# Price of gas rant



## Carex (Mar 1, 2004)

Yes, it's been done before but I can't help but vent here on my favorite board. 

Went to fill up the diesel Golf today. We only need to do it about once a month so maybe I haven't been paying attention but... the price at the pump was a whopping 91.9 cents per litre. It was one cent more per litre than regular gas!!! 

Is this a supply and demand issue or are we the consumer being bent over the proverbial barrel again. It wasn't so long ago that diesel was 1/2 as cheap as regular gas. 

Sorry, needed to get it off my chest.


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## talonracer (Dec 30, 2003)

Imagine my pleasure - my babies demand the tastiest high octane petrol.

I swear, I can hear Petro Can giggle as I drive closer...


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## GratuitousApplesauce (Jan 29, 2004)

Get used to it!

The days of cheap oil are gone. The increases of the last year or so are only the beginning. I would say "trust me on this", but I think I'd have to pay royalties or something.


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## MacNoob (Oct 29, 2004)

I paid 97.4 for premium the other day, officially the most I've ever paid for gas.

However, apparently adjusted for inflation, it's rumoured to still be less expensive than 20 years ago.

MacNoob


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## MacNutt (Jan 16, 2002)

I paid 99 cents per litre for diesel today. At the cheapest fuel stop on Vancouver Island, no less!  

Regular gas here on Salt Spring is about 1.04/litre right now. Premium is around a buck eight. And the touroid season is not yet in full swing. Once all of those rich folk start showing up here in their Porsche Cayenne SUV's and Mercedes and Range Rovers and such...the price will go right thru the ROOF! 

But they don't seem to even notice. Too much money, I guess.

Maybe they won't notice a drastic price increase in their favorite bottled spring water, either. Hmmmm....


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## K_OS (Dec 13, 2002)

I filled up yesterday with regular at 85.5 but the Super unlead was going for 97.5 

The most I've ever payed for gas was on my last trip to Europe in '98 where I payed a whopping $1.85 per litre now that's expensive gas.

Laterz


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## miguelsanchez (Feb 1, 2005)

what are you talking about? the oil companies are hurting! you've seen the stickers at the pumps haven't you? they're only making 3% profit! [/sarcasm]

seem like it was only last year that the stickers said "2% profit" and not long before that, "1% profit". so they've tripled their profit in the the last few years. not bad, i'd say. i wish my salary matched that kind of progress!


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## gastonbuffet (Sep 23, 2004)

can you say "public transportation", 'cause that's the future, specially in Downtown areas. I say, only people with a residence in downtown, and a parking space in that residence, should be able to actually "drive" in downtown, anyone else, public transportation and maybe, tiny little smart cabs. Period. And a few thousand permits that would cost a fortune to let you enter the downtown core in your vehicle. 


Unless i buy the Infiniti fx 45, then, scru everybody. Hey, if we can make our own beer, how hard is it to make our own gas?


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## Melonie (Feb 10, 2005)

From a global perspective, I hope the price goes to $4.00 a litre - then we'll FINALLY see some action from government (they need to apply much more funding for public transportation, and they need the balls to legislate automakers to build engines with higher fuel efficiency standards - as well as removing the "truck" designation from SUV's which has only resulted in lowering the average kpl/mpg for passenger vehicles in the past 20 years.

Mel


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## Mrs. Furley (Sep 1, 2004)

Mel, I completely agree. And the higher the price goes, the more likely we are to begin looking at other resources. Yes it hurts to pay more, but in the long run I believe it's a good thing.

I say let the prices rise!


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## MacNutt (Jan 16, 2002)

Just remember that every time the price of fuel goes up, so does the price it will cost to transport pretty much everything that you eat or wear or use every single day. It ALL arrives by truck...and those trucks cost far more to run when the price of fuel goes up. Expect price increases on EVERYTHING.

Public transportation is a good idea...but it has it's limitations. And if it is manned by Big Labour then watch out! Once we have all become totally dependant on it as our only means of personal transport then they will have us by the bag. Strikes and shutdowns will become a way of life. As will rapidly rising costs and poor service.

Also, I'd like to see how a mother with three kids would manage to take them all with her to the grocery store for the weekly shopping trip...and then lugs all of those bags of groceries back to the house. Would the public transpotation system drop that particular family right at their door with all of those packages in their arms? Or would they have to walk from the nearest station? How would that work out in...say...really bad weather? You know, the kind that much of Canada experriences for much of the year?

Makes you think, eh?


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## Melonie (Feb 10, 2005)

It (money) does seem the only way to bring change...a sad reflection upon our society's mores and perogatives...

Maybe if concerned citizens PUSH and combined with the PULL of high gas prices, things will work out in the end. But we are dealing with a social, political, geographic commodity that is finite by nature.

My faith in the dark side of human nature (greed) assures me that WHEN there is enough money to be made (by developing environmentally responsible conveyances), they (big corporations) will build it.

A seachange in how we think of our world and its future is required and I fear we will run out of time before adequate action is taken. Call me chicken little, but when I hear this morning on the news that General Bush is back at drilling for oil in the Alaska nature preserve I realize just how myopic our so-called leaders really are.

Mel


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## used to be jwoodget (Aug 22, 2002)

Oddly enough, mothers of three do precisely that in many towns and cities across the nation. For some, owning a car is an impossible luxury, for others its a matter of choice. You need to get out more, methinks.


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## MacNutt (Jan 16, 2002)

I'm not sure that the oil companies are the real culprits here. It's supply and demand that causes the price of fuel at the pump to rise or fall. China and India are modernising their societies and sucking up all of the available resources right across the board. This situation is only likely to get worse as all of China's 1 billion PLUS citizens begin to buy personal automobiles.

The only way to prevent even higher fuel prices is to either find more oil or replace it as a fuel. Even then, oil is a crucial base material in all sorts of manufactured goods. Plastic as we know it today could not be produced without oil.

You can either drill for more oil...perhaps in some sensitive places...or you can watch the price go through the roof. That's the choice that we face.

OR....you could lobby the Canadian government to stop taking such a huge tax chunk out of the price of a liter of gas. The government makes more than ANYONE on each liter. Even more than the oil companies themselves.

Canada is completely self-sufficient in petroleum. But it's the only non-importing country that I am aware of that has very high fuel prices at home. Other self-sufficient nations like Venezuela and Saudi Arabia et al all charge their own residents a fraction of what we pay.


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## Melonie (Feb 10, 2005)

Hmm...MacNutt...I have lurked on this board for several years now, and have read much of what you have written and much of what people have written about you. I appreciate your thick skin as I fear I would not have been so gracious with some of the posters' comments that have been directed towards you the were rude, dismissive, exclusionary, etc., etc., etc.

You and I are at polar opposites on just about every topic I have read on this board, yet there is no reason why all ideas should not be welcomed and discussed.

My only quibble with your opinions is that you seem not to offer any solutions, just negativity. Obviously, world oil supplies are finite. MacNutt, you simply cannot, regardless of how much funny water you decant and drink from your $pring (don't get me going on the gullibility of consumers and bottled water), ignore the fact that we are going to run out of oil in the foreseeable future. China, MacNutt...China. What to do about China's soon-to-be-insatiable thirst for oil.

Gotta start somewhere, MacNutt.

What would you do about the oil situation? Status quo?

Mel


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## MacNutt (Jan 16, 2002)

I can't imagine the previously mentioned mother of three heaving eight bags of groceries ten blocks from the bus stop to her house while trying to corral the kids and keep them from getting run over. In a driving rainstorm. Or in -30 weather. And then doing that all over again in a few days.

Might happen...but I doubt that she likes it much.

And I suspect that MOST mothers would only do this a few times before they found an alternative. Like car ownership.

In Canada, even the "poor" have their own cars. Certainly you must have noticed this, Jim.

Or maybe you would, if you got out more often.


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## gastonbuffet (Sep 23, 2004)

MacNutt said:


> Canada is completely self-sufficient in petroleum. But it's the only non-importing country that I am aware of that has very high fuel prices at home. Other self-sufficient nations like Venezuela and Saudi Arabia et al all charge their own residents a fraction of what we pay.


Argentina is self sufficient, and gas prices there are way way waaaaaaay higher, relatively speaking, of course. Not anyone can afford to have a car, and certainly not fill the tank. And although every time i did had to pump, i was mad, in perspective i applaud the government taking a large chunk, because it made me more conscious of the finite quality of this resource, and all the negative impacts on the environment. (let's not talk what the government made with those funds, sons of......)

Prices in Canada should go wayyyyyyyyyy higher, and let's start thinking of all the obstacles that MacNutt validly comments on, 'cause we CAN work around them, and we all will be better off in the long run. A sound future demands we do this.
But we won't, not in the next 20 years we won't.


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## MacNutt (Jan 16, 2002)

Mel...

I am all for an alternate fuel that is readily available in huge quantities and can even be manufactured without much trouble at all.

Natural gas. Canada alone has so much of it that we cannot honestly see ourselves running out for several hundred years. Cars can run on it and it is already the best choice for electrical generating plants. Diesel engines can be converted to run on it pretty easily.

But we will still need oil for materials production (paint, plastics, fabric dyes and a whole host of other stuff). So..where do we get these new supplies?

China has vast unexplored areas and is already a signifigant oil producer. The Canadian tar sands are only just being tapped, and we really only have scratched the surface of offshore exploration.

Then there are the frozen hydrates of methane that lie on the sea floor, or just under the seabeds. Masses of energy there, just waiting to be tapped.

By the time we run short of this vast resource (probably hundreds of years) we will have found some way to exploit zero point energy or something equally clean and cheap.

It's not a "negative" outlook at all. At least not to me.


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## used to be jwoodget (Aug 22, 2002)

> And I suspect that MOST mothers would only do this a few times before they found an alternative. Like car ownership. In Canada, even the "poor" have their own cars. Certainly you must have noticed this, Jim.


Are you a distant relative of Marie Antoinette?


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## MacNutt (Jan 16, 2002)

GastonBuffet...

I suspect that Argentina's high pump prices are due to the same basic reasons that we suffer with here in Canada. Big Government taking a huge tax bite and massive labour unions creating inefficiencies and driving up costs.


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## gastonbuffet (Sep 23, 2004)

MacNutt said:


> It's not a "negative" outlook at all. At least not to me.


I agree with MacNutt, he is not the negative, but his positive outlook is maybe too positive. If we keep going the way we are going, the earth is not going to take it for much longer (100 years of this, and we'll be better off in Mars). The good news is, we'll know when the earth says enough!, and we will be able to modify our habits to re- accommodate, but, we should do it now, not after we scruu it up.


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## MacNutt (Jan 16, 2002)

I'm all for cleaning up the environment. But we ALL have to do it together. Making just a few of us watch our pollotion output while half of the world's population is left free of all controls is pure bunk!  

That's why we need to dump the flawed Kyoto Accord and get down to business making up a new set of rules that will cover EVERY country on earth.

We need to do this now. Not twenty years from now when we finally figure out that Kyoto didn't do a darned bit of good.


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## Melonie (Feb 10, 2005)

MacNutt, I just spent 15 minutes writing what I thought to be an intelligent, considered response to points made in one of your previous posts. Then I went to post and the system had decided to log me out. My reply lost forever. I can't deal with crap like that so I will not post any long responses again. What is the point? This board's software is seriously flawed. I think you have had the same frustration in the past. Not gonna fight it. Don't have the time to waste.

L8r

Mel


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## gastonbuffet (Sep 23, 2004)

Kyoto is a flawed start, but, it is a start, and the US didn't signed it not because of it flaws, but because it's not convenient for them now. They are willing to risk it a few more years( and so to the hypocrites that did signed and won't do crap about it). 

The future is crap. but interesting nevertheless. I always have an image of an American, 20 years from now, telling the chinese (with cars coming out of their wazoo by then) that they have to dump their cars, cause the future are "bikes".

there will be one last war after all.


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## Eukaryotic (Jan 24, 2005)

Happens to me too. I have to hit the back button in the browser a few times to get back to the reply, and then it works. 

It's a good incentive to keep posts short  Funny...seems to only happen when I reply to MacNutt.


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## gastonbuffet (Sep 23, 2004)

Melonie said:


> MacNutt, I just spent 15 minutes writing what I thought to be an intelligent, considered response l


Happened to me too, in EVERY one of my inteligent responses. Only the stupid ones ever make it here


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## gastonbuffet (Sep 23, 2004)

Derailed Derailed Derailed Derailed


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## miguelsanchez (Feb 1, 2005)

hmmm...let's see here...

mother + 3 kids + groceries = take a taxi? that might work. cheaper than a car too.

personally i think we have some of the cheapest fuel in the world here, barring the opec nations. we may be a net exporter, but not on the scale that they are, otherwise we would be a member of that exclusive club. 

on the other hand, we also have some of the lowest quality fuel as well. in malaysia (also a net exporter), the lowest octane rating available is 92 and the highest, if memory serves, is 97. the price per litre is regulated by the government, and the price is approximately 44 cents canadian, with price difference between 92 and 97 being marginal (less than a penny). i believe the octane ratings are similar in europe as well. not sure about the rest of the world. 

my personal philosophy: if you buy bottled water, you can't complain about the price of gas.


