Aces High Bulletin Board
General Forums => The O' Club => Topic started by: Holden McGroin on April 02, 2005, 07:46:02 PM
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The largest single element of the USA's trade deficit is the importation of oil. 27.996 million barrels a day as of last November. @$50 / barrel, 1399.8 million, $1.3998 Billion / day or 511.3 billion / yr goes out of the country to buy foreign oil.
The USA has ¼ of the world’s coal supply and known domestic reserves equal to that of 4 times the Saudi oil reserves or equivalent to the entire earth’s oil supply.
The total energy consumption in the United States for 1990 was 86 x 1015 kJ. Of this total, 41% came from oil, 24% from natural gas, and 23% from coal. Coal is unique as a source of energy in the United States; none of the 2118 billion pounds used in 1990 was imported. Furthermore, the proven reserves are so large we can continue using coal at this level of consumption for at least 2000 years.
China and South Africa have signed a deal that could affect the rest of the planet. The two will work to establish a couple of so-called coal liquefaction facilities that take coal and turn it into fuel oil. Not only is the technology one tool to fight the high cost of oil but it also helps purify the energy combustion process.
The major obstacle is economics. If the technology is to be financially feasible, the price of oil must remain at least above $32 a barrel. While the current price is $50 a barrel, debate is now fierce among analysts as to whether it will stay that high or fall back to traditional levels, oftentimes around $20 a barrel. The good news for those who are making investments in coal-to-liquid technologies is that the NYMEX futures index for oil is above the break-even point for 60 months into the future.
“Certainly, this is something that will have to happen,” says Randy Harris, an ex-official with the National Energy Technology Laboratory in Pittsburgh. “If oil was not so unstable, it would have happened by now. We have not been able to make the economics work because oil prices are so often below $32 a barrel. So, we can't get the investment needed to build plants. It's not that the technology isn't there. It is. It's just been that the economics have not worked.”
$32 a barrel won’t be seen anytime soon.
The number of oil refineries is about 200 as of 1989 (the latest data I could come across.)
If we built coal liquefaction plants to augment oil-refining capacity in 10 years we could be largely weaned of foreign oil. The world price for oil would drop to the production cost of liquid fuel from coal.
Our trade deficit would plummet, jobs would be made in West Virginia, Wyoming, Pennsylvania and 35 other coal producing states.
Just thinking...
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If we built coal liquefaction plants to augment oil-refining capacity in 10 years we could be largely weaned of foreign oil. The world price for oil would drop to the production cost of liquid fuel from coal. "
with the enviromentalists fighting it every step of the way, you'd be lucky to have construction started on the first plant in 10 years, and be in production within 30...
of course, if someone somewhere grows a spine and tells em to **** off...
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Originally posted by vorticon
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If we built coal liquefaction plants to augment oil-refining capacity in 10 years we could be largely weaned of foreign oil. The world price for oil would drop to the production cost of liquid fuel from coal. "
with the enviromentalists fighting it every step of the way, you'd be lucky to have construction started on the first plant in 10 years, and be in production within 30...
of course, if someone somewhere grows a spine and tells em to **** off...
I wish we could just take ONE state and turn it into a socialist environmentalist utopia just so we have a great example that this kind of thinking DOESNT WORK!
People are even againts wind generators because of how bad it looks to have a thousand of them in your back yard. Here we have clean energy (inefficient at that) that should have every endorsment from the sierra club but it might effect property values.
This coal thing sounds like a pretty good Idea. I think Nuke plants are the way to go myself.
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Originally posted by Gunslinger
I wish we could just take ONE state and turn it into a socialist environmentalist utopia just so we have a great example that this kind of thinking DOESNT WORK!
People are even againts wind generators because of how bad it looks to have a thousand of them in your back yard. Here we have clean energy (inefficient at that) that should have every endorsment from the sierra club but it might effect property values.
This coal thing sounds like a pretty good Idea. I think Nuke plants are the way to go myself.
I was in Palm Springs a couple of weeks ago. They have a wind farm there with thousands of the generators. I thought it was a beautiful sight, especially in the context of friggin crazy Muslims with what, 70% of the world's oil?
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Originally posted by Holden McGroin
The largest single element of the USA's trade deficit is the importation of oil. 27.996 million barrels a day as of last November. @$50 / barrel, 1399.8 million, $1.3998 Billion / day or 511.3 billion / yr goes out of the country to buy foreign oil.
The USA has ¼ of the world’s coal supply and known domestic reserves equal to that of 4 times the Saudi oil reserves or equivalent to the entire earth’s oil supply.
$32 a barrel won’t be seen anytime soon.
The number of oil refineries is about 200 as of 1989 (the latest data I could come across.)
