Redstate

it's always fun to take jabs at the extreme environmentalists you are GROSSLY overstating their influence in these matters.  Certainly they have an influence but it's not like they have dirty pictures of the President.

The problem is that the debate is being fought by the edges on BOTH sides thus leaving the middle with little choice but to stick with the status quo.

Clean coal is a marketing concept.  While clean coal technologies are cleaner than older plants they still throw up a lot of nasty stuff.  

Nuclear power died in the US after 3 Mile Island, and then was buried with Chernobyl. And I haven't see a single politician push in any serious way to bring it back.  The sad truth is that nuclear power still scares a lot of people who don't understand what it is.

I don't know much about the LNG debate so I must defer to you on that.

While environmentalists are resisting exploring ANWR and the Continental shelf the pro-exploration people are too busy trying to convince people that drilling in ANWR is no big deal and, imo, deceptively trying to convince Americans that drilling in the ANWR will greatly reduce our foreign oil dependency.  

You also seem to forget the power of the NIMBY.  If there is a TRUE culprit for our lack of new power plants and refineries it is the NIMBY and the NIMBY can be found in both blue and red varieties.

I don't consider myself an environmentalist.  But I do believe in smart planning and not simply looking for ways to open the spigot some more whenever demand, and thus cost, goes up.

remember to thank environmentalists for cleaner air, cleaner water, and all the species that aren't extinct today because of them.  And let's recall the rivers that now have fish in them again, the recovery of deer, the national forest program, migratory birds, the end of leaded gasoline, the list goes on and on.  Yes, we have problems with energy, but no, burning every last lump of coal in the ground is not the answer.  The stuff is filthy and the majority of coal plants aren't anywhere near "clean."  I don't know how you feel about breathing mercury, thorium, vanadium, and uranium from coal, but I could frankly do without it.  

On nuclear power, I'm in full agreement.  Build it.  Build lots of it.  The French are right.  With respect to LNG, the problem with it is that the ships are floating bombs.  In an age of terrorism, it wouldn't necessarily be prudent to put an LNG terminal in a busy port.  

The energy bill just passed features massive tax breaks for the oil industry, during a time of record profits.

Or lots of money to corn based ethanol, which is more expensive than oil, and completely impractical

And the house just hammered through a bill to build new, unneeded refineries.

Maybe the environmentalists don't offer any real solutions, but at least they aren't actively wasting federal money on clearly lousy solutions like our republican controlled congress is.

I'm interested in exactly how your so called "small band of extremists" has been able to set the regulations in a majority rules democracy? Could it be because most people realize environmental laws are important?

Y'all may find this interesting. It doesn't say what you might expect it  to say.

Yes, build nuclear plants, but we better be extremely rigorous with safety procedures because the public is not going to forgive any accident. It would also be nice to figure out what to do with the end products (while we wait for cold fusion).

This is spot on.

Supply and demand is the only way to have supply and lower prices.

We need to drill, drill, drill. PERIOD. Refine, refine, refine.

Plan? as in "planned economy"? There is too much planning. It leads to artificial markets. We need our energy markets to be more free, not more "planned."

A lot of the environmental movement is sappy and simply "I got here first and you are too late."

Look at the Keys; it was the environmentalists that fought waste water treatement. Look at the stupid $ave the Manatee Club, which is using a feral species to steal private property rights and destroy native species. Only true outdoor sportsman really give a darn.

What's their plan?

well, I can't speak for the hippy strawman you're envisioning, but I think most reasonable people would like to see the fuel efficiancy standards raised on all cars accross the board.  With a little government pressure and taxes going to new technologies instead of tax breaks to Oil companies that are already having very profitable years (and I should know, I have a significant amount of money invested in them) we could have cars averaging thirty to forty miles per gallon in ten years, easily.  The technology is there, we're just not using it.

Cold Fusion is a SCAM!!!!

If the government wants to give tax breaks for investment I'm all for it. But specific breaks for specific technologies is STUPID and leads to all kinds of pork projects and dead ends. Remember Semitech.  Let the free market decide.

Where did I say anything about planned economy?  Before you start prop up some Karl Marx straw man, let me save you the effort, and tell you that I am in no way advocating a planned economy.  

Please tell me what an "artificial market" is.  I would love to know.  Would you consider a market in which 90% of the supply is control by one entity to be a "artificial market"?  

Are you familiar with the term public policy?  It is used to implement public changes in order to further our general welfare and/or our common defense.

...

GROSSLY overstating their influence in these matters.

We have environmental laws that allow them to have the upper hand regardless of what is good or bad, right or wrong for the country as a whole. And they have become very, very proficient at making use of those laws to delay permits with endless reviews and analysis.

They  have access to the courts. And we have courts that have provient hemselves well able to allow spurious lawsuits and non-science to cloud the issue. That's enough right there to slow the process down for 10 years.

But it isn't the extreme environmentalists that are passing the laws, or getting them passed.  

And for the most part the people who are blocking new plants and refineries are the NIMBYs with help from the extreme environmentalists.

Are you willing to have a refinery built down the street from your house?

I agree with LundPHD.

With the demand for oil at record highs, and no projection for declining in significance, the most practical solution for me is to make our oil consumption more efficient.  There is no need at this time to be dumping piles of money on top of already extravagantly profitting oil barons.

For me, this means the encouragement of hybrid sales, making public transportation a more viable option in big cities (which I'm happy to say Kansas City is one of those pursuing this option.), and subsidizing the development of engine and fuel technologies.

The anti-people groups like Greenpeace et al have been lying to people for decades about nuclear power and the {cue scary music here} dangers it poses. Ever since Walter Cronkite and his infamous BS about plutonium being the 'deadliest substance known to man' the anti-nuclear folks have been scaring people with radiation poisoning and leaks and gruesome deaths etc. And they are doing it to this say only now they've added terrorists' "dirty bombs" to their repertoire for good measure

As far as I am aware there is no know case of anyone being killed by the operation of a commercial nuclear power plant in this country. Plant personnel are injured, but people working at Ford or GM get the same injuries - falls, tool accidents, etc. Even the "disasters" like Three Mile Island were nothing approaching a disaster.

coming more from pundits and pols on the right (and left) than from environmentalists on the left.  I think you're picking the wrong culprit.

Regarding the 3M island disaster.  It was a failure with poor results but falls short of being a disaster.  I suspect Chernobyl is a better example of what happens when a failure becomes disasterous.  I'm not an alarmist, I know that French, U.S. technology, safeguards and oversight are far superior to the old Soviet standards so accidents are far less likely.

On the other hand, a big failure in the nuclear world pretty much makes other potential industrial disasters pale in comparison.  It is prudent to be cautious.

What? new, unneeded refineries?

For the past several years now the US has been importing ever increasing millions of barrels of refined product every day because we do not have the capacity to refine in this country. Before Katrina/Rita refineries were at 93-95% of capacity and now there are several still offline from the storms. And 93-95% of capacity means you are overbooked --- it leaves zero margin for plan shutdowns, maintenance, product mix changeovers, etc.

If we found that a bazillion barrel pool of oil under Kansas tomorrow it wouldn't make any difference, we can't refine the stuff. Which, when you consider the recent technology advances in oil shales and the vast reserves available there ought to make one ill. Even if the technology works and we suddenly have the largest oil reserves in the world it won't do us any good --- we can't refine it.

But then I hold out no real hope for the shales anyway. From my reading I think the technology will work and it will work very, very well. But my grandchildren will still be waiting for the first barrel to come out --- the environmentalists will see to that.

were passed 20-30 years ago. The enviros have simply learned how to make use of them --- very, very effective use.

And I do not discount NIMBY, but NIMBYs and the enviros are in lockstep.

as regards the 'dirty bomb' I don't hear it from the same quarters as you I guess, but it's stupid regardless of where it comes from. It's all part and parcel of the 'scare generation' where we are supposed to be frightened of things like 'nuclear' and 'atomic' and all that nonsense. The "don't do anything and be prudent and cautious" school will be the death of mankind yet. We didn't get to where we are by being overly prudent and overly cautious. All great advances involve risk.

Three Mile Island is the poster-child for the anti-nuclear types in this country and it didn't actually hurt anyone. And had the plant personnel not overridden the computer controls it wouldn't have happened in the first place. Chernobyl was a disaster, but even it has been overblown. Recent reports of long term observation of the area residents show nothing approaching the predicted "biblical" proportions of cancers, etc.

already extravagantly profitting oil barons

Right out of the Big Oil Talking Points™ book.

Oil profits are at record levels for a very simple reason. The price of finished product is up, way up because demand remains high and actually continues to grow. And people continue to pay it. The cost of crude is up, way up too, but it has always represented a modest proportion of the price of refined prodcut.

More and more demand chasing a relativly stable supply. Oil company costs are not rising as fast as finished product prices; ipso facto oil profits rise. Conspiracy and nefarious business practices are not necessary to explain it; it's called supply and demand.

massive tax breaks for the oil industry, during a time of record profits

tax breaks are a good thing and profits are a good thing.

And the house just hammered through a bill to build new, unneeded refineries.

Three cheers for the House! Unneeded? Says who?

