loves; we are not in an either-or situation here. Without more drilling, US production of oil is constantly dropping! Any oil company has to drill up more production capacity to compenste for the depletion of existing wells. So, with a horrendous $350,000,000,000 annual oil import bill, the US cannot afford NOT to drill in all domestice places possible!
As for snapping your fingers and switching to alternative energy, that only happens in a Walt Disney movie or a sci-fi flick. The transition from steam to diesel locomotives (a known technology) took about 25 years. The only rapid technology change we have witnessed these days is the demise of photo film in favor of digital photography. That required little capital oulay and infrastructure changes.
Bio fuels will supply no more that 10-15% at best. Plug-in hybrids will take 10 years to make a significant consumption impact if they were on sale today! The US car fleet will take 10 years to change over; it’s economically hard to scrap a Ford Expedition, a vehicle only a Middle East country would want at any price.
The Norwegians are enjoying a massive trade surplus, but have taken your advice and are paying $8.25 per gallon for gas (and taxing gas guzzlers)as a major oil exporting country!! They hosted the first Green Olympics and heavily subsidize solar technology to kickstart the change. At the same time they are still developing their remaining oil fields and are leaders in carbon sequestration.
I’m all for a crash program in alternative energy, but count on at least 20 years to make a transition even with a very painful cost attached! Sending a man to the moon was simple by comparison.
My understanding is that offshore drilling wouldn’t make a dent in our consuming habits at all (if the argument is that it would reduce the current price of gas). Then there is the resultant pollution. Just visit the Texas gulf beaches - you’re constantly having to watch where you step lest you want “tar-feet.” Instead of sprinklers to wash the sand off, hotels have cans of turpentine and rags. High-speed rail and super-efficient cars/trucks are the answer.
Ellie; every country must pick the options it deems most suitable. Aside from the Iraq war, the US is bleeding $350 billion per year in oil imports. This could be virtually eliminated if YOU and I and all others all drove samll, 4 cylinder cars and took the bus or train more often. In other words, if we used as much gas as the French or Japanese did, we would not have this huge import bill, and we would maybe not have to drill offshore (which every other oil country is doing) for a while. You CAN drill offshore and keep the beaches pristine; the British, who have been producing oil from the North Sea for 40 years, had one major oil spill and that was a leaky Greek transport tanker, carrying Middle East oil, manned by substandard crews. The EXXON Valdez spill had nothing to do with oil production, but everything with poor transportation regs and drinking on the job.
In an above post we state that bringing out new technology and the time required to fully implement it takes 20-30 years, not 10 as you suggest.
The next tenant in the White House will have to discipline US personal consumption with a war measures style control to save the dollar more than the environment. I’m quite happy to make these sacrifices; are YOU?
While not necessarily better than developing alternate energy sources, offshore drilling and ANWR drilling are certainly necessary to our continued well-being until those alternate sources are developed. Drill here, drill now – even if we probably won’t pay less.
Just curious here. What is your expertise in the field? Are you a degreed climatologist?
As to where I get my info, I’ve stated before I get it from my son who is a climatology scientist and by reading through a number of obscure and downright mind-numb boring books and technical manuals.
Along with misspelling tectonic, socialogical is also misspelled and adnauseum should be separated with a breath of air between ad and nauseum.
My son will be here tomorrow and I’ll get him to read through this but he will not get involved in an internet discussion. It’s pretty pointless in his opinion so he just concentrates on the science end of things and motors on.
You and I both Doc, and maybe a few others amounting to about 1 percent of the population…how do you make luxuriousness unfashionable and legislate common sense and morality???
I am with you, Doc! The Iraq War is the first war in American history in which we have cut taxes and not been asked to make sacrifices for the good of the country. Any real Americans with a sense of history will be willing to make these sacrifices (and more) for the good of the country.
Kuiama, the answer is not to legislate common sense and morality. That has never worked. We should look to the greatest generation as an example of how sacrificing can make a difference. Back then, if you were not saving cooking grease for munitions, or if you weren’t growing your own vegetables, your peers frowned upon you. Peer pressure works better than legislation.
Richard Nixon imposed some draconian wage and price controls, import restriction and other unpopular things. A president, faced with a plummeting dollar, skyrocketing oil prices (if the present trend prevails), and actual shortages will either have to impose rationing (WW II style), or jack up the gas prices futher to choke off demand. He will have to impose a crushing horsepower and weight tax, like most developed countries do and tighten up the CAFE standards to the level of California.
The US is not far from that point; if you had followed our threads on this for the last year there have been predictions that this very thing will happen. The big question is, will a democratic president do the right thing, even if it might mean the possible death of GM, Ford and Chrysler?
