Are you ready for $10/Gallon gas and long lines at the pump?

The BBQ Pit
181

[QUOTE=Ale]
In my home country, Uruguay, I could literally walk out the door, and within a 500 meter radius I had the option to take a bus to any place in the city AND the country. Granted, i was in a slightly gifted area but almost anywhere in the city you could take a bus or make a two bus combination to go anywhere.
Setting up a bus system is the least expensive vial infrastructure you could implement, you don´t need to buy 1 million buses on a single stroke,

[/quote]

For it to make a lick of difference in a country this size, you sure do. Again, people who think this would be quick don’t comprehend the scale involved.

A single bus stop is easy and relatively cheap to make. millions of them are a different story.

sorry, but thats just a small part of it. I’ve got friends who work in the city bus depot…our bus system is woefully inadequte and it still takes a huge facility to keep the busses running. There is a huge number of employees to be trained, and studies to be done on planning. It takes a year to get a street light fixed in most US cities because the maintenance is underfunded…getting a bus system off the ground from scratch is a lont term goal.

Busses are a good idea, I’m not arguing that. But the were not talking about a bus system in one mid sized city…that wouldnt put a dent in the problem. Were talking about a massive undertaking for a huge country. it’s a very long term goal.

182

I think we are driving as energy efficient cars as practical. Yup I drive an SUV. We own two. We could probably get buy with one SUV and a 4x4 wagon of some sort. Some folks say that we didn’t need SUV’s in the past. Though my SUV gets better mileage and can do more than the station wagons that my parents owned. We DID have SUV’s in the past, only they where called Chysler Town and Country Wagons (or some variation).

Who doesn’t multi-task their trips nowadays? I sure do.

Sharing rides only works if you have riders that need to go where you go when you go. I car pooled once in my life. For about 6 months. In my 47 years that was the only time that it worked out. Funny thing. We both lived in the City, and car pooled out to suburbia.

Admititly, houses are getting bigger, but I will bet dollars to donuts that a 3000 square foot house built within the last 10 years is much, much more energy efficient than a 1500 square foot house built 50 years ago.

(heh, Word can’t find Msgr???32.dll to do a spell check, oh well, I’ll post it any way).

183

btw sorry for being a jerk earlier in the thread. The cost of gas kind of put me under alot of pressure. It wasn’t right to lash out at people over it though.

184

[QUOTE=enipla]
We DID have SUV’s in the past, only they where called Chysler Town and Country Wagons (or some variation).
.
[/QUOTE]

Nah, the old station wagons were the mini vans of their day. SUV’s were still SUV’s…suburbans, travelalls, scouts, broncos, wagoneers…I miss my tavelall greatly but I couldn’t afford to feed it.

185

Taking it from the top:

Challenging OPEC is stupid. First, OPEC has lost large parts of its ability to control world oil prices. And this isn’t OPEC’s fault. Here’s why oil is really expensive right now:

  1. Demand for oil is outstripping supply, or at least the projected demand is outstripping projected supply, which is driving up the futures price for oil, which drives up the current price. In fact, current production is meeting supply fine, and oil inventories are actually increasing. Iran is apparently leasing a bunch of tankers so it can float its excess oil offshore.

  2. In the U.S., the ability to process oil into gas for cars is restricted because various governments have made it very hard to build new refinery capacity, and stupid state government rules demanding unique gas formulations makes it hard for refineries in one state to pick up the slack for another. As a result, gasoline production in the U.S. is brittle and inflexible.

This has nothing to do with excess oil company profits, which is the current bogeyman in this debate. If the oil companies charge less for oil, the result will simply be oil shortages. If Congress taxes away their profits, the result will be less exploration and R&D and eventually that will result in higher prices anyway. This is a supply/demand problem, not one of monopolization or ‘greed’.

I have no idea where people get the notion that $1.50/L equals almost $9/gal. There are 3.78 liters in a U.S. gallon. $1.50/L gas is therefore about $5.67 per US gallon.

