Robert Redford on kicking the oil habit:
By on May 31st, 2006 at 10:03 am
Robert Redford on kicking the oil habit:
“Today the American people are way out in front of our leaders. … People are coming together and demanding new answers. A grassroots movement is gathering today to promote solutions, like renewable fuels, clean electricity, more efficient cars, and green buildings that use less energy.†Join the effort at KickTheOilHabit.org.
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We’re in front of our leaders because we’re the ones who are paying more at the pump, we’re the ones who are struggling to pay our heating and electrical bills.
May 31st, 2006 at 10:06 amWell, what can I say, I guess it’s time to turn my moonshine still into making ethanol.
May 31st, 2006 at 10:16 amLookout big oil, farmers and hillbillys will send you into history.
Legalize hemp production. Great oil from the seeds, fab fiber for making paper or textiles, good biomass for alky production. Plus it grows like a weed and needs no cultivation or fertilizers.
May 31st, 2006 at 10:21 amNo forward thinking is what this administration is about. They would rather hold the reigns on progressive projects than move this country ahead in a positive and productive manner. No wonder the people that had faith in them are losing it. No vision…no honesty…no mas.
May 31st, 2006 at 10:25 amAre you all crazy? Just keep sitting on your hands and let the government tell you what to do. Take orders. Join the military to fight and die in Iraq. It’s all you can really do, you have no control over your lives. Uncle Sam wants you to die. Not for freedom, not for wealth, not for anything noble. nor a good cause. Just dry up and blow away.
You’re on your own, until Uncle Sam needs you to fight or pay taxes, then you belong to him.
Congressmens’ sons and daughters get a free ride, you pay the piper.
May 31st, 2006 at 10:33 amLook what George Clooney has done with his celebrity…. I hope more of them will follow suit. Be the advocates that our hard earned money affords them the time and status to do (we did and do spend billions on their entertainment careers – in terms of movies, etc.).
May 31st, 2006 at 10:39 amIs there a 12 step program?
Goper’s Lament (Hard To Be A Republican
May 31st, 2006 at 10:43 amYou can’t blame one party or another for the fact that profits drive the economy, not potential future profits (and we all know how UN-American it is to NOT be greedy.) ALL politicians are more concerned with getting re-elected and campaign contributions than actually Governing.
During the first two months of 2006, the House of Representatives spent 47 hours – that’s hours, not days – in session. If it sticks to its current plans, House members will spend 97 days in Washington this year. That’s down from 141 last year, and is even fewer days than the 108 that led Harry Truman to blast the “do-nothing” Congress of 1948.
The only way alternative fuel energies will be developed is by aspiring entrepreneurs, or by government subsidization. No profitable energy company can forgore earnings NOW for pie-the-sky alternatives that LOSE money. Narrow-minded thinking, yes, but it’s unfortunately the reality when the main focus of a publicly owned company is to benefit it’s share-holders.
And since people who play the stock market only care about their stupid money, they’re unlikely to force Big Oil to change (”Let my grandkids figure this mess out! I’ve got to earn more so I can move to Florida!”)
May 31st, 2006 at 10:49 amwhen haven’t the people been out front?
politicians generally are low-risk followers when they care about policy at all. Most are in it for the opportunities of self-enrichment by getting their hands in the cookie jar and stealing the people blind.
May 31st, 2006 at 11:00 am.
Much as the campaign to reduce dependence on ‘foreign’ oil (makes me laugh, as if domestic oil is safer for the environment?), corn-based ethanol is no panacea and hands your energy dependence to 2 and not 5 big multinationals: ADM and Cargill. KicktheOilHabit is mostly about corn ethanol from what I can see. Different drug, different pushers, same result.
May 31st, 2006 at 11:01 am#10 – think of ethanol as the entry drug to our long term solution. It’s like a sleeping pill – it’ll keep you going for now, but it’s a gateway to solve the larger problem of insomnia. Ethanol is our gateway to solving hte larger problem of energy production – we need something that’s going to last; we switched from coal to oil because oil was cleaner and it seemed to be in abundance; it’s in abundance now, but it’s in places we don’t want to depend on.
May 31st, 2006 at 11:35 amHey TerrytheTurtle, checkout what’s going on with ethanol co-op’s. I’ve owned stock in ADM for years and i think the co-op’s can push them in the right direction.
May 31st, 2006 at 11:35 am#11, Xbot – I don’t agree that oil is in abundance – I think oil has already peaked or is going to in the next 5 years. Which ever way you look at it, ethanol is not a cost-effective replacement for West Texas crude at $4 a barrel to produce. I somewhat agree that ethanol has a stopgap future and is one way as Hillbilly says, using coops, to break the monopoly of Big Oil. However, I have no faith that ADM and Cargill will not also use the power of the ‘market’ (corporate speak for lobbying) to tilt the field against the coops. However, noone yet has articulated to me where the replacement of energy demand today at today’s prices is coming from….ethanol doesn’t have it, wind cant do it, nuclear can’t do it all…
May 31st, 2006 at 12:06 pmHey Hillbilly,
TerrytheTurtle is right: Different drug, different pushers, same result. (i.e. corruption and fleecing the public in order to make $$$)
ADM has reaped big dividends from lobbying the government over ethanol subsidies and mandates for its increased use in gasoline.
