Pajamas Media

79 Comments

1. David H Dennis:

This all sounds good, but E85 in my area is much more expensive per unit of energy than oil. That is, it is 2/3 as efficient as oil at 87.5% of the price. When oil was at $4 a gallon, E85 was at $3.50. For it to cost the same to move the vehicle the same distance, it would have to cost $3 a gallon when gas was at $4.

I don’t see E85 as the right fuel for our future if it’s more expensive than $4 a gallon gas, even with enormous subsidies given to ADM. It also increases the prices of agricultural commodities to the extent that third world food supplies were disrupted. None of these things are good.

Recent news stories have shown that biological fuels can be reformulated to be the same as gas, with microbes customized to excrete fuel, and that sounds more like our future. In that case we would not need cars capable of running E85 and all present cars could use the new fuels — much more promising in my view.

D

Nov 11, 2008 - 12:21 am 2. David Thomson:

“Why has the housing market collapsed? If you want the answer, just follow the money.”

The number one reason behind the housing market collapse is due to the Clinton administration forcing lending institutions to provide mortgages to minorities possessing poor credit histories. Eventually the larger white community also jumped on the bandwagon—and all hell really broke out. When are we going to investigate and possibly criminally indict the Democratic Party officials responsible for this mess? Why is Barney Frank, for instance, not undergoing a thorough U.S. Senate investigation?

Nov 11, 2008 - 12:49 am 3. Ed Wallis:

Sorry, Mr. Zubrin,

I concur with #2 David Thomson. Hou$ing crisis = Carter CRA + Clinton amendments thereto.

ALSO of note: E85 gas has such a lower efficiency, it would nearly DOUBLE consumption of auto fuel…at exactly what (literal and metaphorical) price to those who need – ahem – FOOD?!

Nov 11, 2008 - 2:48 am 4. John:

This country has a 200 year supply of coal.Why not make synthetic fuel just as germany did in WWII.This country also has millions of acres of farm land that is not being used and farmers are being paid not to plant anything.We have the resources to make opec a thing of the past.Will this happen-NO

Nov 11, 2008 - 3:14 am 5. The Fed’s Ponzi Scheme: “It’s none of your business where the money is going.” « Mark Epstein:

[...] what’s Obamination going to do besides undo Bush’s policies? Is he going to “man up” and tell OPEC to pound sand? Well this is where I think we’ll see some “real change” from Obama. He’s [...]

Nov 11, 2008 - 3:21 am 6. beb:

Like others before me, I think your analysis of why we have this housing crisis is not even in left field, it’s completely out of the park. I don’t know of anybody that thinks the bad loans that led us to this has anything to do with oil prices. They may be an excuse for some people but it isn’t the reason.

Having said that, I’m all for destroying OPEC but the idea that flex fuel is the way to go seems to fly in the face of all evidence of the viability of ethanol. Talk about a burden on the market. How many people lost their houses because of the increase in food prices as a result of ethanol. I’m being sarcastic of course but there are a lot of people who’s tortilla prices have gone through the roof because of misguided support for ethanol.

Sorry but this entire piece seems to be the ramblings of somebody who hasn’t really thought through these issues.

bb

Nov 11, 2008 - 3:44 am 7. Bob Newton:

It’s an interesting hypothesis, and is likely to be one cause of the crisis, but clearly it isn’t the only cause. The more credit-worthy homeowners decreased consumption in other ways but their mortgages have not been at risk of default. The increased fixed expense base affecting more marginal borrowers certainly did affect their ability to make their payments or buy new properties.

The flex-fuel argument is interesting also, but the idea that a government mandate can fix ANYTHING has been proven every time to be a dystopian fantasy once the unintended consequences kick in. A more effective way is to eliminate both the subsidy on corn-based ethanol and the tariff barrier that keeps cheap ethanol (e.g., from Brazil) out of the US market. Bringing the cost of ethanol down to a true market level will make it competitive enough to incent the car makers to provide for it – because customers will demand it.

Nov 11, 2008 - 4:23 am 8. Jonesy55:

The power of OPEC to control the world oil price is exaggerated in my opinion. The OPEC countries control 40% of the global market, enough to be influential for sure, but that also means that 60% is out of their hands. Even their efforts to restrict their own output are regularly undermined by individual countries cheating and producing more than agreements permit.

If the cartel was that good at maintaining high prices, why have they allowed a 60% drop in the past few months?

You can’t blame the OPEC countries for wanting high prices, oil is pretty much the only resource for many of them and naturally, they want as much wealth as they can get from it.

Having said that, it’s always good to explore other options and it can’t be healthy for the west to rely on such an unstable region of the world for such a vital resource as energy.

I find the attempt to make a link between the oil price and the housing crash to be a bit tenuous though. It’s probably true to say that deteriorating household finances (in which rising oil prices were a factor) were the trigger for the downturn but the root causes are deeper. You can’t permanently have 15% annual growth in house prices when incomes are only rising by 3-4% per year, the only way that this can be afforded is if people borrow ever greater income multiples and by heading down this path there will inevitably come a time when people either can’t or won’t take on any more debt. The only guaranteed thing about a bubble it that it will burst.

You can add into the mix legislation that forced lenders to lend to people they otherwise wouldn’t, opaque financial instruments created to hide the risks involved and a government reluctant to curtail the flow of easy money because the consumer spending it created was the backbone of the economy once production had been shipped out to the lowest bidder. All these factors combined just inflated the bubble faster and for longer than would otherwise have happened and made the inevitable bursting more painful than it needed to be.

Had oil prices not rocketed then that might have bought a couple more years of delusion but by delaying the day of reckoning it probably would have only made it worse in the end.

Nov 11, 2008 - 4:31 am 9. Glenn:

Zubrin says in his book that in addition to mandating flex-fuel vehicles, the tariffs on imported ethanol would have to be lifted. This would bring substantially more imported ethanol into the country, at a lower price than the corn ethanol we produce. I think if the Zubrin plan were implemented along side a plan to drill for our own damn oil, OPEC could be busted as a an effective cartel. We use about 140 billion gallons of liquid fuel per year, Brazil has said they alone could provide half that number. If we’re going to continue to import energy, we can either get it from the people who invented the suicide bomb belt, or the people who invented the thong bikini…..

The obstacle of course is the fact that the Iowa caucus is the first primary, and all the politicians pander to the farm lobby, making promises to keep the tariffs and subsidies in place.

Nov 11, 2008 - 4:43 am 10. Steve Bourg:

Hey Peeps: It’s both…….Clinton’s CRA regs in 1995 mandated disastrous loans, leading to lenders having to get smarter and trickier to package and sell the junk. And massive spending by our consumers TO other countries for their oil, is just WAY too much for our economy to handle. But the answer to that is to drill offshore and in Alaska. Then we keep more dollars here. The #1 exporter of oil to us is………Canada. Let’s go 500 miles to the north, people!! But we know the Democrats will never do that. So we’re toast, until Congress is replaced with more rational lawmakers.

