How dare the Saudis....

treitz3

For cross reference, check this thread...
http://www.polkaudio.com/forums/showthread.php?p=859196#post859196

markmarc

Big oil began consolidating in the late 1970's and early 80's, at that time their were too many refineries, so MANY older ones were shuttered. The long term goal of big oil was to raise the price. Well it's taken them 25 plus years but it's worked.

Now add on the fact that China and India are increasing their consumption by 15-20 percent per year. On top of that Mexico and Venezuela's production has fallen fairly dramatically (despite Chavez' claim otherwise). Then consider that we've added 30 million people to the USA in that time. Vehicles have actually become less fuel efficient. Next, environmental concerns both logical and silly have closed off areas to drilling. Finally, that with the Mortgage mess, investment $$ now go into the safest commodity OIL, and the rising deficit and lowered federal funds rate have weakened the dollar. It's a perfect storm, and only action by industry, gov't, and individuals is going to solve this mess.

Demiurge

Oil companies do not control the price of oil.

carpenter

DarqueKnight wrote: »

I hope those billions of barrels stay right where they are, at least for the near future.

I don't see where it makes much sense for us to use up our oil reserves when other countries are willing to pump theirs dry. Oil is, after all, a non-renewable resource.....

Exactly. Oil is gonna run out sooner or later. the countries that keep their reserves, will have a 20 years "transition period" advantage so to speak.
China will not be able to sustain it's economic growth rates without the energy flow. India? forget about it. Saudy? well ....

Midnite Mick

We've been paying this price for a long time.

Right now it is 1.30 a litre and supposed to be 1.50 within a week.

1.30 x 3.78 = 4.91/gallon

at 1.50 x 3.78 = 5.67 this was the price all last summer

It is supposed to go much higher than that this summer as well.

markmarc

Everybody has a hand in oil prices, whether directly or in directly. The point is what are we going to do about it now? I believe we need a concerted effort (think Manhattan Project level) to rid ourselves of the need to suck at the **** of foreign oil. If we don't we'll be spending hundreds of trillions this century fighting energy wars.

Energy independence requires us to look at all forms including nuclear, solar, wind, wave, hydro, coal, natural gas, algae, etc. A solid mix of all will not only provide freedom from foreign sources, but a strong economy as well.

BTW, the lack of refining capacity is a part of the gas price problem, especially on the west coast. Many of the shuttered refineries could be brought back onto line with modern pollution controls at a far smaller cost, and without massive environmental delays due to grandfathered laws than new plants. In the meantime, some of our Alaskan oil I understand goes to Japan.

DarqueKnight

Ok, this is how we fix it:

Every registered voter write or email their senate and congressional representative and tell them that, unless they come up with a viable plan to wean us off foreign oil and provide reasonable incentives for developing alternative fuels-and implement it immediately, their asses will be thrown out in the next elections.

Now, what are the chances of that happening? Most people don't even know who their political representatives are or what they are doing, let alone their mailing/email addresses.

Have a pleasant afternoon.

MacLeod

DarqueKnight wrote: »

I hope those billions of barrels stay right where they are, at least for the near future.

I don't see where it makes much sense for us to use up our oil reserves when other countries are willing to pump theirs dry. Oil is, after all, a non-renewable resource.

Not necessarily. There are more and more people believing that oil is a byproduct of all the **** that goes on in the earth's core. There are millions of barrels being spewed up thru the oceans floor every day for years! They said 30 years ago we were 10 years away from running out of oil - yet we keep on and keep on finding oil supplies capable of sustaining us for 30+ years.

One of the best bargaining chips we have is that the Saudis (and other oil producing countries) know that we have our own substantial oil reserves. If prices get crazy to the point that Americans are rioting over oil prices, you can be assured that oil will start flowing from our own sources. Contrast that with European countries, most of whom have no oil reserves and where the average price of a gallon of "petrol" is 6 bucks.

