Might be paying $4 for gas.

[oguevarra]

I'm already pissed because of gas prices but $4 for gas. This is getting crazy. Here is the article.

http://money.cnn.com/2005/08/31/news/gas_prices/index.htm?cnn=yes

[rollhard]

Great, now the MR2 must hybernate in the garage....

[MikeD]

Maybe we can send Robertson to Venezuela to talk with Chavez, get him to open up the pipelines to keep our prices down.

:)

Seriously, $4 would be pretty bad...but I'll reserve judgement on these gloom and doom scenarios for awhile, they may not come to fruition.

[Apex]

Oil released from patroleum reserve.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20050831/ap_on_bi_ge/oil_reserve_hk3

[Merlin]

People here in Atlanta are presently going crazy. There is a run on the gas stations. I passed a couple on the way home from work and they both had cars lined up around the block to get in. The rice sign had the numbers removed at one station so who knows what they are charging. This must be what it was like in the 70's.

For the first time ever I locked my gas cap. People are just not being rational around here.

[Kevster]

Well it's a good thing I can bike to work if I want to (though it is not exactly safe with few sidewalks and no bikelanes on the most of the reasonable routes I could take). One of the problems though is I have been putting in some long hours with our global network integration with our new parent company and that means I'd be riding home in the dark.

[Thesifer]

I heard a rumor about Utah and them finding more Oil there then is in the Middle East Reserves.. not sure on the validity of the rumor .. but I'm going to look it up.

[Kevster]

If you're thinking more along the lines of the oil sands of Alberta Province in Canada, then you'd be right. They're using a more advanced extraction technique to get at the oil, much the same as they're doing with the natural gas shale in Northern Texas.

[Thesifer]

"more advanced" as in Horizontal Drilling? .. If so thats been around for a while they just havent had the legal right to use it in the US because of Mineral Rights and other Issues.

[Kevster]

Actually what they are doing is small explosions at the bottom of the drillhead, then they pump water in to force the oil/gas out. Before they were relying on the natural gas pressure to drive the oil out. Once that started to lower, the flow of oil dropped off significantly to the point where it is a virtual trickle (like 5 barrels per day out of a well).

They also use variable direction drill heads to do some horizontal extraction as well, but that is primarily done to minimize the number of wells and pumps being used. You'd be surprised how long they have been using that in the U.S., they have been using it in California for many years.

[gwilks98]

I liked this thought:


Meanwhile, as far away as Connecticut, lines at the pump grew as people filled their tanks in fear of shortages and rising prices. That, of course, only makes matters worse, says Amy Myers Jaffe, a fellow at the James A. Baker III Institute for Public Policy at Rice University: "If everybody in America fills their tank, [the added consumption] could be in the millions of barrels a day. You want to do the opposite. If everybody in the country filled their tank only halfway, it puts less strain on the supply system."

http://www.businessweek.com/bwdaily/dnflash/sep2005/nf2005091_6199_db094.htm

It sure makes more sense than everyone making a beeline for the gas pumps.

[smeakim]

I heard a rumor about Utah and them finding more Oil there then is in the Middle East Reserves.. not sure on the validity of the rumor .. but I'm going to look it up.

Actually I think you are referring to what they call oil shale (sp?). It is in solid form. They have to heat it up to extreme temperatures to get it to liquify. Then they can pump it out. It is huge here on the western slopes of Colorado. However, the economies of scale have not hit yet, so it is sill very expensive to do. Once they can do it cheaply they said there is plenty of shale just in CO to last at least another 20 years without any foreign oil for the entire us.

[Apex]

New oil finds and refineries will not help in the short term. Those are 10+ year solutions on average.

[smeakim]

You are 100% correct..... But since we can't advance alternative fuels as fast as we want for whatever reason at least its something to alleviate some of the need on foreign oil.

[brainsmile]

The rice sign had the numbers removed
Man why you gotta bring race into this?













:P

[Apex]

If you're thinking more along the lines of the oil sands of Alberta Province in Canada, then you'd be right. They're using a more advanced extraction technique to get at the oil, much the same as they're doing with the natural gas shale in Northern Texas.


http://msnbc.msn.com/id/9149079/