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To: Jim McMannis who wrote (110103)	9/16/2000 8:27:48 PM
From: Scumbria	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 186894

Jim, Weren't these incentives tied to the tax code? Seems to me a lot of them were a joke. Even some of the programs continue to be bottomless pits. What about hot fusion? Hot fusion is the only viable long term energy source. We better hope that someone figures it out. I realize what YOU do is very important but how do you convince everyone else to stop traveling because what they are doing isn't AS important? Airplane travel is very important, because there is no substitute. The same goes for other oil uses like plastics. On the other hand, the amount of oil people waste commuting to work is mind boggling. If they coordinated the traffic lights in Silicon Valley, that single act could reduce oil consumption by 50%. How about telecommuting? I do 50% of my job by video conference. There are many very simple solutions to the near-mid term problems. We are wasting a precious resource due to simple ignorance. Scumbria

To: Jim McMannis who wrote (110103)	9/17/2000 4:36:18 AM
From: nihil	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 186894

It is quite true that Reagan helped dismantle the alternative energy program. Hardly single-handed -- the oil and gas producers, American and OPEC played an important role for many years. And all went pretty well considering -- this is the first really solid spike in a while. IMO, it was a serious mistake to discontinue R&D and demonstrations of alternative technology. The Gulf War should have made us thing about the possibility of another panic. The SUV boom was also a serious mistake. I believe we should have adopted punitive taxation for petroleum just as the Europeans and Japanese have. We can always do with some peppy demonstrations. The proceeds should have been invested in massive stockpiling and reserving and petrooleum substitute R&D. There is little to be said on premature deployment of costly energy technology, but it hardly made sense to drain America first. As for nuclear power, we must someday redeploy nuclear power if only because of the CO2 problem. We have some excellent experience with very safe and relatively cheap reactors -- Duke Power is great. As for fusion, if we are capable of planning several hundred years ahead we will see that fusion is the only technology that presently has a reasonable future. Again it is research, rather than premature deployment that is important. There remain immense quantities of coal which might be safely utilized. We are presently experimenting with disposal of massive amounts of liquid CO2 in ocean depts. There are also immense deposits of hydrated natural gas in the ocean and the tundra. None of these technologies can be utilized to meet sudden price spikes. This is just another industry which the so-called free market screws up. The idea of electing a couple of oil creeps to the presidency is unlikely to help.