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The Price Of Oil - Page 2

I paid $1.75 on Saturday for 87 (regular). My owners manual says that's all I need, so that is all my truck is ever going to taste!

FarSeer I read your post about cars being a choice, I understand the point you are making, but I don't think the alternatives are necessarily good choices. We can choose to work closer to home for less pay (small towns may only have minimum wage service jobs, for example). We can choose to live in the cities, but most of us can't really afford decent housing in the larger cities. Most people living in the cities are either wealthy (living in nice areas) or poor (living in not so nice areas). Schools are also a problem if you have children. Most big city schools aren't very good. Wealthy people send their children to private schools. Poor people don't and their children do not get very good educations. So, I think most people in the US really have little real good choice about driving. However, we can all choose more easily what we drive. I, too, drive a 4 cylinder vehicle. I owned an SUV once. I loved it, but once the gas prices began to rise (about 4 years ago), I had to get rid of it. I couldn't afford the gas.

Oil Price The

It's not looking good for gas prices.

Oil Ends at Highest Price in 13 Years
Wed Mar 17, 2004 03:57 PM ET

NEW YORK (Reuters) - U.S. oil prices roared to its highest closing price in over 13 years on Wednesday as a drop in already low gasoline inventories sharpened the threat of a supply crunch that could hurt economic growth.
U.S. light crude futures (CLc1: Quote, Profile, Research) rose 70 cents to settle at $38.18 a barrel, nearly two percent higher. In London, May Brent crude (COK4: Quote, Profile, Research) ended 85 cents, or 2.6 percent, up at $33.53.

It was the highest settlement for U.S. crude since October 1990.
U.S. light crude prices have averaged almost $35 a barrel so far in 2004, well above 2003's average price of $31, which was the highest in more than two decades.

At the day's settlement, crude futures had risen $4.31, or nearly 13 percent, since Feb. 10, when OPEC decided it would cut official production quotas by 4 percent from April 1.

OPEC cuts plans and rocketing Asian demand from China and India have combined to push prices to levels which consuming countries fear could hurt economic growth.

The head of Germany's export industry association said on Tuesday that oil prices pose a bigger risk to Germany's economic recovery than the euro's exchange rate.

Link To Story

The Price Of Oil History & Civil Business Politics

U.S. Gas Prices Hit New Record High
Mar 28, 8:07 PM (ET)
By TIM MOLLOY

LOS ANGELES (AP) - Gasoline prices across the country climbed another 3 cents in the past two weeks to a record-high average of $1.80 per gallon for all grades, according to a study released Sunday.

There is little chance of prices falling significantly in the near future, because increased demand will likely result from an improving economy, Memorial Day travel, and even the extra hour of light from daylight savings time, said Trilby Lundberg of the Lundberg Survey of 8,000 stations nationwide.

"The demand push this time of year is adding to supply tightness and therefore price," Lundberg said. "I don't see any recipe for substantial gasoline price cuts anytime soon."

https://apnews1.iwon.com//article/20040329/...G=home&SEC=news

Page 2 Oil Price The

Re:High gasoline prices:
As I type this reply,prices have risen now to all time highs,in parts of the West [CA],it is in some stations over $3.00 per gallon and going higher!in a way,we have only ourselves to blame for the present situation we now face,our dependence on OPEC,and other foreign countries,which is a well known fact,however we have to place blame where it belongs,namely the greedy oil companies,who gouge the consumer,we are literally at their mercy, furthermore,we have had the technology right at hand ,some of it going back to the first gasoline crisis in the early 70's remember?at that time there was a big Pr by the gov't stating that they would start drilling for "shale oil deposits",that we were going to speed up the mfg of more methonol,which is grain based,that the use of electric vehicales would be increased,and lastly,how about hydrogen powered vehicles,all of this technology is proven and has beeen tested for years,but because the oil cartel has such a stranglehold on the market,they stifle any attempt which could cut into their profit,so where are we left,with soaring gasoline ,home heating,etc,prices miving out of sight for the average consumer,oh,I forgot,ther is also propane which can be used to run vehicles,a sad situation indeed!
Lucky

Oil Price The

Saudi: Don't Blame OPEC for US Gas Prices
Sun Apr 4, 2004 05:11 PM ET

By Tom Doggett
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Saudi Arabia on Sunday blamed record high U.S. gasoline prices on America's tough environmental laws and lack of refining capacity, saying OPEC's oil production policies were not at fault.


However, Al-Jubeir said the lack of refining capacity in the United States was a key reason gasoline prices were rising.

