It's been said before. I know it. But I have to say it again.

We can



and

make an



but we can't develop a cost-effective, environmentally-safe source of renewable energy?!?

Okay, granted the above were possible because of plastics which are petroleum products, but it still shows the amazing potential for human ingenuity.

We've known about the dangers of burning fossil fuels and relying on an oil based economy for over three decades. The race to the moon took less than one. Why the fuck do I still have the choice between driving a big car that is powered by gasoline, driving a small car powered by gasoline, taking a bus powered by gasoline, commuting on a train powered by gasoline or flying on an airplane powered by gasoline?

Yes, every single one of us can make a small difference based on our individual decisions and that can add up...BUT...the difference between a subway commuter and an SUV driver is not as great as that among John Q. Citizen who doesn't have two nickels to rub together at the end of the month, the government and gigantic multi-billion dollar corporations with the resources to make a difference.

Sorry Exxon, but a $36B profit in one year alone could fund a shit load of R&D. I hold you and every other big oil company responsible for your short-sighted, greedy rape of the planet and ultimate destruction of mankind.

Show me the technology or Fuck Off!

The President budgets exactly $9M for alternative fuel research. Even when combined with $1.1B for renewable fuel research, it's a fucking pittance and it's absolutely pathetic.

If we wanted to ACTUALLY fund energy research, a fuel alternative would've been found by now, I guarantee it.

That's all it takes. Don't argue using their premise about technological feasibility.

Change the premise to volition, and the argument changes completely.

to do with "won't." I don't buy it at all!

I know Exxon et al. do not even try to find an alternative fuel source because they can rake in profits with the status quo, but do they not have even an ounce of imagination? If they were the first in the door to create a new fuel system, they would have the market absolutely cornered for a decade and more.

They seem not to realize that alternative fuels ARE coming, one way or another. They can be on board or they can get the fuck out.

The first one of these companies to "scoop the market" would be way over the top. I cannot fathom why it has not been a priority.

They ignored the ISSUE and refused to make it a topic of dicussion during the election.


Kerry on Energy and Gas issues:

The Kyoto Treaty was flawed but could be fixed

BUSH: Had we joined the Kyoto Treaty it would have cost America a lot of jobs. It's one of these deals where in order to be popular in the halls of Europe you sign a treaty. There's a better way to do it. The quality of air is cleaner since I've been the president of the US. And we'll continue to spend money on research and development, because I truly believe that's the way to get from how we live today to being able to live a standard of living that we're accustomed to and being able to protect our environment better, the use of technologies.
KERRY: The Kyoto Treaty was flawed. I was in Kyoto and I was part of that; I know what happened. But Bush didn't try to fix it, he just declared it dead, ladies and gentlemen. And we walked away from the work of 160 nations over 10 years. You wonder why it is that people don't like us in some parts of the world. You just say, Hey, we don't agree with you, good-bye. Bush's done nothing to try to fix it. I will.
Source: Second Bush-Kerry Debate, in St. Louis MO Oct 8, 2004
No American should be held hostage to our oil dependence

We value an America forever independent of Mideast oil. What does it mean for our economy and national security when we only have 3% of the world's oil reserves, yet we rely on foreign countries for 53 percent of what we consume? We will rely on our own ingenuity and innovation, not the Saudi royal family. We will invest in new technologies and alternative fuels and the cars of the future so that no young American in uniform will ever be held hostage to our dependence on oil from the Middle East. Source: Acceptance speech to the Democratic National Convention Jul 29, 2004


Encourage fuel efficient cars & use reserves in short-term

Kerry says he would spend $10 billion over 10 years on new plants to manufacture more fuel efficient vehicles. He also would offer up to a $4,000 tax credit for people who buy advanced technology vehicles that get better mileage. Kerry wants to divert oil being used to fill the Strategic Petroleum Reserve in the short term and bring it to market to bring down prices. And his administration would demand that oil-producing nations increase supply. Source: CNN.com May 25, 2004
No nuclear waste dump in Nevada's Yucca Mountain

Nevadans understand better than anyone why so many Americans don't trust Bush. In 2000, candidate Bush promised not to ship nuclear waste to your state unless scientifically deemed safe. But after the election, President Bush caved to special interests and broke his promise to Nevada, and he has been doing his best to turn this state into a nuclear waste dump ever since.

