So how do you think we can produce dozens of nuke plants a year?
Build CANDU reactors like the ones found in Pickering Ontario, they are the safest nuclear plants in the world, cheap and easy to operate, and all parts are manufactured in Canada and can be imported.
The Pickering Nuclear facility was constructed in stages between 1966-1986 by the provincial Crown corporation, Ontario Hydro. In April 1999 Ontario Hydro was split into 5 component Crown corporations with Ontario Power Generation (OPG) taking over all electrical generating stations and which continues to operate the Pickering station.
The Pickering station is one of the largest nuclear facilities in the world and comprises 8 CANDU nuclear reactors located on the northern shore of Lake Ontario, having a total output of 4124 MW (capacity net) and 4336 MW (gross net) when all units are online. Pickering is only surpassed in Canada by the Bruce Nuclear Generating Station, which while also having 8 reactors, has a greater output. In 1994 Pickering Unit 7 set a world record for continuous operation (894 days) without a shutdown. Over 150 private companies in Canada supply components for the CANDU system.
China has purchased the technology and built several Candu reactors already, why not the US ?
I still like the idea of using a Solar Satellite laser beaming microwaves to the earth to a microwave reciever station, this would provide limitless electricity at a fraction of the cost. See...free energy that any company could charge to the public and make massive profits. A simple Wind Generator is said to produce enough electricity to power 1000 homes, all on free wind power. Sounds good to me, I should go an buy one and hook it up to the grid.
Hydrogen Fueled Car Hydrogen From Seawater The auto industry will begin mass producing its first cars powered by fuel cells during the next decade. They’ll run on pollution-free hydrogen, but critics point out that creating this hydrogen from natural gas or oil, as is done today, will still produce greenhouse gases. Using electricity from power plants fueled by coal, oil or gas to split water into hydrogen and oxygen will have the same problem. And the cost of carbon fuels will double over the next decade, further driving up the cost of electrically-produced hydrogen.
If solar satellite receiving antennas were built to float on the ocean off the East, West and Gulf Coasts of the U.S., this low-cost electricity could produce all the hydrogen needed for the nation’s fuel celled cars. East Coast and Gulf Coast solar satellites could become hurricane deflectors as needed with only minor disruptions in hydrogen production.
Wow and these solar satellites will be able to control the weather !
I would agree that we could build a few nuclear plants. Are the CANDU reactors the best way to go? The current refurbishment at the Bruce Power Plant in Canada may influence how many more units get built. http://www.thestar.com/News/Ideas/article/283653
One thing we can all be assured of, nuclear plants are not going to spring up as fast as ethanol plants did and still are.
CNNMoney is reporting that the average Prius spends 17 hours on the dealer lot. I wonder if the people are negotiating with the truck driver that delivers the car.
I suppose the hot gift this upcoming holiday season will be a Prius with a Wii inside. :shades:
Dear Santa
I have been a good boy this past year...........................
Errr.... solar energy is great and all, but the cost of building anything in space is ridiculous. Solar Satellite is not the answer.
It costs $10,000/kg to send something to space. Current solar panels generate 44 watts/kg.
Say we want to build a Gigawatt power station, enough to power 1/1000th of America. Lets assume that the transfer equipment back to Earth takes up no weight.
The cost of such a plant would be $227 billion, just to launch it. Ignoring, of course, the ridiculous further costs of designing the craft, getting large scale microwave power transfer to work, cooling the bloody thing, assembling it, getting it to fit in rockets such that the $10,000 /kg applies, and many more things I haven't thought of in this hasty assessment.
This is really hard to believe,in Fla the charter boats are running non stop and the recreational fishing has increased at least 10 percent over last year.Every boat ramp and marina is full and overflowing with no parking and you need traffic cops on the water,The only people we have seen inpacted by high fuel prices are the watermen.
any country subsidizing energy below the 'market' cost is setting themselves up for trouble.
Not necessarily...this is what I was talking about before. A growing economy produces more revenue for the government in the form of increased taxes. That increased tax revenue MAY (key word) be greater than the amount of money spent subsidizing gas prices.
It's a theory we can't really check, because most of these countries (including China, as mentioned) won't let us look at their "real" books. But theoretically it's sound...Sony and Nintendo basically sell consoles at a loss to make money on the games. HP sells inkjet printers at a loss to make money on the ink. A country could theoretically sell gas at a loss (in effect) in order to make money on the ensuing economic growth. The business model in itself has already been proven.
So some of these subsidies in other countries may go on for quite a bit longer than some thing. Though i realize some have already given them up, others haven't.
Tourism of every sort is up in the USA. The cheap dollar has made the US a good place to vacation. Especially for Europeans that are used to high priced fuel. Ours is still cheap by EU standards. Disney claims 28% increase this Spring over last year. Hawaii is up 18% over last year. Not everyone going to Florida is interested in Disney World. Makes sense that deep sea fishing would be booming.
