What A Crock Of @#@##@#$!!!!!

[peterca]

Blue, "You're dependent on gas, pure & simple."

Currently, only because I have a gas engine. Once I save enough pennies to put in a diesel engine I will switch to biodiesel. Currently Biodiesel costs around $3/gal here and upwards of $3.70 if you get it from a service station. Premium gas is $2.25 around here and is raising.

Heck, in the past 3 week regular diesel has gone from $1.90 to $2.15 at the one station I see every day. During this time biodiesel locally has gone from $2.90 to $3/gal (all road taxes included). I can easily see gas prices hitting $2.5 or $2.7 this summer in Washington and then the gap is much less. When the price hits that high, I'll check back and tell you where the cost of bio is and if it has climbed another 20% or more like gas probably will. I'm willing to bet it won't.

So you're wrong Blue, I'm not dependant on gas and I have options to not use it and plan on switching to them in a bit. Think outside of the box just a little, there are other options out there. And perhaps, you don't know what I depend on, but thanks for trying to tell me.

PM, So you probably don't vote either since your vote doesn't count? Maybe 10,000 people not buying gas won't reduce prices. Actually, it wouldn't at all. But ironically enough, if I got 10,000 of my friends' friends to switch to buying biodiesel instead of gas, it would actually reduce the price of biodiesel as the current gating factor is not enough steady demand (thus, not a lot of production). You can actually get it in B100 blend for around $2 from a large manufacturing plant in Nevada, or so I've heard, but there aren't any plants that big around here. If 10,000 suddenly wanted it in a small geographic region, competition would start to bring the price down.
It's not about boycotting, it's about leaving that source of fuel in the past and changing what you use.

A pipe dream probably and I figure the large gas companies will try to suck up all the local biodiesel refineries to gain more power, but for the time being the large gas companies aren't big players and there's more room for competition.

Off my bio-soapbox (pun intended).

pwc

 

[Chris F]

Alan,

This is the start for us here so we may as well get use to it.

I heard that one should use smaller gas stations instead of using ones like petro Canada & Shell because the larger ones dictate what the prices are. If possibly they are not getting the sales then perhaps they will lower their price to increase their sales. Just a theory that is out there.

 

[peterca]

dave lucas,
If you got a rain barrel or two and hooked them up to a couple of downspouts, it looks like the Denver area with average rainfall of 15" a year would get you enough water to help water your lawn all summer every other day and not increase you public utility water bill. Just a thought.
Water's free, it falls from the sky all the time. We're just not good at capturing and distributing it sometimes.

And is it true that Denver really gets 2+" of rain in the month of July?

 

[peterca]

Sergei,
Sorry, hadn't caught up on your post. "My point is - you cant refuse from using it. " Yes I can. I can get a diesel engine and run biodiesel. In its most simple form, is made up of vegitable oil, lye and ethanol as a catalyst.
heck, those truck drivers you mention can get biodiesel in Denver now http://www.biodiesel.org/resources/pressreleases/gen/20031114_denver_pump_opening.pdf that's an old press release and I'm sure there's more around now. One of the big pushes with local groups is not so much getting consumers to use it, because diesel engines make up only a small percentage of car/truck engines, but to get fleet managers to start using it since they are almost all diesel engines. I could dig more and find stories about certain trucking companies that are switching to B2, B20 or B100 if you like, but suffice to say, there are more and more of those big trucks running with it at least part of the time.

 

[Alan]

Chris F,

Yea, I know. I just hate it when it feels like we're getting screwed so badly here and there's no real explanation for it. It just seems that if you produce it yourself, it shouldn't cost you more to buy it than places that don't produce it.

I was thinking of buying a car for daily driving...looks like I may do it sooner than I thought but it pisses me off that this kind of crap happens. It feels so much like a cash grab.

And the bad thing is that a company like LR may not last very long in a market like this. 4x4's are all they make and none of them would be considered fuel efficient so unless they decide to do something about it, they're going to see huge drops in sales.

