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 Post subject: Re: What should be done about climate change?
PostPosted: Tue Jun 26, 2007 3:00 pm 
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Largely agreed. Where I am here in New York, I know we're allowed to generate electricity and feed it back into the electric network. The main problem is that to install the infrastructure, most people can't do it. There are a few people that supplement their houses with solar, but by and large it's not done. I guess the big thing around here is wind energy, but the only way that functions is through subsidies. As well as farms using manure to generate power. Some of the larger farms that have the capital to make the initial investment on these systems are really banking. They're cutting down on hundreds of thousands in energy bills, and putting back into the NYSEG/RG&E electric networks.

The million dollar plus investment is too intimidating and too much of a risk for anything less than a multi-thousand cow operation though.

There's one thing to remember about peak oil too. It only takes into account known oil reserves. We're finding oil all over the place as we speak. Just in the past few months they've found all kinds of serious oil deposits across Africa, northern Russia. Nobody knows what's in ANWR, or the other two polls. There is exploration going on in many parts of Africa. And on top of that, there's enough natural gas in Qatar alone to run the world for forty years. And only minor adjustments are required to turn gasoline combustion engines into natural gas engines. And natural gas is extremely clean burning.

Anyhow, it really doesn't matter because the majority of the worlds population is still developing and living in poverty. Third and second world cities are still growing and developing. The majority of these people don't have adequate housing, cars, electricity, MOST appliances, access to clean water...man...I don't even know why we're worried now, because the impact on global climate in the developing world is going to so, so, so much worse than anything we're attributing to it.

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 Post subject: Re: What should be done about climate change?
PostPosted: Tue Jun 26, 2007 4:24 pm 
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LittleWing wrote:
So what is it? You got one liberal journalist who says that the people surely want this. But that it's BIG OIL standing in the way. Then you got Psychobain up there sayin' that people just don't give a shit. So which is it?

Do people not care? Or is the government going to force us to care because we're obviously too stupid to correct this problem ourselves, take our money away from us, and dump it into whatever alternative energy outfits they see fit? Say...like multi-billion dollar ethanol plants that take more fossil fuels to operate than they save?

What a great day we live in when there are people out there that want to run the global economy into the ground in the name of something that might be happening.


Our ethanol doesnt need any fossil fuel. Its the stupid corn-based ethanol that is the problem that you americans are insisting.

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 Post subject: Re: What should be done about climate change?
PostPosted: Tue Jun 26, 2007 4:39 pm 
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Human Bass wrote:

Our ethanol doesnt need any fossil fuel. Its the stupid corn-based ethanol that is the problem that you americans are insisting.


It probably takes fossil fuels to process and transport it. But more importantly, it takes water to grow. Rising global temps, due to AGW or not, will mean less available fresh water. No alternative fuels that require diverting water from people to machines should be considered as solutions to dewindling hydorcarbon fuel reserves.

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 Post subject: Re: What should be done about climate change?
PostPosted: Tue Jun 26, 2007 4:48 pm 
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broken iris wrote:
Human Bass wrote:

Our ethanol doesnt need any fossil fuel. Its the stupid corn-based ethanol that is the problem that you americans are insisting.


It probably takes fossil fuels to process and transport it. But more importantly, it takes water to grow. Rising global temps, due to AGW or not, will mean less available fresh water. No alternative fuels that require diverting water from people to machines should be considered as solutions to dewindling hydorcarbon fuel reserves.


To transport of course, so everything needs. But the production gets energy from the rests of the sugar cane, no outside sources. And it rains a lot where sugar cane is planted, so water is no big deal.

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 Post subject: Re: What should be done about climate change?
PostPosted: Tue Jun 26, 2007 5:14 pm 
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http://www.creators.com/opinion/john-st ... hanol.html

The Many Myths of Ethanol

No doubt about it, if there were a Miss Energy Pageant, Miss Ethanol would win hands down. Everyone loves ethanol.

"Ramp up the availability of ethanol," says Hillary Clinton.