> You might remember to thank environmentalists for cleaner

> air, cleaner water, and all the species that aren't extinct

> today because of them.  And let's recall the rivers that

> now have fish in them again, the recovery of deer, the

> national forest program, migratory birds, the end of

> leaded gasoline, the list goes on and on.

No. Thank the wealthy and the middle-class. In every society, after people get secure in their basic needs, their thoughts turn to beauty and improvement of their surroundings. It's so predictable that it must be genetic. And, as science and education improve--pointing out the consequences of various kinds of pollution--you don't need activists to tell people that drinking clean water is better than drinking a chemical soup. It's wealth and basic education that changed America's attitude about the environment. Do we need advocates to tell the public that restaurants shouldn't have rat droppings on the floor? No. The public just needs the information, and that restaurant's business will disappear.

No. Thank the wealthy and the middle-class. In every society, after people get secure in their basic needs, their thoughts turn to beauty and improvement of their surroundings.

Who do you think is in the environmental movement?  You're describing the same thing.

And I'm a proponent of nuclear power ...  Just like many, many other environmentalists.  Taking care of the environment is not about fetishism, it's about making decisions that will allow businesses to prosper in the long term and individuals to protect their health in the short term.  Anyway, high heating costs aren't the results of "environmentalism."  They are the result of energy market deregulation.

Who should do the "smart planning" and what would it be? If you propose the government has an energy policy for the government ok. But if you propose the goverment control or influence private energy behavior for the private sector, choosing winners and loosers and setting targets, you are a marxist.

The government needs to get out of energy policy. It needs to encourage free markets. Sure OPEC has nominal control over pricing but that is because there is no marginal free market. Opening up ALL domestic engery exploration and lowering the cost of capital and shutting down the trial attornies would put a bullet in the heart of OPEC. Our environmental policies are as bad as OPEC at controling prices.

free trade for pushing our dirtiest industries and factories to Mexico, China, etc.

Double bonus- cheap stuff and clean air.

For me, this means the encouragement of hybrid sales, making public transportation a more viable option in big cities (which I'm happy to say Kansas City is one of those pursuing this option.), and subsidizing the development of engine and fuel technologies.

I'm just curious... why this focus on automobiles?  It seems like the notion is that driving is responsible for all of the energy consumption.  I know I've seen some figures here on redstate, but don't have time right now to do a search.  What percentage of energy consumption is directly attributable to consumer driving?

What about power generation?  Heating the home or buildings?  My house uses natural gas for heat; I'm sure others have oil furnaces.  What about commercial buildings?  Not a lot of places have nuclear power for such things, and I highly doubt large office buildings are being heated with electric coils powered by nuclear power plants or solar or wind or what-have-you.

Does public transportation consume no energy?  Anyone got any numbers on how (let's just pick an example) the NYC subway system is powered?

It just seems like any time energy comes up as a topic, folks on the other side of the ditch obsess about SUV's and gas mileage, to the exclusion of all else.  Why?  Do the numbers support the obsession?

-TS

What's wrong with lower taxes and better profits?

There are all these so described brillant people complaining about higher energy prices where all you had to do to hedge was buy some XOM.

The House does not build refineries. They just remove barriers from private enterprise from doing the same...if it makes economic sense.

The only good energy policy is NO energy policy.

that we scrap all environmental laws?  

according to the DOE is for gasoline used by cars and light trucks.

Its consumption accounts for almost 45 percent of all oil use

Not sure if you got the memo.

isn't a lot of the value determined in the market with speculation on supply and demand?

Here's what you said:

"We must [push efficiency] in conjunction with finding new technology and new sources of energy."

But what you proposed was:

carbon

nuclear

carbon

carbon

And that is why your arguments and indignation have no weight.  You pay lip service to the solutions in your attempt to portray environmentalists as the only evil to be overcome.

No market is truly free, since someone has to make the market in which trading exists.  

However, since you imply that by "free" you mean less involvement from government, let's take that to its logical conclusion:

No gov't regulation on energy exploration and development?  Ok, fine.  But let's also add:  

No subsidies to energy companies, also known as tax cuts.

No subsidies to gas consumption.  That means that all costs associated with driving, including construction and maintenance of roads, should be paid for at the pump by the driver.  

No restrictive zoning to keep those refineries out of your back yard.  If they can buy the land, they can build wherever they want.

No more releasing oil from the strategic oil reserve.  Hell, no more strategic oil reserve at all, as this messes with the "free" market.

No anti-monopoly regulations. No complaints about price-gouging. (Hello, Standard Oil!)

Finally, no gov't influence in securing/ managing energy sources. (No department of energy, no propping up friendly oil-rich dictatorships, no military engagements for oil.)

Then, we can all bask in the joys of a free market.

What is always left out of these free market arguments is the fact the the market isn't some natural, physical law with immutable properties but rather it's a social construct.  Society, valuing things like cleaner air, water or to live far removed from power plants and refineries are part of the social market condition and not artificial barriers constructed to constrain the market as if it were a Tsunami.

Like all social contracts those issues facing our economic activity need review, tweaking, tightening or loosening from time to time but their really isn't some conspiracy against "the market."  We all want economic benefit as part of but not the sole determinant in our quality of life.

of the matter is that the oil market is enormously complex. Crude prices are determined by a number of "market" factors; Production is determined by another set of factors. All of these go into making up the eventual cost of crude landed at a refinery.

But given our refinery capacity situation the availability of crude at any price does not appear to be a controlling factor. Exxon could offer to pay $100.00/bbl and they could get crude coming out their ears. But they can't refine it here. So we end up refining what we can and importing finished product to make up the shortfall. And that finished product importation is increasing by the year.

Right out of the Big Oil Talking Points book.

That's funny, I missed the part where he attributed oil profits to "conspiracy and nefarious business practices." Since you agree that oil profits are "at record levels" (because, as he already explicitly said, demand is high) I'm confused as to what, exactly, you are refuting here.

While it is true he did not use the word 'conspiracy' I for one interpreted the term as accusatorial. The composition of the phrase led me to believe that the poster viewed thes profits as the result of some sort of "questionable" practices.

The focus on cars comes from my personal situation.  Kansas City is almost exclusively a car-commuting city.  

I've also read some figures somewhere, but can't recall exactly where at the moment.  (Maybe the Dept. of Energy?)

I'll check it out later.

The Sun, giver of life, still shines up in the sky, ignored.

Wind? The water cycle?  Hydrocarbons?  Yeah, those things just make themselves.

First, we have another "Manhattan Project" as people have suggested.  I think the focus of this project should be more effiecient and cheaper solar energy capture.

Think of of all the roof space available across the U.S. If the project boosts solar panel efficiency by say 30% to the dollar (of panel production cost), the payoffs would be enormous.  It would be cheaper to install solar panels throughout the country (and not just the Southwest).  If 60% of roofspace across the U.S. is covered by solar panels, we severely decrease our dependence on other forms (but I admit we will have a demand for it).  

A common point against solar is the inefficiency during cloudy days and the winter.  I say we simply employ a system where the big producers (i.e. the southwest) will  'trade' their excess energy for  'excess' water.  Some parts of the country have excess water, others have excess sunlight.  

It doesn't need to be built down the street. There are plenty of other places. But then the enviros complain it 'interferes with nature.'

But you need to get the unrefined oil to the desert and then ship the refine oil to the markets.  

This is part of the problem.  The more remote you make the refiners the more expensive it is to refine the oil.  

I realize this might fly in the fact of "It's all the environmentalists fault" but the laws of supply and demand do come into play here.  

Everything got cleaner since the 70's when he signed common sense laws (extremists want to do away with fossil fuels entirely, no matter the cost). SInce then polution has declined while energy use has drastically increased.

Amen to nuclear power, but until two democratic senators, one with 45 votes and filibuster power, clean-up costs make nuclear power far more expensive than coal - 11 cents per kWh as opposed to 4 cents.

your R & D senators.

and his price control ideas were wonderful.

No doubt environmentalists have contributed to the increased regulation of energy production.  Maybe that increases the cost of production to the producer, and maybe it doesn't.  There are probably cases of each.  It does definitely decrease some of the costs of production that were formerly borne by society at large in a wide range of forms.

The real driver in the energy market, however, is not regulation but money.  M-O-N-E-Y money.

Gasoline: the reason gas costs a lot right now is because refinery capacity is close to maxed out, and supply cannot therefore reliably respond to demand.  The reason for limited refinery capacity is that, for the last 20 years, oil companies have been closing less profitable refineries.  The section you want to read is "U.S. Refining Capacity", although the whole article is interesting.

LNG: a primary reason that there are only 5 LNG terminals in the US is that, until quite recently, it was cheaper to extract and sell domestic gas.  The reason other countries have relatively more LNG terminals is because they don't have domestic supplies.  

No doubt the process of permitting and building LNG terminals is "cumbersome and expensive".  That's because LNG is highly volatile.  It burns and blows up.  I drive by an LNG terminal twice a day, every day, and I can assure you that an accident there would make a very, very big dent.  I am, in fact, more than willing to go way out on a limb and guess that the overall costs associated with the permitting regs are far, far lower than the cost of one good LNG terminal meltdown would be.  It's called not being stupid.

