The Engine
As you all know, we are here to deal with changing the economy to get off foreign oil. You do know that is what we are talking about, right? We are not just talking about building wind mills and making cars to run on CNG, we are talking about moving off oil. This is a really big deal. Major. We do not have enough oil in the boarders, even if we drill everywhere in the country, to supply this country with the oil it requires. That is a simple fact. After all, there is a reason we import it, because we don't have it. Back in the 70's we reached peak production and since then we have had to look elsewhere, instead of doing what both Nixon and Carter, (That is right, a republican and a democrat, the left and the right both agreed) that we need, no MUST, stop the mad, insane road we were on. We needed to stop depending on foreign oil to run the engine of our economy.
So, that is where I am taking you. The analogy of our economy to a internal combustion engine. It makes perfect sense for what I am about to say and this might make some of you mad. So know, before hand, I am not trying to make you mad, I am simply trying to make you understand something that you might not see yet. I am trying to connect dots for you, unfortunately, the dots I am going to connect might be so difficult for you that you may dismiss me with out actually hearing what I am trying to say. This however has to be said if we are to succeed.
I have pointed out that our economy is very much an engine. Right now a stalled, sick engine but it is an engine no the less. Put in energy and it runs. Lets put aside the psychological aspect of the engine for now. Just because people are freaking out and are afraid of driving 70 miles an hour on a 2 lane highway, well that has happened to us all. Lets just stay focused on the engine.
We currently feed our engine oil. We feed it oil in the form of gas, plastics, petrochemicals for manufacturing and agriculture, heating oil to stay warm, lubricants to keep machines running smoothly. There are a million things we are doing with oil but they all drive the pistons down in the cycle giving the engine thrust power to move us forward. This is how a engine works, thousands and thousands of little explosions that convert one form of energy into another. This is a basic fundamental fact of life. One form of energy needs to be transformed into another form of energy. We do this by eating food and turning it into energy our bodies need. In the form of our economy, we consume energy to move, manufacture, grow, consume. We use the "free" sun energy that was stored millions of years ago by plants converting sunlight into carbon chains that we burn to convert them into another form of energy we can use to do something else.
Lets look briefly at this, and I do mean briefly. We all know oil is sold in barrels so I want to change this into something easy to understand. Physical labor. So lets say you go out and dig a ditch. Lets say 3 feet deep and 3 feet wide. Maybe some of you have did this type of manual physical labor, if not find, in your life, a time that you have done some major physical labor. Think about doing it for 1 hour. How hard it is and how exhausted were after 1 hour of nonstop physical labor. Hold that thought for just a moment. Now a barrel of oil, 1 barrel of oil does the physical labor of 1 man for 23,200 hours. This is a straight energy conversion but the figure is astonishing.
So exactly how does this equate to the engine analogy you might ask yourself. For every barrel of oil we use each day, we are using the energy that 23,200 people do in 1 hour. We are subsidizing our productivity as humans or the beasts of burden we used to use, with this old energy. We use the oil to drive tractors to plow the land at the most fundamental agricultural level. Which after all is the building block of civilization. You talk away food, agriculture, and we can only go back to a hunter and gathering life style. Now I know for a absolute fact that without a MAJOR reduction in population, we can't go back to this way of life.
Sticking on the agricultural theme, lets bring this oil engine analogy a little closer to home. Lets just look at the power of all of the tractors in our country, the combined horse power of these machines, all dependent on oil. I have read estimates that to replace all of the agricultural machinery in the US, the tractor power of our economy, we would need 450 million horses. Please just think about that for a moment. The number might be different I can't find the discussion I originally saw this discussion in but here is an excellent discussion on the topic.
So our engine is running on oil right now and we are talking about changing that to Wind. Solar, Geothermal. Actually from a purely technical stand point, The Pickens plan is only pushing Wind and CNG, Compressed Natural Gas that is. Now this is great. Moving away from oil but we are speaking only about he gas tank of the economy. We are only looking at what is going into the engine. And here is where I am going to change the discussion a bit. Please, hold on.