Nov 11, 2008 - 4:43 am 11. RE:

Didn’t I read that one of Obama’s first executive orders will be to stop domestic oil drilling?

If true, it seems like Obama is more interested in enriching OPEC while crippling us economically.

Nov 11, 2008 - 4:44 am 12. hdgreene:

The most powerful member of OPEC are the Democrats in Congress. They keep more oil off the market (by far) than any other member. Why would they do anything to undermine it? If they can find a way to get control of that money rather than sending it to foreigners — then maybe. Still, they will want the money (or more to the point the power of the purse and the power of regulation), not affordable fuel. They need expensive fuel to make their “alternative future,” with them in command in DC, a reality.

What do you call Bankrupting the coal industry? A good start on the road to bankrupting oil.

Nov 11, 2008 - 4:46 am 13. Sean:

I completely agree! We need more action from the government to fix the actions of the government! Wait a second. How can anyone think that those who created nearly all of the current messes are capable of fixing them? Government is incapable of improving anything over the long haul. The correct solution is to get government out of the way and let the markets and consumers decide what will and will not succeed. If the government hadn’t strong armed lenders, we wouldn’t have this credit “crisis” because risky lenders would go out of business and non creditworthy borrowers wouldn’t be able to borrow. The government and no one else created our current messes, all of them. Government is NOT going to get us out of them.

Nov 11, 2008 - 4:56 am 14. BFB:

If you build it they will come works well for Kevin Costner films. Ethanol and methanol are for need to be punny just a field of dreams. The article fails to convince or demonstrate how mandating flex fuel vehicles is going to make ethanol or methanol a competitive market alternative with oil. Consumers will fill a flex fuel car with what is cheapest, and that is gasoline, not e85. So unless part of the plan is to artificially increase the cost of gasoline, ethanol and methanol are not viable market alternatives. Others have already covered the housing market nonsequitur. If Americans want to know why they are in an economic bind, they need only look to our individual and our governments perennial habit of spending more each year than we make.

Nov 11, 2008 - 5:23 am 15. Dinocrat » Blog Archive » Some thoughts on oil prices and housing:

[...] cartel, which he believes has been one major cause of many of the economy’s current problems. Excerpt: This year, with OPEC-rigged oil prices averaging near $110/barrel, Americans will pay $900 billion [...]

Nov 11, 2008 - 5:50 am 16. tom:

ethanol / flex fuel is a bad myth brought on by corn subsidees.

ethanol from corn only yields around 20% energy for the amount of oil used to produce it. 100 in 120 out, not very efficient Sugar cane (chief eth fuel stock in Brazil) is an 8 fold yield (we could grow more in Louisiana).

google in “ethanol energy balance” to get many articles on the subject

transportation makes up 30% of our energy consumption

49% of electricity is fuel stocked from coal

oil exploration in the US is getting exceedingly more difficult and older fields are declining. Worldwide exploration is also getting harder. It isn’t a case of just drill baby drill. shale plays have helped (particularly the natural gas market, but are not sustained in a low price environment)

oil prices will go back through the roof when the value of the dollar and the surplus oil stores are tapped into.
Over 25% of the gulf of mexico production is still shut in from the hurricanes.

Speculators helped drive the price up and down. But will not be able to stop the inevitable rise in prices. We are at the mercy of these cartels and will not be able to stop them.

America could reverse the trend with nucleur and clean coal (if worked in gradually with incentives). Obama will hurt not help this process – he wants to study nucleur – not move forward, he wants to come down on coal.
Solar and wind are a decade off small contribution, despite what Boone Pickens says.

Nov 11, 2008 - 6:26 am 17. Maggie:

Flex-fuel is still oil. Natural gas is abundant in the USA and the technology is available NOW. Existing cars can be converted. Many cities already use compressed natural gas for buses. CNG is the way to go for cars.

Nov 11, 2008 - 6:49 am 18. Grover:

Is Ethanol the answer? I think NOT. Congress mandated its use, the corn farm cartel got rich, prices of consumables made from corn skyrocketed. Fuel efficiency DECREASED, causing us to use MORE fuel; along with that, ask any fuel supplier about the HUGE increase in water content – you can’t store it as long as gasoline. Is the writer speaking for himself or the corn producers? He never once mentioned what is uppermost in the public mind: “Drill, baby, drill”, along with accelerated research of other fuels, such as hydrogen. Steve #10 has it right.

Nov 11, 2008 - 7:05 am 19. cedarhill:

We should be a net exporter of energy. Counting up all the coal, oil, oil shale, uranium, thorium and natural gas gives us in the neighborhood of billions of years of energy. We even have the technology to manufacture gasoline from electricity and air (create dry ice – CO2, convert it to methane via synfuel process and then into almost any petrochemical).

The thrust of the article is correct. However, it will need to be subject to the voters when oil is again over $100/bbl. As we write these posts, Obama has signaled reinstating the Presidential ban on oil, etc. At least I have a wood stove and 10 acres of wood to keep warm.

Nov 11, 2008 - 7:20 am 20. Self-hating boomer:

The reason the housing market crashed has nothing to do with energy and everything to do with gravity. The runup in energy prices just made the inevitable happen a little sooner. Even if they were handing out oil for free, the market had to eventually crash.

Please, there’s enough voodoo economics floating around the internet without adding this.

Nov 11, 2008 - 7:20 am 21. Amphipolis:

This has got to be the most insane piece of economic analysis I have ever seen.

You compare what some Americans spend for new homes in a given year to the petroleum the entire country purchases in a year for whatever purpose. You may as well compare it to the cost of tea in China.

How about comparing what the average family spends for rent or mortgage with what they spend for gasoline or fuel oil? You seem to conclude that we pay a lot more for fuel than for housing. That is simply absurd.

And you top it off by targeting OPEC as the problem – as if they are not also responsive to the market. Our biggest suppliers, Canada and Mexico, are not even members of OPEC.

If what you said was true then the auto industry would be pulling out all the stops to make flex fuel vehicles. If they are really that good, nothing will be able to stop them. We don’t need the government to tell us what kind of car we want.

Stick to rocket science and leave economics alone.

Nov 11, 2008 - 7:31 am 22. Kastaco:

The argument is interesting, but in reality, OPEC has no interest in having oil prices so high that economic growth stops, because that will hurt them just as much in the long term by killing demand for oil. In truth, the current economic disruptions are happening because the world is entering the end days of oil based energy production, and there is not yet a clear sucessor energy source to replace oil. So, over the short to middle term (1-10 years) economic, political and military conflict will most likely be the norm, as nations seek to control the existing resources and new technologies develop to replace oil. In the long term (>10 Years) things will stabilize as new forms of energy are developed and become abundant. As a side note, increased drilling for oil here in the U.S. will happen as there is simply too much money at stake, and oil will remain a valuable resource as a base conponent for a whole host of industrial and chemical uses. It’s simply that that global oil production will not be sufficient to use in for both energy production (Transportatin and electrical generation) and industrial production

Nov 11, 2008 - 9:35 am 23. kochevnik:

Fascist headline and a lame argument for a noble end. Ethanol requires energy from petroleum so it actually burns MORE gasoline. This article looks like OPEC paid for it.