Nuclear: the last nuclear plant brought online in the US was Watt's Bar in TN, brought online in 1996.  Not the 70's.  The US has greater nuclear generation capacity than any other country, and nuclear power generates 20% of the electricity here.  In spite of recent closures, generating capacity has held steady through the renewal of licenses and increased efficiency of generation.  Of the eight plants shut down since 1991, only one had production costs below the industry benchmark for profitability.  There are tons of incentives currently available for companies to build new plants, but it's easier for them to diversify into nuclear by buying existing plants.  So, they don't build new.  Money is the driver.

ANWR: environmentalists oppose drilling in ANWR because it's one of, if not the, last untouched piece of wild land left under federal control.  I agree with them.  Optimistically, at it's peak in 2025 ANWR oil will reduce US oil imports from 70% of total use to 66% of total use.  Four percent difference, at peak production.  We can make drilling in ANWR completely unnecessary by applying passenger car CAFE standards to SUVs.  You can decrease your gasoline use by a little over 3% by inflating your tires to the correct pressure.  If we can't put conservation measures of that level of simplicity on the table, there's no point in drilling ANWR anyway, because we'll just pee it away.

And, the "Dulles Airport" thing is cute, but estimates of that size generally rely on counting only the footprint of the actual drilling gear.  It's BS.

Regarding this:

So this winter, if you're freezing in your house or apartment, if your energy bill is costing more than your food bill, let's not forget to give credit where credit is due: Thank an environmentalist

Baloney.  You might, however, thank environmentalists for the clean air you breathe, the clean water you drink, and for whatever scrap of open land might still exist.

Money talks and BS walks, boys.  The driver on energy production is how much money can be made out of it, not whether the Birkenstock crowd has their undies in a knot.

died with communism. Or at least they should have.

Your heart is in the right place, but if we're doing a "Manhattan Project" for energy, we need to GO TO THE SOURCE.  The Sun does not burn FROM the atmosphere.  If we're going to drop billions on solar energy (which we should), it needs to be a BO-NAN-ZA, Moon Shot, Trinity level, OMFG I can't believe it's not butter project.

Put an solar-electric converter into orbit, and microwave the power into the grid. Done. Then all we have to do is invest in good batteries/fuel cells and we'll have SURPLUS power in 50 years.  A new gilded age.

Supply and Demand: it's like a giant auction. consumers like us bid up the prices of limited amounts of oil. If the greedy oil barrons lowered their prices to say $2.00 ( to take an extreme example right now) per gallon, we would buy up the supply too quickly and people would be left without gas at all (this happened in Socialist Russia a lot because of price controls). So 'greedy oil companies' bid it up to make sure everyone has a opportunity to get some. They then take the extra profits into their calculations for new production. When gas was $2.00 per gallon, it didn't make since for oil companies to produce gas that costs 2.50 to produce, but at $3.00 per gallon, it makes sense. Doesn't do much for bringing prices down though. Eliminating environmental restrictions makes it cheaper to produce gas, so it may make sense to produce more gas at $2 prices because it now costs only 1.50 to produce that same 2.50 gas (due to decreased regulation that isn't necessary), thereby lowering prices.

And if you still think the greedy oil companies are immorally destroying society to make money, then boycott them! don't give them your money. build or buy your green car. I cheer for you to do so, because it takes one less bidder out of the competition.

Hydroelectric has been a part of the mix for decades. It's great but clearly it only works in certain physical locations. And don't forget that the enviros doen't much like dams either.

Solar and wind are simply not 100% reliable; the wind does not blow and the sun does not come out from behind the clouds just because we flip on a light switch. Which means that there has to be  sufficient non-renewable (coal, oil, gas, nuclear) capacity to deal with an unknown asynchronous demand, an unknown demand that varies from hour to hour, day to day.

Renewables are a nice idea but they don't replace building power plants. I saw an item on TV a few days ago about some guy on Long Island who has his roof covered in solar cells. He's essentially independent of the power grid --- most of the time. But I've spent a fair amount of time on Long Island and I'll guarantee you that there are days and days when his solar array doesn't generate enough power to heat the inside of a matchbox.

The total cost for his installation was about $70,000 as I recall, $60,000 of which came from a "rebate" from the power company i.e. all the other power company customers payed for his solar cells. Combined with tax incentives it made it very attractive --- for him. But very expensive for everyone else. The only saving grace for LI power customers is that very few customers decide to go this route. But assuming enough customers went this route, LI power would still have to have sufficient on-demand capacity available to meet the demand of solid-overcast winter day or week.

I'll be the first to say that we need more research into alternatives, but even if we come up with an alternative tomorrow there is 100+ years of petroleum/gas distrbution infrastructure, much of which would have to be replicated for some other fuel system.

This is one reason why I don't think hydrogen as an automotive fuel is going anywhere in the near future. There is little free hydrogen on Earth; we have to "make" (release) it from some other form. That takes energy. And once we get it we have to distribute it. That means pipelines, delivery vehicles, filling stations, all of which have to be designed and constructed. And we can't lose sight the simple physical fact that hydrogen is a liquid at about -430 degrees F. That alone raises all sorts of "opportunities" for hydrogen as a fuel source.

It takes MuCh more energy to trap hydrogen than almost anything else...

Check out my "Small Thinking" reply though...I wasn't advocating any renewables in the way you think I was...

I am involved in the LNG issue, I consider myself educated on the subject.  We have 5 LNG proposals in our little town.  It's like a soap opera in these parts, all kinds of weird and shady backroom deals.

The crux of LNG is the energy loss in the gas to electricity process.  Our natural gas prices are very high right now because of the demand of gas-fired power plants.  They kick on during high electricity usage (9-5).  

The LNG process involves piping it out of the ground, turing it to liquid (-260,) putting in on a ship, using LNG to power the ship across the oceans, unloading it into giant tanks, heating it up into natural gas, piping it to a gas-fired power plant and using that electricity for power/heat.

If this sounds like a very in-efficient way of getting energy, it is.  Just the gas to electricity process is a 50% energy loss and this is the number for the best plants (others around 70%).  So, LNG will come online about 2011, but because of the energy-loss, it really won't bring down prices much at all, if it is used strictly for electricity (which all models say it is).  IMHO this is a horrible mistake and the local gas companies say the same thing; use LNG for home and businesses (and possible natural-gas hybrid cars, this is where we really need it) and other sources for electricity.

Car companies meet the CAFE standards by reducing the weight of the vehicle, primarily.  Then death rates go up because everything else being equal, a 3000lb car isn't going to protect you as well when you hit a wall as a 4000lb car will.  Then the same types will push for more manditory safety features on cars, which will drive up the price, except that then no one will blame the increased safety features that were necessary because of the lessened car weight, they'll blame those greedy car companies because your ANSI standard poor family can't afford a car any more, or even if they can, they won't be able to afford repairs to replace all that fiberglass when they get into an accident instead of just having some wrinkled steel.

This playbook has been run before, and it won't run any better the next time than any of the previous times.

for this.  

Up until the past 2 years auto manufacturers were to busy pumping more horsepower into cars, to worry much about fuel efficiency.

But I would like to know some example of cars that were modified in order to meet CAFE standards which then saw greater fatalities in accidents after the change.

To say "everything else being equal, a 3000lb car isn't going to protect you as well when you hit a wall as a 4000lb car will." seems pretty silly.  The laws of physics would disagree with you.  Are you suggesting that we should intentionally make cars heavier for safety reasons?   Perhaps you tell these automanufacturers to stop making their engines lighter because it is making the car more dangerous.  

Your way of thinking regarding auto safety is about 40 years old.  

*almost all.

We should bury their text in Yuccca Mountain.

Make sure to stock up on drinking water.

Look at NY's nuclear power and VA's nuclear power.  NY [even with Niagra Falls] sells electricity at over 10cents/kwh while VA is closer to 5.  The diff is all in birkenstock voters and their checkbooks.

And where do I find this information about NY vs. VA power generation?

Thanks -

So this winter, if you're freezing in your house or apartment, if your energy bill is costing more than your food bill, let's not forget to give credit where credit is due: Thank an environmentalist

No, thank you.  My gas my gas bill from 40 to 120 a month.  How about yours?  I bet your spouce drives the SUV and you drive a Ford F150.  I wouldn't be supprised if you've owned more mustangs/mopars than you have cousins!

But shouldn't we be concerned about the 55% as well?

-TS

... let's adopt Cold Fusion :-)

If you're going to deny the simple basic fact that everything else being equal, a heavier car is going to protect you better in an accident than a lighter car, then we have no common ground to talk about this issue, because I think you're insane.

Tell you what.  You can pick the econobox of your choice and drive it straight into a brick wall at 50mph, and I'll do the same with an SUV.  If you survive, I'll get out of the hospital before you do-- unless you picked a Volvo, in which case your 'econobox' cost more than my SUV.  (And before you ask, no I don't own an SUV or have any particular love for them.)

What is OK is to have some regulations or standards of health and safety. What does not work is trying to steer the ship. The government should not be selecting technology or setting prices. It should encourage development with simple guidelines.