Not necessarily. First of all, it would take us 2-5 years to get more oil flowing back over here. Not like we can flip a switch and BOOM we've got a million barrels a day added to the flow. Waiting around a few decades for the Saudi's to run out of oil (and there is no guarantee they will) then what do we do? We're still running off of 30 year old refinery capacity and 30 year old supply of nuclear power plants. We need to get caught up now! There is no quick fix, we've screwed ourselves over the last decade or two by giving in to the NIMBY's (not in my back yard) and communist environmental movement so we're stuck with $4/gallon for now but we can and need to fix gas prices for 2010.

Another thing going for us is that, if push comes to shove, we have the technology to wean ourselves off of oil. I don't see us doing that until we have too.

Yes we have the technology to run engine off water - problem is that the car would be the size of a tractor trailer and cost $10,000,000. There is no alternative energy source ready to be implemented into society. There will be in the future as technology and a free market will, as always, overcome but until that time we're foolish for not using the increasingly abundant, cheap and efficient energy sources we have domestically.

Every registered voter write or email their senate and congressional representative and tell them that, unless they come up with a viable plan to wean us off foreign oil and provide reasonable incentives for developing alternative fuels-and implement it immediately, their asses will be thrown out in the next elections.

The government is completely incapable of fixing this problem. They can only get out of the way and let the free market fix it. Lift the 25 year long ban on drilling within 250 miles of the coast of Florida!! 85% of the oil in the Gulf is OFF LIMITS!! The government is NOT the solution - they are the very cause of this problem!

Again, alternative fuels are great and wonderful but we need to forget about them for now. Whoever comes out with the water powered car will be a gazillionaire overnight. Thats way more incentive than the imperial federal government could EVER come up with. And you know what? I wouldnt be surprised if its an evil oil company that comes out with it. Did you know that Exxon, BP other oil companies have been spending BILLIONS of dollars on research into alternative energy sources over the last several years. Everything we have that is good in this world was given to us by free enterprise. The only thing government can do is get in the way and screw things up.

TroyD

First of all, Cathy, much as I love ya.....your suggestion just isn't practical. Our society is built on the premise of affordable oil. Mass transit infrastructure simply doesn't exist in most places and even in the ones it does, it can't sustain the demands if we all simply stopped driving. Great idea. Completely unpractical.

As I understand it, it's more of a refining issue than a production issue combined with rampant speculation on the open market, so simply asking the Saudi's to ramp up production isn't really solving the problem either.

Tapping our reserves, I've got mixed emotions on that. The problem is, tapping them is a long term process. So, if we said today, ok, let's drill....we still won't actually SEE a drop of that oil for awhile to come.

BDT

Norm Apter

It seems to me that even drilling for oil on our own ground is a short-term solution, at best. As demand in China and India (and other developing countries) keeps rising, so will overall world demand and that means steady rise in prices when we're talking about a finite resource. Like it or not, we're living in a globalized world.

In my view, there's a couple things that need to be done. Raise fuel efficiency standards by mandate (much more rigorously than was done last year -- if I'm not mistaken, the minimum was raised to something like 35 mpg by 2018 or something; thats pretty pathetic, in my view). Second, as others mention more money needs to be invested in alternative (not corn-based ethonol!) energies like solar, hydrogen and (wince) nuclear. Second, I agree w/ Cathy that everyone needs to take some responsibility. Of course, if your car/truck is needed for your work, then you have no choice. But I think we call can cut down on our driving in one way or another.

I'm 34 yrs. old. But I'm still in grad school out here in L.A. and I have lived without a car here for several years. But I have very favorable conditions (i.e. great weather). That said, if there is a driving city, L.A. is it. So many people just can't believe it that I have lived in a city as spread out as L.A. without car. The public transportation system is decent but I get around solely by bicycle whether its to the grocery store -- (try to imagine it, bags of stuff hanging from my handlebars), Target or campus (about a 30 minute ride). Unfortunately all of this is going to end in a few months. I've got a one-year teaching job at Pepperdine in Malibu and there's no way I can afford to live there. So I'm going to have to commute and there's no bus system between here and there and thus I'm going to have to get a car. I'm dreading it, but aside from commuting I hope to still use my bike as much as possible for getting around. We'll see. So, in sum, each of our circumstances are varied, but I think we can all try to cut down, as much as that is possible.

