Fossil Fuel

Excerpt from EPA's documentation. Please especially note emissions of bio-diesel are MORE than gasoline!!

Why does burning the gas create humidity? where does the humidity come from, water in the air? and where does it go, does it float up above the flame? is there any way to trap it?

Even if, with the aid of electronic engine controls and efficient catalytic converters, a hydrocarbon fuel is burned completely to water and carbon dioxide, there is now growing concern about carbon dioxide as a greenhouse gas. Measures to cut back on production of carbon dioxide by automobiles without sacrificing performance can focus on efficiency. However, some fuels inherently produce less carbon dioxide when burned completely than gasoline or diesel fuel.

Combustion or burning is a chemical process, an exothermic reaction between a substance (the fuel) and a gas (the oxidizer), usually O₂, to release heat. In a complete combustion reaction, a compound reacts with an oxidizing element, and the products are compounds of each element in the fuel with the oxidizing element.

Consumption of fossil fuels is the dominant source (>99%) of greenhouse gases in Rhode Island. Because of the importance of this source and in order to give a more complete picture of the trends in fossil fuel emissions,

Coal-fired power plants utilize significant quantities of both coal and water for generating electrical energy. For example, a 500 MW power plant burns approximately 250 tons per hour of coal while using over 12 million gallons per hour of water for cooling and other process requirements.

Partly because of these concerns about radioactivity and the cost of containing it, the American public and electric utilities have preferred coal combustion as a power source. Today 52% of the capacity for generating electricity in the United States is fueled by coal, compared with 14.8% for nuclear energy. Although there are economic justifications for this preference, it is surprising for two reasons. First, coal combustion produces carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases that are suspected to cause climatic warming, and it is a source of sulfur oxides and nitrogen oxides, which are harmful to human health and may be largely responsible for acid rain. Second, although not as well known, releases from coal combustion contain naturally occurring radioactive materials--mainly, uranium and thorium.

"What you're about to read may challenge your assumptions about the kind of world we live in, and especially the kind of world into which events are propelling us. We are in for a rough ride through uncharted territory. “

Peak Oil is entering the mainstream. A phrase once considered synonymous with “The End of Oil” – the point at which global oil production reaches its peak – is now a subject for serious debate.

The view that it makes sense to consider the prospect that there will be quite different peaks – indeed quite different types of peak – in each of three main producing categories: the non-OPEC world outside the Former Soviet Union (FSU), the FSU itself, and the OPEC countries, particularly the five giant Middle East producers: Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Iran, Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates.

Everything that you need to know about the future of Saudi Arabian oil production can be found in a staff report to the subcommittee on international economic policy of the committee on foreign relations of the United States Senate (1979). Regardless of what you may or may not have heard on that increasingly relevant subject, between 1979 and now hardly anything has changed, although the question must still be asked why this and similar documents were – and still are – overlooked by many energy professionals.

Some citizens of Middle East countries – to include Saudi Arabia – were quite vocal about the economic and social inadvisability of producing too much oil. According to an article in The Economist, (May 29, 2004), Mr bin Laden was one of them. We can now ask how we reach equilibrium, and the answer is uncomplicated. If the flow demand and supply curves are of the usual types – i.e. have the usual slopes – then the increase in price raises flow supply above flow demand, resulting in an increase in inventories that continues until AI = DI, and Dp =0.

In good news for the SUV set, Daniel Yergin's Cambridge Energy Research Associates (CERA), is predicting we will soon be awash in light, sweet crude - ideal for making gasoline. CERA doesn't believe in peak oil, at least not before 2010, and probably not before 2020. The report indicates that the “inflexion” point will come between 2030 and 2040. Moreover, rather than a “peak,” it will be an “undulating plateau” that will continue for several decades.

Wall Street firm John S. Herold Inc. of Norwalk, CT http://www.herold.com/ has estimated peak production for about two dozen oil companies. Without substantial new investment and additional discoveries, the company believes that French oil company, Total S.A., will reach peak production in 2007. Exxon Mobil, ConocoPhillips, BP, Royal Dutch/Shell Group, and the Italian producer, Eni S.p.A. will hit peak production in 2008. In 2009, Herold expects ChevronTexaco Corp. to peak. In Herold's view, each of the world's seven largest publicly traded oil companies will begin seeing production declines within the next 48 months or so.

"prudent to be skeptical of Saudi production forecasts". He argued that published critical data concerning Saudi reservoirs was sparse

"It is a difficult problem and challenge faced by us. So it is a task of our petroleum staff to fully realize the severity of the problem and take effective measures to solve it in time."

Civilization as we know it is coming to an end soon. This is not the wacky proclamation of a doomsday cult, apocalypse bible prophecy sect, or conspiracy theory society. Rather, it is the scientific conclusion of the best paid, most widely-respected geologists, physicists, and investment bankers in the world.

So one could say the oil world provides the pool from which the dollar exchange rate valuation is applied and enforced. Gold investors love to point to Iran war tensions as a factor to lift the gold price, but they might overlook how the associated earthquakes in banking shift the very ground under the world currency reserve.

