Gas to hit $4 a gallon in August

I get it. The ones that agree with you are forward-thinkers. Visionaries. And the ones who believe in real science, or the farmer cited earlier who can see growing seasons changing, they're the ones who are wrong.

Dude, sometimes, just because you don't like it, doesn't mean it's not true. You're wrong. Period.

 

I saw an episode of Mythbusters recently where they took regular restaurant fryolator oil, filtered it and ran a diesel engine on it. And they got damn near as good gas mileage as they would have with regular diesel. Since I used to work in a restaurant and am still good friends with the manager, I wish every day that I had a diesel engine and a filter.

 

I didn't say that the growing seasons haven't changed. It doesn't have anything to do with people driving SUVs. I guess you're just never wrong.

 

We've done stories on this. There are people in my state going to Chinese restaurants to ask for their grease.

 

My stepfather began working on this process 25 years ago. He passed away a few years ago.

So, it's extremely bittersweet to see this technology bubbling up closer and closer to the mainstream every year.

 

That's becoming quite common.

http://www.greasecar.com/

http://www.caranddriver.com/article.asp?section_id=4&article_id=7818&page_number=1

And troll ... I mean trounced, is right about one thing. Global warming is not caused by SUVs. It's caused by the burning of fossil fuels for anything and everything. Anything that releases CO2 into the atmosphere is contributing to global warming. SUVs are a very small part of the problem compared to coal-fired electric generators.

 

My worry Trounced is that, OK maybe you are right. Maybe we are in a big cycle. But what if the warming cycle lasts for another 50 years or another 100 years?
No one really knows, and even the guy quoted in the Post column said that some of the current warming is caused by humans.
It just seems like an awful big bet to keep doing the same ol' thing and not change because a very small percentage of scientists say that everything will bey a-okay in a few years.
A larger percentage of serious people say that angels walk among us.
Anyway, so, OK, how about a President standing up and saying, "this government will find a cheap synthetic gasoline in 10 years. Nothing will stand in our way."
Or even a Bill Gates or Warren Buffett standing up and saying, "I will give $5 billion dollars to the first person who can come up with a cheap synthetic oil product. Ten billion if they get in down in five years."

 

We're always looking for the qucik fix, though. It's going to take more than one guy with one check.

It's has to be attacked on several fronts: Conservation, Ethanol, Hybrids, Tax Breaks, Taxes, Fuel Alternatives, Hydrogen Cars, Cars running on McDonald's french fry grease, cutting back on coal usage, carpooling, walking, biking etc. etc.

 

Stupid question from a layman type time: Is it possible for a company not in the oil business to develop synthetics? Have some start up with some ex-oil people pony up the funding and go? On the other hand, the oil companies don't have a problem pushing synthetics, at least when it comes to motor oil.

 

A cheap synthetic gasoline would be great. That should be a goal. It's hard for me to believe that it hasn't happened yet. Nor am I suggesting that we keep on doing the "same ol' thing.' I'm just not a proponent of dumping a huge amount of money into solving the "global warming problem" when we still don't know if it's being caused by anything that isn't just a normal earth cycle.

 

What's the incentive for oil companies to do that when they're making record profits as things are now?

And trounced, how are CO2 levels being at a 600,000-year high a normal earth cycle?

 

It'd be possible, but usually with stuff like this it comes from the industry involved because research is so expensive. I'd love to see the government set up some money (Hey, the GOP doesn't pay for anything they pass anyway; might as well do something useful) for research, funding independent groups or universities. Let them figure out a way to produce a synthetic oil that can be refined into gas, or a synthetic fuel, or an engine that doesn't need gas to run at all. The research is expensive, so a lot of schools don't do it. Plus, when some of the top engineering schools have Exxon or an oil exec's name slapped on the sides of buildings, then there's a little disincentive there too.