I'll believe this when I see it, but I'm heartened to see the President actually appearing to take steps toward something I have been advocating for several years, and that should have begun many years ago, as soon as Washington began to receive evidence that the global jihad was being financed by oil money. But of course, it is difficult to find anyone in Washington willing to speak of "jihad," rather than "terrorism," even today. From AP, with thanks to JE:
MILWAUKEE - Saying the nation is on the verge of technological breakthroughs that would "startle" most Americans, President Bush on Monday outlined his energy proposals to help wean the country off foreign oil.Less than half the crude oil used by refineries is produced in the United States, while 60 percent comes from foreign nations, Bush said during the first stop on a two-day trip to talk about energy.
Some of these foreign suppliers have "unstable" governments that have fundamental differences with America, he said.
"It creates a national security issue and we're held hostage for energy by foreign nations that may not like us," Bush said.
It's the one with a "stable" government that professes to "like us" right well that concerns me the most.
Tech-fuel will replace "fossil fuel" in a short time, probably within a decade. However, when the world goes to alternative fuels, when the revenue streams from oil dry up, Loonytoons will deny reality, blame the Jews. But I have a hunch that ordinary folks in the Middle East and elsewhere are going to put the blame where it belongs.
500 years ago the Atlantic nations of Europe had to seek alternative sea routes to the Far East because of conflicts with Islam, conflicts with the Ottoman Empire. The West will soon discover a New World of alternative fuel because of similar conflicts with Wahabies, Jihadists, Toons.
when the world goes to alternative fuels, when the revenue streams from oil dry up, Loonytoons will deny reality, blame the Jews.
In this instance, they may be right. We can only pray.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/4719334.stm
Frank, what woulf that "tech-fuel" be ? And that in a decade - well, that's optimistic. I hang around at some forums which concentrate in oil depletion. There is some speculation even about Saudi's themselves. Officially, Saudi's are very confident about their reserves, they boast that they can double the production whenever they want. The public opinion at depletion community is that Saudi's are just bragging, they can only cater minor increases with razor-thin spare capacity. The skeptics also point out that all increases in production appears to be sour, so not only are the reserves declining but the quality switches from sweet to sour which causes problems that too. If you want to get a skeptical wiev on the Saudi's, I'd recommend Matthew Simmons "Twilight on the desert". According to Simmons, the Saudi's are already on the plateau state and will start declining within 10 years. That would naturally solve or ease the Wahhabi problem caused by petrodollars in a natural way. However, the secretive nature of Saudi's oil company Aramco makes all this speculation shaky. The Saudi oil minister said once that the stone age did not end to that one run out of stones. Go figure.
What relevence would the depletion community have on this forum then ? Well, the public opinion there is that it is damn difficult to replace oil - as a vehicle fuel. It is not so that we have an energy-crisis; the hydro, coal, nuke and other power plants work just fine. Rather, we have a "transport crisis." It is very typical that a newbie jumps in to a depletion forum with a new fresh idea, and after the regulars show the newbie the maths, enthusiasm fades. After a while the (former) newbie is himself one the cynical-sounding regulars. And the point is that at depletion forums, most of the stuff to replace oil has been tried, debated.
Hydrogen ? There are no free H2 deposits anywhere, what you can do is that you split water with nuke power to H2 and O. Of the top of my head, I recall the amount of nuke plants required to switch the U.S from gasoline to H2 would be approx. 1000 x 1000 MW. Yes. 1000 new 1000 MW nuke plants.
Ethanol ? Input > output. The only reason for the idea of farmers growing the U.S fuel is politics and the subsidies.
Methanol, the by-product from pulp factories ? Go ahead, but use it on-site. If you transport it somewhere, the transport will eat up the effect ratio to near zero.
And so on it it goes. Of course, I'm in no position to say that there possibly could not be some new inventions on a way, especially on the long run. But so far I've seen the destiny of new innovations to be buried into the second law of thermodynamics. If not buried, one finds nevertheless the room of operation being very limited both techically and ecomically.
