Hydrogen economy looks out of reach

Jack May wrote:

"Jack Dingler" wrote in message
news:6h1cd.247315$MQ5.226792@attbi_s52...


. . .


Problems cited in reports by private consultants include the reliability
of
equipment and availability of spare parts, The New York Times reported in
yesterday's editions. Reports specifically noted a leaky generator and
unreliable controls on a reactor.
In addition, the federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission is investigating
claims by at least two employees that their superiors retaliated against
them after they expressed concerns about safety, the newspaper reported



And the ratio of people that have died from coal pollution to the number of
people that have died from nuclear power plant radiation is ...?

You also think that no advances in nuclear power plant safety over the
decades? Your problem with pebble bed and other new reactor designs that
can not melt down even without controls is what?

Do you believe that the world never changes and problems are never be
solved?




Those quotes were from the article. I didn't write them.

Pebble beds so far have some sort of weird run away feedback problem.
The experimental versions don't work yet. Maybe they will work one day.

But what worries me is the that many in nuclear crowd wants nukes to
replace oil. To reach that quantity of energy production, we'd need
thousands in the US. Then we'd need to build hundreds every year to keep
economic growth going. To man these things I guess we could import cheap
engineers with fake degrees from India. Our own education systems aren't
prepared for this.

Finally, we need to be building them by the hundreds now so that in ten
years, when we absolutely need them need them, they will be ready. I see
no sign we're doing that now.

Some folks here argue that we'll build nukes during the energy decline.
But that's like investing after you're retired, without investing before
you retire. Isn't it prudent to invest when you have resources rather
than wait until you don't have them?

Jack Dingler

http://www.globalpublicmedia.com/#Julian20041013

There's talk about oil prices staying high, but they won't. They
represent negative feedback to the economy. Once enough jobs are shed
and especially after the economic downturn in 2005, I think oil prices
will be down to the mid-thirties.

Matthew, you need to get on CNN and argue your case.

Jack Dingler

Jack Dingler wrote in message news:ogccd.191841$wV.178195@attbi_s54...
http://www.globalpublicmedia.com/#Julian20041013

There's talk about oil prices staying high, but they won't. They
represent negative feedback to the economy. Once enough jobs are shed
and especially after the economic downturn in 2005, I think oil prices
will be down to the mid-thirties.

Matthew, you need to get on CNN and argue your case.

Jack Dingler

Crude is now going for $55 a barrel. A year ago it was $27. It's a
speculative bubble and it will end soon. $40 before the eoy. As we
speak, investors are rotating out of energy and into technology
stocks.

On 16 Oct 2004 19:44:24 -0700, (Laura Bush
murdered her boy friend) wrote in message
:

As we
speak, investors are rotating out of energy and into technology
stocks.

ITYM "speculators". Investors are in for the long haul.

Guy
--
May contain traces of irony. Contents liable to settle after posting.
http://www.chapmancentral.co.uk

88% of helmet statistics are made up, 65% of them at Washington University

"Just zis Guy, you know?" wrote:

On 16 Oct 2004 19:44:24 -0700, (Laura Bush
murdered her boy friend) wrote in message
:

As we
speak, investors are rotating out of energy and into technology
stocks.

ITYM "speculators". Investors are in for the long haul.

A lot of people who are considered investors will sell their stock
after it has stopped appreciating in favor of buying a stock which
appears to have better current prospects for appreciation.

The speculators I'm thinking of were the ones who bought crude futures
at $40 a barrel in hopes of quickly seeing $50 a barrel. I wish I were
one of them.
Mitch.

Mitch Haley wrote:

"Just zis Guy, you know?" wrote:


On 16 Oct 2004 19:44:24 -0700, (Laura Bush
murdered her boy friend) wrote in message
:



As we
speak, investors are rotating out of energy and into technology
stocks.


ITYM "speculators". Investors are in for the long haul.



A lot of people who are considered investors will sell their stock
after it has stopped appreciating in favor of buying a stock which
appears to have better current prospects for appreciation.

The speculators I'm thinking of were the ones who bought crude futures
at $40 a barrel in hopes of quickly seeing $50 a barrel. I wish I were
one of them.
Mitch.


Exactly. They see the end of the $50 crude coming, as demand destruction
signs are picking up.

