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  • commenter
    Brahm
    Jul 16 04:22 PM
    Implementing Pickens' Plan for Public Energy Policy [view article]
    Did you or did I make a mistake? As I said I had been kind of scandalized by those TV ads I am fairly sure that what T. Boone has been pushing is diesel derived from NG. There were news interview/program which I saw where he appeared to advocate such an apprroach. Or perhaps, even I read about also. Perhaps, my mind is playing tricks. I will check again.

    On the subject of private cars and natural gas, I am afraid that it has been sort of dismissed as being impractical . It presents a lot of safety issues as well. Ever thought about basements and houses blowing up when piped gas (at even low pressure) is used for heating? How about mass public places blowing up, where natural gas is filled up for cars or cylinders installed, if such a model were to be adopted? Or cars blowing up in crowded public places when a car has been fitted with malfunctioniong gas cylinders/controls/gad... which may be leaking. Expect every car-driving American to become an expert in handling gas at moderate or high pressure? Did T Boone say anything about this? I bet not, whether I am mistaken on what he meant on natural gas use for transportation.

    As I have said, mass public or commercial transportation (trucking, buses, perhaps trains, etc) are excellent candidates for natural gas susbtitution. And, the infra-structure for these would not be expensive because we don't have to put up a filling station in every locality.

    We actually have a tough time to set up pipelines for natural gas transmission across the country. If all private (cars) transportation were to be switched on to it, it would perhaps be a formidable 100 year problem to evolve an adequate infrastructure.

    The $2/gallon equivalent for gas is speculative. It probably does not include transmission, distribution and marketing costs. (Current gas price (bulk does not include transmission, distribution, etc) is about $11 to $13 per 1000 cu ft (or per $7 million Btu). The equivalent for gasoline is about $23 on the East Coast at the gas station. Still think $2 dollar equivalent for gas is possible! How about if OPEC drives the price of the barrel to $100. Or, the market in gas gets so tight because of mass demand that it kicks up the price of gas to a current equivalent of about, le's say, $17 at the hub in Kansas(?)/Louisiana?

    The intermediate term solution for private automobiles, in my most thought-out view, is more small cars, hybrids, electric cars with much highher mpg average standards thyan prevalent now. We can cut consumption 30 to 40% using this approach within 10 years. Of course, we need to bring this to start immediately, using incentives/disincentiv... including severe tax implications if necessary.

    I will check again! I don't know how to reach you beyond today.     Reply
  • commenter
    bellard
    Jul 16 04:02 PM
    Implementing Pickens' Plan for Public Energy Policy [view article]
    Hick;
    20 years ago I spent a month in the flattop mtn - great trout fishin. I am sorry about the range issue - I did not understand the query.

    Go to the Tesla web site - I think the range is over 250-300 per charge, and that is for a high performance rig.

    You could have an truck and bring with you a thin film solar system and charge up in the backcountry!


    Also we could have bio-diesel - I use bio-diesel right now in my Golf tdi and get 50 mpg.
    Any diesel vehicle could run bio-diesel, but if these vehicles were designed and manufactures for bio-diesel - they would work even better.     Reply
  • commenter
    paultaut
    Jul 16 04:00 PM
    Implementing Pickens' Plan for Public Energy Policy [view article]
    Ultra Capacitators and other all-electrics would not need an infrastructure build up. Reply
  • commenter
    JUst A Hick
    Jul 16 03:42 PM
    Implementing Pickens' Plan for Public Energy Policy [view article]
    One more thing about Pickens Plan and using nat gas for cars, what happens if you run out of fuel on the highway? Exactly what type of container do you have to tote along as you walk to a filling station to get what you need to get your car to a station and how would you transfer lng or cng from that container to your car? Reply
  • commenter
    JUst A Hick
    Jul 16 03:38 PM
    Implementing Pickens' Plan for Public Energy Policy [view article]
    Bellard,

