Crooked Energy Companies

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Originally posted by Cais
Okay, you're right Aristotle. I guess compartively meager was the wrong wording. I should have said.... Would they prefer to go back to their still enormous revenues from there still even more enormous revenue. I was just trying to emphasise the current rise in profits, and expenses for the consumer.

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Was that so hard? :) I had a feeling this was what you meant, which was why I didn't slaughter you for the "comparatively meager" comment initially. I just had to respond to it. Thus I was kinda shocked when you chose to try and defend it.

And yes, it is clear they don't want to come back from outer space into the upper atmosphere of profits.

The talk of windfall taxes and such are feel good, political "quick fixes" that set a bad precedent. The real fix is not to do stuff like let Exxon and Mobil merge, and to actually crack down on their anti-competitive behaviors that violate antitrust laws.

Or even better real fixes: like raise the CAFE standard to 40 mpg and make a real effort to get us off our oil dependence. But on these two I'm just dreaming. :(

I have no difficulty admitting when I'm wrong, so long as I'm admitting to something valid.

I agree with you on the taxing of their windfall profits - it solves not a thing. I'm a very big fan of turst-busting era Republicans, I think it's sad we've by and large departed from that path.

But I share your dream as well. Hell, some old guy converted his hybrid to average about 100 miles/gallon by loading his trunk with batteries: if I had the resources, I'd do the same. Anything to spite this pathetic circumstance.

Electricity in the US averages several cents per KWh higher than in Australia, but we're still talking around 10c - nothing like the price of petroleum-based energy (although of course all energy prices have gone up significantly in recent years). It makes brilliant economic sense to replace a gasoline-powered vehicle, like a car, with an electric one, like... a bicycle with an electric motor to help you up hills. There's a company making and selling electric bikes here in Melbourne, and my brother and I just went out to have a look. For $1600-$2400 (Australian dollars, but the US dollar is near enough) initial cost and a few cents a day for current, you can get 50km range on a bicycle with only about 2kg extra weight on it. I think that makes excellent economic sense for anyone who lives and works in a citified area. Of course, if you drive a heavy truck long distances, there's no way to change... but there are people who jump in their cars and drive from one car park to another to get lunch, when the only distance they're going is across the road. Duh!

What also picks my ass is the jacking up of prices on long weekends. I used to be able to fill my car for $40, it's now closer to $60. I own a new mazda3, so comparatively I'm lucky, I guess?

Experts say we're about to run out of oil. But we're nowhere near having another technology ready to take its place.
The transitional technologies seem sluggish in the development, and the infrastructure doesn't even seem to register on the radar. Is it because government isn't making it much of a priority? Or is government not providing tax break incentives to propel the research harder?
As a side note, it's always struck me as odd that scooters are so prevalent in european countries, both inner city and suburban. Why hasn't it caught on here as much?
A decent scooter here would run me $3000. I'm seriously considering getting one for the mild months up here.

The human race is well known for actually inventing important things in times of stress. Right now there is no stress, the big energy companies oppose any kind of serious research, and they can be very "persuasive". Therefore, I wouldn't expect any REAL and VIABLE technology until we really do run out of oil, which you needn't worry, won't be anytime soon (especially if we can drill from the oceans, then you'd have practically a limitless amount of oil, but that depends on other fields of research).

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Originally posted by kestra
What also picks my ass is the jacking up of prices on long weekends.

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NO KIDDING!!!!! What kind of cutthroat, jackassed r-tardness is this? I'm totally disgusted by this, and I'm glad someone else noticed it. It's totally lame to screw families and people wanting to vacation by jacking up prices on known long weekends. They even do it locally when they know the public schools are going on a long weekend. Totally lame.

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Originally posted by kestra

Experts say we're about to run out of oil. But we're nowhere near having another technology ready to take its place.

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Actually, scientists say that if they had to do so, the car companies could probably come up with an alternate source tomorrow. The problem is that there's not enough pressure for them to do so. I've been reading for 20 years alternate methods of powering cars. Tons of scientists have come up with various things, but the gas and car companies won't come on board. With the CAFE standards STILL being so low, they won't do so.

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Originally posted by kestra

Is it because government isn't making it much of a priority?

