BoatBanter.com - View Single Post

Urin Asshole

On Thu, 04 Apr 2013 02:32:37 -0400, wrote:

On Wed, 03 Apr 2013 19:17:21 -0700, Urin Asshole
wrote:

On Wed, 03 Apr 2013 20:48:10 -0400, wrote:

So the range, without underlying infrastructre and related cost, per
year is, let's say in the middle... $32B. That of course, won't help
the Social Security situation if it were funneled to it. Is that what
you're claiming? Nice try.

When you read what they are trying to include in the "oil subsidy"
like keeping the shipping lanes are open you understand we would be
spending that money anyway.
The real subsidies are going to wind and solar and they are direct
payments or tax credits

So, you're claiming that all the big oil subsidies and all the
infrastructure that supports that is somehow equal to the paltry sums
that are used to subsidize wind/solar, two technologies that don't
pollute nearly as much and are completely renewable.

The problem with these "oil subsidies" is that the detractors are
calling a lot of things a subsidy that are clearly not. "Defending
shipping lanes"? Get real.

Feel free to identify those costs that are specificially targeted
toward big oil. Those can be eliminated??

When you look at the subsidies for wind and solar you also need to
look at how much electricity is actually being produced per subsidy
dollar. That is when the numbers really start to soar.

No, that's not necessarily correct. When oil first came around, not
much in the way of electricity was being generated. It takes a while.
Are you disputing that wind/solar can cover a lot of our energy needs?
If so, try doing some research.

The actual solar panel is not producing pollution but the process of
making them is very dirty, labor intensive and expensive. We don't see
a lot of that because they are polluting China to build most of them
with cheap Chinese labor.

Depends on the technology being used. Is oil dirty? What's the cost of
producing it.... oh yeah, the Gulf oil spill.

There is an interesting article in this month's Scientific American
(Apr 2013) about the EROI on the tar sands. It says the tar sands are
not really that efficient because of all of the processing costs but
when you actually look at these "costs" it is mostly "jobs" for people
in North America. I can see why Canada is pushing it. They also
stretch this cost thing to the limit, even including roads, food and
the schools for the worker's kids in the price of the oil.
At a certain point, isn't that the definition of an economy?

Canadian jobs? Not much in the way of US jobs. Is it worth the spill
and pollution potential? No. How long will it take? Years.

For electricity generation
The EROI on solar PV is second to last, only having nuclear being
worse.
Best is hydro but you can't build a dam in this country. We are
blowing them up.

The numbers are
Hydro 40+
Wind 20
Coal 18
Nat gas 7
Solar 6
Nukes 5

We get 160 times as much power from gas and 290 times as much from
coal as we do solar. Wind is about 10x solar.

Looking at liquid fuels
It really gets ugly when you look at corn ethanol. They set an
arbitrary EROI of 5-9 "required for the basic functions of an
industrial society" and ethanol comes in at 1.4, far behind heavy oil
from California at 4.

They seem to like sugar cane ethanol (9) but they ignore the
ecological cost of that. The Brazilians are filling wet lands and
burning the rain forest to grow sugar. That has a worse effect on
carbon than just about anything man does and it destroys ecosystems
that exist nowhere else on earth.
In the US we really do not have that many places where sugar will grow
and most of them are environmentally sensitive (like the Everglades or
the bayou where most of our sugar comes from)

Blah, blah... stats that don't mean anything. We're talking about
billions in subsidies to oil companies that don't need them. nice try.