$3 gas is here!

I'm confident that if/when it is profitable and low risk, they will be built.

Yes, and we are. I think we should be conserving domestic oil and importing all the foreign oil we can get, ideally all of it, for vehicle fuel use. For "energy" I favor other means.

I'd prefer to exhaust foreign oil supplies first. Then too, I suspect that the US may eventually have to sell all or part of Alaska to pay its debts and other obligations, and mucking up ANWR could adversely effect the sale price.

The wholesale price of gasoline dropped over 50 cents a gallon in the last week. Prices tend to lead on the way up and lag on the way down. We have a profit motivated supply chain. So in a couple weeks the price should moderate somewhat.

This is due to foreign flagged vessels being allowed to dock and offload both crude and refined products.

It takes a time to approve either a refinery or a nuke plant measured in decades, not years or minutes.

The leaders of our arab "allies" have repeatedly stated our problem is a lack of refinery capacity. I declare them experts.

Adding "splash ethanol" is the most expedient and cost effective way to reduce 15% of refined fossil fuels essentially overnight.

This thread is OT.

Jerry

Well, I'm guessing that he only saw the same pictures that I did - outbound lanes a parking lot, inbound lanes a ghostown...

Eldred

Well, that removes the last thin doubts. You're definitely an idiot.

I thought it was for Cheney's benefit regarding all the gov contracts his company(s) received to rebuild Iraq?

Regardless, this is not a war on terror as claimed but a war for liberation of Iraq citizens(as should have been properly claimed but was not for some odd reason) from Saddam Insane....or is it Inane :)

Ted Novak TRA#5512 IEAS#75

Well, that removes the last thin doubts. You're definitely a troll that doesn't fly rockets.

I'd call you a full on asshole but I'll wait until/if we ever meet in person.

Ted Novak TRA#5512 IEAS#75

Like nuke plants, one purpose for all the regulations and permit hassles is specifically to make it UNprofitable. You can thank the liberals/environuts for this. Same with all the lawsuits everytime someone tries to build something useful like a refinery or power plant

-- they figure if they can't stop it outright, they can at least make it too expensive to build.

Good idea, at least on its face. On the other hand, we need at least some domestic oil to help keep the price of the foreign stuff down. Without it, they'd really have us over a barrel. Also, if we wait until the foreign sources dry up (physically or politically), it could take too long to get domestic oil into production.

It wasn't a given?

Nope. I don't conclude that anyone's an idiot until they do or say something that demonstrates so conclusively, as Mr. Kaplow just did.

And it's a very popular move from the point of view of Nebraska.

- Rick "What bias?" Dickinson

What makes you think that we went to war to *lower* oil prices?

I'd imagine that the representatives from the fine state of Halliburton might object to a policy like that....

- Rick "You can't out-cynical reality" Dickinson

That's very open minded.

Ethanol is a political solution, NOT an fossil fuel conservation solution. Here in the midwest, ethanol is good for the farmers. It's NOT good for your car or for your mileage. When they make the seasonal changes to the gas formula here in the Chicago area, I can see my mileage drop 4-5 MPG. It's a very clear difference between the summer and winter blends, that supposedly reduce polition, but in fact do not.

One thing the regional blends do is to prohibit Chicago from getting gas from say St Louis, when one of the three Chicago refineries is ofline. SO we see huge regional spikes in prices due to spot supply shortages. This is one of the restrictions that has been lifted inthe aftermath of Katrina that should be permanently dispensed with.

Well, someone just called ME and idiot for making this same observation, so I guess you've just joined the club :-)

I can't imagine joining any club that would have someone like me as a member. Looks like we're in good company, in any case....

- Rick "Grouchos anonymous" Dickinson

"I once shot an elephant in my pajamas..."

There's plenty of waste land in this country to put a refinery, or 20. Problem is there is no pool of talent sitting in the waste land to run the thing. No people, no refinery. Now where there are plenty of people is where they WANT the refinery, problem is that isn't waste land.....well not if they don't build. The refineries in this area have taken entire cities, brought the blight and destroyed the landscape. For a refinery to be built in your backyard you have to write off the land it's built on and everything downwind and down stream for a couple miles. You can buy a house in Marcus Hook for about $20,000, the same thing 10 miles up the road is $250,000.........now why would someone want anything like that in their back yard?

It's not terribly hard to figure out.

Chuck

Yep, I saw taillights on the right and ghost highway on the left.......never believe what you see on Fox News, I should really stop watching them......next disaster I'll surf to get a more balanced look.

Chuck

That's the same Catch-22 that a lot of industries suffer from. Airports are a good example, too. Thing is - you put industry X somewhere, people will congregate around it for the jobs. Eventually, you get people moving there because it's become a Nice Place to Live.

However... when the industry that started the growth wants to expand, the residents protest against it. They forget that they owe the existence of their community to that industry.