TroyD

You know, I'm all about personal responsibility....that's probably one of my biggest things in life.

However, to just to tell someone: drive less. Move to walking distance from work....that's ****. It's simply NOT POSSIBLE. Do you realize how many places simply do not have mass transit?? Take my parents town. First of all, for many years, you couldn't build a house on anything less than an acre. So, that imediately spread things out. Two, how do you propose they get grocieries? The closest supermarket is about 4 miles away. That's a hell of a hike with a few sacks of grocieries.

Ok, so let's say my parents move closer to the grocery store (ignoring the fact that there are no houses in walking distance but let's just say there is)....oh, ****, now Mom is 4 miles farther from work. Oh, and what about working families? Should we make them live in separate houses? If you are, do you want them to live closer to work or the grocery store?

Like I said, personal responsibility is one thing but when you design a society around a paradigm such as ours...to just say, drive less: it's not only impractical but in many cases, impossible.

BDT

Norm Apter

Yeah, I don't disagree with you. I'm not pointing a finger at any people. And like in my case, its just impossible for me to be able to move where I will work. So of course we need our cars for certain things. But I think its still possible to cut down, that is, on stuff out of necessary driving to work or getting necessary things like groceries.

But that was really a second-level point. My key point was that drilling in U.S. territory is just not a long-term solution for a global problem which, given the rise of China, India and other developing countries whose population is becoming accustomed to our Western lifestyle and now can afford to emulate us. The real key is going to be raising fuel-efficiency standards while also investing in technologies to replace fossil fuels. You know, its amazing. Back during the oil crisis of the 1970s Brazil began to invest in sugarcane-based ethanol. Now something like half of their fuel is based on this virtually renewable resource. Without any disprespect to Brazil, I would say hey, here we are the U.S., a leader of innovative technology and what have we been doing the last couple of decades to really deal with the coming problem of energy security.

markmarc

Our society is so enamored with driving that we forget sometimes how silly our habits have become. Since January my wife and I made some significant changes in our driving habits. No longer do we drive for one thing, usually everything is done on a Saturday morning unless is directly on our way to or from work. We each get an extra week to 10 days out of our fuel tank. In addition, I begun to practice hyper-mileage driving techniques more consciously. These little changes do add up. I figure we have cut our driving by 20%. If half of Americans could chop just 10% off that would make a tremendous impact.

I'm with Norm, attacking and draining our reserves is a short-term band-aid that will leave us far worse of in the long run. IMHO, the best bet for America is in alternative fuels, especially Algae. Recent breakthroughs have it growing vertically in tubes. Add to algae's rapid growth and energy efficiency in conversion to fuel makes it super viable.
http://www.cnn.com/2008/TECH/science/04/01/algae.oil/index.html
http://www.engadget.com/2008/02/22/upstart-solazyme-promises-to-make-fuel-from-algae/
http://blog.wired.com/cars/2008/04/algae-farm-to-p.html

By growing it vertically in tubes, I can see giant rust belt factories given new life (some growing light induced algae, others darkness version) just create some natural light openings. Add in the fact that many of the sites have grandfather laws for pollution would allow for the building of a refinery on site.

I've said it before, the next great economic boom is alternative energy. We have the technology, resources and the free market spirit to accomplish it. But the governement must play a part in focusing and assisting private enterprise upstarts. By doing so, we can set our country up for solid economic growth and prosperity for the 21st century. To turn away from developing alternative sources like a few have suggested is setting our children and grandchildren up for a future as an also-ran power.

cfrizz

I know that it isn't practical for everyone Troy.

But your point of "Our society is built on the premise of affordable oil." is also impractical & unsustainable as car owners are finding out the hard way!

So it's either wake up, get a clue & start finding alternative sources or shut up & pay up. At least until everyones fields are sucked dry then everyone's screwed!

