We're already seeing that increased gas prices does a LOT more damage than oil consumption.  Some people say our current recession is based on it.

First of all, I agree that any posting in this thread should not be getting any arrows, red or green, since this is off topic. Unless, of course, there are personal attacks.

[rant]
So the speculators, who were blamed for the run up in oil prices this past summer for buying futures at $145/bbl, are making exactly how much selling them at $94?  Speculators are not the problem, the United States Congress is. Not drilling for any new oil in the U.S. along with indications of future "problems" in the Middle East, (which indicate no additional supply and possible supply interruptions) with projected continued increase in world demand is the reason the speculators bid up the futures prices. The day after the President rescinded the executive order banning off-shore drilling, the futures price fell $15. That fall was precipitated by a meaningless act, since the Congress must also make changes to current law banning any drilling. So for all of the blithering idiots who keep saying it will take 10 years before any new drilling will have an effect so it's just not worth the efforts,  just open your eyes and look at that 1 day event. Why should we bother to educate our children, since it will take 12 to 15 years before it will do any good. Geezzz.

Of course all of the above is only relevant to the price of crude. Not allowing any new refineries (current regulations make them nearly cost prohibitive) means that the supply of gasoline and diesel fuel is limited to the daily output of existing facilities. Some of our fuels are imported already refined, but there is a limit of how many gallons that can be shipped. Simple supply and demand economics here. Hurricane Ike shut down the gulf refineries, price shoots up the same day, not because of the price of crude oil, but because the supply of fuel was reduced by the number of refineries producing it. Several oil companies are in the process of expanding their capacity at current refineries, and that will take time to have any major effect on prices.

They passed (or introduced, I just heard snippets on the radio) a new off-shore law today, allowing drilling outside 50 miles, which is effectively a continuation of the current ban, since the majority of known oil deposits off the coast are within that 50 mile restricted area. They continue to decry that drilling in ANWR will somehow destroy the planet with no evidence that it would. All the while promoting converting our food producing land into fuel producing land with ethanol subsidies, then complaining about the high cost of food. How long will the American people continue to allow these petroleum engineers in congress to continue this charade of an energy policy remains to be seen.

The only thing more amazing to me than this is that a lot of people think these same petroleum engineers are also qualified as doctors and should take over the best health care system in the world, and that they are also very good businessmen, so they should take over the mortgage industry that their regulations bankrupted in the first place.
[/rant]

So yes, DO EVERYTHING. There is no reason not to have more nuclear and clean burning coal power plants. There is no reason we should not have more hydro-electric plants. Research solar and energy storage, wind, geothermal, figure out if they are economically feasible. But for God's sake, don't just throw up our hands in despair and say "we can't use oil because we're going to run out someday anyway." We live in the most technologically advanced period of human history, and a bunch of people who are not qualified to operate a power plant (congress) are telling us that we have to step back into the 1700's because they're not going to let us use the oil under our own soil.  So you all had better get your horses now, because in a couple of years, an old nag might cost $100K.

On a side note, increased world wide demand for food (mainly meat) has driven up phosphate demand causing the price of fertilizers (an other phosphates) to increase from 2 to 5 times in the last year and a half. We make industrial detergent that sold for $46 a box in January of 07 that is now $98. The cost of fuel has had some impact on this, but primarily it is the phosphate demand.

There is a good amount of oil in the US that is not located offshore or in ANWAR, but it's not being drilled at all by any of the oil companies. Most domestic exploration and development in the US dropped to extremely low levels when the price of oil was so cheap that it wasn't cost effective to drill in the US and we instead imported the oil from other countries where their cost of labor for producing the oil was less. Now that oil has risen in price, the oil companies want new leases rather than work on the undeveloped ones they have been sitting on for 10 years or more.

Here's a cool site:

Movies

Who Killed the Electric Car:

Car

Quoting Mithi:

Quote:
Quoting hal9g:

Quote:
There's no way to implement or enforce this kind of stuff

There is ... increase the gas prices until the people are forced to reason.

cya, Mithi

You can't be serious.  What do you think will happen to the price of goods if your solution is implimented?

The farmer still has to run his equipment.  Do you think he is just going to eat the increased cost of gas?
The shipper, who delivers that food to the market, still has to drive his truck.  Do you think he is going to eat the additional cost?

The cost of gas is factored into, just about, every product you have in your home.  If that price goes up, who do you think is going to pay for it?  And that doesn't even take into account all the gas used by police cars, fire tucks, ambulances, etc.  Again, who do you think is going to pay for all of that?

Like it or not, the industrial world's economy is linked to the price of fuel.  Simply raising that price isn't going to do anything but screw up that economy.

Quoting Astrakan:

Quote:
Quoting Unicus69:

Quote:
You can't be serious.  What do you think will happen to the price of goods if your solution is implimented?

...The cost of gas is factored into, just about, every product you have in your home.  If that price goes up, who do you think is going to pay for it?

With this post I don't want to give the impression that I favour the solution of increasing the cost of gas until people are forced to alter their habits, but...

There's a simple workaround to the problem you're describing. If the government increased the tax on gas to the point where they force individuals to alter their gas consumption habits, they could make it so corporations and government services either don't have to pay the tax, or that they get that part of their gas consumption $ back from the government.

This is not a solution I came up with, it's the way it works in some other countries when it comes to sales tax spent by corporations.

KM

And the left would scream that we're giving big corporations a tax break while sticking it to the "middle class".

Raising gas prices through any means is not the answer.  Moving to alternative energy for cars is.

Quoting Mithi:

Quote:
Quoting hal9g:

Quote:
There's no way to implement or enforce this kind of stuff

There is ... increase the gas prices until the people are forced to reason.

cya, Mithi

The problem with artificially increasing the price of gas is that it falls disproportionately upon the people who are the least able to afford it.  People on the left (and many on the right, too) complain about oil companies making "obscene" profits -- so they clearly feel that rich people should pay more.  But if you increase the price of gas, the rich people would still be able to buy as much as they want with little effect on their standard of living.  Lower income people (i.e., the working stiffs), would be the ones who would consume less gas because they can't afford the higher price.  This is a terribly regressive way to encourage conservation.  And if you raised prices high enough to affect the rich people -- those prices would be so high that the lower income wage earners probably couldn't afford ANY gas.

As Hal said, raising gas prices is NOT the answer.

Hi Guys,

When gas was relatively cheap Detroit gave us SUV's, Hummers & other gas guzzlers. Why gas was cheap & larger cars equal more profit. Shareholders were happy & car companies prospered. It's the correct thing to do with our form of enterprise. When gas prices shot up, the big three were, out of tune, and are scrambling (johnny come lately) to supply fuel sipping autos. It's important for government to not interfere with free markets, or as little as possible. Solutions always come from problems, hence high oil prices brought a renewed effort for alternatives. When gas is selling for 50 cents a gallon, the electric car is a curiosity, that is not taken serious. With oil prices at current prices Rick Wagoner CEO of GM chose the 100th anniversary of GM, to announce the 'Volt.'

What's important here is a balance or (middle ground) between extreme environmentalists & their opposite contingency. While nuclear reactors, and hydro power seem like the correct thing to do now. The costs of today's solution, can be problematic in the future.

Take Care
Rico

PS - Judge Brian - If I remember correctly your familiar with the "Upper Hand" aka Michigan, are you aware of U. of Michigan study/report on """"Adaptive Cruise Control"""" & its impact on transportation?