I agree with Finn. When you look at the real amounts of energy needed, and the
portability, there isn't anything on the radar. The article linked by Charles
Martel above points out that there isn't enough zinc available to make that
fuel viable on a large scale. In addition, solar power on a large scale,
as mentioned in the same article would leave a nation vulnerable to a
crippling attack. Not exactly a recipe for national security. If one reads
up on the subject of oil depletion and the prospects
for it's replacement,
it gets real depressing. I recommend reading the vast amounts of information
and debate available out there and drawing a conclusion from a consensus
of people without a vested interest. I for one am a pessimist about the future
based in part on the subject here in this forum, and also from the future
energy picture.
"Bush: U.S. on Verge of Energy Breakthrough"
Oil discovered in Saudi Arabia (yes, that's it).
From article: "It creates a national security issue…”
But it’s OK to have the UAE take over operations of 6 of our ports? Yeah, that makes total sense. Not.
Cellulosic Ethanol.
Cheaper to make than ethanol, better emisions, less capital to build production plants and way more potential fuel sources (corn stalks, wheat straw, wood chips, even grass).
This is the fuel that will stop the supertankers bringing oil from the ME, sooner than you think.
Moose
Current IC engines are 60% inefficient. Bush is saying that 60% of America's oil is sourced from foreign nations. Plugging the leak would be a good start.
If we could build steam engines that were over 90% efficient a century ago, then it seems nothing short of... sinister that we're wasting most of our bang-for-buck with such reckless abandon.
Biofuels are viable. Look at the agricultural yeilds achieved by China over the last century. Now consider the vast expanses of open plains across the US.... If bannana republics can fuel their vehicles on bannanas, then what gives? Not prudent economics, that's for sure. Homegrown fuels could even be carbon negative, and sink some carbon back into the earth as biomass / humus.
Finn-I note your remarks and they are based on reason. However, in 1945 the world was stunned that there had been a "Manhattan Project" and the research at Los Alamos. I would not be surprised re an energy "Manhattan project" and Bush may be thinking about things that are not public-yet. Just a hunch.
Don't dismiss hunches-LOL. James Baker once said that the only person who thought the Soviet Union was going to collapse was Ronald Reagan. Sometimes intuition proves to be right.
CSIRO is developing a device the size of a microwave oven that can convert water into hydrogen at very high efficiency that could provide enough hydrogen every day to run your car for 150km. You could use solar (on your roof) or mains power to do this.
http://www.cmit.csiro.au/news/viewpress.cfm/152
...and to store it easily in your car a company called HYdrexia..."have demonstrated a hydrogen storage capacity of up to 7 wt%, which would allow a vehicle carrying a 100kg hydrogen storage unit to safely store hydrogen for a 500km driving range (a target set by the US Department of Energy for hydrogen storage systems by 2010)."
http://www.hydrexia.com.au/technology.htm
and there are a multitude of other companies (far better funded) working on this.
I mean companies working in this hydrogen production and storage area so I think it is doable for the west to cut its middle eastern oil dependency.
People the answer is 20 miles off the California coast and in Alaska. This patch of real estate is prime with oil! But the environmentalist wackos protest any move from foreign fossil fuels. The government may have a small roll in this as well with the democrats always blocking any attempt to move towards oil exploration on behalf of the environmentalists. The environmentalist are still reliving the Exxon Valdez incident at Prince William Sound in Alaska. According to them, it was going to take 10 years to clean up the Sound. It only took a little under a year. The fears of the environmentalists are totally unfounded and embellished at best. Just like the environmentalist wacko movie "Day After Tommorow." All fluff and no substance. We have the technology to not only tap into the oil underground but to refine it and clean up any accident that may happen. Remember during the first Gulf War in Kuwait? Sadman Insane's troops blew up the Kuwaiti oil fields and set them on fire. The environmentalists wackos made the claim that the fires could not be put out and that the oil fields would burn for 20 years or more. But yet, the mean and evil excutives and the oil experts at the American oil companies rolled up their sleeves and not only put out the oil field fires, but got the Kuwaiti oil refineries operating at full compassity within six months!!!