TroyD wrote: »

First of all, Cathy, much as I love ya.....your suggestion just isn't practical. Our society is built on the premise of affordable oil. Mass transit infrastructure simply doesn't exist in most places and even in the ones it does, it can't sustain the demands if we all simply stopped driving. Great idea. Completely unpractical.BDT

DarqueKnight

MacLeod wrote: »

Not necessarily. There are more and more people believing that oil is a byproduct of all the **** that goes on in the earth's core.

That sounds like a good plot for a sci-fi movie.

MacLeod wrote: »

There are millions of barrels being spewed up thru the oceans floor every day for years!

So why doesn't Exxon just go down there and suck it up?

MacLeod wrote: »

They said 30 years ago we were 10 years away from running out of oil - yet we keep on and keep on finding oil supplies capable of sustaining us for 30+ years.

"They" also said the world was flat. I wouldn't put to much faith in what "they" say.

MacLeod wrote: »

Waiting around a few decades for the Saudi's to run out of oil (and there is no guarantee they will) then what do we do?

I never advocated waiting until the Saudi's wells run dry. I advocated developing alternative fuel sources and weaning ourselves off oil, whether it comes from Saudi Arabia, Canada, Mexico, Nigeria, Venezuela, or bubbles up from the earth's core right into Jed Clampett's back yard.

MacLeod wrote: »

Yes we have the technology to run engine off water - problem is that the car would be the size of a tractor trailer and cost $10,000,000.

I have no knowledge of the current state of the art in water fueled engines. I'm sure you have done a lot of painstaking research on this, so I will concede this point.

MacLeod wrote: »

The government is completely incapable of fixing this problem. They can only get out of the way and let the free market fix it.

The history of the "free market" is full of abuses that pale into insignificance any real or imagined incompetencies on the part of "the government". Why do you think we need anti-trust laws?

There are lots of smart people that work for the government. Unfortunately, like their all too human counterparts in private industry, they don't always work for the collective good. A corporation looking out for the best interests of its management and stockholders, to the detriment of the public, and a politician looking out for the best interests of his campaign contributors, to the detriment of the public, are two sides of the same evil coin. Hence, my wish to see people take a more active role in government. It is very disheartening to me that for most elections, even national ones, roughly half the electorate finds other things to do on election day.

MacLeod wrote: »

Again, alternative fuels are great and wonderful but we need to forget about them for now.

Ok. I guess that sums it up. Thanks. I'm off to have my (gas guzzling) Explorer detailed.

WilliamM2

I've never understood why most people just don't get more efficient vehicles. I understand that some need large trucks and whatnot for work, but I see tons of giant trucks and SUV's on the road, with only the driver aboard, and no load in the back. How stupid is that?

Every car I have owned since 1982 (The year I sold my '72 4-4-2) has gotten at least 30 miles to the gallon.

amulford

There are lots of smart people that work for the government. Unfortunately, like their all too human counterparts in private industry, they don't always work for the collective good. A corporation looking out for the best interests of its management and stockholders, to the detriment of the public, and a politician looking out for the best interests of his campaign contributors, to the detriment of the public, are two sides of the same evil coin. Hence, my wish to see people take a more active role in government. It is very disheartening to me that for most elections, even national ones, roughly half the electorate finds other things to do on election day.

Therein lies the greatest problem. It reminds me of the line from the Hunt for Red October: "A little revolution once in a while is a good thing..."

Ackaroth

Some people do drive only what they need, but some people drive what they want. Vehicles, like purses, watches, houses, damn near everything, are a sign of wealth. And if people are doing ok for themselves, they like big vehicles, with big tires, that suck lots of gas.

As far as public trans, it sucks anywhere outside the city, or is only good for getting to the city and back, what about driving 10-15 miles around to work in the suburbs. Nothing that can be done for that really. And riding a bike is out of the question, I live in Texas, I would be soaked in sweat by the time I got to work.