It is also better for US citizens. Trying to go to Europe will be a real shocker with the exchange rate so high.
Both sound great...I do like the idea of integrating turbines into architecture like that. Just think...get the efficiency and installation right, and buildings could theoretically be largely self-powered, especially if you include a battery system for those times when the wind dies down a bit.
Hmm, self-powered buildings...I like that, come to think of it. Interesting sales slogan too.
Here is the statement that bothered me about that idea.
They were determined to create something effective in mild winds so the mini-turbine installation generates energy comparable to a solar installation in winds as low as 14 mph, with a competitive return on investment.
14 MPH wind is not a breeze in my book. That is less than comfortable to walk around in. I would say in places like Long Beach you would do better with Solar for most of the day. They need to get their generators to work in 5-10 MPH winds to be practical in my opinion. It doesn't look any worse than solar panels on a roof.
In built-up areas, 14 MPH is pretty common, especially on the higher levels of buildings (say 3rd floor and above). So you could get some decent power generation for buildings in, say, NYC or Chicago...well, especially Chicago I'm thinking. :shades:
I was thinking of my patio. If the wind is blowing more than 5 MPH I stay inside rather than get out in the wind. Even the trades where we stay in Hawaii rarely go over 10 MPH. Now the "Windy City" Chicago might be a different story. I know the week I spent there going to a seminar it was cold, blowing and miserable.
Which brings up another issue. Would these wind generators work in the snow, sleet etc, etc?
There are going to be a lot inventor types trying to come up with alternatives. That is a good thing. I am hoping for super efficient solar panels to be developed.
ABC News' Z. Byron Wolf reports: Ken Lay has been dead almost two years and Jeffrey Skilling is several years into his 24 year prison sentence, but one legacy of the Enron era lives on.
It’s the "Enron loophole," which exempts energy speculators who make trades electronically from US regulation. Some argue that the unregulated energy speculation, codified in 2000, can account for $20 to $25 in the jump in oil prices.
But now, 8 years after energy traders were able to push legislation exempting their electronic trades of energy futures from US regulation, a measure in the Farm Bill aims to close the loophole and subject futures trades made electronically inside the United States to US law.
“This bill is really our best bet to deter unscrupulous traders from manipulating energy prices and engaging in excessive speculation. This has been a long, hard road – and this is a major legislative victory," Said California Democrat Sen. Dianne Feinstein after the Senate passed the underlying Farm Bill on a broad, bipartisan basis.
I'll let you know in a month or so. We live in the center of one of the hottest family vacation spots in the mid-Atlantic states. Our guess is that a lot of people may forego their European or Middle Eastern or Asian vacations and 'stay at home' by going to the shore here.
Rather than spend $1500 / person in airfare and $200-$400 a night in a nice euro-hotel and $200+ per dinner at a nice restaurant having 4 couples rent a 10 BR beach house for $12000 a week is much more cost effective.
Drove out to my mother-in-law's beach house on the East End of Long Island last Saturday. For a perfect early summer beach day, eastbound traffic on the Long Island Expressway was noticeably lighter than usual. No need for the customary tap on the brakes at exit 56, for example. But my fellow travelers were not slowing down to save gas. I set my cruise control at 65 mph - that's 10 mph over the speed limit - & found that for every car I passed, 6 or 7 passed me. (When you see a Dodge Durango - a truck with the aerodynamics of a tool shed - moving along at 75+, you have to wonder if the owner forges credit cards for a living. How else can he keep that thing fueled up?)
Still, I found that holding my speed to 65 (I normally drive at 70 to 75 mph under those traffic conditions) didn't make our 60 mile trip seem any longer, & it was more relaxing. I could actually pay attention to what my wife was saying. It remains to be seen if that's good or bad for our marriage.
yes it has the 4.3. I hauled down one of the last loads from my old house to the new house. When I first took the far away job 4 yrs ago, it was about $8 gas to drive my full size truck 94 mile round trip. Now it's over $8 a day to drive the full size to a 15 mile away job. Now I just have to sell the old house to stop the bleeding. That is a far bigger concern than if gas goes to $5 right now, but I think in the long run the move closer to work was necessary. I just picked a bad time to do it.
It's amazing to me that given their track-record of being wrong year after year, that they have the kahunas to make some of these predictions. As a taxpayer I'm pretty :mad: right now, that we're spending money paying for these forecasts!
Agree on nonsense forecasts, especially when they give a number, instead of a range. He should say something like 'prices are expected to be somewhere between $80 and $200 in 2015'. He can't know it any better than that.
More worrying: " oil giant BP said world oil production fell 0.2% in 2007, first decline since 2002, while consumption rose 1.1%, highlighting a tight supply-demand balance that has helped push oil prices to record levels."