The energy question isn't how are we, but when are we. OPEC knows that the days of the United States needing their oil are numbered. The oil companies are finding ways to recycle used oil. They are perfecting the synthetic oils. There are vehicles that utilize natural gas. We are finding ways to use the oil from plants to convert to fuel. And sure, we also have the solar and wind power. The auto makers are building hybrid cars and trucks that use both electric and gas power. We've just had the Auto Show here in my city and there are so many innovations to the auto that it totally blows one mind away. The big issue is gas conservation and our vehicles are on the cusp of the technological world. In the United States energy maybe a headache, but never a problem.
We have the know how and the talent working to better our lives and to make foreign oil a thing of the past.
And as far as the oil companies controlling the Arab oil, it's all too easy. "Big oil" could just stop sending machine parts to the Middle East. Let an oil derrick in Saudi Arabia go down because of a broken part. Then we'll see who really controls the oil in the Middle East.
So people, let not your hearts be troubled. We are head and shoulders above the Muslims when it comes to oil technology and exploration. Good ole' American know how and ingenuity, There is no subsitute!!!
God Bless America!!!
as much as I would like to see the end of sending boatloads of money to the middle east in exchange for the boatloads of energy, oil is still the cheapest game in town.
Hydrogen, nice but there is no distribution system. Right now there is a pilot program in the LA area, it takes almost 45 minutes to fuel a car. Even with improvements, who really is going to want to wait 20 minutes to fuel their car. Being in LA, I like the no smog aspect, but..
Alcohol based fuels are in use right now, but alcohol is costly and lower in octane. And it is just 10% or so percent of the fuel, the rest is normal gas. It is possible this will be a good alternative in the future when oil becomes ever more costly. I am not an engineer, but doesnt alcohol take more energy to make than it produces. That means we would need to burn really cheap fuel like agricultural byproducts, can you say acid rain?
The US and Canada have the largest world reserves of shale and tar sands, at current levels of consumption we could become the oil sheiks of the next century. Problem: too costly in comparison to oil and ??
Natural gas and propane, you can buy conversion kits for you car right now (byfuel for about $1500 to $2000). We produce a large amount of gas and have significant reserves, most of the arab nations used to burn gas off rather than capture it.
Grease and food oils, right now you can convert a diesel engine to oil use. It's OK if you own a McDonald's for your used grease needs, but put more than one or two grease cars in a neighborhood, and pretty soon grease will be unavailable. For veg oil, we dont have a distribution system. Who knows what will be necessary to comply with clear air statutes.
Clearly, Oil is still the cheapest game in town, and it is convenient, as we can fuel and go. I hope President Bush is right, as it will put pressure on the arabs to keep the price down and give us the time to develop the distribution systems that we will need.
Bush should shutup. When he speaks, he only confirms our worst fears (Ie: he's a dim-wit). I still haven't caught my breath after his announcement that "we will put a man on Mars".
Let's pull his subscription to Popular Mechanics.
Finn:
I highly recommend this blog - http://ergosphere.blogspot.com/ - when it comes to energy issues. The author, the "Engineer-Poet", covers a wide range of energy issues and provides a lot of background as well as various calculations.
"Let's pull his subscription to Popular Mechanics."
-- from a posting above
Yes.
If bannana republics can fuel their vehicles on bannanas, then what gives? Not prudent economics, that's for sure. Homegrown fuels could even be carbon negative, and sink some carbon back into the earth as biomass / humus.
Posted by: Animus Fox
The next great leap in energy will come from American ingenuity and probably not from the multi-billion dollar laboratories that suck tax dollars out of Washington with smoke and mirrors.