"Ethanol makes a lot of sense," says John McCain.

"The economics of ethanol make more and more sense," says Mitt Romney.

"We've got to get serious about ethanol," says Rudolph Giuliani.

And the media love ethanol. "60 Minutes" called it "the solution."

Clinton, Romney, Barack Obama and John Edwards not only believe ethanol is the elixir that will give us cheap energy, end our dependence on Middle East oil sheiks, and reverse global warming, they also want you and me — as taxpayers — to subsidize it.

When everyone in politics jumps on a bandwagon like ethanol, I start to wonder if there's something wrong with it. And there is. Except for that fact that ethanol comes from corn, nothing you're told about it is true. As the Cato Institute's energy expert Jerry Taylor said on a recent "Myths" edition of "20/20," [http://abcnews.go.com/Video/playerIndex?id=3140713], the case for ethanol is based on a baker's dozen myths.

A simple question first. If ethanol's so good, why does it need government subsidies? Shouldn't producers be eager to make it, knowing that thrilled consumers will reward them with profits?

But consumers won't reward them, because without subsidies, ethanol would cost much more than gasoline.

The claim that using ethanol will save energy is another myth. Studies show that the amount of energy ethanol produces and the amount needed to make it are roughly the same. "It takes a lot of fossil fuels to make the fertilizer, to run the tractor, to build the silo, to get that corn to a processing plant, to run the processing plant," Taylor says.

And because ethanol degrades, it can't be moved in pipelines the way that gasoline is. So many more big, polluting trucks will be needed to haul it.

More bad news: The increased push for ethanol has already led to a sharp increase in corn growing — which means much more land must be plowed. That means much more fertilizer, more water used on farms and more pesticides.

This makes ethanol the "solution"?

But won't it at least get us unhooked from Middle East oil? Wouldn't that be worth the other costs? Another myth.
A University of Minnesota study [http://www.pnas.org/cgi/content/full/103/30/11206] shows that even turning all of America's corn into ethanol would meet only 12 percent of our gasoline demand. As Taylor told an energy conference last March, "For corn ethanol to completely displace gasoline consumption in this country, we would need to appropriate all cropland in the United States, turn it completely over to corn-ethanol production, and then find 20 percent more land on top of that for cultivation."

OK, but it will cut down on air pollution, right? Wrong again. Studies [http://www.stanford.edu/group/efmh/jacobson/E85PaperEST0207.pdf] indicate that the standard mixture of 90 percent ethanol and 10 percent gasoline pollutes worse than gasoline.

Well, then, the ethanol champs must be right when they say it will reduce greenhouse gases and reverse global warming.

Nope. "Virtually all studies show that the greenhouse gases associated with ethanol are about the same as those associated with conventional gasoline once we examine the entire life cycle of the two fuels," Taylor says.

Surely, ethanol must be good for something. And here we finally have a fact. It is good for something — or at least someone: corn farmers and processors of ethanol, such as Archer Daniels Midland, the big food processor known for its savvy at getting subsidies out of the taxpayers.

And it's good for vote-hungry presidential hopefuls. Iowa is a key state in the presidential-nomination sweepstakes, and we all know what they grow in Iowa [http://www.iowacorn.org/]. Sen. Clinton voted against ethanol 17 times until she started running for president. Coincidence?

"It's no mystery that people who want to be president support the corn ethanol program," Taylor says. "If you're not willing to sacrifice children to the corn god, you will not get out of the Iowa primary with more than one percent of the vote, Right now the closest thing we have to a state religion in the United States isn't Christianity. It's corn."


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 Post subject: Re: What should be done about climate change?
PostPosted: Tue Jun 26, 2007 5:19 pm 
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Human Bass wrote:
Our ethanol doesnt need any fossil fuel. Its the stupid corn-based ethanol that is the problem that you americans are insisting.


The other problem is that collectively Americans likely drive a lot more than Brazilians do.