Based on the info they have today, the trends they have in place, and the fact that they do this for a living, doing those projections is just WHAT THEY DO.
Many hundreds of thousands of people around the world do "projections" for a living and that is a valuable service to a lot of people.
No one can see into the future - but with the best info, it is possible to make an "educated guess" based on hundreds and maybe thousands of data points.
I'm sure some of those guys projected $4 gas in June 2008.
Projections are fine as long as the person wanting the projection is paying for it. I don't want the government using my tax money for WAG projections. Or polls where they ask 1000 people what they think and say it is a good cross section of 200 million voters. It could be erroneous projections that has run the price of oil beyond what it needs to be.
Don't get a big-head, but I'd trust your projection on the price of oil or gas in 2015, as much as this guy's. Why? Because the whole mathematical trend has broken down. There is no longer any relationship between if demand goes up 1%, oil goes up 2%.
Because we are now in an era where if oil goes up 1%, or supply goes down 2%, that may cause a 50% price increase which causes the economy to go down 5%, which then decrease the demand. But since no one can predict whether the price increase is 50% or 25% or 75%, no one can predict how the economy will go in this country never mind globally, and it just goes on and on. Throw in the uncertainty of the condition of fields in Mexico, the future of oil-shale, ANWR and other undrilled areas, and there's no way anyone will have a decent model.
These forecasters are simply doing these forecasts because they used to, and they get paid for it. If any of these guys actually knew what they were talking about, they wouldn't be working for a paycheck at the DOE. They'd be making millions elsewhere.
Similarly, I never trust a stock-pick from some "expert with a great track record" unless he himself has earned a fortune picking stocks.
I have a 2002 I-4 Camry. I normally get over 30 mpg on the Interstate, going the speed limit of 70. Is there a resource that will give the mpg vs speed for this car? Short, low speed trips reduce mileage significantly.
For mpg vs. mph, I don't know of a source for 2002 Camry #s (you'd expect mpgs to decrease as speed goes up, of course). I assume you don't have a trip computer in the car. If you're really curious ($170 curious), you can get a Scangauge that plugs into your OBD-II port, discussed here:Scan Gauge blog
My Sonoma only gave me 22.9 mpg this last tank. Ends up as $5.10 per round trip to work.
Okay, it's a boring afternoon at work so I crunched a few numbers and came up with an interesting result.
So far this week I've traveled 119 commuter miles. I've used zero ounces of gas. However, I have used about 20 ounces of water per each 34-mile round trip.
What does all this mean? Glad you asked.
20 fluid ounces equals 0.15625 gallons. Since I use around 20 ounces for every 34 miles that comes out to 217.6 miles per gallon...of water.
It looks like my commute ends up as $0.00 per round trip to work. Well, actually I do get a monthly water bill, so it's not entirely free - maybe a few cents - but I bet it beats any hybrid on the road.
On top of that I just found something to do to unbore myself for a few minutes.
BTW, I noticed that gas is going for $3.88/gal today as I pedaled past.
Good question. I fear the answer might not be so simple.
Back in the early 1990's Quebec Hydro hatched a plan to build several massive dam/hydro projects. This would involve damming several rivers that flowed north and were pretty much useless for navigation or irrigation.
To make the plan work they needed a big customer south of the border who would consume the massive amounts of clean energy. They offered New York State the power at something like 2 cents/Kwh. A bargain even then.
Well, the deal was all set when a couple of native people sailed down to Albany in a canoe and complained that all this progress would disrupt their way of life.
Bingo, deal cancelled. The result? NYS now pay some of the highest electricity cost in the country. The hydro project up north sits half finished.
Welcome to radical enviromentalism.
2019 Kia Soul+, 2015 Mustang GT, 2013 Ford F-150, 2000 Chrysler Sebring convertible
I have a 2002 I-4 Camry. I normally get over 30 mpg on the Interstate, going the speed limit of 70. Is there a resource that will give the mpg vs speed for this car? Short, low speed trips reduce mileage significantly.
I'd say the only way to really find out is to try it and see what happens. It'll vary from car to car, but most cars will probably get better mpg as you drive slower. I'm sure there's an exception or two, though.
I go up to Pennsylvania a lot for car shows. If I averaged 65-75, with occasional bursts to 80, I'd probably see around 27-28 mpg. It was EPA-rated at 29 highway. Back in early October though, I took it a bit slower, more like 55-70, rarely going higher, and got around 31. This past weekend, on the trip up I was only running 58-65, with a rare jump to 70, and clocked 32.1.
Also, it's not just the speed you drive at, but how fast you get there, how fast you brake, how hard you try to maintain a speed on the hills, how quickly you try to pass slower moving traffic, etc.