The U.S. congress is just about as retarded on this issue as is possible for any breathing humans to be. For years, they have been taking actions that have the effect of driving up the price of oil - refusing to allow drilling in ANWR, refusing to allow drilling and exploration of coastal regions which may have large oil fields, refusing to allow development of shale oils in various areas, attempting to have Alberta oil taxed at a high rate because it is an ‘unconventional’ source, putting all kinds of restrictions and regulations on nuclear development, dragging their feet on Yucca Mountain, etc. Then the price of gas goes up, and all they can do is threaten the people who produce oil and haul oil industry execs up before a kangaroo court and lash into them for being ‘greedy’. Morons.

186

[QUOTE=The Tao’s Revenge]
btw sorry for being a jerk earlier in the thread. The cost of gas kind of put me under alot of pressure. It wasn’t right to lash out at people over it though.
[/QUOTE]
Where did you be a jerk or lash out?

IMHO, the only people that are being jerks are those that say “Move closer to work”. “Get a different job”.

Sure there are solutions. But some people will continue to proclaim that all you have to do is move closer to ‘work’. That idea is so simple minded that it does not call for a response.

187

I’m also getting very tired of smarmy Europeans and American inner-city dwellers to use this as another opportunity to launch into a boring attack on the ‘American lifestyle’ and the suburbs.

Understand this: Americans are NOT going to give up the advantage of all that land and crowd themselves like sardines into cities to save energy. Not going to happen. Stop whinging about it. Europe is what it is because it’s small and crowded. Europeans are not morally superior because they live in small homes and travel on mass transit - they do so because market conditions have pushed them in that direction. There’s less space, so everyone crowds together. WHen people crowd together, anything that takes up space, like a garage or wide suburban roads, has a higher cost. Anything that takes advantage of the crowding, like mass transit, is more desirable. The market adapts.

The U.S. and Canada are blessed with abundant land. We like large spaces and room to live in. As a result, our society has adapted and built an infrastructure that matches our lifestyle choices.

Now, higher gas prices will bring about change. But that change is going to come at the margins, and over time. I expect to see cars get smaller and more fuel efficient. People will take more care choosing homes that are fuel efficient, and this may change the focus of new home construction over time.

But you have to keep some perspective here. Consider my case. I live about 15km from work. My vehicle burns about 10L/100km. So in a month’s worth of commuting, I’ll use about 60L of gas. That’s currently about $80/mo. As expenses go, I pay more than that for my cable TV, for our families cell phones, for my parking pass, insurance, and for depreciation of my vehicle. If the price of gas goes to $2/L, I’ll pay $120/mo for gas. Do you really think that’s going to stop me from living in the suburbs? Or push me into mass transit?

Mass transit just doesn’t work in the majority of cities for the majority of people. It works great for some - students, single people who live near a transit stop, people who move from one area on the densely populated transit line to another. That amounts to just a few percent of the residents of the city. The rest of the people will not use it.

I live pretty close to one of our light-rail transit stops. My office is situated right on top of a light-rail transit stop. And yet, I don’t use light-rail transit. How come? Because I occasionally need my vehicle at work. Because I drop my daughter off at school in the morning. Because every night I stop for bread and milk and pick up other things we need at home. My commute is currently about 20 minutes. If I took the LRT, my day would be like this: Walk two blocks to the bus stop. Stand and wait for the bus for 5-10 minutes. Ride the bus for 15 minutes to the transit stop. Wait 5-10 minutes for the train. Ride the train for 10 minutes to the stop under my building. My building is on a 3-block area which includes a mall. The transit stop is in the basement of the mall, so even though it’s as close as it could be, I’m still looking at four escalators, and a two block walk to my office elevator. So my 20 minute commute, in which I drive out of my garage and into another garage at my destination, has turned into anywhere from 50 minutes to an hour and a half of walking, fighting crowds, standing outside in the weather, and general hassle I don’t need. ANd then I don’t have a vehicle at work if I need it. Plus my daughter would then have to ride the bus to school herself.