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## iMatt (Dec 3, 2004)

MacNutt said:


> I can't imagine the previously mentioned mother of three heaving eight bags of groceries ten blocks from the bus stop to her house while trying to corral the kids and keep them from getting run over. In a driving rainstorm. Or in -30 weather. And then doing that all over again in a few days.


Seems you haven't noticed, but in most Canadian cities, especially the largest ones, it's quite feasible to live comfortably and decently, with children, in neighbourhoods that are built for walking and well-equipped with grocery stores. Ten blocks to the bus stop? Try a block or two to a commercial street filled with greengrocers, butchers, bakers, supermarkets and so on. 

Weekly shopping? How about stopping in at the grocery store on the way home from work every day or two for a small bundle of supplies? 

Now, I'm not your hypothetical mother of three, but I fail to see any hardship in living in an urban environment where a car is help and hindrance in more or less equal measure. In the end, it's much more environmentally friendly and much, much more cost-effective to do daily essentials on foot or by bus, to take a cab when doing more substantial shopping, and to rent a car when doing major shopping or going on a weekend getaway. 

True, some people prefer to live in low-density suburban or exurban areas. Those people will either have to accept escalating fuel costs, or they will have to move, or they will have to work to make their suburbs liveable with less reliance on cars. 

BTW, I do think cars have their place. I just don't think that place is "everywhere."


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## iMatt (Dec 3, 2004)

Melonie said:


> Then I went to post and the system had decided to log me out. My reply lost forever.


Select your text and copy it before hitting preview or post. That way there's a copy on the Clipboard just-in-case.


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## skinnyman (Oct 25, 2003)

I think it is quite presumptuous to think that we can continue to tap into the earth's finite resources the way that we do just because a solution is supposedly coming down the road. That's like saying that I can keep spending my money now because I'm gonna win the lottery some day. The passage of time does not necessarily mean that technology will catch up with our expectations.

We need to think about sustainability, especially when we as Canadians like to emphasize our focus on community rather than on the individual. Sustainability does not necessarily mean giving up our cars. It could mean trying to reduce our reliance on them by developing denser, close-knit urban communities instead of rolling out wastelands of cookie-cutter houses as far as the eye can see. It's not just about driving to the local grocery store. How about all the garbage and recycling trucks that have to navigate every meter of every winding suburban road on a weekly basis? How's that for inefficiency?


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## GratuitousApplesauce (Jan 29, 2004)

The price of petrol in Europe has been high for a long time because the governments there add more tax on top than we do. They pay the same for a barrel of crude. That extra tax, for many years has been put into alternative transit, local and rail, and they have an infrastructure there that makes it easier to get by without using a car. Because of the higher price, people there waste far less of it than we do, with our ridiculous shiny SUVs clogging up city streets.

When the prices here start to approach what they pay in Europe, or go beyond that, we will be forced to waste less fuel too and maybe some of those SUVs will disappear. If you're getting a new car, think about possibly paying a few bucks a litre for gas and then think about how much you really need that enormous vehicle with its big powerful engine. Do the math.

However, when prices here start to approach the European levels, we won't have the advantage of having a great transit structure in place that was funded by those high petrol taxes. Poor folks who commute from the cheaper 'burbs in rusting beaters will suddenly be faced with not being able to afford the car and spending 4 hours a day commuting on overcrowded transit, if there's any available at all in their area. Those hypothetical mothers of three are going to be back in that situation, if they live in the transit-challenged burbs and do their grocery shopping at the big box store. If she still insists on using her car, she won't have to worry about groceries, because she'll have far less money to spend on them after she fills up.

The future of suburbia looks bad, folks. If people are smart, the sprawl will tighten up and suburbs will begin to redefine themselves as the autonomous towns that they used to be. Don't know if people are smart. The stupid government here in BC wants to build more freeways, a bone-headed idea that was proven dumb 20 years ago.

Those responsible for this situation are those who lobbied against increased gas taxes at every turn, believing that the cheap oil party would go on forever. Soon, much sooner than many think, the chickens will come home to roost.

If you haven't heard the term "peak oil" look at this Wikipedia page to see what the implications of it are to our society that is completely dependant on cheap fossil fuel.


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## MacNutt (Jan 16, 2002)

Anyone give any thought to my suggestions re: natural gas?

It's an almost inexhaustible resource. Cars can run on it. Big diesel trucks can run on it. Most cities are already using it to generate electricity. We can even make more if we have to.

Then we can save the oil for chemicals and for use in manufacturing (plastics etc,)


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## Carex (Mar 1, 2004)

Who are the geologists here? Doesn't a natural gas reserve sit or 'float' on top of an oil deposit. You vent off the gas (in the old days it was a waste product) to get to the black gold. Does that not mean then that the gas will be exploited first or concurrently with the oil?


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## Roland (Aug 15, 2002)

I'm seriously thinking about getting either a Prius or a Hybrid Toyota.

With my work schedule going extremely busy in the last two weeks I have filled up close to 2-3 times a week ($40 per fillup). I drive 200 km's a day for work.

I can see the savings in both my life not at the gas station and hopefuly to the planet so I don't stop burning dinosaurs.


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## MacNutt (Jan 16, 2002)

Not to derail here...but I'm sort of pleased to see that I am not the only one still losing long posts to the software bugs. The Mayor had me convinced that "it's your Mac" and not the software.

I also dislike having to go back and repeat the same edits and corrections a couple of times before they actually "take". But I'd stopped whining about it because I thought "it's my Mac" not the flawed system.


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## MacNutt (Jan 16, 2002)

Actually Carex, natural gas is present in most of the organic sedimentary rocks that we drill through to get to the oil. Most drilling that is being done in Canada (at least where I worked) is actually for gas, not oil. There is no "pool" of oil, ever. It's actually in tiny pores in the rocks...like a sponge full of water. Natural gas is almost always associated with oil. But it also occurs on it's own far more often.

Canada has masses of the stuff. Hundreds of years worth. And like I mentioned...we can make more. Quite easily. Cows do it every day. So do some humans.


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## RobTheGob (Feb 10, 2003)

MacNutt said:


> I paid 99 cents per litre for diesel today. At the cheapest fuel stop on Vancouver Island, no less!
> 
> Regular gas here on Salt Spring is about 1.04/litre right now. Premium is around a buck eight. And the touroid season is not yet in full swing. Once all of those rich folk start showing up here in their Porsche Cayenne SUV's and Mercedes and Range Rovers and such...the price will go right thru the ROOF!
> 
> ...


I paid .749 for diesel today. Hard to complain when the chipped TDI is so much fun to drive and it just sips fuel. The Supra Turbo sucks <premium> fuel - but it's still hard to complain when it so much more expensive elsewhere.

How much is your water?!?! I find it harder to believe how much bottled water costs!


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## RobTheGob (Feb 10, 2003)

Roland said:


> I'm seriously thinking about getting either a Prius or a Hybrid Toyota.


Everytime I blast past an Echo or some other little "economy" car - I like thing "gas guzzler" (while I'm driving the VW TDI). Getting 50 mpg or more (if someone else was driving) is great - but not for me if there is no fun involved. I can't wait until we finally catch up to the rest of the world with our diesel quality - we should start getting some real "fun" diesels here...


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## Carex (Mar 1, 2004)

Rob, I drive a TDI too and although the thread is going where it may, my original dismay was directed at the fact that Diesel was more expensive than Regular Gas. I don't recall that happening before. When I bought the car in September 2004, diesel was a full 10 cents cheaper per litre than regular gas. Years ago there was more of a gap. Is the popularity of the diesel engine driving these prices or are we just being taken advantage of again?


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## MacNutt (Jan 16, 2002)

We sell most of our water in the big blue watercooler bottles. About 95% of our volume is shipped in this size container. In that format, our premium natural spring water sells for about a buck a gallon.

Let me know if you run across any gas stations that will sell you fuel for a buck a gallon.


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## Carex (Mar 1, 2004)

This is going to be bad but I can't help it... 

Wouldn't it be cheaper, shipping wise, to ship your product dehydrated (less weight, less fuel, less shipping costs). The customer could just add water to the Carley springs crystals and viola!!


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## agent4321 (Jun 25, 2004)

Everyone's going to hate me but I got gas in Mission, BC last sunday and it was 64¢  

I haven't seen gas that cheap in over 10 years. I now make it a regular thing to check http://van.bc.gastips.com/ on sundays and make a small road trip to Mission if the gas is cheap. I think as of today it's sitting around 77¢.


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## miguelsanchez (Feb 1, 2005)

what i meant by my statement is that, in toronto at least, water is relatively cheap. we have some of the cleanest, safest water in the world, and it's available right in your house, on tap. bottled water is an unnecessary luxury, so anyone who buys bottled water (in toronto), should not complain about the price of gasoline. just making a comparison, more in jest than anything else. 

i don't want to get into a bottled water argument, here. it's an issue that is near and dear to me for many reasons. i personally believe that we should be more worried about air quality than water quality, but until we start seeing "perri-air" on the shelves, nobody's really going to care about that, i guess.


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## GratuitousApplesauce (Jan 29, 2004)

Mr. United States of North America sez:


> Canada has masses of the stuff. Hundreds of years worth.


And the Bush administration is just licking its lips to get their hands on it. Could this have something to do with their "deep integration" plans. Hmmmm, I wonder?

Inexhaustible supplies of natural gas. Not what I've been reading, Gerry. Got URLs?
Statistics on natural gas supply.

The major problem with alternative energy sources is Energy Return On Energy Invested (EROEI). EROEI is the ratio of how much energy is required to harvest the energy from a given source. Nothing has an EROEI that is anywhere close to fossil fuels, such as oil and gas, something like 30 to 1, except hydro-electric power. Oil is the best because its so easy to store and transport. Our industrial society has grown massively and has been living on this free gold mine since the mid-1800s, to the point that we've forgotten that most of the available energy in the world has an EROEI of barely more than 1 to 1. Wind power is 4 to 1. Solar power, using the present tech available, is actually less than 1 to 1, meaning we use more energy to make the panels than what we get. The same for biomass fuel, like ethanol, we would have to cover the North American land mass with plants just to fuel our current auto usage. Hydrogen fuel cells are a storage medium for electricity, not unlike batteries. I think firewood has a reasonable EROEI.

Incidentally, the latter half of the oil available in the world will become increasingly harder to get, including things like the much hyped tar sands and the EROEI for that rises markedly from 30 to 1, to something like 5 to 1, becoming negative for the dregs. Much of the energy used in the tar sands extraction, will be natural gas, as much as 25% of Alberta's supply. If you add clean up costs to the environmentally costly methods for getting that oil, some reports put the tar sands EROEI at negative.

Many of the sources for additional natural gas beyond the proven reserves either rely on technologies that as yet do not exist, or rely on methods that radically bring down the current EROEI such as shipping liquified natural gas from large overseas reserves. This requires huge new facilities to be built and massive new ships produced to transport it. There are already plans being considered for one. If natural gas supply is so darned plentiful and inexhaustible, why would this type of thing be considered?

So we have some choices to make, choices that we should have started to make 30 years ago when we first learned that the North American oil supply had reached peak. We were starting to open up to that idea then, but then Reagan came along, removed the solar panels from atop the White House and told everyone to get in their SUVs because our Middle Eastern friends have all the oil we could ever want. I guess we know how that is working out.

We can start to power down, conserving and reducing and even rationing energy use now, or we can live in denial, hoping that magical future technologies that don't exist yet will save us. Whatever we do, we are in for some big changes. Our whole modern industrial world absolutely depends on cheap, plentiful energy and will have to make some major adjustments to function otherwise. Maybe we need to start to teach ourselves how to function otherwise, so the inevitable won't be such a shock. 

Or not, - shocks can sometimes be exciting.


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## used to be jwoodget (Aug 22, 2002)

Don't worry, there's plenty of oil in the arctic refuges. The Senate barely rejected the conservationists arguments (51-49).


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## Carex (Mar 1, 2004)

But it's their god given right to drive those large gas guzzling machines therefor, more oil must be found or the way of life would be threatened!! 

I can't believe (maybe I can) that it got through the Senate.


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## GratuitousApplesauce (Jan 29, 2004)

UTBJW said:


> Don't worry, there's plenty of oil in the arctic refuges.


Did I read that right? 1/20th of the USA's daily supply while the Alaska reserve is in peak production? And how long can it be in peak production, 5 years, a decade maybe? So my calculator tells me that they are risking some of the USA's very rare virgin wilderness for what, 90 to 180 days worth of oil supply? Hey, ramp up Hummer production, happy days are here again!

So this is Dubya's brilliant energy plan? The man's a genuis, eh?


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## used to be jwoodget (Aug 22, 2002)

You can bet this will open up the Alaska-Canada boundary dispute (Beaufort Sea wedge) too.


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## used to be jwoodget (Aug 22, 2002)

GA, even if it lasts 20 years, its an indication of how short-term the politics is in weighing the here and now with the everlasting.


