Less burning of fossil fuels, not more supply of them...

More hybrid vehicles. Plug-in hybrids. Cellulosic ethanol. Biodiesel from waste products. Bus rapid transit. Light rail. High speed interstate rail. Lighter, more efficient aircraft. Pedestrian & bicycle friendly cities and towns. Conserve. Use the big truck or SUV for hauling, not commuting & errands. Combine the errands & carpool. Telecommute one day a week or more. Continued high gas prices will increase all of these.

Oil may be in a speculative bubble and drop again at some point but it's time to transition to sustainable energy. With the rise of developing nations and the amount of easy-access oil dwindling we are now heading into watershed times, thankfully.

Zipfanatik Wrote:Less burning of fossil fuels, not more supply of them...

Not quite right.

Actually, less burning of fossil fuels, plus alternative fuels, PLUS MORE SUPPLY OF FOSSIL FUELS. We need all three.

The problem now is that we have at least three groups--one favoring drilling, one favoring alternative fuels, and one pushing conservation--each seeing their own as the only solution and none willing to work together on a cooperative plan. Sometimes the alternative fuels and the conservation groups end up in the same camp, but they also fight each other.

No matter which approach you favor--fossil fuels, alternative fuels, or conservation--you need to recognize that your favored solution needs to be part of a package including all three, if we are to solve the problem. None of the three, by itself, will get it done. You also need to recognize that no solutions are possible at the level of prices that we have been paying in the past. The good news there is that prices have finally reached the level where they are producing conservation efforts.

Pretending that my favored solution is all we need, to the exclusion of the others, is how we got in this mess. And as long as that kind of thinking persists, the mess will only get worse.

Brasil provides a good example. They decided in the 1970s that their economy couldn't survive at the then level of oil imports. So they became energy-self-sufficient, and today export energy. They did it with a huge biofuels development program, and that has attracted most of the attention. But that program, impressive as it is, only accounts for 20% of their energy consumption. They also did it by developing hydroelectric to provide 35% of their total energy needs, and by stepping up domestic drilling from 3% to 27% of their total energy needs. That kind of comprehensive approach is what we need, instead of the "na na na na na na, my soltion is better than yours," approach we are using now.

Well said. Just trying to produce ever more oil so that millions more Indians and Chinese can also drive 25 mpg cars isn't going to be feasible. There will have to be more mass transit, less sprawl, etc. in the future and this current price shock will drive home that fact and start changing the American mindset. Of course the transitioning will be gradual over many years and there may be increasing political will in this country for coastal and ANWR drilling in the intermediate-term to ease the pain at the pump.

Has anyone noticed that the auto makers are having a hard time getting rid of their big trucks and SUV's while the gas misers they sell are selling like hot cakes?

Here in So California far too many people have big-ass pickups/SUV's to haul around their gas guzzling toys (boats and off road vehicles). There also seems to be a lot of people who own and fly small airplanes and I'm sure flying them ain't cheap. With this gas guzzling mindset practiced by so many people it will be a long time before we begin to see change in the way the majority of Californians lead their lives in regard to gas consumption.

Tell the theives in Washington to reduce the theft of our wages. Being able to "spend" more of the fruits of our labor would make the situation better.

Fo Shizzle Wrote:Tell the theives in Washington to reduce the theft of our wages. Being able to "spend" more of the fruits of our labor would make the situation better.

$4.00/gallon gas on a consistent basis will make people change their habits, with or without government intervention. If it gets up to $5.00/gallon, even more so.

take a bus?

In 1966 gas cost approximately $.25 - $.35 a gallon and citizens made about $1.00 - $2.00 an hour. vehicles then were horrible on gas mileage, around 8-12 miles per gallon. so to drive 60 miles you would have to work about 1.5 hours.

now days, the average car gets 15-25 mpg, average citizen makes about $12 hour. gas costs $4.00 gallon. to drive 60 miles, you would have to work for about an hour.


Just a thought

http://www.energyvictory.net/energy_victory_book.htm

An interesting book claiming that a legislative mandate requiring that cars sold in the US be flex-fuel would break the strangle-hold OPEC has on you and I.

Zipfanatik Wrote:http://www.energyvictory.net/energy_victory_book.htm

An interesting book claiming that a legislative mandate requiring that cars sold in the US be flex-fuel would break the strangle-hold OPEC has on you and I.