How expensive do you think gas would have to be before I’d give up my car and take the train? Long before then, I’ll downsize the vehicle, save costs by telecommuting a day per week, or just suck up the cost. A new car costs the owner over $1000/mo already - adding another $100/mo in gas costs isn’t going to cause the car owner to radically change his or her lifestyle.

188

[QUOTE=Apocalypso]
There’s no doubt a lot of Americans like Joe the roofer will be hurt by rising gas prices. But most people could be doing more to save money on gas. I’m not just talking about taking public transportation. Many people don’t drive fuel efficient cars, tend to make scattered and unplanned trips as need be…

…People will reduce the amount of trips they make, build smaller, more efficient cars and houses, and take other steps to reduce energy. Gas will shoot through the roof, and people will be hurting, but we’ll survive.
[/QUOTE]

Here’s the hole in all this; the market will drive everything. When gas hits 10 bucks a gallon and the ailing USD can’t keep up, the largest single-nation economy in modern history will be effectively crippled because of three problematic things;

  1. We don’t explore for/drill for enough of our own oil. We have enough under our own control to buffer the greed and control of OPEC, for the next 25 years while we’re developing alternative energies.

  2. Even if we did drill for it, we don’'t have enough refining capacity to deal with the excess, still, if we had more, it would cost less worldwide.

  3. We aren’t being altogether reasonable at all about the environmental and monetary impact of oil. The kneejerk nonsense from our elected idiots is causing even more unncessary spikes in pricing. This isn’t all the oil companies fault.

All of that said, I’m more than a little sick of “what it costs in Europe”. Although I’ve used the argument myself, I find it empty. Moreover, I don’t care what it costs in Europe. We may use 25% of the resources, but we create far more of the worlds wealth. We are the largest single nation economy in recent history, at least if you believe the UN, followed only by Japan, who we propped up after we evened the score, so to speak.

The fact is that we don’t get the recognition or respect we deserve for our place in the world. We have been unscrewing the screwups, freeing the oppressed, feeding the needy and clothing the naked around the world since we were able to. We give more between our prvate and public donations to the charities of the world than any country on earth. We have the knowledge, skills and abilities to take what we want, when we want from who we want. We simply lack the will to bully other countries the way we could, if we had the mind to. The world would do well to remember that the better part of it would be speaking German and the other parts Japanese were it not for us, and the Saudis and Kuwaitis would be dancing around a statue of Saddam Hussein were it not for our military and the citizens that fund it.

Call me jingoistic if you must, but I’m proud, despite the dirt that our government has dealt, despite our roosting chickens, despite our idiot-in-chief, of this country and all it has to offer the citizens of the world. There’s a reason that people are risking life and limb to get here, and there’s a reason that people will do anything to stay. No one’s rushing to get into England. No one’s storming the gates in Paris. There’s no one sneaking across Germany’s borders. Everyone who wants a better life comes here to get it because we have it to offer. When you take that away, or force our hands, there will be a price to pay. Whether that price is in oil, money or blood, that cost will be paid. Like it or not, we’re the biggest, the baddest and the best. We carry many nations of the world on our payroll because it is in our best interest to do so, only now, that fact is being shoved back in our faces, and we’re being accused of not doing enough. Well, I can’t stand it, not one more second.

Not that I can do anything at all about it, but there will, I believe, come a tipping point where we finally get fed up, wake up and decide that we’re not to follow the Romans onto the ash heap of history, and if it’s a shovel, a hammer, a pen or a rifle that I need to pick up to make that happen, I will be more than happy to do any one.

If the US economy fails or falls, the rest of the world will follow. Keeping this mcahine oiled (for now) will keep the rest of globe running smoothly.

189

Sam Stone, this is for you.

190

[QUOTE=Spectre of Pithecanthropus]
Cheap fuel and certain cultural factors unique to America definitely propelled the explosion of middle-class, suburban living dependent on automobiles, and, once started, it was impossible to stop. The cultural factors are the urge to have one’s own piece of ground, and the notion that cities are bad.
[/QUOTE]

You think those factors are unique to America? There are exurbs worldwide.