Real alternatives include the seasnake generations that pump waves underwater for energy at megawatt levels [invented by an Australian] and thin-film solar made in Silicon Valley and already selling out in Germany because it’s more cost effective than oil.

Nov 11, 2008 - 9:44 am 24. cedarford:

Robert Zubrin may mean well, but his ideas on ethanol have been thoroughly shredded elsewhere.

http://i-r-squared.blogspot.com/2008/03/debunking-robert-zubrin.html

And his linking of oil prices spiking over 1 years time to the fiscal meltdown created by London, Wall Street greed, lack of ethics and the blunders of BOTH Parties is absurd. The two are barely linked in the economy. Something a plumber or teacher with average brains would “get” if you gave them a half day to go through the basics of finance, the impact on oil prices, their lack of linkage to the housing bubble.

The other great fallacy is of “driving OPEC to their knees” – always with some “miracle cure”. Which, to people unfamiliar with economics and science, conflates the possible with the economically practical. Why, yes we can spend huge amounts of energy to get CO2 collected as dry ice, then spend more energy making methanol or synthetic diamonds from the CO2, then burn the methanol or the diamonds in a furnace to make electricity.

Perpetual energy “gizmos” are right on the same level as perpetual motion machines. Both cannot exist because of simple thermodynamic laws.

We also have a faction that believes, by their Goracle, that it is possible to combine “exciting solar, wind, biomass!!!” none of that hated evil oil, coal, or nuclear stuff into a CO2-neutral energy system. And then have a nation of 300 million run a modern civilization full of heated homes, 70HP vehicles, 35,000HP planes and trains, adequate steel, cement, aluminum, and farming off the “magic 3″ of “wonderful” wind, solar, biomass.

We already did, once. A less modern American Civ in 1780 that ran entirely on “the wonderful 3 sources”. Which had 5 million people from Maine down to Georgia west to the Alleghanies. With efficient carbon, but not methane neutral 1HP vehicles, and 3HP oxen. That typically required 12 hour days of hard labor, women consigned to breeding to create the large families needed to modestly succeed and create small surpluses. Which in turn allowed specialized labor in small cities that also used trade in natural carbon-neutral resources like organic cotton, tobacco, black slaves, meat, fur, wood, indigo to build modest wealth.

Supporting 300 million? Or the 368 million Census projects for 2030? The 438 million Americans of 2050? Not possible.

Maybe 110-140 million, but with a substantial reduction in standard of living, far longer work hours, and an end to most private homes in favor of China-style barracks or “dense-cluster” living.

******************
Both talk of “blaming” OPEC and then of “driving them to their knees”, is ignorant and misplaced.

They make a market in petroleum, gas, and related products that is still cheaper than substitutes. Just as America, Australia, Brazil, Canada, Argentina, and Ukraine by fortune of location are the main market suppliers of wheat and corn. Just as much to “blame” for that as Libya or Iraq is for having the geography of oil reserviors. And just as likely that anyone resenting Canada for being able to grow lots of food will “drive it to it’s knees” as they will drive “Venezuela to it’s knees” for the temerity of selling it’s oil resources.

What America can do is get serious about reducing our huge oil dependency as a national security matter and as a matter of vital economic health. We have to deviate from “Freedom-loving free markets!!” worshippers to understand that our now-good but quickly deteriorating economic and security existence makes imported Nigerian oil at 80 dollars a barrel MORE undesirable in the long haul than a 100 dollar barrel of coal synthfuel.

Fortunately the era of rabid “unfettered free trade!!” worshippers and their dictating to nations on the dogma of globalization, open borders for capital and labor to cross, no tariffs ever, gut advanced nations of good industrial jobs –
Is just about over.

100 million barrels of oil from Nigeria offers a consumer savings of 20 a barrel over US-made sythfuel from coal. It has the advantage the “no drilling anywhere in USA evironmentalists love – all the pollution risk and “unsightliness” from production is kept in Nigeria.

But America has to look past just immediate consumer savings. The Nigerian oil savings offers consumers the change to export their dollars for more Chinese toys. But unlike synthfuel, it has virtually no wealth generation for Americans, no good jobs created, no 8-11 fold economic multiplier where each dollar spent on American product and production causes workers here and engineers and factory builders and union craft folks to spend 8 to 11 dollars locally, creating more jobs, more wealth.
And abandoning, pure, often destructive to US citizens free trade – and imposing energy independence tariffs on foreign oil or extra petro fees on states that block domestic production generates revenue instead of jacking up individual income taxes. It creates good jobs and a larger GNP if tariffs make that Nigerian oil cost the same as USA-made synthfuel.
Consumers pay a slightly higher price at the pump. They may “fret” at a new mountain of processed coal rubble created in “pristine” Wyoming surrounded by newly prosperous, happy, Wyoming residents.

But the consumers benefit not just from economic growth, but knowing that a pack of pissed off Muslims cannot simply cow us and threaten to drive us into economic depression and each citizen into disaster by cutting off the Persian Gulf.
From avoiding the necessity of tens of thousands to millions of US military casualties in a future war over foreign energy resources.

Of course it looks like Obama will cave to Pelosi and the environmentalists…meaning more years of doing nothing and heightened danger of more economic bad times here and higher risk of lots of coffins returning to Dover and still-breathing piles of shattered and burned flesh and bone who paid a high price to keep Wyoming “scenic”.

Nov 11, 2008 - 10:23 am 25. Self-hating boomer:

I wonder how many people here claiming to have the energy panacea all figured out have engineering or hard science degrees? How many can ever pronounce “thermodynamics”? Buhler?

Nov 11, 2008 - 10:45 am 26. Don:

You were great until the agri bidness worship. As the price of grain rises it exponentially starves the third world. That is evil and I don’t want to starve those people so I can drive my car. I will if I HAVE to, but I don’t want to.

1. Drill for American oil and make it a crime to buy foreign oi.
2. put a miniature nuclear power plant (see the ones being made in New Mexico) in every city and town over 10,000 people to supply all the electricity in the United States.
3. Follow something like Newt’s idea to pay the next genius a gazillion dollars to invent the replacement for the internal combustion engine.

If we don’t do these things, we will be burning our furniture in the barbeque pit to cook the dog. Oil made the USA success. It will destroy us if we don’t get free of the islam supply line.

Nov 11, 2008 - 11:02 am 27. tom:

self hating boomer wrote
I wonder how many people here claiming to have the energy panacea all figured out have engineering or hard science degrees? How many can ever pronounce “thermodynamics”? Buhler?

BS MS Geology / Geophysics Colorado School of Mines
But I’m seeing it from your side, not the bio fuels panacea.

