Gas Rage In Staten Island

[Alex Potter]

Nuclear is good, however, the only thing I have against it is the
tranporting of the used fuel to the proposed Yucca mountain storage
facility(sp?)

Ken

Nuclear is bad. Forget about transport of waste - the major problem
centers around the need to store the waste *safely* for more than
20,000 years....

 

[Doug Huffman]

Again, accidents, failures of the transportation system? Or merely
groundless fears.

 

[Ken M]

Well both, accidents and failures in the system. Chances are pretty
slim that either would occur. I don't know who is going to be doing the
tranporting, but I would feel better if it were just the government,
and not contracted out to some company that bid the lowest.

Ken
not a nimby.

 

[Doug Huffman]

I retired from the industry. I used to have to engineer the hypothetical
destruction of such things for specific purposes and would be pleased to
answer fairly specific questions if I can. Be aware though that 'the road
to hell is paved with what-ifs' and 'the conspiracy of ignorance masquerades
as common sense'.

 

[Per D. Sørensen]

Do you seriously consider a Camry an econobox? Around here, a Camry is an
overly large, unpopular sedan, and a Corolla (one size down) is a popular
midsize one. Econoboxes are things like Daihatsu Cuore and other Geo Metro
sized vehicles.

Here in Norway Corolla is two sizes down from Camry, the Avensis is
between them. And then you have the Yaris which is one size down from
Corolla. It is very popular, unlike its predecessor Starlet.

 

[Grolsch]

Merely groundless fears?, Like the lemming like faith the people of new
Orleans had in the Levies?

 

[Per D. Sørensen]

I'll tell that to Art who worked on my kids' bikes. He got along pretty
well on his artificial leg since Korea, but lately he's needed to put his
fat wheelchair into his fat SUV and drive his fat ass around visiting
nursing homes as a volunteer feeder.

Isn't it difficult for him to get himself and his wheelchair in to
a ridiculus tall vehicle?

 

[Kovie]

Have you ever heard of the word 'sarcasm'? Look it up sometime.


Jasper

You're not serious, right? Or are you "kidding on the square"...

Kovie
(e-mail address removed)

 

[Kovie]

Since the Feds didn't do anything to 'force' conservation, via CAFE
standards, the market will do it for them. I feel no pity for the 'big
three', everytime I see a 'gotta have a Hemi' commercial...and fat
america bought into it with both feet.

Not to worry, Hillary and the Dems are coming in '06 and '08 and they'll tax
big oil to the point of bankruptcy, balancing the budget and forcing
conservation on all of us!

Ok, the morning caffeine's wearing off, back to reality...

Kovie
(e-mail address removed)

 

[Kovie]

If there were only one oil company, sure. But a competitive market
economy doesn't work that way. No-one can force the consumer to give
him the same profits he made last year. Why? Imagine that Shell raises
their prices by 10c/gal in order make more money. Well, Citgo don't and
consumers flock to them, and Shell makes even less. So Shell lower
their price.

Only collusion can keep prices artificially high. I do worry that we
have fewer oil companies than before--they quite probably qualify as an
oligopoly these days, and that can have collusion-like effects.

There IS only one oil company these days. It's called the GOP (Government
Oil Producers)! Are you actually suggesting that what's going on could be
due to anything but deliberate collusion? Unfortunately, we can't "prove" it
because Cheney refuses to release his energy task force's documents, under
the excuse of "national security". Don't get me started...

Kovie
(e-mail address removed)

 

[Kovie]

I ride me bike...'gad ZOOKS'...I live 3 miles from where I work, My
wife works 5 miles away. I drive once per week(to see may massage
therapist, broken back, hit by a BIG FOOKIN TRUCK, while riding), I
have cars that get 30mpg...

Don't 'gotta have a hemi'...

I wouldn't bother taking "straw man" arguments too seriously, except to make
fun of them.

Instead, we should all implore Lightspeed, Merlin, etc., to build
all-titanium SUVs that weigh 1500lbs and get 50mpg (and cost $250,000+).
Even Bush would buy one!