Try checking out these urls from CATO:

http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=3409

http://www.cato.org/research/articles/taylor-910319.html

Some choice quotes:

A third effect of CAFE has been to reduce the weight of small cars and subsidize their sales (because those are cheaper techniques of improving mileage than retooling engines), which, in turn, has increased auto fatalities. It has been estimated that the 500-pound reduction in auto weight that coincided with the introduction of CAFE has increased the fatality risk by up to 27%.

Indeed, the relationship between high-mileage cars and body-bags is the strongest finding of the past two decades of auto-safety research. Why? Because cars generally get good mileage by decreasing body weight and "downsizing." The average weight of a car fell to 3,100 pounds in 1989 from 4,100 pounds in 1975, when CAFE was first passed by Congress. Although fuel efficiency more than doubled (without, incidentally, decreasing our oil imports) so did the vulnerability of American motorists.

Even Ralph Nader, one of the most prominent advocates of a 40 mpg CAFE standard, concedes that "larger cars are safer - there is more bulk to protect the occupant."

If you're going to press a point about car safety that even Ralph Nader concedes, then I reiterate my previous point doubting your sanity.

There is no law against a monopoly. There are only laws against the monopoly abusing the it power. Do you honestly believe anyone entity sets gas prices.

There was some dope on Rush today that thought that the spike in gas prices was set by the gas industry.  But when Rush asked the bozo, "Why did they come down?"; the guy had no answer. If the oil companies make money at $3 and they can set prices would they not make more at $4? The ignorance of supply and demand is stunning. If you want people to use less, make less and the price will go up. If you want it cheaper make more! OF ANYTHING.

This is evidence of two things 1) hardly anybody in this country understands basic our economics; 2) it works.

Is there any information available on what change in vehicle weight translates into what level of fatalities? If it is a small number, we should consider how the benefit to society of having a lower demand for fuel weighs against a possible minor increase in fatalities.

Cars used to weigh much more in the early 70's, but I'm not aware that traffic fatalities were adversley affected when we moved to smaller lighter cars after the oil embargo. I'd be very interested to see any study that tried to show impact of weight change normalized for other things like reduction in DUI and increase in use of child safety seats.

Also, I'm curious what type of safety features currently contribute significantly to the cost of a car. Besides airbags (a couple hundred bucks?- if so, well worth it) and seat belts ($20?), have other safety requirements already driven up the cost of cars? If so, I'm not aware.

This is more evidence that the so called environmentalists are phonies.  If they really cared about the environment they would insist that ALL energy exploration and refineries would be in the U.S. where there are environmental rules and regs.

Just like the two biggest environmentalists in the Keys that fought waste water treatment because if there were municiple sewers the guy next store could get a building permit.

Just like the $ave the Manatee Club. Greed on both sides. At least we are honest.

Correct a part of the price of oil is the believe that it will remain hard to get vs the supply. I we get a possitive supply shock then the price will crater.

I was working up to reply to this oft-repeated and meaningless attempt to blame those who have zero control over our energy policy.  But Amos nailed it.  

If we were talking about the high cost of wind and solar, yeah, blame those environmentalists. Otherwise, let's hear what Cheney's energy committee resolutions were.  It's not as if anybody with knowledge around the issue didn't know about Peak Oil a long time ago.  

It's appalling that we even have this argument days after the administration's appalling energy bill was pushed through.

Cold Fusion is a HOAX. It was a scam dreamed up by a couple of guys in Utah. It is a total HOAX>

The albedo of the earth is only ~30%, meaning there's only 30% more energy available outside of the atmosphere than at the surface of the earth.  You have an interesting idea, but I wonder what is more economically feasible.  

Also, I think many people (myself included) would wonder about the safety of microwaving that energy back to the earth, from that far away, it would have to be a quite focused pulse.

Interesting thought though, and definitely worthy of discussion.

Who cares if a species is extinct.  It happens all of the time.  We wast to much time, energy, and money protetecting a spooted owl that 99.9 % of the people will never see and could care less about.  But you Liberal environmentalists closed down a whole industry over a stupid owl and cost many Americans their job.

Ralph Nader is not someone I listen to for sound scientific or economic opinion.

Secondly I generally discard 3rd party commentary on unsourced studies.  Doubly so when the 3rd party is an overtly biased group like Cato.

First of all my point was in response to your hitting a wall hypothetical.  A heavier car hitting a brick wall is likely to just cause more torn metal.

Secondly trying to make a 1 to 1 relationship between CAFE and vehicle weight is dubious.  While a heavier car is generally safer in an accident I would sooner take a modern 3000 lb car over a 10 years 3500 lb car.  

Lastly I don't necessarily care about CAFE versus a gas tax.  CAFE was a more politically expedient than a gas tax so that's what we have.

anything about setting prices or selecting technologies?  

Species are getting wiped off the face of the Earth at quite a pace.  I don't care about most of them; I  get plenty of sleep at night.

But what I need you to personally do is make sure that none of them hold the clues to any kind of medical breakthroughs that could affect me as I age.

Ok?  So... get to work!

... but 99% of all of the species that have ever existed on Earth went extinct before man became dominant. Species extinction is part of natural selection. Species that cannot adapt to changing conditions die off.

I'm not suggesting we all ought to go out and shoot a spottted owl, but waxing elequent over species extinction just doesn't comport with historical reality.

is brought down from Alaska we could take it to Nevada or California for refining which doesn't increase the costs very much compared to transporting it all over the country. The stuff from south America could be brought into Arizona and Texas for Refining with the same minimal costs. When we talk about the difference from down the street from my house to the desert( or some other remote location), we are talking a very minimal distance compared to transporting it across the nation. But Enviros argue that while remote places aren't down the street from us, they are 'down the street' from wildlife.

I agree with you whole-heartedly that it's the simple laws of supply and demand, but the supply curve can be and is shifted left artificially by environmentalists, thereby driving up prices.

... you missed the " :-) " at then end of my comment.

Do you know how much it would cost to build to Venezuela? And how exactly would we keep that pipeline secure for the 3000-4000 miles it would travels through other countries?

There's a reason why most refineries are next to the water.

If you're going to deny the simple basic fact that everything else being equal, a heavier car is going to protect you better in an accident than a lighter car

Since it's possible to build a super-heavy car that kills you in a 25mph collision, and it's possible to build a super-light car that allows you to survive a 180mph collision, I call your "fact" a silly thing.  "All things being equal" has no meaning, practically speaking.

The most I'm willing to grant you is that a heavier car in vehicle-vehicle collisions tends to fare better than the lighter car.

Safety is largely independent of heaviness of the vehicle.  Costs keep cars heavy.  But don't take it from me: you said so yourself with your Volvo comment.

You know, I wasn't sure before, but now that you've quoted this study:

It has been estimated that the 500-pound reduction in auto weight that coincided with the introduction of CAFE has increased the fatality risk by up to 27%.

I'm sold.  I'm welding two 500-pound steel plates to my sedan roof tonight.  That should get me my 27% back, times two!

Supply and demand is the only way to have supply and lower prices.  We need to drill, drill, drill. PERIOD. Refine, refine, refine.

...or we could reduce demand.

I don't dispute what you are saying, but it still doesn't justify the "we don't know what's there, so who cares if we lose it" attitude many people have.

A lot of interesting and extremely useful discoveries that we take largely for granted now-a-days have come from nature.

I feel okay about the species that died off before we got here.  Not much I can do about it, really.  But today, when we have the capability to exploit new discoveries... and we blindly destroy them instead, well, that doesn't settle so well.

It comes in ships. The stuff from vuenezuela would come to Texas and be refined. The stuff from Mexico would come to Arizona (or be refined in Mexico since they need jobs there anyways). And the oil from Alaska would come down to California and Nevada, which I think it already does come to California, though I could be wrong. None of this involves building 4000 mile pipeline through foreign countries.

He said in his talking points one night that someone sets the prices and he wants to know who. He has officially become irrelivant to me.

I inferred a pipeline when you mentioned Texas as the ingress point for South American oil.  Not sure why it would be otherwise but ok.

The problem is that port are very crowded places. Lots of people.  IOW, NIMBY country.  

So now you need to get the oil from the port to the refinery.  This is where the problems begin, economically.

It certainly does start with the problem you mention. The enviros have multiplied the problem by limiting the number of refineries built (we haven't had a new refinery since 1976 even though gas use has increased by 25%). And the certainly use the NIMBY effect by scaring people into thinking the water is going to be poisoned, even if the refineries are built in remote locations (kind of like most Nevadans oppose holding the radioactive waste of the country even though they are no where near it).

I was gradually losing any faith in O'Reilly. and then he pontificated on the dastardely oil business and the shadowy "someone" who is fixing oil prices. At that point I changed the channel and have not been back since.

I don't listen to Ralph Nader generally either, but when even he is forced to concede a point that he probably doesn't want to concede about car safety, which is a topic he's done more work on than probably the entire readership of redstate combined, then I figure the point is proven.  Kind of like Michael Moore conceding any point about Iraq to George W. Bush.  If you're not conceding the same point, then that makes you even more of an extremist about this point concerning car safety than Ralph Nader, which is an awfully lonely position to be in.  Have fun with it.