As far as people thinking alternate fuels arent a viable option, a man in France runs all the forklifts in his warehouse off a 50 lb motor that runs on compressed air, will allow a cruising speed of about 30 mph. I can see that being adapted to work for cars. Maybe a 100, or 150 lb version. BTW I got that info off of a video or article on www.spikedhumor.com, but I dont have access to that website right now as work, so I cant directly link.

jdhdiggs

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=3340274697167011147

Take it with a grain of salt... I don't know anything about the guy but it is somewhat interesting.

You conspiracy nuts will love it...

mrbigbluelight

I don't think it will be only conspiracy nuts who find that interesting.

Do a search for "Gull Island"; you have to do some digging to get some real info.

amulford

It's not far fetched at all. What he starts talking about the real power brokers, as much as people don't want to believe it, is 100% true. The true power in the world is controlled by the money. The mega corporations dictate national policy and manipulate the economy. It's not only oil.

It's common knowledge that the fields in the ANWR are massive. As far as the the quality, don't be misled. It's very refinable, and can be done very efficiently. I have helped build the processes that do it. The technology is readily available.

If this country took a jingoist stance and kept all of the production of our fields within our borders, this would be a non issue. If we started to drill and produce from our known resources, we would not have to import any. It's just not going to happen. They won't let it.

It's all about profits. If people don't wake up our economy is going is going collapse. It won't matter to the powers that be, or to the politicians that have empowered it.

reeltrouble1

ok I will send 25 bucks to Exxon since they are hurting so bad.

Demiurge

Drilling is already approved in ANWR. Has been for years. It's mostly special interest groups that are blocking it from happening. It's the same special interests that are pushing the cost of gas up. Most of what you pay on a gallon of gas is tax, at least in this state and from what I have seen we're hardly the exception. Then you've got the ethanol, which is required here, and in pretty much any corn producing or neighboring state.


Environmentalism /= Conservation

1 of us hunter types are bigger conservationists than 100 of those tree hugging types put together.

I also agree completely with Troy. Telling someone to go ride a bike isn't a solution. We have solutions, but they're being blocked by special interests, as mentioned above.

steveinaz

The Saudis could quadruple production, it wouldn't mean dick. Until the value of the US dollar comes up, we're gonna be payng thru the nose.

shack

It's our own fault. We KNEW this was coming. We stopped nuclear power production. We have not done enough research to develop solar, electric, hydrogen cell vehicles...all of which could be in place NOW if we had made it a priority. Americans love their big SUVs and pickups. We could easily have an entire nation of vehicles that get 40+ MPG on average. Don't get me wrong...I love my muscle cars as much (or more than) anyone...but they aren't daily drivers. My daily vehicle averages around 30 MPG and it was one of the best mileage cars available for the price when I bought it 5 years ago. If we build enough non fossil fuel electric plants, develop the battery technology to make electic/solar vehicle viable, affordable, and capable of traveling significant distances then we can tell OPEC to kiss our ****!

BUT NO...what are we doing? Promoting the taking of one the major food sources of this country and using it to make fuel. Not only does it take more than a gallon of fossil fuel to make a gallon of ethanol...it drives the price of MOST of our domestic foods higher (obviously corn based foods, wheat, milk, beef, chicken, etc, etc). If you are going to do this at least use sawgrass or like Brazil, the cast off from their sugar production.

The environmentalist have had a significant hand in this as well and I'm not talking about oil drilling. There are currently 27 different blends of gas that must be produced, primarily because of environmental constraints. A refinery essentially must be shut down each time they need to make a different blend. That adds significant costs to the price of fuel. The nuclear issues are part of the problem as well. We need to get away from heating homes with oil or making electricity with oil. We could do more with solar, wind, hydro as well as nuclear power for making electricity.

Like I said... WE ALL knew (or should have known) this was coming and we sat back and waited for it to happen with blinders on and didn't do enough to avoid the pain that is happening now. It sucks...but we CAN fix it. There is a positive to all of this. New technology always creates new industries. New industries are good for the economy. They create investment opportunities, new jobs, etc and we will be better for it as a country in the end...IF WE GET OFF OUR **** AND FIX IT!