 

[Kovie]

Have there been any significant transportation accidents? Or you mean the
Yucca Mountain itself - then you're a NIMBY Luddite.

Was there a Cat 4+ hurricane that flattened the gulf states and breached New
Orleans' levees until last Monday? Do people buy lottery tickets because
they've already won $2 million dollar?

It's not about what HAS happened, but what COULD happen, statistically
speaking, based on known science (although I'd guess that the odds of a
catastrophic nuclear spill or accident while being transported are a LOT
higher than the odds of hitting the jackpot).

I'm not arguing for or against nuclear energy, just that it's not this
simple, and name-calling immediately excludes you or your opinion from
serious consideration.

Oh, and btw, there have been MANY non-nuclear hazmat accidents and spills
over the years, that could just as easily happen to nuclear cargo, no matter
how many precautions are taken. NOTHING is 100% safe. It's just a matter of
acceptable tradeoffs and thresholds.

Kovie
(e-mail address removed)

 

[Ken M]

Well New Orleans was an event waiting to happen. That is what happens
when you build a city by the sea in a giant hole.

Ken

 

[Ken M]

Storage? That is what Yucca mountain is for. Just pile it up inside and
forget about it.

Ken

 

[Ken M]

Well the ' what if ' scenerios would not keep me from voting to
transport and store the stuff at Yucca. What if a comet came and hit
Yucca mountain while it had all the spent fuel there? What if some
terrorist hijacked a truck or train with the waste? What if What if. It
all hypothetical.

Ken

 

[Mark Hickey]

Apparently some people don't listen. Because if they did they wouldn't
get all excited about tapping the reserves, it's not going to help, the
only thing that will help short term is a reduction in demand.

Actually, tapping the SPR will make up for the "gap" in imported oil
that would have otherwise come in through the south Atlantic. There
is somewhat less of a need (for the next few weeks) due to the damage
to gulf-area refineries though.

Mark Hickey
Habanero Cycles
http://www.habcycles.com
Home of the $795 ti frame

 

[Mark Hickey]

The SPR isn't gonna do dick. It's mostly crude, and that's not the
bottleneck. There aren't enough refineries to satisfy demand. You can up
refinery capacity elsewhere, but it's gonna take weeks at best for those
tankers to arrive -- and they don't have a port to dock in anymore,
either.

That's the point - a whole lotta tankers got delayed by the hurricane
- and that's why tapping the reserve is going to help. Yes, the
demand for crude is lower than normal since the gulf-area refineries
are down for a week or three - but without the SPR, we'd be looking at
a gap in the imported oil above and beyond that.

Mark Hickey
Habanero Cycles
http://www.habcycles.com
Home of the $795 ti frame

 

[Ray L. Nutz]

No problem mon we been doing that for years in Netherlands.
But were willing to spend money on Dikes .

 

[Jasper Janssen]

Jasper Janssen wrote:

Here in Norway Corolla is two sizes down from Camry, the Avensis is
between them. And then you have the Yaris which is one size down from
Corolla. It is very popular, unlike its predecessor Starlet.

The Avensis is between them? My apologies. Toyota model lines all run
together in my head. Yes, the Yaris is pretty popular, although mostly in
hatchback versions, not sedan versions.

Jasper

 

[Jasper Janssen]

The other sorta amazing thing that gets lost is that oil companies
have an amazingly steady profit margin. Oil at $25 or $60 a barrell
and they still make in the 6-8% range. So their profits obviously go
up, but not because of gouging. If that was so, then the margins
would be more volitile.

Well, the thing is that both sides of the company cancel out. The
refineries & gas stations suffer badly from high crude prices, which drive
down demand and drive down margins as well (because people pay more
attention to prices and shop around, thus upping competition pressures),
and the production (which isn't actual *production*, of course, just
mining for fluids) sides, for obvious reasons, prosper mightily.

The oil companies are generally set up to be pretty well balanced, because
nobody buys stocks in companies that have their profit depend too much on
oil prices.


Jasper