It is time to stop the liberal environmentalists that spew hate of America and yet drive their SUV's and Lexus's and tell everyone else that they have to drive more efficient smaller cars to save the environment.
President Bush does not have the strength to open up the coast of California or the artic wilderness for drilling. Hopefully, there will be leadership soon that will have the strength to do this so America can obtain freedom from the Middle East.
The Texican.
Freedom. The only choice at an cost.
I'll believe this when I see it, but I'm heartened to see the President actually appearing to take steps toward something I have been advocating for several years, and that should have begun many years ago, as soon as Washington began to receive evidence that the global jihad was being financed by oil money.
It all makes sense now-- that's why y'all at Jihadwatch are so fond of travel by stagecoaches and kayaks. ;)
I don't know about you but there's OIL in Downtown Los Angeles !!!!
http://www.upi.com/NewsTrack/view.php?StoryID=20060221-011606-6797r
"Natural gas and propane, you can buy conversion kits for you car right now (byfuel for about $1500 to $2000). We produce a large amount of gas and have significant reserves, most of the arab nations used to burn gas off rather than capture it. " Quote..
This is a good reason not to wait for twenty years. It is here now, along with the many, other options it will allow the 15-20% drop in oil consumption needed to make a real diffrence.
If you want to fight agains Islam, what are you waiting for?
Bush's technology break-through:
"We boost the efficiency of biomass-to-gas conversion by first converting the biomass into burritos (thence, the burritos into natural gas). This additional step, when slaved to the collection of the oil already available on the streets of Los Angeles (see above), will raise the effective conversion efficiency to something approaching 135%. Once this technology is in place, it will be self-perpetuating. Further, note that it will allow our net fuel production to grow at 35% per annum."
... President & Chief Engineer / G. W. Bush
So, kick back, guys. W's on it.
CaptAmerica -
W is wanting more details about the "oil in LA". Are you speaking of the extensive deposits in the hair?
(W would have spoken to you in person, but he's tied up in the lab as we speak.)
I especially appreciate people here who are technically knowledgable about oil and energy (not Bush!) sharing insight.
Any reactions to the study "Winning the Oil Endgame" (link below)? I found it convincing, as a practical program for cutting oil dependence in a short time.
http://www.oilendgame.com/
"Winning the Oil Endgame offers a coherent strategy for ending oil dependence, starting with the United States but applicable worldwide. There are many analyses of the oil problem. This synthesis is the first roadmap of the oil solution—one led by business for profit, not dictated by government for reasons of ideology. This roadmap is independent, peer-reviewed, written for business and military leaders, and co-funded by the Pentagon. It combines innovative technologies and new business models with uncommon public policies: market-oriented without taxes, innovation-driven without mandates, not dependent on major (if any) national legislation, and designed to support, not distort, business logic."
Charles Martel
You don't even have to be religious ~ we can pray!
If they can pray for the destruction of the Whitehouse ~
We can pray to get off that fuel!
Amen
My understanding is that Canada has something like 70 billion barrels of recoverable oil in tar sands using currently available technologies and that as future technologies become available that number could increase to 400 billion which would make Canada one of the (if not the) largest oil producer in the world. Instead of throwing all our money into technologies that are decades away, we should be focusing on finding more efficient ways to extract oil from tar sands. Obviously thats something that is being pursued in the private sector, but I think this is the sort of thing that requires national attention. A Saudi-sized supply of oil from our friends in Canada would not only be a major blow to the international Jihad against us (not to mention the economic benefits), it would also buy us time to develop new technologies that we could export to other oil importing countries.
George Bush didn’t just say ‘oil’ - he said ‘Middle Eastern oil’. There is still oil from Canada - slightly more expensive, but close to home and on friendly territory. Russia also has oil.
Chavez is nuts - 60-40 to him - because I think somewhere in the back of his crazy mind - he knows sending oil to America means money.
I think the problem with oil - is that it is like a ‘gold rush’ thing - people who control it tend to go a little power mad.