191

[QUOTE=Sam Stone]
Taking it from the top:

  1. In the U.S., the ability to process oil into gas for cars is restricted because various governments have made it very hard to build new refinery capacity, and stupid state government rules demanding unique gas formulations makes it hard for refineries in one state to pick up the slack for another. As a result, gasoline production in the U.S. is brittle and inflexible.

[/quote]

This is a myth. They oil companies actually closed down additional refineries years back in favor of expanding others…and they could expand those farther, no governments are stopping them.

Tax on profiteering was done during both world wars and the Korean conflict, with success. It was poorly attempted in the 70’s. tax profits above a reasonable amount and companies will put more money into R&D to avoid paying the tax, or will lower the prices because they can sell at a lower price and still make the same profit anyway.

The price of gasoline is as high as it is because the the price of oil has gone up, and gas companies are insiting on charging based on cost+X% of cost rather than cost + x dollar amount over cost. So the oil comapnies are making more per gallon sold while the rest of the country goes down in flames. It IS greed, and it’s short sighted.

IIRC, there’s what, 6 months of oil in ANWR?

192

[QUOTE=MrDibble]
You think those factors are unique to America? There are exurbs worldwide.
[/QUOTE]

Well, like where? Where do they exist to an extent comparable to in America.

I’m not doubting you, I really want to know. I can see it in the other English speaking countries that began as overseas colonies, not least because they have far lower population density overall than does the U.S., but worldwide?

193

[QUOTE=buttonjockey308]

  1. We don’t explore for/drill for enough of our own oil. We have enough under our own control to buffer the greed and control of OPEC, for the next 25 years while we’re developing alternative energies.

[/quote]

I agree we may need to look at some our domestic oil resources. I really do not want to see drilling in the ANWR, but can the environmental impact of that be minimized to the point where it would be acceptable to most people? It seems to me the technology of oil drilling has made some progress; what with slant drilling and similar approaches. If the derricks could be confined to a small percentage of the ANWR by slant drilling, than it might be something to consider. But we need an oil engineer or other expert to tell us about this. Paging Tapioca Dextrin!.

At least having more of the raw material might eliminate some of the panic factor.

Agree.

This doesn’t mean we don’t need to look at our environmental footprint. Because of our way of life, it’s huge, and as I keep saying here, so much of it is endemic to the way our lives are structured. Our need to keep our cars fueled represents a demand that is nearly inelastic, and we give up other things to afford to do it. If that weren’t the case, this situation would not be so troubling. A few people can say they’ll start riding their bike to work, or they’ll use mass transit, or they’ll telecommute a couple of days a week. These are all great ideas, but probably not feasible for the majority–the last of them, at least not until the typical manager becomes more willing to let back-office staff do so.

What, we should bully the rest of the earth? Seems to me that isn’t working out too well. Even if one accepts the “war for oil” idea, the Iraqi oil is not ours, it’s theirs, and we still have to pay for it.

As for liberating the oppressed, we’ve certainly taken heroic action in the past, as Coldfire’s annual posts about the liberation of The Netherlands attests. We can still be proud of those things notwithstanding more recent errors in judgement. But liberation is not always possible or feasible. I think it may be similar to Marx’s notion that the revolution he called for was not feasible unless there was already an urban proletariat in place. Sometimes, when you take out the dictator, worse chaos ensues.

Is that really so? My understanding is that the EC has quite an influx of legal and illegal immigrants from poor countries near to it, much like we have here. Where do you think all those Muslims in France are coming from?

Just as telling is the fact that European immigration to America has dropped off to practically nothing, compared to that from Asia and Latin America. To me this indicates that, at least in Western and Northern Europe, people are content with their economic lot and no longer feel driven to migrate across the Atlantic as they once did.

I did once meet an illegal immigrant from Denmark, though. I think he had overstayed his visa, and was planning to try to stay.