Just to throw another example out there...I've also made that trip in a 1979 New Yorker with a fairly thirsty 360-2bbl. Running 65-75, it would get around 15.5, I'd guess. I had to take it up to Carlisle in April, when my Intrepid died. Took it fairly easy going up, and had to go REALLY slow coming back, because of brutal rains. Probably averaged 45-55, rarely getting to 60. Got about 18 mpg.
IIRC, the '02 Camry 4-cyl is EPA-rated around 33-34 on the highway. If you slowed down to 55-65, let it lose a little speed on the hills, don't floor it unless absolutely necessary (like you go to pass a slower car and didn't notice that tour bus bearing down on you), etc, you might see mid-to-upper 30's, I'm guessing.
I've had this exact question up on here. In fact it was just last week that I asked. I read a little bit into it, and found that keeping around 55 is best. I found a chart about the efficiency of I believe it was a Mazda, I can't remember.
Anyway, what I saw was that the MPG increased as you got to 55 and then decreased as you went past 55.
Meaning that going much slower than 55 is going to be detrimental to your mileage as well as going above 55. Now for me I recently found that all things being equal, for me, if I travel at 65 in my 03 Accord 4-cyl I get about the same mileage as I do going 55. What does this mean, I don't know, but I like it because 55 is a hard speed to maintain especially on the freeway, I can't take the monotony and all the dirty looks.
I think the Hydro Quebec - NYS deal dates back further than that. I toured Manic-2 and Manic-5 back in 1999 and these guys aren't pikers when it comes to generating power.
Hydro Quebec is like the TVA; they won't be happy until every last stream and rivulet is dammed up. Going nuke would avoid more of that.
I remember some reservoir was getting to full pool up that way on my trip (in Labrador, iirc). Folks were suing because the engineering was screwed up on that one and full pool hit the contour lines some 20 (?) feet higher than what their permit allowed.
Welcome to radical common sense and distrust of the easy engineering fix. :P
[ok Avalon - gas is holding at $4.07 RUG at most places here :shades: ]
Yeah, that isn't really fast enough to be called a breeze. We need 20 to 25 mph to be called a breeze here in ND. Maybe that is why ND has the highest wind energy potential in the U.S. The windmills are growing like weeds. http://www.awea.org/pubs/factsheets/Top_20_States.pdf
Makes me think I should buy one of those Zenn electric cars and be gasoline free.
Gas is up another $0.08 at my usual place overnight, to $4.55 for regular. That is a rise of $0.18 in a single week, as it was $4.37 when I filled up last Wednesday. I think I will just amuse myself around the house this weekend, the car can just sit until Monday morning....
These gas prices make the whole owning-a-car thing a lot less fun. :-(
2014 Mini Cooper (stick shift of course), 2016 Camry hybrid, 2009 Outback Sport 5-spd (keeping the stick alive)
Also AVAV has gotten the wind turbines to generate power down under 12 mph using newer designs.
Lastly think about what happens in urban settings where the wind builds up in tight spaces hits the side of a building and then roars up to the roof. I had this happen today walking through West Hartford. I turned a corner and all of a sudden there was a good 20 plus mph wind running down the side of the street that was probably accelerating to an even higher speed when it tried to climb the building at the end of the street.
This power plant gallery site is pretty entertaining. It has pics of 272 wind energy installations around the world, geo-thermal plants as well as the usual dams and coal fired power plants.
I'm used to large moves. You must not be used to 25 cent jumps in your area. And the graph only shows the bumps in the average price for the area. The portion that routinely has lower prices has exaggerated jumps back to the typical area price when the companies bump things up.
Filled up both cars at $3.94 today minus 10 cent Kroger discount.
Cool chart! It shows the $0.14 here in San Francisco since a week ago. I guess my local rise being $0.18 is within the norm of that chart.
It also shows that while we here in SF don't see jumps or spikes in our gas price, it is also true that our price slowly but surely rises all the time, without any of the jumps down that Dayton (and crude) experience.
I guess I should be glad (and I do remember taking note) that for a lot of May we weren't paying much above the national average. Now we are back to our norm of $0.50 above the national average. But I know the folks in Chicago and a few other big cities are feeling our pain too.
2014 Mini Cooper (stick shift of course), 2016 Camry hybrid, 2009 Outback Sport 5-spd (keeping the stick alive)
Remember, most of those organizations who are predicting oil futures HOLD oil futures. That means they A: want it to go up, and B: have the capability of making it go up by using their own buys and sells to tweak the market.
So they're not delusional. Not only are they saying it will, but they're informing you where their next major value increase is going to come from: your wallet.
"No one can see into the future - but with the best info, it is possible to make an "educated guess" based on hundreds and maybe thousands of data points. "
The problem, as you mention, is getting the best data points. Predicting oil prices means predicting what people will do. That is still a very difficult proposition. You have scientists, economists and engineers trying to understand the oil market that is actually made up of a lot of irrational people.