This week, in theory we as a group broke a million. I am not sure exactly what this represents. Maybe it is the number of people who have signed the pledge? It is not the number of you, the working members on the site. We are only in the 170,000 range. Still a lot for any active working social network on a single topic. I challenge anyone to find a group this big actively working on energy on line. We are a force to be reckoned with.
However, the Pickens site officially stated that we finally broke the million mark. I feel great about that fact. That those talking about the gas tank have hit the million mark. But, and here it comes, those talking about the tail pipe, well they are in the multi millions. Maybe even the hundreds of millions. Maybe the they have crossed the billion mark. I know that the wecansolveit.org group is almost at 2 million. Then you have many other groups out there. Greenpeace, The Sierra Club, C Level, Global Green USA, Inter-Experience Foundation: Climate Change, The United Nations. The list goes on and on. All focused on the tail pipe.
Kind of humbling isn't it. What I am talking about is the Global Warming group of people. there I said it and I will bet the bank that I lost 10% of the people right there. Sorry, I hope you don't leave and you keep reading what is left in this post. For I am proposing a conversation. That is all. A discussion between the 2 camps. the gas tank people and the tail pipe people.
We 2 camps, the fuel in and the gas out people want exactly the same thing. We want to put a new motor in place. We want a motor that is not dependent on a energy source that is not renewable. We want to stop using a energy source that will run out in our or our children's children's lives.
Where we differ is when we think about the the end of the engine we stand. Some of us want to only think the gas tank is the issue. How we fill it. Others think that the tail pipe is the only thing that is important, what is coming out and into the atmosphere that is important.
Well people, they are both connected to the same engine. If the oil stops, the engine dies. If you plug the tailpipe with a rag, the engine stops. These 2 groups are connected to the engine but for some reason these 2 groups are not willing to recognize the validity of the others argument. I hear as much anti Pickens talk form the tail pipe people as I hear anti greenhouse gas talk form the Pickens people.
I am hoping that talking to you, that I might actually get you to think about the other group. Just stop for a second and think like some of us do. Some of us are looking at both sides of the engine. Lets just take the entirety of the the engine into consideration. Lets focus on changing the engine its self. We both win. The tail pipe goes way eventually and the gas tank is replaced by the ultimate energy source the sun. After all the sun makes the wind and the wind makes the waves, the sun can be harvested directly. I am not telling you anything you don't already know.
What I am say here is that we, the gas tank people, the Pickens people can't change the engine by ourselves. We are determined and focused but we are small in numbers. We are focused on energy generation and we are becoming experts in the subject. We would do ourselves a great amount of good to forge alliances with the tailpipe people. The Global Warming crowd. The Green House Gas people. You should think about it, as individuals. If you have not already done so, reach out to someone on the other end of the engine. Find a organization that deals with the topic and reach out.
Maybe the official Pickens people can find a established global warming organization and forge an alliance. Bring them into us and us to them. We do after all, in this time of economic upheaval, have a opportunity to make some major policy changes within our government. With a focused concerted effort, now might be he right time to start removing the old, oil engine and putting a electric one in place. Another few million voices added to ours, might tip the scales.
So, that is where I am taking you. The analogy of our economy to a internal combustion engine. It makes perfect sense for what I am about to say and this might make some of you mad. So know, before hand, I am not trying to make you mad, I am simply trying to make you understand something that you might not see yet. I am trying to connect dots for you, unfortunately, the dots I am going to connect might be so difficult for you that you may dismiss me with out actually hearing what I am trying to say. This however has to be said if we are to succeed.
I have pointed out that our economy is very much an engine. Right now a stalled, sick engine but it is an engine no the less. Put in energy and it runs. Lets put aside the psychological aspect of the engine for now. Just because people are freaking out and are afraid of driving 70 miles an hour on a 2 lane highway, well that has happened to us all. Lets just stay focused on the engine.
We currently feed our engine oil. We feed it oil in the form of gas, plastics, petrochemicals for manufacturing and agriculture, heating oil to stay warm, lubricants to keep machines running smoothly. There are a million things we are doing with oil but they all drive the pistons down in the cycle giving the engine thrust power to move us forward. This is how a engine works, thousands and thousands of little explosions that convert one form of energy into another. This is a basic fundamental fact of life. One form of energy needs to be transformed into another form of energy. We do this by eating food and turning it into energy our bodies need. In the form of our economy, we consume energy to move, manufacture, grow, consume. We use the "free" sun energy that was stored millions of years ago by plants converting sunlight into carbon chains that we burn to convert them into another form of energy we can use to do something else.
