globalexpress

It's long because there's lots of data and it is not easily arrived at. I think energy consumption in the US, particularly crude oil consumption is sort of interesting and I have read a few books on the subject, as well as internet forums and such. That is where I get my data from.

The "drill baby drill" argument is a good one IMHO. And I am all for developing the natural resources that we have here in the US. Natural gas is of particular interest nowadays. Shale's great too, but very expensive to extract and process. If oil keeps going up, it will start to make economic sense to develop, but I'd be willing to pay more for US produced shale gas if given the option.

But as far as "traditional" crude oil goes (i.e. non-shale).....here's the problem. We just don't have enough in the US. The chances of finding a "super giant" (like the North Slope of AK) is close to nil, so as a country (and a world) we're finding smaller and smaller finds that are more and more costly to develop. To illustrate that point.......wait. Every once in a while, you'll see in the news that a country/oil developer has found a "huge oil deposit" of XXX barrels of oil. The next time you see that, divide their "estimated reserves" number by 80 million. That's how many days that find is good for at present crude oil world consumption rates. Notice I used the term "days." That's what it has come down to with the latest "big" finds.

Unfortunately the solution isn't just, "lets stick more straws in the ground" and we'll be able to increase US oil production by 4M barrels/day. If only it were that easy. But hey, I'm all for it. Let's use what we got.

We certainly haven't spent anywhere near a trillion dollars, that's for sure. If googled a little bit because it is a good question though. I found this article. Apparently in 2008 we only spent 15B on subsidies and credits over 10 years. So 1.5B per year I would say.

Just the war in Afghanistan costs 6B-8B a month (it's a political number- war hawks say less, doves say more) to put things in perspective. Subsidies to oil companies result in about 4B in uncollected taxes in the US, per year.

OK, so using that logic, the surging oil prices that we are experiencing RIGHT now are better? How about in July 2008? What would happen if there was another embargo or two like in the 70's? Remember that? They had us by the short and curlies, didn't they? They still do BTW. All Ahmadinejad has to do is utter "Straits of Hormuz" to the press and it costs you $5 bucks more to fill your Ranger up.

What would happen? Well, instead of sending our money abroad to places like Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Iran to spend on jobs and such to build up THEIR energy infractructure so that we can buy THEIR oil, I would imagine what would happen is that WE would have to spend money on OUR infrastructure, like on jobs and such, to make more electricity to meet demand. And bonus- we wouldn't be dependent on unfriendly nations who wish us ill will to put it mildly.

Which of the above is better for our nation?

Rolling blackouts? Hardly. Let me ask you a question. When would people typically charge their electric cars en masse? When people get home from work/sleeping or in the middle of the day? When is demand on our grid the least? When we are at home sleeping or in the middle of the day? Do you realize that in some parts of the country, at night, power plants pump electricity to ground because they can't shut down or "load follow" and the electricity isn't being used? Certainly we would have to increase the capacity of the grid. There is little doubt in my mind that we could do that. Don't you?

Because sometimes governments have to find ways to incentize people to do good things. I mean, why should someone get to deduct charitable contributions from their tax returns? Isn't giving to charity "so good" that it doesn't merit an incentive from the government? Why do we get to deduct home mortgage interest from our income? Isn't owning a home good enough? Well, the government wants everyone to have a "stake" in their country. Home ownership is one way of doing that, so it incentivizes that behavior.

Why do we have to tax the crap out of cigarettes? Why are cigarette smokes being punished for their right to smoke? Because we know that cigarette smokers are a drag on the economy and cost society a lot of money, especially in medical care. So we de-incentivize an undesirable behavior using taxes as well. That's how some tax policy works.

So to answer your question, our government realizes that our dependence on imported crude oil is a problem for our country and they are trying to provide incentives to provoke certain desirable behavior. In the electric car case, they realize that if we substitute electricity (or nat gas or whatever) for "Saudi Arabian crude" that is a GOOD thing for our nation so they provide incentives to move the nation toward that direction.

Not sure I get the point of this. You saw a broken down Prius on the side of the road so therefore the car is less reliable then a Ford Ranger? Ummmm.........OK?

I have the Consumer Reports 2011 buying guide on my bookshelf. They rate the Ranger with "average" predicted reliability and coincidentally rated it very poorly compared to its small pick-up competitors. The Prius is rated with above average reliability and is a "best buy" for its class.

Well, see, here's the rub. Couldn't the Prius/electric car owner say the same to you? You drive a Ford Ranger that gets an observed 16mpg per Consumer Reports. Your "bad decision" is leading this nation into more of the same, isn't it? I mean, if everyone went out and did what you did and bought a 16mpg Ford Ranger, we'd be in deeper trouble, no? We'd be MORE dependent on our friends on the Middle East. But if everyone did what I did and replaced their 12mpg and 16mpg cars (which is what I had) with a Prius and an electric vehicle, we could pretty much pull out of the Middle East and let them fight amongst themselves, saving me, my kids, and my grandchildren a trillion dollars (or two trillion+ after interest).

So in reality, isn't a household like mine going to end up paying for your decision? And by the numbers I post above, it looks like your decision is MUCH more expensive than mine, right?

But again, it's you're right to buy that Ranger and replace it with a F150. I'd be happy that you're happy with your F150. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz DEFINITELY are happy with the choices us Americans make and would be supporting your decision if they had an airlinepilotcentral.com account. I wonder what they would use as screen names? Probably F150Lover or something like that