"There has not been a refinery built in America in the last 20 years. So if you produce more crude oil but you can't refine it, it's not going to translate into gasoline," he said.


Saudi Arabia tried to smooth over relations with the United States after the OPEC vote. The Saudi ambassador made a surprise visit to the White House last Thursday to deliver a message to President Bush from Crown Prince Abdullah that pledged the kingdom would not let oil shortages harm the global economy.

LINK TO STORY

The Price Of Oil

I'm back!

The facts are: We as a nation have made the vehicle a daily routine(for work and play). I walk to places that are close enough, and I drive a 4cyl. Really I have cut as much out of my living for gas as I can. What I dont like is having to not buy grocery's for the week,over something so stupid as gas.

The 'wealthy' comment from my end, would stem from my perseption of weathy which is: If you drive an suv and can afford to fill it in the first place,(how many people do you see in a huge suv all alone every time you see them?) a silly waste of resorces. IMHO. That would be weathy to me, I realize the BIG money people fly, and have their own jets for that matter(which is still a petroleum product). Those people fit into my filthy rich category,anyway. They are removed from real world problems like feeding your family and paying bills and such.

We cant go around making electric/hybrid cars in mass production either, for one simple reason(which they are finally figuring out) where are you going to plug it in?
After you find a place to plug it in,what energy will be used to charge it? We already have rolling blackouts and power failures all over the U.S. So saying we could plug in 50 or so million cars is ludicrus.(as an electrician I have known this for years,our infrastructure for power is very old and obsolete,which drifts into another topic.)

The answer will be hydrogen,now if we could somehow ween the middle east off our greenbacks and us from the oil. It will happen eventually. But in the mean time we are at the mercy of whatever rumor the media wants to spread about the shortage of crude oil.

In the 70's in california (according to my father,I was a bit young then). People were lining up at gas stations for hours on end, in the great gas wars. I guess gas was 'limited' then and gas stations would square off on their respective street corners posting lower and lower gas prices throughout the day untill they 'ran' out.
Then they said there really was no more,it was in limited supply,so you could actually pull up to a gas station and there would be no gas. I know this to be a true occurance considering the source, it was true as far as any of us would ever know.

However, my father-in-law has a different perspective: At that time in vegas gas was cheaper then it had been in years,so ranchers and money men who were smart would buy up as much gas as they could,then drive it down here and make quadruple their money back. As for my FIL he never noticed a gas crisis, odd, since the country was on its knees over fuel at the time.

It really is a hoax to drive gas prices higher, thats just how I see it. The gov. will not be happy untill we are dependant on them for everything. Including information.

The Price Oil - Page 2

My husband and I were on the road during the 70's gas wars. We drove through-out Calif, Nevada, Arizona, Montana, Nebraska, to Rochester New York up to Canada for a week end trip, South Dakota, Minnesota, etc. Never once did we have a problem getting gas until we hit Oregon. We were residents of Oregon, had Oregon plates and they made us take a number. I think they were doing: if the last number was odd, you could get gas on odd numbered days. So, we got gas on our day, then drove to Washington State and stayed with my family and got gas when ever we wanted!

As long as they thought we were Tourists, we could get gas!

I had stated earlier in this thread, 13 March, that gas in my town was at $1.849. That finally went up this last Friday to $1.889. Every day as I drive to work, I check out the prices. Too bad the stations aren't open that early in the morning ~ I need gas tomorrow and I want to get it before they raise their price. They generally do it after 2 pm.

Offtopic but, Welcome back, where have ya been?

Edited: AGene on 5th Apr, 2004 - 7:26am

The Price Oil Politics Business Civil & History - Page 2

regarding hydro fuel cell technology as mentioned by Dio The Dark, and how it's being touted as the solution to all our energy problems, well........i'm afraid it isn't

there's the problem of the inevitable leakage when a car is 15 years old with 250K miles, and maintained with duct tape (especially in countries like Trinidad and other developing countries where they don't throw nuffink away)

- Car Key Boi,
never has a problem with his frist class seat / on the plane from Venez, hottie stewardess chick gave me a smile and an extra pillow! DIGTBK!




https://pr.caltech.edu/periodicals/EandS/ar...es/LXVI/H2.html

According to conventional wisdom, hydrogen-fueled cars are environmentally friendly because they emit only water vapor-a naturally abundant atmospheric gas [see E&S, No. 1, 2003]. But leakage of the hydrogen gas that can fuel such cars could cause problems for the upper atmosphere, new research shows.


