Not a member? Register Now. * Required
Important Energy Events
posted by LtDan on 8/5/2010 - Be the first to recommend this
The oil leak in the Gulf of Mexico is the most important event to take place in the past year or two with respect to the "Energy Conversation." It jolted us Americans awake in a big way, at first scaring our pants off over what was loudly proclaimed to be the biggest environmental disaster of all time, and then, with time, ennuring us to the fact that the problem was ultimately solveable and the fact that it would not have the disastrous aftereffects everyone was being told would surely destroy the Gulf ecosystems. Doom-sayers just love this stuff! It's almost as much fun as the angst game over carbon dioxide emissions and their effect on global temperatures. Unfortunately for the global warmalist crowd, the BP mishap has upstaged them in a big way, and the climate control aspects of energy legislation are being scrapped. Thanks be to BP! Maybe now we can get on to sensible decisions regarding American energy without the global warming silliness mucking everything up.
view all 4 replies respond to this comment
Oil is not a sustainable source of energy.
posted by collinar on 8/27/2010 - Be the first to recommend this
We are on the downward slope of Peak Oil, yet future demand is forecast to increase. This will cause disruptive shortages of oil. Unless we transition to a more sustainable source of energy before oil shortages disrupt our economy, these disruptions will be severe. Can everyone walk to work? No. The store shelves will be empty. Can everyone grow their own food? No. The transition is so massive it will take 20 years, so we must begin the transiition 20 years before disruptive shortages. Opps, too late! The 2007 oil price runup initiated the economic collapse. Did you notice that the most remotely located houses began defaulting first? At $147 per oil barrel and $4.00 per gallon gasoline, transportation expense increases ate into peoples mortgage payments capacity until they began to default. This caused the housing house of cards to crash. The cause was high gasoline prices due to global competition for a finite and declining supply of oil.
respond to this comment
Oil Price Spike of 2007
posted by LtDan on 8/29/2010 - Be the first to recommend this
The rapid run-up of oil prices in 2007 was not due to "competion for a finite and declining supply of oil." It was planned and carried out by President Bush, the big oil companies and the Saudi Arabians in order to cause a slght recession with a fairly significant collapse of equity share prices throughout the world. With such a stock market "sale," this petroleum fraternity would then be able to buy up significant positons in major companies using the massive amounts of cash they had in storage. Then, when Bush would go out of office in 2009, everyone in the fraternity would be comfortably invested in profitable companies. What they didn't foresee was the collapse of the money-lending "industry," engineered and carried out by a different bunch of fast money characters in various investment banking and insurance firms. Using "accounting" magic and the phantom collateralization of really bad debts, these characters were able to ruin credit markets all over the world and to enrich themselves in the process. (Being "too big to fail," they were bailed out by the rest of us.) This world economy of ours could not shrug off these two robberies happening simultaneously. Either one alone we could have dealt with, but the two coming on us at once was too much for us, and we went into the current Great Recession. The basic problem remains: Oil is running out, and we need to begin shifting to alternate energy supplies. Can we solve that problem? Of course we can! With coal, nuclear and solar power all readily available to America, we can easily break the oil industry's choke hold. That will probably involve an embarassing repudiation of Al Gore and his followers, although that could be avoided if we gently tried to ease Mr. Gore out of the public spotlight. (Perhaps that is already being done.) The carbon dioxide fairy tale must be put to rest. Maybe someday the criminal conspiracy to manipulate oil prices will be given a good public airing, but I'm not holding my breath until that happens.
BP and the atmosphere
posted by jgotthold on 8/28/2010 - Be the first to recommend this
Munich Re- the worlds largest reinsurance company-that is they insure insurance companies against potential losses-has just released a chart that tracks extreme weather events over the last fifty years the incidence shows a dramatic upward trend. The main concept of global warming is just more energy in the atmosphere, which leads to greater turbulence of air flows around the planet and to more frequent extremes of drauht, concentrated rain fall, high winds, etc. Some can deny forever that fossil fuel CO2 and agricultural methane and industrial greenhouse gases are contributing to the growth of weather extremes, but the extremes are happening more and more frequently. Go deny the Pakistan floods to a flooded out Pakistani or the Russian heat and fires to a burned out Russian. Deny until a weather extreme destroys your own livelihood, then keep denying as hoards of environmental refugees start pushing across boarders into your area. Then you may finally wake up and say gee maybe we should have listened to the scientists who said adding greenhouse gases to the atmosphere will cause it to trap more energy and cause greater atmospheric turbulence. Error on the side of caution where the planet is concerned is the best way to stay away from extinction.