If we built coal liquefaction plants to augment oil-refining capacity in 10 years we could be largely weaned of foreign oil. The world price for oil would drop to the production cost of liquid fuel from coal.
Our trade deficit would plummet, jobs would be made in West Virginia, Wyoming, Pennsylvania and 35 other coal producing states.
Just thinking...
Don't want to sound "un-American" here, but I've always believed that we could just use less.
Just my $2.35 worth.
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Sounds reasonable except for a few fundamental ( :) )flaws:
One fundamental flaw is that light crude is used for gasoline, not fuel oil, and gasoline is the issue because it impacts the economy across the board.
China has substantial coal reserves, labor costs that are fractional of US labor costs for construction, operation and transportation, plus minimalistic pollution restrictions.
The investment required exceeds the money available or borrowable to do it and one last gigantic hurdle is that oil companies are in the oil business, not the coal business. They make money by leveraging almost the entire supply chain.
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Rolex,
If you have a hydrocarbon molucule you can make just about any hydrocarbon chain you want to in a refinery craking tower. Some chains are so long that a single molecule is the size of an orange.
Diesel can be made from Natural gas... CH4 is thansformed into C10H22... Gasoline is made more easily from light sweet crude, but it can be made from coal as well.
Methanol is easily made from coal, and other hydrcarbons can be made from coal hydrocarbon reserves.
If there is a profit in it, oil companies can joint venture with coal companies.
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Originally posted by Holden McGroin
If there is a profit in it, oil companies can joint venture with coal companies.
If there is a profit in it, it probably would already be happening, no? Here in Alberta, there's the single largest deposit of oil anywhere in the world... to the tune of 2.5 trillion barrels. But it's on the surface... in sand and clay. It wasn't being extracted because it was unprofitable to do it. Once oil went over $25 a barrel (break even point), BOOM.... It's now huge.
Maybe it will get to a point where coal becomes profitable someday?
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From what I gather, the break-even point for coal is at about $35 to $40 / barrel.
It's now over $50, closing in on $60, but if we were to fully develop coal and tar sands, the oil price / barrel would drop to the production costs of the coal and tar sand supply.
Increase the supply and the price drops. The stability point must stay about $50 I would surmise.
I would think a incentive program would be needed if we were to do this immediately.
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Well I dont know if this is possible but...
if the hydrogen fuel cell was comercially avaliable for vehicles and trucks (I know, they working on it), wouldnt it be a good 'investment' for the US gov to launch a program where they subsidize vehicle manufacturers so that anyone who owns a gasoline powered vehicle can trade it in for a brand new hydrogen vehicle?
Say, for 5 years.. and in those 5 years the US becomes largely free of gasoline powered cars and largely free of foreign oil dependency... plus it also gets to become the world's first 'large' producer of hydrogen fuel and hydrogen vehicled which can be sold to other nations as they switch over to the hydrogen tech.
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Originally posted by Nash
If there is a profit in it, it probably would already be happening, no? Here in Alberta, there's the single largest deposit of oil anywhere in the world... to the tune of 2.5 trillion barrels. But it's on the surface... in sand and clay. It wasn't being extracted because it was unprofitable to do it. Once oil went over $25 a barrel (break even point), BOOM.... It's now huge.
Maybe it will get to a point where coal becomes profitable someday?
Nash...for god's sake man keep it down will ya..;)
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Originally posted by Ripper29
Nash...for god's sake man keep it down will ya..;)
Oh, I didn't think about that. But not to worry...
If the Yanks start gettin' uppity, they're in for a real bruising. This aint Panama, Greneda, or some desert. Their guns will jam, and bombs will turn into the equivalent of falling blocks of ice.
But our hockey sticks will still work.
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Don't worry Ripper, developing Canada's tar sands would not free the USA from foreign oil.
Unless we could convince folks that Canucks had WMDs... hmmm... there were some Canuckians at Los Alamos in the 40's, I would what their development program has been doing lately?
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unknown to most people , the US govt is funding 14 pilot plants working to reduce the cost of getting gasoline out of coal.
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Originally posted by Holden McGroin
Don't worry Ripper, developing Canada's tar sands would not free the USA from foreign oil.
Unless we could convince folks that Canucks had WMDs... hmmm... there were some Canuckians at Los Alamos in the 40's, I would what their development program has been doing lately?
Well the closest thing to WMD we have had lately is a couple cases of Mad Cow, really did more damage up here then down south.
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Originally posted by oboe
I was in Palm Springs a couple of weeks ago. They have a wind farm there with thousands of the generators. I thought it was a beautiful sight, especially in the context of friggin crazy Muslims with what, 70% of the world's oil?