There is the switchgrass GW mentioned, which is a-money-for-nothing fuel source, as it grows like a weed in almost any condition. Then there is the usual solar, wind and hydrogen.
Once we start going down this road - we are going to find new and more creative ways to generate energy. Most of the fuels we use are chemical and need to burn in oxygen to produce energy. Promising is the nuclear ‘fusion’ research - which produces clean energy in the same way as the sun does and is powered by seawater. It is said that the cost of this energy will be too cheap to meter.
Power to Bush!
If Bush wants a cake - does he need to know how to make one? Just let the scientists deal with it - they will think of something.
UPS is already turning its trucks over to hybrid, and it’s saving them 100,000’s. Eventually these lower costs will be passed on to the consumer.
_________
Image though, if energy costs become almost negligible. Developed nations can compete, with say China in more areas – by making any number of intelligent robots to do the monotonous jobs. Preventing at least some of the job leakage - but also - perhaps in the case of Europe - it can be more selective in the citizens which it invites to live in the EU - as the robots will do significantly more of the low paid work.
Pensions might also be helped as we can have increased productivity with fewer people.
Keeping the fuel cost low or near negligible will be the key to a much more inventive future.
So I think it’s reasonable for us to expect ~
The Good Life at a Low Price!
Easier and cheaper just to invade Canada and take what you need, surely.
Oooops, I forgot, the USA doesn't do things like that.
Only kidding, but I couldn't resist it. Sorry.
HERE is the breakthrough... No kidding!!!!
rp666:
The oil sands in Alberta are the second largest proven reserves in the world (about 170 billion barrels), after Saudi Arabia. Even given the enormous capital expansion being undertaken at present, total production will only be roughly 3 million barrels per day by 2015. This total production is still minor compared to total U.S. imports.
The technologies exist but currently oil is cheaper. Bush needs a lesson in market economics more than science. The peak oil theorists are a complete economic fraud just like Malthus and his theories.
johnb,
there's also one more problem with oil sands. Right now, NG is used to steam-cook the oil off the rock. I strongly doubt whether the NG reserves are sufficient for the expansion. The NG producers have their depletion demons both in Canada and in the US. Currently, the US is drilling like hell just to keep the plateau. The increased NG demand must then be met with imports, and while Canada no longer is able to import more, the suppliers would them come from ...
... surprise surprise mid-east. By liquifying natural gas, the gas is then shipped in LG form to the US. I recall you guys are already planning for LG ports somewhere in America. Which then brings us to square 1 - the Saudi's, UEA, or whoever on the Arabic peninsula are still strongly in business, or even more so than earlier. All this means that oil sands make no difference whatsoever to the Saudi revenue, which is the main problem in the Wahhabi mission sense.
Now, it's been a while I've checked these things, but so far I haven't heard of a method other than steam-cooking with NG to get the oil.
However, even if steam-cooking could be circumvented and there would hence be no need to import LG for stem-cooking's sake, there's still the problem of decling North American NG reserves. The new supply, I'm afraid, leans mid-east.
Finn -
Strangely, it seems that Qatar has the largest reserves of NG on the planet - about 500 years at current rates of extraction, or so I'm told.
This could explain why the UK and the USA are being so very nice to Qatar, perhaps.
johnb,
that engineer-poet seems quite clear-witted.
Conventional oil - Texas tea as we know it - requires 1 barrel of oil to produce 9 barrels. Input 1
Drat !
johnb,
that engineer-poet seems quite clear-witted.
Conventional oil - Texas tea as we know it - requires 1 barrel of oil to produce 9 barrels. Input 1
Rumor has it that this amazing new energy breakthrough is coming just in time to fuel Bush's mission to Mars challenge...
Er -- wait -- that Mission to Mars thing was just a PR stunt... then -- you mean -- there is no "Energy Breakthrough" coming??? DOHHH!
Tricked again by that wiley Bush...