The fact we're in Iraq has to with WHO gets the $$ from the oil. Whoever is in power is still going to drill, and sell the oil on the market. So whether we buy and use Iraqi oil, or Europe buys that oil, decreasing their purchase of North sea oil, which we then buy really doesn't make much difference. With the amount of money these otherwise poor countries are making selling oil, none of them can afford to stop drilling and selling.
The thing that is driving the price of oil and gasoline higher is the willingness of an increasing number of people to pay the going-rate.
Betting on the future? Sounds a lot like those who thought real estate values would keep going up up up! Could oil speculators be as corrupt as housing speculators hence the big run-up in housing prices and subsequent crash? I think the oil game is going to be the next big scam following the dot.bomb, Enron, and housing debacles.
Man you got that right. I listened to the debate last night (Democratic) neither Hllarious or BAMMER has a straight answer.. GEEEZE and giving US $0.18 a gallon break on gas this summer is really nothing. Diesel is over $4 a gallon now for 8 weeks.. Gas in NC $3.40+/-...
Where is that long promised energy policy promise?
Sure, I agree. I've been on good RT and bad RT, in this city and in others. I agree, SF has a very good system. DC's is good as well. I have had good and bad on CTA / RTA, with most of the bad being CTA and good RTA and Metra. And with the latest multiple "doomsday" and cost run-ups happening with CTA I avoid it like the plague when I'm in the city.
I actually would like to take transit instead of driving, but for me it's a no-no for work route in terms only having the Metra train, the cost (pass, parking, time) and location. I car-pool as much as possible, get into work early and leave late to avoid as much traffic and hyper-mile (actually just doing the speed limit). And I can take multiple routes if one backs up to avoid the jam-ups.
I'm in full agreement that $5 and $6 and $8 per gallon prices are just a matter of time for us the buying public. The prices will continue to escalate inexorably until we decide to stop using the product. That will drive down the price of fuel. However with an expanding country and and expanding economy there's little likelihood that we will ever be able to use less fuel. Therefore the prices are probably never coming down again. "What will you do when gas goes to $[ fill in number ]?" will probably be an annual thread, add one year, add $1 to the title.
The producers and the oil companies and the refiners are doing what's best for their shareholders and employees by keeping the prices as high as possible by limiting supply to match demand. We are not doing our part as a general rule. Certain like yourself are taking action. Most, meaning a majority, either can't react to the higher prices or they don't care or they are just hoping the nightmare ends and the 90's return again.
I don't see this as being Congress' problem or the oil producer's/marketer's problem or anyone's problem except ours. When we decide to buy less then the prices will come down.
All business investment from the kid making lemonade, to the person opening a restaurant next month, to buying real estate, to stock and commodity trading is "betting on the future". It's unavoidable to most people. We need people who take risks.
Sounds a lot like those who thought real estate values would keep going up up up!
And they have historically and will. They just don't go up evenly year after year.
I think you are lumping illegal economics with perfectly legal actions of people to make money, when you use the "corrupt" examples. Wanting to make a lot of money on business transactions is not corrupt.
I think if you take a look at the last two energy bills pushed through Congress you will find the reason oil is so high. They are not well thought out when you are dealing with a World oil market. There is NO reason for $115 oil except that traders are betting on the future. They did it before and the oil market went all the way down to $9 per barrel. That was from an adjusted high in the $70 range.
Sorry Gary this is just an error in economics. There is a very real reason why fuel is $115 per bbl. Simply put, we are willing to pay that price. We haven't said "STOP, that's enough!!" It doesn't matter what the level of price is, as long as we are willing to pay it then it's the right price. There's a seller and there's a buyer.
The world is in perfect balance. If the producers said 'Hey we've decided that the price of oil should be $130 /bbl." If we pay it then that too is the fair market price.
There are a huge numbers of fuel users who just don't care what the price is. These users have certain wants / needs and they aren't willing to change anything, the price of fuel is of little concern and is not going to force them to change.