Our family has already made most of these changes; changing 2 8 cylinder cars for 2 4 cylinder, upgrading to more efficient appliances, light bulbs, retrofitting the house to be more energy efficient. In all, since we started in 2005, we have reduced energy use by about 42% and green house gasses by 45% from the 1990 level as specified by Kyoto/Gore.
Interestingly, our lifestyle has not changed much; we just take the bus a little more often. But I’m not giving up my 50" high definition TV or 3 computers, and my wife loves her kitchen gadgets.
Hello Redleader; just thought I would post back after visiting with my son and while the technical answers are mind numbing and long it can be condensed into something simple. Hope this is not too lengthy.
What ended the ice age? Basically, the sun pulses and when the pulse is large the temps climb. It’s referred to as Irradiance.
How much CO2/particulates from a volcanic eruption? A lot; and at the end of this post I’ll provide a graph to show you what I mean.
How does solar activity affect the atmosphere? It’s the same as answer to question one above.
Are there cracks in the ocean floor, etc, etc. Yes and it does have an affect. Methane is released, it rises into the atmosphere where it is oxidized into CO2, etc. (This is also the cause of the “Bermuda Triangle problem”. It’s huge quantities of methane gas being released from the ocean floor; enough to flip boats and bring down aircraft. Gigantic gas bubbles if you will.)
The effect of natural wildfires and are they a recent occurrence? They have no affect at all except on a local basis (haze which contributes to holding temps down) and natural wildfires have been around for eons.
That’s the short answers anyway and hope it helps.
Here’s a couple of things to consider.
Did you know that these dire predictions of GW gloom and doom are based one one thing; and that one thing is computer modeling. Nothing more. My son said he works with some of these models and has found “mistakes” in them, although he does consider it “accidental” and not on purpose.
Here’s the kicker. Did you know these GW models are good for an absolute maximum of 10 days at the utmost? That’s it and they’re only good for 10 days if everything remains the same. Does the weather remain the same? No.
Here’s the chart I mentioned. Note James Hansen, one of the leading proponents of GW and not even schooled in the field, testified for Al Gore when he was in Congress 20 years ago followed by testifying again on the 20th anniversary. Look real close at those average temps when he testified and tell me where the temps have escalated. Hansen will sure not talk about it. My son has heard this guy speak in person and thinks he’s either a nutcase or one of the crookedest hucksters around.
As to volcanic eruptions, Mt. Pinatubo in the Phillipines went off in 1991 and put 17 million tons of aerosols into the atmosphere along with dropping global temps by .9 degrees F. and raising stratosphere temps by about 2 degrees due to radiation absorption. In that chart note how the spike to the right of 1988 makes a sharp drop-off. That is Mt. Pinatubo caused global cooling.
This is greatly simplified but hope it helps to understand this issue a bit. If more info is needed I will gladly try to provide it.
Why don?t we do both? In the early ?70s, I was building a new house and I was told that nuclear electricity was coming. Then we had ?3 mile island?! ?Oh, my God! We?re doomed!? Bull! There was not a SINGLE death, but ?whoa is me!? AND we had a president [Jimmy Carter!] who was a nuclear engineer, no less! Geesh!
Now that gasoline prices have gone through the roof, it?s time for us to develop alternate energy sources and technology for transportation, housing AND industry!
Dick O, Ossian, IN
Yes, 3 Mile Island actually proved that nuclear power was safe; the plant shut itself down the way it was supposed to, and no one was injured. I remember afterwards the bumper sticker that read: “More people were killed in Ted Kennedy’s car than at 3 MIle Island!”
The Iraq war was probably the first in the World’s history fought by reducing taxes. If you and I beaved this way by maxing out our credit cards, we would soon find ourselves on the street.
caddyman? Try this on. Any motor vehicle that gets 50 mpg or better is exempt from Federal safety and emissions regulations.
You got a link for reference on that? Never heard that before! If true I still don’t see it helping much. Most states wont allow vehicles under specific qualifications on the interstates. Some states require these little compact low horse power electric and/or fuel vehicles to follow the licensing and regulations of mopeds while some class them as motorcycles. Each state has it’s own regulations and I suppose a lot of it involves a minimum horsepower to weight ratio or similar.
I know In SC they are only allowed on city and neighborhood streets. No interstate use. I think the hi-ways are ok if the vehicle is capable of at least 45 MPH. Full size EV/hybrids are allowed on the interstates but must follow all the same safety and emission standards of the federal regulations.
If you are converting a US produced vehicle you must maintain the regulations of that production year. A guy in Rock Hill, NC runs a bussiness doing just that. I have noticed most of his work is on older vehicles that have less equipment to simplify the conversion. A recent production can be done but will cost you much more than it’s worth. The heavily equiped current production vehicles have a tone of stuff to deal with.
I don’t remember the amount of radioactivity being lost at Three Mile Island since this is ancient history but it seems to me as best as I can recollect that the amount was equivalent to what is used/emitted/absorbed during a basic chest X-ray.
