Let

[Judge Hades]

Judge Hades begins to sing to a tune of a Olivia Newton John song!

 

Lets get political.

Political.

Lets get political.

Let me hear the lobbyists talk.

Lobbyists talk!

Lets go get political!

[Atreides]

Well I found this in my readings - which should be relevant to this thread

 

There are also alternative sources of energy that are slowly but surely coming into the market at competitive prices. As an example, the price of solar panels is dropping constantly and the two biggest producers now are Shell and BP.

 

http://www.emptywells.com/Article343.htm

[taks]

i'm not "keen" on oil companies developing new technologies, nor am i against it. rather, i don't care. if an oil company solves our long term fuel needs, yay. if it is someone else. yay. i.e. as long as they are solved. i simply think that the oil companies will be the first in line to fix their own long-term product problems. and alternative fuels are the answer. if they wait now, and someone else takes over, they'll never have a hand in the new market and they will all fail.

 

atreides link is evidence to that end.

 

taks

[metadigital]

Would it not be easier just to attach a mast and sails to the roof of every car?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

The uses for oil go beyond fuel for cars.

 

Rubber, clothing, cigarettes, etc. Rubber is an amazing product by the way, used in a great many things, not just tires and superballs.

...

I have no references, only what I've been casually reading and watching. Feel free to correct me if i'm wrong or disillusionned.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

You forgot plastic. I have it on good authority that the revenue generated for Saudi from non-fuel oil products is > $USBillion a day. Plastics are HUGE. Try living without plastic. For a day.

[Diamond]

The answer is... HEMP PLASTIC! (w00t)

[Nartwak]

Plastics are HUGE. Try living without plastic. For a day.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

[Gabrielle]

The answer is... HEMP PLASTIC! (w00t)

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Hurrah!

[Atreides]

I bet the correct way to dispose them is to burn them.

[Gabrielle]

 

Getting high over the fumes.

[metadigital]

The answer is... HEMP PLASTIC! (w00t)

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

plant fibre + [recycled plastic] = Hemp Plastic

 

Hmmm. Sounds like a finite resource to me. Still, any recycling is better than none. Hemp is a try wonder product, too. Most of British navy was made of hemp (sails, ropes, etc: that and the oak beams).

 

Also, there are several hundred varieties of cannabis sativa, most of which have zero cannabinoids (read: psychoactive components) and all the industrial benefits, such as:

 

The Qualities of Primary Hemp Fiber

structure  hemp under microscope 125 x magnification

length  average 8

[Fenghuang]

I don't think it's that high. More like 30%. But virtually all Canuck oil ends up in America.

 

The neatest idea I heard recently was one I overheard on the train about how there is a type of tree which grows in desert conditions, stabilising them, and coincidentally can be processed to extract fuel oil. Yet the gulf states seem intent on spending their money on rolexes.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

 

First thing I thought when I read this was "Huh, sounds like Manzanita." I looked it up on the internet and whaddya know, it is! My house is more or less surrounded by it, all of it's far enough back that it's not a danger though. The firemen always warn people in the area about it because the trees are quite literally explosive! (w00t)

 

Anyhow, I'm pretty cynical about this because I've read up about all the different technologies and I do know that we in fact have not only one alternative that is already feasible, but three. Ethanol, Biodiesel, and Hydrogen, not to mention Hybrid cars (though they're not all they're cracked up to be). I don't think we'll switch over until after a major crisis, people are just too focused on their short term budgets to consider the ramifications of their current rate of consumption. However, once the crisis does happen, since we already have the technologies and research that refines them in place, the transition will be a lot less painful than all the doomsayers proclaim. Things will be rocky for a couple or ten years at the most probably, after that economies will recover.