End of soapbox....

amulford

Absolutely. This bullsh!t of the different blends due to various STATE regulations are just that, BULLSH!T. The difference in combustion byproduct is negligble, but it allows the feel good tree huggers to say he did something.

The only time a different blend is needed is for diesel, and that only has to do with ambient tempatures. And that could be eliminated if all diesel production is geared for the colder climates. The reason it isn't? It costs more for the additive to blend, and it costs a tiny bit more for the extra process.

Country wide standards would help some with the refining costs. But the refiners don't really want that, it takes away one of their reasons for inflating production costs. So they "persuade" federal pols to keep any real measures from being adopted. They won't do it at state levels, they have too many wildcards to pacify.

(They don't shut down the refinery for that, though. Believe it or not, almost all gasoline starts out basically the same. That is that particular hydrocarbon stream is pretty much equal across the board. It's the various additives or lack thereof which make the different grades and blends. I, in over twenty years of heavy industrial construction, have NEVER seen an entire refinery shutdown due to a blend change. They will shut down particular units for maintenance or upgrades, pieces of equipment such as reactors for catalyst changes, maybe even whole sections due to inter-relational processes. But NEVER the whole refinery.)

And in the long run our enviroment would benefit. Pollution doesn't recognize state borders.

Shack is 100% right about the ethanol. As a viable fuel alternative, we just aren't ready in this country. Bio fuels are interesting but the process needs to be more efficient and our vehicles have to be changed to optimally use it. The only real use I see at this point is as an replacement for MTBE's, and they aren't really very good for that. It absorbs water and actually decreases the fuel efficeincy. Not to mention it attacks present seal materials and wreaks havoc on motors.

We need to find alternative for electric production, which would free up a big chunk of our oil consumption. Utilizing renewable resources and increasing nuclear generation (which is getting better and better BTW) for electric power would be tremendous leaps forward.

Mandatory fuel efficiency standards for ALL automobiles, along with cleaner emission standards (which equates to more efficient combustion) are a MUST. Better utilization of what we are using will be the only way to tackle the supply demand issue we have and allow us the luxury of using only domestic supplies, weaning us off of foreign imports.

The biggest thing we need to do is stop the way government operates. The American public has to stop the influence of these special interests which is destroying our quality of life in the name of profits. And it's not just Big Oil. It's the wild speculation and manipulation of the financial industry, the refusal of the auto industry to catch up with the rest of the world, the fanatical enviromentalists not allowing this country to advance, and the government too busy pleasing their campaign contributors at the expense of their constituency (which is it's own special interest group...).

"A little revolution is a good thing"

Norm Apter

Let me go back to the AP story cited by the OP.

Last summer, I read a very interesting book, House of Bush, House of Saud: The Secret Relationship Between the World's Two Most Powerful Dynasties It is a very richly documented book by Craig Unger. Basically it highlights the special business and family-based relationships between the Bush family, other fellow Texas oilmen, and financial groups like the Carlyle group and the Sauds and bin Ladens that date back to the 1970s. Anyway, though the book was published in 2004, its clear that our current president's relationship with the Saudis (esp. Prince Bandar, who has represented King Fahd here for many years) was already not nearly as close as his father's was. I think that the recent rebuff of his request has to be seen in this context. That is, he thought he had more bargaining power than he really possessed.

sucks2beme

Conservation is a good thing. But it is NOT a long term fix.
That's what we did in the 70's. When we cut back, the price dropped.
Then we went on business as normal. That's not going to work this time.
This price increase is more permanent this time. It's never going back down
to $25 a barrel. Get used to it and plan accordingly.

amulford

You are right, but don't you think that IF we went back to the conservationist ways of the 70's, the price would drop? It will, as we are the largest consumer. And more efficeint utilization would offset the cost increase.

I'm already looking to replace my truck as a daily driver.

PhantomOG

amulford wrote: »

It will, as we are the largest consumer.

are we still? I thought I remember reading somewhere that China was now the largest.