If they are doing this then it's just good business. It's keeping supply and demand in balance. When you go to a station and find it empty and dry then there's a real supply problem.
BTW there is no right of the buying public to purchase vehicles at less than MSRP or by using discounted rates or rebates. It's only a supply imbalance that has caused this. If the auto companies were smart enough they too would limit the supply to match demand and raise prices. But they have other issues which must be addressed first.
The steel companies are currently in exactly the same position as the oil companies. With the growth of China and India there is too much demand chasing a limited supply. Wholesale prices have jumped 50-100%.
Wanting to make a lot of money on business transactions is not corrupt.
No, but manipulating the markets so you're guaranteed to make a lot of money on business transactions is corrupt. In some situations, it's also illegal.
If it's a matter of just holding back supply, if that's even possible in this day and age, or controlling the throughput of refineries to match seasonal demand then that's not corrupt it's just good business practices.
If in turn this control/matching drives up prices for a while, well then that's our decision to buy the product at those prices or not. You're viewing this from the perspective that you must have fuel. But that's not a given. None of us 'need' fuel. We 'want' fuel. That's a huge difference. We've come to expect that fuel is readily available at almost no cost.
That paradigm has changed. It may become a luxury.
Here's the deal. Yes, it makes sense for oil companies to lower the supply to increase their profits. But that only works if ALL of them do it. If even one oil company decides to halve it's profits by cutting prices and increasing supplies, then THEY make a bunch of money while the other oil companies get the shaft, because they pick up sales, increasing their income (and hence their profits).
Which means it's entirely possible that there is collaboration going on regarding keeping the supply low. Which is illegal (check the statutes on monopolism and abuse).
No, but manipulating the markets so you're guaranteed to make a lot of money on business transactions is corrupt.
You'd have to give some examples. Would it be corrupt for me to buy 200 foreclosed condos in an area, rent them for 3 years, and sell them for 3X as much? Is it corrupt that 1 Euro used to = $0.90, and traders now have it at 1 Euro = $1.59? Or that people are making a lot of money buying and selling all sorts of goods, real estate and services?
This only concerns US companies but yes I agree that if the US based companies all conspire to hold back supply then that is illegal. However if one does it and others follow suit and stay 'in step' without discussing it then that's not illegal. That's how the prices of steel were set for years and years. US Steel set the prices and the others followed suit exactly.
However the price of oil is set by the producers and their mostly state-owned marketing arms. These are not US companies so they can do whatever they want and it's not illegal. It's perfectly good capitalism, i.e. the one(s) with the power exert it over the one(s) without the power.
US monopoly laws do not apply to non-US companies doing business outside the US.
Global oil consumption has been growing at around 3% each year. This would be impossible if the oil producers were actually decreasing production. You can't consume more than is produced. With $115/barrel oil the domestic producers are doing whatever they can to maximize production. My understanding is there are localities in Texas with booming economies as a result. Now OPEC could be limiting production, but I doubt it. Regardless, they aren't bound by our anti-trust laws so all the ranting in the world isn't going to change how OPEC operates. We can only look at ourselves and ask, "how did we become so dependent, so vulnerable"?
Would it be corrupt for me to buy 200 foreclosed condos in an area, rent them for 3 years, and sell them for 3X as much?
Yeah.... this is corrupt in two ways... first, that I had not thought of it first, or did not have the guts to take the gamble, and second, that I insist on living in that area, and am pissed off at the asking price. :P
Which means it's entirely possible that there is collaboration going on regarding keeping the supply low. Which is illegal (check the statutes on monopolism and abuse).
Actually, there IS collaboration going on to control the supply of oil.... You may have heard of an organization called OPEC? They are a cartel (fancy word for monopoly) of oil producing countries which meet from time to time to determine how much oil they are going to supply.
The thing is, what they are doing isn't "illegal" since they aren't governed by the laws of the United States of America. You see, the laws of the USA only apply within the borders of the USA, despite what Bush might have let you to believe.
