THERMAL DEPOLYMERIZATION: The Alternative Energy

[Silverhair]

I first learned of Thermal Depolymerization (TDP) in an article in Discover magazine. They are reputable in their science. May 03 issue, article titled "Anything Into Oil" The company doing it is Changing World Technologies. Here is a link to their site: http://www.changingworldtech.com/

Everything that I am going to discuss in this article is based on the idea that the process works as advertised. If it doesn't really work, then this is a nearly useless post.

Since many of you will not know what TDP is here is a brief explanation. It will be over simplified as that is a result of the shortness of the description. Carbon based compounds are mostly polymers that under this process can be broken down into oil of different grades with greater purity than fossil oil, and well as carbon and minerals. A TDP plant can take raw sewage, toxic waste, computer parts, paper, grass, old tires, food waste and at an efficiency of about 85%, convert it into oil. It does this with NO pollution of its own. The water removed is pure. No gaseous emmisions into the air. That efficiency of 85% means that only 15% of the energy put in (in the form of trash) is used up in the process. The cost of a barrel of oil by this process is about $15.00, plus you get the beneficial byproducts.

There is enough agricultural waste in this country that ALL of our imported oil needs could come from this process. With additional crops planted targeted for this TDP we could stop using fossil oil completely. No offshore drilling. No Artic drilling. No drilling period. No supertankers spilling. No massive transfer of wealth to middle eastern dictators & police states.

Helps Global Warming too. The fossil fuels put NEW carbon into the cycle. This process uses carbon that is already in the cycle. I will explain that a bit. A plant takes carbondioxide out of the air, but when the plant dies, even if it is a rain forest tree, it decays and the carbon in the plant becomes CO2 again - no net change. But fossil fuels take carbon that was locked away and puts it back in the air, thereby increasing the greenhouse effect. Essentialy this process uses recent solar energy as the ultimate source. The leaves of plants are the collectors.

This would solve the problem of landfills, toxic wastes, sewage plants, dumping wastes into rivers, etc. All that waste now becomes a valuable resource, and no plant manager is going to throw away something that he can sell for money.

The process is high-tech, but the machinery to do the process is nothing more than refinery technology. Pipes, valves, boilers, etc., with some computer sensors & controls. That means cheap & easy to build. The workers can be ordinary people for the most part. Also, lots of these plants can be made quickly.

The first prototype plant has been built and is in operation. It is mostly a test plant to fine tune the recipies for different types of trash. The first commercial plant is due to go online in a few weeks in Carthage, MO. They will be processing turkey guts into useful oil, carbon, water, & fertilizer & at a profit too. Hey, profit isn't a dirty word.

Not a single one of the Dem candidates have said a single thing about this revolutionary process. Here is my idea:

1. Check the process out to make sure it really does work.

2. Gov't builds thousands of these plants around the country. At first a few to further test the process and train other plant workers & managers. Then more are built. Displaced workers get first shot at a job. The plant is then sold to the workers. The workers will have to form a company, and that company will have to pay a mortage to the Gov't. The company will be then have to stand on their own two feet. The company can not be sold to another company. No mergers, aqqisitions, etc for 10 years or so. I don't know enough how something like that would work exactly, but I have heard of worker owned bussiness and it hould be able to work. To speed up the process we would have to make some serious red tape cutting to fast track this thing.

Result: Lots of new jobs, lessened reliance (Elimination?)on fossil fuels, Energy independence for most countries, Bankrupcy for lots of middle eastern countries, (I don't have any sympthy for them. In some of them women can't be educated, or leave the house w/o a male escort, or even get medical care. And men are allowed to kill family women over "honor" violations, even if the woman didn't actually do anything.)cleaner enviornment, cheap energy gives a hugh boost to the global economy as other countries build their own plants.

As for the guy that invented the process - anybody that can design something that useful deserves to be rich. I have no objection if the guy makes so much money that he leaves Bill Gates eating his dust. That's fine with me. He would probably use most of it for research in to other good ideas anyway.

