How then, do we move backwards? How does a society, with most of the people having no clue of future events, move from being dependent on a vast and intertwined network of goods and services produced by the indigenous people of whereever, to a local resource and renewable energy based society, and do so in the timeframe available (20-30 years using the most liberal extimates, 10-20 with resonable estimates, 5-10 with worst case scenarios), all the while prices on everything increasing, world politics getting more militaristic, governments continuously reducing civil liberties, shortages of goods on the market and weather patterns resembling bad Hollywood movies?
Oil fell on Monday after the Bush administration offered to tap the country's emergency oil reserves, if needed, to prevent a shortage of winter fuel in the world's biggest oil consumer.
US crude oil was off 54 cents at US$65.70 a barrel by 1452 GMT. London Brent crude slipped 30 cents to US$63.18.
"We are prepared to do what is necessary with respect to strategic reserves," US Energy Secretary Sam Bodman said on Monday.... _________________ Let us make him who shall nourish and sustain us. What shall we do to be invoked; to be remembered in the earth.
We have tried with our first creatures but we could not make them venerate us.
So let us try to make obedient respectful beings who shall
Posted: Mon Oct 03, 2005 6:40 pm Post subject: Re: US prepared to tap oil reserves
That's great , but most of the country doesn't heat their house with oil, they heat it with natural gas, which is even worse off than oil right now. As far as I know, there is no strategic gas reserve.
By the way, how long could the country use the strategic oil reserve to lower gas and heating oil prices before it too is tapped out? We've been using it so much lately I think we should rename it to the tactical petroleum reserve.
Posted: Mon Oct 03, 2005 6:56 pm Post subject: Re: US prepared to tap oil reserves
When the government needs more money they just start printing it. Too bad oil and NG are finite resources. Damn limits suck!
I wonder if as the oil/NG depletion grows if the government will respond by going all out printing endless amounts of funny money. As sort of an infantile psychological response to the limits of oil and gas.
Oil fell on Monday after the Bush administration offered to tap the country's emergency oil reserves, if needed, to prevent a shortage of winter fuel in the world's biggest oil consumer.
US crude oil was off 54 cents at US$65.70 a barrel by 1452 GMT. London Brent crude slipped 30 cents to US$63.18.
"We are prepared to do what is necessary with respect to strategic reserves," US Energy Secretary Sam Bodman said on Monday....
Oil reserve is like a CREDIT CARD
It's fun while you use it
But the payback is a BITCH.
Especially if the interest is 12% or if the price of oil rises 12% afterwards
Joined: Sep 06, 2004 Posts: 5315 Location: Smalltown New Zealand
Posted: Mon Oct 03, 2005 7:38 pm Post subject: Re: US prepared to tap oil reserves
skiwi wrote:
"We are prepared to do what is necessary with respect to strategic reserves," US Energy Secretary Sam Bodman said on Monday....
..."....to increase our immediate popularity". _________________ "Complex problems have simple, easy to understand, wrong answers." - Henry Louis Mencken
Posted: Mon Oct 03, 2005 8:04 pm Post subject: Re: US prepared to tap oil reserves
Payback is indeed a bitch. If only they had the cahones to "call a spade a spade." Instead, they'll just continue to prop up the empire until it can no longer support its own weight. Somewhat reminiscent of the fall of Rome. I wish I had noted who said it, but about a year ago on these forums someone said
Quote:
The last thing the Romans consumed was themselves-forcing farmers to pay taxes in grain without leaving enough grain to feed the farmers or even plant next year's crops. The superstructure consumed its own foundation.
Posted: Mon Oct 03, 2005 9:08 pm Post subject: Re: US prepared to tap oil reserves
When the government hack says they'll "Do whatever is necessary" it would appear to suggest they intend
a) magicking new refinery capacity into being to convert the crude oil in the SPR into useable fuels; or
b) paying the going (escalating) global rate for tanker-loads of refined fuels from abroad; or
c) instructing the US navy to seize such vessels on a daily basis for as long as they keep on leaving oil-export ports; or
d) doing nothing much about it beyond making placatory noises.
You takes your pick . . .
regards,
Backstop _________________ "The best of conservation . . . is written not with a pen but with an axe."
(from "A Sand County Almanac" by Aldo Leopold, 1948.
Posted: Mon Oct 03, 2005 10:50 pm Post subject: Re: US prepared to tap oil reserves
They just want political cover when winter hits, "Hey, we are doing everything we can" _________________ "The world is changed... I feel it in the water... I feel it in the earth... I smell it in the air... Much that once was, is lost..." - Galadriel
Joined: Aug 26, 2005 Posts: 60 Location: Somewhere in Saudi Arabia
Posted: Tue Oct 04, 2005 4:16 am Post subject: Re: US prepared to tap oil reserves
Gas is not oil. There are vast amounts of "stranded" gas around the world, with a large seaborne trade in LNG.
What America faces is a loss of domestic capacity.
If LNG terminals were built in California (say) the price of gas would fall as more entered the system. The flow-on effect to the rest of the world would not be immediate.
US gas prices are not reflected elsewhere in the world, because the US supply is mostly piped from local reserves.
The US has all sorts of political bottlenecks that force up cost (regardless of recent losses and consequent impact on Henry Hub prices).
Ultimately, all resources have an increase, plateau/peak, and then decline. The Oil and gas industries are no different.
Try finding a whale rendering plant now, even though whale oil was heavily used last century.
There is not reason to anticipate co-incident oil and gas peaks anyway.
Joined: May 23, 2004 Posts: 276 Location: Melbourne, Australia
Posted: Tue Oct 04, 2005 10:18 am Post subject: Re: US prepared to tap oil reserves
spartacus wrote:
Gas is not oil. There are vast amounts of "stranded" gas around the world, with a large seaborne trade in LNG.
What America faces is a loss of domestic capacity.
If LNG terminals were built in California (say) the price of gas would fall as more entered the system. The flow-on effect to the rest of the world would not be immediate.
Doesn't work that way. Natural Gas shipping is extraordinarily limited since there are literally only a few tankers that are not already spoken for by long term point to point contracts. Also, more worryingly, there are very few shipyards (under a dozen globally) with the capabilities needed to build more LNG tankers - and their order books are literally covered for the next decade or so.
One LNG tanker here or there will not make a difference. You'd need a convoy stretching from Darwin to Baja with multiple daily deliveries to make a serious dent in the sort of natgas supply cliff that North America is facing. Fortunately for the people in Darwin who also use Natural Gas, there'll never be that many tankers afloat. _________________ The purpose of human life revolves around an endless need to extract ever increasing amounts of carbon out of the ground and then release it into the atmosphere.
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