Lets look briefly at this, and I do mean briefly. We all know oil is sold in barrels so I want to change this into something easy to understand. Physical labor. So lets say you go out and dig a ditch. Lets say 3 feet deep and 3 feet wide. Maybe some of you have did this type of manual physical labor, if not find, in your life, a time that you have done some major physical labor. Think about doing it for 1 hour. How hard it is and how exhausted were after 1 hour of nonstop physical labor. Hold that thought for just a moment. Now a barrel of oil, 1 barrel of oil does the physical labor of 1 man for 23,200 hours. This is a straight energy conversion but the figure is astonishing.
So exactly how does this equate to the engine analogy you might ask yourself. For every barrel of oil we use each day, we are using the energy that 23,200 people do in 1 hour. We are subsidizing our productivity as humans or the beasts of burden we used to use, with this old energy. We use the oil to drive tractors to plow the land at the most fundamental agricultural level. Which after all is the building block of civilization. You talk away food, agriculture, and we can only go back to a hunter and gathering life style. Now I know for a absolute fact that without a MAJOR reduction in population, we can't go back to this way of life.
Sticking on the agricultural theme, lets bring this oil engine analogy a little closer to home. Lets just look at the power of all of the tractors in our country, the combined horse power of these machines, all dependent on oil. I have read estimates that to replace all of the agricultural machinery in the US, the tractor power of our economy, we would need 450 million horses. Please just think about that for a moment. The number might be different I can't find the discussion I originally saw this discussion in but here is an excellent discussion on the topic.
So our engine is running on oil right now and we are talking about changing that to Wind. Solar, Geothermal. Actually from a purely technical stand point, The Pickens plan is only pushing Wind and CNG, Compressed Natural Gas that is. Now this is great. Moving away from oil but we are speaking only about he gas tank of the economy. We are only looking at what is going into the engine. And here is where I am going to change the discussion a bit. Please, hold on.
This week, in theory we as a group broke a million. I am not sure exactly what this represents. Maybe it is the number of people who have signed the pledge? It is not the number of you, the working members on the site. We are only in the 170,000 range. Still a lot for any active working social network on a single topic. I challenge anyone to find a group this big actively working on energy on line. We are a force to be reckoned with.
However, the Pickens site officially stated that we finally broke the million mark. I feel great about that fact. That those talking about the gas tank have hit the million mark. But, and here it comes, those talking about the tail pipe, well they are in the multi millions. Maybe even the hundreds of millions. Maybe the they have crossed the billion mark. I know that the wecansolveit.org group is almost at 2 million. Then you have many other groups out there. Greenpeace, The Sierra Club, C Level, Global Green USA, Inter-Experience Foundation: Climate Change, The United Nations. The list goes on and on. All focused on the tail pipe.
Kind of humbling isn't it. What I am talking about is the Global Warming group of people. there I said it and I will bet the bank that I lost 10% of the people right there. Sorry, I hope you don't leave and you keep reading what is left in this post. For I am proposing a conversation. That is all. A discussion between the 2 camps. the gas tank people and the tail pipe people.
We 2 camps, the fuel in and the gas out people want exactly the same thing. We want to put a new motor in place. We want a motor that is not dependent on a energy source that is not renewable. We want to stop using a energy source that will run out in our or our children's children's lives.
Where we differ is when we think about the the end of the engine we stand. Some of us want to only think the gas tank is the issue. How we fill it. Others think that the tail pipe is the only thing that is important, what is coming out and into the atmosphere that is important.
Well people, they are both connected to the same engine. If the oil stops, the engine dies. If you plug the tailpipe with a rag, the engine stops. These 2 groups are connected to the engine but for some reason these 2 groups are not willing to recognize the validity of the others argument. I hear as much anti Pickens talk form the tail pipe people as I hear anti greenhouse gas talk form the Pickens people.