That's a pattern Bush has repeated time after time: on issue after issue, George W. Bush keeps saying one thing to the people, and then doing another big favor for the special interests. As my friends in Nevada can tell you, I have stood time and time again with Nevada families to stop George W. Bush from turning this state into a nuclear waste dump. As your President, I'll continue that fight for Nevada - and you'll have the White House working for your top priority, instead of selling you out to the special interests.
Source: Press release, "Nuclear waste to Yucca Mountain" Feb 13, 2004


Raise CAFE standard to 36 mpg by 2015

Q: Would you increase the required automobile fleet average of 27.5 mpg; and SUVs and pickups averaging 20.7 mpg?
A: I support updating CAFE standards to 36 miles per gallon by 2015. This proposal will reduce America's dependence on oil by saving 2 million barrels of oil per day -- almost as much as we currently import from the Persian Gulf. It will reduce greenhouse gas emissions, smog and ozone pollution.
Source: Associated Press policy Q&A, "Fuel Efficiency" Jan 25, 2004


Ban MBTE and sue companies who make it

Q: MTBE in gasoline is linked to water pollution, but adding ethanol is costly. How would you balance between the environment and the economy, as it pertains to MTBE?
KERRY: It needs to be banned, taken out. And the companies that have put it in need to be held responsible for it. One- sixth of the lakes of New Hampshire are polluted with MBTE. Now, Tom DeLay and his friends in Congress have been busy protecting those companies from their responsibility, trying to give them liability immunity for what they've done. This is the worst environmental administration that I've ever seen in all my time in public life. They're going backward on clean air, backward on clean water, backward on forest policy.
As president, I will balance between jobs and the economy, but I'm not going to give people a phony choice that says, "It's either the jobs or the economy." Cleaning up the environment is jobs. And we're going to create 500,000 of them for Americans in the first years.
Source: Democratic 2004 Primary Debate at St. Anselm College Jan 22, 2004


20% renewable energy by 2020

Q: How would you get the US to become more self-reliant for our energy needs?
A: We have to encourage the use of hybrid vehicles and invest in research and development. We have to set a goal by 2020 that 20 percent of our energy will come from renewable fuels. I am going to create an energy efficient trust fund to look for news sources of energy and we are going to create tens of thousands of jobs doing that. We can't drill our way out of this.
Source: Concord Monitor / WashingtonPost.com on-line Q&A Nov 7, 2003


Drilling for oil doesn't gain energy independence

To some extent, Apollo Project would involve redeploying resources from the failed energy policies of the past and present. At present we spend $1.8 billion in subsidies to the oil and gas industries while investing only $24 million in federal venture capital for alternative energy sources. And the Bush administration seeks to accelerate this trend by moving heaven and most of all earth to expand oil drilling in some of our most sensitive environments. All this drilling won't produce significant quantities of oil for many years, so we will remain dependent on a global oil market whose prices are controlled-and often manipulated-by a handful of countries, lending permanent instability to our economy. Source: A Call to Service, by John Kerry, p. 85-86 Oct 1, 2003


Apollo project approach to energy independence

A smart energy policy can reflect a smart economic policy. We can work toward energy independence not only from foreign energy sources but from environmentally damaging sources as well-in a way that calls on the best of our creative and entrepreneurial spirit and improves both our quality of life and our national security.

In the 1960's President Kennedy challenged America to conquer space and land on the moon within a decade. It's time for comparable Apollo Project approach to energy independence, with a focused effort that relies on public-private partnerships and creates millions of new jobs. For Americans who work in engineering, design, and industry, the growth of wind, solar, and geothermal energy would spark a surge in production and jobs. And since developing new energy technology requires research and path-breaking applications, we can create thousands of high-paying jobs in those areas as well. Americans can take the lead, or we can let Germans and Japanese dominate this new industry.
Source: A Call to Service, by John Kerry, p. 85-86 Oct 1, 2003


Dismissal of Kyoto indicative of Bush's unilateralism

There have been periods in our history when it didn't much matter if we had a president who was inclined toward fostering international relations or commanded a lot of personal respect in other countries. This is emphatically not one of those times. It is hard to think of a modern presidency so reflexively and systematically marked by rejection of diplomacy, international cooperation, and other building blocks for collective security as that of George W. Bush.

