Informative take on gasoline

[tommystinson]

IMHO, hydrogen should be considered a form of energy, rather than a source. There is essentially no elemental hydrogen on earth. It is combined with other elements, as in H2O. Splitting water into hydrogen and oxygen takes energy, and a lot of it. That energy comes from somewhere; solar, fossil or nuclear. Thank your local tree hugger for the price of gasoline when you thank your elected representative. Twenty plus blends of gasoline for different regions in the US? Can't build new refineries because of cost prohibitive environmental regulations? Here is the profit margin for gasoline, per gallon:

$.05 station owner/retailer
$.08 evil "Big Oil"
$.18 NYS tax, your state will differ
$.29 Federal tax

Who's getting rich here? Gas would have cost me $2.60 a gallon today without taxes. Did you know it is ILLEGAL to post gas taxes at the pump? No BS, check it out yourself.
If you want to see why there is no impending collapse of energy resources, google "gas hydrate".

[MAXIMAN]

Originally posted by mro

Here in CA CA land if we would not have had the fiasco with electrical generation (or lack of) and the high spike in price there would not have been any new power plants built. Even with the "brown outs" and high price there were law suits trying to keep them from being built. (Btw, CA electric power generation is still insufficient and cost is still rising)

Will things change? Not in my lifetime.


mro

That truly is sad. But all I can say its..."The people of the state of California put the idiots in office that make the insane policies".

Same can besaid for these United States. The reason refining capacity is not keeping up with demand is two fold. About 30% is market forces. The other 70% is government redtape/ and law suits.

So until the American people decide to "throw" the bums out....nothing will change. People are so utterly stupid. They cause the problems and then they blame someone esle...and the people they blame are not even the people at fault.....hahahaha. Proving only what the founding fathers knew all along. A pure democracy will vote it's self into extinction.

[Crazcnuk]

It goes far deeper than any one has mentioned so far. Tommy has the right idea with Hydrogen. Hydrogen is the most common element in the universe. It powers our sun, and is laying all over the place in the form of water.

Yes it takes energy to break it down, but it is the ONLY available form of combustion feul that does not create any pollution, is infinitely renewable, and readily available.

In order to make it feasible, though, we have to get over our phobia with Nuclear power. There is no other way of producing enough electricity w/o proiducing a pile of pollution.

One day, someone will crack Fusion and all this will be moot. Electricity will be cheap cheap cheap. In the meantime we have to decide what is really important.

Mass transoprt is NOT the solution, and never will be. It is far too inconveneient to the majority of people, and I am sorry, the majority makes the rules.

Hybrids are not the answer, either, they are too expensive, and don't really address the problem. Like ethanol, natural gas, propane, butane and any other 'ane', they are just a stop-gap measure.

Ultimately, we have to get a fuel that has no carbon, sulfur, nitrogen, or any other impurity in it, and Hydrogen is it.

There is no gas shortage. Get over it. Any shortage is man made, in order to up the prices. If there was a true shortage our governments would mandate higher mpg vehicles. The ones we are driving now are no where near their true efficiency limits.

We can mandate that all gas engines produce at LEAST 1 hp/cuin. That was the standard back in 1954 when the small block chevy was designed. As our XS's and other vehicels show, 1.5hp/cuin is not out of the realm of reality. As the hp/cuin goes up so does the efficiency and the pollutants are reduced. Most pollution out of our cars and bikes is due to inefficiency in the combustion process.

The gas companies are raking us over the coals now, because they KNOW thier time is limited. Once the crap really hits the fan, and we actually make inroads into gas mileage our usage will drop, meaning we will need less and less gas.

In Ft MacMurray, Alberta, in the oilsands museum is a plaque that reads:

At present consumption levels, and extraction rates, there is enough oil in the Tarsands, alone, to last the world 800 years. Keep in mind, that they are only extracting a small percentage of what is there with current technology.

Hydrogen can be used in our existing vehicles, it can be used for household heating, and anything else that requires heat generation, It produces WATER. perfectly clean water. Hell, all our water treatment plants can just turn the dirty water into hydrogen, oxygen, and shovel out the solids.

Sea water can be used, or any water source you want to clean.

To make this work though, we have to get over the fear of nuclear power. Put up some big plants, in the middle of no where, and kill the electricty shortage. Then we have to build small, cheap, one-use rockets to fire the spent radioactive materials towards the sun. It will never even notice.