Second, Cato listed their source; if you want to ignore that, go ahead, but don't go trying to call it an unsourced study.  And ignoring the indirect source because it doesn't jibe with your particular views doesn't mean you've proven anything, just that you're not willing to consider viewpoints other than your own.  If you want to prove anything, go to Cato's source and debunk that, or show that Cato's not presenting it accurately.

Third, trying to compare a 10-year-old 3500lb car to a new 3000lb car is comparing apples to orange juice.  It most emphatically is not 'keeping everything else the same', and is totally bogus rhetoric and I reject it utterly.

Finally, saying CAFE was the politically expedient thing to do doesn't prove anything either.  I'm sure we can both list situations until the cows come home where big problems were ignored or kicked down the road because it was easier to do the politically expedient thing than to do the right thing.  In fact, I would call that the cause of 90 percent of the political failures in this country.

My point still stands: raising CAFE standards is dangerous and not sufficiently effective to be worthwhile.

Humans are a species, too.  99% of all species that have ever existed on Earth went extinct before man became dominant, yes.  And now here we are, sitting on top of a big old food chain that, should it collapse, will take us with it.  Here we are, breathing air that, should it become too devoid of oxygen, or too hot, or too cold, will put us up on the extinct list.

Historical reality is that we're here, not the dinosaurs.  Historical reality is that when a species goes out and consumes all of its resources and grows its population, it is followed by population crash in which everyone starves to death.  The tables can turn on a dominant species mighty quickly.  Other species aren't just there to provide medicine, of all things.

He lost me before that but this was the icing on the cake since it was about the dumbest conspiracy theory comment I've ever heard about oil companies.

They're there for food, and fuel, and clothing, and a thousand other uses, some merely aesthetic, some more practical.

Also, I think many people (myself included) would wonder about the safety of microwaving that energy back to the earth, from that far away, it would have to be a quite focused pulse

agreed. has no one played sim city 2000 with disasters on??

for political circles. The scapegoat.

Do you really believe oil companies are not price gouging??? what a joke. there are several holes in that theory. first of all, the gap b/t the price to produce and the end price of gasoline has increased this year. according to the ftc, oil would have to cost $114/barrel to justify these gas prices.

second, if supply and demand was the real reason for the increase, then gas prices would go up, and crude prices would remain stable. if gas prices are truly going up b/c of lack of refining capacity, that would not cause an increase in crude demand. it would cause a decrease. is that so hard?

lastly, natural gas....

natural gas is totally unrelated to crude, gasoline, etc. are we really to believe that all of a sudden natural gas supplies either ran out or demand went up astronomically in a matter of months?

but environmentalists have been blocking supply for decades. SUV people have budged by increasing gas mileage and now they are moving to hybrids SUV's, but environmentalists haven't let up at all about constricting supply. So while I dislike SUV's (nay, I hate SUV's, even my mom's), I know which side is making progress and which side is holding things up, and I don't mind venting against enviros for being obstructionist.

and lower overall prosperity, too.  Funny how that would work.

Scapegoats are actually in no danger of going extinct.  They'll last as long as we do.

last two scapegoats because they will be blaming each other.

I don't know where CATO gets their data, but according to the Department of Transportation:

• The occupant fatality rate (including motorcycle riders) per 100,000 population, which declined by 22.7 percent from 1975 to 1992, decreased by 0.9 percent from 1992 to 2003.
• The occupant injury rate (including motorcycle riders) per 100,000 population, which declined by 13.6 percent from 1988 to 1992, decreased by 16.6 percent from 1992 to 2003.
• The nonmotorist fatality rate per 100,000 population has declined by 52.4 percent from 1975 to 2003.
•  The nonmotorist injury rate per 100,000 population has declined by 45.6 percent from 1988 to 2003.

So, my five minutes with Google seems to find that cars may have gotten lighter, but they have also gotten safer, so we can either conclude:  1)  that CAFE standards have actually been making us a lot safer; or 2) that CAFE standards and weight have little to do with overall automobile saftety.

I'm personally inclined towards #2, but if you want to insist on a linkage, I suppose I'm happy to conclude that a side benefit of CAFE standards is that they're good for safety.

...driving a Prius instead of a Sequoia is going to have a devestating effect on the economy.  Or maybe it's all the people taking mass transit instead of driving to work that are really the drag on the GDP.  Obviously they should be spending money on gas instead of buying other stuff with their money.

Okay, snark mode off...

Spending lots of money on gas is not useful to the economy at all.  It would obviously be much more economically productive to do the same job (moving people, making stuff) for less gas, which also means less money.  Isn't this the very definition of productivity?

because I can't retrieve it)at least Brookings didn't have on their website) and they are not taking direct quotes from the study but rather paraphrasing or inferring from the study.

The fact that the study is from 1989 doesn't really help either.  

My point about comparing a 10 year old car to today is exactly that.  You can't.  So how are they coming up with a study that shows that CAFE made cars smaller and thus caused more fatalities, especially when you consider that highway fatalities are down over the same time period?

but I was just answering your question; not proposing a policy focus!

Personal transportation is not the only cause of energy consumption, and, generally speaking, trying to accomplish the same amount of work while consuming less energy, let alone increasing productivity so as to increase prosperity, smacks, at least faintly, of perpetual motion.

Mass transit is, in many regions of the country, an utter non-starter.  The infrastructure for it does not exist, and, given that most of us no longer toil in centralized factory locations, it makes little sense.  We are dispersed, in our dwellings and places of employment, and this will not, and cannot change, absent either catastrophe or the expenditure of, probably, trillions of dollars on, literally, the reconstitution of our patterns of living and working.  

Not.  Going.  To.  Happen.

Politically, the most likely form any enticement to conservation is likely to take is either a higher tax, a restriction of supply, or, in the case of personal transportation, mandated increases in efficiency, all of which either singularly or together, increase costs, thus prices, and thereby lower living standards.  And besides, I would think that our government, wedded as it is to such transgenerational ponzi schemes as social security, would not wish to provide yet another disincentive to larger families, which is precisely what higher efficiency standards are: a family with three children cannot vacation in a freakin' Prius.  

Re: and, generally speaking, trying to accomplish the same amount of work while consuming less energy, let alone increasing productivity so as to increase prosperity, smacks, at least faintly, of perpetual motion.

Humankind has been doing more work with less energy for millennia. That's the whole history of technology, from human-muscle power to a few very simple machines (wedges, screws, pulleys, the wheel etc.) to beast power to wind and water to steam to electricity.

Re: Then death rates go up because everything else being equal, a 3000lb car isn't going to protect you as well when you hit a wall as a 4000lb car will.

No, that's the red herring. Car weights went down by nearly 1/2 from the early 70s to the mid 80s, but guess what-- despite more drivers and more miles driven, highway death tolls also declined dramatically. Car mass is a very small factor in vehicle saftey, one that can be easily compensated for better engineering of the vehicle (today's small cars are actually safer in crashes than the old giants of the 60s), better roadways, and better driving behavior.

Re: If you're going to deny the simple basic fact that everything else being equal, a heavier car is going to protect you better in an accident than a lighter car

But everything else is not equal, and it never will be. Good grief, you are ignoring the fact that there are many ways to make your vehicle safer, including becoming a better driver. And even the much-maligned plastic parts of today's cars are actually a safety feature besides being lighter, as soft or easily breakable plastic is less likely to cause severe injury when impacted by human flesh than the hard rigid, metallic parts of old cars. If smaller cars = more deaths why did the vehicular death rate decline as car weights went down, and why are death rates in Europe and Asia, where vehicles are smaller than ours, comparable to, not greater than, our own? Facts mean something, and when facts on the ground contradict abstract theory then it is the theory not the facts which needs to be reexamined.

is the case of energy, inasmuch as the proposed alternatives to petroleum either require trillions in infrastructure, are themselves inefficient as sources of energy, or are so unviable economically that they must be subsidized by government.  Hydrogen fulfills at least the first two of my disqualifiers.  

As to the question of simply utilizing petroleum resources more efficiently, this will, as I have said, only increase costs, or itself require increased costs to be imposed, on the transportation end of things; and, as to other forms of consumption, there is a limit to how little energy we can consume to heat and cool our homes, to how cold in winter and how hot in summer we are willing and able to be; a limit to how much  more efficiently industrial processes can be made; a limit to the transition costs we can absorb in the switch to some as-yet unforeseen source of energy.

Although, I admit that I am a partisan of the increased use of nuclear power as a source of energy for non-transportation needs...

Re: It has been estimated

Key word: "estimated". Not proven or shown. Anyone can estimate anything. But without hard facts that's just junk science of the worst kind, rather like the scare claims  of the environmentalist.

ftc, oil would have to cost $114/barrel to justify these gas prices.

Supply and demand justify the current price. If you were to base the selling price on cost alone then they might be right, but the selling price is not set only by the cost to produce, it's also set by demand and what the market will pay.

then gas prices would go up, and crude prices would remain stable

Why do you beleive that only one variable can move at a time?

if gas prices are truly going up b/c of lack of refining capacity, that would not cause an increase in crude demand. it would cause a decrease. is that so hard?