Energy is far far from being figured out.
US hasn’t had an energy policy since carter asked us to put on a sweater. Obambi doesn’t stand a chance with his enviro lib approval seeking policies.

oil prices are artifically low right now, this will change soon and summer 2008 will look like a picnic

Nov 11, 2008 - 11:30 am 28. Amphipolis:

Water soluble ethanol can’t be moved with pipelines, the most efficient means of transport there is. It must be hauled across the country by truck on roads through neighborhoods. Add that and the resulting highway congestion to the glorious waste that is ethanol.

Nov 11, 2008 - 11:56 am 29. Robert Hansen:

Chevy Volt……………………….. Hope GM doesn’t bite the dust too soon.

Nov 11, 2008 - 11:58 am 30. goy:

Sorry. Ethanol = federal (and state) tax $ windfall. That’s why it’s mandated by Congress.

By reducing efficiency per gallon through ethanol mandates, consumers are forced to purchase more gallons of gasoline (mix) per year.

Federal and State Gasoline Tax per gallon is the same regardless of base price. And I don’t remember them giving us a break on the gasoline tax when they robbed us of more efficient, pure gasoline. Thus, increasing the # gallons purchased due to decreased efficiency automatically increases federal and state government gas tax income.

To boot, States with sales tax make out even further through the forced increased in (taxable) consumption.

And on top of that, Hillary brays that she wants to “take” the oil companies’ profits too. It’s Bizarro-World.

So the result is that we spend more, not less, overall on fuel costs as a result. How in the world that’s ever going to help the housing market simply because the money isn’t going to OPEC, I fail to understand.

The answer to both coal-stocked power generation and energy for transportation is right in front of us: Chevy Volt / Aptera / Tesla technology + a distributed, redundant miniature nuclear power generation grid. And there’s no reason that ALL of these shouldn’t be manufactured right here in the U. S. of A.

Nov 11, 2008 - 12:42 pm 31. tom:

goy wrote
The answer to both coal-stocked power generation and energy for transportation is right in front of us: Chevy Volt / Aptera / Tesla technology + a distributed, redundant miniature nuclear power generation grid. And there’s no reason that ALL of these shouldn’t be manufactured right here in the U. S. of A.

1)who can afford an electric car in a recession?
2) where do you get the electricity from?
Obama sees coal is dirty, nucleur must be studied

even worse on ethanol – do you know that some US ethanol is actually exported to europe and sold there for strong profit margins (Europe profiting from lower prices from our US subsidy – a loophole that hasn’t been stopped yet)

Nov 11, 2008 - 1:20 pm 32. thegr8_1:

Drill Baby Drill. Maybe Obama will do the math and if we drilled our own oil instead of giving $900 billion to other countries Obama would have that money to spend here in what he wants WITHOUT having to raise taxes to do so. He needs to tell the envionmental wackos to go s”@&$ themselves.

Nov 11, 2008 - 1:24 pm 33. thegr8_1:

Also agree with prior post that our cars should be made to run on natural gas it is cleaner and cheaper.

Nov 11, 2008 - 1:27 pm 34. harry:

The housing bubble burst because there was too much buying and too much building. People buying new homes they couldn’t afford. People buying new homes to sell at a quick profit. People buying second homes. As prices rose demand dwindled. Developers did great for a while but they overextended themselves. A downturn was a few years overdue. The party was over. What was left was the cleanup. People talk about giving money to people who lost their homes. Now banks really don’t want to go into foreclosure and certainly not with a glut of foreclosed homes already on the market, so it puzzles why we need to give people money when they should be renegotiating with the banks themselves? Let them restructure their mortgage. As long as they have a steady income and were able to pay their mortgage before why shouldn’t they be able to pay them now? Mortgage rates are low. The prime is an amazing 1%. If people can’t afford the same home now then a bailout won’t help much, or is the government going to give them a free home? If the government is giving away homes then give me one too preferrably in La Jolla. It must be that people couldn’t afford it in the first place and/or speculators were buying numerous properties with little or no money down. That scenario makes more sense because a crash would be more likely than simple restructuring. This is criminal because as anyone who applied for a mortgage knows that one must prove they can afford the payments. But most of us know that mortgage brokers will manipulate numbers in order to close the deal and sell a house. It was up to mortgage companies to do due diligence and they probably didn’t. Everyone caught up in this is to blame. The buyer, the mortgage broker, and the mortgage company. Fannie Mae and Freddy Mac had to be big players here knowing full well they were giving loans to people with not enough money down and too big a mortgage to eat. No one gave a damn it was full speed ahead. I can’t see how any of this has to do with the price of oil.

Nov 11, 2008 - 2:05 pm 35. goy:

tom,

Q: “who can afford an electric car in a recession?”
A: Ask me when we have one (a recession, that is – we already have affordable electric auto tech – it just needs to be refined and put into production on a large scale).

Q: “where do you get the electricity from?”
A: Did you miss that bit about the distributed, redundant miniature nuclear power generation grid? It was admittedly poorly worded, but there’s no way to edit comments here. It should properly have read “distributed, redundant miniature nuclear reactor power generation grid”. Like these.

Nasty bit, that, about the ethanol exports. I guess we should add it to the list.

Nov 11, 2008 - 4:52 pm 36. Jason Sieckmann:

Funny, I thought that the only monopolies capable of existing in a free market economy are those sanctioned by the government. Oh, that’s RIGHT! The government, our government, HAS been sanctioning monopolies under George Bush! You know, that guy that has a membership to OPEC, and oil company, and invaded Iraq for oil? That guy.

Why not argue for free trade as opposed to alternative fuel sources. That way, without government intervention, the free market can find alternatives for when oil becomes overpriced.

Nov 11, 2008 - 6:02 pm 37. Gambling Now! » Blog Archive » Pajamas Media » We Can Solve the Financial Crisis by Destroying OPEC:

[...] unknown wrote an interesting post today onPajamas Media » We Can Solve the Financial Crisis by Destroying OPECHere’s a quick excerptTo see how this tax can destroy real estate values, it is only necessary to compare expenditures. In 2003, Americans paid $268 billion for new homes and $197 billion for oil. In 2008, we paid for new homes at an annual rate of $134 … [...]

Nov 11, 2008 - 6:05 pm 38. Someone75:

Sure – blame the minorities and blame the democrats. I seem to remember Bush placing a lot of importance on getting every American into a home. A great way to hide a troubled economy is to artificially bolster the housing market. But then you’d have to have some understanding of the economy and a bit of common sense.

Do you know what is NOT the cause of this? Oil. How could it be? Conservatives love oil, so that’s definitely not the problem.

Also, you can blame this on the Clintons all you want, but who has been in power for the last eight years? At least own up to your mistakes, people!