194

[QUOTE=buttonjockey308]
No one’s rushing to get into England.
[/QUOTE]

Desperation Gathers and Makes a Nightly Dash for Britain

“Most weeknights, smugglers lead clandestine migrants across the maze of highways that encircle Calais to parking lots like this, where drivers sleep before catching a ferry to Dover, 21 miles away. The migrants, who have paid the smugglers $500 to $1,000 to get them across the English Channel, will try again.”

195

[QUOTE=Sam Stone]
But you have to keep some perspective here. Consider my case. I live about 15km from work. My vehicle burns about 10L/100km. So in a month’s worth of commuting, I’ll use about 60L of gas. That’s currently about $80/mo. As expenses go, I pay more than that for my cable TV, for our families cell phones, for my parking pass, insurance, and for depreciation of my vehicle. If the price of gas goes to $2/L, I’ll pay $120/mo for gas. Do you really think that’s going to stop me from living in the suburbs? Or push me into mass transit?

[/QUOTE]

You’re being a little disingenuous here Sam. You have a short commute to a city in the middle of the prairies, and you don’t deal with the daily grind of commuting that people in larger cities have to face. You also neglected to price out the cost of all the extra driving you do.. to daycare, for groceries, to the in-laws. My wife’s commute is just as long as yours, and the car is just as efficient, but we still go through 5/8s of a tank every week, which is a lot more than $15.

Look at Toronto (horrid as it may be), where living in Milton, a mere 56 km from the city, is considered a short commute. Yeah it’ll take you an hour to drive there.. and you’re burning a hell of a lot more gas.

Here in Montreal, there are people buying places out in Vaudreuil-Dorion, which is at least a 45 minute drive.. assuming the bridge isn’t blocked.

Those are the options 'Europeans and American inner-city dwellers’are dissing.

196

[QUOTE=Barbarian]

Look at Toronto (horrid as it may be)
[/QUOTE]

Gotta get those anti-Toronto comments in, huh? :rolleyes:

197

[QUOTE=Barbarian]
You’re being a little disingenuous here Sam. You have a short commute to a city in the middle of the prairies, and you don’t deal with the daily grind of commuting that people in larger cities have to face. You also neglected to price out the cost of all the extra driving you do.. to daycare, for groceries, to the in-laws. My wife’s commute is just as long as yours, and the car is just as efficient, but we still go through 5/8s of a tank every week, which is a lot more than $15.

Look at Toronto (horrid as it may be), where living in Milton, a mere 56 km from the city, is considered a short commute. Yeah it’ll take you an hour to drive there.. and you’re burning a hell of a lot more gas.

Here in Montreal, there are people buying places out in Vaudreuil-Dorion, which is at least a 45 minute drive.. assuming the bridge isn’t blocked.

Those are the options 'Europeans and American inner-city dwellers’are dissing.
[/QUOTE]

A 45 minute commute or worse is the norm for most people taking mass transit.

And you’re right, my case is a little better than most. But that hardly changes the point. My company’s office may be moving, in fact, and one of the possible locations will turn my commute into about 30km each way, and close to an hour through traffic. So then my gas bill will jump to $160 per month. That kind of money is not a deal-breaker for most people in the suburbs. If they own a vehicle they’re already spending close to $1000/mo on transportation.

I’ll tell you what I’m going to do: If the company moves, I’ll sell my vehicle and buy something like an Escape hybrid, or hopefully a Chevy Volt or another plug-in hybrid. And then I’ll be fine, because I can run on electric power alone for the whole commute, at a fraction of the cost of gasoline.

Those are the kinds of choices people will make. They won’t sell their homes and move into apartments in the cities. They won’t start putting their families on buses and trains.

A more likely result than suburban residents moving to the city is that they will force the city to come to them. The adaptations society makes could just as easily be to have companies relocate into the suburbs, expend more effort developing telecommuting hardware and practices, and work harder to provide fuel efficient vehicles that the market will strongly demand.

There will be changes in both directions on the margins. The guy who was evaluating two jobs might decide on the job closer to home. Some city dwellers who were contemplating moving into the suburbs will choose not to. Some suburbanites who were contemplating moving into the city will choose to do so.

