You're not serious, surely?? What do you think powers all those automobiles and buses and trucks you see on the street everyday? Got news for ya, pal...the vast majority of them ain't been converted to biodiesel yet. And for that matter, are you aware just how much of the fertilizers used by our agricultural industry are manufactured using petroleum (I'm not just talking about the machines which are used to make it, either)? The plastics industry is another major consumer of petroleum -- don't you know that? If you were to search through your house and make a pile of everything that is in some way dependent on petroleum, either in its manufacture or in its operation, I think you'd find that you have a *much* bigger pile than you might expect (People have actually done this). Not to mention the fact that these days, most of the food that you purchase in the grocery store was transported a considerable distance before it arrived on the shelves -- which means that a truck or a train had to carry it there.
As it happens, we also don't have quite as many readily available alternative sources of energy as you appear to think we do and those which we do have are at least somewhat problematic. If it were otherwise, doesn't it make sense to think that we would be taking greater advantage of them and weaning ourselves off petroleum more efficiently? There are some under development, yes -- but most of them are not yet at a place at which they can replace petroleum. At least at present, ethanol is not an efficient fuel because it uses up more units of energy in the process of manufacture than it actually creates. According to some of the experts, domestic natural gas also appears to be approaching peak production -- so that's not really a secure alternative. Perhaps if we'd continued paying attention to solar and wind power after the energy crisis of the 1970's (resulting from domestic oil production reaching its Hubbert Peak), they would be in more widespread use but we didn't. Nuclear energy inevitably produces radioactive waste which must be stored for a very long period of time so that it does not harm the environment -- and if you want to know what can happen if there's ever a serious accident at the plant, just go to the Ukraine and ask people there. Neither coal nor wood is as efficient as petroleum -- if it were otherwise, one would think we would have kept on using them as we did in the past even after the discovery of petroleum -- and coal has the additional drawback of being an environmental pollutant through carbon dioxide and sulfur dioxide ("acid rain") emissions. What petroleum can be extracted from oil sands and oil shales costs more to refine than sweet crude, and the fact that we're already considering them is not a particularly good sign. Off-shore drilling is potentially harmful to ocean life -- or didn't you hear the news recently that most of the seafood may be *gone* in the next forty years due to overfishing and destruction of habitats?
If you really wanna stick your head in the sand and assume that everything is going to be hunky-dory, feel free to go right ahead -- I can't stop you -- but Aesop said it best more than two thousand years ago in his fable about the ant and the grasshopper. It's better to be safe than sorry.
Can't help but notice that the name Matthew R. Simmons doesn't appear on that list. Matthew Simmons is a proponent of the Peak Oil theory -- and one would think that he might actually have some idea of what HE'S talking about as well, considering that he's been an investment banker focusing exclusively on the petroleum industry for about the past twenty years AND served as an advisor to Dick Cheney's 2001 Energy Task Force (make of that what you will). He's the chairman of his own company, Simmons & Co. International, which began in 1974 -- a number of his articles are available at the company website.
Let's remember one thing -- many of the people who worked in the petroleum industry back in the 1950's sneered at Marion King Hubbert (the originator of the Peak Oil theory) when he predicted that domestic oil production would begin to decline sometime during the late 1960's or early 1970's, but it turned out that he was RIGHT and they were WRONG. When you think about it, it makes sense. Do you really think that a petroleum executive whose salary depends on the availability of oil would be eager to break the news to the American public that the world's supply of oil might be dwindling -- especially since one quite likely consequence of that would be increased efforts at conservation?
Always VERY important to ask that question! You had exactly the same thought as I did. Just because someone says that they're acting in your best interests and/or telling you the truth doesn't automatically mean that they are -- and it seems to be getting harder and harder these days to tell who does and does not have an axe to grind.
One of the things I've been listening to on my iPod is a recording of a talk given by the writer Quentin Crisp ("The Naked Servant") -- and by the sound of it, Crisp would have been a big fan of this idea. One of the things he discusses during the program is the idea that some of the greatest sources of human fear and unhappiness are secrecy, concealment, and outward conformity to popular culture because they rob us of our individuality and make us feel self-conscious and ashamed. I think he had a point! I don't know that I'm entirely up to it or ready for it myself -- at least not yet -- but I think it's an intriguing concept.
Yet another news item suggesting that the United States is being slowly but surely transformed into a carbon copy of the former Eastern Bloc (if not Oceania), all in the ironic guise of "safeguarding our freedoms". Monitoring citizens' telephone calls without a warrant in the name of catching terrorists, constructing a wall across our southern border in the name of stemming illegal immigration, making it possible and perfectly legal (through the Military Commissions Act) to detain even US citizens indefinitely without access to proper legal recourse -- need I go on?
