Filled up for $1.78/gallon

[Brucelee]

Originally Posted by Perfectlap

I can do without nearly all of those things...but the engine oil which I only need once a year.

gas is something that you really don't have a choice about. You may save a few bucks by going to different gas stations but if the lowest price to fill your tank is nearly twice what it was two years ago. You are a paying. Or you are a staying home, or taking public transportation (if it shows up, waited 2 hours today).
Everbody else can switch from Starbucks to cheapo instant brand, from listerine to generic supermarket brand, from bottled water to tap water, and make tremendous savings yet still be able to go one with their lives without skipping a beat. Can't do that with unleaded.

I just changed cars and improved my mileage per gallon by 50%. Also switched from premium to regular gas, save another .20 per gallon.

In the long run, everyone has alternatives. It is the use of these alternative that has resulted in the drop in demand for oil and the drop in oil prices to under $50 per barrel. Simple economic behavior.

BTW-I will take any bet you want on that gas price you pointed to. Lastly of course, the historic price increases on gas has actually been moderate on a percentage basis. Adjusted for inflation, it has NOT been a large issue for many many years. It appears that the last year was a blip. Of course, you do have to strip out the taxes on gas to see the REAL cost, which in some states is nearly .40 per gallon. So, in the example above, the real cost of gas is likley about $1.40 per gallon. Not bad I think!

We shall see.

Next time, read the article and respond with facts, not hype!

[Perfectlap]

question, when crude was last $50 a drum two years ago, how much was a gallon of unleaded? Now that its back to $50 why is unleaded still a dollar more per gallon than it was two years ago?
Are we going to see a a dollar drop in the price of a gallon of 93?

[Brucelee]

Originally Posted by Perfectlap

question, when crude was last $50 a drum two years ago, how much was a gallon of unleaded? Now that its back to $50 why is unleaded still a dollar more per gallon than it was two years ago?
Are we going to see a a dollar drop in the price of a gallon of 93?

As the article pointed out, crude prices have plunged quickly and gas prices are following, with some lag.

Regarding the specific price per gallon in your area, look to your state and fed gas tax as a source of discrep. In CA case, we also have our own "special fuel" mandated by state law. Costs more!

[Allen K. Littlefield]

One must also take into account, while the rest of the nation freezes in extremely cold temperatures, the Liberal North East ( a vast consumer of all energies) is enjoying a rather mild winter which has led to surplus of heating oil due to less demand. More crude is now available for gas but since that demand is off things are starting to back up.

We also are not "addicted" to oil. Oil is the life blood of a free capatilist economy. Are we addicted to a steady flow of red blood cells? Too bad the Ecocrats will not allow drilling in the Arctic or Gulf for our own oil which would add to the surplus and thus furthur drive down prices and boost the overall everyday Joe's economy. We can only wait and see.

986geezer

[Brucelee]

Originally Posted by Allen K. Littlefield

One must also take into account, while the rest of the nation freezes in extremely cold temperatures, the Liberal North East ( a vast consumer of all energies) is enjoying a rather mild winter which has led to surplus of heating oil due to less demand. More crude is now available for gas but since that demand is off things are starting to back up.

We also are not "addicted" to oil. Oil is the life blood of a free capatilist economy. Are we addicted to a steady flow of red blood cells? Too bad the Ecocrats will not allow drilling in the Arctic or Gulf for our own oil which would add to the surplus and thus furthur drive down prices and boost the overall everyday Joe's economy. We can only wait and see.

986geezer

Well, you wouldn't want to increase SUPPLY would you? Geez, that would only increase GLOBAL WARMING, which as we all know, is going to kill us by 2010!!!!!!!!!!

[jeffsquire]

Originally Posted by Brucelee

Well, you wouldn't want to increase SUPPLY would you? Geez, that would only increase GLOBAL WARMING, which as we all know, is going to kill us by 2010!!!!!!!!!!

________________________

Funny you should mention this. Last week I was looking at a cartoon with my son. I think it was called "Captain Enviroment" or something. Anyway, it was created in 1993. 5 kids were part of Captain Enviroment's posse. They alll have superpowers of some type that heal the earth. They have weapons like the Scum-o-copter, the sludge cannon, eco body armor. . . you get the point. The premise of this cartoon series is that the earth will be a catastrophic, madmax-type wasteland by the YEAR 2000!!! unless we stop consuming so much energy. THere's an eco-villain and all the bad guys have sludge, dirt or toxicity incorporated into their surnames. It was outrageous and mortifying yet hysterical to watch. Luckily my son found it humorous but I see how this type of stuff terrifies some young folk.

[Brucelee]

Too funny! See below:



Read the latest on global cooling in the Winter 2003-2004 issue of 21st Century in "The Ice Age Is Coming" by Zbigniew Jaworowski, M.D., Ph.D., D.Sc. (pdf format)


Return to top Is a New Ice Age Under Way?
by Laurence Hecht

“Watch out, Al Gore. The glaciers will get you!” With that appended note, my friend, retired field geologist Jack Sauers, forwarded to me a report that should have been a lead item in every newspaper in the world. It was the news that the best-measured glacier in North America, the Nisqually on Mount Rainier, has been growing since 1931.

The significance of the fact, immediately grasped by any competent climatologist, is that glacial advance is an early warning sign of Northern Hemisphere chilling of the sort that can bring on an Ice Age. The last Little Ice Age continued from about 1400 to 1850. It was followed by a period of slight warming. There are a growing number of signs that we may be descending into another Little Ice Age—all the mountains of “global warming” propaganda aside.

Our current understanding of the long-term climate cycles shows that for the past 800,000 years, periods of approximately 100,000 years’ duration, called Ice Ages, have been interrupted by periods of approximately 10,000 years, known as Interglacials. (We are now about 10,500 years into the present Interglacial.)