This is not the panacea that the author claims for several reasons:
1. It would take several years to get enough flex-fuel cars on the road
2. The present subsidy for domestic corn-based ethanol and tariff on more efficient sugar-cane-based imported ethanol (both pushed by Mr. Obama's favorite special interest group, the agribusiness lobby) will have to be repealed in order for us to get enough ethanol into the system to make it work
3. The infrastructure to deliver ethanol to users all over the country will take some time to develop

Bottom line: This approach will take a bit longer than "drill here, drill now" to get onstream in sufficient quantities to make a difference.

That being said, this is an integral part of any sensible energy strategy. We need "drill here, drill now" to provide the quickest, cheapest relief (not a reduction of gasoline prices to $2/gallon, but holding in the $4-5/gallon range for longer). Then we need this program to kick in big-time in about the 5-7 year time frame. BTW, one thing that would greatly help this approach is reopening trade with Cuba. Cuban sugar cane would enable us to make enough ethanol to get up to Brasilian standards--25-26% of gasoline, plus "pure" ethanol (85%, since you need some petroleum-based product to stop the water-based ethanol from freezing or evaporating or decomposing), giving you an average of about 44% ethanol in the total gasoline usage. This would enable a major reduction in oil imports. "Drill here, drill now" plus ethanol enable us to get to the point that the factors necessary for electric cars to become truly feasible--increased electricity supply (wind, solar, nuclear) and delivery infrastructure (modular replacement batteries at service stations?)--are in place around the 10 year time frame. Meanwhile, we need to be pushing more exotic alternatives (swtichgrass ethanol, hydrogen fuel cells, etc.) and hopefully some of those will come onstream in the 12-15 year time frame. Finally, we need to be making the kinds of infrastructure changes (comprehensive public transit in every metro area above 1 million first, then extend to smaller cities; high-speed trains connecting major metro areas, good trains like Japanese Shinkansen or French TGV, not Amtrak Metroliner; efficient means to store electricity so that solar and wind become 24/7/365 sources).

We don't need to be arguing for one or the other of these alternatives. We need to be making every one of them happen as quickly as possible. That is the way out of this mess--the ONLY way out.

Owl 69/70/75 Wrote:

Zipfanatik Wrote:http://www.energyvictory.net/energy_victory_book.htm

An interesting book claiming that a legislative mandate requiring that cars sold in the US be flex-fuel would break the strangle-hold OPEC has on you and I.

This is not the panacea that the author claims for several reasons:
1. It would take several years to get enough flex-fuel cars on the road
2. The present subsidy for domestic corn-based ethanol and tariff on more efficient sugar-cane-based imported ethanol (both pushed by Mr. Obama's favorite special interest group, the agribusiness lobby) will have to be repealed in order for us to get enough ethanol into the system to make it work
3. The infrastructure to deliver ethanol to users all over the country will take some time to develop

Bottom line: This approach will take a bit longer than "drill here, drill now" to get onstream in sufficient quantities to make a difference.

That being said, this is an integral part of any sensible energy strategy. We need "drill here, drill now" to provide the quickest, cheapest relief (not a reduction of gasoline prices to $2/gallon, but holding in the $4-5/gallon range for longer). Then we need this program to kick in big-time in about the 5-7 year time frame. BTW, one thing that would greatly help this approach is reopening trade with Cuba. Cuban sugar cane would enable us to make enough ethanol to get up to Brasilian standards--25-26% of gasoline, plus "pure" ethanol (85%, since you need some petroleum-based product to stop the water-based ethanol from freezing or evaporating or decomposing), giving you an average of about 44% ethanol in the total gasoline usage. This would enable a major reduction in oil imports. "Drill here, drill now" plus ethanol enable us to get to the point that the factors necessary for electric cars to become truly feasible--increased electricity supply (wind, solar, nuclear) and delivery infrastructure (modular replacement batteries at service stations?)--are in place around the 10 year time frame. Meanwhile, we need to be pushing more exotic alternatives (swtichgrass ethanol, hydrogen fuel cells, etc.) and hopefully some of those will come onstream in the 12-15 year time frame. Finally, we need to be making the kinds of infrastructure changes (comprehensive public transit in every metro area above 1 million first, then extend to smaller cities; high-speed trains connecting major metro areas, good trains like Japanese Shinkansen or French TGV, not Amtrak Metroliner; efficient means to store electricity so that solar and wind become 24/7/365 sources).
ogram to do
We don't need to be arguing for one or the other of these alternatives. We need to be making every one of them happen as quickly as possible. That is the way out of this mess--the ONLY way out.

