Well, as some of you know, the CEC & ARB (Cal Energy Commission & Air Resources Board) are doing a joint "study" in response to legislation (a law) to find ways to reduce petroleum use in California. I attended the latest public "workshop" to offer my silly ideas and hear their good ones. To sum up, their good ideas were to use natural gas as a straight fuel, to use natural gas to make Fischer Tropsch blend diesel, and to use natural gas. Oh, also, they will recommend purchase of a new fleet of govt vehicles (natural gas) and for good measure there is an extensive study indicating proper tire inflation will do some good. There is token mention of E-85, and ethanol - so maybe the new fleet will include some E-85 ready vehicles. Biodiesel is also mentioned, so surely the new govt fleet will include some diesel vehicles that could use it, or maybe be converted to use natural gas. LPG somehow made it onto the slate of solutions as well. As a marketing study for natural gas, the 2 inch thick set of reports, prepared by CEC, ARB and private contractors, will surely save the natural gas industry a ton of money as they develop their marketing strategies. I submitted my silly ideas to a somber crowd of well dressed consultant and govt official types, and there were a couple blue collar types, and even one professor type - but mostly this looked and felt like a stockholders meeting for the natural gas industry. There, I said it. After I read my 2 page summary, which focused greatly on how many die each year, but also how the proposition would actually exceed the desired 15% reduction by 5% - Susan Brown smiled and politely said they had covered the idea in their report - I could not resist replying that one page in a 2 inch thick report was unacceptable for such a well qualified body, and that 2 paragraphs from Highway Patrol consultant Keller hardly amounted to justification for dismissing the idea. I was polite, they were nervous. Clearly this is just not an option - I understand why. It would reduce petroleum use by as much as 20% and that is NOT what they are trying to achieve. They want 15% (or less). As a matter of fact, at the last minute they reduced their predicted results to a 10% decrease rather than the requested 15%. Plus they need to switch the market demand to another commodity controlled by their handlers, which would be, ummmm, natural gas. The whole thing sickened me to this point: I surrender. I give up. No one wants to slow down to conserve energy. They simply will not hear of it, so I give up on that for now. I will leave www.drive55.org up (because I can), but I will not waste another btu of my energy on it. Nor will the CEC, ARB, DOE, EPA or any other agency populated by well educated well paid natural gas industry reps anytime soon. Nor will any of the so-called eco types such as NRDC, nor the dozens of political action groups that got the press release such as MoveOn.org or for that matter any of the good readers of this list, or any of the others I have pitched the idea to (maybe its my colorful personality?).
Maybe instead we should subsidize Hummers. Equip them with natural gas capable V12's, 2 gallon natural gas tanks to supplement 50 gallon gasoline tanks and drop all the power robbing smog control devices altogether. This would accelerate everything, and that seems to be the order of the day - SPEED. Add a/c and cable TV to make it just like home with individual screens for the kids (yep they make them) and give everyone that wants one their piece of the american pie if they will just agree to send at least one of their offspring to rampage around the world killing dummies who happen to have our oil under their sand (or ice). That would surely accelerate things indeed. ========= Average BTU consumed Per Passenger mile by mode of travel: SUV: 4,591 Air: 4,123 Bus: 3,729 Car: 3,672 Train: 2,138 Source: Bureau of Transportation Statistics http://199.79.179.77/publications/nts/index.html It is not a sign of good health to be well adjusted to a sick society. __ J. Krishnamurti (1895-1986) ========= Average BTU consumed Per Passenger mile by mode of travel: SUV: 4,591 Air: 4,123 Bus: 3,729 Car: 3,672 Train: 2,138 Source: Bureau of Transportation Statistics http://199.79.179.77/publications/nts/index.html It is not a sign of good health to be well adjusted to a sick society. __ J. Krishnamurti (1895-1986) [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor ---------------------~--> Get A Free Psychic Reading! Your Online Answer To Life's Important Questions. http://us.click.yahoo.com/Lj3uPC/Me7FAA/uetFAA/FGYolB/TM ---------------------------------------------------------------------~-> Biofuel at Journey to Forever: http://journeytoforever.org/biofuel.html Biofuels list archives: http://archive.nnytech.net/ Please do NOT send Unsubscribe messages to the list address. To unsubscribe, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