The history of the petro-dollar could be described as a syndicate contract between the United States and Saudi Arabia to subsidize the US dollar, to prop up the Western banking system, to enable the Arab royals (sheiks and emirs) to continue to claim their national treasures as their private property.

If the petro-dollar prop were to be removed, entire national banking systems like the Japanese or Korean or German would shift, which would come as a delivered shock wave to the US Treasury Bond complex.

The US Senate Judiciary Committee unanimously voted in favour of the so-called "NOPEC" legislation, which would allow for criminal prosecution of countries that organize energy cartels and manipulate the prices of natural resources.

A new study ordered by the Pentagon warns that the rising cost and dwindling supply of oil -- the lifeblood of fighter jets, warships, and tanks -- will make the US military's ability to respond to hot spots around the world "unsustainable in the long term."

Oil refining's perception problem has taken a new, unflattering turn: Not only are there not enough refineries, they don't run right.

Updating the Depletion Model
Work proceeds in updating the depletion model. It is less than an exact science to try to spot the anomalies in the data and to formulate realistic forecasts.

Though the estimates vary, everyone agrees that the question of global peak is not "if" it will occur, but "when."

As Richard Heinberg makes shockingly clear in this extraordinarily well-researched and -written book, our way of life will soon change dramatically, as oil production and reserves both begin to decline. He also makes clear that our actions now will strongly affect what is left of the world when this shift away from oil takes place.

It's inevitable. But just how soon will the vital fuel become so scarce and expensive that we're forced to make hard choices about how we live?

If peak oil theorists are correct, our dependence on oil is not only foolish, it's lethal.

Are we running out of oil? Running out is not the important issue. A better question is: When will production reach a peak?

"We are as dependent on oil and natural gas as the Sioux and Cheyenne were on the buffalo."

Petroleum is black magic, the lifeblood of our civilization. The petroleum industry provides 40 % of the globe's energy and is humanity's largest commercial enterprise. Oil is our most concentrated, flexible, and convenient fuel. Without petroleum there would be no automobile industry, no tourism. Without petroleum 2 % of Americans could not feed the remaining 98 %.

The fundamental driver of the 20^th Century's economic prosperity has been an abundant supply of cheap oil. At first, it came largely from the United States as it opened up its great territories with dynamic capitalism and technological prowess. But its discovery peaked around 1930, and inevitably led to a corresponding peak in production some forty years later.

"Few would deny that the world runs on oil. By describing oil as a fossil fuel, everyone admits that it was formed in the past, which means that we started running out when we consumed the first barrel. That much can surely be agreed, even if opinions differ about how far along the depletion curve we are. ...."

Assessing the world's endowment of oil would not be a particularly difficult task were it not for the atrociously unreliable database on what has been found so far. The analyst has therefore to spend much time and effort defining the data and removing the worst anomalies before addressing the nature of depletion.

While this general picture remains valid in resource terms, events did not unfold as expected but took a different turn. The limits to production capacity were indeed reached at the end of 2000 and prices did soar, but the economy reacted more quickly than expected by plunging the world into recession, which cut oil demand and reduced pressure on prices, which have remained weak.

"The reality is that there is no real reprieve. Gradually the market – and not just the oil market - will come to realize that OPEC can no longer single-handedly manage depletion. It will be a dreadful realization because it means that there is no ceiling to oil price other than from falling demand. That in turn spells economic recession and a crumbling stock market, the first signs of which are already being felt.

Unfortunately, the ability of alternative energies to replace oil is based more in mythology and utopian fantasy than in reality and hard science.

Oil fuels the modern world. No other substance can equal the enormous impact which the use of oil has had on so many people, so rapidly, in so many ways, and in so many places around the world.

What about alternatives to oil? Can’t we just switch to different sources of energy?

Unfortunately, the ability of alternative energies to replace oil is based more in mythology and utopian fantasy than in reality and hard science. Oil accounts for 40 percent of our current US energy supply..

The coal industry is attempting to enhance its attractiveness in light of growing concern that coal-fired utility plants are one of the biggest contributors to world-wide pollution. "Coal Gasification" is the latest method to "clean-up" coal. This is a visual representation of the process. Please allow time for this to boot as it is a large file.

Talk of "clean coal" focuses only on reducing some pollutants released into the air when we burn coal for electricity. Such talk completely ignores massively destructive coal extraction techniques. Mountaintop removal is not "clean."

Robust reformate demand in Asia boosted gasoline prices to a three-month high on the last trading day in April, Platts data revealed.

Gasoline is produced by "breaking down" the larger hydrocarbons in crude oil into smaller ones with between 3-12 carbon atoms.

Gasoline prices tend to be volatile due to a number of factors ranging from feedstock availability, fundamental supply/demand shifts, plant outages, government taxes and fuel specifications.

Europe and Asia have both seen historical highs for gasoline prices in 2004. Below are summaries of the key prices movements, and the market reactions that followed.

The state has no unbundled natural gas service programs for residential customers.