I agree. Wind farms are pretty cool looking if you ask me. BUT, when you want to add a couple hundred more right next to the back yard of somone's $500,000 vacation home they tend to protest it.
I don't understand environmentalist. If you got all the animal lovers and environmentalist in one room you'd have the biggest argument ever of what/who/how to protect.
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Originally posted by Holden McGroin
Don't worry Ripper, developing Canada's tar sands...
Just a point of fact. They're not called tar sands anymore, but oil sands. It's already developed - prodution costs are now down to about 12 bucks a barrel - and 50% of the oil produced and consumed comes from them.
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A thought,
Futures markets reflect demand for products,
When demand is greater than supply, the futures markets invert, ie the front month is higher than the next month ex. May crude would be at $50 and June would be $45.
When supply is greater than demand futures markets go to a carry, ie the front month is lower than the next month, ex May crude would be at at $50 and June would $52.
The closes on Friday CLK5 $57.27 (May) CLM5 $58.29 (June)
soooooo the market is at a carry in fact crude is at a carry all the way out to Oct.
There is a huge speculative bubble in this market right now and it will break as the fundamentals would not support prices at these levels.
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Originally posted by OIO
Well I dont know if this is possible but...
if the hydrogen fuel cell was comercially avaliable for vehicles and trucks (I know, they working on it), wouldnt it be a good 'investment' for the US gov to launch a program where they subsidize vehicle manufacturers so that anyone who owns a gasoline powered vehicle can trade it in for a brand new hydrogen vehicle?
Say, for 5 years.. and in those 5 years the US becomes largely free of gasoline powered cars and largely free of foreign oil dependency... plus it also gets to become the world's first 'large' producer of hydrogen fuel and hydrogen vehicled which can be sold to other nations as they switch over to the hydrogen tech.
My understanding is that hydrogen fuel cells arnt the answer but just another delay in the inevitable. To my knowledge they are highly inefficient as a power source and you still have to use huge amounts of power to make them. So the trade off is less fuel consumption by cars more by the plants.
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They had a hydrogen convention sometime showing how cool, efficient, pollution free hydrogen cars were. Heck they even had a hydrogen refueling station. I'm not supporting any of that but to make it into the tank in a liquid nature it would have to be cooled in the holding tanks and all the way into the car. Remember hydrogen normally exists in a gaseous state down to below 100 degrees fahrenheit I believe. Anyway if they could kept it cooled down to actually be combusted it might work i'm not counting on it though. Coal liquification might be a good start though.....why haven't we discussed those much loved solar panels yet? Expensive, not a huge energy out put, but hey slap some on the roof for a backup energy supply and you might be able to get away with it.
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Originally posted by nirvana
They had a hydrogen convention sometime showing how cool, efficient, pollution free hydrogen cars were. Heck they even had a hydrogen refueling station. I'm not supporting any of that but to make it into the tank in a liquid nature it would have to be cooled in the holding tanks and all the way into the car. Remember hydrogen normally exists in a gaseous state down to below 100 degrees fahrenheit I believe. Anyway if they could kept it cooled down to actually be combusted it might work i'm not counting on it though. Coal liquification might be a good start though.....why haven't we discussed those much loved solar panels yet? Expensive, not a huge energy out put, but hey slap some on the roof for a backup energy supply and you might be able to get away with it.
Hydrogen cars? Well, it'd make pileups on the motorways fairly interesting to watch.... and drive by shootings could get a bit more action packed.
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Originally posted by Vulcan
Hydrogen cars? Well, it'd make pileups on the motorways fairly interesting to watch.... and drive by shootings could get a bit more action packed.
what are you trying to say, that gasoline fumes don't explode?
what do you think makes your car go down the road?
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Hydrogen is much more unstabe and volitile...though the polution factor is much lower...I'm sure they are working to find a way to make it safer.
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Originally posted by ASTAC
Hydrogen is much more unstabe and volitile...though the polution factor is much lower...I'm sure they are working to find a way to make it safer.
Gasoline is about as bad an explosion hazard as you can get and still be liquid.
The problem with hydrogen is you can't drill or dig for it. You must produce it with other forms of energy, like nuclear, oil, wind, coal, solar, etc.
Hydrogen is not a source of energy, it is a storage medium.
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Not trying to rain on your parade, Holden. :)
I understand the chemistry and appreciate that there are numerous alternatives to our overall energy system, but technical feasability is rarely a catalyst for action in the US. Corporate investment is short term and maximizing return as long as possible with old technology is common place.
America does new ideas well, but doesn't develop or apply them, or transition to them well. Broadband, cell phones, high definition TV, hydrogen cars - there are numerous examples of American business unwilling to invest and consumers being a generation or 3 behind in technology.
