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2004-10-11 Home Front: Economy

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Posted by trailing wife 2004-10-11 11:19:11 AM|| || Front Page|| [2 views since 2007-05-07] Top

#1 good work, TW, it's all good. Whatever uses less oil gives less money to Saudi Wahhabists, which equals less money being used to radicalise muslims and train jihadis.

it's all very good.

Posted by Anon1 2004-10-11 11:54:42 AM|| 2004-10-11 11:54:42 AM|| Front Page Top

#2 Not so fast. The Saudis know how the game works. If gas prices rise so fast that they cause a sharp increase in conservation and fuel-efficient car purchases, then OPEC will do all in its power to cause prices to come down sufficiently to kneecap the conservation/fuel-efficiency baby before it learns to stand on its own.

We've been here before. Oil prices tanked in the 1990s, and Detroit's customers went right back to purchasing 12-mpg gas guzzlers again.

Posted by lex 2004-10-11 12:02:33 PM|| 2004-10-11 12:02:33 PM|| Front Page Top

#3 Couple of more features on the Dodge truck(called Contractors special).It also features a hydralic system that stores prasure upon brakeing for a stop,then release' the preasure to assit in acceleration.The truck also has an panel on the right rear that sports 110v electrical outlets.

Posted by Raptor 2004-10-11 2:12:29 PM|| 2004-10-11 2:12:29 PM|| Front Page Top

#4 Buy a motorcycle. Then I can go ridin' with y'all.

Well, at least when you're in California. :)

Posted by Bomb-a-rama 2004-10-11 3:32:01 PM|| 2004-10-11 3:32:01 PM|| Front Page Top

#5 Two words, Benjamin: nuclear power.

Posted by lex 2004-10-11 3:58:29 PM|| 2004-10-11 3:58:29 PM|| Front Page Top

#6 I don't believe in car mixin

Posted by Sen Byrds 52 Chevy 2004-10-11 5:18:11 PM|| 2004-10-11 5:18:11 PM|| Front Page Top

#7 Hybrid cars mileage don't match their hype and are not much better than gasoline engines. They certainly don't justify their price diffential. The crux of the matter is to drastically reduce oil as the fuel for transportation. The only practical way to do that are to:
1. Force everyone to drive Geo Metros.
2. Build several hundred nuclear plants and mass manufacture new electric cars (few people drive more than the range of an electric) or hydrogen cars (in the long term). Long haul transport can still use oil based fuels.

Hybrid Mileage Comes Up Short
Honda's Civic Hybrid is rated by the EPA to get 47 miles per gallon in the city, and 48 mpg on the highway. After nearly 1,000 miles of mostly city driving, Blackshaw was getting 31.4 mpg.
...
Data from independent product-testing organization Consumer Reports indicates that hybrid cars get less than 60 percent of EPA estimates while navigating city streets. In Consumer Reports' real-world driving test, the Civic Hybrid averaged 26 mpg in the city, while the Toyota Prius averaged 35 mpg, much less than their respective EPA estimates of 47 and 60 mpg. Hybrid cars performed much closer to EPA estimates in Consumer Reports' highway tests.

Posted by ed 2004-10-11 5:52:15 PM|| 2004-10-11 5:52:15 PM|| Front Page Top

#8 What percentage of oil does the national fleet consume? I thought it was about 25%. Significant but we need to get smart quick to cut loose from the mid-East crazies. Bush mentioned development of the hydrogen powered car. Hydrogen is plentiful but requires energy to extract. Also a serious infrastructure would need to be developed to support a hydrogen car.

Posted by A. Bungfodder 2004-10-11 6:13:52 PM|| 2004-10-11 6:13:52 PM|| Front Page Top

#9 http://www.eia.doe.gov/emeu/cabs/usa.html#oil
The United States consumed an average of about 20.0 MMBD of oil in 2003, up from 19.8 MMBD in 2002. Of this, 8.9 MMBD (or 45% of the total) was motor gasoline, 4.8 MMBD (24%) "other oils" 3.9 MMBD (20%) distillate fuel oil, 1.6 MMBD (8%) jet fuel, and 0.77 million bbl/d (4%) residual fuel oil.
...
The United States averaged total gross oil (crude and products) imports of an estimated 12.2 MMBD during 2003, representing around 62% of total U.S. oil demand. Over two-fifths of this oil came from OPEC nations, with Persian Gulf sources accounting for about one-fifth of total U.S. oil imports. Overall, the top suppliers of oil (crude and refined products) to the United States during 2003 were Canada (2.1 MMBD), Saudi Arabia (1.8 MMBD), Mexico (1.6 MMBD), and Venezuela (1.4 MMBD).

If we can replace just 50% of gasoline usage with nuclear generated electric cars, it would replace twice our Persian Gulf oil imports.

Posted by ed 2004-10-11 6:47:28 PM|| 2004-10-11 6:47:28 PM|| Front Page Top

#10 Hybrid cars ar OK, but we urgently need to build nuclear plants. It will deny Sauds of $$$$$$$$ to promote hate, will reduce our trade deficit by hundreds of billions per year and will create thousand of jobs to design, bulid and operate the plants. There is no any discussion in the media or government on the topic. I WONDER WHY???

Posted by Wondering 2004-10-11 7:01:43 PM|| 2004-10-11 7:01:43 PM|| Front Page Top

#11 Nuclear is safe. Environmentalists went crazy after 3-Mile Island. 3-Mile Island was a really story in containment of an incident (think donut eating guy on Holiday Inn commercials) We don't usually hear that story. New builds were scuttled. france gets 70% of its energy from nuclear--I have not heard of any problems. One thing they got right. There was a project at Oak Ridge at one time to look into nuclear-powered aircraft. The breeder reactor project at Oak Ridge was nearly completed and got shut down by Congress. Political weasels. We need to get back to building nuclear plants. Feasibility of nuclear cars???

Posted by A. Bungfodder 2004-10-11 7:49:52 PM|| 2004-10-11 7:49:52 PM|| Front Page Top

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