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## MACSPECTRUM (Oct 31, 2002)

used to be jwoodget said:


> You can bet this will open up the Alaska-Canada boundary dispute (Beaufort Sea wedge) too.


the sight of a few US destroyers and subs will take care of that "dispute" pretty quickly
so i guess this is why so many called for an increase in Cdn. military spending?


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## Chris (Feb 8, 2001)

Cheapest fuel in Napanee, Ont. is 78.9/L, for both diesel and gasoline. And, yes, diesel is less refined so it SHOULD be cheaper.

Actually, I can't figure out why oil prices keep climbing. US supplies are pretty much topped up to the max, and demand from India and China, though high, has dropped of late. 

International high finance - meh!

I will admit, though, that I wish more small diesel vehicles were offered for sale here. Volkswagen's near monopoly on this type of car has kept prices ludicrously high, and kept my bum out of their product when I bought my latest car.


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## miguelsanchez (Feb 1, 2005)

chris, have you looked at the smart car? 

smart 

it's now available in canada.

regarding oil prices being so high, i think we're seeing the oil producers cashing in while they can, 'cos they know something we don't i.e. there's not as much oil in those wells as we're being led to believe. just my view of the conspiracy theory.


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## K_OS (Dec 13, 2002)

miguelsanchez said:


> chris, have you looked at the smart car?
> 
> smart
> 
> ...


Either that or there trying to squeeze as much cash out of us now because they know that Hydrogen and real electric cars are just around the corner R&D money towards these projects at some auto manufacturers has tripled and in some cases quadrupuled over the last 5 years.

Hydrogen Powered Hyundai Tucson
http://www.ottawahyundai.com/oh04/news/news24.html

Hydrogen powered Honda
http://www.edmunds.com/advice/specialreports/articles/100335/article.html

Laterz


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## RobTheGob (Feb 10, 2003)

Carex said:


> Rob, I drive a TDI too and although the thread is going where it may, my original dismay was directed at the fact that Diesel was more expensive than Regular Gas. I don't recall that happening before. When I bought the car in September 2004, diesel was a full 10 cents cheaper per litre than regular gas. Years ago there was more of a gap. Is the popularity of the diesel engine driving these prices or are we just being taken advantage of again?


Diesel is still about 3 cents per litre cheaper than regular, here. In the middle of last summer - it was 20 cents cheaper!

I think the main driver of the prices is heating oil. I can't see the number of passenger diesels on the road being that much of an issue...

You should look into a chip! 30% increase in torque! I'll have mine in Victoria next week if you want to give it a drive...


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## RobTheGob (Feb 10, 2003)

miguelsanchez said:


> i personally believe that we should be more worried about air quality than water quality, but until we start seeing "perri-air" on the shelves, nobody's really going to care about that, i guess.


I'm sure as soon as someone can convince people to buy it for a buck a gallon - you'll start seeing it on the shelves...


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## Carex (Mar 1, 2004)

Rob, talk to me about the 'chip'. PM me if required. If you increase the torque, what happens to the gas mileage (which we like a lot!).


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## Eukaryotic (Jan 24, 2005)

Oil and natural gas, being non-renewable, will continue on this economy of scale. We'll reach a point sooner than later where the supply will be just too short for oil to be affordable. It is inevitable that North America will switch to renewables. Europe is already putting infrastructure in place for renewable energy. We do have a nuclear reactor operating 24/7 providing direct energy, as well as indirect energy via the creation of surface winds and tides. 

I think there is reason to be optimistic. Large oil companies are investing heavily in renewable R&D and will switch over once the oil has dried up. 

Until then, turn your lights off, drive less, etc. etc.


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## MacNutt (Jan 16, 2002)

I agree. The big energy companies are spending lots of time and cash on the "next big thing" right now. They, of ALL people, know pretty much exactly how much of this stuff there is left. And they don't want to have to suddenly shut down due to zero supplies.

But I have to take issue with the statement that "oil and natural gas are unrenewables". Oil, perhaps (although it CAN be produced artificially, it's terribly expensive to do)...but natural gas is in incredible abundance and it CAN be generated from decaying biomass. Natural gas is likely going to be the true "bridge fuel" that carries us over to the next level of energy technologies. Using plentiful natural gas for pretty much all of our energy needs would be the simplest and easiest of all of the choices we have before us right now.

Hydrogen and electric cars are just a pipe dream. And will always be so until there is some sort of a major breakthrough that allows us to produce hydrogen cheaply (it costs more in oil and gas to produce hydrogen than we save in oil and gas by using it) or to generate cheap and clean electric energy to power our electric cars. Think about where our electricity comes from right now....and remember the fact that we are already pretty well maxxed out on capacity...before suggesting that even a fraction of us could switch to purely electric cars without causing serious problems. And generating masses more polloution from all of the new generating plants that would be neded to power them.


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## Eukaryotic (Jan 24, 2005)

I'm thinking of the generation of hydrogen from solar or wind. But yeah, I agree, it's not feasible to generate electricity at the moment in order to produce hydrogen.


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## K_OS (Dec 13, 2002)

MacNutt said:


> Hydrogen and electric cars are just a pipe dream. And will always be so until there is some sort of a major breakthrough that allows us to produce hydrogen cheaply (it costs more in oil and gas to produce hydrogen than we save in oil and gas by using it) or to generate cheap and clean electric energy to power our electric cars. Think about where our electricity comes from right now....and remember the fact that we are already pretty well maxxed out on capacity...before suggesting that even a fraction of us could switch to purely electric cars without causing serious problems. And generating masses more polloution from all of the new generating plants that would be neded to power them.


I don't say now or maybe even in 5 years but in 10 it's a possibility.

Shell-GM Hydrogen refuelling station if Washington DC

Hyundai-Kia Texaco Hydrogen refuelling station in Chino

As for the electric cars they are only feasible for people who need a inner city car to go from and to work, with possible 200km's before needing recharging for the Old GM Ev1 and it's technology has been surpassed by now, 200km's for me would almost be 5 days of going to and from work before I would need to recharge it that's not bad at all.

Laterz


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## GratuitousApplesauce (Jan 29, 2004)

MacNutt said:


> ...but natural gas is in incredible abundance and it CAN be generated from decaying biomass. Natural gas is likely going to be the true "bridge fuel" that carries us over to the next level of energy technologies. Using plentiful natural gas for pretty much all of our energy needs would be the simplest and easiest of all of the choices we have before us right now.


Again with the unsubstantiated natural-gas-a-plentiful-magic-bullet-to-solve-all-of-our-problems statements. Got some evidence or should we just "trust you on that"??

I put my links up in a previous post that say we are going to have a similar problem with natural gas as we will have with oil. You didn't respond to that you just repeated your statement. Why am I not surprised?

Yes, "biogas" can be produced from dung and compost and there are various technologies in place that have been doing that for some time. In India there is at least one plant producing biogas. ( Sometimes I wonder if I produce enough swamp gas to run my car, after I've eaten chili.  ). 

The problem with biogas and the problem with almost everything that is promoted to replace oil and natural gas is *Energy Return On Energy Invested (EROEI)*. Everything I could find on biogas states that it's EROEI is only slightly better than 1 to 1. Our society in the last century and a half has expanded rapidly based on EROEI ratios from fossil fuel running at 30 to 1. There is nothing waiting in the wings that can replace this cheap energy. It will be a massive shock to our society when we start to see that we have burned through our huge fortune of free energy, that was created over millions of years.

The sooner we start to curb our energy usage the better. The sooner we stop believing that cheap energy is limitless the better. The sooner we stop wasting it the better. The evidence has been there for decades, yet as a society we have chosen to keep our heads buried in the sand. 

I don't say this with any degree of satisfaction, Mr. MacNutt. I'd like to think that the partying can go on forever too. But if you've *really* got any reason to believe that there is some solution to the coming fossil fuel crunch, other than blind faith, I'd love to see it. Honestly. I asked you this very same thing about one year ago, in a similar thread, that started with gas price griping and you never answered then.

I'm sure you pride yourself as a realist MacNutt. Well, it doesn't get any more real than this.


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## GratuitousApplesauce (Jan 29, 2004)

K_OS, here's why hydrogen is a pipe dream, as MacNutt correctly stated - it's EROEI again. Hydrogen can be created by using electricity. The electricity can be created using a few methods but it all comes down to EROEI again. What method do you use to create that electricity? Coal, natural gas, nuclear, hydro, etc. Hydrogen fuel cell technology is more or less the same as a kind of battery for energy that has to be created elsewhere. Those hydrogen fuel cell cars are not clean and pollution free, although they may be cleaner than gasoline vehicles, depending on the method of producing the hydrogen.


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## used to be jwoodget (Aug 22, 2002)

There may be great potential for harnessing the hot air that emits from parts of Salt Spring Island and using them to fuel one of Talonracers cars. Not sure of the EROEI though (I guess it depends on diet). Someone should tell the US Senate


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## K_OS (Dec 13, 2002)

GratuitousApplesauce said:


> K_OS, here's why hydrogen is a pipe dream, as MacNutt correctly stated - it's EROEI again. Hydrogen can be created by using electricity. The electricity can be created using a few methods but it all comes down to EROEI again. What method do you use to create that electricity? Coal, natural gas, nuclear, hydro, etc. Hydrogen fuel cell technology is more or less the same as a kind of battery for energy that has to be created elsewhere. Those hydrogen fuel cell cars are not clean and pollution free, although they may be cleaner than gasoline vehicles, depending on the method of producing the hydrogen.


I understand that there are technical barriers to be broken especially with Hydrogen, but what you are saying is that all of these company's are putting billions into R&D for nothing?

Laterz


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## MacNutt (Jan 16, 2002)

There are some very interesting new technologies that are being worked on for the cheap production of Hydrogen. They might actually allow it to become the "next big thing". But this is all quite a ways off, if you ask me.

Meanwhile, natural gas is my best bet. I think that we will all be using a LOT more natural gas long before we switch over to something much better. Whatever that may be. We could make this switch with the least pain and cost out of all the alternatives, and...as I have mentioned earlier...we have masses of the stuff and can even make more if we need to.

And it will work in all of our present internal combustion engines. Unlike hydrogen or any of the other more exotic alternatives.


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## MacNutt (Jan 16, 2002)

I should also note here that, while drilling into the ground for hydrocarbons, we begin to encounter a gas background very early on. Like at 1000 meters or less. This gas background reading is ALWAYS With us, all the way down the hole. It is mostly natural gas. I can't imagine that anyone has ever considerted this a "resource" so I doubt if it would even show up on any "known natural gas resource" lists. 

Also, I personally helped to drill into the Hecla gas field in the High Arctic back in the late seventies. At the time it was the largest known natural gas find in the history of the planet. And we've never even considered exploiting it due to the sensitive environment of the far north.

I bet THAT one doesn't show up on the charts either.

As for ROEI...that ratio becomes a moot point when everything starts to go dark and cold. That's when you look around for something to fuel the equipment you already HAVE....in order to quell the rioting in the streets that is just about to start.

Something that could power your dad's tractor or your Honda SUV or the city powerplant that produces the electricity that you use every day. Something that can keep that big diesel truck running...the one that hauls food to your grocery store. And can do all of this in these existing systems without much modification.

That particular "something" would be natural gas.


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## GratuitousApplesauce (Jan 29, 2004)

MacNutt said:


> Also, I personally helped to drill into the Hecla gas field in the High Arctic back in the late seventies. At the time it was the largest known natural gas find in the history of the planet. And we've never even considered exploiting it due to the sensitive environment of the far north.
> 
> I bet THAT one doesn't show up on the charts either.


So basically MacNutt, you're saying that you can't cite any factual information to back your contention that natural gas is a unlimited resource and we'll just have to trust you on that because you were an oil industry guy. Why would I expect a different response?


Macnutt said:


> As for ROEI...that ratio becomes a moot point when everything starts to go dark and cold. That's when you look around for something to fuel the equipment you already HAVE....in order to quell the rioting in the streets that is just about to start.


Rioting in the streets? Let's hope it doesn't get that bad before we start to change the way we waste energy.

EROEI will of course become moot if things get to the point where society is about to collapse. In that case we'll be trying to keep everything running with whatever we have, firewood, old books, whatever we can somehow convert into energy. My point was that our society, as it is presently structured, completely depends on insanely cheap and easy to access energy to continue in its present form. This cheap energy will at some point, sooner than most of us care to admit, start to become very scarce. It is not limitless and there are no magic dilithium crystals or warp drive engines waiting around for us to exploit.

So what happens to our society when it has to shift from cheap energy to expensive energy?


> It has been estimated that the average sustained human power output is roughly one-twentieth of a horsepower. ... If we were to add together the power of all of the fuel-fed machines that we rely on to light and heat our homes, transport us, and otherwise keep us in the style to which we have become accustomed, and then compare that total with the amount of power that can be generated by the human body, we would find that each of us Americans has the equivalent of over 50 "energy slaves" working for us 24 hours each day. In energy terms, each middle-class American is living a lifestyle so lavish as to make nearly any sultan or potentate in history swoon with envy.
> 
> Richard Heinberg, _The Party's Over: Oil, War and the Fate of Industrial Societies_ (New Society Publishers, 2003)


What happens when each of us can only afford to buy 25 energy slaves for what we used to pay for 50? What happens if we can only afford 5? What happens to a manufacturing company that can only pay for a workforce of 25,000 energy slaves for what it paid for 50,000? What happens if it can only afford 5,000? What happens to our economy, our earning power our ability to sustain our lives at all? 