In an article that appeared in a June issue of the journal Science, Caltech researchers reported that the leaked hydrogen gas that would inevitably result from a hydrogen economy, if it accumulates, could indirectly cause as much as a 10 percent decrease in atmospheric ozone. The researchers are Tracey Tromp, physics research scientist; John Eiler, assistant professor of geo-chemistry; Yuk Yung, pro-fessor of planetary science; Run-Lie Shia, PhD "86, planetary science research scientist; and Mark Allen, PhD "76, Jet Propulsion Laboratory scientist.


If hydrogen were to replace fossil fuel entirely, the re-searchers estimate that 60 to 120 trillion grams of hydrogen would be released each year into the atmosphere, assuming a 10 to 20 percent loss rate due to leak-age. This is four to eight times as much hydrogen as is currently released into the atmosphere by human activi-ty, and would result in a doubling or tripling of inputs to the atmosphere from all sources, natural or human.


Because molecular hydrogen freely moves up and mixes with stratospheric air, the result would be the creation of additional water at high altitudes and, consequently, an increased dampening of the stratosphere. This in turn would result in a cooling of the lower strato-sphere and a disturbance of ozone chemistry, which depends on a chain of chem-ical reactions involving hydrochloric acid and chlorine nitrate on water ice.


The estimates of potential damage to stratospheric ozone levels are based on an atmo-spheric modeling program that tests the various sce-narios that might result, de-pending on how much hydro-gen ends up in the stratosphere from all sources, both natural and anthropogenic.


Ideally, a hydrogen fuel-cell vehicle has no environmental impact. Energy is produced by combining hydrogen with oxygen pulled from the atmosphere, and the tailpipe emission is water. The hydrogen fuel could come from a number of sources (Iceland recently started pulling it out of the ground). Nuclear power could be used to generate the electricity needed to split water, and in principle, the electricity needed could also be derived from renewable sources such as solar or wind power.


By comparison, the internal combustion engine uses fossil fuels and produces many pollutants, including soot, noxious nitrogen and sulfur gases, and the "greenhouse gas" carbon dioxide. While
a hydrogen fuel-cell economy would almost certainly im-prove urban air quality, it has potential unexpected consequences due to the inevitable leakage of hydrogen from cars and hydrogen production facilities, and during the transportation of the fuel.


Uncertainty remains about the effects on the atmosphere because scientists still have a limited understanding of the hydrogen cycle. At present, it seems likely such emissions could accumulate in the air. Such a build-up would have several consequences, chief of which would be a moistening and cooling of the upper atmosphere and, indirectly, destruction of ozone. In this respect, hydrogen would be similar to the chlorofluoro-carbons (once the standard substance used for air con-ditioning and refrigeration), which were intended to be contained within their de-vices, but which in practice leaked into the atmosphere and attacked the stratospheric ozone layer.


The authors of the Science article say that the current situation is unique in that society has the opportunity to understand the potential environmental impact well ahead of the growth of a hydrogen economy. This contrasts with the cases of atmospheric carbon dioxide, methyl bromide, CFCs, and lead, all of which were released into the environ-ment by humans long before their consequences were understood.


"We have an unprecedented opportunity this time to understand what we"re getting into before we even switch to the new technology," says Tromp, the lead author. "It won't be like
the case with the internal-combustion engine, when we started learning the effects of carbon dioxide decades later."


The question of whether or not hydrogen is bad for the environment hinges on whether the planet has the ability to consume excess anthropogenic hydrogen, explains Eiler. "This man-made hydrogen will either be absorbed in the soil-a process that is still poorly understood but likely free
of environmental consequences-or react with other compounds in the atmosphere.


"The balance of these two processes will be key to the outcome," says Eiler. "If soils dominate, a hydrogen econ-omy might have little effect on the environment. But if the atmosphere is the big player, the stratospheric cooling and destruction of ozone modeled in this Science paper are more likely to occur.


"Determining which of these two processes dominates should be a solvable problem," states Eiler, whose research group is currently exploring the natural budget of hydrogen using new iso-topic techniques.


"Understanding the effects of hydrogen on the environment now should help direct the technologies that will be the basis of a hydrogen econ-omy," Tromp adds. "If hy-drogen emissions present an environmental hazard, then recognizing that hazard now can help guide investments in technologies to favor designs that minimize leakage. On the other hand, if hydrogen is shown to be environmentally friendly in every respect, then designers could pursue the most cost-effective technologies and potentially save billions in needless safeguards."


If hydrogen indeed turns out to be bad for the ozone layer, should the transition to hydrogen-fueled cars be abandoned? Not necessarily, Tromp and Eiler claim.


"If it's the best way to provide a new energy source for our needs, then we can, and probably should, do it," Tromp says.