No reason whatsoever that USA should be driving all these gashogs, except for EPA and DOE being in cohoots with BigOil, along with all the US auto manufacturers!!! BOYCOTT them ALL, except for one . . . Honda. Honda is the highest mpg auto producer and ONLY company still selling the REAL CURE to high petrol prices . . . CNG - - compressed natural gas. USA has massive supply of cheap natural gas (witnessed by Utah cng price of $0.64 per gge - - - gallon of gas equivalent). Also Rocky Mountains has massive supply that is being piped through new 36 inch pipeline from Colorado to Chicago!! Also, new Denali pipeline is being built from Alaska to Canada to use massive supply of natural gas in Alaska. Finally, yet another massive supply of natural gas was located in Pennsylvania - - - all of these add up to likely 100 to 150 year supply of ng, even if ALL crude oil was NOT bought from OPEC!!
Buy yourself a Honda Civic GX (dedicated cng) and find any public cng refueling station near your house and USE cng!!! If no public cng station, then buy yourself a Fuelmaker cng compressor that connects to normal natural gas line that supplies your home furnace with natural gas!!!
CNG is the SOLUTION to transportation needs of USA . . if only Pres Bush, EPA, DOE, and car makers would promote cng!! Current "Oil Crisis" is what I call Enronizing the price of crude oil to help all of Pres Bush BigOil cronies in TX, Halliburton buddies of VP Cheney, etc. Throw all those scheisters out!!
The Honda Civic GX has many incentives to purchase including HOV in CA. Problem is it is only a commuter type vehicle. When you get 180 miles from home you will not be able to find anyone to fill your CNG tank. Add to that the very small trunk because of the large CNG tank.
If you want or need a REAL truck Honda has no option. If they ever offer a diesel Pilot I may consider Honda a viable car company. Not before. Nothing they have is practical for me.
PS Friends that own the Odyssey do not get more than about 16 MPG in mixed driving. I can get that in my Sequoia and not worry about getting stuck in a sandy wash.
by consolidating errands. Ended up hitting the gas station, doing my weekly beer run, and picking up cigs for my roommate all in one trip. Unfortunately, I did it in a '76 LeMans that gets about 10 mpg in local driving. :sick:
I'll tell ya what's really incredible, is how much cigarettes have gone up! A pack of Marlboro Medium is now something like $5.59! They were running a sale on menthol, but the guy at the liquor store didn't recommend getting those for someone who's not used to them. I ended up getting him some Parliament, which was running a sale of 2 for $5.99.
It wouldn't surprise me to find out my roommate's cigarette habit costs more per year than my fuel bill!
Oh, as for the gas? 93 octane at the local Shell came out to $3.679 per gallon.
No reason whatsoever that USA should be driving all these gashogs, except for EPA and DOE being in cohoots with BigOil, along with all the US auto manufacturers!!! BOYCOTT them ALL, except for one . . . Honda.
I think highly of Honda products. Whether it's a lawnmower, generator, motorcycle, outboard motor, personal watercraft, and cars.
If you think about it, Honda 225HP outboard will get a max 4mpg pushing a boat. Since many offshore boats have two handing on the back, make that 2mpg. Regardless, I love boating and am just throwing this out there. Honda does make so called gas hogs.
Besides, honda needs someone to build a vehicle that can tow the boats they put their outboards on. BTW, a 225HP Honda outboard costs more than a Civic. Not going to tow a Honda PWC with a CNG Civic.
Besides, it doesn't bother me to fill up my Suburban, so I'll keep driving it.
Is CNG really that great to power our cars. My NG bill in the winters are high enough. No free lunch.
then buy yourself a Fuelmaker cng compressor that connects to normal natural gas line that supplies your home furnace with natural gas!!!
That's not an option where I live; and probably for many people. The gas company lines stop about 40 miles east only serving a few cities. The main fuel used here in homes is oil, followed by propane, and then wood.
