What happens if we say no?

[archenemy]

If we could melt those pesky polar ice caps and glaciers then we may have enough water to pull this project off. Then either build a canal from the Arctic ocean to northern Alberta or a superhighway for tanker trucks to transport the water in. Suck that place dry, then bury garbage from all over N. America in the hole. Light off a couple underground nukes to jump start the oil making process and in a few thousand years after that start pumping out black gold again. We could call this sustainable energy.

Good idea, and quite timely with the recent ice shelf mishap. I think you are onto something here.

[tvashtarkatena]

Rollins looks like he needs to join up, get wounded in combat, then saw his own gangrenous leg off and write a song about it.

[RogerJ]

Henry Rollins has the thickest neck of any poet I have ever seen.

[JayB]

The answer is we'll need all of the above.

 

I don't think wind and solar are red herrings at all, although they're not a silver bullet, either.

 

Ex: Half your home energy usage is for hot water. Everyone focuses on photovoltaics, which are the least cost effective and most expensive home technology, but what homes really need is passive solar, which requires no more energy to produce that a standard plumbing system. A friend as a system here in seattle, and it produces all of his hot water for 6 months a year, and half for the rest of the year. He supplements it with an on demand water heater, which is in itself more efficient than a tank unit. The payback for these systems is about 5 years in Seattle.

 

So...how many passive solar water heating systems do you see around your neighborhood? How about in new construction?

 

That's the problem. We haven't even begun to conserve. And that's just one example out of many where, with proper planning and new construction techniques, we could cut our energy usage per capita in half at least...and still live as well as we do now.

 

As for wind, the new windfarm at Vantage will power 70,000 homes at average output. Not bad for just getting started.

 

A new company is now producing biodeisel from fast growing algae. Soon, a cellulose based biodeisel will be available, which will make favorable the energy in vs energy out equation for that fuel.

 

My point is: let's max out these clean technologies before we 'gladly make the tradeoff' (ie: selfishly fuck future generations in the ass with a hotter planet).

 

How - exactly - would trading power generated by burning fossil fuels for nuclear power "selfishly fuck future generations with a hotter planet"?

 

 

 

 

[tvashtarkatena]

I'm not. I am saying that extracting and combusting oil from tar sands using nuclear power (or any other means) fucks the planet; something you advocated explicitly in your 'tradeoff' statement. We owe it to our kids to push the conservation agenda as far as it will go, and we've not even tried, before we talk about strip mining half of Canada.

[tvashtarkatena]

Couldn't we just drill THROUGH the earth, maybe with nuclear powered equipment, to tap into Saudi Arabia's oil from underneath?

[tvashtarkatena]

Our fossil fuel consumption causes three problems:

Global warming (the most urgent) and other environmental damage, finite supply, and funding of countries full of assholes.

 

Only one solution solves all three problems, and that is moving away from fossil fuels, regardless of the supply.

[G-spotter]

Couldn't we just drill THROUGH the earth, maybe with nuclear powered equipment, to tap into Saudi Arabia's oil from underneath?

 

no, silly, because of the mole men.

[tvashtarkatena]

That's the Canadian in you talkin

 

Not only are we gonna buy the mole men off; they're gonna do the diggin for us.

 

jis lak weer gonna git them spics ta make that fence ta keep they own selves aut.

Edited January 19, 2007 by tvashtarkatena

[Fairweather]

http://ca.news.yahoo.com/s/18012007/3/canada-u-s-urges-fivefold-expansion-alberta-oilsands-production.html

So let me get this straight, Canada should sell off our energy self sufficiency for a few trillion baubles, accelerate environmental damage and in the future we'll then be left out in the cold(literally) so hordes of soccer moms can drive their SUVs to Starbucks?

And there's talk of putting in a nuclear reactor to power the expansion.

 

Perhaps you could get those Canadian companies of yours to stop their strip mining operations in the American West - and while you're at it maybe ask that big canadian smelter near the border to stop dumping mercury into the Columbia River. Poor Canada. Pot. Kettle. Black.

 

F'nG is a fucking crybaby.

[Fairweather]

...More from our environmentally conscious corporate Canadian brethren:

 

http://www.coal.ca/content/index.php?option=com_jd-wp&Itemid=36&m=200501

 

Is this what Fear&Greed means by "Canadian energy independence"?

[tvashtarkatena]

As I vaguely recall, the Mole Men aren't evil, so much as misunderstood.

 

Cute little fellers....

Edited January 19, 2007 by tvashtarkatena

[catbirdseat]

I can't believe no one called you on this statement, especially statement number 2. The figure that I remember for recovery is 30%. Say you are right, and that an equal volume of oil is required to extract a volume of oil. You burn both in the end and both are turned into CO2 and water. That's 2 times the amount of greenhouse gases, not 5 to 10 times.

.

Canada should definitely say no. A significant exploitation of its tar sands would be an environmental disaster:

 

1) The energy required to turn tar sand into oil is nearly equal to the energy of your end product. There is little net gain.

 

2) The tar sand > oil process releases from 5 to 10 times the amount of greenhouse gases as standard crude oil production/refinement.

 

3) The process itself requires strip mining hundreds of thousands of acres. Enough said.

 

4) We should 'exploit' conservation (which save money) and green technologies before this kind of desperate measure is even discussed.

 

Price should never be the only deciding factor in a process that has as much devastating environmental impact as this would. Shame on those who argue for this (and always with the caveat that the destruction takes place in someone else's back yard.)

[Dechristo]

I can't believe no one called you on this statement...

 

It's like shovelling sand against the tide

[G-spotter]

In fact, they burn natural gas to extract oil. Not oil for oil.

 

Three barrels of natural gas (at $7/barrel) are burned to extract one of oil (at what, $60 a barrel now).

 

Net greenhouse gasses increase, but looked at only due to costs of oil and natural gas, it's a money maker and will continue to be until price of natural gas is raised, either through supply/demand, or better, through carbon tax.

[KaskadskyjKozak]

I can't believe no one called you on this statement...

 

It's like shovelling sand against the tide

[Stefan]

http://ca.news.yahoo.com/s/18012007/3/canada-u-s-urges-fivefold-expansion-alberta-oilsands-production.html

So let me get this straight, Canada should sell off our energy self sufficiency for a few trillion baubles, accelerate environmental damage and in the future we'll then be left out in the cold(literally) so hordes of soccer moms can drive their SUVs to Starbucks?

And there's talk of putting in a nuclear reactor to power the expansion.

 

If Canada does not do it, then the terrorists will.

[tvashtarkatena]

I can't believe no one called you on this statement, especially statement number 2. The figure that I remember for recovery is 30%. Say you are right, and that an equal volume of oil is required to extract a volume of oil. You burn both in the end and both are turned into CO2 and water. That's 2 times the amount of greenhouse gases, not 5 to 10 times.

.

2) The tar sand > oil process releases from 5 to 10 times the amount of greenhouse gases as standard crude oil production/refinement.

 

And I can't believe you can't properly interpret such a simple, clear statement. Turning tar sand into oil requires 5 to 10 times the fossil full expenditure (and thus C02 release) for extraction and refining as standard crude oil production. In other words, standard refining requires .1 to .2 barrels of oil in for every barrel of oil out. With tar sands, the ratio is close to, or greater than 1 (economically feasible because natural gas, which is used in the process, is much cheaper than crude). Do the math. Energy content of the final product, which is, of course, the same either with either method, has nothing whatsoever to do with it.

 

Look before you leap into the tide.

Edited January 23, 2007 by tvashtarkatena