Petro Canada is having a "win gas for life" contest right now. I was thinking they're going to be upset if I win it.

 

[Sergei]

Peter - with current engine - no you cant

Yeah i am agree that i can swap out engine to run on alternative fuel.

Heck i can come back to me old projects, model and research and build some plasma driven engines, if i would have couple hundred billlion dollars in financing. Unfortunately - i dont. If anyone feels like spending some money researching solar wind driven engines or powered by any other form of cheap weird energy - i would gladly join with proper funding. However its not that easy Money offset is too big.

And again, let me repeat it - there are plenty of patents on engines and energy that held back by corporations only to let them make more money. And they may never make it into production in our lifetime.

 

[peterca]

Damit Sergei, you're making me want to go out and swap the engine right now just to prove you wrong. I mean in the big scheme of driving, I'm not dependant on it. There are other choices I can make as a consumer. Heck, I can go buy a diesel volvo or vw right now and suddenly I'm not dependant. That's that kinda dependency I mean. If you could only move a car with a petrol engine, I'd agree with you.

I also agree there are plenty of great ideas that can't get funded because it goes against the shotty way some companies run while chasing the mighty dollar. But there are people who try to change that. There's one guy locally who picks up 250 gal. of biodiesel with his own truck, drives it back 60 miles to his house and fills a tank there. He then offers it to anyone who wants to stop by for the exact same price he bought it for. He doesn't jack the price up as he could for his cost in time and fuel in bringing it home for you to use. I know, a feel good heart warming story you don't care about. But I'm just trying to point out there is a reason those CF bulbs are on the market now, it's because someone realized it was the right thing to do....and someone else figured out how to make at least a buck off of it.

Solar power used to be way too expensive for consumers to buy and use; now it's cheaper and California will even chip in for half the cost of a system for residential use because the nuclear reactors and dams aren't keeping up as we saw. Necessity forces change and the higher gas prices are forcing some people to help drive down the cost of alternatives. Your plasma engine might be too expensive right now to develop, but progress and eventual scarcity of resources will leave the gas engine in the past. As well as the diesel engine some day.

Ask yourself why people develop electric cars or fuel cell cars if they cost too much to make and there is no ROI right now.

 

[Blue]

So you're wrong Blue, I'm not dependant on gas and I have options to not use it and plan on switching to them in a bit. Think outside of the box just a little, there are other options out there. And perhaps, you don't know what I depend on, but thanks for trying to tell me.

sounds to me like you're dependent on gas, pure & simple.

 

[bri]

Pet,

Because you have a choice not to use gas does nto mean that you are not dependent on it. A couple of messages back you say "Currently, only because I have a gas engine." then "So you're wrong Blue, I'm not dependant on gas".

If you are driving a gasoline vehicle and you drive it then you are dependent on it. So you ARE dependent on it. Pretty simple.

There are very limited places in Denver to get Bio-deisel (I have yet to see them), so limited that it is VERY inconvenient. Making it, thats all I want is 55 gallon drums of vegetable oil and ethanol laying around by house. I do own a diesel vehicle, but still consider myself dependent on gas AND diesel.

Brian

 

[peterca]

Ok, this is just getting silly. I'm beinging to think some of you are just trying to get my goat, pure & simple.

If I ride my bike to work today, am I dependant on gas today? Well, no. But then tomorrow I take the truck, so then I am that day. In my mind I see the fact that I have an option to drive or not drive a gas truck as not being completely dependant on gas. If I ran out of of gas today, I could still get to work everyday and to the grocery store, etc...

Now expand that to be; this year, in your mind, I'm dependant on gas. Next year I may not be. And possibly from that year on forward. I guess then I'll post a message since some of you can't seem to understand the bigger picture. Today I need gas but am not dependant on it to stay alive and get to work and make money.

If something is a convenience are you dependant on it? I say no, but some here say yes. Oh well.

