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To: Elroy Jetson who wrote (162883)	11/8/2008 2:15:31 PM
From: Lizzie Tudor	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 306849

Oil production may be sold only as plastics and chemicals, or it may also be sold to power plants, but it will have a strong market demand long after you and I are gone. I agree with that, but what we don't need to do (if autos go electric) is to spend 600 billion PER YEAR on foreign oil. Thats the issue, the foreign oil, not the domestic refineries. While buying foreign oil gives the US cheap gas, it is still 600 billion per year drain on the economy. Better to transition to greenfuels that are made here -even if the price at the pump stays the equivalent of $4 per gallon- because the problem is this liquidity drain to Saudi Arabia. And the only reason $4 gas is such a problem is because the existing FLEET was designed as an ultra consumer of fuel, deliberately, thanks to detroit and the Bush admin.

To: Elroy Jetson who wrote (162883)	11/8/2008 3:03:56 PM
From: neolib	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 306849

The problem with automobiles is a small energy conversion plant, such as a gasoline engine, is very inefficient compared with a large conversion plant like an electrical power plant. The switch from inefficient distributed power plants to efficient centralized plants has been held back by good storage devices. It turns out that modern small diesel engines are about on par with large stationary thermal plants at energy conversion (high 40's low 50% efficiency). This is why if you live in a cold climate, where heating is typical for a significant fraction of the year, a small household diesel cogen system which produces electricity, but also heats your water, and provides building heat, is actually a very efficient system. In addition, with centralized thermal plants and distributed power consumption, the transmission system and conversion efficiencies become significant, whereas it is pretty cheap to haul liquid fuels around to local stations.