Well, if we start getting ready for this shift sooner, we will have a soft landing. If we start learning how to live in a lower energy, sustainable, post-fossil fuel world now, we will do much better. If we wait until we discover that the oil can has gone dry, keeping our heads in the sand, believing in magical limitless energy, our futures will not be very pleasant.

_My father rode a camel. I drive a car. My son flies a jet plane. His son will ride a camel. - Saudi proverb_


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## GratuitousApplesauce (Jan 29, 2004)

K_OS said:


> I understand that there are technical barriers to be broken especially with Hydrogen, but what you are saying is that all of these company's are putting billions into R&D for nothing?


No K_OS, I'm saying that those companies are investing in a new way of making a battery of sorts and they probably will get a return on investment. Hydrogen fuel cells are only a carrier of hydrogen energy produced by other means, primarily by fossil energy. Coal, natural gas, and to a lesser extent, nuclear and hydro, produce electricity used to produce hydrogen. Hydrogen fuel cells can not solve the basic problem our industrial world faces, which is depletion of fossil fuels.


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## Chris (Feb 8, 2001)

miguelsanchez said:


> chris, have you looked at the smart car?
> 
> smart
> 
> it's now available in canada.


Yes, and it was exactly what I needed, but only became available more than a year after I had to get a more thrifty vehicle. I'll be seriously considering it when finances permit. It's a logical commuter car for my needs.


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## Carex (Mar 1, 2004)

I like the 'energy slave' analogy. Imagine if you will, a household or neighborhood, where the houses run on battery power, or some other technology that requires recharging. You are a relatively fit individual and you invent a treadmill or stationary bicycle that will patch into the houses energy system and recharge the batteries. You charge an hourly fee for your service. You would be rich and very healthy. Alternatively if you are out of shape, you may consider starting such a business and starting slowly. You will burn fat, shed pounds, and make money. 

Where do I apply for a business license?


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## goobertech (Jan 24, 2005)

diesel fuel prices should go down now that heating season is over , number two fuel oil ( home heating oil ) and diesel is about the same ( except the crud and high sulfur in the number two) and some times diesel is added to number 2 ( making it number 2d ) for better low temperature qualities .


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## miguelsanchez (Feb 1, 2005)

carex, there is one small problem with your analogy: in order for you to run for one hour, you body requires an intake of energy (food). that food requires energy to be produced, cleaned, cooked, etc. then you will take that energy, run to your heart's content, and convert into another form (electricity, say) at some efficiency level i.e. at a loss. that electricity will be used to, for example, cook food, and so on. it's an endless cycle. the only difference is that your idea is probably much better for the environment, except for the likely increased methane emmissions


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## GratuitousApplesauce (Jan 29, 2004)

Carex, I think the wealthy, in an expensive energy future will just revert to what they have been doing for centuries to maintain their high standard of living, - they will use real slaves ( known as "the help") over energy slaves. The rest of us may be busy running on our own treadmills to keep our Macs powered up.


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## Carex (Mar 1, 2004)

Under such a scenario (expensive energy and high standard of living), we will have little currency. Countries with a lot of currency (read, big populations) will fair better, both in the energy department and the ability to export workers to rich folk. 

Years ago a family friend travelled to China and was astonished at Chinese construction practices. Where we in North America would have a 5 man work crew with heavy equipment and fancy machines, they would have 40 people with shovels.


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## Eukaryotic (Jan 24, 2005)

Or how bout we round up convicted rapists, pedophiles, and other violent, nasty offenders and chain them up to a treadmill/turbine device and have them make a little energy. If they can't keep up...well...

We pay to keep those guys locked up...might as well get something extra in return.


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## GratuitousApplesauce (Jan 29, 2004)

Less wasteful energy practices tend to make you healthier, although they often take more time. 

When I go to Vancouver every month with my car, which I need to transport all my stuff there, I usually park the car for the week or so I'm there and walk, bus and bike around town. I often have an hour of walking in the day or half an hour of biking. If I drove those distances I would have 20 minutes to 50 minutes extra time in my day, but also a few hundred extra calories hanging around my, already too large, waistline.


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## MacNutt (Jan 16, 2002)

Things are changing everywhere. Most noteably in China. India isn't all that far behind, either.

And if anyone here is entertaining the silly notion that any of these newly awakened economies full of newly affluent citizens is going to quietly shut down and go back to coal oil lamps and no TV when the "oil runs out"...then I've got news for them. Ain't gonna HAPPEN.

It certainly won't happen here, either. Once one source of energy becomes unworkably expensive, then a new one will be found. Human civilisation will continue to improve...not go backwards (except in smallish zones where there are special circumstances). But civilisation as a whole will continue to move forward in ever increasing leaps and bounds. Just as it has been doing since the renaissance period.

Anytime I hear someone claim that "we are running out of oil" I always remember what my instructors used to say back at oilfield technical school in Houston. This was in the mid seventies, mind you.

They always told us young squids that "we'd be lucky to get twenty years" out of our new oilpatch careers. That was, they said, because "we will be OUT of oil by that time". These were industry professionals and they had plenty of textbook data to back up their claims, as well. It was considered part of the basic lexicon of oilpatch knowledge that we left tech school with. "Save your shekels...because all of this will suddenly come to a grinding halt". No more big bucks job. No more travel to strange lands. Back to real life, so be prepared.

Things have changed since that time. To say the least.

Thirty five year later, and we are STILL finding new oil and gas resources! Lots of them. And new technology has allowed us to extract a whole bunch MORE oil out of old fields as well. When I left tech school it was well known that we were oly ever able to extract about thirty per cent of the oil in any given reserve....which meant that more than two thirds of all the oil found up to that point was still locked in the ground!

And we've only just scratched the surface of offshore oil reserves at this point in time. There are vast areas of promise that we haven't even gotten to just yet. If oil and gas become scarce, you can expect a new flurry of drilling in areas that were previously ignored or overlooked.

Then there is the hugely abundant natural gas reserves that exist all overr the planet. Even in places where oil is not present. Not to mention the hydrates of methane that we know exist at the bottom of the ocean (think glaciers of methane "ice" here. Masses of the stuff.

So...sorry, I just don't buy the doom and gloom forecasts. Not for one second.

I see the world and it's human civilisation modifying how things are done to accomodate a different set of energy resources as we progress. But I sure don't see us going back to an agrarian lifestyle with one cow and one chicken and a horse drawn cart parked by the house. Mom growin veggies in a small plot while dad rocks on his chair on the porch and regales the young-uns with fantastic tales of electricity and TV sets and jets that "flew through the air like a bird...all gone now. So sad."

Too silly.

Although this DOES seem to be a dream scenario for some of the more leftish amongst us. Luddites have been with us since the industrial revolution...best to humor them and not chuckle too loud when they make their dire predictions in public.

Better to simply ignore them. Their track record at correctly predicting the future is...what...roughly zero? 

Or worse.


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## used to be jwoodget (Aug 22, 2002)

Leftish politics now equals Luddite? Heck, there's better evidence that those on the Right would love a "simpler, more spiritual" future. I'd say that none of us has been particularly successful about predicting the future.

There will be an energy crunch. Oil is non-renewable and the rate of growth of consumption is clearly unsustainable. We have not sufficiently invested in new energy forms. Engines today are based on engineering principles over 120 years old and their modest increases in efficiency are laughable compared to advances in electronics, computing, etc. The vehicle manufacturers are looking for something that is just an adaptation of their current economic model and products. There's the flaw. Such changes are incremental and wholly inadequate to date. I don't blame them, that's their business but the type of progress that is needed will not come from an industry that is based on historic technology.

I think its reasonable to be optimistic, but I also think that we should not expect miracles to emerge from tinkering of current technologies. Oil is a stop-gap solution that has given us a thirst for energy and a time-limited opportunity to find a far more effective means of harnessing power. The future cannot lie in organic fuels since our insatiable appetite will simply exhaust them at a faster and faster rate.


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## MacNutt (Jan 16, 2002)

Natural gas, as I have pointed out previously, is likely to be the bridge energy that will allow us some time to fully develop the new technologies. That, plus a whole bunch of other emerging technologies that make it much more cost effective to run our "120 year old technology" for some time to come.

As for the statement that "not all the luddites are from the left"....

Wellll...okay. Just MOST of them. Eh, Jim?


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## used to be jwoodget (Aug 22, 2002)

Get your quotes correct, MacNutt, don't make them up.

As for natural gas reserves, the picture isn't so rosy: Canadian reserves. 

There's an interesting geopolitical ramification to the worldwide estimated reserves of NG. By far the most is in Russia and Iran. The only reasonable means of intercontinental transport is via liquification which adds cost and danger compared to oil.


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## RobTheGob (Feb 10, 2003)

Carex said:


> Rob, talk to me about the 'chip'. PM me if required. If you increase the torque, what happens to the gas mileage (which we like a lot!).


I'll send you a PM.

I drive with a pretty heavy (*very* heavy) right foot and still average just over 50 mpg. If you drive the same as before the chip (you won't!) the mileage would most likely increase. My car had the chip installed before I bought it - so I don't really know if my mileage changed much. Compared to my Supra - it's incredible.

I'm sure if my wife drove the TDI - she'd get 60 or 65 mpg...


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## GratuitousApplesauce (Jan 29, 2004)

Mr. Magical Energy said:


> Once one source of energy becomes unworkably expensive, then a new one will be found.


Ah, so MacNutt, so it is blind faith that technology will save us. Even though the peak of oil production may be 2010 or as the currently most optimistic prediction from the US Geological Survey states, 2035, you think that somehow scientists will pull something, anything, out of a hat. 

Tell me, what brand new source of energy has been invented in the last 30 years? (Cue sound of crickets) Tell me what source of energy has the outrageous EROEI as fossil fuels do? (More crickets). So whaddaya got in mind MacNutt, dilithium crystals? Anti-matter? Warp-drive engines? Oh wait, I know, cold fusion, right?

During the 70s, as you mentioned, the same propellor-heads that you disdain, saw their prediction of the US peak of oil production come true in 1970. Those same propellor-heads have predicted 2005 - 2020 as the world’s peak. The problem is that the peak can’t be accurately measured until we’ve passed it, just as in the 70s.

Once again, MacNutt, you present heresay evidence as your argument’s support as you do everywhere else on this board. “Some guy told me”, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera.

Statements by oil and gas industry geologists, oil industry executives, even Bush’s own energy advisor, don’t shake your resolve at all, because you “know some guys, who told me” ... etcetera, etcetera, etcetera.

So MacNutt, you continue to state, with no evidence, that there are vast undiscovered reserves of oil and gas and that we are finding new ones every day. The links I posted contradict that, but still you go on.

Maybe I’ll help you out here, since you are loathe to cite anyone other than yourself and some guys you know. Bjorn Lomborg, author of the “Skeptical Environmentalist” (2001) in one of his central arguments, states that known reserves are not finite but constantly growing.


> It is like glancing in the refrigerator and saying: “Oh, you’ve only got food for 3 days. In 4 days you will die of starvation.” But in 2 days I will go to the supermarket and buy more food. The point is that oil will not come from the sources we already know, but also from many sources of which we do not yet know.


 He also states, as you have, that we are becoming constantly better at exploiting it.

So where is all this extra oil hiding? Even though all of the world’s oil companies are frantically searching for oil everywhere, most of the cheap and easy, massive sources have been found. New finds are increasingly much smaller and governments are scrambling for everything they can lay their hands on, including invading other countries for it. Bush just pushed through the bill to drill in the pristine Alaska Wildlife Reserve to gain possibly an extra 3 to 6 months of additional oil reserves for that country. The US Energy Information Agency has stats that show production increasingly lagging behind consumption from a couple percent in 1965 to more than 25 percent in 2000. Also the same agency tells us that peak productivity of natural gas wells was in 1971 and has fallen to one-third of that in 2000, with the graph heading downwards. Meanwhile the rate of worldwide consumption continues to increase exponentially. Even with an increase in the ability to get more oil out of the dwindling reserves, as we get closer towards the bottom half of the barrel the EROEI gets sharply higher, so that we are left looking at things like the Alberta oil sands as an answer, which has an EROEI barely higher than 1 to 1.



The King of The Straw Man Argument said:


> So...sorry, I just don't buy the doom and gloom forecasts. Not for one second.
> 
> I see the world and it's human civilisation modifying how things are done to accomodate a different set of energy resources as we progress. But I sure don't see us going back to an agrarian lifestyle with one cow and one chicken and a horse drawn cart parked by the house. Mom growin veggies in a small plot while dad rocks on his chair on the porch and regales the young-uns with fantastic tales of electricity and TV sets and jets that "flew through the air like a bird".
> 
> Too silly.