We've seen a rise in the jobless rate and signs the economy has slowed.
By shedding jobs and increasing both business and personal bankruptcies,
the economy is able to account for supply and demand mismatches and
automatically correct. This is natural. The only way to keep jobs going,
would be to find ways to free up fuel from other less necessary uses.
Capitalism has no innate mechanism for managing this, so boom and bust
is the natural mechanism. As production increases in energy aren't
keeping pace with population growth in the US, the net effect is that
energy per capita is declining and the result is a cooling off of the
economy and net job loss.

The same situation happens in ecological systems when the food supply
doesn't rise to meet the population. The population self reduces to
match the food supply. As this is often an overshoot situation the
population usually drops lower than it need be, then swings back up
again for another crash. This happened to the reindeer on Matthew
Island. In healthy ecosystems, there are checks and balances and
populations have limiting mechanisms. We work hard though to eliminate
checks on the economy though. Because we're always trying to run it flat
out at maximum speed, it's prone to the boom and bust cycle as it hits
resource limits.

2005 should be a correction year with a new recession kicking in for the
first quarter. By shedding jobs and businesses, the economy will cool
until demand for oil is reduced enough to bring the price back down. The
US Gov will compensate by releasing a flood of money into the economy,
and this will raise fuel prices and pick up economic growth again until
it hits those supply and demand limits again.

The problem with blaming speculators every time prices rise, is that
this argument often must pretend that the laws of supply and demand
don't exist. Even at $54 / barrel for crude, production all up and down
the chain is running flat out. The wells are pumping as fast as they
can, storage is way down, tanker contracts are high, refineries are
running flat out. This means we're sucking the oil out of the ground as
fast as we can and using it just as fast. When supply and demand get
this tight, basic economics tells us the price will rise.

And yes, speculators will cause price increases as will any little
setback in the supply and demand chain. But only because the supply and
demand chain has no slack. When you're running at maximum capacity, the
slightest setback will magnify in costs.

On Fri, 15 Oct 2004 13:29:47 -0500,
(Matthew Russotto) wrote:

Electricity being touted as a replacement for fossil fuels WOULD be
dimwitted, unless you specified electricity generated by nuclear,
wind, solar, hydroelectric, or other non-fossil sources.

That is one of the benefits of electricity: it is amenable to changes
of fuel without having to re-equip vast numbers of homes and
businesses.

Guy
--
May contain traces of irony. Contents liable to settle after posting.
http://www.chapmancentral.co.uk

88% of helmet statistics are made up, 65% of them at Washington University

In article ogccd.191841$wV.178195@attbi_s54,
Jack Dingler wrote:
http://www.globalpublicmedia.com/#Julian20041013

There's talk about oil prices staying high, but they won't. They
represent negative feedback to the economy. Once enough jobs are shed
and especially after the economic downturn in 2005, I think oil prices
will be down to the mid-thirties.

Matthew, you need to get on CNN and argue your case.

Why would I bother? Who, besides other Chicken Littles and those with
vested interests in believing them, is going to listen to people who
have announced that Oil Is Running Out many times before and been
wrong each time?

In article ,
Just zis Guy, you know? wrote:
On Fri, 15 Oct 2004 13:29:47 -0500,
(Matthew Russotto) wrote:

Electricity being touted as a replacement for fossil fuels WOULD be
dimwitted, unless you specified electricity generated by nuclear,
wind, solar, hydroelectric, or other non-fossil sources.

That is one of the benefits of electricity: it is amenable to changes
of fuel without having to re-equip vast numbers of homes and
businesses.

Too bad the transmission and distribution losses are so high and the
current technology for storage is so poor.

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"Matthew Russotto" wrote in message
...
In article ogccd.191841$wV.178195@attbi_s54,
Jack Dingler wrote:
http://www.globalpublicmedia.com/#Julian20041013

There's talk about oil prices staying high, but they won't. They
represent negative feedback to the economy. Once enough jobs are shed
and especially after the economic downturn in 2005, I think oil prices
will be down to the mid-thirties.

Matthew, you need to get on CNN and argue your case.

Why would I bother? Who, besides other Chicken Littles and those with
vested interests in believing them, is going to listen to people who
have announced that Oil Is Running Out many times before and been
wrong each time?

Do recall that in the story about the Little Boy Who Cried Wolf, that the
wolf did in fact finally show up.