I understand the issue of finding our own sources of oil would be a great improvement on our economy and security both. However, regardless where anyone gets their oil from, there is still a great issue of environmental impact that must be considered at each site. ANWR is a very significant interest to the world and we are the ones in control of it’s destiny, in relation to how we use it. If we allowed oil production in ANWR it would definitely impact the environment. Don’t be fooled by the hype, the site in question is a tiny fraction of size in comparison to the oil fields already in production throughout Alaska. The ANWR oil is also in small scattered areas that would require multiple pumping stations and numerous pipelines to connect to a few central points. The actual impact of this sprawl would be wide spread throughout the coastal plain. The oil in question is in small deposits along the coast. There are other areas as well but require more difficult mining techniques. The ones along the coast are the easy access wells.
Get your foot in the door, then balls to the wall on the rest! I gather thats the idea.
This is strictly my own opinion:
They (oil industry and it’s supporters) just want to get in on a refuge that is remotely located to set a presidence to greater increase chances of doing the same anywhere they choose down the road.
Current production in Alaska is already causing environmental problems. Is it OK to ruin a land just because the area in question is sparsely populated by humans? What about the long term effects? What is the point of a wildlife refuge? Just more freaking politics, I guess!!
The “1002 Area” is 1.6 million acres between the Beaufort Sea and the foothills of the Brooks Range at the northern edge of the 19 million-acre Arctic refuge. 95% of Alaska?s coastal plain is already open to oil and gas exploration. Refuge coastal plain (Area 1002) represents the last 5% of Alaska?s coastal plain that remains inaccessible and Undevelopable.
40 USGS scientists spent 3 years preparing a 1998 report. Alaska agencies, federal agencies and several universities were involved. 1400 miles of seismic data collected by the petroleum industry were reanalyzed. Here are the USGS numbers for the entire 1002 area, including native lands and the offshore areas.
If native lands and the offshore areas are excluded:
Technically recoverable oil:
F95 (pretty sure) 4.3 billion barrels,
F05 (outside chance) 11.8 billion barrels.
ANWR oil is not another Prudhoe Bay. There is less oil and it is distributed in a large number of small fields dispersed over a large area. The oil is under the coastal plane.
Since “technically recoverable oil” means “recovery without regard to cost,” it is not a good metric. The USGS should have provided numbers for economically recoverable oil.
The outside chance of technically recoverable oil with exclusion of offshore and native lands @ 11.8 billion barrels is less or equal to the remaining volume at Prudhoe Bay. I have had no luck finding the actual current volume for Prudhoe. The original volume was 35 billion (mean estimate) and in 2004 we had used up about 13 billion over a period of approximately 27 years. The condition of the TAPS system would need a major overhaul and upgrading to speed up production if we wanted to increase daily pumping from that region. That is a task that would take many years and yet another huge increase in oil price to pay for it. With the savings for domestic versus import at the end we would be in the same boat as we are now once you added the cost for rebuilding the TAPS system.
Prudhoe Bay has also caused environmental impacts in Alaska. Why would this site not see the same? Why would it not be worse, seeing that in ANWR the fields are small but wide spread on a coast that is a major habitat for migratory birds? Hosts feeding for many other animals as well. Many sources are speculating the ANWR oil, if allowed, would be pumped to the TAPS pipeline which is a reasonable conclusion. The TAPS system is already greatly degraded and some parts have been shut down. It is just a matter of time before the whole system will be shut down even if only temporary for rebuilding!$$$$$$$$$$$ Recent trends in the price of oil going up has caused decreased budgets for maintaining the TAPS system. Will this trend continue? I for one think it will!
What we need is an increased investment in sustainable energy such as wind, solar, and geothermal. Many people know the basics of solar and wind, though there are a lot of misconceptions of them, but not many understand what geothermal is. Well here is an interactive explanation: http://www.calenergy.com/html/aboutus4.asp
The biggest issue with these technologies is cost, but oil prices are only going to continue to go up and out price these technologies in the end. Plus the oil will run out eventually. Costs are dropping with these technologies as more and more people are starting to use them. One of the big boosts to the solar energy has been the evolution of selling excess production to the power company at your peak during the day. This allows you to delete several thousand dollars from your solar installation due to no need of storing the energy in a massive bank of batteries. The peak production is typicaly in the day when the power company would be at peak demand. It’s a win win situation. An integrated system of wind/solar is also an option. Many are concerned about loosing production during bad weather. Usually when a storm comes along and reduces solar energy there is an increase in wind velocity due to thermal air mass changes. So integrated systems are a good match in that situation. Also when tied to the grid you always have access to energy even if your solar or wind system is down.