I am hoping that talking to you, that I might actually get you to think about the other group. Just stop for a second and think like some of us do. Some of us are looking at both sides of the engine. Lets just take the entirety of the the engine into consideration. Lets focus on changing the engine its self. We both win. The tail pipe goes way eventually and the gas tank is replaced by the ultimate energy source the sun. After all the sun makes the wind and the wind makes the waves, the sun can be harvested directly. I am not telling you anything you don't already know.
What I am say here is that we, the gas tank people, the Pickens people can't change the engine by ourselves. We are determined and focused but we are small in numbers. We are focused on energy generation and we are becoming experts in the subject. We would do ourselves a great amount of good to forge alliances with the tailpipe people. The Global Warming crowd. The Green House Gas people. You should think about it, as individuals. If you have not already done so, reach out to someone on the other end of the engine. Find a organization that deals with the topic and reach out.
Maybe the official Pickens people can find a established global warming organization and forge an alliance. Bring them into us and us to them. We do after all, in this time of economic upheaval, have a opportunity to make some major policy changes within our government. With a focused concerted effort, now might be he right time to start removing the old, oil engine and putting a electric one in place. Another few million voices added to ours, might tip the scales.
Tags: energy, gas, global, green, oil, peakoil, pickens, power, solutions
Comment
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Comment by Monte Smith on October 13, 2008 at 12:05pm -
in response to Pat Jack's comment... What is the significance of a number?
If I were to have an army I would prefer to have 5,000 of any who have commented here than have 5 million who have pressed 1 at the suggestion of a robocall.
I do understand that there is PR and there is "PR". PR can be incredibly powerful. "PR" can be incredibly dangerous.
Monte
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Comment by Monte Smith on October 13, 2008 at 11:21am
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DTM,
Excellent blog! I very much appreciate the well placed steps (just the right rise) that you installed to lead us from one scope of understanding to that of a much wider scope wherein the interconnected or disconnected pieces of the whole come into view. Very nicely done!
One cannot turn the train, that is zooming down the mountain and has become a runaway, around abruptly. And if one attempts such a maneuver there will certainly be a crash. A problem, of no small magnitude, that we are dealing with is that the lion's share of the populace doesn't have a clue that they are on a runaway train. They are faced with so many immediate problems dealing with hour to hour survival that they are unable to raise their heads and look around. As we continue to expand our depth and breadth of the bigger picture and actual magnitude of the problem we must incorporate and enact ways to include our friends who are, at this time, outside of the loop and bring them to an understanding and eventual participation in the solution process. Your blog here does that Dan. Your message reaches out and is embracive of those who may not have the understanding that you so adroitly communicated.
This is a blog that I can share with many I know who are outside of our loop.
Thank you.
I see now that you are holding a bag of pieces to the puzzle.
MTM
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Comment by Conrad Watson on October 13, 2008 at 7:46am -
I have to ask you Dan and Kathy and Lawrence and Pat, Rich, Scott and especially JT: Do you own a hybrid, or have you put in a windmill or a solar array or are you growing your own vegatables........ There are so many things all the army can do on a daily basis. At great expense(not really considering the incentives and payback) the new solar array on my office building has eliminated electric usage for A/C and lighting and because we built it too large for our electrical needs it is eliminating fifty per cent of our heat bill by connecting it to infra-red and space electric heaters. Farm animals cause enormous carbon pollution. Just by cutting back on dairy and meats by 50% the affects are staggering.
I know what you mean Dan though on a macro scale. If all the groups could institute an agenda for doing the simple things the big things would follow. You have a lot of experience working with groups in Oregon and what you are proposing would get us off oil in five years. It really would. People from both ends of the engine are so mad at how Bush has hijacked our government for Exxon that there is no problem getting them all on the same page. A single message for all the lemmings would be great. 'Drill baby drill' has resonated with the masses and, beleive it or not, the majority of people think that's the solution. Sun, wind and water should be the new mantra.
Thanks so much Dan for your positive message.
CW
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Comment by Kathy Lee Hart on October 12, 2008 at 9:37pm -
Dan,
I always enjoy your conversations/blogs. Yes, the tail must talk to the head <--- --- > head to tail.
Devotion & Courage vs. Egoism and Cowardice.