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Totally. The problem with it is that the one company that comes up with the new standard will eat the R&D costs while the other companies will just ride their coattails. That's why no one will be the "first" unless the government creates a reason for them to do it. You see the same phenomenon in child labor. While many companies wanted to get rid of it, they wouldn't have been able to compete with the companies that didn't get rid of it. Thus, it took the whole practice being outlawed in England for the everyone to stop doing it at the same time. (I hope that I explained that sensibly.)

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Originally posted by kestra

As a side note, it's always struck me as odd that scooters are so prevalent in european countries, both inner city and suburban. Why hasn't it caught on here as much?

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We love our damn cars in North America. In the Asian countries, half of the population is on scooters or motorcycles. 25 years ago it was almost all motorcycles or bikes, and it was pretty easy to get around even in a city the size of Bangkok. About 10 years ago, you could barely get around Bangkok because there were so many freaking cars. People were having babies in their cars at a record number, so the solution was to build more and more roads. Now the pollution has skyrocketed beyond belief.

Sigh!

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Originally posted by kestra

The transitional technologies seem sluggish in the development, and the infrastructure doesn't even seem to register on the radar. Is it because government isn't making it much of a priority? Or is government not providing tax break incentives to propel the research harder?

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The government this, the government that. They can certainly help and put money towards it. They can also do their own research if they feel like they should do something and it matters to their constituents. However, none of that is going to make a difference. Oil is here to stay until it is completely gone, and that's decades away at least.

Some smaller countries (especially in Europe) may switch to alternative energy sources before then (some are probably transitioning even now), but large industrialized countries (the USA) will not completely restructure the way things work until absolutely necessary. Until that point, alternative energy research will continue to pitter-patter along. Some "major breakthroughs" may even occur over the next decade or so, but no comparably viable alternative will arise until all oil reserves have been exhausted.

That being said, you can bet that the very next day after all the oil is gone, some company or another will release the super-efficient alternative energy source they've been secretly perfecting for 50+ years. They were just waiting for the time when they could no longer bend us over an oil drum and milk us for everything they could.


EDIT: Jidoe stole my idea as I was posting it! :p

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Originally posted by kestra
As a side note, it's always struck me as odd that scooters are so prevalent in european countries, both inner city and suburban. Why hasn't it caught on here as much?
A decent scooter here would run me $3000. I'm seriously considering getting one for the mild months up here.

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A large reason for this is city design; most major cities in Europe are hundreds, if not thousands of years old, and were designed to be only large enough for people to walk and ride horses from point a>b, certainly not wide enough for 6 cars to stack in side by side. Necessity facilitates getting something that will fit into such tiny roadways while still having a means to walk around.

Another reason for it is the fact that oil and gas costs about 3-4x + as much per gallon there as it does here, and thus there is a bigger need for people who use gasoline to have a more efficient means of transportation.

These two reasons are also a part of why there are much larger and more efficient means of public transportation in so many places there, vs. the typically small and usually inefficient (read: NOT New York) public transportation systems you'll find around the US.

Chevrolet has just announced their first official plug-in hybrid production vehicle.

http://jalopnik.com/5050235/chevy-vo...-and-unplugged

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Originally posted by Dalaena
The problem with it is that the one company that comes up with the new standard will eat the R&D costs while the other companies will just ride their coattails. That's why no one will be the "first" unless the government creates a reason for them to do it. You see the same phenomenon in child labor. While many companies wanted to get rid of it, they wouldn't have been able to compete with the companies that didn't get rid of it. Thus, it took the whole practice being outlawed in England for the everyone to stop doing it at the same time. (I hope that I explained that sensibly.)

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That about says it. It's situations like this that are supposed to be prevented by patent law - theoretically, the company that spends the R&D money can get back something from other people who coattail them - but what happens in the marketplace? Everyone buys the cheap clones. Since that's going to happen, manufacturers aren't prepared to splash out too much, lest they get stung (example of getting stung: the Segway was funded by vulture capital, and they're very quiet about their profitability, leading to speculation that they haven't recovered their investment yet, after nearly seven years - see Wikipedia article and its references quoted), so spending hugely on R&D is very likely to be unviable financially. But we need that research or society as a whole can't move forward. So what's the answer? I don't know. Bootlegging and skunk works - geeks working in the back rooms of their houses? Perhaps.