How can you predict when OPEC will raise or lower production? Can you predict when the CEO of an oil company will decide to drill in a certain area? Does our thousands of data points help us decide when or if countries will drop a fuel subsidy? Do we know what the breaking point is for the average American diver? $4 $5 $19.37? How will the politicians react or what legislation will they pass?
Back in 04, 05 & 06 the EIA predicted that Mexican oil production would rise despite the fact that it had leveled off in 04 and 05. Mexican investment in exploration and production was inadequate. The EIA knew that yet they kept up with their rosy forecast.
The EIA and the IEA are worthless pieces of :lemon: when it comes to predicting. Sure they collect millions of pieces of data, but they cannot see the forest for the trees.
I was actually referring to the retired Admiral, not every future trader.
" Not only are they saying it will, but they're informing you where their next major value increase is going to come from: your wallet"
No, they might be able to temporarily tweak the market, but as prices rise people stop buying. For example: at $100 a barrel 10 % of the people world wide stop buying oil at $200 a barrel 20 % of the people world wide stop buying oil at $300 a barrel 30 % of the people world wide stop buying oil at $400 a barrel 40 % of the people world wide stop buying oil
Demand would plummet as the price rises. People would find substitutes, drive less or whatever. You really should do some searching for energy/oil/gasoline/diesel news stories on Google news or theoildrum to see how people are already reacting to high energy prices. It is not going to take $400 a barrel or $10 a gallon for RUG to have the you-know-what hit the fan.
RUG is at $4.06, another record. Diesel is at $4.79 also a record.
And how about Hawaii, their diesel has hit $5.18. :sick: Me thinks I need to search Google News later today to see how the Hawaiian folks are reacting to all this good news. Good thing they do not need heating oil to heat their homes. I predict they will be using Lava powered cars and trucks in the not to distant future.
Comments
Build CANDU reactors like the ones found in Pickering Ontario, they are the safest nuclear plants in the world, cheap and easy to operate, and all parts are manufactured in Canada and can be imported.
The Pickering Nuclear facility was constructed in stages between 1966-1986 by the provincial Crown corporation, Ontario Hydro. In April 1999 Ontario Hydro was split into 5 component Crown corporations with Ontario Power Generation (OPG) taking over all electrical generating stations and which continues to operate the Pickering station.
The Pickering station is one of the largest nuclear facilities in the world and comprises 8 CANDU nuclear reactors located on the northern shore of Lake Ontario, having a total output of 4124 MW (capacity net) and 4336 MW (gross net) when all units are online. Pickering is only surpassed in Canada by the Bruce Nuclear Generating Station, which while also having 8 reactors, has a greater output.
In 1994 Pickering Unit 7 set a world record for continuous operation (894 days) without a shutdown.
Over 150 private companies in Canada supply components for the CANDU system.
China has purchased the technology and built several Candu reactors already, why not the US ?
I still like the idea of using a Solar Satellite laser beaming microwaves to the earth to a microwave reciever station, this would provide limitless electricity at a fraction of the cost. See...free energy that any company could charge to the public and make massive profits.
A simple Wind Generator is said to produce enough electricity to power 1000 homes, all on free wind power. Sounds good to me, I should go an buy one and hook it up to the grid.
Hydrogen From Seawater
The auto industry will begin mass producing its first cars powered by fuel cells during the next decade. They’ll run on pollution-free hydrogen, but critics point out that creating this hydrogen from natural gas or oil, as is done today, will still produce greenhouse gases. Using electricity from power plants fueled by coal, oil or gas to split water into hydrogen and oxygen will have the same problem. And the cost of carbon fuels will double over the next decade, further driving up the cost of electrically-produced hydrogen.
If solar satellite receiving antennas were built to float on the ocean off the East, West and Gulf Coasts of the U.S., this low-cost electricity could produce all the hydrogen needed for the nation’s fuel celled cars. East Coast and Gulf Coast solar satellites could become hurricane deflectors as needed with only minor disruptions in hydrogen production.
Wow and these solar satellites will be able to control the weather !
http://www.thebulletin.org/web-edition/features/the-reality-of-frances-aggressiv- e-nuclear-power-push
I would agree that we could build a few nuclear plants. Are the CANDU reactors the best way to go? The current refurbishment at the Bruce Power Plant in Canada may influence how many more units get built.
http://www.thestar.com/News/Ideas/article/283653
One thing we can all be assured of, nuclear plants are not going to spring up as fast as ethanol plants did and still are.
I suppose the hot gift this upcoming holiday season will be a Prius with a Wii inside. :shades:
Dear Santa
I have been a good boy this past year...........................
It costs $10,000/kg to send something to space. Current solar panels generate 44 watts/kg.