Well, the conversion of a vehicle from a "normal" vehicle to a "flex fuel" vehicle is about $150 according to GM. I can't see why there couldn't be a program like the tv set boxes for the change over to digital or instead of giving $600 rebate check, how about a conversion voucher? But as you said, it will take time to get adequate supplies of ethenol and to convert gas stations. One thing of note though. Brazil has lost rainforests to sugar farming.

RobertN Wrote:One thing of note though. Brazil has lost rainforests to sugar farming.

El wrongo. Take a look at the map. The sugar cane growing regions are not in what used to be rainforest.

To be fair, some of the soybeans used to make biodiesel (another alternative fuel in wide use) are grown in former rainforests.

So there is a rainforest impact. But not the one that you stated.

RobertN Wrote:Well, the conversion of a vehicle from a "normal" vehicle to a "flex fuel" vehicle is about $150 according to GM. I can't see why there couldn't be a program like the tv set boxes for the change over to digital or instead of giving $600 rebate check, how about a conversion voucher? But as you said, it will take time to get adequate supplies of ethenol and to convert gas stations.

The Brasilian experience is that factory flex fuel costs about $100 more. That makes $150 for aftermarket conversion sound about right.

Bigger problem is producing enough ethanol and getting the delivery infrastructure in place. As long as we are stacking the deck in favor of inefficient corn, supply is going to be tough. Cuban sugar cane probably makes the most sense, but there's a little matter of the Florida electoral vote.

What's really ridiculous is that we are simultaneously subsidizing corn ethanol (which is the least efficient way to make ethanol but a very efficient way to drive up worldwide food costs), imposing what has been a prohibitive tariff on ethanol imports (although at $4/gallon, it is looking less prohibitive), and subsidizing domestic sugar prices (further driving up food costs). Get rid of all three, and the Cuban trade prohibition, and we could probably get pretty close to the 44% ethanol that now makes up Brasil's fuel supply.

And we could solve the delivery infrastructure by again emulating what Brasil did with Petrobras and bringing the oil companies into the loop instead of treating them like the enemy.

But as long as our political leadership puts lobbyists ahead of the public interest, this probably won't happen.

Emulating what has already worked somewhere else makes a whole lot more sense than putting all our faith in technologies that remain to be proved effective.

http://www.c-spanarchives.org/library/in...d=200600-1

Zubrin says that stations don't want to install an E85 pump because there aren't enough flex fuel cars yet and so the f/f mandate would solve this and break the current oil monopoly. He also says that any plant material can now be converted to biofuel (i.e. methanol which gets about half the milage as gasoline but would only cost about $1/gal). He also says the automakers could adapt their production lines within a year since after all they did it before during WWII to switch over to building tanks.

http://www.e85prices.com/

Rapid Growth New E85 Stations

The number of Stations offering E85 continues to expand; the US now has 1,608 Stations in 1,183 cities across 43 States offering E85 (as of May 31, 2008) Still thousands more stations are needed to prepare for General Motors pledge to have half there production of vehicles be E85 capable by 2012. At current pace E85Prices.com fully expects and projects that there will be between 7-10 thousand Stations offering E85 at more than 2,500 US Cities

It seems to me any medium or large city could support at least a couple of biofuel pumps...a lot of people would go a bit out of there way to get it. I'd think the ethanol producers like Verasun would want to start their own chain of stations to help get their product out there and encourage more purchases of f/f vehicles.

Zipfanatik Wrote:Zubrin says that stations don't want to install an E85 pump because there aren't enough flex fuel cars yet and so the f/f mandate would solve this and break the current oil monopoly.

It seems to me any medium or large city could support at least a couple of biofuel pumps...a lot of people would go a bit out of there way to get it. I'd think the ethanol producers like Verasun would want to start their own chain of stations to help get their product out there and encourage more purchases of f/f vehicles.

These are examples of the kind of thinking that gets us in trouble with government mandates. Pass a law, make something a mandate, and it will obviously happen, right? Like driving 55, right?

There isn't enough ethanol production to support this. If you try to mandate using ethanol without having the ethanol available, you'll drive up the price and create shortages. Remember gas lines? As long as we are stuck with corn-based ethanol, there won't be that much benefit from doing this, as it takes the equivalent of half a gallon of gasoline to make a gallon of ethanol. It will be a long time, if ever, before the economics will justify opening up ethanol-only facilities. If you think that opening "a couple of ethanol pumps" in "a medium-sized city" will get the job done, you are kidding yourself.