It's so hard because it's simply wrong. World crude demand, and thus world prices, is not driven solely by the US. The US is now importing millions of barrels of refined product every day; that refined product is being produced as non-US refineries so the demand is still there.

sudden natural gas supplies either ran out or demand went up astronomically in a matter of months?

What makes you think this just suddenly happened? The press may suddenly have noticed it, but the price of natural gas has been going up for years. Go back and look it up, people have been moaning about natural gas prices for a decade. And yes, one reason is that supply is not increasing as fast as demand.

is concerned about price gouging.  They are so concerned they(at least the House) made it illegal to gouge on gas in their latest energy bill.

that "we don't know so who cares." I am merely arguing for some sense of perspective, a commodity that is almost non-existent among the enviros. And I'm not arguing for an active extinction program. I am arguing that stopping some project because the 300 surviving members of the gray spotted snail darter sub-species may be lost, without any regard to the importance or value of the project, is foolish.

We have environmental suits that have held up projects because some land mass is part of the "historical range" of some animal when the facts establish that the animal is not even remotely endangered and has not lived in the area for hundreds of years. This is loony tunes.

And we could have slower economic growth, and lower overall prosperity, too.  Funny how that would work.

We could easily consume more gas by attaching large parachutes to the back of everyone's car.  Would that help speed economic growth and increase prosperity?

The piece of the puzzle you're missing here is that of energy efficiency.  It's possible to get the same work done more efficiently than we have been doing it.  That's not perpetual motion--it's just being smarter.

I'm not saying don't drive a car--I'm saying we should double the mileage to halve the demand for automobile fuel.

who argues for rampant pollution and killing of anything that's in the way. We are arguing for sensible controls, sensible regulation. The enviros are generally in the "all or nothing" camp.

An example is the logging business. The anti-logging groups create the impression that lumber companies want to cut down every three standing, neglecting that if Weyerhauser cuts down all the trees, poof, no Weyerhauser. It is generally considered to be a bad business practice to destroy your source of supply. The reality is that for every tree they cut down they plant three. I don't have the numbers at hand, and little interest in searching for them, but I've seen figures that show there is more US land in forest today than in the early 1900s.

We've made environmental mistakes, and I do not dismiss the value of early environmentalists in helping us see the errors and correcting them. But, like labor unions, the things they fought for are now in place and they have become a hindrance.

public transit is a loser from the get go. The fares are never anywhere near the actual cost-per-ride. Transit gets enormous subsidies from the taxpayer, the same taxpayer riding the transit. It's just that the true costs are hidden from the rider.

There are private mass transit options out there that are profitable.

New York's transit system is largely revenue neutral.

Well that only serves to prove the point that price gouging isn't real.

Any time Congress wades in on an issue you can bet that finding the truth is not on the agenda; and that's true regardless of the party in power.

I sometimes whether some of the enthusiasm for mass transit is not so much a matter of pragmatic desires for energy savings or whatnot, but ideological distaste for the automobile and what it represents.

As to the question of simply utilizing petroleum resources more efficiently, this will, as I have said, only increase costs, or itself require increased costs to be imposed, on the transportation end of things

I disagree entirely.  I drive a car that costs less than an SUV and gets better mileage.

Not only that, but bad fuel efficiency is already a cost.  Any additional manufacturing costs, even if they are passed to be consumer, are counteracted by this.  Hybrid car demand is up, right?

Some petroleum consumption technologies actually are more cost-effective than others, and we haven't invented the most cost-effective ones yet.   We have all kinds of new technological edges we didn't have 30 years ago to leverage.

As for heating, until I have a sheet of aerogel in every wall, and a clear aerogel window in every frame, I don't think I'm being as energy efficient as I can be.  You think costs of energy efficient technologies are prohibitive?  Fiberglass isn't free--and yet people put it in their homes for insulation.  And I don't believe it is the most cost-effective insulator that will ever be invented.

There are limits, like you say, but we're not even close.

I didn't mean to suggest that you were suggesting what I said that other people were suggesting. :-)

I agree with the call for a happy medium.

The government pays for roads and bridges.

The government could mandate such a solution to the problem of dependence on oil and, aside from the tremendous costs and inconveniences involved in developing technologies capable of doubling the fuel efficiency of the average automobile, replacing the national fleet of existing vehicles and forcing families to cope with vehicles inadequate to their needs, this proposal would encounter the brick wall of economic reality: assuming that the foregoing obstacles could be overcome, the resultant increase in efficiency would not prompt the American people to pat themselves on the back for being such wonderful stewards of natural resources, but would conclude, rationally, that if they could accomplish as much as they once did with only half the outlay for fuel, they might as well drive more, and do more using automobiles.  

There is no way out of this cycle of economic reality and the love of freedom the automobile embodies short of punishing taxation that will make most of us a good bit less well off.

as to hybrid vehicles, they're wonderful and all, but the word is that the manufacturers are either losing money on each one sold or making only minimal profits.  Moreover, there is no inkling of the necessary recycling program for the massive and massively toxic batteries utilized in hybrids that, in addition, will last only approximately 5-7 years and cost upwards of 5K to replace, assuming that the technology doesn't progress so rapidly as to render that 25K Prius a 5-year disposable car.  Not to mention that fact that such vehicles can hardly substitute for the larger, less efficient ones as family vehicles.

In the end, any technology not demanded by the market - any technology, that is, that must be subsidized or mandated - will only increase costs because it will necessitate uses of economic resources in ways that are less efficient, in terms of expenses and profits, than the uses signalled by the market.  As I have said elsewhere in this thread, the limits most pertinent to these questions will be those imposed on our freedom to make certain economic and lifestyle decisions.

Not sure what sort of international exposure this has been getting, but there's been a bit of public debate in Australia recently about becoming the world's nuclear "dumping ground" (for want of a better term).

http://www.jennifermarohasy.com/blog/archives/000926.html

Note that the discussion hasn't involved many in power at this point - the government itself (and the opposition) still seem to regard it as political suicide to discuss nuclear waste (and at this point they may be right), but the idea certainly has a lot of merit.

You're right, things sort of fizzled interest-wise after Three Mile Island, but it shouldn't have. The French keep on a-buildin', nary a problem. Time to rejuvenate that interest.

That we ought to be finding more sources for oil and natural gas? This is not an either/or with fuel efficiency. We should do both, no?

If you're going to encourage new exploration and new sources through the tax code, would these benefits inure to a 7-11 or to the companies doing the exploring?

As I noted above, fuel efficiency is not incompatible with finding new sources for energy. We need to do both. Would you agree?

We need to do both, no?

Hard to know where to start.

Sorry to hear that the LNG terminals that you drive by are blowing up left and right. Very volatile, you know. Horse-hockey.

Alaskans support ANWR. The drilling footprint is small. Sorry you choose not to believe it. Remember they said the caribou herd would vanish when the pipeline went in? Increased six-fold. The sky wasn't falling, as it turns out.

France gets 80% of their power from nuclear, we get 20%. Lessee, that's a 60% difference. We ought to produce more, not less.

Finally, the law of supply and demand remains a stubborn fact of life. Sorry 'bout that.

I drive a moped!

Sorry to hear that the LNG terminals that you drive by are blowing up left and right. Very volatile, you know. Horse-hockey

Nope, no accidents so far.  And that's the way we like to keep it.  So, there are some hoops to jump through to permit new LNG terminals.  Sounds about right to me.

Regarding "very volatile", if you actually read the CRS paper I link to you will see that, in fact, LNG presents certain very significant dangers.  Perhaps unlike you, I live with them every day, but I'm not interested in making them more likely to happen by loosening permitting regulations.  If you'd like to try a pilot project to see how looser regulations will work out, great.  Your town can go first.

Alaskans support ANWR. The drilling footprint is small. Sorry you choose not to believe it.

Some Alaskans do and some don't.  And, since ANWR is federal property, Alaskans aren't the only folks that get to weigh in.  The popular claim of a 2,000 acre footprint for the drilling footprint is based on the area of physical contact that the drilling gear would make with the ground.  That is, shall we say, somewhat less than the total area that would actually be affected.  I choose to believe what's demonstrated to my satisfaction, not what gets bandied about as alleged fact.  It's a good approach to take.

More to the point, my issue with ANWR is that what we get back from developing it isn't worth it.  By "not worth it", I mean, among other things, that we could get the same result for less cost by very simple conservation measures.  I have other thoughts concerning the value of conserving wild open land, but my guess is that they won't mean a whole lot to you, so I'll leave them off the table.  In any case, feel free to disagree, but at least disagree with what I'm actually saying.

France gets 80% of their power from nuclear, we get 20%.

In absolute amounts we generate more power from nuclear than any other country.  20% of US power consumption is more than 80% of French.  We're bigger than they are.  

I have no particular beef with increasing the amount of power produced by nuclear plants.  If you read my post carefully, rather than not, you will see that I was contesting the claim that (a) we haven't put a plant online since the 70's, and (b) our use of nuclear power is minimal.