I never said that, you did, MacNutt. Just another classic fallacious straw man argument from you. What I did say is that if we wait, pretending that fossil fuels will last forever, or that magical technologies will appear, as you are suggesting, then we will have an industrial society, used to functioning on cheap EROEI sources of energy, thrown in a huge tailspin when it becomes clear that the era of cheap energy is gone. How that could manifest, I don’t think anyone could say for sure, but my guess is, it wouldn’t be pretty. If we start to get ready for an era of expensive energy, now, today, then we stand a better chance of maintaining our living standards and relatively stable societies into the future. If you prefer the ostrich approach, be my guest.

Again, MacNutt, I asked you a year ago to present some evidence, yet you have not. And I am sincere in saying "Prove me wrong". I don't like the idea of society heading into an energy crunch, because I find it hard to believe we have the collective wisdom to deal with it intelligently. Especially with people like you and others singing, "Don't Worry, Be Happy". 

Surely if you are right and we are awash in oil and gas forever, there must be some credible source to back this contention up. Somebody must have written a book, or published a paper saying so. Until you can come up with something other than your own internally produced methane to support your contention, your argument is crap. 

Sorry, Gerry, that’s the way it works when adults debate things.


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## GratuitousApplesauce (Jan 29, 2004)

Great article in the Energy Bulletin that describes a typical, upper middle class person, who has to divest himself of everything that fossil fuels provide. There isn't much left afterwards. Thanks for your other link to that site, above, UTBJW.


> I am not telling you that this will suddenly happen overnight. It might take 50 years, or it might take a century. I doubt it takes longer, because it only took North America, Europe and Australia a century to use the first half of the world’s oil and gas.
> 
> When you finally realize how pervasive it is in our everyday lives, you will begin to understand exactly how much the human race must change in order to do without it. The Mad Max scenario is not going to happen overnight, but if we do not begin to think about and actually plan our future, it may suddenly become a possible yet unwanted reality.
> 
> Hopefully, you have now removed your head from the sand and begun to think for yourself about the real magnitude of the crisis our children are facing.


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## Eukaryotic (Jan 24, 2005)

I try and draw as middle a line as possible. I'm not on either side per se, but my feeling is that in 50 years from now, considering the advances over the past 50 years, there is reason to be optimistic. For example, right now solar PV cells can convert only 15% of light into useable energy, but I suspect in 5 or 10 years it will be 50%.


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## used to be jwoodget (Aug 22, 2002)

At least we'll be able to listen to iPods in 2060 as we're working those treadmills.

Solio charger
Belkin charger

Who said there was a problem with iPod batteries.....


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## GratuitousApplesauce (Jan 29, 2004)

Eukaryotic said:


> For example, right now solar PV cells can convert only 15% of light into useable energy, but I suspect in 5 or 10 years it will be 50%.


Boy, I really, really, really hope that is true. What could be better than direct solar energy? Basically that's all our fossil fuels and just about everything else is, stored solar energy. But, presently, from what I've read, solar panels take a bit more energy to be manufactured than they can collect over their usable life. If you've got some info that points to breakthroughs in solar PV tech that shows they will yield these results, I'd love to see it.

Actually, I just took a look around the web for info on this and found that, yes, there are researchers who believe that the efficiency of solar PV can be improved. There have been some discoveries, but nothing that I found indicating that the EROEI equation has changed, yet. It would be great if it did. I'd love to see a solar future.

Incidentally, I also found while looking for this that, even while the Bush administration is showcasing hydrogen technology and using it to show off how much they care about the environment etc., they have dramatically slashed funding on alternative energy research across the board. Are these idiots brain-damaged or what?


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## MacNutt (Jan 16, 2002)

Funny about all of this. Here we sit GA...both of us out here on the west coast of BC. And we are just a bit to the south of a vast untapped reserve of oil and gas that sits between the Queen Charlottes and the mainland of BC. Not only does it contain what may be a larger resource of oil and gas than the Hibernia reserve off Canada's east coast...but there is already evidence of a massive frozen glacier of hydrated methane on the surrounding seabed as well. It's actually been photographed, BTW.

But the oddest thing about all of your tormented public angst on this subject is this:

The one single thing that is stopping us from going after these BC westcoast reserves right now is the enviro/lefty lobby. They are freaking out and saying NO WAY!! No DRILLING...EVER!! And they're doing everything they can to shut the whole program down. Before it even starts.

And all the while, their public gadflies like yourself are beating their chests and moaning about how we are all "running out of fossil fuels!"  

And using this upcoming "shortfall" to tell all the rest of us that we must shut down civilisation ASAP! 

Meanwhile the actual truth is that we haven't even explored much more than ten per cent of the offshore areas yet...and we are still finding new ways to extract even more of the two thirds of the oil that was still left in the ground in all of the known fields after we'd gotten the easy stuff out about twenty five years back.

Example of "known reserves" being suddenly revised upwards:

I was on the SEDCO 706 in 1980 when the first drilling program began at Hibernia, off the east coast of Newfoundland. No one really thought there was all that much oil in that particular formation...but oil prices were very high in those days (comparatively) and the general feeling was that there might be ten or twenty years of production out there.

So, despite all of the difficulties of drilling on the Grand Banks (the North Atlantic in winter can be absolutely brutal and unforgiving) we went ahead with the project.

And guess what? It turns out that there was a LOT more oil and gas there than anyone ever imagined. I believe the proven and potential reserves have been revised upwards by a factor of TEN at this point. And it looks like there may be a whole lot MORE in there as well. Twenty five years into it the Hibernia field is going stronger than ever. And there doesn't seem to be any end in sight.

Okay...ready for this? The earth sciences professionals that I work with and who've seen the preliminary drilling results for the west coast (Queen Charlotte basin) are saying that this area may have TEN TIMES the oil and gas that Hibernia has. Or more.

And that's not including those massive hydrated methane glaciers that are sitting on the sea floor in the area, either. Huge amount of energy available for the taking in that zone. No question about it.

And that's just ONE of the potential areas of interest right now. There are MANY more. All over the globe.


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## MacNutt (Jan 16, 2002)

Try as I might, GA, I just can't seem to get myself worked into a purple froth over the potential loss of all of our lifestyles due to a looming energy shortfall.

Especially since I've been hearing differing versions of this same old song and dance, from pretty much the very same people, for...oh...about three decades now.  

Same impassioned pleas. Same dire predictions for the whole human race, based upon some study or factoid that they've been carefully fed by their handlers. Same angst.

But...oddly...the human race just keeps on rolling along. Despite their ongoing grief. Things just keep on advancing. Life gets more modern with every single day. We don't seem to be going backwards...as the left would like us to. Instead we keep on moving ahead.

And we just keep on finding new sources of energy. While modifying our systems to utilise that energy with far more efficiency.

I'm pretty sure that we will continue to do this for the rest of my lifetime. And well beyond that. History would indicate this.

But you guys will keep on rending your garments and pounding your chests and crying out in pained anguish anyway. Right?

What to do....

Say...perhaps all of those of the leftish persuasion out there, who are predicting doom and loudly telling all of us to pull back from what we know of as modern life, would like to move themselves to a nice warm tropical island where their chosen religion is practiced openly. By everyone. (at gunpoint, mind you).

One word for you...CUBA!! 

Civilisation there is pretty much static. Locked into a timewarp from forty years ago. Very few cars. Not many telephones. Regular power outages. Hardly any computers. Almost NO modern convieniences of any kind. And no new ones on the horizon, either.

Lots of people grow their own food. Many people commute in horse drawn buses. Nothing ever gets any better in Cuba. Only worse. More and more shortages all of the time. No end to it, really.

It's a friggin luddite _PARADISE_ fer goshsakes!  

And it's governed by a far-left political system. Gee..go figure. 

If I were you GA, I'd hop the next plane to Cuba and bask in your particular ideal of the "future of mankind".

But you'd better hurry. Even THAT one looks like it's going to go away pretty soon. Modernity is just around the corner...even for backward and wasted Cuba. Once they toss off the tired old ideology that has put them in this terrible state, they will rapidly become just like every other modern nation on the face of the planet. What's there now won't last forever. Better hurry before it's gone for good. You haven't a moment to lose. 

Trust me on this.


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## GratuitousApplesauce (Jan 29, 2004)

MacNutt, you’ve just proven, beyond a shadow of a doubt with these last two long winded and essentially silly rants why it’s a waste of time to bother responding to anything you have to say. After wading through many paragraphs of nonsense and hyperbole, crappy humour, paragraphs of unadulterated BS and taunts about moving to Cuba, basically you had nothing new to add to the discussion other than more heresay evidence.

So some industry insider you know said the west coast has ten times the oil that Hibernia has. Even if that’s true (considering the source we all have good reason to suspect it’s just more exaggeration) what does that amount to, 6 months of extra oil for the world? This doesn’t change the fact that production is falling behind consumption by more every day. The graph shows the gap is growing exponentially. None of your blather has changed this.

Now you’re going on about frozen methane. There is no evidence at all that there is any way to get at this stuff. There’s a US government agency that’s been studying that issue since the mid-nineties and you know what their very latest conclusion is? They have no idea at all whether there is any way to economically use frozen methane, meaning that the EROEI is too low. They really hope they can, someday, but can’t say if it will ever be possible.

You’ve ignored evey bit of info that’s been posted in this thread, but still continue to repeat your argument that their is magical energy to be tapped everywhere, even though all the evidence says there is not. You’re welcome to leave your head buried in the sand. Just don’t try to convince me that it’s a nice place to be.

As I said in post #83 in this thread, and it bears repeating: “ Surely, if you are right and we are awash in oil and gas forever, there must be some credible source to back this contention up. Somebody must have written a book, or published a paper saying so. Until you can come up with something other than your own internally produced methane to support your contention, your argument is crap. 

Sorry, Gerry, that’s the way it works when adults debate things.”

Still waiting for an answer from a year ago.


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## MacNutt (Jan 16, 2002)

Odd about this, Gratuitous Applesauce...

Like JWoodgett, you are constantly trying to minimise and trivialise my carefully thought out replies to your nonsense by saying, rather loudly, that they are "not worth replying to!"...

But, strangely enough, you still do reply to them. In depth. And repeatedly, no less.

Funny about that, eh?


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## MacNutt (Jan 16, 2002)

GA...

To once again restate what I have re-stated so MANY times here already...

I do NOT think that we are "awash in oil and gas". Not hardly.

But I also do NOT think that we are "running out of resources" any time soon. There is a market-driven shortfall between supply and demand at this point because China and India are in a rapid adnacement mode right now, and THEY are sucking up all of the available supplies these days.

Two and a half BILLION people (almost HALF the polulation of the planet) have uncerimoniously _CHUCKED_ the tired old socialist ways and have embraced a free market capitalist economy of late.

This massive group of human beings have suddenly catapaulted themselves from bare subsistence farming and desperation into a completely modern lifestyle that is the equivalent of our own. It mirrors the BILLION-plus human beings who suddenly abandoned the socialist ideal, and adopted free-market principles almost a decade ago when the Soviet Empire unexpectedly collapsed.

Thirty years ago....two thirds of the planet was governed by command-style centrally planned economies.

Today...almost ALL of the countries on earth are embracing some form of modern capitalist market-driven economic model. And most of them are rapidly expanding and enrichening themselves, because of this choice. 

No WONDER there is a sudden shortage of raw materials these days. Especially the fuel that powers this modern lifestyle. 

DUH!!


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## MacNutt (Jan 16, 2002)

Further to all of this....

The previously mentioned market-driven consumer oriented economy that is now a fixture of prcatically ALL of the nations on this planet will soon find new ways to provide oil and gas to all of the available customers who have fistfulls of cash in hand.

That's how it _WORKS_.  

We have found masses of gas and oil in the past few years. Many more finds will be coming, just so long as supply and demand is the motivating factor.

And utilising the enormous hydrated methane deposits that lie at the botton of the ocean is just a case of modifying existing technology to fit the situation. In order to make some cash from the available resource.

Do you THINK that everyone will simply walk away from these massive resources, just because they are "more difficult" to get at?

Silly boys. Think again.


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## GratuitousApplesauce (Jan 29, 2004)

MacNutt said:


> Like JWoodgett, you are constantly trying to minimise and trivialise my carefully thought out replies to your nonsense by saying, rather loudly, that they are "not worth replying to!"...


Your “carefully thought out” replies ain’t worth the pixels they are using up. This thread and the similar one last year are awash in factual links, references and quotes refuting every single argument that you’ve made here. Yet you persist. It’s really quite remarkable. The man who is impervious to fact!

If you’ve got a point that you want to try and convince anyone of, you’ll have to do better than repeating made-up wishful thinking, MacNutt. Anyone with half a brain can see that you just keep repeating the same things with no reference other than your say-so. “We have found masses of gas and oil in the past few years.” “Many more finds will be coming.” “Utilising the enormous hydrated methane deposits ... is just a case of modifying existing technology.” “It's [natural gas is] an almost inexhaustible resource.” *Says who, Mr. MacNutt, says who??* You got a name? You got a study? You got a respected publication, author, anything at all besides your own imagination? I’ve given you piles of them.

But you don’t have anything, do you? Again, I say, prove me wrong. 

I promise you, if you give me something believable that can really counter all these unpleasant facts, I’ll be the first to congratulate you. As I said before, it doesn’t give me any pleasure to have discovered that our society is heading for an energy crunch. But given that we are, I only think it would be prudent to look at the facts, not play make believe.