Nov 11, 2008 - 6:27 pm 39. kabud:

I am clearly delighted that the subject created a flame

finaly may be some of you here will at least look in wikipidea on simple words like methanol ethanol

and dont forget to add our defence budget to the price for oil

some coments are realy amazingly silly

ethenol program is only known to increase american and other countries food exports))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))

Nov 11, 2008 - 7:46 pm 40. kabud:

Henry Ford saw future auto fuels be METHANOL

actually in his vision made from hemp

simple known for 200 years and used in times of WW2 industrially process called

GASIFICATION can turn any coal, wood or biomass into synthetic gas that is ideal feedstock as for many chemical processes and a source for methanol as well

today methanol is around 50 c per gallon

you need 2 gallons of methanol to replace 1 gallon of gas

If we go along Zubrin plan i would bett any money that in several years Americans and most of the world will have liquid transportation fuels almost for free

To completely convert USA to alcohols will cost under 500 billion and will operate on the renewables on the big part and on coal for the rest

We dont need to transport methanol or ethanol:

in some places local manufacturing caoul be a better solution

More agriculture, more forest cleaning, more garbage processing:

we may not even need coal.

An nuclear of course: to provide easy energy for
ethanol and methanol production

Growing things like beats, sugar cane, corn and others anly imporve invoronment:

more vegetation the better , it cools the planet down, creates better water circulation and so on

Hemp can produce 2-3 crops a year and in order to get high yeilds you only need to aplly cow manure

Flex fuel standart willjump start many projects like that

just donr subsidise em: they will become a trillion dollar domestic industry in just 1 year

It will start a new era for automaking:

size of the engine will not matter: fuel is almost free

Nov 11, 2008 - 8:25 pm 41. Max from Australia:

Why not just make “FoodPec” = our equivalent to OPEC and starve OPEC countries until they disband the cartel….

We’d only have to catch the bus for a week and a half

Nov 11, 2008 - 8:27 pm 42. kabud:

Max from Australia:

exactly this will do a flex fuel law

we just have to have it NOW

Oil and nat gas consumption will seize in 1-2 years

we just have to do it no matter what the oil price will be: it is NOT A FREE MARKET

OIL and AUTOMARKETS are the opposite of free

http://frontpagemagazine.com/Articles/Read.aspx?GUID=5AA1B700-CA82-4703-8AAA-CD6EB4147D73

Nov 11, 2008 - 8:47 pm 43. SteveMDFP:

” The number one reason behind the housing market collapse is due to the Clinton administration forcing lending institutions to provide mortgages to minorities possessing poor credit histories. Eventually the larger white community also jumped on the bandwagon—and all hell really broke out.”

Completely untrue. The vast majority of sub-prime mortgages were lent by UNREGULATED companies, not subject to the CRA or pressure from ACORN or individual congress-members.

This unregulated pseudo-bank activity was made possible by excessive DEREGULATION, the Gramm-Leach-Bliley act and the Commodity Futures Modernization Act of 2000.

Fannie and Freddie had very little to do with the bubble in sub-prime mortgages, and CRA and ACORN had nothing to do with it. It is all a myth.

Nov 11, 2008 - 9:20 pm 44. Max from Australia:

kabud

A flex fuel law will starve everyone – we need to target starvation on OPEC countries

OPEC Needs to be taken out as quickly as possible.

Never forget it is the wests duty to suck up as much cheap oil from other countries as possible and plunder THEIR resources as quickly as possible to prevent other players getting their hands on this energy wealth in the future, and if we can buy it with paper money fresh from the printing press all the better.

The fact is we need to keep OUR oil and energy fields in the ground for future generations as long as possible.

Nov 11, 2008 - 9:34 pm 45. cedarford:

Jason Sieckmann – Why not argue for free trade as opposed to alternative fuel sources. That way, without government intervention, the free market can find alternatives for when oil becomes overpriced.

Faith in free trade and free markets is dangerous folly when your nation and people become or are at high risk of becoming vulnerable to:

1. War or other conflict (oil embargoes) that negates free trade and free market mechanisms.

2. Reliance on an absolutely critical item needed for survival or national strength, or imposes extreme hardship – that cannot be substituted for without long lead times.

In WWI, the British effort to starve Germany finally succeeded at the end. While German armies were never beaten in the field, they had reached the end of their ability to get critical food and raw materials. And the Brits kept up the starvation blockade until Germany agreed to capitulate to ruinous reparations, loss of part of Germany to create Czechoslovakia, loss of land and whole industries to Poland and France.

In WWII, the Brits were paid back in spades. They had become the first true globalist, free market, free trade and thought it made perfect sense to “outsource” most of their chemicals and specialty metals to Germany to make. When war started, they were screwed. They did not have time for “free market” solutions to products it would take 2-3 years to design, build, and get production up to required levels. Only the US helped, not enough, and the Brits paid through the nose for materials they were making as late as the early 30s.

Outside war, you cannot rely on free trade and free market solutions to instantly create a new food or energy economy. That takes many years, decades to build. That is why we must look ahead and use government to alter free market rules so that we can begin to replace foreign oil, even if the substitute(s) is now something market forces will not create on their own.
Similarly, nations have learned from bitter experience that capacity to create certain food crops and materials do need to be kept in-country, because they can’t afford a massive free market speculation fueled upsurge in price.

Nov 11, 2008 - 9:38 pm 46. kabud:

A flex fuel law will starve everyone – we need to target starvation on OPEC countrie

never, to the contrary: all those who have land for agriculture and there are like 100 countries that can grow sugar plants-

they will get the money russians and their allies are getting now

you know russians plan to kill you if depression begins with nukes and you are paying for it now

OPEC is just a front for kremlin operation: kgb is massively involved in the ME since 50s

we her dont have any oil

drill for coal:
here is a technology used in ex-USSR for manufacturing methanol in a coal layers undeground

they do it, we – dont

THERE IS NO OIL OR NATURAL GAS IN USA

3% of world reserves. It is 20 years maximum but not enough to keep oil price under 100$

and soon we will have a war in the ME that will bring tis economy to a complete stop without fuel

read wikipidea at least

Nov 11, 2008 - 10:02 pm 47. fear Obama:

The vast majority of sub-prime mortgages were lent by UNREGULATED companies, not subject to the CRA or pressure from ACORN or individual congress-members.
I agree.

Even Wal-Mart had a booth set up where I could go refinance my home.

/I would never lie about making $125,000 a year,
when I was only making 45,000.

Nov 11, 2008 - 11:08 pm 48. DaveK:

I sort of agree with the basic thesis, that the-elephant-in-the-room-whose-name-shall-not-be-spoken is the high cost of energy. No, however, the high cost of energy did not directly cause the housing market to collapse. Instead, it imposed an extremely high burden on virtually all sectors of the economy. Eventually, this burden increased to the point that a critical sector (in this case real-estate) reached failure. The rest followed.

Would the real estate market have still failed without the unreasonably high cost of energy? Probably yes, since there were no serious efforts to fix the subprime loan business. But it would have taken a while longer before that happened. Would another sector of the economy have failed if the real-estate and credit business had cleaned house a few years back? Well, probably yes… We were beginning to see the beginnings of huge inflationary price increases, especially in sectors that have traditionally relied on low transportation costs (how much has the price changed for that cheap little pack of ramen noodles? Where I shop, it’s about doubled!).