Finally, the law of supply and demand remains a stubborn fact of life.

Thats funny -- that was my point.  It's financial factors that drive the production of power in this country, not the evil ministrations of the all powerful environmental lobby.

As a final point -- there are five URLs in my post linking to independent research articles that back up what I said.  By "independent" I mean sources like the Department of Energy and the Congressional Research Service.  For laughs, I just scrolled through this whole thread.  Bee put up two links from CATO on the CAFE issue.  Other than that, nothing.  Just a lot of folks flapping their gums about "enviros".  It's the same lazy spouting off that we always see about the "liberals" and the "MSM".

I did my homework.  I don't see anyone else doing theirs, including you.  If you have some facts to put on the table, I'm all ears.  Otherwise, I'll stick to my own resources, thanks just the same.

is safe enough for the US Navy to use to power our most technologically advanced submarines, destroyers and aircraft carriers, it's certainly safe enough for me.

that people hear the word nuclear and think bombs and bad stuff.

My dh was nuke in the Navy, for years my sister thought he did something with bombs.

The only real problem with nuclear power is what to do with the waste-but if the plant is run according to regulations, it is a very clean source of energy.

There are plenty of ways to decrease fuel consumption without hurting (and, arguably, improving) the economy.  Increases in efficiency are a form of productivity increase, which is one of the best ways to improve the economy.

Now, you can perhaps argue against specific mechanisms to improve efficiency or how to accomplish them, but arguing that decreasing consumption necessarily hurts the economy is just silly...

(Incidentally, in the example I cited, the Prius has an MSRP about $7K lower than the Sequoia, so not only would buying you one save money on gas, but you'd save a bunch at the dealership as well.)

Well, we can't see the future, but I'll put another box of donuts on the line and say that we'll see a general increase in automobile efficiency in the next... lifetime.

Automobile, rail and air travel are all subsidized by the government as well in that much of the infrastructure is tax-payer funded.  Most people agree that providing transportation infrastructure is a good/useful role for government.

Moreover, there is no inkling of the necessary recycling program for the massive and massively toxic batteries utilized in hybrids that, in addition, will last only approximately 5-7 years and cost upwards of 5K to replace

I agree hybrids suck because of the battery problem... but this is a battery problem, not a hybrid problem.  Battery technology is a hot field right now, and it's being driven by market demand, not government incentives.  Let's see what it looks like in five years.

Nobody sets prices because nobody can set prices. What is the price that is "justified" (your term). If the oil companies can set prices why are they so LOW???

was exploited by the environmentalists, and their hysteria was given credence and even encouraged by MSM.

The Westinghouse design was in use when I was in the Navy, and I'm unaware of any accidents that were attributed to the Westinghouse reactor.  Maybe Strieff has some insider info that I'm not privy to, but I can't recall a single accident.

Spent fuel storage is the biggest drawback to nuclear power, but the Yucca Mountain facility would go a long way toward solving that problem.

Nimbys use enviromental regs to set stop development. Not just energy, but condos, marinas the whole gamit. That is why I say most environmentalist are phonies.

We protect the stupid Manatee in Florida even though it is a feral species introduced by the Spanish in the 17th century for FOOD. Sea cow is no word game. They are cows. Poop and poop and poop. e. coli FACTORIES.

reducing demand is easy as pie. INCREASE price!!! Works every time its tried. The Algore concept.

At least not while dh was in the Navy-of course how much of this is due to the reactor design, and how much is due to training?  Hard to say, but if civilian plants set standards similar to Navy standards, accidents due to stupidity would be unlikely, which would leave design flaws as the main issue.

Overall, I think the environmentalists worked up more than enough fear on the issue of nuclear energy to make the suggestion of expanding or building new plants almost impossible.  

Overall nuclear energy has been demonized to the point that it just isn't considered.

The Golden Gate bridge tools pay for the money loosing bus and ferry system.

Cars subsidize more than the roads they use not vice versa!!

Do you know of any actual nuclear plants that were planned, but abandoned, because of pressure from environmentalists?

Thanks -

But Comanche Peak was a pain in the butt for years because of enviros and internal screwups.

Duke Power gave up on the one that was planned just seven miles from my house.  The property is just sitting there growing weeds and trees.

plant there had plans to expand and those were killed.

Also, seems like something similar happened to the power plant in Virginia when we lived there.

I can't say that I have heard of any plants being planned in the last 20 years, but then by the mid 90's nuclear power was already more than demonized enough that a brand new one wouldn't have made it too far.

in Long Island, isn't there? Shoreham, maybe? I don't know to what degree you're distinguishing environmentalism from NIMBY-ism, which I'm sure played a big role.

was about as NIMBY as you can get.  Environmentalists rarely bring these things down themselves. NIMBY, sometimes clothing themselves in environmentalism (they'll use whatever they can), tends to be a far stronger force in fighting specific proposals, at least that's my experience, and I've sited several dozen power plants.

I have to disagree on the hindrance bit, on both the part of the environmentalist and the part of labor unions.  I think there is always value to having a group on the far-left or far-right when it comes to these issues.  If I have corporations that want to lower wages in order to make a bigger profit, then I want labor unions around.  If I have companies that want to dump all of their waste into my river, I want the environmentalists around.  

The facts are that the free market that everyone values and appreciates the value of will always inherently be pushing to increase profit at the cost of workers, the environment, or whatever else gets in their way.  This is because they are corporations, and this is their nature.  And as long as that is the case, a counter-balance is important.

Don't get me wrong...I think Weyerhauser will plant trees all day long to avoid running out of its source product.  However...its source product isn't the wildlife that lives in the trees.  So there are certain aspects of the environment that won't concern them until they start seeing the effects on their revenue....

And I hope that it is market-driven, not imposed in accordance with an ideological conception of the proper modes of resource utilization, that's all.

maybe like internet e-commerce, which piggybacks on government R&D?

I've been studying the market for alternative energy companies. A good number of technology leaders are based in Europe and Japan, since governments there subsidized the market while oil prices were cheap. Now oil is getting more expensive, and they have a leg up, having already invested in technology development.

Don't get me wrong, I'm an entrepreneur, a big fan of free-market competition for most of the economy. I also think that there are some times when government investments can pay off.

new refineries are great so long as they proccess crude more efficiently.  In fact, now is a great time to start phasing out old refineries and replacing them with the best our technology can offer.  

did I say mopars?  I'm sure I meant to say mopeds!  Way to go.

Public Infrastructure used by cars and SUVs is paid for by cars and SUV through the gas tax. These users also subsize "Public" transit.

Where is this location?  I'd like to do some homework.

Thanks -

steam engines would have been disqualified by your criteria since the only available models, based on Hieron's in antiquity, were absurdly inefficient, inferior even to human muscle. Nor did an infrastructure (coal mines, etc.) exist to support them. I am concerned that your criteria would dictate technological stasis based on the precept that if something is not viable now it never shall be. I am much more optimistic about human technological prowess I guess as it has usually been the case throughout history that once we put our minds and money behind an effort we usually do accomplish it.  See: synthetic rubber, the atomic bomb, locomotives, canned food, the airplane, the automobile itself etc-- all of which had no few scoffers claiming "It can't be done".

Re: Not to mention that fact that such vehicles can hardly substitute for the larger, less efficient ones as family vehicles.

There are in fact hybrid SUVs under production. They are less efficient than their smaller siblings, but more so than a standard SUV. Moreover how many people have large families (>2 children) nowadays? Some people do yes, but not so many that the whole automotive market needs to based on their needs. They are a niche and the market will provide for them too.

As for car companies losing money that's a business probolem, not a technological one. Obviously they need to figure out how to make money off the vehicles and since they have shown that they can do so on non-hybrids I fail to see that this should be an insoluable problem. Perhpas some execs need to put their MBAs to work and start earning their salaries instead on coasting on auto-pilot based on outmoded business models.

Cars do not subsidize anything--taxpayers do.

this "all or nothing camp" of which you speak?  I'm sure there are some Earth-firsters out there, but that's certainly not my perspective or that of the vast majority of people who would describe themselves as concerned with ecology.  What we have realized is that the enlightened self-interest of logging companies or polluters is not sufficient impetus to ecological responsibility.  The cataclysmic brush fires and the choked streams of the 19th and early 20th centuries are proof enough of that.  In the absence of pressure from legislation and activists, loggers, miners, and factories will race to the bottom in order to maximize shareholder profits.  That is, after all, their fiduciary responsibility.  Some things are too important for the market to be allowed to determine their fate.  Anyone who fails to realize that is no true conservative, but rather a very dangerous type of liberal.

you and I disagree.

For the most part the obstructionism does not come from the rational people concerned with balancing the environment and the economy. The obstruction comes from those whose attitude is 'my way or the highway.' The incessent lawsuits that stand in the face of reason and good science. To what do you ascribe the insanity that prevented cutting and controlled burning in the 1990s and resulted in the catastrophic fires in the western national forests?

this is not a problem to which the government should be providing answers.  It is, in my judgment, not a legitimate use of state power for a government to impose regulations that will a)increase energy costs, b)require families to purchase new cars to compensate for the increased energy costs, c)impose regulations, or create circumstances which will penalize those who, by choosing to have larger families, will contribute more to the offsetting of the negative consequences of the approaching entitlement crisis.

