government for every gallon of gas I burn what will that have accomplished?
However, if I demand that you contribute 1 buck to a cause that I believe in, with a gun to your head, that's called robbery. Somehow, dressing myself up as a government tax collector makes it all okay with you?
That's true. I'm sure that the taxes you currently pay are going towards a lot of programs you don't support. So the government already has this gun to your head. In this case they aren't asking for more money they are just asking for you to pull it out of a different pocket.
The existing gasoline tax is for highway fund. There is no federal tax on fuel oil. If the goal for new tax is couched as for "oil independence," then gasoline tax alone wouldn't even make sense as fuel oil is just as dependent on oil import, so is off-road use such as farming and boating, both of which are currently exempt from gasoline (road) tax.
Not all of the federal gas tax is dedicated to a highway fund. Some of it is for debt reduction and even some of the highway portion goes towards mass transit. As far as the other fuels not being taxed, good point. They should be.
I would have thought the rational behind this is obvious. First off, I understand that Norway is a huge oil exporter. Let's say that Norway's government requires X amount of dollars to fund. The more of these X dollars they can get from exported oil revenue the less they have to take from their citizens. Discouraging domestic oil consumption results in a greater amount of oil that they can export. Resulting in their government being more funded by foreign consumers of their oil resulting in a lower overall tax on their citizenship. What's so difficult about that concept?
Yes.
I'd like for blufz1 to re-read this and try to soak it up. Because apparently the ENTIRE line of his argument is:
"Mid-east oil BAD; be less reliant on Mid-east oil.
Accomplish this by reducing demand for oil. Accomplish this by taxing it's usage."
I think that blufz1 needs to realize that with DECREASED demand for oil (for whatever reason), comes a DECREASE in the price of oil. As the demand and price of oil goes DOWN, DOMESTIC wells are shut down first because it makes more economic sense to purchase oil from the Mid-East since the production costs are much less.
Reduced demand ends up making us MORE dependent on FOREIGN oil, not less.
Rocky
We supposedly had a budget surplus in the 1990s. Not one penny was spent on reducing the deficit. The last time we paid off any of our debt, Ike was president. One of the few non-partisan policies is running up the debt.
Facts are facts: it cost more to get oil out of the ground in Texas than it does to buy it from the Saudi's and ship it over. Simple matter of physics.
Now, I suppose we could restrict/eliminate imports from 'terrorist' countries (which we already do with regard to Iran). But that DOESN'T mean that those countries don't sell any oil; they just sell it to the French or Indians or Chinese instead.
End result - those countries are still funded, you've jacked up the price of fuel to the American consumer, and it's not like you've made any new "friends" in the Mid-east in the process.....
Aren't we suppose to have more morales than French, Indians, Chinese ?
I'm actually kind of surprised by your answer. :surprise:
Rocky
Bingo.
It's about oil independence. Not a way to secure petroleum flow to our pumps, but about reducing our dependence on petroleum-based fuels.
Drilling more holes in Texas and Oklahoma? Go ahead if you like. More holes in the gulf or new holes in Alaska (an investment no oil company wants to take at this juncture, BTW) or off the CA coast? No.
Ripping the landscape apart with further coal excavation to be able to produce $80 oil, or fire "clean" generator plants? Big no.
It's about finding a way to take burnt hydrocarbons out of the equation as much as possible, leaving only the processed petroleum we rely on for durable goods until we can engineer a way past that.
Not about domestic petroleum productivity at all. All about new economic opportunity in a completely different direction...
Yes, the majority of the 9/11 terrorists were Saudis. Does that imply they were state supported? McVay was an American; does that imply HE was state supported?
One of our moral codes is to only 'punish' those who actually deserve it. I'm all for ceasing the purchase of oil from those nations who DO support terrorists; but to reflexively seek to cut imports from the "Mid-east" JUST because most terrorists are "middle-eastern" isn't (IMO) moralistic; it's bigoted.
It all comes down to how you define level of dependency. If it's based on the percent of imports then what you're saying makes sense. If it's defined by the amount you need to import then it doesn't make sense. Let's say that I'm capable of growing all my own food in my backyard but I choose to instead get 100% of my food at the store because its cheaper and more convenient. Am I 100% dependent on that store for food? I don't think so. If this country is capable of producing 8 million barrels of oil a day but needs 20 million then its more accurate to say our level of dependency is 12 million barrels, not 60%. If by some miracle we cut our consumption by 4 million barrels per day I seriously doubt that 100% of that would come out of domestic production. So the gap between what we use and what we can produce has shrunk even though the percentage may have gone up.
If oil can really be made out of coal for $40/barrel why aren't we doing more of this? Sounds like a pretty good return on investment to me.
Oil will never again be cheap enough to compete with electricity in terms of cost per mile. Its just a matter of the technology maturing, but it will eventually happen. The sooner it happens the sooner we can all start saving on our driving costs. If spending extra now can make it happen 5 years sooner that may ultimately turn out to be a savings in the long run.
We are pretty much in agreement on using electricity to propel our cars. I am not sure that the government spending money to come up with better storage devices will speed up the process. We spent a couple billion on the EV-1 which netted NiMH batteries. The only company to benefit so far is Toyota. Not sure that has been a shot in the arm for US industry. Then I think hybrids are a money maker for the manufacturers and a loser for the consumer, long term. Just my opinion.
Truth.
I say find the steps beyond petroleum and help new companies (or existing ones for that matter) develop them into viability, then walk away and let the Middle East tear itself apart into the melange it was before the red line, suitable only for tourists again and license the tech to the rest of the world and make mo' money, mo' money, mo' money...
You might wish to google a bit and see where the defense department has long let R and D and actually have let contracts out for the production of so called "synthetic" fuels such as JP8 etc. etc.
Another example would be the diesel TDI with a 50 mpg already. Combine that 250 miles on electricity, that would put the "effective DIESEL mpg at" 68 mpg. !!! In other words 14 gal of diesel will (with electricity of course) go 950 miles between need to fill up with diesel.
Best part, IMO, is the installation of photo-voltaic panel arrays over the roofs. Efficiency on those as well as life-expectancy has grown pretty substantially in just the last ten years. Life on these new installs is around 40 years. School is energy independent on most days (CA is after all CA), selling back to the grid on fully clear days, and saving enough to realize the cost of install in less than 24 months, IIRC (could be less).
All related, IMO.
I think that if the government did it in the right way it might speed things up. Rather than fund R&D why not offer a huge prize, in the billions, for the first company that can manufacturer an electrical storage device that meets certain set parameters?
I don't mind us as a tax body prodding development with investment, but I have issues with us owning the rights, beyond royalties to help pay back the loan. That should belong to them as makes it happen, IMO.
Yet, how many folks can imagine life going forward without the web as we know? All this in just over a generation!!! (31 years) And thestill forward potential is almost unlimited!