Say we want to build a Gigawatt power station, enough to power 1/1000th of America. Lets assume that the transfer equipment back to Earth takes up no weight.
The cost of such a plant would be $227 billion, just to launch it. Ignoring, of course, the ridiculous further costs of designing the craft, getting large scale microwave power transfer to work, cooling the bloody thing, assembling it, getting it to fit in rockets such that the $10,000 /kg applies, and many more things I haven't thought of in this hasty assessment.
Even better, why not just buy the power? The grid is already in place, and we can let Canada deal with the waste and siting issues.
I don't remember if anyone posted this link - hard to keep up in here:
Extreme Driving Techniques for Extreme Fuel Economy
That article talks about the "requirement" of owning a Scan Gauge: Choice of Hypermilers Everywhere
Not necessarily...this is what I was talking about before. A growing economy produces more revenue for the government in the form of increased taxes. That increased tax revenue MAY (key word) be greater than the amount of money spent subsidizing gas prices.
It's a theory we can't really check, because most of these countries (including China, as mentioned) won't let us look at their "real" books. But theoretically it's sound...Sony and Nintendo basically sell consoles at a loss to make money on the games. HP sells inkjet printers at a loss to make money on the ink. A country could theoretically sell gas at a loss (in effect) in order to make money on the ensuing economic growth. The business model in itself has already been proven.
So some of these subsidies in other countries may go on for quite a bit longer than some thing. Though i realize some have already given them up, others haven't.
It is also better for US citizens. Trying to go to Europe will be a real shocker with the exchange rate so high.
Hmm, self-powered buildings...I like that, come to think of it. Interesting sales slogan too.
They were determined to create something effective in mild winds so the mini-turbine installation generates energy comparable to a solar installation in winds as low as 14 mph, with a competitive return on investment.
14 MPH wind is not a breeze in my book. That is less than comfortable to walk around in. I would say in places like Long Beach you would do better with Solar for most of the day. They need to get their generators to work in 5-10 MPH winds to be practical in my opinion. It doesn't look any worse than solar panels on a roof.
Which brings up another issue. Would these wind generators work in the snow, sleet etc, etc?
There are going to be a lot inventor types trying to come up with alternatives. That is a good thing. I am hoping for super efficient solar panels to be developed.
Congress Seeks to Close the 'Enron Loophole'
May 15, 2008 1:22 PM
ABC News' Z. Byron Wolf reports: Ken Lay has been dead almost two years and Jeffrey Skilling is several years into his 24 year prison sentence, but one legacy of the Enron era lives on.
It’s the "Enron loophole," which exempts energy speculators who make trades electronically from US regulation. Some argue that the unregulated energy speculation, codified in 2000, can account for $20 to $25 in the jump in oil prices.
But now, 8 years after energy traders were able to push legislation exempting their electronic trades of energy futures from US regulation, a measure in the Farm Bill aims to close the loophole and subject futures trades made electronically inside the United States to US law.
“This bill is really our best bet to deter unscrupulous traders from manipulating energy prices and engaging in excessive speculation. This has been a long, hard road – and this is a major legislative victory," Said California Democrat Sen. Dianne Feinstein after the Senate passed the underlying Farm Bill on a broad, bipartisan basis.
Rather than spend $1500 / person in airfare and $200-$400 a night in a nice euro-hotel and $200+ per dinner at a nice restaurant having 4 couples rent a 10 BR beach house for $12000 a week is much more cost effective.
Still, I found that holding my speed to 65 (I normally drive at 70 to 75 mph under those traffic conditions) didn't make our 60 mile trip seem any longer, & it was more relaxing. I could actually pay attention to what my wife was saying. It remains to be seen if that's good or bad for our marriage.
http://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/energy/2008-06-11-energy-dept-oil-gas-p- - rices_N.htm
"Caruso said oil prices are likely to stay high far into the future. He projected oil costing $107 a barrel in 2015."
This is a good example at why I don't like to give any more $ via any tax, while they waste $ with garbage like this.
More worrying: " oil giant BP said world oil production fell 0.2% in 2007, first decline since 2002, while consumption rose 1.1%, highlighting a tight supply-demand balance that has helped push oil prices to record levels."
Many hundreds of thousands of people around the world do "projections" for a living and that is a valuable service to a lot of people.
No one can see into the future - but with the best info, it is possible to make an "educated guess" based on hundreds and maybe thousands of data points.
I'm sure some of those guys projected $4 gas in June 2008.
Because we are now in an era where if oil goes up 1%, or supply goes down 2%, that may cause a 50% price increase which causes the economy to go down 5%, which then decrease the demand. But since no one can predict whether the price increase is 50% or 25% or 75%, no one can predict how the economy will go in this country never mind globally, and it just goes on and on. Throw in the uncertainty of the condition of fields in Mexico, the future of oil-shale, ANWR and other undrilled areas, and there's no way anyone will have a decent model.