    I don't think you get what I mean about range.
    I don't mind waiting 10 minutes for a charge but that charge has to last me 300 miles-in 4WD.That means a lot of power.Go out to Utah Badlands/Canyonlands or Flattops wilderness in Colorado.You don't find gas stations behind every elk! Also think of power consumption when you're hauling a four horse trailer.Electric will not get you there and back.Granted these are a few extreme examples but how do people get their boats out to Lake Powell? Ever travel I-70 through Utah? There's a 160 mile stretch with absolutely no services.
    What I'm saying is that electric would kill a lot of the Outdoor rec industry if range didn't increase dramatically.You also have to remember that outdoor enthusiasts require a lot more power,on average from their vehicles.You want to put electric refueling stations out in the boonies, you have to start stringing a lot more power lines.     Reply
  • commenter
    User 125446
    Jul 16 03:30 PM
    Implementing Pickens' Plan for Public Energy Policy [view article]
    Do you really think those pinheads in Congress will ever wake up and get out of the way ? My PO . Fat Chance....Dan Daly Reply
  • commenter
    Bumski
    Jul 16 03:27 PM
    Implementing Pickens' Plan for Public Energy Policy [view article]
    I appreciate the comments here. As a Nat Gas vehicle owner, I want to add my comments. I believe that Nat Gas vehicles offers the most sensible stop-gap measure. However, there are a yet a number of other issues to consider over and above the substantial price differential. I live in Utah... we just had a price increase on our Nat Gas and now I am paying $.85 per gal (I believe this is well below the nat'l avg). A gallon nets me approximately 35 miles. I have not noticed much power difference between gasoline and nat gas but I have understood it is an issue on bigger loads. My vehicle (Honda Civic) is a dedicated Nat Gas. Many of the vehicles are bi fuel which would probably be the best solution for most individuals. The biggest challenge that I see is:
    1) There are too few Nat Gas stations. This is a big problem but could be resolved fairly quickly for most locations as demand increases since many areas already support an infrastructure of Nat Gas. I am primarily limited to driving around town or I have to make sure in advance there are stations in the areas that I am driving too. This is a hassle.
    2) The range on most Nat Gas vehicles is substantially less than gasoline. The maximum that I am able to drive is about 175 miles on a full tank. Its not too bad but can be a problem when there is a substantial distance between pump stations.

    All in all, I would buy another Nat Gas vehicle but I would probably buy a bi fuel. The cost savings is significant. In my situation (I mostly commute to and from work) I am saving about $250 to $300 per month. The cost of gasoline in my area is $4.15.

    Most cars could be converted without too much difficulty although the present cost seems to be from $5K to $7K which is significant. The conversion cost could be reduced as more shops are certified for conversions. Most auto manufacturers have stopped producing Nat Gas vehicles. I believe that Honda is still producing the Civic Nat Gas. Longer term, we need to look for other alternatives but I believe that Nat Gas could offer the best short term viable solution... all things considered. Even though we have all heard of this alternative, most don't understand the advantages/disadvantag... of this option. Until we become priced out of gasoline we will not undertake the effort to become educated.     Reply
  • commenter
    bellard
    Jul 16 03:09 PM
    Implementing Pickens' Plan for Public Energy Policy [view article]
    "use of natural gas for diesel and transportation as proposed by T. Boone. The efficiency of conversion of natural gas to diesel is only about 50%"

    Brahm;
    I do not understand what you are talking about - no one is talking about NG to diesel conversion? Also if you read the article, I am not proposing the NEW alternative to oil based engines - my view is let energy efficiencies and real free markets(include all cost - pollution) decide the winners.....


     Reply
  • commenter
    Brahm
    Jul 16 02:14 PM
    Implementing Pickens' Plan for Public Energy Policy [view article]
    When I was in elementary or middle school, our teachers, while teaching us hand-writing made us write "patern" sentences over and over again, sometimes more than a 100 times or more to teach us to write well. (Yes at that time in history, they actually taught us hand-writing by making us write on a "patern-notebooks... filled with sample hand-writing!)

    The sentences used to be mostly wise sayings or homilies. One of them which I still remember was: NECESSITY IS THE MOTHER OF INVENTION. Quite cute and true! But only till yesterday. Today invention usually runs against economics and economists, sometimes of the phony sort. This species called economist will justify anything, even, however bad, using his science of economics. Fequently hidden personal benefit often at the cost of others, the environment and even global warming is the real hidden agenda behind these economic analyses.

    Our celebrated author of this piece has thrown us a very marvellous opportunity to hash out some ideas (if possible!) by propounding the wisdom of T Boone Pickens on the use of natural gas. Of course, being myself always somewhat on the weird-side, I can't help thinking that perhaps the middle name for the gentleman should be changed to Bonehead. However, I did not and shouild not do such a thing, even though I have been brutalized by those sellf-serving ads on TV for the last several days. Only for the sake of civility I shall not!