These changes will come gradually, and you’ll hardly notice it until the change is here. Think of how the big-box retailers destroyed the shopping malls and large department stores. They moved closer to the suburbanites than the malls, and offered them specialized products. Stores like Home Depot bring building materials right into the suburbs so people do not have to drive long distances to acquire it. Home Depot also enables the development of small, local contractors who work within their communities. These are all market adaptations to suburban living. There will be more.

If the price of oil skyrockets, we can adapt. With sufficient incentive, people could reduce their gasoline usage rapidly even with their current vehicles. They’ll learn to drive them more economically and probably shave 20% off their fuel consumption right off the bat. They’ll keep their tires properly inflated, combine shopping trips more often, etc. There will only be major disruption if gasoline simply can’t meet demand and there are actual shortages and rationing. But if that happens, you will see an incredibly rapid turnover of the personal auto fleet into electrics and smaller, highly efficient vehicles. They’ll turn down their thermostats and wear sweaters more. They’ll stop going out much for entertainment and stay home and play XBox and watch their HDTV’s. Life won’t suck.

And people will be buying up solar panels, putting wind generators in their back yards, and opposition to nuclear will melt away and we’ll go on a nuclear frenzy.

In 50 years, the economy will have transitioned to a more sustainable energy infrastructure, and everyone will be better off for it. And if you just sit back and let the market work and respond to high prices, we’ll find the optimal path through the transition.

198

[QUOTE=Spectre of Pithecanthropus]
Well, like where? Where do they exist to an extent comparable to in America.
[/QUOTE]
They don’t have to exist on any scale comparable to America to overturn the idea that the motivation to move to suburbia is uniquely American. Hell, that sort of move to a little country village thing crops up in British comedy more than once.

[QUOTE=Spectre of Pithecanthropus]

I’m not doubting you, I really want to know. I can see it in the other English speaking countries that began as overseas colonies, not least because they have far lower population density overall than does the U.S., but worldwide?
[/QUOTE]

India, Russia and China have new “commuter-town” type suburbs growing, or gated communities outside towns. Mostly for the upper classes, rather than upper-middle, like in the US. Here is South Africa & Australia, gated communities and exurbs are also a common feature. I know those are ex-colonies, but I don’t see the significance of that to what you said.

199

IMHO, new technology is not invented, but it is found.

The hundreds of billions spent on a ridiculous war could have, and should have be spent discovering technology that could have helped get us off of the oil teat.

Nobody has a magic wand. But we need to invest heavily in nuclear, solar, wind, water and perhaps geo-thermal energy in both micro and macro scale.

Telecommuting should be the norm for office workers. But that’s not going to create or transport commodities. We will always need to move goods.

I also see communal farms to help reduce the need to ship a tomato from California to New York. Say County sized collectives that people can contribute to or not. Basically big farmers markets. Those that contribute get a better deal.

I’m a bit up in the air about ethanol added to fuel. It seems to be a big waste of energy to me. It raises the price of fuel, and lowers the mileage. I believe it was originally done to reduce pollution in the winter months. New cars are so much more eco friendly that I think it may be time to drop the ethanol additives.

It may just be the winter/summer blend that we have to deal with. It puts a strain on refineries. As efficient as new cars are, I wonder if we can get rid of that.

We have already made our personal choices about living in the city, the suburbs or the sticks. That’s just not going to change. Cramming everyone into cities is not going to help things one bit.

200

[QUOTE=Barbarian]

Look at Toronto (horrid as it may be), where living in Milton, a mere 56 km from the city, is considered a short commute. Yeah it’ll take you an hour to drive there.. and you’re burning a hell of a lot more gas.

Here in Montreal, there are people buying places out in Vaudreuil-Dorion, which is at least a 45 minute drive.. assuming the bridge isn’t blocked.

[/QUOTE]

ouch! I know Canada has much less overall population density, but I thought the southern tier was heavily populated. I really didn’t know you had commutes like that there.

Did there use to be more traditional rapid transit that doesn’t exist anymore, in some places?