My impression was that Brazil simply didn't have to import any oil from sugar ethanol. If I'm wrong, feel free to correct me.

Also, what's the impact on the Amazon jungle from increased sugar production?

broken iris wrote:
Rising global temps, due to AGW or not, will mean less available fresh water.


Has there been any clear determination on precipitation? I've seen a jumbled message--the worst case doomsday scenario saying that the wet places get wetter and the dry places get drier. *shrugs*


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 Post subject: Re: What should be done about climate change?
PostPosted: Tue Jun 26, 2007 5:22 pm 
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LittleWing wrote:
What a great day we live in when there are people out there that want to run the global economy into the ground in the name of something that might be happening.


do you endorse condom usage for people who do one night stands?

point being: rather safe than sorry.


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 Post subject: Re: What should be done about climate change?
PostPosted: Tue Jun 26, 2007 5:30 pm 
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Human Bass wrote:
To transport of course, so everything needs. But the production gets energy from the rests of the sugar cane, no outside sources. And it rains a lot where sugar cane is planted, so water is no big deal.


Brazil is relatively unique in it's climate and usable farmland. The same thing could not be accomplished anywhere else in the developed world and certainly not with the scale it needs to be for the US, EU, India, and China.


Green Habit wrote:
Has there been any clear determination on precipitation? I've seen a jumbled message--the worst case doomsday scenario saying that the wet places get wetter and the dry places get drier. *shrugs*


http://www.usgcrp.gov/usgcrp/Library/nationalassessment/overviewwater.htm#Surface%20Water%20Quantity%20and%20Quality

"Rising temperatures are very likely to affect snowfall and increase snowmelt conditions in much of the western and northern portions of the US that depend on winter snowpack for runoff. It is very likely that as the climate warms, less precipitation will fall as snow, the existing snowpack will melt sooner and faster, the runoff will be shifted from late spring and summer to late winter and early spring. This change in the timing of runoff will very likely have implications for water management, flood protection, irrigation, and planning."

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 Post subject: Re: What should be done about climate change?
PostPosted: Tue Jun 26, 2007 5:33 pm 
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Quote:
"Rising temperatures are very likely to affect snowfall and increase snowmelt conditions in much of the western and northern portions of the US that depend on winter snowpack for runoff. It is very likely that as the climate warms, less precipitation will fall as snow, the existing snowpack will melt sooner and faster, the runoff will be shifted from late spring and summer to late winter and early spring. This change in the timing of runoff will very likely have implications for water management, flood protection, irrigation, and planning."


Yeah, I'm well aware of this considering where I live. But it doesn't state any change in precipitation itself, just the form in which it falls.


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 Post subject: Re: What should be done about climate change?
PostPosted: Tue Jun 26, 2007 5:45 pm 
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Oh GH, that was such a great read. Thanks for posting it.

I really don't think the people forwarding ethanol realize that it's going to have a serious impact on the lower class. Of all the things that you could make a fuel out of, why would you make it out of something that's a basic staple to so many of the foods we eat? The subsidies are going to also drive up the cost of other grains down the road as well, because less farmers will grow other crops and perform other types of farming to grow corn as a cash crop.

As for Cono's comment. No I don't advocate condoms for one night stands! How crazy is that? That's what abortion is for silly!

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 Post subject: Re: What should be done about climate change?
PostPosted: Tue Jun 26, 2007 5:50 pm 
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LittleWing wrote:
Oh GH, that was such a great read. Thanks for posting it.

I really don't think the people forwarding ethanol realize that it's going to have a serious impact on the lower class. Of all the things that you could make a fuel out of, why would you make it out of something that's a basic staple to so many of the foods we eat? The subsidies are going to also drive up the cost of other grains down the road as well, because less farmers will grow other crops and perform other types of farming to grow corn as a cash crop.

As for Cono's comment. No I don't advocate condoms for one night stands! How crazy is that? That's what abortion is for silly!