The first sign of indifference was the summary rejection of the Kyoto Protocol on Global Climate Change. the handiwork of dozens of countries acting under U.S. leadership for a decade. Kyoto could and should have been improved; instead, it was dismissed by the Bush government out of hand. This was followed by the United States' refusal to sign the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, another product of long years of American leadership. Both rejections came in the president's first year in office.
Source: A Call to Service, by John Kerry, p. 48-9 Oct 1, 2003


ANWR won't provide any oil for 20 years

Q: On one hand you say there is a national security need to reduce dependence imported oil, while on the other hand you oppose drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska?
KERRY: The Arctic Wildlife Refuge won't provide a drop of oil for 20 years. And the total amount of oil, if it were to come through at the level that some people in the oil industry predict, will amount to about a 1% to 2% reduction in the total dependency of the United States on oil.
Source: Debate at Pace University in Lower Manhattan Sep 25, 2003


Invent our way out of oil dependency-don't drill our way out

We only have 3% of the world's oil reserves. There is no physical way for the US to drill its way out of this problem. We have to invent our way out of this problem. The sooner that we commit America to the science & discovery of renewable alternatives, the better off America will be, the better our health will be, the more effective our economy would be, the better our national security will be, and the better world citizen we will be. We need to commit ourselves to energy independence now. Source: Debate at Pace University in Lower Manhattan Sep 25, 2003
Invest in advancing secure forms of energy instead of oil

Q: What is your view on our dependence on fossil fuels?
A: Today we have an energy policy of big oil, by big oil, and for big oil. With common-sense investments in advancing and speeding breakthroughs, we can harness the natural world around us to light and power the world we live in with secure forms of energy at reasonable costs for a modern economy. I recently unveiled a plan to increase America's security and improve the environment, by ending our dependence on foreign oil within 10 years.
Source: MoveOn.org interview Jun 17, 2003


Create new energy sources to end Mideast dependency

We must invest again in America and put our ingenuity to work to unclog our highways, to build a modern transportation network we can be proud of. We must harness the creative genius of our entrepreneurs, laboratories and universities to create the energy sources of the future, to liberate us from dependence on Middle East oil and do all of this while protecting our precious resources like the Arctic Wildlife Refuge.
Source: Speech at Massachusetts Democratic Convention May 31, 2002

EVERY single rooftop in the U.S.? We could make a small effort to at least OFFSET by some percentage our dependance on non renewable energy.

Economics. The capital expense isn't worth the return. Either for the home owner or the power company. Both could better spend their money towards similar ends. This won't necessarily always be true however.


"Why arent there wind mills and solar power panels on EVERY single rooftop in the U.S.? We could make a small effort to at least OFFSET by some percentage our dependance on non renewable energy."

First, the residential technology I have been able to find pretty much limits solar power to heating your water. $6-10,000 to install the equipment to do that.

The estimate I got for converting completely to solar energy was roughly equal to the purchase price of my home with no guarantee that my roof size would accommodate the necessary panels.

Ouch! Hardly in the "affordable" range.

"We've known about the dangers of burning fossil fuels and relying on an oil based economy for over three decades. The race to the moon took less than one. Why the fuck do I still have the choice between driving a big car that is powered by gasoline, driving a small car powered by gasoline, taking a bus powered by gasoline, commuting on a train powered by gasoline or flying on an airplane powered by gasoline?"

The answer is fairly simple, yet frustrating. Those other examples you provide put no special demands upon the laws of physics. With fossil fuels you are up against the laws of physics. Basically all those vehicles are powered by variations of hydrocarbons. (They aren't all gasoline but I'm trying not to be too pedantic). Moving platforms take alot of energy to move and storage volume, and in some cases weight, become very important. You can engineer the vehicle six ways from Sunday, but engineering the fuel is a bit more difficult. Petrolium is pumped out of the ground with the energy embedded in it. Through distillation it can be reformed into other products. But the energy is there. With most other forms of energy storage (elecric, hydrogen, ethanol) you have to create/draw the energy from somewhere else and cram it in there. Coal, hydroelectric, wind, solar, etc. The process is expensive, and short of making gasoline out of those processes, you'll be hard pressed to achieve the same kinds of energy density in terms of both weight and volume. I'm not saying that it is impossible, but don't expect it to be easy or of the same magintude as going to the moon.

The beauty of hybrid vehicles is that they by their energy storage nature provide the possibility of "multi-fuel" capability. However you can best create electricty, you can then store it and use it to drive your vehicle. And economically, anyone who can create a better "battery" (electron storage device) can virtually immediately enter a market where their product will produce a profit. Do not under estimate this factor in attracting venture capital. The longer the car goes without having to use the other engine, the more that solar power can be used to power it. Strangely enough, the same demands that laptops put on batteries are those that cars will also be looking to use for better batteries there as well. The future maybe here and we may get to watch and participate.