A lot of the natural gas that is available here in New England is brought in liquified on tankers. Needless to say not many communities want to harbor this process due to the tanks and the danger. Security is very high when these tankers come in, so that someone doesn't do a "Cole-type" attack and create a mile-wide fireball. In Boston they even close a major bridge while a tanker passes underneath.
And as far as those 36" delivery pipes go, how do you protect thousands of miles of those if terrorists decide to one day knock those out (for a week or so), and thus bring the transport in the nation to a stop?
There is no way the there would be enough natural gas to go around if everyone changed to a natural gas car. They hardly have enough for electric generation, home heating, and production (such as fertilizers, etc.). They also use extensive amounts of natural gas to extract oil from poor sources like tar sand, or to pressurize oil wells as the natural pressure subsides. Natural gas is not a replacement for oil or gas powered cars.
"Natural gas production in the United States peaked in 1971. Since then Canada has increasing supplied the United States to 15 percent of its needs in 2002. However, in 2002 Canadian gas production declined. That trend continued in 2003. Currently, 80 percent of all wells are drilled for gas not oil, but in spite of this increased effort the production decline has not been reversed. The amount of gas found per foot drilled has also declined 50 percent in the past decade indicating that the easy-to-find large fields have already been discovered. New gas wells are showing decline rates as high as 80 percent the first year." -Originally published in Natural Resources Research
Quote: What will you do when gas price rises above $4 a gallon? /Quote I'll continue to drive my Honda and laugh every time I drive by a fuel/gas station
"No reason whatsoever that USA should be driving all these gashogs, except for EPA and DOE being in cohoots with BigOil, along with all the US auto manufacturers!!!"
Except for the fact that neither agency has anything what so ever to do with the vehicles the manufactures choose to make or what citizens choose to purchase. It is actually the publics demand that decides what manufactures build. No one buys any SUVs? Then they stop making them. Demand for econo-cars skyrockets? They step up production of those models and put more R&D into that category (remember there is a 3 to 5 year lead time on what rolls off the assembly line).
If certain models sat on dealer lots and didn't sell, you can be they would make less of them. But when everyone that walks in buys a V8 rather than a V6 in a vehicle, or a V6 rather than an inline 4, that is what the manufactures build. Blame your neighbor, not gov. agencies. Supply and demand, remember?
Coming to a full stop at intersections wastes gas, right? So let's either legalize California stops or swap a bunch of stop signs out for yield signs. No one stops at them anyway:
It's the silly posts that keep these forums so popular. There's always someone marketing the pill to drop in water to make gasoline, or the little fan-device that you put in your air-intake, or to pump-up your tires well above your owner manual's specification.
We really need to ignore those and concentrate on getting back to basics - coal-fired steam engines.
I'm shopping for a house now, and I'm looking for one that has a wood/coal stove, as an alternative to oil heat.
18 cents times 100 gallons a month for 3 months nets a whopping $54. I can drive my truck a couple hundred miles on that. But only if the oil companies don't see the 18 cent drop as a chance to get well on profits and raise the price of gas, thinking we can afford the increase. And then what about when the gas tax reinstates? Higher yet.
getting back to basics - coal-fired steam engines.
The wave of the future. China is leading the surge, building one new coal fired generator plant per week. It is a good alternative for producing diesel.
"Oil's gains on Friday were limited by the dollar, which strengthened against the euro, sending oil prices lower earlier in the day. A stronger dollar makes commodities such as oil less attractive to investors as a hedge against inflation, and it makes oil more expensive to investors overseas. Analysts believe the weaker dollar is the primary reason oil has soared well past $100 a barrel this year."
"Ritterbusch estimates that the average difference between what refiners pay for oil and receive for the gasoline they make from it stands somewhere between $13 and $15 a barrel. But in some areas, this difference has actually gone negative at times in recent weeks, meaning that refiners "were losing money on each barrel of gasoline produced," Ritterbusch said."