What Causes Ice Ages
These cycles are not mere statistical correlations, as some Wall Street prognosticator working at the modern PC version of a ouija board might spin out. They are determined, with great scientific precision, to correlate with long-term, cyclical changes in the Earth’s orbital relationship to the Sun. Three fundamental orbital relationships are involved, each of which contributes to the amount of sunlight received in high latitudes of the Northern Hemisphere. When these cycles combine to reduce the incoming solar radiation (insolation) during summer months, over a number of years, the ice sheets which permanently cover Greenland, parts of Alaska, northern Canada, Scandinavia, and elsewhere, begin to advance.

At a certain point, the growth process becomes self-feeding, partly because the high reflectivity of ice and snow reduces the local temperature, partly for reasons that are not fully understood. The glaciers thicken and expand until they become continental ice sheets, one to two miles thick, creeping ever southward. Geological evidence shows that in the last Ice Age, the southern boundary of the continental ice sheet, known as a terminal moraine, stretched down the center of Long Island, through New York City, across New Jersey and Pennsylvania to Southern Illinois and Missouri, then up the Plains States through Montana and Washington State. All of this real estate was buried under one to two miles of ice.

Geologically and climatologically speaking, we are due for another such glacial advance. It might not happen in our lifetimes, but radical shifts in the climate of northern regions can take place suddenly, and in some places may already be taking place.

How to Look at ‘Global Warming’
A very important thing to understand in interpreting all the swill that issues daily from the Global Warming mill (really the anti-industry, anti-population lobby, headed and pumped with money by the Royal Consort Prince Philip, and former Nazi Party member Prince Bernhard of the Netherlands), is that the onset of an Ice Age is not marked by global cooling. In fact, the very same astronomical conditions which cause a cooling at high latitudes in the Northern Hemisphere, produce the opposite effect in the Southern Hemisphere, where there is much more ocean to absorb and retain the incoming solar radiation. Thus the global average temperature does not tell us anything of importance.

The geological requirements for an Ice Age are the presence of a large landmass around the Polar Circle and extending southward. A look at the globe, or world map, shows that those conditions exist in the Northern Hemisphere, but not in the Southern. Therefore, the important thing to look at is the climate conditions in northern and far northern regions. Some of the indicators:


• Since 1980, there has been an advance of more than 55% of the 625 mountain glaciers under observation by the World Glacier Monitoring group in Zurich. (From 1926 to 1960, some 70-95% of these glaciers were in retreat.)

• A comparison of the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s 1965 and 1990 Plant Hardiness Zone Maps, shows a southward change of one zone, or 10°F, between 1965 and 1990.

• Careful measurements of the oxygen isotope ratios in German oaks, which are rigorously calibrated to temperature data, show a 1°C temperature decline from 1350 to 1800 (the lowpoint of the Little Ice Age). Temperature thereafter increased by 1°C from 1800 to 1930, and has been declining since then.

• From weather stations in the Alps, and in the Nordic countries, we find the temperature decline since 1930 is also 1°C.

• Satellite measurements have shown growth in the height and breadth of the huge Greenland ice sheet, the largest in the Northern Hemisphere

On Nisqually
That brings us to the Nisqually glacier, up on the 14,410-foot Mount Rainier, near Tacoma, Wash. Just 85 feet shy of Mount Whitney, the highest point in the lower 48 states, Mount Rainier has 26 glaciers, and is the largest single peak system in the United States.

In 1931, fearful that the receding glacier would provide insufficient runoff for their newly completed hydroelectric facility, Tacoma City Light began careful measurements of the glacier. Since the mid-1800s, the glacier had receded about 1 kilometer. Annual to semi-annual measurements, continued by the U.S. Geological Survey and private contractors for the National Park Service, provide the longest continuous series of glacier measurements in North America.

The details are described in a report by government specialists, which appeared in the September 2000 issue of Washington Geology:

“The greatest thickening during the period of measurement occurred between 1931 and 1945, when the glacier thickened by about 50% near 2,800 meters of altitude. This and subsequent thickenings during the mid-1970s to mid-1980s produced waves that advanced its terminus. Glacier thinning occured during intervening periods. Between 1994 and 1997, the glacier thickened by 17 meters at 2,800-m altitude, indicating probable glacier advance during the first decade of the 21st century.”

That’s the story from Mount Rainier. Retired geologist Sauers, who has been observing conditions in the Cascade Mountains of western Washington for a lifetime, says “I’m preparing for an Ice Age.” Perhaps we all should.


Laurence Hecht is Editor-in-Chief of 21st Century.

[MNBoxster]

Originally Posted by Brucelee

...In the long run, everyone has alternatives. It is the use of these alternative that has resulted in the drop in demand for oil and the drop in oil prices to under $50 per barrel. Simple economic behavior... in the example above, the real cost of gas is likley about $1.40 per gallon. Not bad I think!...Next time, read the article and respond with facts, not hype!

Hi,

I agree with what you say and found the article to be very credible and informative.

Gasoline, even at it's recent high was still a very good bargain given cost/mi. or Therms/gal. compared to many other possible fuels. We're just so used to paying a historically low price for it, that the new realities are stinging a lot of people.

Happy Motoring!... Jim'99

[RandallNeighbour]

When I have a sour stomach, I'd pay $200 a gallon for Pepto Bismol! I gotta have my pink stomach stuff when I feel like

[racer_d]

Paid $2.39/gal for Sunoco 93

[FrayAdjacent]

I filled up today at $2.29 for 93 at a Shell down the street. Not too shabby. I hope prices stay this way for a while!