Meteorite Debris wrote:

On Sun, 24 Apr 2005 16:06:24 +0800 the ET form known as
Peacenik<cnelsonpublic@hotmail.com> sent a radio signal across the
vast expanse of deep space -._.--._.--._.--._.--._.--._.

"JTEM" <gymraven@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:6ridnQadotvw3PbfRVn-qw@comcast.com...

I've been saying all along that higher energy prices
are a goal of this administration's, and it looks like
they're about to reach that goal.

But I've also said that these people are morons. And
they are. The operation currently underway is pretty
much the exact same operation they used to drive up
electricity prices in California.

Close down the plants.

Three major U.S. oil refineries are currently closed.

There's presently no shortage of crude oil. There's
no problem getting crude oil just now. But crude oil
is worthless to you. You don't use crude oil, you use
it's products. You use the products we get from crude
oil after it is refined.

Yup. Manipulating supply to drive up prices and therefore profits. It's no
secret that that's what they're doing, and it was no secret that Enron was
doing the same thing back in the California power crisis.

There are real supply problems. Geology is real oil supplies are
limited. Production has outstripped discovery every year since 1986.
Last year the big 4 spent twice as much on exploration as the value of
oil found for their effort. That is what takeovers and mergers are the
preferred way for an oil company to increase its' reserves. Except for
Shell who have not taken over anyone but they were rather naughty in
making reserves increase by using ink on paper.

Last October production including condensates reach 84.147 million
barrels a day - the highest level ever and not match since. This may
have been the much talked about global Hubbert Peak of oil production
but it is too early to say with certainty. There may still be a rabbit
or two to come out of the hat. Ghawar (world's largest oil field) is
in trouble and might be in decline. Catarel (second largest) is in
decline. 80% of today's oil comes from fields discovered before 1973
and this will have to be replaced by smaller fields discovered since.
57 million of oil each day come from declining fields, declining in
capacity by 1.4 million/day per year. That has to be made up for by
younger fields still in the upswing stage and by newly operational
fields before production can be increased and that is getting harder
to do.

It is very tempting to see corporate manipulation but the reality is
that our way of life is nearing its' useby date for geological and
thermodynamic reasons. Today's high petrol prices are only going to
get higher. It's going to be one hell of a rough ride. If there is a
conspiracy it goes higher than government or industry. It goes right
to the gods of Mother Nature, the laws of physics and Father Time.

Chomsky on 'Peak Oil'

Noam Chomsky was in Seattle today [20/4/05] and appeared as a guest on
KUOW FM's "Weekday," where a caller asked for Chomsky's opinion on peak
oil. First, the host Steve Scherr asked the caller to define 'peak oil,'
and after the description, Scher said "they should call it 'peaked oil.'"

Chomsky's reply: If you're interested - I don't know if we have time to
talk about it - there's quite an interesting article about it in the
Bulletin Of The Atomic Scientists, in the current issue ["Oil: Caveat
Empty" By Alfred J. Cavallo], which is a very serious journal, and the
person who wrote it I know is very good.

He points out that Exxon/Mobil, the biggest energy corporation, and the
one that's very quiet and conservative about this, just published its
forecasts, and for the first time ever, they bring this up.

What they predict is that within five years - five years - non-Opec oil
will have reached the peak. Non-OPEC means U.S., Canada, and so on.
Venezuela - Venezuela isn't OPEC, but most of the non-OPEC oil producers
will have leveled off. That's five years.

And Exxon does not predict that alternative sources like tar sands,
shale and so on will replace it - they think that's way too expensive
and uses too much energy in fact.

Their prediction is that it's just going to have to come from OPEC,
meaning mainly the Gulf. So the gulf states are going to have to sharply
increase oil production even to meet current demand, let alone the
future demand, which is rising. And that's not a long way off, they're
talking about five years.

So yeah, this is a very serious issue, and my own guess is that if we
ever get the secret documents about the planning for the Iraq war, my
expectation is that these considerations will have entered
significantly. (my emphasis)

As to when you get a peak for OPEC, that's farther off - decades, but
it's certainly real.

There's another side to this, there's a sense in which it's advantageous
if the oil peak is earlier. The reason why is it will compel the world,
primarily the U.S. here, to move toward something like sustainable energy.

If there's unbounded amounts of hydrocarbons, we're just going to
destroy the environment for human life or most biological life, so the
earlier the peak is, in some respects - yes, it could be catastrophic,
it could also be beneficial.

Host Steve Scher: So you see a silver lining?

Chomsky: There is, because the major threat is the effect we're having
on the environment, and that's mostly through hydrocarbons.

Scher: There was a report that China was experiencing blackouts and
expensive gasoline in the last week because of a shortage of oil.

Chomsky: China is probably the most polluted country in the world - you
can't see. It's kind of a totalitarian state, so they kind of force it
on people, but the level of pollution is awful, and India too.

Still in per-capita terms, the U.S. is way above anybody else, and we
don't do anything about it.

For example, I was just in Europe for a couple of weeks, and they have
the same traffic jams we do, but not SUV's. Their mileage for cars is
way higher than ours. They have a public transportation system which we
don't have.

So here the rail system, which is the most efficient, has been very much
underfunded for fifty years and is now being virtually eliminated. There
they're way more advanced, and Japan even more so. These are policies
that HAVE to change if society is going to survive.

<wbt@privacy.net> wrote

independent economist have pointed out several times
in the last month that fuel prices are having NO
APPRECIABLE effect on the economy.

Do any of these people have names?

"Canada, of course. Assuming that Canada still isn't passing
it's oil profits to middle eastern terrorist groups."
I had no idea we were doing this.

"Canada, of course. Assuming that Canada still isn't passing
it's oil profits to middle eastern terrorist groups."

I had no idea we were doing this. Do you have any sources I can read
about the economic ties between the Canadian government and terrorist
groups?

The claim just sounds like something the Republicans would say to
justify invading us.

"That evil dictator Paul Martin is funding
terrorists somehow, somewhere. Let's get their back bacon and beer!"

"Canada, of course. Assuming that Canada still isn't passing
it's oil profits to middle eastern terrorist groups."

I had no idea we were doing this. Do you have any sources I can read
about the economic ties between the Canadian government and terrorist
groups?

The claim just sounds like something the Republicans would say to
justify invading us. "That evil dictator Paul Martin is funding
terrorists somehow, somewhere. Let's get their back bacon and beer!"