Just my $.02
DaveK

Nov 12, 2008 - 2:43 am 49. Watcher of Weasels » Ch-ch-ch-ch-Changes:

[...] Submitted By: Joshuapundit Dr. Robert Zubrin/Pajamas Media We Can Solve the Financial Crisis by Destroying OPEC [...]

Nov 12, 2008 - 4:32 am 50. Mike:

As long as it takes more calories to produce a gallon of ethanol than that gallon of ethanol will yield, flex fuels are a loosing game.

By the way, I hope all you rich liberals out there are going to pay a bunch of taxes because Joe Biden said it’s your patriotic duty to do so and I am waiting for my share of the free stuff Obama promised me.

Nov 12, 2008 - 4:40 am 51. tom:

goy wrote

Q: “who can afford an electric car in a recession?”
A: Ask me when we have one (a recession, that is – we already have affordable electric auto tech – it just needs to be refined and put into production on a large scale).

I agree that the electric and hybrid cars are options, but they won’t be afforable during a recession. Also electricity mostly comes from coal (49%) and oil and nat gas (most of the other %). We all know what Obambi thinks about those

Q: “where do you get the electricity from?”
A: Did you miss that bit about the distributed, redundant miniature nuclear power generation grid? It was admittedly poorly worded, but there’s no way to edit comments here. It should properly have read “distributed, redundant miniature nuclear reactor power generation grid”. Like these.

I’m all for nucleur – have been since the 70’s. The French who have no oil have done this effectively.
The plants you talk about are exactly what we need, too bad that will never happen under the big BHO administration.

Obambi wants to study nucleur – not do it
He has to cow -tow to his leftist friends

Nasty bit, that, about the ethanol exports. I guess we should add it to the list.

I heard that one on NPR – they actually top off a tanker of US ethanol in NJ with a little foriegn ethanol so they can sell it in Europe with our subsidy bought into the lower price. American tax payers paying for Europeans cheaper ethanol. The distributer makes a higher margin then he does in America because the subsidy makes it more competitve. A lovely loophole – sell off America to the highest bidder

Nov 12, 2008 - 5:58 am 52. kabud:

ethanol production generates much more energy then is used for it

WHO MISINFORMED YOU PEOPLE?

Are you first time on the internet?

Saudi oil is cheap to produce(around $1 a barrel in some cases), but price of oil on the market

is $60

Ever asked yourself WHY?

Ethanol – is very good solution as domestic and totally independent from oil way to power our vehicles

Methanol- even better.

Find out about methanol program that Bush senior was supporting in the 80s: u ‘ll be surprised

This year USA will have to spent alltogether up to 2 trillion dollars on oil

IF WE INCLUDE MILITARY SPENDINGS for the same exact reason: secure oil imports

It is INSANE

For 500 billion we can in 1 year forget about oil and natural gas needs if we go to adopt alcoholic solution when ethanol and methanol will be used

If this is not done: USA will spiral into a crisis of its existence and chances are : will disappear as a superpower if not as a nation

yes it is a result of idiocracy and mass stupidity of TV viewers

Our enemies will not let us live if we go into full grown depression: nuclear war will become inevitable

This is exactly THAT SERIOUS

Nov 12, 2008 - 7:48 am 53. Destroy the Oil Cartel by making Food Expensive:

[...] Bob Zubrin says “we can solve the financial crisis by destroying the oil cartel”. [...]

Nov 12, 2008 - 8:04 am 54. kabud:

expensive oil makes food expensive

simple as that

USA agriculture achieved unprecedented growth after ethanol program was adopted

And not just in ethanol corn: EVERYTHING WENT UP
Food exports went up in double digits

Who is fooling you people?

this is so amazing how they made idiots out of americans

Nov 12, 2008 - 8:15 am 55. » Breaking the OPEC Cartel:

[...] Read the whole thing here. [...]

Nov 12, 2008 - 9:46 am 56. Preposteroso:

Another way to destroy the cartel is perhaps to invade Iraq, set up a western-leaning government there and buy oil from it. Ah, but this has been wisely tried and is not progressing because we are all too wet and weak to see it properly through.

Nov 12, 2008 - 9:47 am 57. Captain Ramen:

Man, the level of ignorance in these comments is astounding.

If the only food you could eat was rice, do you think you would be highly susceptable to fluctuations in the cost of rice? If 40% of the rice you bought came from people that hated your guts, don’t you think they would squeeze you for everything you had?

There are a few reasons why E85 is not competitive with gasoline at the pump. There are tariffs on importing ethanol from Brasil. In the US, large scale ethanol production only comes from one source, corn (I think we can all agree that corn based ethanol production is a boondoggle). And of course the main reason is that there is a limited market for ethanol based fuel!

In all the gas stations I’ve been to around here I think I have seen ONE E85 pump. There is really no market for it. If all new vehicles were flex fueled, it would create a new market for ethanol. Thus there would be more people trying to produce it, the cost would come down, and there would be more gas stations selling it.

I thought the idea that competition keeps prices down was pretty obvious – clearly ignorance of that concept is where all this nerdrage is coming from.

Nov 12, 2008 - 10:10 am 58. kabud:

57. Captain Ramen:

>(I think we can all agree that corn based ethanol production is a boondoggle)

NO! Can you like READ ? It is absolutely not true. Corn for ethanol is not irrigated, requires less furtilizer and creates excellent foodstock for pigs: what is left after processing

Why you people are so easily manipulated?

Increase in agricultural useage of the land is VERY GOOD thing in all respects:

invironmental, economical, national defense wise,
moral(you feed people)

When you grow more corn or anything else for ethanol : it is better for the World then not growing it

If you know about other agricultural process for ethanol- good for you

But corn is better then oil anyway

And better then natural gas

This flex-fuel law also should require engines to burn METHANOL

Which is even better to produce from biomass or would or coal or garbage in terms of cleaning the environment

All the technologies for both

METHANOL and ETHANOL

are known for centuries))))))))))

we just have to come back to industrial level of manufacturing of those two alcohols

and the way to do it is a simple

DEREGULATION of FUEL MARKETS

BY INTRODUCING COMPETITION

thru flex fuel law.

It is a very simple matter. If someone did not get this:

it means that they never had intellectual ability to analyze things on a high school graduate level

In the middle of the informational war against alcoholic fuels there are

KREMLIN INTERESTS

OPEC – is just a bunch of very stupid dependent puppets of kremlin

This design is at least 50 years old

It worked in
1973

1979

2001

and since 2003 they already won the stealth war with USA:

oil price constant rising did in fact brought us to crisis along with other things

I believe russian plan is to put the whole world into depression

and then their enormous strategic military forces will become the SOURCE OF TAKING OVER THE WORLD

It is not going to be MONEY or ECONOMY:

it is going to be simple nuclear and biological weapon

USA is far from the enemy territories consequences of biological attack will be limited only to American continent

Nov 12, 2008 - 10:35 am 59. kevin c:

HMM-THE US NAVY HAS BEEN USING NUCLEAR POWERED CARRIERS AND SUBS FOR HOW LONG? OVER 30 YRS ID IMAGINE. AND NO ACCIDENTS. EVEN THE COMMIE RUSSKIES HAVE ONLY HAD LIMITED PROBLEMS WITH THERES AND OURS ARE MUCH BETTER(WE ALL KNOW WHY). THE FRENCH GET 80% OF THERE ELECTRICITY GENERATED FROM NUCLEAR. THE REAL REASON THE COMMIES DONT WANT NUCLEAR POWER IS IT FREES US FROM DEPENDENCE. AND DEPENDENCE ON THE MOSLEM FILTH IS LIKE GOVERNMENT WELFARE PROGRAMS.

