gas prices WAAAAYYY up

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horndude, you obviously do not understand what America is all about AND what has made it so successful.

You bring up supply and demand, but then you go off on what 'America' does, as if it is a single consciousness that makes decisions. America RUNS on supply and demand. If that curve gets out of whack, as you suggest it will, things will change based on consumer decisions, not by 'America' doing something.

Gas prices get to high, people by different types of cars, people buy less gas, Company's respond (not the responsibility of the government) and new forms of energy are given more attention and things change.

The way it works, the best thing for the consumer is what is used. Because oil isn't in (real dollar standards) that expensive, not that much has changed. Although, more people are buying Hybrids and such, not from laws, but from choice, already.

People love going off on $3/gallon gas, but have no concept on the time value of money which puts the current price right about on par as what it was in the 50's.

The American way of life will not self destruct as you suggest. It will change as needed and continue to grow and get stronger.
 
idiotec said:
horndude, you obviously do not understand what America is all about AND what has made it so successful.

You bring up supply and demand, but then you go off on what 'America' does, as if it is a single consciousness that makes decisions. America RUNS on supply and demand. If that curve gets out of whack, as you suggest it will, things will change based on consumer decisions, not by 'America' doing something.

Gas prices get to high, people by different types of cars, people buy less gas, Company's respond (not the responsibility of the government) and new forms of energy are given more attention and things change.

The way it works, the best thing for the consumer is what is used. Because oil isn't in (real dollar standards) that expensive, not that much has changed. Although, more people are buying Hybrids and such, not from laws, but from choice, already.

People love going off on $3/gallon gas, but have no concept on the time value of money which puts the current price right about on par as what it was in the 50's.

The American way of life will not self destruct as you suggest. It will change as needed and continue to grow and get stronger.

That only works if the energy input can be grown to an infinite size, which it cant. Money in essence represents energy, and most of the energy in the world is from oil.There isnt a replacement, nothing even remotely close.Growth both economic and population wise have a linear relationship with energy usage. Take a look at world population charts then superimpose the age of oil, you will see a huge change. The rate of decline of oil production once the world starts its decline will be much faster than the world can adapt to at first, it will take decades, its taken more than a century to get where we are now, in the meantime, things like population overshoot and resource mismanagement will show their ugly heads. The world is about to have a bit of a bumpy ride.

The US has spent almost a century, the last 30 years very seriously building a way of life that is unsustainable without cheap energy, it doesnt even have to run out or get that close, just get too expensive and it overwhelms the gross inefficient way of life americans enjoy today.Sure the market will force some adjustments, it already has, but nothing even close to whats needed.The US needs to go on a crash diet from energy, a 50% cut immediately would be about whats needed in order to buy enough time to deal with it and play catch up soon enough before the serious downslope of oil production.

Civilizations have risen and fallen in the past for the exact same reason, man's inability to comprehend a simple equation and geometric growth.
 
horndude, even with ONLY PROVEN oil reserves, estimates are at 50-80 years worth of oil based on a normal growth rate. Further, it is estimated that there are MANY more reserves to be tapped. We could easily have sufficent reserves out there to last at least 200 more years.

That being said, THERE ARE alternative energy sources to tap. Nuclear probably being the best KNOWN source, but in the years to come, no doubt, new ones will also be developed/discovered.
 
idiotec said:
horndude, even with ONLY PROVEN oil reserves, estimates are at 50-80 years worth of oil based on a normal growth rate. Further, it is estimated that there are MANY more reserves to be tapped. We could easily have sufficent reserves out there to last at least 200 more years.

That being said, THERE ARE alternative energy sources to tap. Nuclear probably being the best KNOWN source, but in the years to come, no doubt, new ones will also be developed/discovered.

Better check the reserve numbers again, and how long it lasts isnt the first problem.The first problem is when production can no longer be increased, which is about where we are now. Once you hit that point, infinite indefinite growth ends

The US is using 20 million bpd of crude at the moment. At current growth rate of just the US which is roughly 3.5 %, the US will need 40 million bpd by 2025 or 20 years from now. The oil industry hasnt been able to ramp up production to that level in such short time EVER. The world oil production in order to keep up assuming no other countries grew either would have to be 100 million bpd, isnt gonna happen, wont even be close. In about 2-3 years or less world oil production will start DECLINING at about 3-5% per year at first, then as much 10% after that. Thats a serious serious amount of change. so while conservation can help lengthen the time we have to deal with it, it wont be nearly enough to just easily slip into a new way of life, not enough time. Katrina showed what a minor minor blip in oil production will do, my heating bill this winter just due to that one incident will DOUBLE. Geometric growth is a real tough problem to reconcile when using a finite resource.No other civilizations have been able to beat it, and technology isnt a solution for social problems.
 
Harper said:
Reading in the paper today, and it looks like the motorists won as Howard has backed down on his planned petrol tax increase.



GRRRR i came here to post that.
 
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