These forecasters are simply doing these forecasts because they used to, and they get paid for it. If any of these guys actually knew what they were talking about, they wouldn't be working for a paycheck at the DOE. They'd be making millions elsewhere.
Similarly, I never trust a stock-pick from some "expert with a great track record" unless he himself has earned a fortune picking stocks.
Okay, it's a boring afternoon at work so I crunched a few numbers and came up with an interesting result.
So far this week I've traveled 119 commuter miles. I've used zero ounces of gas. However, I have used about 20 ounces of water per each 34-mile round trip.
What does all this mean? Glad you asked.
20 fluid ounces equals 0.15625 gallons. Since I use around 20 ounces for every 34 miles that comes out to 217.6 miles per gallon...of water.
It looks like my commute ends up as $0.00 per round trip to work. Well, actually I do get a monthly water bill, so it's not entirely free - maybe a few cents - but I bet it beats any hybrid on the road.
On top of that I just found something to do to unbore myself for a few minutes.
BTW, I noticed that gas is going for $3.88/gal today as I pedaled past.
Actually 14 MPH is considered a moderate breeze and is a force 4 on the Beaufort scale.
Also remember that wind turbines are usually installed well above ground level which would have higher wind speeds.
2011 Hyundai Sonata, 2014 BMW 428i convertible, 2015 Honda CTX700D
2011 Hyundai Sonata, 2014 BMW 428i convertible, 2015 Honda CTX700D
2011 Hyundai Sonata, 2014 BMW 428i convertible, 2015 Honda CTX700D
Because it's the Windy City.
However, it got that moniker because of the longwindedness of politicians, not because of the breeze. Windy City
Good question. I fear the answer might not be so simple.
Back in the early 1990's Quebec Hydro hatched a plan to build several massive dam/hydro projects. This would involve damming several rivers that flowed north and were pretty much useless for navigation or irrigation.
To make the plan work they needed a big customer south of the border who would consume the massive amounts of clean energy. They offered New York State the power at something like 2 cents/Kwh. A bargain even then.
Well, the deal was all set when a couple of native people sailed down to Albany in a canoe and complained that all this progress would disrupt their way of life.
Bingo, deal cancelled. The result? NYS now pay some of the highest electricity cost in the country. The hydro project up north sits half finished.
Welcome to radical enviromentalism.
2019 Kia Soul+, 2015 Mustang GT, 2013 Ford F-150, 2000 Chrysler Sebring convertible
I'd say the only way to really find out is to try it and see what happens. It'll vary from car to car, but most cars will probably get better mpg as you drive slower. I'm sure there's an exception or two, though.
I go up to Pennsylvania a lot for car shows. If I averaged 65-75, with occasional bursts to 80, I'd probably see around 27-28 mpg. It was EPA-rated at 29 highway. Back in early October though, I took it a bit slower, more like 55-70, rarely going higher, and got around 31. This past weekend, on the trip up I was only running 58-65, with a rare jump to 70, and clocked 32.1.
Also, it's not just the speed you drive at, but how fast you get there, how fast you brake, how hard you try to maintain a speed on the hills, how quickly you try to pass slower moving traffic, etc.
Just to throw another example out there...I've also made that trip in a 1979 New Yorker with a fairly thirsty 360-2bbl. Running 65-75, it would get around 15.5, I'd guess. I had to take it up to Carlisle in April, when my Intrepid died. Took it fairly easy going up, and had to go REALLY slow coming back, because of brutal rains. Probably averaged 45-55, rarely getting to 60. Got about 18 mpg.
IIRC, the '02 Camry 4-cyl is EPA-rated around 33-34 on the highway. If you slowed down to 55-65, let it lose a little speed on the hills, don't floor it unless absolutely necessary (like you go to pass a slower car and didn't notice that tour bus bearing down on you), etc, you might see mid-to-upper 30's, I'm guessing.
Anyway, what I saw was that the MPG increased as you got to 55 and then decreased as you went past 55.
Meaning that going much slower than 55 is going to be detrimental to your mileage as well as going above 55. Now for me I recently found that all things being equal, for me, if I travel at 65 in my 03 Accord 4-cyl I get about the same mileage as I do going 55. What does this mean, I don't know, but I like it because 55 is a hard speed to maintain especially on the freeway, I can't take the monotony and all the dirty looks.
http://www.permanent.com/
Are we off topic or what.....
RUG is up to $4.10 here. :shades:
Hydro Quebec is like the TVA; they won't be happy until every last stream and rivulet is dammed up. Going nuke would avoid more of that.
I remember some reservoir was getting to full pool up that way on my trip (in Labrador, iirc). Folks were suing because the engineering was screwed up on that one and full pool hit the contour lines some 20 (?) feet higher than what their permit allowed.