Good ol American politics. Whoever has the most money, wins!
Part of ADM’s lobbying effort is to tax imports on ethanol, keeping prices high, so they can make a profit from their product at the expense of the American consumer.
As a result, ethanol actually costs more per unit than gasoline.
And ethanol is less efficient than gasoline, so you’ll be filling up more often as the % of ethanol per gallon increases. Where’s the economic benefit in that?
At least their stock prices are going up! Gotta stay focused on the goal of “he who dies with the most toys wins”, right?
May 31st, 2006 at 12:07 pmUnfortunately, there are NO ethanol stations in California. well, there is one at Lawrence Livermore Labs, for research, but they don’t sell it.
May 31st, 2006 at 12:09 pmI guess they don’t want to miss out on ther lucrative California driver’s market.
And really, no problem with oil abundance (we know the war was just to creat a bottleneck and drive up prices), but pollution is of course the big issue. Is ethanol cleaner burning? If so, we should be demanding it.
Robert Redford is a good person but the GOP calls him a communist! The press mimics the GOP by ignoring his views!
May 31st, 2006 at 12:09 pmWe need to follow the lead of the Brazilians on this issue. Corn-produced ethanol, as is mentioned above, is not the panacea we need. Sugar-based ethanol on the other hand is much more efficient and cost effective to produce. While we’ve spent the last 20 years jockying for petroleum supremacy (read as: death and destruction in the name of enriching exxon and chevron), the Brazilians have spent that time on research in mapping the sugar genome. They will reach complete energy independance by the end of the year and estimates say it may save their economy as much as $70-90 Billion a year. I don’t believe that ethanol is a long-term solution either but, as Lao Tzu said, “Even a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step”. We need to start somewhere and I think better development of the existing renewable technologies we have (ethanol, wind, & solar in particular) is definitly a step in the right direction.
May 31st, 2006 at 12:28 pmOk, I’m alot like you folks, I own stock in ADM, GE , VZ, so I play the game. It beats making my money digging coal don’t ya think? IMO, the only way that us capitalist are going to change is to actually pay for what we use. It’s costing alot of money to get our oil, is it not? Blood and treasure. War and peace. Well, why don’t we tax those things like nonrenewable energy?
May 31st, 2006 at 12:33 pmThe reason we don’t is because we all want something for nothing. And when we get to the point of not having, we will see the swing of the tao and harmony will be restored. Get used to some suffering dudes, we have had it, to good for to long. Democracy is a experiment, and the results look grim.
#17, Brazil is a fine example, but three things stop the Western economies from copying them:
May 31st, 2006 at 12:34 pm(1) Brazil gets ethanol from sugar which yields more ethanol per acre than corn and is grown in a tropical climate (maybe in 50 years, the US can rely on climate change to help here – tongue firmly in cheek)
(2) Brazil’s energy intensity per person is six times as small as the average American – therefore they have a much smaller target to shoot for
(3) Brazil’s farming industry is much more labor intensive, meaning that the Western countries burn a lot of hydrocarbons just to farm their corn, making the net energy gain minimal from corn-based ethanol
The next time Mr. Redford decides to visit his place in Colorado and flies commercial instead of via private jet I’ll start listening to him about “kicking our oil habit”. I’m growing a little weary of those who want to tell the rest of us how to live without taking any of their own advice.
May 31st, 2006 at 12:36 pm#18, right on WBH – a carbon tax – tax the wastage of energy and the impact on the environment. Let the real cost of driving laps around the freeway and stopping for a burger and fries be clearly stated. The price of every US gallon should have included in it, the price of every aircraft carrier being used to secure the supply.
May 31st, 2006 at 12:37 pm#11 – Entry drug…gateway…?
High school or college, Xbot? Not that there’s anything wrong with that.
May 31st, 2006 at 1:39 pmdid I read, somewhere, in the past, that car engines, could actually run on water?
June 13th, 2006 at 11:38 amdid I read, somewhere, in the past, that car engines, could actually run on water? AND, by the way it is my FIRST, comment, ever, on this post.
June 13th, 2006 at 11:42 amdid I read, somewhere, in the past, that car engines, could actually run on water? AND, by the way it is my FIRST, comment, ever, on this post. I would like to know who is telling me I made that comment before
June 13th, 2006 at 11:44 amdid I read, somewhere, in the past, that car engines, could actually run on water? AND, by the way it is my FIRST, comment, ever, on this post. I would like to know who is telling me I made that comment before
June 13th, 2006 at 11:44 amdid I read, somewhere, in the past, that car engines, could actually run on water? AND, by the way it is my FIRST, comment, ever, on this post. I would like to know who is telling me I made that comment before
June 13th, 2006 at 11:44 amdid I read, somewhere, in the past, that car engines, could actually run on water? AND, by the way it is my FIRST, comment, ever, on this post. I would like to know who is telling me I made that comment before
June 13th, 2006 at 11:44 amdid I read, somewhere, in the past, that car engines, could actually run on water? AND, by the way it is my FIRST, comment, ever, on this post. I would like to know who is telling me I made that comment before
June 13th, 2006 at 11:44 amdid I read, somewhere, in the past, that car engines, could actually run on water? AND, by the way it is my FIRST, comment, ever, on this post. I would like to know who is telling me I made that comment before
June 13th, 2006 at 11:44 am