Slashdot Mirror
"So what if we run out of oil?"
You're not serious, surely?? What do you think powers all those automobiles and buses and trucks you see on the street everyday? Got news for ya, pal...the vast majority of them ain't been converted to biodiesel yet. And for that matter, are you aware just how much of the fertilizers used by our agricultural industry are manufactured using petroleum (I'm not just talking about the machines which are used to make it, either)? The plastics industry is another major consumer of petroleum -- don't you know that? If you were to search through your house and make a pile of everything that is in some way dependent on petroleum, either in its manufacture or in its operation, I think you'd find that you have a *much* bigger pile than you might expect (People have actually done this). Not to mention the fact that these days, most of the food that you purchase in the grocery store was transported a considerable distance before it arrived on the shelves -- which means that a truck or a train had to carry it there.
As it happens, we also don't have quite as many readily available alternative sources of energy as you appear to think we do and those which we do have are at least somewhat problematic. If it were otherwise, doesn't it make sense to think that we would be taking greater advantage of them and weaning ourselves off petroleum more efficiently? There are some under development, yes -- but most of them are not yet at a place at which they can replace petroleum. At least at present, ethanol is not an efficient fuel because it uses up more units of energy in the process of manufacture than it actually creates. According to some of the experts, domestic natural gas also appears to be approaching peak production -- so that's not really a secure alternative. Perhaps if we'd continued paying attention to solar and wind power after the energy crisis of the 1970's (resulting from domestic oil production reaching its Hubbert Peak), they would be in more widespread use but we didn't. Nuclear energy inevitably produces radioactive waste which must be stored for a very long period of time so that it does not harm the environment -- and if you want to know what can happen if there's ever a serious accident at the plant, just go to the Ukraine and ask people there. Neither coal nor wood is as efficient as petroleum -- if it were otherwise, one would think we would have kept on using them as we did in the past even after the discovery of petroleum -- and coal has the additional drawback of being an environmental pollutant through carbon dioxide and sulfur dioxide ("acid rain") emissions. What petroleum can be extracted from oil sands and oil shales costs more to refine than sweet crude, and the fact that we're already considering them is not a particularly good sign. Off-shore drilling is potentially harmful to ocean life -- or didn't you hear the news recently that most of the seafood may be *gone* in the next forty years due to overfishing and destruction of habitats?
If you really wanna stick your head in the sand and assume that everything is going to be hunky-dory, feel free to go right ahead -- I can't stop you -- but Aesop said it best more than two thousand years ago in his fable about the ant and the grasshopper. It's better to be safe than sorry.
Can't help but notice that the name Matthew R. Simmons doesn't appear on that list. Matthew Simmons is a proponent of the Peak Oil theory -- and one would think that he might actually have some idea of what HE'S talking about as well, considering that he's been an investment banker focusing exclusively on the petroleum industry for about the past twenty years AND served as an advisor to Dick Cheney's 2001 Energy Task Force (make of that what you will). He's the chairman of his own company, Simmons & Co. International, which began in 1974 -- a number of his articles are available at the company website. Let's remember one thing -- many of the people who worked in the petroleum industry back in the 1950's sneered at Marion King Hubbert (the originator of the Peak Oil theory) when he predicted that domestic oil production would begin to decline sometime during the late 1960's or early 1970's, but it turned out that he was RIGHT and they were WRONG. When you think about it, it makes sense. Do you really think that a petroleum executive whose salary depends on the availability of oil would be eager to break the news to the American public that the world's supply of oil might be dwindling -- especially since one quite likely consequence of that would be increased efforts at conservation?
Always VERY important to ask that question! You had exactly the same thought as I did. Just because someone says that they're acting in your best interests and/or telling you the truth doesn't automatically mean that they are -- and it seems to be getting harder and harder these days to tell who does and does not have an axe to grind.
One of the things I've been listening to on my iPod is a recording of a talk given by the writer Quentin Crisp ("The Naked Servant") -- and by the sound of it, Crisp would have been a big fan of this idea. One of the things he discusses during the program is the idea that some of the greatest sources of human fear and unhappiness are secrecy, concealment, and outward conformity to popular culture because they rob us of our individuality and make us feel self-conscious and ashamed. I think he had a point! I don't know that I'm entirely up to it or ready for it myself -- at least not yet -- but I think it's an intriguing concept.
Yet another news item suggesting that the United States is being slowly but surely transformed into a carbon copy of the former Eastern Bloc (if not Oceania), all in the ironic guise of "safeguarding our freedoms". Monitoring citizens' telephone calls without a warrant in the name of catching terrorists, constructing a wall across our southern border in the name of stemming illegal immigration, making it possible and perfectly legal (through the Military Commissions Act) to detain even US citizens indefinitely without access to proper legal recourse -- need I go on?