Welcome to radical common sense and distrust of the easy engineering fix. :P
[ok Avalon - gas is holding at $4.07 RUG at most places here :shades: ]
Yeah, that isn't really fast enough to be called a breeze. We need 20 to 25 mph to be called a breeze here in ND. Maybe that is why ND has the highest wind energy potential in the U.S. The windmills are growing like weeds. http://www.awea.org/pubs/factsheets/Top_20_States.pdf
Makes me think I should buy one of those Zenn electric cars and be gasoline free.
Every news article I can find says that the state run oil companies are loosing millions of dollars a day with the way fuel prices are now.
Even with the recent increases in fuel prices they are still losing money.
http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2008%5C06%5C10%5Cstory_10-6-2008_p- g5_32
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601091&sid=aj.xKO5fCqSc&refer=india
These gas prices make the whole owning-a-car thing a lot less fun. :-(
2014 Mini Cooper (stick shift of course), 2016 Camry hybrid, 2009 Outback Sport 5-spd (keeping the stick alive)
http://www.stormfax.com/beaufort.htm
Also AVAV has gotten the wind turbines to generate power down under 12 mph using newer designs.
Lastly think about what happens in urban settings where the wind builds up in tight spaces hits the side of a building and then roars up to the roof. I had this happen today walking through West Hartford. I turned a corner and all of a sudden there was a good 20 plus mph wind running down the side of the street that was probably accelerating to an even higher speed when it tried to climb the building at the end of the street.
Early adopters of architectural wind
As you can see they are using them all over the country and at least one place in the UK so they work in a variety of conditions.
Ha what are the odds another stock I own has a set of wind turbines on one of their US buildings.
Rio Tinto Minerals Borax Visitors Center Boron, CA
Power Plants Around the World
This is one of those headlines I read and just wonder. Are people that delusional.
I am going to go outside now and see if pigs can fly. :surprise:
Filled up both cars at $3.94 today minus 10 cent Kroger discount.
San Fran in red; Dayton in blue; crude, green.
full size
2014 Malibu 2LT, 2015 Cruze 2LT,
It also shows that while we here in SF don't see jumps or spikes in our gas price, it is also true that our price slowly but surely rises all the time, without any of the jumps down that Dayton (and crude) experience.
I guess I should be glad (and I do remember taking note) that for a lot of May we weren't paying much above the national average. Now we are back to our norm of $0.50 above the national average. But I know the folks in Chicago and a few other big cities are feeling our pain too.
2014 Mini Cooper (stick shift of course), 2016 Camry hybrid, 2009 Outback Sport 5-spd (keeping the stick alive)
So they're not delusional. Not only are they saying it will, but they're informing you where their next major value increase is going to come from: your wallet.
The problem, as you mention, is getting the best data points. Predicting oil prices means predicting what people will do. That is still a very difficult proposition. You have scientists, economists and engineers trying to understand the oil market that is actually made up of a lot of irrational people.
How can you predict when OPEC will raise or lower production?
Can you predict when the CEO of an oil company will decide to drill in a certain area?
Does our thousands of data points help us decide when or if countries will drop a fuel subsidy?
Do we know what the breaking point is for the average American diver? $4 $5 $19.37?
How will the politicians react or what legislation will they pass?
Back in 04, 05 & 06 the EIA predicted that Mexican oil production would rise despite the fact that it had leveled off in 04 and 05. Mexican investment in exploration and production was inadequate. The EIA knew that yet they kept up with their rosy forecast.
The EIA and the IEA are worthless pieces of :lemon: when it comes to predicting. Sure they collect millions of pieces of data, but they cannot see the forest for the trees.
I was actually referring to the retired Admiral, not every future trader.
" Not only are they saying it will, but they're informing you where their next major value increase is going to come from: your wallet"
No, they might be able to temporarily tweak the market, but as prices rise people stop buying. For example:
at $100 a barrel 10 % of the people world wide stop buying oil
at $200 a barrel 20 % of the people world wide stop buying oil
at $300 a barrel 30 % of the people world wide stop buying oil
at $400 a barrel 40 % of the people world wide stop buying oil
Demand would plummet as the price rises. People would find substitutes, drive less or whatever. You really should do some searching for energy/oil/gasoline/diesel news stories on Google news or theoildrum to see how people are already reacting to high energy prices. It is not going to take $400 a barrel or $10 a gallon for RUG to have the you-know-what hit the fan.
RUG is at $4.06, another record.
Diesel is at $4.79 also a record.
And how about Hawaii, their diesel has hit $5.18. :sick: Me thinks I need to search Google News later today to see how the Hawaiian folks are reacting to all this good news. Good thing they do not need heating oil to heat their homes. I predict they will be using Lava powered cars and trucks in the not to distant future.