Gas rationing in the UK, soon the US?
Is it just me or is every pump in my immediate vicinity (Fulton county, Georgia) out of "regular and medium" gas and of course, they apologize for the inconvenience. First the low cost gas station was invaded, a week ago and I didn't think much of it, with waiting lines and all and next, yesterday, high end BP and Shell were out of Gas on the 2 lower lines of product. Then this morning, the Fintag blog reports of shortages and rationing of gas in the UK. It's official over there.
Should I freak out? Or is some company hoarding stash as the price of oil shoots to $120 a barrel? I shouldn't freak out I guess, but at the very least I feel like a dying breed putting gas in my Porsche Turbo. I love the car but it looks like an endangered specie however. I look at the SUV next to me, pumping even more gas in the tank. I see dead cars!
I can't wait for my Tesla Motors car to get here and stay marginally ahead of the curve.
Bring it on!
Should I freak out? Or is some company hoarding stash as the price of oil shoots to $120 a barrel? I shouldn't freak out I guess, but at the very least I feel like a dying breed putting gas in my Porsche Turbo. I love the car but it looks like an endangered specie however. I look at the SUV next to me, pumping even more gas in the tank. I see dead cars!
I can't wait for my Tesla Motors car to get here and stay marginally ahead of the curve.
Bring it on!
Comments
William
A link to the BBC article: Strike refinery shutdown comp.
120$/barrel might be a conservative figure... 150 by the end of the year, or may be 200?
(Not to mention the prices of buying cars ...)
Interesting dilemma for the CA people who drive SUVs and put "War is not the Answer" bumper stickers on them...when will you break down and allow drilling in that 40 billion barrel field off the coast of LA area? Perhaps after a couple of years of 10 gallon / month rationing + $200 1 gal coupons on eBay? :-) ...
Dilemma for the FLA people too...drill for nat gas off the coast of Florida or don't A/C the house?!?
I gotta get one of those plug-in hybrids before you rich people bid them up to $100K+! :-) ...
It's these major shifts coming that had me shaking my head a bit at these 2020 visions of the future. Good to think long term and have a vision. Unfortunately, the world, particularly in the US, will be much different than one imagines. Thomas Friedman and some of these 2020 visionaries are skating to where the puck is, not where it is going.
I'd say in addition to some of the new energy and bio tech fields, the great industries of the 21st century will be those of the 19th century - rail, coal (with a modern bent, e.g., CTL), river/water transport, localized industry, and agriculture. I've not seen any of these expounded on in these tech industry 2020 visions.
interesting...
yes. I was thinking yesterday about it. Take the french bullet train the "TGV". It is a great regional transport mode that works of electricity. When gas becomes scarce, unless we can find planes that work off of electricity, this could be a good mode of transportation. Of course the french will probably never capitalize on that trend... we have been so poor at marketing those fine technologies. We just think marketing is dirty or something.
electricity represents only a few part of the energy supply. Switching from gas to electricity just does not scale, as it takes years to build a nuclear plant (and months to build a coal plant, assuming people are ready to accept those kind of plants close to their cities ...)
Unless you couple a personal solar plant on top of your roof to feed your car's batteries, I don't see electric car to become a reality for more than a few thousands people.
And considering that a hell lot of people simply don't have a roof to put a solar plant on ... Like in big cities where people are just packed in small flats...