 

[bri]

In a way Pete I am trying to get your goat. In another way I am trying to beat some sense into you. ;-)

When people discuss whether you are dependent on gas, they tend not to discuss one day to the next like you are. They talk in general or accross the board. In general do you use gas equipement? Drive to work? To the store? To the trail? If so you are dependent and it definitely sounds like your are dependent on gas to me. Do you mow your lawn with a gas mower? Drive in a friends gas auto?

What you are doing is kidding yourself that really you are not dependent on it. That you could make the decision at any point in time not to be dependent on gas (note that you have not at this point, but still are dependent).

Not being dependent on gas means that you never use a piece of gas powered equipment. IMO you cannot be 50% dependent on gas, you are or you are not.

Brian

 

[peterca]

Brian, by your definition I am dependant, by mine, I'm not. I guess it doesn't matter much but if people want to keep telling me what I am and am not, I guess I can't stop them.

But if you're talking general across the board, then long term I won't be. When I put in a diesel engine. By the way you put it, today I am but tomorrow (next year) I won't be. So be it. Pure & Simple.

As for all all the other devices, well, no I don't use a gas mower but my lawn is still cut. Nor do I really use any other devices. About the only thing I use nowadays from time to time is a gas chainsaw.

But all these other devices still begs the question: If something is a convenience are you dependant on it? That chain saw is a convenience and that's it.

PS Brian, it wasn't you so much as Blue who is obviously trying to get my goat by repeating the same thing he typed before. Pure & Simple.

 

[utahdog2003]

City Planner chimes in: Even when you ride your bike you are dependent on gas. There would be no roads to speak of were it not for federal transporation dollars such as TEA21, and since our pro-oil President updated TEA with increases in road construction dollars, but fixed dollars for alternative transportation, I'll argue that in a round-a-bout way your bicycle trip is possible because of pro automobile/oil government investment.

unless of course you ride of-road...but even then I could probably tie-n trail construction dollars for your favorite trail to a localized grant program in part funded by those same pro-oil transportation initiatives.

There are very few politicians in Washington who would approve a dime for alternative transportation were it not for a guarantee, in the same bill, for twenty dollars for new roads...for cars...running on gas. In a sense...if you respirate and you live in the USA, you are dependent on Oil, maybe not gas as a liquid, but Oil as a special interest in our political system. There's more power there than Wal-Mart...and that's a lot!

 

[utahdog2003]

One more thing...how the hell does putting in a diesel engine in your car, even with 'biodiesel' as your targeted fuel, get you out from under the yoke of Oil dependence? That stuff was probably developed by a subsidiary of Exxon-Mobil, which operates using funding for alternative fuels supplied as a microscopic percentage of a billion dollar transportation program. Program runs out, fuel isn't turning a profit, and your back to buying the Oily-Gas just like Mr Peterbuilt.

You could convert your LR to run on Hydrogen...but then just don't come home after a hard days work and turn on the lights in the garage. Colorado burns a lot o fossil fuels in their power plants.

 

[LostInBoston]

Utahdog,
I have many more pics but tried to keep it PG for Dweb.

Biodiesel is not made by exxon in the US. It is in europe however and sold at their stations. Currently only independant production facilities produce biodiesel as well as many home made plants. The Diesel engine was developed to run on vegetable oil, not diesel fuel, which was only named diesel fuel that after oil companied relized that one of the byproducts of oil distillation can be used in a diesel engine. so the changed the name from waste crap to diesel fuel and sold it to us. biodielse will never run out. there is enough production capabilites to convert 25% off all diesedl use to 100%biodiesel. and the ability to expand that to over 100%, which means we can export, if we start making biodielse from algae, yes algae. If bought in mass quantities biodiesel can be purchased for close to $1 a gallon. the 3 billion gallons of waste vegetable oil , thats a lot of fries, the are thrown out every year will be the easiest start to swithcing over to biodiesel.