Climate Change Causes
Gotthold, you simply MUST stop confusing cause and effect. The trees moving do not make the wind blow, and increases of CO2 in the atmosphere do not make the climate grow warmer. As long as serious people keep believing Al Gore's CO2 malarky, we are going to hinder our efforts to deal with climate change in common sense fashion, and we are going to continue struggling to break the hold the petoleum industry and the Arabs have on our nation. ----- Emotional diatribes such as yours don't help one bit. (And it's "hordes," not "hoards," and it's "borders," not "boarders," and it's "drought," not "drauht." Correct spelling adds to credibility.)
Hydrogen
posted by jgotthold on 8/6/2010 - Be the first to recommend this
Somehow it doesn't occur to people that the heat wave baking southeast US and the drouth and fires over two million acres of Russia and the extreme flooding in Pakistan are all caused by the burning of fossil fuels and the buildup of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. The only solution is to stop releasing CO2 and Methane and oxides of nitrogen and other greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. If a person were in a confined room would they knowingly dump detrimental gases into their air? There are now nearly 7,000,000,000 people on this confined planet EARTH, most all of them doing some detrimental dumping and somehow thinking that it won't collectively affect them. There are only two power solutions which will allow the maintenance of civilization as we know it. One is the creation of fusion energy, which is still thirty years away, as it has been for the last sixty years, and the other is to liberate and use HYDROGEN as fuel. There is no physical way to grow enough biomass to create bio fuels and replace the fossil fuels we consume today. as we consume approximately i,000,000 years of fossil accumulation per year. So it seems very clear, continue burning, fossil fuels, turn the planet into a drouth plagued hell of extreme weather and extinct most of the human race, or start to seriously consider using HYDROGEN as fuel for all uses. John Gotthold CTO- HySolGEnics, Inc.
greenhose gasses
posted by LtDan on 8/7/2010 - Be the first to recommend this
Warm weather is NOT being caused by the emission, by humans, of carbon dioxide or any other greenhouse gasses into the atmosphere. We are still coming out of the present ice age, and average global temperatures will continue to increae until we go "over the top" and start down into the next ice age. Nattering about human emissions of greenhouse gasses only serves to distract our attention from the task of dealing with the effects of this natural climate change. The whole global warming panic, with Al Gore's Oscar and Nobel Peace Prize, has been generated entirely by a prodigious effort to promote nuclear power generation of electricity in the United States and throughout the rest of the world.
The truth
posted by Johncockerill on 8/7/2010 - Be the first to recommend this
So who is right here. Can't NASA, or someone find the answewr to what is going on. So 2000 scientist are wrong. Gore is a fraud? Lt Dan: Do you mean Gore is on the nuc payroll? Your saying that china coal, is not a problem? What about the polar ice studies about soot and stuff.? It all means nothing. I think we should all reach out to find the answers and bring them back to this board. It seems none of us can know enough. Either Lt. Dan is full of disinformation from one of the big guys, or everyone has been fooling us. Lt. Dan, disinformation is not good. Could you give us more on this from an authority source? Really, we do not want to go in the wrong direction. We come here for the truth. Ca you fill us in better?
http://www.exqheat.com
Global warming
posted by jgotthold on 8/7/2010 - Be the first to recommend this
The peak of glaciation in the northern hemisphere occurred 18,000 years before the present and the last sub peak of glaciation went by around 12,500. The Earth has been warming since. The heating & cooling cycles swing about every 22,000 years as the Earth orbit wobbles through the dust in the plane of Jup1tor. We appear to be around the peak of the current warming cycle. The fact that we have heated the Earth 1.34 F in the last thirty years and reduced Oxygen in the Atmosphere from 21 to 19 percent in the same period should give us pause. If the human race is so stupid as to continue to believe that we can forever pursue growth and profit by destroying the ecosphere of the Earth, then we deserve the same species extinction that we are causing to hundreds of other species already. HYDROGEN is the least damaging way to continue what we call civilization, until we can figure out a power system even more benign. John Gotthold- CTO HySolGenics, Inc.
Hydrogen is not an energy source. Hydrogen is an energy carrier.