Of course, if TDP doesn't work, then this was a wasted post. But it is certainly worth checking out.

The Reps seem to be content with allowing private industry to build these at its own speed. I'm sure the oil companies are very excited about all of their expensive drilling equipment not being needed. - (Wink, wink, sarcasm)

To win over the Reps we need to be the Party of New Ideas, the Party of Progress.

Can the Reps steal this idea? Of course - that's part of politics. But people will remember that the idea was ours.

[htuttle]

1. Given that absolutely no planning is going into a 'post oil' economy...

...I fully expect to be warming myself over a scrap fire in a barrel within 20 or so years.

Science is great -- if it's used.

[Silverhair]

2. Did you read the article?

You are talking about a "post oil economy" when TDP delivers and endless supply of pure oil. I's sorry, but it sounds like you didn't read the full post but just knee-jerked.

[Brian Sweat]

10. Where do they get the energy?

[Silverhair]

31. Read the article, or look at their web site.

[Occulus]

3. I read this article too

when it was published, and the general idea behind it (this is the easily-graspable quick explanation that you can give your friends) is that they've found a way to do to carbon-based materials, sludge, animal wastes, etc. in a few minutes what the Earth does to all that over millions of years.

They cook it all.

Apparently, this is an old idea but until now it's not been known what kind of "cooking" process to use. Turns out they were perhaps cooking it too hot to begin with.

Anyway, this thing is scalable- you could put these out in a city in place of garbage trucks, and have them roving around picking up trash in one tank on the truck, and doling out ready-to-use gasoline from another tank. For that matter, if this technology is adopted, it would likely become less and less expensive, to the point that people could buy small ones for home use.

Oh, wouldn't that put the oil co's in a snit?

on edit: I just remembered... some oil companies are enthusiastic about this because it's relatively easy to integrate into the existing infrastructure. The concept is something of a refinery itself, at least.

[Silverhair]

4. They are reclaiming the waste heat.

The products are HOT when they come out of the "oven". The old way was to let then cool by themselves, and the process was too expensive. The old way has been known since the 1960's. What this guy did was to route the hot products back to the intake so that the input is preheated by the hot output, thereby reclaiming the wasted heat energy.

[JM]

5. Not to burst the bubble...

but as I recall, this company was somehow tied to Carlyle and the BFEE. I will look it up to see if I can find the source. It was a while ago, back when this info aired in Pittsburgh.

Later,
JM

[TLM]

6. They had one guy who worked with Carlyle as a consultant...

on military applications of this process.

Like building this on aircraft carriers or military bases... etc.

[Silverhair]

7. Logical error here.

You are judging the validity of an idea by it's source. Judge the TDP on it's own scientific merits. Even bad sources can have scientificlly valid results. For an example look at the WWII Nazi's. Definately evil, but they had some great rocket science. Just because there may be, (I don't know.) a Bush connection doesn't automatically make TDP invalid. The Interstate Highway system was Ike's idea. Does that mean you won't drive on an Interstate?

[DUreader]

8. This article scared the crap outta me in may, Hitler would have loved it

The potential for 'humans to fuel' adds profit to genocide. Horrific.

Otherwise it seems like a good thing.

[TLM]

13. They simply used that as an example...

[DUreader]

9. Back in May, another reply stated that dioxin or pcbs would be present

The science of it was beyond me , but , if true, certainly it would be a drawback.

[arendt]

11. According to the article, process is not hot enough to make pcbs n/t

n/t

[Silverhair]

20. My understanding is that it would break down dioxin.

I could be wrong. But even if it can't, it still does a lot else that's worthwhile - if it works.

[arendt]

12. My friend, in waste recycling, found the article not unbelievable, but...

a google on the company and the process produced nothing
but a bunch of circular references. IOW, there is zero corroboration
by independent parties.

My friend said the temperature of their process was high enough
that he had some doubts about their efficiency numbers; but he
did not doubt their ability to "crack" the chemicals. He said his
company is researching very similar processses.

