I blame environmentalists, for preventing drilling for oil on our own soil, making it so a new refinery hasn't been built in almost 30 years. Since 1982, refinery production has only risen about 20%. Not nearly enough to keep up with demand.

If we were allowed to drill off our own coast, (Like Russia, and China and many European countries are drilling of OUR coast, in neutral waters) we would see the price of oil drop.

It is very true that the price of oil (and gasoline) is not at all reflecting the free market value, and that's because it isn't a free market. The oil companies aren't allowed to increase production capacity in order to meet demand.

The current congress has passed far too many laws regarding the whole "global warming" scam.** The drive to keep the barren wasteland of ANWAR from having an oil well site, to keep the vast ocean off the east coast from having another oil platform, also the drive to switch to Ethanol, which is completely useless as a fuel.
It requires 30% more energy to produce a gallon of ethanol than the gallon of ethanol contains. It is an unsustainable net loss. The drive to ethanol is also quite nearly single handedly responsible for the world food crisis, as it skyrocketed the price of corn, and when food demands switched to other grains, it drove those prices up as well. The environmentalists have caused food riots around the world. Corn is a wonderful source of food, but a horrid source of fuel.

There is also the bubble going on with oil investors. So many people who used to not be in the oil market are buying and investing in oil, speculating. They're buying so much oil, and therefore driving the cost of oil up. Playing the oil market like the stock market. The speculating has caused a massive bubble, that is unsustainable. Eventually this bubble will burst, and there will be a "crash" of the oil market, much to the consumer's delight.

So you can thank the current oil prices both on a paranoid, environmentalist congress, and eager young stock brokers hoping to make more money.

And no, it's not Bush's fault. The president doesn't have that much power.



**I dare you to find a study showing that global warming is man made that takes into account both water vapor (Which is responsible for about 95% of the greenhouse effect) and the variable energy output of the sun.

Biffmeistro, I agree on the oil prices and global warming, and the president (any president) not having that much power. In addition to the things you mentioned about global warming, there's also the earth's natural micro and macro climate cycles, and natural variations. I think people who believe that humans have had that much effect on the world are pretty full of themselves...we're just not that powerful. As well, we're pretty clean in the US, but we have no control over what's going on elsewhere; and you can bet that huge portions of the rest of the world are making a terrible mess.

I disagree about the food, though. While corn is certainly NOT optimal for fuel production, at least the way it's done now, it's not to blame for food prices. Energy prices are to blame for food prices. I've discussed this at length with actual corn farmers, and they have discussed it at length with others in the industry; and other sources agree -- corn just doesn't have that much effect on food prices. OTOH, energy does. Also, is it better to pay the farmers to make ethanol corn, or to pay them subsidies to prevent them from growing too much and oversaturating the food market?

I, personally, suspect that these are more realistic: fuels from the waste stream (WVO and biodiesel made from WVO; ethanol/biodiesel from biological industrial/agricultural waste; ethanol/biodiesel from algae sewage treatment -- see the algae fuel thread for that, they're actually doing it in New Zealand); fuels that are not necessarily energy sources (again with the ethanol, as well as maybe hydrogen for internal combustion engines) that can use any energy source (which can be centrally controlled to be renewable or not); and finally fuels like biodiesel/ethanol made from more appropriate crops (sugar cane, sugar beets, whole corn plants instead of just kernels, etc). I also think existing fossil fuels should NOT be used for central power generation (electricity); instead, they should all be converted for use in gas/diesel engines. The technology exists and is feasible to do so, even coal can be made reasonably into gasoline. Central power should be something renewable, since it's much easier to build a few big expensive power plants with new technology than hundreds of millions of cars with new technology. I just don't want to have to stop driving internal combustion powered vehicles if the dinosaur juice really does run out.

Biffmeistro

Nice post, I agree with all your points. Do you have a prediction for future gas prices? Maybe I missed it.

THANK YOU. someone IS paying attention. we have 5% of the world's population and we consume 25% of the world's oil. hmmm...

BTW, something about GW i hadn't heard until recently...the moon is moving away from the earth affecting ocean waters AND global temps.

wouldn't be a suprise if the left tries to pin THAT one on Bush as well, along w/ fuel prices, the economy, katrina, and whatever else the haters push for.

As I figured the gas prices have stabilized even though crude went to 135 a barrel today. If any of you think that by us humans burning all the fuel that we burn does not affect the atmosphere then I suggest you park your car in a garage with the motor running for a little while and then come back and tell us what you find.

Trying to use that sort of an argument is like trying to say if everyone in the world dumped a bottle of food coloring in the ocean that it would turn red, merely because if you put a bottle in a glass of water it would turn red. The scale is far too great to have much of an effect.

The effect that humans have on global warming is real, and it is measurable. But it is also negligible. Even if all man made CO2 were to stop, it wouldn't do any good for the "climate crisis".

With water vapor taken out of the picture, man made greenhouse gasses account for about 5.5% of all greenhouse gasses. Quite the significant amount. However, since water vapor accounts for 95% of ALL greenhouse gasses, and something like 99.999% of all water vapor is natural. This makes it so that man made gasses only account for about .23% of all greenhouse gasses.

So yes, man does have an effect, and a measurable one. But a completely negligible one.


Anyhow, I don't have a prediction as to how high gas will go... I know enough about the econemy to know what's going on, but not accurately predict what will happen. I doubt it will go over $5, as that's a big enough, signifigant enough number to stop people from driving much.

Heck, I'm buying a Honda Metropolitan scooter tomorrow. Can't even afford to drive my mustang.

Are you a climate scientist?

gas prices here are 4.19 a gallon, up from 4.12 yesterday

It is the rotational energy of the earth which is causing the moon to move away.. It's been doing so for around 4 billion years now and will continue to do so for quite a while longer. Of course, the earth's rotation is being slowed by the same process.

The moon's orbit is increasing in diameter by about 3.8 centimeters per year, that is a little more than an inch in 240,000 miles.

3.8/(240,000*5280*12*2.54) = 9.83837721 ? 10^-11

Thats 9.83 x 10^-9 % per year..

Not exactly a major influence, the variability of solar radiation is many times that and it is at a minimum in the 11 year cycle right at this moment.

there are better, more detailed links, but i'm sick of fighting the GW argument. basically, i found this on a limited search. so let's start drilling for new oil so our predictions can go down rather than up!

https://cei.org/pdf/5331.pdf