Hydrogen is not an energy source since hydrogen is not free. It must be created through an energy intensive process, and that energy must come from somewhre. If a method can be found to produce hydrogen effectively using a sustainable source of energy, and if fuel cells can become practical, then yes, hydrogen can be useful as an energy carrier. It is not an energy source. Hydrogen can be freed from water via electrolisys powered via solar PhotoVoltaic cells. In this case solar is the energy source. When the true and total cost including negative externalities of fossil fuels are considered, cars powered either by hydrogen fuel cells, or via batteries from solar produced electricity are preferable to the unsustainable use of fossil fuels.
Important events influencing the energy conversation from Oct. 2008 to March 2010
posted by collinar on 8/6/2010 - Be the first to recommend this
The economic meltdown caused by poor political policy which resulted in capital being directed into a non-productive housing bubble which had to crash. IMO if political policy had directed the same amount of capital into productive energy investments, we would have more energy security today. Who influences political policy? Lobbyists, and to a lesser degree, voters. Large financial institutions and existing large fossil fuel based energy corporations can afford to pay lobbyists to influence political policy. Unfortunately many companies offering sustainable energy solutions do not have the money to buy political influence. Another important event is solar photovoltaic solutions from First Solar, NanoSolar and others for less than one dollar per watt (peak) with forecasts for lower costs in the near future. IMO when negative externalities from coal and oil are considered, solar is already cheaper. All that is needed at this time is for voters and corporations to influence political policy toward investments in sustainable energy production, and away from investments with large negative externalities and with no productive use.
view all 2 replies respond to this comment
Investment in Conservation
Conservation will reduce income to energy companies. They pay the government not to save energy. The big companies have the money to spread disinformation and form public priorities with large advertising budgets. The small guy with technology and the consumer do not have the advertising budget required to get anything done.
http://www.Exqheat.com
Unlocking New Energy Technologies
posted by Olivia on 8/27/2010 - Be the first to recommend this
Hi collinar. The financial investment is not the only barrier to bringing new energy technologies to market. In addition to substantial funding for research and development, there is possibly development of new infrastructure to deliver the product/service to market, as well as both regulatory and market mechanisms that enable sustainable adoption, implementation and scalability. We've hosted this conversation on this site before, but the subject is valid in the context of this complex issue you raise above: how do we unlock all of these barriers in order to more rapidly deploy new, sustainable energy technologies? Thanks, Olivia from Chevron
http://www.willyoujoinus.com/discussion/topics/?d=29
Focus on Energy Efficiency?
posted by Olivia on 8/12/2010 - Be the first to recommend this
In President Obama’s State of the Union address in January 2010, he said, “…we need to encourage American innovation… And no area is more ripe for such innovation than energy. You can see the results of last year's investments in clean energy -– in the North Carolina company that will create 1,200 jobs nationwide helping to make advanced batteries; or in the California business that will put a thousand people to work making solar panels… But to create more of these clean energy jobs, we need more production, more efficiency, more incentives.” It’s been said that perhaps there are greater benefits to be gained from better practices/policies around energy conservation and efficiency, rather than increased spending on new (clean) energy technologies. The President seems to be calling for a balance. Thoughts? Olivia from Chevron
Events Influencing Eneergy From Oct 1 2008 through March 31 2010
posted by councilor408 on 8/6/2010 - This comment was recommended 1 time
The on-going trend toward diverting a greater portion of the US economy to financial markets reached an apex. Financial derivatives and adjusted rate mortgages produce enormous profits at the expense of the global economy. Why? Because all the International monetary markets were based on the stability of the US dollar, which was based on a continually expanding US economy. Financial institutions were allowed to grow far beyond the government's ability to effectively counteract a fiasco of the magnitude which occurred when the "Housing Bubble" burst. The revenue diverted to "toxic asset" bailouts derived from the disposable income of US consumers by outsourcing employment, undercutting wages by legal and illegal immigration, together with the State and Local government revenue lost because of high and sustained unemployment may have created what may be an irreversible downturn in the US economy. God only knows if we will be able to recover from this disaster unless Wall Street financial giants accept the losses generated by their unbridled and aggressive pursuit of unsustainable, unmerited, and unproductive profiteering! Where were all the proponents of the Bell system breakup when these financial institutions which are "too big to fail" were created?