    Now, about the wind thing. It is being done in many parts of the world, and, of course, should continue despite the distraction introduced by T. Boone. Even when it is somewhat (not too much more!) costly, it should be done. Why? Because among many phony obstacles, justified mostly on economic grounds by those who are gung-ho for fossil (coal, oil and even gas) based power/energy, hidden fraud appears to be the bias on the use oif fossil fuels. The votaries of economics almost always assume that apples and oranges are the same. Coal, oil and gas based power (or other uses) appear to be assumed as having the same effectiveness so long as they can satisfy the same end, or have similar economics. This kind of economic analysis is actually nonsense! For example, there are health costs associated in the use of each of these fossil fuels. In the case of electricity production, these costs may not be borne by the utility company or the investor, but nonetheless they are real costs. They are borne by the individual (in terms of disease and personal costs), or the government or society at large.

    How about the costs (in future mostly) on global warming induced by fossil fuel use?

    Now coming to the use of natural gas for diesel and transportation as proposed by T. Boone. Should we be adopting this model, even if economics can justify it? The efficiency of conversion of natural gas to diesel is only about 50%. Are we forfeiting a large part of the advantage (in terms of global warming) on the use of natural gas through such a model vs use of natural gas in pother situations without injvolving conversion to diesel? Why not a natrual gas engine for use in trucking, heavy vehicles, and other public transportation needs? It has been done and is being done in some parts of the world with excellent results. Good economics and improved environment in central cities. And also not tough to set-up a network of stations to provide compressed LNG to the commercial transportation industry. Excellent concurrent benefits in terms of public health. Granted, it is not practical for private small transportation vehicles (i.e. our cars). However, use of such an approach in heavy public transportation would save us lots foreign exchange. And the economics would be excellent compared to that on the use of natural gas based diesel or oil per se.

    What do we do with coal? Forget about power plants run on combustion technology. Wherever suitable coal supply is available, use integrated gasification combined cycle (IGCC) technology. For base-load plants, we can get 45% efficiency now using IGCC (vs. 42% for coal combustion). 2 or 3% improvement in efficiency translates to 5 to 7% better over combustion technology! Nothing to sneeze at when you look at it in termsof the modest Kyoto proposals.

    Many analyses performed in the past show that costs are actually better for IGCC if you factor in health costs. Almost zero pollution in the case of IGCC, and this technology can also spur the use of CO2 isolation and storage (sequestration) in future. Of course, this will have to await feasibility of undergrouind storage for CO2 in future.

    Can gas be used in a better way as such without resorting to conversion? Yes and no. The subject is broad and it would be confusing at this point to cloud our contention that T. Boone Pickens doesn't have much to his proposals or contribution at this time. Perhaps, he wants to make a fast buck or two more before he leaves. Serious approaches to solve real problems in credible real ways take a long time. It takes more serious and perceptive minds and souls to do so. But first there must be a national will and a strong public consensus on the need to do so. The time is not right yet! Otherwise, nobody would be side-tracked by light-weights like T. Boone Picken.

    I have some of the natural gas stocks mentioned above in my portfolio. However, I have no desire to make more gains with ideas like diesel!     Reply
  • commenter
    bellard
    Jul 16 11:24 AM
    Implementing Pickens' Plan for Public Energy Policy [view article]
    Allen;
    Thanks for you thoughts. The move from income taxation to consumption taxation will increase productivity and the economy. Income taxes are a disincentive to create wealth, and an incentive to cheat......

    Also these energy taxes will create a huge amount of high paying jobs. Venture capital firms have the money - but will not fund alternatives yet. - This money - 100's of billions is waiting for a comprehensive plan that will allow renewables to compete on a level playing field.

    Just changing out the service station to have NG, and fast charge electric would be a huge boost to the economy.
     Reply
  • commenter
    bellard
    Jul 16 11:18 AM
    Implementing Pickens' Plan for Public Energy Policy [view article]
    "They will not voluntarily support higher gas prices. "

    They will support paying $200 bucks more in gas a month, if they get 300 bucks more a month in take home pay. That is what my tax plan is all about.

    You are correct - the fear mongers will just scream about the high gas prices.....we need to combat this.     Reply
  • commenter
    bellard
    Jul 16 11:15 AM
    Implementing Pickens' Plan for Public Energy Policy [view article]
    "one concern I have about electric engines is range"

    Hick;
    Fast charge electric devices have been around for years. Service stations could be fitted with such devices. How long will you have to wait for a complete charge? I do not know 10 minutes? - but I know how greed works in our economy - this would be a huge infrastructure change with 50-100 billion dollars at stake - it will get done!

