Re: [asa] $4 gas is here to stay

One of the biggest mistakes this country made following WWII was the
decision to subsidize automobile travl & the trucking industry with the
interstate highway system at the expense of passenger &, to a lesser extent,
freight railroads. (Of course "decision" is a loose term there - I don't
think anyone in power said "Let's shut down the passenger trains" &c.)

If I were elected dictator today I would mandate a major program to develop
hydrogen propulsion systems, not for personal cars & trucks but for a new
generation of hydrogen powered high speed trains, both pasenger & freight,
together with the infrastructure (tracks &c) needed for the system, together
with nuclear power plants to supply the energy for hydrolysis. Such a
system, when developed, could replace a good deal of automotive traffic &
trucking transport, especially with tax dis-incentives for use of petroleum
powered transport. Quite apart from questions about energy and fuel
availability, it would make more sense for several reasons to do this
instead of just trying to keep the same system we have but switch from
petroleum to hydrogen power. There's economy of scale & safety
considerations for a start.

A really good 21st century rail system could also handle a good deal of
traffic that now goes by air. Of course you can't take a train overseas &
sometimes you do need to get from NY to SF in one day, but for many trips
some speed could easily be sacrificed. When I went to Philadelphia last
month it would have been much better if I could have hopped on a fast train
(Eilzug) in Akron & taken a few hours to cross Pennsylvania instead of going
throough the standard airport ordeal (with delays) that we're all accustomed
to now.

"Only the details are missing" - please remember that I'm a theorist.

Shalom
George
http://web.raex.com/~gmurphy/

----- Original Message -----
From: "Glenn Morton" <glennmorton@entouch.net>
To: "'j burg'" <hossradbourne@gmail.com>; <asa@calvin.edu>
Sent: Thursday, June 05, 2008 8:52 PM
Subject: RE: [asa] $4 gas is here to stay

> Hi Burgy, you wrote:
>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: asa-owner@lists.calvin.edu [mailto:asa-owner@lists.calvin.edu] On
>> Behalf Of j burg
>> Sent: Thursday, June 05, 2008 9:52 AM
>>
>> On 6/4/08, Glenn Morton <glennmorton@entouch.net> wrote:
>>
>> > Last month there was a discussion of $4 gasoline and is it here to
>> stay. Way
>> > back in 1999 I wrote an article entitled "The Coming Energy Crisis,
>> which
>> > was eventually published in the ASA in 2000.
>>
>> FWIW, Glenn, I did not think you "nutty" back then or now.
>
> My broker, who went and checked with other people in the oil industry, all
> of whom said we didn't have a problem, thought me batty when I told him
> what
> I wanted to do.Even today the talking-heads on TV will often say things
> that
> can't possibly be true. Steve Forbes said the other day that 80% of the
> rise
> in the price of oil was due to the falling dollar. Since the dollar has
> only
> fallen about 30% since 2001 and oil has nearly quintupled, that can't
> possibly be true. Sean Hannity citing a USGS report which claims that
> there
> are huge volumes of oil in the Bakken formation of North Dakota thinks
> that
> we have enough oil there to run our nation's cars for several years. He
> doesn't seem to understand the difference between oil in place and what
> can
> be gotten out and moved to market. George Soros thinks oil is a bubble. I
> sincerely hope that guy goes short on oil. Daniel Yergin, of The Prize,
> founded a company which advises oil companies. I once asked a vice
> president
> and Kerr-McGee why on earth we paid for his advice since he was wrong all
> the time. For the past many years, he has been predicting a decline in the
> price of oil (see http://home.entouch.net/dmd/cera.htm). Only in the last
> month has he actually predicted that the price would rise--it then fell
> from
> $135/bbl to $120/bbl!
>
>
>
>>
>> Using some of your thinking, I added an article on my web site
>> predicting $4 gas by last summer. Later, I revised it to this summer.
>>
>> Now where are we going? There are suddenly all sorts of alternative
>> energies and auto-propellents being developed. I see these --
>> eventually -- having an effect, even as conservation and car pooling
>> have an effect. But slow -- and the ramp getting there will be
>> painful.
>
> I would be interested in what 'auto-propellents you are thinking of. I can
> think of none that will work. You are a physicist, Burgy, surely you have
> run the numbers comparing the amount of energy burned each day in oil vs
> the
> rate of rise of wind and solar. There is a huge disparity.
>
>
>>
>> My guess is $6.00 gas next summer -- and this is independent of what
>> candidate wins in November.
>
> Agreed. But, if we pull our troops out of Iraq precipitously, and Iraq
> descends into chaos, it will remove 2.1 million barrels per day of oil
> from
> the world markets--2.5%. Now, if you think gas prices are high now, just
> try doing that and see what happens. Same thing goes if Israel becomes
> convinced that Obama won't protect them from Iran and they decide to nuke
> Iran first, then the price of oil will look fantastic today. If any of
> that
> happens be ready to lose your job.
>
>
>>
>> Here is another perspective though:
>>
>> I keep records a lot. Recently I found my auto records from 1962-1964.
>> An analysis of these may be of interest. All numbers rounded.
>>
>> 1. My primary car during these years was a simple sedan, getting 13
>> mpg on 32c gas.
>> 2. The inflation factor 1963 to 2007 is about 7.
>> 3. So I really paid $2.24 for gas. 17c per mile.
>> 4. My daughter today also has a simple sedan. It gets on average 26 mpg
>> 5. You can do the math. She pays less per mile today than I did in
>> 1962-64. At $4.00, 15c per mile.
>>
>> Her car has A/C, and a host of gadgets that mine (in 1962) were
>> luxuries or only pipe dreams. .
>>
>> In 1963 I bought a Chevy compact -- 19 mpg. Now my cost was 12c per
>> mile. But I had to pay (in 2007 dollars) about $20,000. Still no AC or
>> other amenities though.
>>
>> I think my daughter might be able to buy a 32 mpg economy car -- that
>> would get her per mile cost down to 12c also.
>>
>> So -- $4.00 a gallon is "OK." At least for now.
>
> Yeah, but, even in Houston now, I can walk into restaurants on a Saturday
> night which used to require an hour's wait and be seated immediately.
> People
> aren't eating out as much as they used to. I suspect that it is gas and
> food
> which are causing this change.
>
>
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Received on Fri Jun 6 07:55:08 2008