http://www.fyi.bz
Pulse Report
posted by MachWing on 8/6/2010 - Be the first to recommend this
I spent some time reviewing both additions of the Pulse Report. I remember some of the conversations here at willyoujoinus.com toward the beginning of 2008, wherein started the temporal scope of the Pulse Report, also. As for me, I was most greatly influenced by gasoline prices, all the way as early as 2005. This may seem like a late entry into the conversation, by some estimates. But I wasn't even born before the oil embargoes and energy crises of the 1970's. But I think that around 2007-2008, high oil prices and high gasoline prices were reigniting the conversation. Otherwise, I had wanted to learn more about the large scale picture of energy issues, and was very concerned, personally, with Peak Oil -- moreso even than global warming/climate change. And the Gulf of Mexico oil spill was more like icing on the cake after a few years' engagement in the conversation. The great thing, though, is that I've learned that profitable pathways exist for creating much wealth in the transition away from foreign and even domestic fossil fuels and extermist-funding foreign oil as well. The economic and mechanical mechanisms, machines, systems, and processes will be different -- but they're quite profitable, if done right. It's more a socio/political/economic problem than it is a technical/mechanical/scientific problem.
Long Term Common Sense Solutions
posted by markmulligansr on 8/5/2010 - This comment was recommended 1 time
If there were a way that Chevron could build a hydrogen extraction plant to extract hydrogen, oxygen and salt from the ocean then the hydrogen could be piped around the country just like natural gas to homes and businesses that could have hydrogen oxygen fuel cells to generate electricity. The home refueling station designed by Honda could be used to fill us our SUV's, cars and trucks with hydrogen and hydrogen oxygen fuel cells could run our transportation system instead of gasoline. The oxygen could be piped around the country as well and provide more oxygen to our cities to help clean and clear the air and to improve the health and intelligence of our population. The salt could be used to build homes and buildings instead of wood and this would last longer, require less electricity to heat and cool and prevent homes from burning to the ground when there are fires. Some salt could be recycled into the oceans. The hydrogen oxygen fuel cells would generate electricity and water as a by product and be recycled into the environment and eventually find it's way back to the oceans. Fresh water could be extracted from the oceans as well and piped around the country to provide fresh water where ever people want to live and grow food. Population growth in the southwest U.S. would not have to be limited due to a lack of fresh water. If companies with capital and brain power like Chevron invested in these types of infrastructure instead of trying to maintain the status quo then they would evolve into our next generation of industry that would help us free our economy from the geo-political and environmental problems caused by burning fossil fuels. If we stop living like cave men and burning everything in sight then we will move a long way toward being able to sustain 1 trillion people on our planet. We'll never be able to do that with fossil fuels.
Breaking down sea water
posted by LtDan on 8/6/2010 - Be the first to recommend this
Mark, your ideas are terrific! Hydrogen production facilities would, idealy, be located in desert country where the sun shines nearly every day and there is a ready source of water nearby. Energy nay-sayers will be quick to tell you that it takes more energy to break down water than the resulting hydrogen can generate. But if the energy is free --- which solar energy most certainly is --- then that makes that argument senseless. Usable energy gasses --- hydrogen and oxygen --- are ours for the taking and maiking. Add to that the ready supply of methane we have from our prodigious organic waste streams, and our enormous reserves of coal, then all of our petroleum dependency woes are over.
Hydrogen and/or Anhydrous Ammonia
I love this soapbox issue re: hydrogen. Check out the Ocean Energy Institute, Matt Simmons's approaches with ammonia fuel, fresh water, and salt from longer-distance offshore wind and ocean water. Also check out the Ammonia Fuel Network, as some of these folks are working with the Ocean Energy Institute on this approach. As for inland ammonia fuel and fertilizer production and consumption, I have suggested a Midwestern coalition of model sustainable cities along a "renewable ammonia corridor value cycling engine" at my "Model Sustainable Cities" website. A real kicker for a lot of these projects is the "solid state ammonia synthesis" process that kinda squishes out the electrolysis process from the industrial process chain in obtaining hydrogen from water, and instead uses solid state electro-chemistry to use direct inputs of water, electricity, and gaseous nitrogen to produce anhydrous ammonia and gaseous oxygen as outputs. I've posted some here at the willyoujoinus.com website along these lines, as well. Let's see where this new conversation about the Pulse Report goes.
http://modelsustainablecities.weebly.com
Addiction to oil, worldwide
posted by arnoh2fc on 8/5/2010 - Be the first to recommend this
I wonder, why we are all so addicted to oil? Can anybody please explain this? Once you have studied the background, of it`s exploration, transport, refinering and transport, it is hard to understand why we are driving around ion moving machines, which are containg around 2 tonnes of heavy metall, just to move one person from A to B. This must be very strange to understand, when one far day our "clivilization" will be discovered and analyzed byfuture archeologist. More: www.hydrogenambassadors.com
http://www.hydrogenambassadors.com