And you can keep the silly diversionary tactics. I know you like how dramatic it sounds to say that my views on this subject are based on being a luddite, or a disgruntled Cuban fifth columnist or whatever fanciful distortion you can come up with. I can assure you that they’re only based on factual information, that is freely available, even to you.


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## powerbooker (Mar 21, 2005)

*hm...*

sorry too many posts to go through and I don't have the time, so I'm sorry if someone has already said this...

anyway
my take on this whole high priced oil fiasco is this...

oil companies want more money...NOW...not 10 years from now, not 20...because their stock holders and company CEO's want their money, NOW...it's all because of human greed really.

and politicians don't have the balls to oppose the people/companies that fund their multi-million dollar campaigns

what i don't understand is the car companies...
why have they not capitalized on this more?
i mean, hasn't the oil crisis in the 80's shown them anything?
basically, they've had 25 years to come up with the technology now present in the prius of all cars!!!!
honestly, if you make a hybrid that looks a lot nicer than that, i'd buy it!
instead, they go and make bigger cars!!!

i mean, i understand the cost of r&d might be pretty high, but in the long run it works out for the better.. you gotta spend money to make money

honda is doing the right thing by coming out with a new hybrid accord (looks just like it's fuel guzzling counterpart)..sure it's 3000 bucks more, but you can make that up in fuel savings over 2 years...

also
has anyone been to Europe?
I'm sure there are many single mother families 3 children to feed that don't have a car...and they survive!!!! *gasp*

what do they do?
they live in a house that is close to the necessities that they need!... ie- a small local grocery store...

or they are smart enough to OPEN a store that has the necessities that people in their neighbourhood need!!!

then they can jack up prices and afford gas and any other necessities that are driven up by higher oil costs

anyway, those are my two cents


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## used to be jwoodget (Aug 22, 2002)

MacNutt said:


> Odd about this, Gratuitous Applesauce...
> 
> Like JWoodgett, you are constantly trying to minimise and trivialise my carefully thought out replies to your nonsense by saying, rather loudly, that they are "not worth replying to!"...
> 
> ...


Since you brought me up, here's my previous take on reasons for replying to your posts. (I know, I can't even follow my own advice....).

Carefully thought out replies? Here's a reply that corrected factual errors in your post.

Perhaps if you balanced your posts with facts instead of regurgitated rhetoric, hence self-trivializing your writing, others would not feel obliged to point out these errors and exaggerations? Just a guess.


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## talonracer (Dec 30, 2003)

Pistols at dawn! Settle this like gentlemen!


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## used to be jwoodget (Aug 22, 2002)

Difficult, neither of us own guns and we are 3,000 miles apart. Roll out the chicken cannons? And who are you calling a gentleman (young wippersnapper).


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## mrjimmy (Nov 8, 2003)

*Conspiracy theory*

So just on the heels of a report stating huge oil inventories the blast occurs at a Bp plant in Texas. (article) The sheep freak and up goes oil yet again. Hmmm coincidence? When it comes to oil, I don't believe in coincidence.


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## GratuitousApplesauce (Jan 29, 2004)

Not sure what that article means when they say "inventories" but oil reserves and discoveries world wide are lagging far behind consumption, which shows no signs of letting up. This means that long term oil prices won't be coming down, no matter what kind of swings we see short term relative to events.

No doubt oil companies wish to spin things for maximum profit, especially since they are all aware of the long term outlook.


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## mrjimmy (Nov 8, 2003)

As long as someone is reporting 'huge inventories' and there are no 'service interuptions' the price of oil will decline. Simple economics. If in fact the info you are stating is correct, the price will rise. Currently, someone somewhere believes that there are huge inventories. If it is enough to make the price of oil lower, it is the most reliable information source. IMO.


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## GratuitousApplesauce (Jan 29, 2004)

I might be wrong about this, but a cursory look around the web tells me that "inventories" refers to oil that is already out of the ground. Therefore a glut may affect prices downward short term. Recently there was a shortage of inventory.

Oil reserves are another matter. It has been variously predicted that world wide we have used up half of the oil that was ever in the ground or near half. Estimates about when we get to that point vary from present day to 2020. Increasing consumption world wide may bring that "oil peak" sooner. Keep in mind that much of the oil that is left will become increasingly more difficult and energy expensive to get at, with the final amounts requiring more energy to extract than it will yield. Also keep in mind that people are already looking at things like the Alberta oil sands, that require almost as much energy to extract as is gained. Some think that if the huge environmental cleanup costs of this kind of oil is added that more energy is actually used than is gained.

As far as the economics of it, recognition of dwindling reserves will eventually have to have an effect on the price of crude. This is a long term trend.


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## mrjimmy (Nov 8, 2003)

> a cursory look around the web tells me that "inventories" refers to oil that is already out of the ground. Therefore a glut may affect prices downward short term.


Prices are only ever affected in the short term (ie. what is out of the ground). Prices will one day reflect the fact that we are running out of oil but currently they are being affected by many other factors ie. Iraq, China, growing consumption, inventories etc.). Hopefully when and if the day comes that supplies have vanished we/ they have successfully integrated an alternative.


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## GratuitousApplesauce (Jan 29, 2004)

mrjimmy said:


> Hopefully when and if the day comes that supplies have vanished we/ they have successfully integrated an alternative.


Hopefully, yes, although currently there is nothing at all on the horizon that can replace fossil fuels at the cheap energy levels that our society is so dependant on. I think it is a good idea to start thinking about how we will live in a world that only has expensive energy left. How do we get our industrial society to adjust? We need to go beyond hoping and start acting, because that day is coming soon.

I've been away, so I couldn't post this link in a timely fashion, but here it is, from March 31st:


> CNN Money - Goldman Sachs sees oil spiking to $105
> 
> LONDON (Reuters) - Oil prices could touch $105 a barrel in the next few years, the influential investment bank Goldman Sachs said Thursday.
> 
> The bank's analysts said in a research report that the world energy market is in the early stages of a "super-spike" period that could see 1970s-style price surges. The bank called its forecast "conservative."


I'd say conservative is right, from what I've read. $2 per litre, anyone?


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## mrjimmy (Nov 8, 2003)

Here's something a friend emailed me this morning. Something similar circulated a while ago. I know it's only a band-aid solution but still worth a try. The more the corps see the power of the consumer the better off we will be IMO.



> It is rumored that we are going to hit close to a $1.42 a Litre by the
> summer. Want gasoline prices to come down? We need to take some
> intelligent, united action. Phillip Hollsworth, offered this good idea:
> This makes MUCH MORE SENSE than the don't buy gas on a certain day
> ...


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## talonracer (Dec 30, 2003)

But... my PetroPoints....!!


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## SINC (Feb 16, 2001)

Been there, done that, have the T-Shirt, doesn't work. Ho hum.


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## mrjimmy (Nov 8, 2003)

> Been there, done that, have the T-Shirt, doesn't work. Ho hum.


And that is precisely why it wouldn't work.


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## MacDoc (Nov 3, 2001)

You can travel in Europe the same distance for the same amount of money as here.
Think about it and why.
THAT will happen here soon with high gas prices - should've happened a while back.


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## (( p g )) (Aug 17, 2002)

<i>"We all know that we're being controlled by the oil companies"</i>

Hardly. It's elementary supply and demand. The market is only asking what people are prepared (even begrudgingly) to pay. We are in control of the market we want for ourselves: it's the choices we make that shape the market we get. That said, the only way to fight skyrocketing oil prices is to reduce our consumption, be it by driving a more fuel efficient vehicle *and* by cutting back on our dependency on cars as personal transportation vehicles.


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## MacDoc (Nov 3, 2001)

Mmmmm I think that's not quite right on either side. There is an element of market control/collusion OPEC for starters - it's not a frictionless market by any means as there are choke points ( refineries) and taxes come into play as a use factor.

Nations WILL step in when threatened ( see Pearl Harbour ).
The US has huge strategic oil storage in salt domes in the US south.

LNG is very likely a "next phase" from what I can see - there is lots but it does NOT solve the warming issues tho it's cleaner AND a source for hydrogen.

Clathrates also offer opportunity but that's further out AND worse for the warming.
Reducing reliance on ruminants would do a world of good as well as extensive reforesting at the same time.
But as long as populatin pressures exist and first world trade is done the way it is......... 

Blade Runner future looks pretty unavoidable.........hope it's not worse


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## Oakbridge (Mar 8, 2005)

I moved here to Cambridge from Oakville 4 years ago. There are major differences in the attitudes between the two locations with regards to the automobile, walking, biking, and public transit.

Cambridge is made up of three 'centres', Galt, Hespeler, and Preston. Hespeler is located on the north side of the 401 and the other two are south. I found it absolutely amazing that one cannot 'legally' bike, or walk to Hespeler from either of the other two. There are actually signs posted on the bridges that span the 401 and carry automobile traffic that state that walking and biking on the bridges is against the law.

Public transit? It's a joke, buses snake their way through subdivisions that were built to avoid the grid pattern but make efficient public transit next to impossible. A walk to the main mall from my house takes roughly 20 minutes, the same trip by bus takes as long or longer with the best of connections. 

So the car is king, not surprising where the major industry is the trucking industry (we have a slew of trucking companies based in Cambridge) and one of the major single employers is an auto manufacturer (Toyota). 

We have bike paths that don't go anywhere just perhaps a km of paved path, but they have painted lines running down the middle and cute little stop signs at each end. However there are major streets that don't have a sidewalk on either side. 

Add to that the fact that we typically pay 3-4 cents more per litre than places like Hamilton, Guelph, Milton, etc. Monday is typically 'get your gas by noon before the price goes up'. This morning? 82.3 cents per litre. By 2 p.m., 92.3 cents per litre.


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## CN (Sep 3, 2004)

I think the worst part of it all is that the internal combustion engine is only 26% efficient! That's right, next time you put $40 gas into your car, remember that $30 is going towards making lots of heat and noise! And then there are all the bottlenecks: How do we get oil out of the ground? By burning oil of course! How do refine the oil? We heat it up ALOT to break the carbon chains, using lots of oil in the process! How does the oil get to us? Well it has to be transported of course, using more oil! AND THEN you use it in your car, which is only 26% efficient! 
Sure, we have developed more efficient combustion engines (eg- the rotary engine, can't remember the exact name) but those are too expensive to put in cars!
I really believe it will only get worse, currently production is on an upward trend, so that it can keep up with demand, but it is predicted that soon (next 50 yrs) production will decrease, while demand continues to soar! We can only guess how high the prices will become then...


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## GratuitousApplesauce (Jan 29, 2004)

Doc said:


> The US has huge strategic oil storage in salt domes in the US south.
> 
> LNG is very likely a "next phase" from what I can see - there is lots but it does NOT solve the warming issues tho it's cleaner AND a source for hydrogen.
> 
> Clathrates also offer opportunity but that's further out AND worse for the warming.


The US strategic oil storage is not particularly huge when put next to the huge US consumption. The strategic reserves amount to no more than days of usage and if that's all that's left, then things will be dire indeed. They are in place mainly for emergency military usage.

Many posts back in this thread I wrote about EROEI (Energy Return On Energy Invested). Oil and natural gas are the best and these fossil fuels are the main drug of our industrial society's addiction to cheap energy. The world's oil is running out and so is our natural gas. The fact that Liquified Natural Gas terminals are in the works means that things are getting low because using LNG brings the EROEI equation down quite significantly.

Clathrate technology is nothing more than vapourware at this point, (pardon the pun  ) although many people hope that these frozen methane deposits in the ocean can be used. A US government agency has been doing the main research on these for a decade and to date they can't say whether there is any hope ever for their efficient utilization.

Right now we have fossils fuels with an EROEI of roughly 1 to 30 and a bunch of other alternative tech solutions that are not much better than 1 to slightly more than 1. If we ran out of cheap EROEI fossil fuels today, we would have nothing left to fuel our industrial society, which is predicated on cheap EROEI energy. If cheap EROEI fossil fuels start running out in 15 or 20 years (one of the more optimistic assessments), all we have is hope and faith that science will save us with some other cheap EROEI alternative.

We are a society in denial. The cheap energy party is coming to an end and we vainly hope that somebody will invent something, anything.

If we quit the denial and start planning on an expensive energy future now, we can make a transition that will not be too difficult. If we remain in denial and believe that some scientist has cold fusion or dilithium crystals stored away, then in a couple of decades, or less, we will certainly have a major hangover to deal with.

BTW, this morning 99.9 cents a litre in Vancouver. Next year, $2 litre?


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## MacDoc (Nov 3, 2001)

Mmm the US has some 650-700 million barrels in published reserves - you can bet the military has more.
That's about a month if ALL sources including Alaska and domestic were cut off and we supply a good chunk as well.
Rationing could easily double or triple that.
Stillit won't come to that.

I still think the greater danger to a real econimc nightmare is it triggering a world recession and housing bubble collapse if an oil shock comes in too hard.
If the "green industry" can ramp up into a strong economic force then the transition MIGHT be relatively smooth.