These are choices we have to make. The hardest hit will be, of course, people working in the petroleum industry.

Wind power and solar power are not feasible on a large scale. It would take an area 10x the size of any city, just to power that city, at present technology levels. Not to mention we don't know what environmental damage they would do, on that large a scale.

We can't build anymore Hydro electric projects, now that we know the true cost of them.

[MAXIMAN]

Tommy Stinson

You are soooooo right on! Except in Oklahoma we do post the taxes. It has helped people wake up to the reality of who's gouging who...YOUR GOVERNMENT!

And concerning hydrogen you have once again hit the proverbial nail on the head. I am utterly amazed that people in general are so completely ignorant of basic facts of physics and chemistry.

As you so aptly pointed out manufacturing hydrogen takes loads of energy. Some people are so utterly clueless to the three laws of thermodynamics that they actually believe some day they'll be able to fill up a vehicle with water and drive away.

[MAXIMAN]

Originally posted by Crazcnuk
In order to make it feasible, though, we have to get over our phobia with Nuclear power. There is no other way of producing enough electricity w/o proiducing a pile of polution.

NOW you're talking!!! But it will never happen in the USA. The EnvironMENTALS will not allow it.

Strange how the French are kicking our ass regarding nuclear energy...

[Crazcnuk]

Believe it or not people already do this. I have a video, if I knew how to post it here for you, I would.

Here you go:

http://www.blogtelevision.net/p/Vide...,2,,70049.html

Have you ever added up how much energy is used to get oil out of the ground, processed, and shipped?

Ontario has been a nuclear powered grid for almost 50 years.

I think Canada should build a mammoth plant in each of the 8 biggest provinces, and corner the market.

Add up all our coal and gas burning capacity + future needs (25yrs) x 2 and build. Then we can phase out the polluting plants, cover our usage, and have lots left to sell.

[MAXIMAN]

Get no argument here. But what are you going to do with all the waste? Becuase if we convert totally to Nuclear....the radioactive waste from said venture will increase ten fold!

And though air pollution is bad stuff...it pales compared to Nuclear waste.

Other than that I'm all for it. The problem is Al Gore is against it. And he is the final authority seeing how he invented the internet...

[Crazcnuk]

You build small one-use rockets, with reusable boosters, and fire at at the sun. You need very little guidance, basically a big cylinder with a gyro, and good aiming. The sun is HUGE, can't really miss.

Another whole market for NASA, or us Canucks. Hudson Bay is a great place to recover the boosters...

As more and more countries get into it, the cost will come down.

Also Nucelar doesn't create HUGE amounts of waste, just small obnoxious amounts.

[JWSanders]

"Shoot it to the sun!"

The argument against shooting it into the sun is simple...what happens to it's cargo if it blows up on the way up? (as rockets are prone to doing at times) Mass death on a truly horrid scale. The effects of which would last thousands of years.

Another thing to consider is that there is over 50,000 tons of waste already in existence. The best heavy lifting rocket can carry 24 tons to low earth orbit. (A pretty amazing feat!) To get a payload to the sun would take a far bigger rocket. Even if you could get half of the waste we have (the nastiest) off-planet, it would still take 1,250 or so rockets to acheive it, and thats being generous at a 20 ton payload.

They'd have to shoot smaller amounts in massive containers more frequently to be safest. You only get one chance at that kind of mistake. I can only imagine how much all that would cost.

I think fusion power will be the next real revolution. It's just a matter of time.

[malber]

Originally posted by MAXIMAN


NOW you're talking!!! But it will never happen in the USA. The EnvironMENTALS will not allow it.

Strange how the French are kicking our ass regarding nuclear energy...

I recently saw a program on the History channel about how we need to change our energy consumption, kind of like a companion to "An Inconvenient Truth." In it, an environmentalist who had previously been anti-nuke was interviewed about how his position has changed since nuclear produces fewer polutants than current energy production, the byproducts are more self contained with current technology, and is massively more efficient than other "clean" energy sources like wind and solar. It's not the environmentalists that are blocking nuclear, it's all the regulations that came out from fears of another Three-mile Island. The program illustrated that it can take 10-15 years just to begin construction on a new nuclear power plant with all the governmental red-tape.

[nubee]

We should FLY everywhere we go. Who needs mass transit anyway?

The Texas TGV project, cancelled in August of 1994, was to connect the "Texas Triangle" (Dallas - Houston - San Antonio) with a privately financed high speed train system.

