"big oil" will do what most successful american companies have done over the years, they will expand or die. simple. natural gas, fuel cells if they ever are developed, large batteries, possibly electrical plants. the energy field is HUGE and there is plenty to expand into. the strongest will survive, as is the nature of a capitalist society.

highly doubtful, but yet no one knows for sure how we could ramp up corn, switchgrass, etc etc production our capability to refine it. don't forget there are many many countries around the world that can produce large amounts of corn and similar grown products if they invested a little into their growing areas (water delivery, etc).

also keep in mind that a lot of the technology is being developed and by defintion will be tested by the US by implementation, so it will be MUCH easier for other countries such as india or china to take our tried and true methods of energy production and implement them much cheaper than we ever could because they didn't have to go through the R&D costs nor the growing pains, rather they just get the finished product.

unlikely. almost anyone can farm corn, and its not nearly as expensive to make an ethanol refinery in comparison to an oil refinery and IIRC a lot of the pollution concerns with an oil facility don't apply with an ethanol facility.

some of these oil rich nations have seen their future, such as some of the more progressive arab nations (UAE, dubai, kuwait in some respects, etc etc). the rest will continue to have poor populations while the leadership dissolves by various coups. the kingdom of saud has let its general population continue to slip into poverty while the ruling family got richer and richer over the last 50 years. it is a scary prospect but i do believe more lawless nations will pop up, taking the place of the newly bankrupted "kingdoms," and radical islam will expand greatly now that the little restraint these ruling parties had on it is gone.

as far as the countries that cannot produce their own ethanol, such as most of europe or japan, they will continue to import their energy requirements, but i also expect the expansion of electrically powered items and the expansion of the nuclear infrastructure to provide for those items.

 

I dont like the Anwar thing....not at all. Alaska is beautiful, lets not turn it into this...

 

Incredibly, just a small portion of US oil needs is supplied from the middle east. There was a good article in Popular Mechanics, and US buys just 6% from Saudi Arabia. Another 6% from nigeria. Then 10% from Canada. And some more from Venezuela.

Like someone said already, about 55% of oil is imported.

Still, for cars that switch to E85, they get significantly lower MPG than running on regular fuel. Yes, it's higher octane, but if you take into account lower mpg, it actually becomes more expensive to run E85 (again, the break-down was provided by Popular Mechanics). I'll dig it up once I get home.

 

Not if the price of E85 is 70% that of gasoline. Even if E85 cost the same, it will be cheaper for our nation in the long run, there are a lot of side effects to us using gasoline that cost a lot of money.

 

i thought i had seen somewhere that flex fuel vehicles could adjust the timing for E85 to take advantage of the higher octane and get better fuel economy...

 

I would really like to see a study of GDI engines, high compression motor and E85 ability? Could the benift of very high compression that is allowed with E85 and Direct Injection, actualy increase gas milage? How about with the help of a turbocharger, as in this case, to increase effiency?

 

My '03 Suburban gets about 25% less gas milage on the E85 than it does on traditional gasoline. You pay about 25% less for it: so it becomes a push when you look at it from the direct-consumer-cost perspective. The trucks drives & feels the same. Buring ethynol releases the carbons that corn requires during it's growth, so the net-effect (environment-wise) is near-neutral. Ethynol production is currently limited. As production and refining ramp up, it will be more readily available - and be cheaper than it is now (some estimate it could get as low as $0.70-$1.00/gallon). My only complaint is that you really hafta look to find the gas stations that offer it. Personally, I'd like to see GM become the first automaker to offer a full-line of flex-fuel vehicles: make every GM vehicle a flex-fuel vehicle and MARKET the heck out of it.

Check out:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/12676374/

 

I like what he said aboutthe oil exec.
" be careful...we can drop the price of oil"

 

Thats what I was thinking. Once E85 production ramps up big time, prices should drop significantly. I also would love to see GM market the hell out of their Ethynol vehicles. I was pretty happy to see the E85 Avalanche display at the auto show I went to this year, hopefully they stay into it and really push for it.