"May natural gas futures rose 20.4 cents to settle at $10.587 per 1,000 cubic feet."
If the price of natural gas is shooting up too, I'm sure there is no large excess supply.
About 10 years ago my school district experimented with compressed natural gas as a "green" alternative to diesel. What a disaster.
First off the driving range was only about 50 miles (limited by the number of tanks you could install) vs. 300 plus miles for our regular diesels. This required 3.5 hours of staff time each week just for fueling vs. about 10 minutes for the diesel which only required fueling once per week.
Second, the buses were dangerously underpowered. I once floored an empty bus from a stop and kept my foot to the floor for 3 miles. I got it up to 40mph! Pulling out in heavy traffic was suicide.
Third, the gas engines were unreliable. The buses broke down almost daily. They replaced all the engines in the first few years to no avail. They finally sold them all to some third world country just to get rid of them.
2019 Kia Soul+, 2015 Mustang GT, 2013 Ford F-150, 2000 Chrysler Sebring convertible
Coming to a full stop at intersections wastes gas, right? So let's either legalize California stops or swap a bunch of stop signs out for yield signs. No one stops at them anyway:
I visit France every 4 years to participate in a big bicycling event (what else?). One thing I like about their road system is that there are a lot less stop signs and a lot more roundabouts than we have here.
I know that converting every intersection that has stop signs over to a roundabout would be very costly and there probably wouldn't be room to do it in many places. However, France seems to have considered the roundabout in the original design of the road. I wonder if the high price of fuel (currently over $8/gal in US dollars) had anything to do with it?
the price of oil was $116.69 (a new record) and per a new AAA report today, the average price of gas in San Francisco is now $3.96.
So $4 gas is here. My officemate, who has a 20-mile drive each way in her commute, started participating in a complicated carpool with three coworkers two weeks ago. All of them come from at least that far away; one has a commute of approximately 35 miles each way.
She is now arriving late half the time while they work out the kinks, but she seems fairly happy with it, and says her savings are going to be substantial after the first full month. The sacrifice on her part is that she is limited to the couple of places within walking distance for lunch, on days when she doesn't brown bag it.
2014 Mini Cooper (stick shift of course), 2016 Camry hybrid, 2009 Outback Sport 5-spd (keeping the stick alive)
I just filled up my girlfriend's Buick LaCrosse yesterday morning after dropping her off at the airport. It had jumped overnight from a ridiculous $3.27 to an absurd $3.33 for Sunoco Regular. This morning it's an insane $3.39 for regular! How the (censored) can it jump 18 cents in two days?!?!? Either we're being viciously gas-raped or we're experiencing some Weimar-esque inflation! Looks like it's time to break out the Nikes.
Comments
So whether we buy and use Iraqi oil, or Europe buys that oil, decreasing their purchase of North sea oil, which we then buy really doesn't make much difference.
With the amount of money these otherwise poor countries are making selling oil, none of them can afford to stop drilling and selling.
The thing that is driving the price of oil and gasoline higher is the willingness of an increasing number of people to pay the going-rate.
Where is that long promised energy policy promise?
I actually would like to take transit instead of driving, but for me it's a no-no for work route in terms only having the Metra train, the cost (pass, parking, time) and location. I car-pool as much as possible, get into work early and leave late to avoid as much traffic and hyper-mile (actually just doing the speed limit). And I can take multiple routes if one backs up to avoid the jam-ups.
The producers and the oil companies and the refiners are doing what's best for their shareholders and employees by keeping the prices as high as possible by limiting supply to match demand. We are not doing our part as a general rule. Certain like yourself are taking action. Most, meaning a majority, either can't react to the higher prices or they don't care or they are just hoping the nightmare ends and the 90's return again.
I don't see this as being Congress' problem or the oil producer's/marketer's problem or anyone's problem except ours. When we decide to buy less then the prices will come down.