Nov 12, 2008 - 11:38 am 60. kevin c:

HET ROBERT HURLEY ,YOU DUMB COMMIE-WHAT DO YOU THINK IS GOING TO GENERATE THE ELECTRCITY NECESSARY TO POWER THE VOLT? COAL IS THE LEADING SOURCE OF ELECTRICITY. NUCLEAR IS NEXT. THE ENVIRO COMMIES HATE THEM BOTH,MAYBE BECAUSE THEY WORK AND THE ENVIROCOMMIES DONT WANT ANYTHING THAT WORKS(EXCEPT FOR THEM-ALGORE STILL DOING 30K?MO IN ELEC BILLS?). TRY THAT LAME EXCUSE ON YOUR COMMIE SYNCOPHATS.

Nov 12, 2008 - 11:42 am 61. Webloggin » Watching the Weasels:

[...] Submitted By: Joshuapundit Dr. Robert Zubrin/Pajamas Media We Can Solve the Financial Crisis by Destroying OPEC [...]

Nov 12, 2008 - 12:31 pm 62. kabud:

another totally idiotic dream:
ELECTRIC CAR

People it is NOT GOING TO HAPPEN for years and years

Because there is no possible battery technology that can push a 2000 pound vehicle for at least 200 miles without charge

And that is the necessary requirement for any personal vehicle solution for USA conditions

It is just a fact.

If anyone tells you different: they are either misinforming you on purpose or out of stupidity

You must understand that AUTO industry is not just something that can move on wheels

It is COMPLEX INFRASTRUCTURE with

200 000 fueling stations,

200 billion gallon a year fuel industry,

250 million fleet of vehicles

A network of service stations(hundreds of thousands)

to name major parts of it.

Any new invention will take over 10 years to be implemented on massive scale

May be 50 years in case of auto industry

So we have to go with a simplest solution that is proven and that will not require new 250 million vehicles

It is impossible to achieve before world runs out of oil

We got to use EXISTING infrastructure:

same cars but different materials for a fuel line in their engines($100 a car)

same gas stations but out of three 87, 89, 93 tanks:

1.gas 2.methanol 3.ethanol

This is around 30 thousand each station in conversion(10% of stations is a good start: it is 20000 stations)

Methanol and ethanol production are technologies known for centuries, cheap, simple and

MUCH BETTER environmentally(in a real not marxist way) then oil processing

WHY THIS GOVERNMENT IS NOT DOING IT?

Nov 12, 2008 - 1:16 pm 63. PA:

The article fails to convince or demonstrate how mandating flex fuel vehicles is going to make ethanol or methanol a competitive market alternative with oil.

LPMeOH methanol can be produced for under $1.50 for a gasoline gallon equivalent (about 2gal of methanol).

Nov 12, 2008 - 2:01 pm 64. Bookworm Room » They do the blogging so I don’t have to:

[...] Submitted By: Joshuapundit Dr. Robert Zubrin/Pajamas Media We Can Solve the Financial Crisis by Destroying OPEC [...]

Nov 12, 2008 - 2:32 pm 65. Phineas Worthington:

Didn’t many of the Arab countries steal the oil infrastructure from western companies in the first place?

OPEC should be dismantled instead of rebuilding fascistic oil-nation states. That has a snowball’s chance in Hades of coming to pass.

The link of cause and effect of the oil price rise and housing values falling is wrong.

More likely, it is a correlation due to the artificially high demand of consumer goods like oil and houses due to too much cheap and abundant fiat money in markets.

Nov 13, 2008 - 6:21 am 66. kabud:

if you take out of USA economy(GNP14 tril) in one year 300 billion
next year 500
next 700
next 900

it is getting to be close 10% of GNP!!!!!!!

this is the major mechanism to start a recession

I remember Greenspan saying at the hearings that he thought markets will take care of the housing bubble

The reason they did not: our economy since 2003 lost disproportional amount of resources to oil exporters and chinese dumping trade policies:

THEY ACCUMULATED what we lost and were able to spiral the oil price thru speculations even higher

And i am not sure yet what is a final planned outcomu they arfe pushing for.

One of the possible: war with USA and a plan to destroy us

If someone is armed and you have money:
they just point a gun at you and you give them all

doesn it what is happening now to us?

May be Obama is marked as a guy who will make a TRANSFER?

Nov 13, 2008 - 10:39 am 67. The Irascible Chef » Oil, Oil, Toil, and Trouble:

[...] We Can Solve the Financial Crisis by Destroying OPEC There’s a way to force the oil cartel to compete with other energy sources. – by Robert Zubrin Dr. Robert Zubrin, a senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, is an astronautical engineer and author of Energy Victory: Winning the War on Terror by Breaking Free of Oil. [...]

Nov 13, 2008 - 10:52 am 68. Watcher of Weasels » Winners: New Strategies for New Times:

[...] Fifth place with 1 vote – Dr. Robert Zubrin/Pajamas Media We Can Solve the Financial Crisis by Destroying OPEC [...]

Nov 14, 2008 - 9:22 am 69. kochevnik:

kabud,

“ethanol production generates much more energy then is used for it”

This is blatantly false, unless some breakthrough has occurred in the last 24 months. Even worse, meat takes a massive quantity of oil and energy due to reliance on the Standard Oil/corn lobby. Big Bush loved ethanol because it boosts oil sales AND shuts farmers up.

Nov 14, 2008 - 10:00 am 70. Pat J:

Flex fuel would be a good start. I’ll give you that. But it won’t kill our dependence on foreign oil and it won’t kill OPEC. It has to be a combination of things including conservation, improved infrastructure, public transportation, clean technologies such as wind and solar, and other common sense things like car-pooling, or riding or walking to work.

Nov 14, 2008 - 2:03 pm 71. Marcel F. Williams:

We already know how to covert biomass into carbon neutral gasoline, methanol, diesel fuel, aviation fuel, dimethyl ether. And there’s enough urban and rural biowaste to supply at least 6% of our transportation fuel needs. But 80% of the carbon dioxide in biomass conversion is wasted. If cheap hydrogen from nuclear and hydroelectric power plants is added to the mix then 30% of our transportation fuel needs could be met.

http://newpapyrusmagazine.blogspot.com/

Heavy federal investment in technologies related to synfuel production (carbon neutral gasoline, methanol, diesel fuel, aviation fuel, dimethyl ether) through aero-carbon dioxide extraction devices combined with hydrogen through water electrolysis will be essential if we are to totally free ourselves from the petroleum economy.