    And remember, we currently spend 700 billion buying oil from other countries!     Reply
  • commenter
    Allen Fuller
    Jul 16 11:04 AM
    Implementing Pickens' Plan for Public Energy Policy [view article]
    Excellent article.

    People (many of the commenters above) need to get past their political biases that color their view of the world. It's a whole different world now than even just a few years ago. The laissez-faire approach will cause more chaos than a smart directed policy. I'm conservative but I see the huge problem we face and if we don't move together as a nation, with smarter policies that SHIFT US INTENTIONALLY AWAY FROM FOSSIL FUELS, we'll be sunk. As it is, it is already a huge enough challenge that even if we could all get on the same page today it would still be difficult to avoid massive repercussions.

    If we don't buckle down and voluntarily apply some short-term pain (relatively speaking; it could still be years or even decades), then we are in for some real long-term hurt.

    I like the idea of shifting taxes away from income and onto fossil fuels. Some will say this will stifle economic growth. Earth to La-La-Land! It's being stifled already and if we don't manage the situation, not only economic growth but even economic SURVIVAL will be crushed. On the flip side, taxes on income also stifle economic growth, so by shifting from income tax to fuel tax we are just moving sideways, but with beneficial side effects (getting off our crack addiction to oil).

    If we had plenty of time, I'd agree that a free-market solution would be best. But there is no longer time. And the market needs direction; in the past, oil set the direction for the market; but currently no single player or technology is big enough to give direction to the market. The result is that the market doesn't commit itself to a coherent course and instead tends to wander and waste time. How many alternative technologies were lost, or companies went under, because oil was too cheap for several decades after the 1970s? If we had followed through with a national policy that gave those technologies and companies a chance, we could have been fully prepared for this day already. More than that, we could have been exporting these new technologies to the world, instead of sending all our money overseas for a dinosaur of an energy source that has no future.

    Pickens' plan is a great step in the right direction. I happen to think there are a few naive assumptions in it, but it will be much better than doing nothing (our CURRENT non-strategy). The main flaw is assuming that natural gas will continue to be abundant, and the second flaw is to fail to account for fluctuations in wind power production (at least, as far as I have examined his plan). These fluctuations become important the more wind power you use. It needs to be complemented with grid-scale energy storage solutions.

    It's time to shift our thinking. We need to recognize oil for the precious, limited resource it is... there are certain things it does which we cannot feasibly replace yet. Instead of using it up as fast as possible at the cheapest market price, and then crashing our civilization when it is gone, we should be carefully managing it for both the present and the future. All possible uses of oil that can be replaced with renewables, should be replaced, as soon as we can. We need to leave some oil in the ground for future generations, for those uses for which we have no practical substitute for oil.     Reply
  • commenter
    Red Raider
    Jul 16 10:49 AM
    Implementing Pickens' Plan for Public Energy Policy [view article]
    Very insightful and well thought out. This plan, or something like it, would probably work well enough to save our future.
    Nevertheless, our US democracy does not respond to logic! Voter interest and support is needed to move politicians, and the voting public does not understand or care about this. They will support the politicians with the high sounding promise. They will not voluntarily support higher gas prices.
    How do we, and Boone Pickens convince the politicians that this plan would gain votes? How could we win the public support neccessary to make such a major change in the tax laws? Who will support the extreme (voluntary) increase in fuel prices?

    We do have plenty of oil, and we could (if needed) import experienced workers and rigs with ever higher wages. Company profits can be (and will be) applied to training workers as needed.

    The suggested changes presume that we will respond to logic and sound planning. In reality the economy and the business world respond to the market. To the extent that social planners and tax manipulaters mess with the free market they always screw it up.

    Maybe some politicians will try to be rational but most will respond to special interests and perceived voter interest.

    Good plan, but I doubt we can plan our way out of this mess.     Reply
  • commenter
    bellard
    Jul 16 10:46 AM
    Implementing Pickens' Plan for Public Energy Policy [view article]
    "I say Drill,Drill Drill. Build Nuke power plants. natural gas cars, solar power, Coal. Lets do them all and may the winner stand up!!"

    Hi Riley;
    I fully agree. Let economics pick the winners. But you need to add back in the cost of pollution to those energy sources that pollute - well to wheel.

    If you don't add in the pollution costs, then the markets are not fair or free markets. Wind, solar, geothermal, CTL, bio fuels, natural gas, electric engines - are all economically disadvantaged because the polluting sources - Oil, coal - are basically subsidized since they don't pay for the pollution they produce......     Reply
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