The former Gulf of Mexico

[joeydb]

Originally Posted by Coach Pants

Cars that run on Natural Gas. The liberals won't go for it though.

I just got a flashback of "The Road Warrior". Isn't that what they used?

Originally Posted by joeydb

I just got a flashback of "The Road Warrior". Isn't that what they used?

I don't remember.

All I know is the U.S. is loaded with natural gas and it is the perfect transition resource between oil and solar.

[hoovesupsideyourhead]

the very agency that looks over the oil wells at sea..epa will never let that many new nuke sites go up.. its a pipe dream.. fossle fuels rule..

[Riot]

We're always going to need oil for transportation, I agree, that would be difficult and expensive to replace. h28-30% of our oil goes to transportation. Fine, between what we can produce, Mexico and Canada, that's beyond covered.

We've coasted for years not having to develop other sources of energy for the other 60-70% of our energy use: electricity, heating, cooling, etc. We live on petroleum, natural gas, coal, and any attempt to develop other sources is met by screams of protest. It's beyond time to change that, but we're spoiled in the US. We want anything we want, when we want it, and nobody can tell us no. We use it until it's gone, with little to no planning ahead or thought to the future (see water in the western US).

Plenty of other, rather easily implemented, increasingly inexpensive ways to create electricity - geothermal, wind, hydroelectric, etc. We need to get serious about that, rather than going after more oil for these uses.

You want the end of offshore drilling? Start by opening up ANWR and let's go at it. I'd prefer land based drilling for the simple reason that you'd never have a leak go 24 hours let alone 50 some days.

It took 5 days for the largest Alaskan North slope spill to be detected a few years back. Thousands and thousands of gallons spilling over the tundra.

Until then, we need to perfect the techniques for the extraction of oil to drive the probability of this kind of event to as close to zero as we can get it.

Bobby Jindal is screaming for drilling to resume, due to jobs needs. I'd think all those oil men can be gainfully employed bringing the thousands of oil rigs currently drilling in the Gulf up to new safety standards.

[Cannon Shell]

Originally Posted by Riot

Plenty of other, rather easily implemented, increasingly inexpensive ways to create electricity - geothermal, wind, hydroelectric, etc. We need to get serious about that, rather than going after more oil for these uses.

The problem is those forms of energy arent that cheap or easy. If they were they would have been put into widespread use long ago. Collecting energy from wind turbines for instance isn't difficult but the storage, disimenation and reliability is. Usable geothermal energy is mostly found in remote places. hydroelectricity is hardly not already extensively used in areas condusive to its use.

The way to go would be nuclear but that seems to be against the environmentalists code.

[Riot]

The problem is those forms of energy arent that cheap or easy. If they were they would have been put into widespread use long ago.

Those forms of energy have become pretty affordable. They reason they are not in great use is that we in the US haven't been forced to use them. In the US we coast on what we know, and what is easy and familiar. We have lost our desire to innovate when what we have is working. We just came off eight years of oilmen determining our energy policies - what incentives were put forth during that time to not use oil? Right now, we have all the oil we need (for "today"), and we can afford it. We live day to day in the US, we don't plan ahead very well.

[Cannon Shell]

Originally Posted by Riot

Those forms of energy have become pretty affordable. They reason they are not in great use is that we in the US haven't been forced to use them. In the US we coast on what we know, and what is easy and familiar. We have lost our desire to innovate when what we have is working. We just came off eight years of oilmen determining our energy policies - what incentives were put forth during that time to not use oil? Right now, we have all the oil we need (for "today"), and we can afford it. We live day to day in the US, we don't plan ahead very well.

They arent as easy or affordable as you want to say they are. The viability of alternative energy sources doesnt have anything to do with what we want or what we know. Geothermal energy simply isnt easily gotten to and areas that it is are remote western states. Wind energy is fraught with issues. Same with hydroelectricity. Their issues have nothing to do with attitudes.