The long term energy goal of the US is to pump everything dry, them we'll worry about what to do later. The oil companies make money at any price of oil. Pumping everything dry and creating a crisis atmosphere will relieve them of any responsibility to invest - they'll cry poor mouth to Congress and get the American taxpayer to do their investing.
Technology and cost effectiveness of it (post capital investment) takes a back seat to short term profit in most industries. Markets are not as free as people think they are. There are convoluted controls and biases that mold markets. If the cultural cool (derived from advertising) were to drive cars with over 15km/l fuel efficiency, the oil would last a lot longer and be cheaper right now.
Sorry for using metric, but my point is that if the US can't even transition to the metric system, what are the chances of a smooth transition to alternative fuels or alternative transportation means? We use too much oil. We're focused on using the same old fuels for the same old cars with same old big engines.
We don't want to look at the cure, we want to keep treating the symptoms.
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methane is as good a choice as any, better, really, since if were pulling from waste, it wont run out.
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This is an interesting discussion I'm unfortunately not up to speed on regarding recent technical developments. Thanks for having it. I'd really like to see us using less foreign oil.
Question: where does fuel cell technology stand in all this?
culero
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Maybe if we stopped hoarding our oil for a disaster that is very unlikely..and start using it..we can get by a little longer while these technologies mature..not to mention get our prices down a little.
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Originally posted by Rolex
The long term energy goal of the US is to pump everything dry, them we'll worry about what to do later. The oil companies make money at any price of oil.
That's why it would have to be a government inititive to help industry make the transition now. Tax breaks, maybe even no tax for a decade for a company that would be starting up a coal to liquid refinery. Liquid fuels from coal would not require any technical change to automobiles and would buy years of transition to a hydrogen economy without being addicted to outside sources of oil, and all the political and economic problems associated with that.
No problem with the metric system personally. I would rather divide by 10 than 3 or 8 or 12 or 5280 anyway.
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could care less about the measuring system we use...hell a metric speedometer makes you feel like you are going FAST..however, I way too used to measureing stuff using fractions.
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Originally posted by vorticon
methane is as good a choice as any, better, really, since if were pulling from waste, it wont run out.
I wonder if the could fit a tube to the drivers seat ;)
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Originally posted by Holden McGroin
"...and would buy years of transition to a hydrogen economy without being addicted to outside sources of oil, and all the political and economic problems associated with that. "
The US is "addicted" to outside sources of financing and manufacturing, among other things. Why would energy be any different?
Sounds like there are two issues here when talking about not wanting to be addicted to outside oil. First is the rising cost (which is probably the main impetus for this discussion and will only get more play when the summer hits), and having to suckle at the tit of a bunch of terrorist fundamentalist nutjobs. Call that resentment for not being able to bite the hand that feeds you.
Whatever it is... It's not going to change any time soon.
Two things are driving up the cost. The market and the Chinese. I don't know what it's like in other places, but here people are falling all over themselves trying to figure out better ways to get more and more oil to China 'cuz damn.... It's like they all of a sudden just woke up and are REALLY hungry.
I'm not a tech type guy, but my instinct tells me that when it comes to energy, it's a different thing than, say, pharmaceuticals. Those folks don't even know what's going to be possible. With energy, I think we've already mapped the entire genome, as it were, and are going to have to play the hand that was dealt us. At least for a good long while.
The only change we're probably ever going to see in our lifetime is going to be from within. Which means ponying up at the pump, or changing our lifestyles and expectations and getting by using less (in addiction parlance this is known as "chipping").
Hey... whaddyagonnado?
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fractions are the work of the devil , give me decimals.
quick , whats bigger 5/8's or 11/16's?....5mm or 6mm?
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That's what we are up against Rolex, ASTAC is to used to paying $2-5/16 per gallon of gasoline to change to a decimal system.
You mentioned "The long term energy goal of the US" when we really don't have one. The energy system of the USA is largely free market. The only reason ANWR is an issue is because it is federal land.
The Palm Springs wind farm exists not because it was a good investment on the open market, but due to tax breaks, the investment penciled out. My company was not investing in any more turbines until the tax break was renewed for 2005.
A more agressive national energy policy would use that model to give a heavy push the development of alternates.
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I hear you brother, so you're preaching to the choir. You're right about no comprehensive national energy policy - I was being sarcastic.
I just hate sounding negative and I've tried my best to see any path not leading to some sort of dire circumstance in the next few decades, but I'm still searching. We're going to be alright for a while, but we're too late and public finances are in too much of a shambles. The only thing keeping investment floating now is foreign investment. Foreign oil or foreign investment subsidizing the debt? Pick your poison.
I was vilified here last year for warning about this administration's fiscal irresponsibility. But I'm rich; not smart like those who disagreed.