Congrats on making a small difference.
All business investment from the kid making lemonade, to the person opening a restaurant next month, to buying real estate, to stock and commodity trading is "betting on the future". It's unavoidable to most people. We need people who take risks.
Sounds a lot like those who thought real estate values would keep going up up up!
And they have historically and will. They just don't go up evenly year after year.
I think you are lumping illegal economics with perfectly legal actions of people to make money, when you use the "corrupt" examples. Wanting to make a lot of money on business transactions is not corrupt.
Sorry Gary this is just an error in economics. There is a very real reason why fuel is $115 per bbl. Simply put, we are willing to pay that price. We haven't said "STOP, that's enough!!" It doesn't matter what the level of price is, as long as we are willing to pay it then it's the right price. There's a seller and there's a buyer.
The world is in perfect balance. If the producers said 'Hey we've decided that the price of oil should be $130 /bbl." If we pay it then that too is the fair market price.
There are a huge numbers of fuel users who just don't care what the price is. These users have certain wants / needs and they aren't willing to change anything, the price of fuel is of little concern and is not going to force them to change.
BTW there is no right of the buying public to purchase vehicles at less than MSRP or by using discounted rates or rebates. It's only a supply imbalance that has caused this. If the auto companies were smart enough they too would limit the supply to match demand and raise prices. But they have other issues which must be addressed first.
The steel companies are currently in exactly the same position as the oil companies. With the growth of China and India there is too much demand chasing a limited supply. Wholesale prices have jumped 50-100%.
No, but manipulating the markets so you're guaranteed to make a lot of money on business transactions is corrupt. In some situations, it's also illegal.
If in turn this control/matching drives up prices for a while, well then that's our decision to buy the product at those prices or not. You're viewing this from the perspective that you must have fuel. But that's not a given. None of us 'need' fuel. We 'want' fuel. That's a huge difference. We've come to expect that fuel is readily available at almost no cost.
That paradigm has changed. It may become a luxury.
Which means it's entirely possible that there is collaboration going on regarding keeping the supply low. Which is illegal (check the statutes on monopolism and abuse).
You'd have to give some examples. Would it be corrupt for me to buy 200 foreclosed condos in an area, rent them for 3 years, and sell them for 3X as much? Is it corrupt that 1 Euro used to = $0.90, and traders now have it at 1 Euro = $1.59? Or that people are making a lot of money buying and selling all sorts of goods, real estate and services?
However the price of oil is set by the producers and their mostly state-owned marketing arms. These are not US companies so they can do whatever they want and it's not illegal. It's perfectly good capitalism, i.e. the one(s) with the power exert it over the one(s) without the power.
US monopoly laws do not apply to non-US companies doing business outside the US.
BTW, just because we don't know they're discussing it doesn't mean they're not doing it...and laughing all the way to the bank.
Yeah.... this is corrupt in two ways... first, that I had not thought of it first, or did not have the guts to take the gamble, and second, that I insist on living in that area, and am pissed off at the asking price. :P
Actually, there IS collaboration going on to control the supply of oil.... You may have heard of an organization called OPEC? They are a cartel (fancy word for monopoly) of oil producing countries which meet from time to time to determine how much oil they are going to supply.
The thing is, what they are doing isn't "illegal" since they aren't governed by the laws of the United States of America. You see, the laws of the USA only apply within the borders of the USA, despite what Bush might have let you to believe.
Buy yourself a Honda Civic GX (dedicated cng) and find any public cng refueling station near your house and USE cng!!! If no public cng station, then buy yourself a Fuelmaker cng compressor that connects to normal natural gas line that supplies your home furnace with natural gas!!!
CNG is the SOLUTION to transportation needs of USA . . if only Pres Bush, EPA, DOE, and car makers would promote cng!! Current "Oil Crisis" is what I call Enronizing the price of crude oil to help all of Pres Bush BigOil cronies in TX, Halliburton buddies of VP Cheney, etc. Throw all those scheisters out!!