I have an irrational hatred of Iowa and New Hampshire, which i try to justify as being due to their inordinate importance in the presidential election, but this ethanol/ Iowa thing just takes the cake. Fuck you sparsely populated swing states, no one loves you and actually, we DO think that dress makes you look fat.


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 Post subject: Re: What should be done about climate change?
PostPosted: Tue Jun 26, 2007 6:24 pm 
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Green Habit wrote:
Human Bass wrote:
Our ethanol doesnt need any fossil fuel. Its the stupid corn-based ethanol that is the problem that you americans are insisting.


The other problem is that collectively Americans likely drive a lot more than Brazilians do.

My impression was that Brazil simply didn't have to import any oil from sugar ethanol. If I'm wrong, feel free to correct me.

Also, what's the impact on the Amazon jungle from increased sugar production?



Brazil has some good amount of oil too, we already explore the same amount of we consume, but we still have to import a little bit of oil only because our crude oil is a bit hard to refine and we still lack some infra-structure on this matter. But this importation is more like an exchange, we give our heavy crude oil, and pay the difference for light crude oil.

And "the impact on the Amazon jungle from increased sugar production" is none. Because sugar cane is planted on the northeast coast and southeast region....VERY far from the Amazon jungle that is in the north region.

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 Post subject: Re: What should be done about climate change?
PostPosted: Wed Jun 27, 2007 12:03 am 
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LittleWing wrote:
I guess the big thing around here is wind energy, but the only way that functions is through subsidies.

Two quick points: Fossil fuels are heavily subsidised
If the environmental costs of them were taken into account, the price gap between coal & wind would close up faster.

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 Post subject: Re: What should be done about climate change?
PostPosted: Wed Jun 27, 2007 12:19 am 
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I don't approve of government subsidizing oil either.

As for your second comment. Could you please elaborate?

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 Post subject: Re: What should be done about climate change?
PostPosted: Wed Jun 27, 2007 12:37 am 
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broken iris wrote:
Human Bass wrote:
To transport of course, so everything needs. But the production gets energy from the rests of the sugar cane, no outside sources. And it rains a lot where sugar cane is planted, so water is no big deal.


Brazil is relatively unique in it's climate and usable farmland. The same thing could not be accomplished anywhere else in the developed world and certainly not with the scale it needs to be for the US, EU, India, and China.


Oh, I agree. But there is a lot to improve even if they will never reach the same level that we did. Getting ethanol from corn is like getting milk from a mare. You can, but its dumb.

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 Post subject: Re: What should be done about climate change?
PostPosted: Wed Jun 27, 2007 12:44 am 
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LittleWing wrote:
I don't approve of government subsidizing oil either.

As for your second comment. Could you please elaborate?

carbon tax.

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 Post subject: Re: What should be done about climate change?
PostPosted: Wed Jun 27, 2007 12:46 am 
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vacatetheword wrote:
LittleWing wrote:
I don't approve of government subsidizing oil either.

As for your second comment. Could you please elaborate?

carbon tax.



:?


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 Post subject: Re: What should be done about climate change?
PostPosted: Wed Jun 27, 2007 12:54 am 
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Oh... So the price gap isn't close at all... got it.

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 Post subject: Re: What should be done about climate change?
PostPosted: Wed Jun 27, 2007 1:19 am 
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LittleWing wrote:
Oh... So the price gap isn't close at all... got it.

all i'm saying is you should have to pay a penalty for polluting. build the price to the environment into the price of the energy

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Oh, the flowers of indulgence and the weeds of yesteryear,
Like criminals, they have choked the breath of conscience and good cheer.
The sun beat down upon the steps of time to light the way
To ease the pain of idleness and the memory of decay.


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 Post subject: Re: What should be done about climate change?
PostPosted: Wed Jun 27, 2007 2:20 am 
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vacatetheword wrote:
LittleWing wrote:
Oh... So the price gap isn't close at all... got it.

all i'm saying is you should have to pay a penalty for polluting. build the price to the environment into the price of the energy


flat

out

insane

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