No Runny Eggs

The repository of one hard-boiled egg from the south suburbs of Milwaukee, Wisconsin (and the occassional guest-blogger). The ramblings within may or may not offend, shock and awe you, but they are what I (or my guest-bloggers) think.

Archive for May 23rd, 2008

The Morning Scramble – 5/23/2008

by @ 9:26. Filed under The Morning Scramble.

There is but one reason for this song…

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_nLiQBV6A7c[/youtube]

I’m on vacation next week (hunting the great Canadian walleye, to be specific), so I’ll leave you in the tender care of Shoebox and the guest-bloggers. Before then, however, we’ve got one more Scramble:

  • Matt reminds us of what Monday truly is for. Words cannot express enough my appreciation for those that gave all for the greatest country on Earth.
  • Owen (my blogfather) and Jed are celebrating the fifth blogiversary of Boots and Sabers. I hope I don’t have to explain to anybody how it is the most-influential Wisconsin blog.
  • Ace is shocked, SHOCKED that the ‘Rats would lie about Iraq. I wonder just how angry the DUmmies and KOmmies are after finding out that Paul Kanjorski rolled them right over.
  • Ed Morrissey exposes the latest “Hide the Language” game being played by the ‘Rats. So much for “Most Ethical Congress EVAH!”
  • HotAir commenter cannonball answered my plea on that thread for a Wile E. Pelosi, genius Photoshop…

    Thank you, cannonball.

  • Pete Fanning wonders where Steve Kagen (D-Green Bay) is on the SAVE Act now that it’s time to pull it out of committee. Funny thing is, Kagen is a co-sponsor.
  • Allahpundit catches Maxine Waters admiring Hugo Chavez and socialism so much she doesn’t even know the right term for what she wants to do to the oil industry. I believe the proper verb is “destroy”.
  • Shoebox finds a Flatlander pol that is happier than a pig in shit over high gas prices. Doyle (he of the $.40/gallon federal tax hike for “infrastructure” call, ironic considering he uses Wisconsin’s transportation fund as his personal slush fund) has to be envious of Blagojevich and his state’s imposition of sales taxes on gasoline.

    Side note, that sales tax is what Barack Hussein Obama was once so opposed to, he wanted placards saying he was responsible for its temporary suspension back in 2000.

  • Mike runs some numbers on Chuck Schumer’s claims of the value of Saudi oil versus ANWR oil. Guess we can put Chuckie into the Blood for Oil category.
  • Silent E has the Obamanation Quote of the Day. Question to BHO – if you think we’re the greatest country in the world, what are you going to change it to?
  • Trail-Mix collates a heap of toons hacking apart BHO, Gorebal Warming and the Farm Pork Bill.
  • John Hawkins is off the McCain Straight Double Talk Express. It took a lot to get Hawkins off the Express, but lying directly to his ear on immigration did it.
  • JammieWearingFool has news of one less difference between the two halves of the bipartisan Party-In-Government; a proposed FCC rule imposing “advisory boards” full of the aggrieved designed to bum-rush radio stations that are too conservative (specifically, anti-illegal-immigrant) off the air. The UN-Fairness Doctrine by any other name, and this one’s from a nominally-Pubbie FCC.
  • Speaking of the aggrieved, Patrick McIlheran notes the professional complainers are mad over carbonated fruit. No, they’re not mad because carbonated fruit is any less healthy than non-carbonated fruit; they’re mad because they see it as a gateway to soda. News flash – it’s more of a gateway away from soda.
  • Dean says, “Just blog to be healthy.”
  • JackBoot found a very enterprising car dealer who is giving away a handgun with every purchase. If only I were in southwest Missouri instead of southeast Wisconsin,….
  • Jib skewers the decision by the UN to send condoms to Burma as aid relief.

Blogging will be light on my end today and tomorrow; I still have some last-minute items to take care of. If I don’t make it back in here, see you next Saturday.

It’s Time for a Game Changer

by @ 5:00. Filed under Energy.

What if I told you:

  • I could guarantee oil at no more than $75/barrel
  • We would have a 100 year supply at current usage levels
  • Gas would cost about $2.50
  • We could eliminate at least 25% of our foreign oil import
  • At $75/barrel, we could eliminate sending $67B dollars a year to foreign governments
  • The most it would cost US taxpayers is an amount equal to what we just paid for the phony stimulus checks.

Would you be interested?

In 2006 when oil was running about $75/barrel, the CEO of Jet Blue, David Neeleman put together a plan  to develop an industry that converted coal to oil.   The technology for this process was developed in WWII and was used by the Germans to manufacture oil as they were being shut out from other sources.   Following WWII  the abundant availability of cheap oil, along with lobbying from oil companies and environmentalists  caused various US trials and efforts towards commercializing coal gasification technology to be forgotten.

So why can’t we get coal gasification going now?   First, as you may have already guessed, environmentalists go crazy any time coal is mentioned.   The gasification process does release carbon dioxide (oooooooh, the boogieman of global warming!).   However, recent advances in cleaning processes have advocates claiming that they can actually make the process less carbon impactful than today’s burning of natural oil.   Additionally, carbon dioxide is used by traditional oil companies to claim oil otherwise unattainable.   The carbon dioxide is pumped deep into wells which causes oil to move towards the surface.   Once in the ground, the carbon dioxide naturally is reabsorbed into the ground.

The second reason coal gasification hasn’t moved forward is that it is economics.   Neeleman’s plan had an estimated cost of $4B per plant that was capable of producing 20M barrels of oil each year.   The estimated break even point is about $55/barrel.   One can imagine the difficulty of gathering capital to produce a commodity that has the significant fluctuations of oil.   Even in 2006, there were well known analysts saying that oil would settle back to $30 or $40 per barrel.   Neeleman’s proposal would be that the US government would guarantee the capital investment.   Ironically, in exchange for the guarantee, Neeleman’s plan offered a windfall profit to the government of 25% of any amount that oil went over $75/barrel.

Neeleman’s plan called for 45 plants for a total guarantee of $180B (this would be a guarantee not a handout).   With 45 plants they could replace about 25% of our current imports.

As with other solutions, coal gasification isn’t going to solve our energy problem overnight.   However, also like other solutions, if we don’t start, we’ll never get there.

It’s time for Congress to quit telling us what won’t work  or spending time on asinine pandering like voting to sue OPEC or degrading oil executives.  

If Congress took our energy problem seriously they would  recognize that for the forseeable future there are no alternatives to petroleum for transportation.   It’s time to take the Ben Bernanke approach, throw out “business as usual” and develop new tools that address the very specific issue of expanding supply.   Anything else is just wasting time.   Unfortunately, that’s one of the few things that Congress seems competent in doing.

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