That's still in the "give us a license" phase. Build-out would be complete in 2018. Journal of Commerce
The Honda Civic GX has many incentives to purchase including HOV in CA. Problem is it is only a commuter type vehicle. When you get 180 miles from home you will not be able to find anyone to fill your CNG tank. Add to that the very small trunk because of the large CNG tank.
If you want or need a REAL truck Honda has no option. If they ever offer a diesel Pilot I may consider Honda a viable car company. Not before. Nothing they have is practical for me.
PS
Friends that own the Odyssey do not get more than about 16 MPG in mixed driving. I can get that in my Sequoia and not worry about getting stuck in a sandy wash.
I'll tell ya what's really incredible, is how much cigarettes have gone up! A pack of Marlboro Medium is now something like $5.59! They were running a sale on menthol, but the guy at the liquor store didn't recommend getting those for someone who's not used to them. I ended up getting him some Parliament, which was running a sale of 2 for $5.99.
It wouldn't surprise me to find out my roommate's cigarette habit costs more per year than my fuel bill!
Oh, as for the gas? 93 octane at the local Shell came out to $3.679 per gallon.
I think highly of Honda products. Whether it's a lawnmower, generator, motorcycle, outboard motor, personal watercraft, and cars.
If you think about it, Honda 225HP outboard will get a max 4mpg pushing a boat. Since many offshore boats have two handing on the back, make that 2mpg. Regardless, I love boating and am just throwing this out there. Honda does make so called gas hogs.
Besides, honda needs someone to build a vehicle that can tow the boats they put their outboards on. BTW, a 225HP Honda outboard costs more than a Civic. Not going to tow a Honda PWC with a CNG Civic.
Besides, it doesn't bother me to fill up my Suburban, so I'll keep driving it.
Is CNG really that great to power our cars. My NG bill in the winters are high enough. No free lunch.
That's not an option where I live; and probably for many people. The gas company lines stop about 40 miles east only serving a few cities. The main fuel used here in homes is oil, followed by propane, and then wood.
A lot of the natural gas that is available here in New England is brought in liquified on tankers. Needless to say not many communities want to harbor this process due to the tanks and the danger. Security is very high when these tankers come in, so that someone doesn't do a "Cole-type" attack and create a mile-wide fireball. In Boston they even close a major bridge while a tanker passes underneath.
And as far as those 36" delivery pipes go, how do you protect thousands of miles of those if terrorists decide to one day knock those out (for a week or so), and thus bring the transport in the nation to a stop?
"Natural gas production in the United States peaked in 1971. Since then Canada has increasing supplied the United States to 15 percent of its needs in 2002. However, in 2002 Canadian gas production declined. That trend continued in 2003. Currently, 80 percent of all wells are drilled for gas not oil, but in spite of this increased effort the production decline has not been reversed. The amount of gas found per foot drilled has also declined 50 percent in the past decade indicating that the easy-to-find large fields have already been discovered. New gas wells are showing decline rates as high as 80 percent the first year."
-Originally published in Natural Resources Research
Here is another good article, including the follow-up questions and answers...
How the coming home heating crisis could threaten the grid
I'll continue to drive my Honda
and laugh every time I drive by a fuel/gas station
Except for the fact that neither agency has anything what so ever to do with the vehicles the manufactures choose to make or what citizens choose to purchase. It is actually the publics demand that decides what manufactures build. No one buys any SUVs? Then they stop making them. Demand for econo-cars skyrockets? They step up production of those models and put more R&D into that category (remember there is a 3 to 5 year lead time on what rolls off the assembly line).
If certain models sat on dealer lots and didn't sell, you can be they would make less of them. But when everyone that walks in buys a V8 rather than a V6 in a vehicle, or a V6 rather than an inline 4, that is what the manufactures build. Blame your neighbor, not gov. agencies. Supply and demand, remember?
