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Automotive News & Views Are gas prices fueling your pain? 
10042 messages, Last post on Jul 12, 2008 at 3:07 PM
You are in the Automotive News & Views Forum. Your Hosts are steve_ & claires
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Replying to: grbeck (Jun 10, 2008 2:33 pm) Another thing to consider - any country subsidizing energy below the 'market' cost is setting themselves up for trouble. They are mandating inefficiency. Imagine how much waste goes on in Venezuela with gas at something like $0.20/gallon. Their use of oil per unit of economic output is staggering, and they will (eventually) pay a price for this. Only so long as their oil exports can support these massive subsidies can they survive under the current system, and the subsidies cause domestic use to skyrocket, reducing exports.
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Replying to: gagrice (Jun 10, 2008 5:40 am) I think there are two reasons for that: First, many of the projects are best placed where rich elitists have there playgrounds. Sure, put that windmill in a slum and they're all for it but if it impacts their view, screw the environment. Best typified by Ted Kennedy putting the ky-bash on wind power offshore where HE would see it. Second, the environmental movement which has become so radical and fanatical that ANY human activity is seen as the rape of mother nature. These folks will not be satisfied until we elect a Bison as president and all humans are required to hold their breath to reduce CO2 emissions. We regular folks are caught in the middle of this insanity. 
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Lower the speed limit to 55 mph again will flood the market with surplus gas and the price will drop. It worked in 1979 and it will work again. Test your self drive your car to work for a week and see how much you will save. Also drive 5 mph under the posted limit on local roads. Use your cruise control as much as possible. It will work but we all have to do it. Write your congressman and tell them to DROP THE SPEED LIMIT TO 55. I have a 1995 Lincoln Mark VIII and on the freeway with the cruise set at 55 mph I get 32 MPG .. |
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Replying to: kernick (Jun 10, 2008 11:13 am) LOL. The farmer subsidy hype is only second to the hype about oil profits. I guess when things go south people need somebody to blame. "Greedy" oil execs and "rich" farmers are easy targets because we don't know anybody like that. So it's easy to be mad at "them". Basic tribal behavior that the politicians play like a fiddle. Hitler blamed the Communists. Look how far he got with that. 
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Replying to: 1stpik (Jun 10, 2008 4:12 am) We do power our country with nuclear power. See the list below. Power stations need to be relatively close to your population centers, the closer the better. Central Nevada is too far removed. U.S. Number of Generators Generator Nameplate Capacity in Megawatts Coal 1,493 335,830 Petroleum 3,744 64,318 Natural Gas 5,470 442,945 Other Gases 105 2,563 Nuclear 104 105,585 Hydroelectric Conventional 3,988 77,419 Other Renewables 1,823 26,470 Pumped Storage 150 19,569 Other 47 976 Total 16,924 1,075,677 Source EIA France did the nuclear thing because they were dependent on expensive oil back in 1973. The US has cheap coal that works just fine for base load power. "There is a possible impediment to production of nuclear power plants, due to a backlog at Japan Steel Works, the only factory in the world able to manufacture the central part of a nuclear reactor's containment vessel in a single piece, which reduces the risk of a radiation leak. The company can only make four per year of the steel forgings, which contain radioactivity in a nuclear reactor. It will double its capacity in the next two years, but still will not be able to meet current global demand promptly." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_power So how do you think we can produce dozens of nuke plants a year? Electric cars will help reduce the pain at the pump down the road. Just do not expect that most will get their electrons from Nuclear energy.
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If we built just one nuke plant per year for the past 20 years, we'd have 20 more nuclear power plants today. If we build one a year for the next 20 years, we'll have 20 more by 2028. Just like if Congress had increased the CAFE standards by just 1 mpg per year over the past 22 years (instead of leaving them stagnant like they did), then the average car would be getting close to 40 mpg today. We're already late to the game, and we're paying a heavy price. The more excuses we use NOT to improve our energy sources, the later we'll be, and the more we'll pay.
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Replying to: oldfarmer50 (Jun 10, 2008 3:00 pm) Speaking of Architecture... A few months ago while doing some stock research I ran across this company called Aerovironment. They primarily build small UAVs for the military but they also have two smaller side businesses and one of them is called Architectural wind. They mount small wind turbines on the leading edge of a building to pick up the wind as it comes up the side of the building. They design the turbines to fit in with the look of the building so they are kind of a moving modern art piece. The company impressed me so much that I bought some stock in it and I am still buying stock when it dips down. link title The same company also makes this system called Posicharge that rapidly charges battery powered equipment like forklifts. The system can charge a forklift in minutes instead of hours... Now how does that sound for rapid charging electric vehicles?
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Replying to: 1stpik (Jun 10, 2008 4:19 pm) |
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Replying to: avalon02wh (Jun 10, 2008 3:29 pm) Build CANDU reactors like the ones found in Pickering Ontario, they are the safest nuclear plants in the world, cheap and easy to operate, and all parts are manufactured in Canada and can be imported. The Pickering Nuclear facility was constructed in stages between 1966-1986 by the provincial Crown corporation, Ontario Hydro. In April 1999 Ontario Hydro was split into 5 component Crown corporations with Ontario Power Generation (OPG) taking over all electrical generating stations and which continues to operate the Pickering station. The Pickering station is one of the largest nuclear facilities in the world and comprises 8 CANDU nuclear reactors located on the northern shore of Lake Ontario, having a total output of 4124 MW (capacity net) and 4336 MW (gross net) when all units are online. Pickering is only surpassed in Canada by the Bruce Nuclear Generating Station, which while also having 8 reactors, has a greater output. In 1994 Pickering Unit 7 set a world record for continuous operation (894 days) without a shutdown. Over 150 private companies in Canada supply components for the CANDU system. China has purchased the technology and built several Candu reactors already, why not the US ? I still like the idea of using a Solar Satellite laser beaming microwaves to the earth to a microwave reciever station, this would provide limitless electricity at a fraction of the cost. See...free energy that any company could charge to the public and make massive profits. A simple Wind Generator is said to produce enough electricity to power 1000 homes, all on free wind power. Sounds good to me, I should go an buy one and hook it up to the grid.
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Hydrogen Fueled Car Hydrogen From Seawater The auto industry will begin mass producing its first cars powered by fuel cells during the next decade. They’ll run on pollution-free hydrogen, but critics point out that creating this hydrogen from natural gas or oil, as is done today, will still produce greenhouse gases. Using electricity from power plants fueled by coal, oil or gas to split water into hydrogen and oxygen will have the same problem. And the cost of carbon fuels will double over the next decade, further driving up the cost of electrically-produced hydrogen. If solar satellite receiving antennas were built to float on the ocean off the East, West and Gulf Coasts of the U.S., this low-cost electricity could produce all the hydrogen needed for the nation’s fuel celled cars. East Coast and Gulf Coast solar satellites could become hurricane deflectors as needed with only minor disruptions in hydrogen production. Wow and these solar satellites will be able to control the weather !
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