Nov 15, 2008 - 2:17 am 72. Bookworm Room » The Watcher’s Council results:

[...] Fifth place with 1 vote – Dr. Robert Zubrin/Pajamas Media We Can Solve the Financial Crisis by Destroying OPEC [...]

Nov 15, 2008 - 2:29 pm 73. dena:

We need to stop depending on forgien oil and start re-bulding our own fuel in America we have the sources keep compaines from taking job’s away from Americans from leaving to other counties looking for cheaper workers – or no benefit/heath/noninsure- labor’s to do the work we can do here do not not allowed them to sell back in the USA if they leave. Stop blaming the poor or low credit comsumer on bad judgement on brokers that lie to the consumer and the bank’s they were selling home loans over price and not worth the paper they had them sign. this 700-bill- bailout is going to the same people who crash there compaines to the ground the banks are not lending the money and do not want to help those that are losing there homes once again the American people have been taken, those that fear to spred the weath are the same people who do not want to share with those who have work for this county all there lives and still cannot pay off there homes or send there children to collage and still want the American dream to make a better life for there childen and grand children. lets take care of american first and stop giving away American tax dollars to other country with no benefits to Americans first.

Nov 16, 2008 - 8:57 am 74. Dissenting Opinion:

Interesting discussion but all over the map.
1. The low hanging fruit is drilling/mining(new oil fields and oil shale) and nuclear. Start now.
2. Flex fuel is good alternative when the new technologies that convert biomass to biodiesel mature.
3. Corn based ethanol should not be subsidized.
4. Electric cars are good and will be the urban area solution – problem is rare-earth materials requirement that has to be solved(we are running out of rare earth minerals).
5. Yes high gas prices broke the back of the housing market (last straw).
6. Subsidize any non-petroleum solution that is more than 50? efficient (most of the biomass conversion technologies could pass that test when mature).

We want to get out of the oil consumption business but not kill ourselves doing it. We want to explore all the alternatives because there will be niche markets for at least several of them and one of them will be the most cost effective oil replacement. We want to generate as much power from Nuclear because it is the efficiency king at generating the most energy for the energy cost of producing the fuel and can be relied on to produce steady power.

Oil-free future not going to happen tomorrow if we start today. But we should start today.

Nov 16, 2008 - 5:31 pm 75. andrea:

Check this video out for insight on our economic crisis. http://www.thetruthabout.com/public/297.cfm?affID=and16

Nov 18, 2008 - 10:41 am 76. Carney:

David H Dennis, drop the counterproductive tarrifs we have in place against Brazilian ethanol and watch the price of E85 plummet.

We can reassure US farmers with a Flex Fuel mandate that creates so much ethanol business that there is more than they or anyone can handle alone, plenty to go around.

Plus, you neglect the existence of methanol, which can be made from ANY organic matter without exception, today (no more research required), and is far cheaper than gasoline.

A real flex fuel mandate would require methanol compatibility. And because methanol is the simplest alcohol molecule, any engine that can run it can also run on ethanol, and propanol, butanol, and biogasoline too.

Dec 9, 2008 - 11:07 am 77. anthropisces:

Our new president-elect has proposed to implement a massive public works program to restore our highway/roads infrastructure. While this is generally a sound strategy, it has to be revamped as if we were already living in the future.

What is true is that roads will lead to our salvation. Those roads must extend into the future rather than into the past.

What must be done is to create a new roadway. We must not however look back at the past and decide as a past president has. Rather, we must decide to do something which has never been done before, if we are to become something new.

Vehicles lighter than 500lbs are the foundation of the plan. It is for these that the new, two-lane roadway will be built.

Each lane of the new roadway will be optimized to accomodate light vehicles, which will be narrower than standard vehicles yet will still permit passengers sitting side by side. New speed limits and rules of the road will be utilized on the new roadway.

The new road will permit the emergence of myriad new vehicle companies and more.

The materials from which the road will be constructed will be specialized and like all aspects of the undertaking-sustainable. The lighting for the roads will be completely new, the barriers which separate the new lanes from existing lanes, the signals, the paint, the reflectors, the smart elements of the road, will all be of a completely new design.

The roadsides will be reserved for wind and solar capacity, plants for biofuel or other sustainable production, native habitat, or businesses which harmonize with the new plan for the new society.

The businesses servicing road traffic will incorporate new standards of sustainability and automation. At a roadside restaurant, your sandwich will be prepared by a machine; Future generations will design and maintain automation equipment rather than flipping burgers.
Fast battery recharge stations, battery swap enterprises, and renewable fuel providers will be the best and in fact the only permitted energy vendors (lest we slip into the past).

Special consideration and expemptions will be provided as incentives for setting up shop in these new locations, which will, before long, become the premium place to do business. Guaranteed leases with highly favorable terms will be granted to those who are willing to innovate. The expectations and demands will be great, the rewards and incentives will be greater.

The road and everything traveling on it or surrounding it will be completely new, incorporate new technology, under a new set of standards that the rest of the world will be unprepared to meet, and which our own citezens will be uniquely enabled to take advantage of.

When it is done our nation will have 100,000 healthy new companies, exporting our technology to the rest of the world and continuing to innovate our own nation. Our nation will be cleaner, greener, better educated, safer and will have a more secure future.

It will not happen overnight, but it will begin overnght

Dec 17, 2008 - 7:43 pm 78. Keith:

For people who don’t think OPEC caused this economic meltdown, see what happens when Chavez and Ahmadinejad and whoever else–Saud–raises the price of oil to 200$ per barrel. In other words, I dare you to talk all this about loans and whatever else when you are paying over 8 dollars per gallon of gas. Remember, less than half a year ago, when some people were paying over 5 dollars a gallon. Hmm…

Jan 16, 2009 - 2:16 pm 79. Jack Keats:

As I recall, former President Bush origionally spoke of using high cellulose grasses, not corn, when he proposed a biofuel initiative. In any case, as I understand it, in the corn “refining” process, the cellulose is seperated from more digestable nutritional fractions that can be used for fuel production without loss of food value.
Truly though, it is becoming apparent that the only “shortage” of domestic oil is a result of our own laws. Gulf oil fields and other offshore resources as well as our own western oil shale could provide us with fuel for the next 200 years, and that does not include domestic coal which is estimated at 25% of the world reserves which with clean generating technology could provide domestic fuel for any forseeable future needs. Government research on alcohol deisel engines has already exceeded 40% efficiency when used in a mg set for hybrid use. I’ve read recently about various bio-alcohol solutions for turning sewage into fuel when we get around to converting old facilities, and there’s news of solar cells getting down to $1/watt and batteries becoming 10 times more efficient than the current lithium/iron technology in use now, so once we bridge this gap with current domestic energy we are going to be in good shape. We just need to get moving, eh?

Mar 18, 2009 - 2:44 am

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