 

[LostInBoston]

some good sites for info

http://www.nbb.org/

http://www.veggievan.org/

 

[bri]

Dog,

I was contemplating taking the argument further, but didn't. Thanks!

I think Peter means that he would ALWAYS run bio-diesel in his diesel engine.

Pete,

Your definition IMO is not a common one, most people that live in a similar manner (i.e. driving a gas car, using a gas chainsaw) would have no problem admitting that they are dependent on gas. I think that your definition is also very convenient for your argument.

I believe that you are dependent on something if you use it, matters not how often or if it is convenient or not. If you use a chainsaw you are dependent on the chainsaw no? If you drive a gas car you are dependent on many petroleum products including gas. Anything else and you are rationalizing and kidding yourself.

I happen to agree with Dog, that our dependence on oil is nearly impossible to get around at this point.

Brian

 

[bri]

Lost,

I have seen some articles that state you can produce it in your home for $0.60 USD.

Accurate or no, I still don't want restaraunt waste in my house. Shoot. Once I accidentally toppled 5 gall of oil, what a mess.

Brian

 

[peterca]

Utahdog,
You're getting a little far off the original argument, which was using gas as a fuel in a truck and paying the higher prices for it. I was stating there are alternatives in that regard. I realize roads are made from taxes but those taxes are also paid by people who use biodiesel incidentally. And a lot of those big trucks have diesel engines and are not dependant on oil based diesel.

Your second post shows you don't understand the fuel you are knocking. It's lye, ethanol and some form of vegetable oil in its simplest form. Heck, there are even people running straight vegetable oil (SVO) in their diesel engines as that is how the engine was originally developed. Granted, you can't use SVO all year in most climates here in the US.
" and your back to buying the Oily-Gas just like Mr Peterbuilt. " You're also wrong here as you don't understand the fuel.

If you look at the lobbying of those big oil companies you will notice it is not FOR biodiesel as they aren't in the business of making it, yet. But I don't doubt your statement about the power of oil companies in the political system in the US as it's unfortunately true.

"You could convert your LR to run on Hydrogen...but then just don't come home after a hard days work and turn on the lights in the garage." Huh? What does this mean? Do you know what the output exhaust of a fuel cell is?

 

[peterca]

Brian,
then I guess we'll just disagree on the definition. "If you use a chainsaw you are dependent on the chainsaw no?" No. When my saw breaks or runs out of gas, I use a hand saw. If by your definition, if I'm truly dependant on it, I wouldn't be able to use anything else. Right? I guess that's the finer point we disagree on. I see dependency as it being the only thing you can use as in the normal definition of dependant. You see it as, everything I touch, whether I have another option or not, I'm dependant on it. Right? Such as, if I want to use a spoon to eat ice cream, I'm dependant on it. Let me know if I have it wrong, but this is the way it sounds. In which case, we'll never agree.

I did have one quesiton on your point of "When people discuss whether you are dependent on gas, they tend not to discuss one day to the next like you are." Well then, if it's not one day at a time, is it one month or year or decade? We used to be dependant on steam engines but we're not now because we switched. I plan on doing the same for dino-gas to non-dino-biodiesel.

BTW, I have no illusions on my total dependancy on oil byproducts in general. I realize plastics and other byproducts have so permiated society that I can't get by without them. I was merely speaking to the original idea that gas and its high prices can't be avoided as a means of getting around.

BTW, as you probably know, since it looks like you've actually done some research on the subject, you don't have to use waste oil and have it sitting around your house. As for the mess, that's hard to debate, but look at the pipeline accident in the SF Bay. What happens if that much biodiesel is spilled into the water? Clean up is a lot easier and the harmful impact on the environment is a lot less. Just compare the material safety data sheets for biodiesel, gas and oil.

I think we've flogged the horse enough for now and both made our point. I'll concede I'm currently dependant on gas to get around. But I won't always be. And yes, I'm taking into consideration that I need gear oil and things like that in my truck too.