When we have ennough ethanol that shortages aren't a problem,
AND we have a distribution network as convenient as gas stations,
AND the manufacturers are making enough flex cars,
THEN we will get ethanol use up to the level that will make a difference, with or without government mandates.

If you REALLY want to increase the usage of ethanol, open up to imports from Brasil, or even better Cuba. The best way to get the distribution network in place is to have the oil companies add ethanol pumps at their existing facilities--that's what Brasil did with Petrobras.

I'm all for using as much ethanol as possible as soon as possible, but passing a mandate to use a product that doesn't exist is not a way to get it done.

Flex-fuel vehicles can run on either standard gasoline or up to 85% ethanol. So they could be run on gas wherever ethanol is not yet available and when the ethanol becomes available in an area then the driver has a choice of OPEC-fuel or farmer-fuel. OPEC has the monopoly as long as drivers are restricted to gas only...that's the point. The mandate would not require ethanol use but rather would make vehicles ethanol-capable so that the market can develop. It would just require automakers to upgrade fuel lines, injectors, etc. and the government could even help them with tax breaks or whatever as part of our energy policy. As more and more of the national fleet goes flex-fuel the E85 pumps and stations will soon follow. Subsidies and tariffs should be phased out as there would be plenty of demand at a strong price point to support US farmers as well as Brazil. Corn-based ethanol is a temporary stepping stone until cellulosic becomes commercially viable which should be soon if the oil price keeps going up.

Zipfanatik Wrote:Flex-fuel vehicles can run on either standard gasoline or up to 85% ethanol. So they could be run on gas wherever ethanol is not yet available and when the ethanol becomes available in an area then the driver has a choice of OPEC-fuel or farmer-fuel. OPEC has the monopoly as long as drivers are restricted to gas only...that's the point. The mandate would not require ethanol use but rather would make vehicles ethanol-capable so that the market can develop. It would just require automakers to upgrade fuel lines, injectors, etc. and the government could even help them with tax breaks or whatever as part of our energy policy. As more and more of the national fleet goes flex-fuel the E85 pumps and stations will soon follow. Subsidies and tariffs should be phased out as there would be plenty of demand at a strong price point to support US farmers as well as Brazil. Corn-based ethanol is a temporary stepping stone until cellulosic becomes commercially viable which should be soon if the oil price keeps going up.

Yeah, but ethanol capability with no ethanol is a pretty empty threat. BTW, I don't need you to lecture me about how flex-fuel vehicles work. I've spent plenty of time riding in and driving them myself. In Brasil. Before we had them here.

Look, I'm not disagreeing that this needs to be done. I'm just pointing out that the claims being made for it--like the claims that we can drill our way out of this situation--are beyond what the facts support. Yes, we need to do this. No, it does not free us from OPEC for many years. This PLUS drilling will get us free of OPEC faster--and cheaper--than anything else. That's what Brasil did. They get a lot of positive press for their biofuels program (and rightly so). But they got just as much, if not slightly more, of their current energy usage by stepping up drilling activity, including offshore. There's a model out there to follow, folks. It's not that difficult. We don't have to reinvent the wheel. JUST DO IT.

As for cellulosic, that's a good idea that's still a number of years away. Why don't we go ahead and use sugar cane in the meantime? Because the midwest agribusiness special interests have too many congressmen on their payroll--including Mr. "I won't take lobbyist money" Obama. I do find the hypocrisy of that to be somewhat alarming. We've chosen to subsidize the least efficient alternative fuel option because of the political clout of its congressional representation and their lobbyists; that concerns me a whole lot more than the fact that Exxon has a 9.5% profit margin.

The good news in all of this is that if the government doesn't screw it up by trying to pick favorites (like corn ethanol), prices have risen to a level where the free market will find some solutions.

A good comprehensive assessment of the situation:

http://www.thecuttingedgenews.com/index.php?article=601

Today's vehicles have an average lifespan of 17 years and, for the most part, can run only on petroleum. Every year, 17 million new cars roll onto America's roads. For a cost of less than $100 extra per car, automakers can make virtually any gasoline-powered car a flex fuel vehicle, capable of running on any combination of gasoline and a variety of alcohols such as ethanol and methanol, made from a variety of feed stocks including agricultural material, waste, and coal. Indeed, alcohol does not just mean ethanol, and ethanol does not just mean corn.