All the best,
Kathy Lee
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Comment by Lawrence Murray on October 12, 2008 at 6:09pm -
We are there already. I started CoolingEarth.org to end imported oil and solve climate change. I joined Pickens plan and learned we could only pay for renewable energy by DRILLING. May not sound very global warming alarmist, but with the economic collapse, we have to pay for our new energy plans or our nation fails. If you go to CoolingEarth.org you can see the new electric pneumatic car engines that use liquid air and superconductor motors to run a car, this type of technology is made possible because of an Atmospheric Cleanup Machine.
HaveFun Lawrence
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Comment by Richard Wickberg on October 12, 2008 at 3:52pm -
Dan,
As always, a great, well thought out out post. In this election year it is especially important to vote for candidates who have taken the stand to take action on this national security threat.
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Comment by Scott Baker on October 12, 2008 at 3:40pm -
There are actually LOTS of alternatives. Just today, I read about Compressed Steam powered cars in New Scientist. It only goes 10km, but this is just a proof of concept car and the company thinks they can do MUCH better. IT only takes 5 minutes to refill (unlike hours for electric), and performance is like a regular car. Honda and Ford (I think) are looking into hybrids based on gas/steam (from waste heat). Then there's flywheel, possibly as a hybrid too. Electric Teslas are just coming out with 200 mile ranges and 0-60 in under 4 seconds! Oh, you do need 100K and an outlet to refill. As BP says, it's a start. On the generation side, people on this very site are putting wind turbines on their property. Here in NYC, we have a major supermarket on Roosevelt Island powered by Water Turbines - more are coming.
I could go on and on. The point is we must not assume that things need to be the way they've been just because that's how they've been, and we should not think there are no other things we can do besides the Pickens' Plan. We need to build as many solar thermal fields as wind fields, for example. We are getting our first offshore wind fields off New Jersey as well. We will get some off NYC's coast too.
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Comment by JT on October 12, 2008 at 2:56pm -
Dan,
A couple things:
1) You need to be a LOT more concise with this message. Make the analogy different, or keep it the same, that doesn't matter, but all of that could have been summed up with that we need to forge alliances with the Global Warming folks.
I think we already have that alliance. The sum collective group is people who want a change our status quo technology (but NONE of us wants it except that it has finally been demonstrated as too costly, in various ways.) So the Global Warming folks are looking to the techie types to join with the money movers & shakers and give them that alternative.
Think I'm oversimplifying? Look at the support that hybrid cars got. People jumped on that bandwagon big-time. The great thing about this subject is that gas is SO high we don't have to choose; Anything that doesn't use fossil fuel saves money too! ANYthing. Even replacing gasoline altogether, when one thinks about the total costs of making gas. First there's the speculative drilling, and pulling the crude oil out of the ground. Then there's hauling it. Then there's building a refinery for it, and then refining it, then trucking it all over the place, then shoving it in the ground at stations, pumping it back out, cleaning injectors, replacing exhaust components, etc.... All things considered, petroleum is a VERY expensive product (but still cheaper than feeding and cleaning up after 400 milllion horses)! In contrast, wind turbines get built, put up, and their generated electricity moved through a central system for use via lines that are already there and paid for and run to most everywhere in our country already. I can even envision there being outlets that you can recharge at. Punch in your PIN and come back to a topped off vehicle. Will there be costs? Sure will. Batteries (for electric cars) and compressor tanks (for compressed air cars, NG, etc.) But there will be immense savings as well, when we're rid of that ugly, smelly noxious, toxic stuff they call Petrol. Give the market a choice, and they'll opt for it.
If we got 80% of the non-commercial public onto electric cars, those boneheads who insist on their V-8 motors could have that Big Boy's Toy to run around on weekends til the fuel runs out. But I'm guessing a more enlightened mindset is coming. Even the drag-strip redneck will convert when he gets his butt kicked by something that whispers past him at 300 mph.:) Sure, there will be hold-overs. There are still people who insist on having a Harley, even though Japanese in-line 4-cylinders are exponentially more reliable, efficient and quiet. Those types have ego issues, and as society changes, what they find rebellious and admirable will change as well.
SO, let's keep on pushing for technology that gets rid of the combustion engine altogether. If we build it, they will come.
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