I'm kinda of excited to see the move coming - I worry that the banks are going to up the interest rates at exactly the wrong time - this is exactly the time when gov can kickstart a vibrant conservation industry. Make it DOUBLY worthwhile for people to save energy.

You know I do think many of the energy companies know the score and are working on transition. Iceland is IN the hydrogen economy NOW tho they are specially endowed with natural sources.
Still it's a start and a test bed for a first world society. :clap:
I don't see the energy production corps as the "evil villians". Retailers might be a bit on the exploit end as are govs but producers KNOW they have to transition.

So do we.


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## gwillikers (Jun 19, 2003)

I saw $1.02.7 in North Van just an hour ago on my way home.


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## MacDoc (Nov 3, 2001)

I just chunked in $90 for 97 litres on the Windstar. ( 100 litre Mom vehicle tank ).


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## used to be jwoodget (Aug 22, 2002)

Although it could be seen as a tax grab, what about instituting more dramatic progressive taxation on private vehicles (not commercial) based on fuel consumption. We do this to a small degree right now. People can choose to buy a gas guzzler at the higher price or they can save and buy a vehicle with better mileage. The problem right now is that gas prices are not a disincentive for people to buy guzzlers - as demonstrated by the popularity of full size SUVs. The people who buy these vehicles can afford to run them but they are accelerating the consumption of a finite resource which will impact everyone.

Dedicate the tax revenue to a fund for increasing energy efficiencies, i.e. Kyoto programs, clean power, alternative fuel technologies or even discounts off fuel efficient vehicles. Make Lincoln Navigator owners subsidize the cost of the Toyota Prius or Ford Escape hybrid!


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## K_OS (Dec 13, 2002)

*Great Idea*



used to be jwoodget said:


> Dedicate the tax revenue to a fund for increasing energy efficiencies, i.e. Kyoto programs, clean power, alternative fuel technologies or even discounts off fuel efficient vehicles. Make Lincoln Navigator owners subsidize the cost of the Toyota Prius or Ford Escape hybrid!


Not a bad idea UTBJ at the same time maybe kick in a bit of money towards the proliferation of Bio-Diesel as well if I understand it correctly B100 is pure grown canola and uses very litle by-products to mix. Bio-Diesel could easily be used as an inbetween product as well as keep our agricultural comunity's working while the holy grail of energy could be found and used.

I just wish that diesel power was more popular over here.

Laterz


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## skinnyman (Oct 25, 2003)

I'm surprised that no one has mentioned the impact of suburbs yet in this thread (though maybe I just skimmed over it). People have become accustomed over the last half century to the ideal of having your own house in a clean neighbourhood away from the "dirty" cities. Every ad for a new subdivision stresses the element of "moving back to nature." But what are you really moving to? A countryside of cookie cutter houses as far as the eye can see?

I believe that this way of living is one of the biggest, if not the biggest, reason that we are in such a debate over oil right now. You can't get anywhere without driving, and when you consider all the garbage, recycling, and snow vehicles that have to crawl through every winding suburban road, the amount of gas used really adds up.

I'm not saying that we need to live simpler lives, just more sustainable ones. I think we have to go back to a more traditional, walkable kind of mixed-use neighbourhood. The trouble is, you can't really transform existing suburbs. What are you going to do, erect stores in the spaces in between houses? You pretty much have to demolish and start over, and with over 50% of Canada's urban population living in suburban style neighbourhoods, that is not likely to happen.


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## skinnyman (Oct 25, 2003)

In short, I guess what I'm trying to say is that we shouldn't just focus on trying to find new energy sources to fuel our current way of life, but that at the same time we should be trying to cut back by making lifestyle choices that are more sustainable.


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## Strimkind (Mar 31, 2005)

We should also start pressuring local, provincial, and federal governments to fund more public transit. I know that here in Victoria, I would bus more if the buses came more often, and I bet many others would as well since the traffic is starting to get pretty bad. Yet funding for the transit service has been frozen or decreased (cannot remember which).
Also, for the 2010 games, instead of building a brand new highway, our government should build a state of the art rail system connecting Twassassan, Vancouver, and Whistler. This would not only provide a service for people to go from victoria to whistler without using a vehicle, it also would get people to downtown faster without having to rely on those expensive bus rides, and it would show we as a province are committed to the environemnt.
Here's to hoping.


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## logcomet (Jun 11, 2004)

Regarding suburbia, Peak Oil, the impending oil crash etc. Has anyone here see the documentary 'Death of Suburbia'. Very interesting and recommended. 

Our future urban development will be very different from the past 50 years of cheap oil lead development sprawl. It's unfortunate that designers, consumers, and developers have created a living structure so alienating to community and non-vehicular mobility. My rule: all necessities (local theatre, bakery, grocer, butcher, library, civic functions, school etc.) must be with a 10 minute walking distance to create a successful living pattern. How many new developments meet these criteria?

Presently, for most families, every errand is a trip in the car. Need milk: drive, need to take bobby to soccer: drive etc.

Unfortunately when fuel prices increase, we will suffer a short term economic rough spot before we adapt our living patterns. We can all hope oil prices will rise and spur a sea change in attitudes, but this will negatively affect us all, urban, suburban, or rural. Hopefully we adapt quickly.


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## MacDoc (Nov 3, 2001)

UsedtoBe - the floor has dropped out from under the SUV market. It was gone in Canada last year and now gone in the US.

••

I suspect there will be adjustments but not like there were in Europe - we have a lot of fuel and Canada is a big country.
Taht said we can do better.


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## GratuitousApplesauce (Jan 29, 2004)

UTBJW said:


> Although it could be seen as a tax grab, what about instituting more dramatic progressive taxation on private vehicles (not commercial) based on fuel consumption.


This should have been done a long time ago in my opinion. One of the reasons that gas is so expensive in Europe is higher gas taxes, which are ploughed into transit, rail and other alt transportation. 

When the price of gas does get really high here we will have an overburdened public transit system, because our leaders never thought ahead. Even in the last year transit use has been increasing because many have started to feel the pinch of the increased cost of running a private vehicle. A fill up for me that was $36 is now $60. That's getting close to double and I think it won't be long before it is double. Translink in Greater Vancouver has reported a 10% increase in ridership in the last year.

But without the perception of a major crisis, this would never fly. People already have complained that the gas taxes should be lowered and any politician who proposed raising gas taxes would be destroyed. With the media and much of the population in denial about the coming energy crunch, people are only thinking that these increases are short term, maybe something to do with the Middle East, soon to be set right, rather than the reason why there is such a problem in the Middle East to begin with.

logcomet, the documentary is called "The End of Suburbia" and I highly recommend it also.

From the film:


> The whole suburban project can be summarised pretty sucinctly as the greatest misallocation of resources in the history of the world. America took all of its post-war wealth and invested it in a living arrangement that has no future.





logcomet said:


> My rule: all necessities (local theatre, bakery, grocer, butcher, library, civic functions, school etc.) must be with a 10 minute walking distance to create a successful living pattern. How many new developments meet these criteria?


Right on, logcomet!

Suburbs are not sustainable and must evolve back to the original small town centres that most of them had at their cores. In the Greater Vancouver Region, in the 90s, there was an initiative called the "Liveable Regions Strategy" that was supposed to guide future planning decisions, by emphasizing the build-up of suburban town centres, but this seems to have been shelved by short-sighted politicians and pressure from the province's current brain-damaged leadership, who are actually, flying in the face of all logic, proposing more freeways, as Strimkind mentioned.

Also recommended are Richard Heinberg's excellent books, The Party's Over: Oil, War and the Fate of Industrial Societies and Powerdown: Options and Actions for a Post-Carbon World


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## MacDoc (Nov 3, 2001)

Tokyo is amazing that way - an entire life within a block or two.

Europe encourages high performance diesel purchases by offering a substantial and I mean almost half price discount on that fuel.
Low sulphur high performance diesel is only now coming available in Canada. The diesel Mercedes we rented was amzing - cruise all day at 160 km and sip fuel with 4 people and luggage aboard ( 
It was somthing like this - earlier model not quite as svelte.










I think we can still count on suburbia for a while - just new vehicles to get around BUT that also implies density in the cities as well.

Small towns are more likely to go before major city suburbia. They already are - more's the pity.


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## GratuitousApplesauce (Jan 29, 2004)

Some upcoming Ontario screenings of The End of Suburbia:

April 5 - Oshawa, ON at 6:00PM at the Durham College and University of Ontario Institute of Technology, 2000 Simcoe St. N.

April 16 - Markham, ON in the Canada Room at Markham Town Centre, Warden and Highway 7 at noon. Presented by York Region Environmental Alliance.

April 20, - Milton ON at 7:30 pm at the EC Drury Food School. Sponsored by the Halton NDP

April 22 - Waterloo, ON. 7:00PM at the Princess Cinema, 6 Princess Street. Sponsored by the Kitchener-Waterloo NDP Riding Association. Contact: 519-725-4888.

Don't drive your SUV to the screening.


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## SINC (Feb 16, 2001)

About six years back, a firm approached our city council with an idea for a "Techno Village".

There is an unused block of industrial zoned land that borders on our south and the city of Edmonton. This firm proposed building a self contained "village" on the site, about 300 acres, situated behind a bingo hall/casino complex and a gof driving range.

It was designed to have space for techno firms and encourage software development along with two high rise towers and perimeter parking with a walkabout in the centre filled with bakeries, grocery stores, a bank, a couple of restaurants, a pub, a laundry and dry cleaners, a bicycle shop a small hardware, a clothing store, liquor store and the like. The idea was to house all the new techno employees in walking distance of their work and provide tax incentives to attract them to our city, rather than heavy industry.

It would be a self sustaining living area with no traffic and designed for pedestrians. They even had allowed for a bicycle/golf cart delivery service.

Our council turned them down flat when objections were raised by the Chamber of Commerce about taking business away from "the core" to an industrial park.

What a complete bunch of jerks. It was an idea whose time had come back then, never mind now.

The sooner they call that developer back and get going, the better off we will all be.


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## used to be jwoodget (Aug 22, 2002)

macdoc,

Don't you see Cayennes, Touaregs, Hummers, Navigators, Expeditions, Suburbans, Tahoes, etc in Mississauga?? 

GA,

The thing is, this wouldn't be a gas tax, it would be a gas guzzler tax and it could be cost neutral overall. Take from the people who insist of driving mobile tankers and give to the people who want to get around without dragging a mobile house on their wheels.

I wonder if there is a future for the Segway in suburbia? Dean Kamen was just a few years too early (as usual).

I read in the paper a couple of weeks ago that Mercedes is thinking of shutting down production of the Smart car division. Eh?


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## Hypno (Sep 27, 2003)

I agree with the end of suburbia quotes, all i have to do is look at Hwy 7 And Weston Rd North of Toronto..it has to be the worst urban planning i have seen, to many stores and you pretty much have to drive to get to any of them...and to think of all that fuel wasted just to travel a few Km down Hwy 7 just to get to another store. Sometimes i think the drive to Barrie is shorter then the drive through Woodbridge on any afternoon. Walking to the store is impossible in some suburban neighbourhoods and its pretty sad.
The Americans know that suburban lifestyle is consuming and this is there only reason for their middle east presence. 
Ten years from now demand will be higher then supply and what a better way of the americans to get a leg up on the asian countries that have manufacturing pretty much to themselves; this is why you won't see hybrid cars on the road any time soon...because maunfacturing of these cars favors china and other asian countries leaving the Americans with a little less control and we can't have that now can we. 
Americas invasion of Iraq was planned and now that they have established themselves there they will look to any other neighbouring countries... Oh and yes i had to fill up today this is my rant!!!...Next will be the BAD DRIVERS RANT!!!!!!!!!!!! cause there's way too many these days.


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## Oakbridge (Mar 8, 2005)

However to put it in perspective. One HP56 Black Inkjet cartridge is just under $30 for 19ml. 

The price per litre for black ink? Over $1,500 Cdn per litre.


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## GratuitousApplesauce (Jan 29, 2004)

used to be said:


> GA, The thing is, this wouldn't be a gas tax, it would be a gas guzzler tax and it could be cost neutral overall. Take from the people who insist of driving mobile tankers and give to the people who want to get around without dragging a mobile house on their wheels.


Sounds like it could be a good idea to me. I think that the issue is to get people to use less energy overall and if this did it, I would be in favour. Green Party's around the world have been advocating tax shifting to energy usage for years.

I still think that for any politician to take this on would be hazardous to their career longevity. Even these days a lot of people think it is their God given right to waste the earth's precious fossil fuel resources and will react angrily to anyone who tries to prevent this. Unless a majority of people start to realize that their is an energy crunch heading our way in the near future politicians won't do any more than make bland gestures towards solving the problem.

SINC, too bad your council stuck with the status quo. Ideas like that, aimed at incorporating green principles into new development are actually good for the economy. If our society can start looking at innovative ways of powering down, we will be helping our economies and creating jobs as well as protecting the sustainability of those economies and our planet as a whole.


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## MacDoc (Nov 3, 2001)

Sure we see them but they ain't sellin' well in Canada.

Suburbia may dwindle in smaller cities but not for the GTA - what it needs is no more sprawl and that's in the works already.

