comic_relief said:
How won't it help the farmers? Getting tractors that are better mileage and can run better and longer. Plus when the shipping costs of the farmers goes down, then so will the gas prices.
The shipping costs
are the gas prices. Regardless of what the United States does in terms of infrastructure development, oil won't be coming back down anytime soon because of the major global demands, our approach to (or passing of) peak oil, the vice like grip of a industry that makes more money than god, and invests zero in new refineries to increase production. And don't get me started on ethanol.
comic_relief said:
Do not think that this is to get gas prices to go down. I am advocating an entire shift in the nature of the United States political system and its people. If we continue to rely on outside sources for energy then we will be damned.
Thats all nice and easy to say, but that will take an act of god for this transformation. I feel the same change is needed if American wishes to continue to be
the superpower or become a Hyper power. But you must get this idea of break our reliance on foreign energy out of your mind, because it isn't going to happen. Ever. The only way this could happen is if we discovered an oil well bigger than Athabasca and the Gulf combined and next to that 2 Billion years worth of Uranium, encased in Noah's ark with a happy Jesus saying "Howdy Y'all"
comic_relief said:
If there was an effective program coming into use for public transportation, then I would be one of the first people to help get it going.
Whats the problem with the ones now? If anything all you really need to do is expand the system capacity and distribution and increase the appeal of trains themselves and the people will come.
comic_relief said:
if we would redo the public transit system, then we would actually be creating growth in this country and demand would go down as well. More people using public transit would theoretically equal less gas consumption. Less gasoline consumption would equal lower prices as well at the pump.
And who will pay for it? I also redirect you to my first counter-point.
comic_relief said:
And if you would really like to think about it, if we could rework the coal industry of Montana. Montana has enough coal that it has been dubbed "the Saudia Arabia of the United States"
Our power plants burn billions of tons of coal each year, and since this coal contains radioactive uranium and thorium, burning coal actually puts 2,000 tons of radioactivity into our atmosphere each and every single year. So thats a no from me on coal.
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comic_relief said:
true all at once, it cannot be absorbed. If we would continually add a quarter in each couple months, then the country would be able to absorb it.
No because its still an increase in cost over a short period of time. And where will this money go? Money conveniently disappears in government.
comic_relief said:
Actually less demand will help the country more and more. Supply and Demand is what is happening. Gasoline is an inelastic demand unless we change the backbone of the country.
Yes, less demand will help. But that assumes you'll have a substitute readily available, not in its infancy.
comic_relief said:
True, it would be a good idea to go to electric cars. Unfortunately, it is a short term solution to a long term problem.
How'd you come to that? Cars aren't the problem. And I'm never, ever, ever, ever,
ever going to give up my car. Except for a sweet ass bike.
comic_relief said:
We have the technology and the know-how to redesign the engine to get well over 50 miles per gallon or higher. Hell, I read an article at Yahoo about a car that can get over 3,000 miles to the gallon (three wheeled car with a much different design) from a French team. This is one example of a car that can get massive amounts of energy. If one group can do this, then why can we not get this into the everyday cars?
You're still thinking in MPG, try miles per charge. And because that would require the elaborate, multi-billion dollar manufacturing process of modern automakers to change. I would refer you to Jan08 of Wired.
comic_relief said:
I also heard that combustion engines only use 31% of the energy that it could be using. I'm not sure the validity of the statement and I would love to learn more about it.
Yes, 50 years from now, it will look terribly inefficient. The majority of energy that is released is heat. An electrical grid powered by Nuclear reactors would allow the plug in electric to thrive.
comic_relief said:
Offer better tax and insurance breaks to the owners of cars and the companies that get all of there vehicles over 50 mpg. This will offer money back to the owners of such cars and send over tax breaks to the companies that get rid of ALL cars in their lines that get below 50 mpg. With higher gas mileage, theoretically demand will go down. I have a general gist of the supply/demand.
No real opinion regarding this statement.
comic_relief said:
P.S. we must diversify our energy needs. I know that oil is the most powerful product out there at the moment, but putting all of our eggs in one basket is a disaster.
We're not solely dependent on oil, we have massive stores of Natural gas that we could be using in cars, but like morons, we use it to make electricity.
This is what an Electric Car looks like.
And this is what it goes like