I am not one that supports this trend of using these current bio-fuel products. We are growing a huge population and can’t afford to continue forfeiting food for fuel. Methanol may burn cleaner but the efficiency is less than that of the standard gasoline so what good does that do in the long run?
My bottom line point is we need to look els where for energy! Oil will not last forever and will continue to rise in monetary costs as well as continue to escalate conflicts as it becomes more scarce!
They estimated that members of the public received a total of about 1 millirem (mr) due to the accident, to put that in perspective, the legal limit for public exposure is 100 mr in one year or 2 mr in any one hour. The limit for workers in a plant is 5000 mr in one year (most people don’t approach that limit). I can routinely get about 5 mr in a couple of hours within the radiological controlled areas of a plant, which I probably do a dozen times per year. Some people routinely get several 100 mr per year, depending on their job.
Personally, I don’t have a problem nuclear energy sites. Like anything else, a problem can occur but with current technology, etc. and numerous safeguards I think it’s a safe trade off.
One thing I do have an issue with is if there is a problem and a coverup occurs. This is what I believed happened in the Karen Silkwood case, which was partially documented in a movie.
In the Silkwood case there was leakage due to faulty welds on casings that enclosed plutonium rods and the company was apparently trying to hush this up. There was a lot more to it than what the movie was able to present and the company that owned the facility itself was bought out a few years ago.
I live right down the road from this facility and after the Silkwood death the press was really on this issue but some serious questions remain unanswered to this day.
The facility went through several name changes after the Silkwood thing and has been closed for a number of years with a skeleton crew of security, etc. left in place.
The facility sits on a hill about a 1/2 mile from the Cimarron River and it was reported on the local news here a year or so ago that a small town down the river and about 30 miles away detected radiation in their ground water. It was also reported at that time that there was a small? spill of some sort before the Silkwood incident, both of which occurred well over 30 years ago.
Details are still pretty sparse but at this point there appears to be no human/plant/animal life affected. No one is catching any 3-eyed fish out of the river at this point.
One thing I do have an issue with is if there is a problem and a coverup occurs. This is what I believed happened in the Karen Silkwood case, which was partially documented in a movie.
As long as there’s money involved…people will cover it up. Look at the shuttle disaster in 85. Engineers working for the booster rocket company told management YEARS before the accident that those seals needed to be redesigned. There were memo’s and letters…it was all hushed up…NASA didn’t hear a word about this problem from the engineering company. Then the disaster and the investigation found all these memo’s and engineers willing to talk.
The cover ups will happen…it’s just what will be the result of the cover ups that scare the h*ll out of me. I do NOT trust this whole industry. Cover-up after cover-up after cover-up…3-mile island or much much worse can happen again. And when it does…we’ll find out AFTER people are killed or massive amounts of radiation are leaked that there was a cover-up.
Wow… GW IS much more involved than just calculating greenhouse gasses, yes! One of the reasons for so many different types of scientists being involved is because GW is not just about climatology but rather “Earth systems” which is a collection of many different fields (my field, BTW, is astronomy but I do have a fairly extensive background, if not a degree, in climatology. Astronomy allows me to know quite a bit about solar cycles and Earth’s orbit both of which have a very large NATURAL effect on the climate). I would actually be very interested in your 3000 PPM CO2 level from 5M years ago because that is one that I have not encountered before… What I do know about is the Antarctic record which extends back about 600,000 years and there are no CO2 levels that are higher than today in that record. Those records fit the solar and Earth-position cycles perfectly… with the exception of the last 100 years or so.
All of that aside, what means more to you: the idea that GW is NOT anthropogenic or the idea that we are currently not being particularly good stewards of our planet? I do not think that there should be any of this fuss over the issue of natural vs. anthropogenic GW… the MOST IMPORTANT point is that if there is even a remote CHANCE that GW COULD be anthropogenic, should we not TRY to do better? The US used to be the most technologically advanced country in the world… now we are falling behind. The “green trend” is a really good opportunity for the country to get back up to the top of the pile both technologically and economically.
I personally do not worry about spewing oil wells in the Arctic as I know how far that technology has come with containment. What concerns me is that the cost of exploration, road building, pipeline building, fuel for all those vehicles, man-power, etc. will far outweigh the benefit of reduced cost from the oil found there. We all have to remember to look at the big picture, is all. While it might seem like a great idea to help relieve the current oil stress, I personally do not think that the results will, in any way, overcome the costs. We would do a lot more by putting that same money into US-based green alternatives.
I think Caddyman means “try this idea on for size.” It isn’t true currently. I think it is a good idea. Look at all the motorcycles being run without catalytic converters. They don’t require ABS, airbags, or crumple zones. If we relaxed these same standards for cars that get more than 50 MPG, we would save a lot of fuel. You could buy an economical small car that gets fuel economy as good as or better than the average motorcycle. Just make sure there is enough room inside for me to wear a helmet.
