Webs’ Random Ideas

Hopefully the argument of dependency on foreign oil and using alternative energies can be laid to rest.

Not a bad idea really. Sure I would rather see a faster transistion to alternative energy, but we do not have the infrastructure to transistion over night. Nor are we currently spending enough money on research to advance technology.

But how exactly does the plan work?

The Pickens Plan is a bridge to the future — a blueprint to reduce foreign oil dependence by harnessing domestic energy alternatives, and buy us time to develop even greater new technologies.

Building new wind generation facilities and better utilizing our natural gas resources can replace more than one-third of our foreign oil imports in 10 years. But it will take leadership.

Seems like a good idea to me. Check out the site and see what you think.

I guess those two go hand in hand… anyways here is what I am talking bout:

So there are two issues here:

1) McCain wants to drill of the coast in part to help with energy independence, in fact he seems to be claiming that this will in fact help achieve this.

2) McCain is stating that inflating tires has no effect on how much gas Americans consume, and has no marginal gain in energy independence.

1) For this statement to be true drilling off-shore would have to have an effect on US oil supply. Well according to some people that know what they are talking about the change would be marginal. It would take 7-10 years to start getting oil from off-shore, and the amount coming in would be minimal and have no real effect. It’s simply pandering.

Even if some new technology were able to make the drilling go deeper and tap into previously unknown sources, the effect is still a marginal gain in the grand scheme of things as we are importing 10,000 more barrels a day then we are exporting. It’s going to take a lot to change this.

Unfortunately off-shore drilling has disasterous environmental effects and other solutions could have a more immediate effect. Such as using more alternative energies. Who cares how wasteful people are being their energy used comes from a renewable source? It just makes sense to me.

2) As for this point, well 1 simple link will do just fine. The funny thing is, I learned about the usefullness of inflating tires 10 years ago from drivers ed. And I heard the same thing repeated from multiple car “experts” (friends or local mechanics I trusted as a source of info). Only now has it become politicized.

Both candidates are pandering on energy that one is obvious and is why we need to question them. Don’t let your candidate get off easy, write them and prod them with questions.