It is all well and good to observe that governments establish the conditions under which it is possible for any market to emerge; it is quite another to draw out the non-sequitur that governments should enact policies, or, by inaction or restraint, allow or encourage the emergence of conditions which will necessitate alterations, some of them quite radical and intrusive, in our ways of living.  I thought it axiomatic that lifestyle choices were not among the proper ends of state action:))

As regards the hybrids: all of the hybrid SUVs are small, and inadequate to the needs of families with multiple young children.  I have looked at them.  Moreover, Toyota is presently the most successful auto manufacturer, and it has been rumoured that even Toyota loses money on the Prius; perhaps they hope to recoup their losses when, in five years' time, customers will face the prospect of battery replacements starting around 5K.  So, no, it has nothing to do with outmoded business models, but with the intersection of manufacturing costs, R&D expenditures, and market forces (people will buy the Prius at 25K, but won't touch it at 35K).  

Finally, I might note that all too many participating in these discussions are tiptoeing around a basic economic reality: we might be able to increase the efficiency of our energy usage, in some instances quite substantially, but on a macro level, economic growth requires increases in energy consumption; this is an incontrovertible lesson of history.  Technological advancement allows, within limits, for increased outputs on decreased inputs, but there can be no progress to infinity; there are limits, rooted in the nature of physical reality, to how efficient any object, such as a house, or any process, as in manufacturing, can be made, and it is often the case that the cost of an increae in efficiency will outweigh both the benefit and the cost of simply consuming more energy.  Diminishing returns and opportunity costs still obtain.

talking past each other.  I'm not ready to jump to conclusions regarding the causes of severe wildfires.  It was my impression in any event that it was a long-standing USFS policy to put out all fires, which led to the buildup of fuel in the first place and consequently permitted worse fires to develop.  I'm not sure whether that policy was the fault of environmentalists, or of property owners and logging-rights holders who didn't want their investments torched.  From an ecological perspective, forest fires are an integral part of most forest ecosystems.

It is all well and good to observe that governments establish the conditions under which it is possible for any market to emerge; it is quite another to draw out the non-sequitur that governments should enact policies, or, by inaction or restraint, allow or encourage the emergence of conditions which will necessitate alterations, some of them quite radical and intrusive, in our ways of living.  I thought it axiomatic that lifestyle choices were not among the proper ends of state action:))

Transportation and energy consumption have never been outside of government purview; it's illogical to assert that they should be so now.  It was government that built the roads, and especially the interstate highways, and government that has made cheap oil one of the foundations of our foreign, economic, and social policies for the past 70 years or more.  Finally, it's government that owns much of the land from which fossil fuels are extracted.  

"Public Infrastructure used by cars and SUVs is paid for by cars and SUV through the gas tax. These users also subsize "Public" transit. "

The use of cars increases taxes through gas taxes and tolls. Mass transit is a consumer of these taxes. If everybody quit driving there would be no roads upon which to drive busses and less funds for rail and everything else the goverment spends money on.

some evidence to backup your assertion that fuel taxes and tolls create a net positive revenue gain for government.  I would love to see it.

although, plausible, conflates a number of things, and carries implications that would be, to most people, counterintuitive and unaccpetable.

I'm assuming that the existence of the interstate highway system, cheap oil and the federal ownership of lands from which fossil fuels are extracted are your examples of ways in which government has taken into its purview questions of energy consumption and transportation.  In the first place, I can only assume that there were and are many rationales for the construction and maintainance of the interstate highway system.  Among them, undoubtedly, would be numbered the role that system plays in the facilitation of interstate commerce.  More generally, although some libertarians might disagree, roads, and at least some highways, are quite naturally and logically a public monopoly or near-monopoly; at the very least, private ownership of certain  routes, in the absence of the sort of regulation that would raise interesting theoretical and practical questions concerning the nature of such public-private arrangements, could result in conditions one could plausibly argue would constitute restraint of trade.  

  In this respect, the existence of the interstate highway system is little different from the involvement of government in the creation of the railroad system; basic physical realities do not permit the existence of a competitve market that even roughly approximates that which obtains in other sectors of the economy.  Government establishment of certain infrastructural systems thus serves to create the conditions under which economic development can occur absent the inefficiencies that would obtain were either such systems not to exist, or to exist as private monopolies.  

  However, this type of government action, involving, essentially, the establishment of certain physical conditions for economic development, is not the same sort of thing as the recognition, at one time, that oil was cheap, and thus the most rational basis for a developing economy.  "Cheap oil" was not, first and foremost, a policy, but a recognition of economic reality that, because of its very obviousness, became the basis of policy.  But yielding to obvious economic realities is not the same sort of thing as a natural public monopoly; and neither is itself, or when taken together with the other, analogous to the public promotion of specific forms of transportation or energy utilization, save in the utterly trivial sense that conditions of possibility enable the emergence of all sets of circumstances consistent with the initial conditions.  That is, they do not determine outcomes, but establish certain sets of outcomes as possible.  

  Given the foregoing, it simply cannot follow that government should now begin to engineer specific outcomes regarding energy and transportation; it cannot follow unless one is either prepared to accept some or other form of the argument for central planning, however modified, or making a sort of libertarian reductio.  And both positions, most conservatives believe, fail to remain fully cognizant of all of the relevant economic realities.  

As to the matter of federal ownership of many lands that could contain fossil fuel resources, this is not a necessity of either political science or economics; if, however, we have made a collective decision that federal ownership is desirable for certain ends, we are surely free to  alter those ends, for those lands are held as a public trust, and are not King's Forests belonging to a sovereign who stands in relation to us as a king to his subjects.  

So, no, I don't grant that it follows from the creation of the interstate highway system or the reliance on cheap oil, or even the federal ownership of potential oil-producing lands that government ought to engineer economic outcomes that will entail radical alteration of our way of life; it is one thing for the government to have established conditions which laid the foundation for an expanding economy and a greater overall prosperity, facilitating new expressions of American liberty, invention and the pursuit of happiness, and quite another for that government to now constrain all of those ends and ideals in pursuit of specific, ideologically given ends, all justified by a logical mistake.

No market is truly free, since someone has to make the market in which trading exists.

SOMEONE!?

The free market consists of people freely exchanging their property in exchange for others' property. A market can, indeed, be truely free.

No subsidies to energy companies, also known as tax cuts.

A tax cut isn't a subsidy. Granted, I don't want the government determining the direction of the market by taxing some companies more than others. In fact, I don't want the government taxing companies at all: all taxes are paid by individuals. When the government taxes companies, it is really just using the company to collect a hidden tax from individuals.

No subsidies to gas consumption.  That means that all costs associated with driving, including construction and maintenance of roads, should be paid for at the pump by the driver.  

Are roads a "subsidy" to "gas consumption"? Really? I presume, then, that roads did not pre-exist the internal conbustion engine.

No restrictive zoning to keep those refineries out of your back yard.  If they can buy the land, they can build wherever they want.

Right. It is their private propety, after all.

No more releasing oil from the strategic oil reserve.  Hell, no more strategic oil reserve at all, as this messes with the "free" market.

So what are you planning to do with the oil you won't release or keep?

No anti-monopoly regulations. No complaints about price-gouging. (Hello, Standard Oil!)

Good. There is no such thing as price-gouging, anyway.

Finally, no gov't influence in securing/ managing energy sources. (No department of energy, no propping up friendly oil-rich dictatorships, no military engagements for oil.)

There are a whole host of gov agencies that we would be better off without.

However, to my knowledge, we haven't fought any wars for oil.

C'mon, it'd be FUN /evilgrin...

There's actually a MUCH better way to generate electricity in zero-gravity, involving large toroid magnets spinning around a metal cylinder/control station... but that has to be engineered to a much higher standard than a simple collector...

when I lived in Torrance, California, I lived right across the street from what I believe is the largest refinery in SoCal.  If all new refineries are run like the Torrance refinery, I would enthusiastically say yes.

the conversion of NG to heat for cooking?  Compared to how much NG is used to create enough electricity to bring, say, one gallon of water to boiling, how much NG, applied directly to the container of water as heat, would be required to bring the same amount of water to boiling?

Plus, natural gas is only useful as heat in the home.  Electricity is useful for FAR more things, so overall, might it not be more efficient to turn the NG into electricity?

Please induldge me in a little scifi here.

The ultimate answer to nuclear waste, next to cold fusion, is the space elevator.  If you aren't familiar with it, a space elevator is a carbon fiber nano-tube cable thousands of miles long in geosynchronus orbit with the earth that you can raise and lower payloads on much more cheaply and safely than a rocket launch.  Plop containers of nuke waste on it, raise it up to earth orbit, and gently push the stuff into the sun.  Problem solved.

not necessarily.  For example, when coal was being burned in earnest in Britain, and London was completely covered in black soot all day and night, public officials made various claims about the health benefits of burning coal, including its beneficial effects on womens complexions.  You can read about it in the book Coal:  A Human History.