[Crazcnuk]

"The argument against shooting it into the sun is simple...what happens to it's cargo if it blows up on the way up? (as rockets are prone to doing at times) Mass death on a truly horrid scale. The effects of which would last thousands of years. "

Of course, the ONLY alternative is to leave it on the planet... where it would land if....

Seriously, with that attitude we'd never have made airplanes, or any other major technological advance. Right now they want to bury it, in the ground, where it will slowly seep out a few thousand years from now.

With the rockets, you make the cargo portion like a sealed can. Launch in remote areas, and make the engine a seperate piece, so that in the event of an accident, it simply falls into a large body of water, gets retrieved and you try again.

But I think we have been launching rockets, all over the world, for quite some time now. It's not really NEW science.

My major fear would be that after depleting the planet of uranium, we find out we need it for something else...

As for the 50,000 tons around now, not my problem. I am only talking about what will come from now on. However, mass production would bring costs of the launch vehicles down.


"If there were no problems, man would never advance..."

[mro]

Get Spaced

Don't need rockets
(they pollute worse than an XS )
Thing called a rail gun I believe, developed years ago and one of it's possible uses is to place things in orbit. (not people, would turn em to mush) Uses electricity so........

Other thing is "global warming"
With current tech we could freeze Africa
Could use something like Mylar to block the sun:cool

Sounds wacky??? Yup, but could be done now.


mro

[HobbyMan]

Planes are some of the worst fuel consumers. From DFW to London, my Dad will burn 180k pounds of jet fuel from here to London. Theoretically, From DFW to Houston, a Boeing 777 will burn 25000 pounds or about 4000 gallons of jet fuel. That same trip with a Diesel train will burn about 1/4 of that hauling more 10x as much stuff. A loaded Boeing 777 weighs as much as a good sized steam engine. A plane accelerates air giving it forward thrust as per Newton's laws. A train forces the ground(stationary as apposed to air) and the ground forces the train forward. Its Physics. Don't get me started on the Physics of shooting rockets into space. The mass of a rocket compared to earth's mass is negligible but if this becomes a regular practice and we change earth's mass we are all really screwed. I know we are constantly being hit with meteors but 100 years ago automobile pollution and CFC's seemingly had no effect on the atmosphere. We start shooting rockets off and 100 years later our orbit is screwed up. Think extreme summer and extreme winter. We all die. Anyway. Maximan and Tommy, you are definitely right about taxes. I looked into some sources where you can buy non taxed diesel (died diesel) which is not intended for use on roads. You see sometimes more than $1 difference in price. My uncle is a electrician/ contractor and he deals with heavy equipment all the time. Do you think they pay the same price we do for DL? Not. You know, they built that huge underground facility a while back for storing our Nuclear waste. I can't remember where it is or what its called. I live about 70-80 miles from a Nuclear power plant and I am fine with it. A lot of people here don't know or don't care about our proximity to nuclear facilities. Movies like China Syndrome and events like Chernobyl( did I spell that right?) give nuclear power a bad name. If we bury the waste deep into the earth where it won't hurt anything(it came from the ground right?) we shouldn't have a problem with pollution from the production of electrical energy.

[prometheus578]

"Fine, fine, fine..."

Our state taxes in the last five years went up maybe five to ten cents, yet gas prices went up two dollars.
Taxes, while something to take into account, are not really the issue.
Three years ago I was paying $1.75 per. Yesterday, it was $3.45. That's not taxes.
"Oh, it's summer driving season... the demand for fuel is higher, it costs more to supply it so the prices must go up."
"Oh, it's winter season... the demand for heating oil is higher, it costs more to supply it so the prices must go up."
Uhmm.. wouldn't that mean, that during the "off-seasons", the price then goes back down to $1.75?
Yeah, I thought not.
Yeah, I know, I know... Hurricane Katrina took out the off shore rigs... Iranians are firing Exocet missles at our tankers... the Chinese are buying more oil from the mid-east...,blah, blah, blah.
HHmmm...
Lettuce is cheaper in California than in Nevada 'cause Nevada doesn't grow lettuce.
Beef is cheaper in Texas than in Ohio 'cause Ohio doesn't grow beef.
Washington state has five huge refineries, yet gas costs more here than in states that don't have any.
Yeah, makes sense to me.
(sorry, but it's not taxes)