Does anybody really stop at stop signs? (Straightline)
(Dang Andre, beer, cigs and gas. That's three bad "addictions" you have going there. :P)
You forgot the worst - Mopar tanks!
Never seems to help the Chronic Car Buyers though, lol.
The Miata is more fuel efficient than the S2000.
The Sienna is more fuel efficient than the Odyssey.
Prius is more fuel efficient than the Civic Hybrid.
I could go on and on.
Yes, Honda has a high CAFE average but that's mostly because they do not sell big trucks like Toyota does.
Choosing the most fuel efficient vehicles that meets your needs makes sense.
Boycotting a Miata, which is more fuel efficient than an S2000, just because of the manufacturer's badge, makes no sense at all. It is ridiculous.
No one wants to pull the stop signs down?
Yes, by a whole 2 mpg in the real world.
We really need to ignore those and concentrate on getting back to basics - coal-fired steam engines.
I'm shopping for a house now, and I'm looking for one that has a wood/coal stove, as an alternative to oil heat.
The wave of the future. China is leading the surge, building one new coal fired generator plant per week. It is a good alternative for producing diesel.
Congressional Ethics
Luxury Compact
Jumbo Shrimp
and now ...
Clean Coal
That's a definite maybe. :shades:
Isn't that an oxymoron?
Clean Coal
Isn't that ALSO an oxymoron? :P
http://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/energy/2008-04-18-oil-prices_N.htm
"Oil's gains on Friday were limited by the dollar, which strengthened against the euro, sending oil prices lower earlier in the day. A stronger dollar makes commodities such as oil less attractive to investors as a hedge against inflation, and it makes oil more expensive to investors overseas. Analysts believe the weaker dollar is the primary reason oil has soared well past $100 a barrel this year."
"Ritterbusch estimates that the average difference between what refiners pay for oil and receive for the gasoline they make from it stands somewhere between $13 and $15 a barrel. But in some areas, this difference has actually gone negative at times in recent weeks, meaning that refiners "were losing money on each barrel of gasoline produced," Ritterbusch said."
"May natural gas futures rose 20.4 cents to settle at $10.587 per 1,000 cubic feet."
If the price of natural gas is shooting up too, I'm sure there is no large excess supply.
First off the driving range was only about 50 miles (limited by the number of tanks you could install) vs. 300 plus miles for our regular diesels. This required 3.5 hours of staff time each week just for fueling vs. about 10 minutes for the diesel which only required fueling once per week.
Second, the buses were dangerously underpowered. I once floored an empty bus from a stop and kept my foot to the floor for 3 miles. I got it up to 40mph! Pulling out in heavy traffic was suicide.
Third, the gas engines were unreliable. The buses broke down almost daily. They replaced all the engines in the first few years to no avail. They finally sold them all to some third world country just to get rid of them.
2019 Kia Soul+, 2015 Mustang GT, 2013 Ford F-150, 2000 Chrysler Sebring convertible
I visit France every 4 years to participate in a big bicycling event (what else?). One thing I like about their road system is that there are a lot less stop signs and a lot more roundabouts than we have here.
I know that converting every intersection that has stop signs over to a roundabout would be very costly and there probably wouldn't be room to do it in many places. However, France seems to have considered the roundabout in the original design of the road. I wonder if the high price of fuel (currently over $8/gal in US dollars) had anything to do with it?
So $4 gas is here. My officemate, who has a 20-mile drive each way in her commute, started participating in a complicated carpool with three coworkers two weeks ago. All of them come from at least that far away; one has a commute of approximately 35 miles each way.
She is now arriving late half the time while they work out the kinks, but she seems fairly happy with it, and says her savings are going to be substantial after the first full month. The sacrifice on her part is that she is limited to the couple of places within walking distance for lunch, on days when she doesn't brown bag it.
2014 Mini Cooper (stick shift of course), 2016 Camry hybrid, 2009 Outback Sport 5-spd (keeping the stick alive)