Flex fuel vehicles provide a platform on which fuels can compete and let consumers and the market choose the winning fuels and feed stocks based on economics. For example, China is rapidly expanding production of the alcohol fuel methanol from coal, and its vehicle industry is ramping up to fuel flexibility.

In Brazil, where ethanol is widely used, the share of flex fuel vehicles in new car sales is estimated to be 90 percent this year. These cars are manufactured by the same automakers that sell to the U.S. market and entail no size, power, or safety compromise by consumers. The proliferation of flex fuel vehicles in Brazil has driven fuel competition at the pump such that the Brazilian oil industry has been forced to keep gasoline prices sufficiently low to compete with ethanol in order not to lose more market share.

We should be using as much ethanol as possible as soon as possible.

But projections of how much that is need to be bounded by reality. The US consumes 150 billion gallons of gasoline a year. The US currently has the capacity to produce something on the order of 10 billion gallons of ethanol a year, with projects underway to increase that capacity to around 14 billion gallons per year by 2009. A reasonable goal would be to get where Brasil is, with a mix of 25% ethanol and 85% ethanol resulting in an average of 44% ethanol content for all gasoline. That would mean about 66 billion gallons of ethanol a year, which is over SIX TIMES current domestic production capacity and about FIVE TIMES current capacity with additions in progress. At some point, the ability to keep expanding domestic production will go away, at least as long as we are committed to corn as our feed stock. Additionally, the inefficiencies associated with corn ethanol mean that we really don't gain that much, and may actually be losing ground in the global warming battle because of deforestation to make cornfields, plus there are the obvious negative impacts on food prices to consider. Swtichgrass or other potential sources will take even longer to develop, although they should be pursued as well.

The article is correct to suggest that we can make up a lot of that with imports from developing countries. That still leaves us importing, but has the advantage of giving us a different set of source countries, therefore making us less susceptible to problems in OPEC countries. We could get to a position where we could trade off one against the other and gain some negotiating leverage regarding oil (and/or etanol) prices. This will happen a lot faster if we repeal the current tariff of over 50 cents per gallon on imported ethanol. While we are at it, the current subsidy of over 50 cents a gallon for domestic ethanol is unnecessary at current oil prices. Those two provisions, along with the subsidies paid to sugar growers, would all be unnecessary if we just opened up the ethanol market. Don't hold your breath waiting for Mr. Obama to take these steps; he's too far in bed with the midwest agri-business lobby.

Looking at the numbers this way, it's pretty obvious that we are looking at significant lead time to get to 44% ethanol. I'd put the over and under at about 10 years, if we start today and move with great haste and eliminate the subsidy/tariff provisions that are having negative impacts today. When you say that the impact of offshore drilling won't be felt for five years, just be sure to apply that criticism with equal vigor to ethanol.

The truth is that we need BOTH increased ethanol usage and "drill here, drill now" to make any meaningful impact in the short run. And that impact will most likely be measured in terms of holding prices somewhere near current levels as opposed to run-ups to the $7-8/gallon range.

One thing that would greatly expedite ethanol use would be to lift the current embargo on a major sugar cane producer 90 miles from our coast. The political downside is that the Cuban exile vote might cost anyone who proposes this the Florida electoral votes. But I have a feeling that things could be structured in a way to appeal to them. Create some sort of program where Cuban exiles get first crack at doing the importing and making the profits, and I imagine you could soothe a lot of opposition. Ethanol plants in Florida could make a huge positive contribution to the economy of that state. At some point I could also see constructing a few ethanol pipelines from plants in Cuba. Cuba may not be our friend now, but creating that kind of commercial relationship could change that in a hurry. And Cuba could probably put more effective pressure on Hugo Chavez to behave than we ever can without taking military action.

Anyone who thinks that government intervention is necessary, or even useful, in resolving the energy issue need look no further than our commitment to corn ethanol to realize that there are serious flaws in letting the government pick winners and losers. We don't need to invent the wheel here. Brasil solved their problem in this area, and they arguably had less to work with than we do. They have given us a good road map. We will need to take a few detours, but it's still a model that we'd do well to emulate.

I like it Owl 69/70/75. Too bad it's too intelligent. It'll never make it, not with our government's stupidity. We should start making amends with Cuba and quit shooting ourselves in the feet with corn ethanol.