There WILL be alternatives. There are in Europe already - we just don't use them.
Stuff like this we will see more and more of

http://www.dcss.org/speedsl/why_kitetugs.html










Real energy sustainable devices will mean MORE mobility not less. Heating and cooling is going to be a bigger challenge.
Demographics will automatically limit suburban sprawl in first world nations. There are 17 million fewer kids in North America.
It's the city cores that will lead the way in getting low rise high density ala Paris.


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## GratuitousApplesauce (Jan 29, 2004)

Oakbridge said:


> However to put it in perspective. One HP56 Black Inkjet cartridge is just under $30 for 19ml.
> 
> The price per litre for black ink? Over $1,500 Cdn per litre.


I'd say it's a good thing that our industrial civilization doesn't depend on Black inkjet ink for its continued existence the way it depends on ever more expensive fossil fuels.


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## MacDoc (Nov 3, 2001)

Well think about that for a minute - MAYBE REALLY costly fuel would be a good thing. 
Ingenuity 'n all


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## shoe (Apr 6, 2005)

wanna save on gas? call in sick once a week that should even it all out

shoe


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## GratuitousApplesauce (Jan 29, 2004)

shoe said:


> wanna save on gas? call in sick once a week that should even it all out


And when gas is double what it is now, call in sick 3 days a week? And if it's triple ... ?

Or you could start demanding that your governments provide the transit you'll need, right now, before your car becomes too expensive to use and you'll have to cram yourself sardine-like onto crappy buses for a 3 hour commute holding the strap. 

Or get a job closer to your home, or move closer to your job.


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## MacDoc (Nov 3, 2001)

or move your job to home.


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## Dr.G. (Aug 4, 2001)

As Memorial University's first teleprofessor, let me tell you it is a good experience when it comes to having to travel. No matter how much snow, sleet, rain, wind, fog, etc, etc, comes my way, so long as I have electricity and my DSL phone line, I am able to teach. When MUN was closed due to snow, I was able to teach. When we were on strike for two weeks, I was able to teach. Granted, I live only a 10-15 minute walk from my office (depending upon the wind direction) and a 3-5 minute drive in really bad rain, it would be the same if I was 1-2 hours away from my office. I can teach wherever there is a highspeed internet connection.

Thus, Macdoc, you are correct in your assumption. Telecommuters have an advantage over those who need to work on-site somewhere, especially somewhere they have to drive or take mass transportation. In 5 1/2 years, we have put 9500 km on our car, but that is because we drove across NL to go to Nova Scotia a few years ago. Having been born and raised in New York City, I learned to use the subway and bus system rather than to learn to drive.

It should be interesting if we see an exodus from the suburbs back into the heart of our cities. We shall see.


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## MacNutt (Jan 16, 2002)

Yeah, Dr. G. I'm eyeing a condo in downtown Toronto as we speak.(as if)

Back to the subject of this thread....oil and gas futures are moving lower today. This could mean a future drop in fuel prices!

We can only hope.


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## Dr.G. (Aug 4, 2001)

Macnutt, with US production of gas at its maximum level, there is no capacity for further refinement to meet the 2% increase in expected use of gas.


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## MacNutt (Jan 16, 2002)

US production of fuel is only a small part of the equation Dr G. And the fact that oil and gas futures are on the way down should give us all a bit of hope. This means that the people who trade in these commodities see prices heading southward in the months to come.

Let us hope.


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## IronMac (Sep 22, 2003)

MacNutt said:


> the fact that oil and gas futures are on the way down should give us all a bit of hope. This means that the people who trade in these commodities see prices heading southward in the months to come.


One day does not make a trend.


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## Dr.G. (Aug 4, 2001)

Futures are up and oil/gas stock prices are down. Moderation in the short term, and potential disaster in the long term.


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## MacNutt (Jan 16, 2002)

But it's a small start in the right direction, is it not?

And it's coming from the people who live and die on gas and oil prices, after all.

They seem to be bettin that those prices will FALL in the coming months.

This is, to me at least, is a positive sign. It means lower gas prices in the future.


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## MacNutt (Jan 16, 2002)

Of course we could aways listen to the political left on this subject.

They are telling us, rather loudly in fact, that the world is coming to an end!! 

But...they've been telling us this for about thirty or forty years now. And they've been completely WRONG each and every time! (They've also been telling us that socialism is the only way to save the species from this impending DOOM, BTW).

And THAT didn't exactly work out too well...did it? (Talk about a major dead-end!)

They've also had some rather spectacular failures at predicting what would happen in the middle east once the US led coalition invaded Iraq and deposed Saddam Hussein

So...is anyone still listening to them?

No? I didn't think so.


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## IronMac (Sep 22, 2003)

MacNutt said:


> Of course we could aways listen to the political left on this subject.
> 
> They are telling us, rather loudly in fact, that the world is coming to an end!!
> 
> ...


Amazing...more proof that MacNutt is always bringing along the same baggage to every thread that he touches. Why don't you simply put it all in your signature and save yourself the time to type it?

Hey, there's a difference between socialism and communism. Look it up!

And, once again, what predictions are you talking about? Are those my predictions or are you seeing me as a poster child for the lefties? LOL!!!


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## MacNutt (Jan 16, 2002)

No Ironmac...I don't actually see you as a "poster child for the lefties".

I just see you as a reasonably bright guy who has been seriously misled. For a VERY long time. That's all.

This error will correct itself over time. Just so long as you are still able to see what is before your very eyes...and aren't too heavily indoctrinated at this point.

The reality is out there, Ironmac. And it doesn't have very much to do with what you've been taught , so far.

Learn to recognise what is real...and what is just unattainable and unreasonable lefoid fantasy.

Then you will finally be on the right track.

Trust me on this.


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## IronMac (Sep 22, 2003)

C'mon...what predictions...stop avoiding the question now.


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## MacNutt (Jan 16, 2002)

My predictions?

Hybrid vehicles will be adopted by a majority of the population. Rather soon.

Just as I said in that post from two years back (when gas only cost about 60 cents per litre, BTW).

And the greenies, or their children, will be mounting a huge wave of protest against hybrid vehicles...once they become mainstream.

That's what I see coming down the pike.

Anything else I can help you with, Ironmac?


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## IronMac (Sep 22, 2003)

IronMac said:


> And, once again, what predictions are you talking about? Are those my predictions or are you seeing me as a poster child for the lefties? LOL!!!


These predictions..the ones that you've been saying that I've been wrong about in so many different threads. C'mon...stop pussyfooting around...as I said before, give me three examples of my predictions where I've been "terribly WRONG" in your own words.


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## MacNutt (Jan 16, 2002)

See my post on this subject on a related thread.

And, if you really want to pursue this subject IronMac...and take ut to it's logical conclusion...then feel free to start a brand new thread with a title like "IronMac's Bad Calls" or something.

I'll participate. Reluctantly.

Do you really want to do this?


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## talonracer (Dec 30, 2003)

*siiigh* I just paid over a dollar a litre to put the good stuff in my turbo.

I drive it to work, and walk as much as possible. But still, it hurts.....


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## MacNutt (Jan 16, 2002)

Prepare yourself TalonRacer. The price of fuel will likely rise in the next few months...before it drops back down to a more reasonable level.

These new high oil prices have spurred lots of new expolration in areas that were not previously thought of as "economically viable". Also, the canadian tar sands have now been further energised with massive new investments in oil recovery infrastructure.

And Iraq will eventually come back on line...once the foreign "militants" begin to realise that their constant suicide bombings are not actually having the desired effect. Or once they run out of willing young people who have nothing to live for, and are happy to strap a shrapnel-laden bomb onto their bodies and then wander into a big crowd and blow themselves up..

Two or three or five years from now I can see us all marvelling at how much fuel prices have actually dropped. Or...at least...have stabilised at a manageble level..

Watch and see.


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## used to be jwoodget (Aug 22, 2002)

> Two or three or five years from now I can see us all marvelling at how much fuel prices have actually dropped. Or...at least...have stabilised at a manageble level.


Time capsule note. For ease of future searching, here's a marker keyword: MPREDICT

Average gas price (Toronto): 90 cents per litre (I bought a tank at 84c yesterday)


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## GratuitousApplesauce (Jan 29, 2004)

> From the Toronto Star:
> 
> Last year, Ottawa shovelled $5.9 billion of your tax dollars to the fossil-fuel industry. This is far larger than current government support for sustainable energy technologies that will no doubt become the cornerstone of our future economy.
> 
> ...


Ironically, the ad that was served up when I viewed the article was an ad for the new Pontiac Montana SV6. "Built for drivers", yeah right, and everybody else can go to hell.


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## GratuitousApplesauce (Jan 29, 2004)

Two energy-predicament stories on the web today.

First, from James Howard Kunstler in Rolling Stone. This article serves as an excellent primer on the coming energy crunch.


> Carl Jung, one of the fathers of psychology, famously remarked that "people cannot stand too much reality."
> ...
> Most immediately we face the end of the cheap-fossil-fuel era. It is no exaggeration to state that reliable supplies of cheap oil and natural gas underlie everything we identify as the necessities of modern life -- not to mention all of its comforts and luxuries: central heating, air conditioning, cars, airplanes, electric lights, inexpensive clothing, recorded music, movies, hip-replacement surgery, national defense -- you name it.
> 
> The few Americans who are even aware that there is a gathering global-energy predicament usually misunderstand the core of the argument. That argument states that we don't have to run out of oil to start having severe problems with industrial civilization and its dependent systems. We only have to slip over the all-time production peak and begin a slide down the arc of steady depletion.


Secondly from Mark Morford in The San Francisco Chronicle. He uses rather colourful language to paint the picture.


> And here it is: We, humankind, people, sentient carbon-based biped creatures, only us and no one else but us because it sure as hell ain't the goddamn lions or caribou or meerkats or rhododendrons, we humans have, in our shockingly short time on this wobbly sphere, used up a staggering 60 percent of the world's grasslands, forests, farmland, rivers and lakes.
> 
> That's right, 60 percent. Gone. Burned up. Used up. Much of it irreversibly. These are the basic ecosystem services that, simply put, sustain life on Earth. The glass ain't even half full, people. It's about three-fifths empty and draining fast and we are doing our damnedest to expedite the process because, well, this is just who we are.


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## MacDoc (Nov 3, 2001)

Summer reading .... BOTH of Jared Diamond's books. Some of you may have caught his interview on CBC lately.

*Guns Germs and Steel* which recently won the Pulitzer prize.
and
*Collapse* which is both a caution and offers some cautious optimism IF decisions and actions are taken now.
It's some pretty scary reading about human foible over time.......and now.










Excellent scholarship, a broad view. He's devoted the rest of his life to this........for his kids sakes. :clap: Highly, highly recommended.


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## Dr.G. (Aug 4, 2001)

Macdoc, finished reading Guns Germs and Steel. I agree with your contention that it is a scholarly work, and I found it most educational.


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## GratuitousApplesauce (Jan 29, 2004)

Something hopeful?

A Canadian scientist has come up with a theory for a new form of alternative energy, called an "atmospheric vortex engine". I have no idea whether this is viable or just wishful thinking but the basic idea is to create, in effect, a tornado contained in a tower, by manipulating hot air, (don't ask me how) and use the air movement to run turbines that create electricity. If this is feasible it could be more efficient than wind power or existing solar and wouldn't require such large swaths of land to be used. The scientist is talking about creating 100 metre tall towers that could be 200 megawatt generating stations.

I would say an idea like this is deserving of some serious study and if worthwhile, serious investment.

http://www.energybulletin.net/5258.html 

BTW, does anyone know whatever happened to tidal power generating? I first heard about it a few years ago and it seems like it would be ideal for a place like BC or for the Maritimes. Tides and ocean currents are so incredibly powerful and I would have thought that some attempts to try and harness that energy would have been jumped at. Here on the west coast and Vancouver Island the demand for more power and the unsuitability of natural gas fired stations have been proven.


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## Eukaryotic (Jan 24, 2005)

This sounds interesting. 

BTW, I think there is a tidal energy project going in somewhere around New York soon..maybe in the east river, but I can't remember off hand. I think like most alt energy, it just can't compete with fossil fuels. 

Geothermal is coming on strong, and in odd places (e.g., Saskatchewan).


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## Dr.G. (Aug 4, 2001)

$1.009 is the cheapest gas one is able to get in the province of NL.


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## FeXL (Jan 2, 2004)

GratuitousApplesauce said:


> Something hopeful?
> 
> A Canadian scientist has come up with a theory for a new form of alternative energy, called an "atmospheric vortex engine". I have no idea whether this is viable or just wishful thinking but the basic idea is to create, in effect, a tornado contained in a tower, by manipulating hot air, (don't ask me how) and use the air movement to run turbines that create electricity. If this is feasible it could be more efficient than wind power or existing solar and wouldn't require such large swaths of land to be used. The scientist is talking about creating 100 metre tall towers that could be 200 megawatt generating stations.
> 
> I would say an idea like this is deserving of some serious study and if worthwhile, serious investment.


GA, you may find this link informative (solar towers):

http://www.enviromission.com.au/


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