One gallon closer to energy independence
With gas prices dominating the headlines and our monthly credit card bills, we’ve spent a lot of time, and even some blog posts, considering meaningful ways for all of us to conserve this finite resource, breathe cleaner air, reduce our dependency on foreign oil, and save a few bucks. Turns out, it might be easier than you think.
How to save gasoline
As of 2005, there were just over 200 million licensed drivers in the United States. If each one of them saved just one gallon of gasoline every week, the net result would be a savings of almost 10.5 billion gallons of gas every year. If that sounds like it might be hard to do, think about how much fuel you could save simply by slowing down. In Consumer Reports testing, fuel mileage in a relatively economical four-cylinder Toyota Camry improved by 10 mpg simply by slowing from 75 to 55. Using that example, a Camry driver could save a gallon of gas in just 30 miles of highway driving. If that’s too slow for you, just slowing to 65 improved the mileage in the same car by five mpg. And around town, reducing hard acceleration and braking saved 2-3 mpg.
There are other ways to save, like combining trips when running errands, and keeping your tires properly inflated. Under-inflated tires could cost you another one mpg, or 20 miles per tankful if you have a 20-gallon tank. Simply carpooling one day a month could easily save more than your gallon a week share, depending on your commute.
The next post in this two-part series will look at the U.S. demand for oil, and the difference each motorist can make.
Posted by: poetryman69 | Nov 25, 2007 3:10:55 PM
Almost all wars and terrorism in the world can be stopped. Almost all dictators and tyrants can be rendered powerless. All we have to do is to stop paying them. An alarming amount of the money Western nations pay for oil is going into the coffers of people who terrorists and dictators. All we have to do defund the world’s most violent criminals is to become energy independent.
In the first phase of energy independence we get as much energy as possible from resources which we own or which are in the hands of friendly, stable nations. First we build new nuclear power plants in every state. If the French can make nuclear work what excuse do we have? In addition, we drill for oil off all our coastal waters and we build new refineries and pipelines in every state. Existing energy companies are making plenty of money in the current climate of false scarcity. We will have to find away around them. Usually way around greedy energy companies would require political will. However, almost all existing politicians are in the pocket of the energy companies. This includes democrats and republicans. So every politician currently in office needs to be thrown out. Anyone who works for or who owns an existing conventional energy company is in my view disqualified for public office. We already know from the Bush/Cheney experience that such politicians will work in a way contrary to the national security of the United States and will start pointless wars for oil.
Merely having new politicians willing to clear the legal minefields laid down by oil bought senators and congressmen might not be enough. We might have to get a little bolder. Therefore I suggest that we build terawatts of new nuclear power plans and miles of new oil refineries in Mexico and that we send the power back to the states via pipelines, power lines, hydrogen, or whatever works. This will provide work for Mexicans and energy for us. The Mexican government will have a large incentive to make the plants secure and this increased security might even spill over to the borders and make our borders more secure.
While phase one is going on we need to start on phase 2. In this phase we bring online as many green and renewable technologies as are currently viable and put as much money as is needed into producing more. I would suggest that the model cities be built in the west and south—anywhere that it does not get cold enough to snow. The idea is to build small towns or cities that will go cold turkey. There will be no fossil fuels of any kind allowed in these cities. All vehicles and houses will be powered by wind, solar and bio-mass. The best locations would be those that have year around wind, sun and enough farming in the area to produce the bio mass. These experimental towns would be off the power grid. The only way to get power to them would be to make the green and renewable technologies work. Volunteers who truly believe that the future is green would be invited to apply for residency. We would probably take engineers and farmers over other types because we would need people who were skilled in keeping the power conversion machinery going and others who don’t mind the get your hand dirty hard work of farming.