Re: The irony, tragedy and morbid humor of Ayn Rand

From: Eric Gisin (ericgisin_at_hotmail.com)
Date: 01/03/05 

Date: Sun, 2 Jan 2005 19:12:17 -0800

"Clouseau2" <eric@webmethods.com> wrote in message
news:1104648707.802897.297110@c13g2000cwb.googlegroups.com...
>
> The world oil industry is running at 99% capacity and demand just keeps
> growing. Discoveries peaked 40 years ago, and what new oil fields are
> being discovered each year are more and more miniscule. Coal, heavy
> oils, tar sands, shale, etc., can all be used to replace the oil, but
> are either 1) require way too much energy to exploit and are thus a
Nope. All fossil fuels require energy to extract and refine. Oil sand
extraction can use nuclear power.

> poor replacement 2) cause horrible pollution and environmental
60 years ago the major fuel was coal, and its pollution was much worse. We
survived, and coal is burned much cleaner today.

> devastation or 3) will also run out quickly if we convert our
> transportation system to use them. It is simple to show that if a
Nope, you won't live to see the end of oil and gas, and fuel from coal and tar
sands will last hundreds of years. Oil prices are causing shifts to other fuels
now.

> resource is finite, with a 2% yearly growth rate it will quickly be
> used up, especially if we are anywhere near using 50% of what has ever
Population growth has to stop for reasons other than energy depletion. So
energy use will level off.

> existed. This would be true even if the entire planet was a perfect
> sphere made up only of oil. This is not economics, this is
> mathematics.
>

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