So, several possiblities, other than the obvious:

1) It is a Ponzi scheme based on controlling the information.
2) It is the same as other similar techniques; these guys have great PR.
3) It is a threat to the powers that be, and is being suppressed
4) It is a threat, but also a solution that keeps the oil infrastructure
alive; so it is being bought up to be monopolized.

At this time, I don't have enough info to decide. But, I'm definitely
tracking the story.

arendt

[Abaques]

14. Its all about the energy cost going in....

I am concerned that there would be a very high cost in energy for this process, although it does look promising. If it can be made efficient then it could be a good thing.

[JohnyCanuck]

15. I'm still skeptical

Oct. 27, 2003 – A staggering 98 tons of prehistoric, buried plant material – that's 196,000 pounds – is required to produce each gallon of gasoline we burn in our cars, SUVs, trucks and other vehicles, according to a study conducted at the University of Utah.

<snip>

Unlike the inefficiency of converting ancient plants to oil, natural gas and coal, modern plant "biomass" can provide energy more efficiently, either by burning it or converting into fuels like ethanol. So Dukes analyzed how much modern plant matter it would take to replace society's current consumption of fossil fuels.

He began with a United Nations estimate that the total energy content of all coal, oil and natural gas used worldwide in 1997 equaled 315,271 million billion joules (a unit of energy). He divided that by the typical value of heat produced when wood is burned: 20,000 joules per gram of dry wood. The result is that fossil fuel consumption in 1997 equaled the energy in 15.8 trillion kilograms of wood. Dukes multiplied that by 45 percent – the proportion of carbon in plant material – to calculate that fossil fuel consumption in 1997 equaled the energy in 7.1 trillion kilograms of carbon in plant matter.

Studies have estimated that all land plants today contain 56.4 trillion kilograms of carbon, but only 56 percent of that is above ground and could be harvested. So excluding roots, land plants thus contain 56 percent times 56.4, or 31.6 trillion kilograms of carbon.

Dukes then divided the 1997 fossil fuel use equivalent of 7.1 trillion kilograms of carbon in plant matter by 31.6 trillion kilograms now available in plants. He found we would need to harvest 22 percent of all land plants just to equal the fossil fuel energy used in 1997 – about a 50 percent increase over the amount of plants now removed or paved over each year.

http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2003-10/uou-bm9102603.php

I'm skeptical that this depolymerization process will entirely be able to replace fossil fuels at our current and projected rates of consumption. While it could help alleviate some of the shortages we will no doubt face, it will be a mistake to think that we can continue our energy intensive, industrialized societies by just growing our energy as crops or reprocessing manufactured waste products back into oil.

As this University of Utah study indicates to grow the material would mean a 50% increase increase in the amount of land devoted to agriculture (to meet just the 1997 consumption figures). As for the argument that the depolymerization process can be used to retrieve oil from waste products, the laws of thermodynamics will dictate that each time the conversion process takes place energy will be lost in the process and the useful energy derived from the output will always be smaller than the energy used to create the input. In a closed system that would mean eventually the process would grind to a halt. However, if outside energy is available to supplement the energy obtained from the material produced by the depolymerization process, it might make some economic sense to derive as much oil as possible from the process in order to alleviate the shortages that will occur after peak oil.

I certainly would not count on depolymerization to mean that life will continue as normal and we'll get to continue our energy hungry North Amercian lifestyles, driving our single occupant SUVs 30 miles from the suburbs to work each day, jetting off each winter to Hawaill or the Caribbean for our vacations etc. etc.

From the article Nine Critical Questions To Ask About Alternative Energy:

Ethanol is another case in point. Some research has shown a negative EROEI for ethanol. Newer research from Oregon shows a slightly positive return. Ethanol is, at best, a slightly beneficial temporary alternative - not a substitute.

Claims that cars can run on vegetable oil never take into account the amount of energy necessary to generate the vegetable oil (farming, vegetable transport, extraction, etc.).

Devices that recycle plastic into oil don't mention the fact that plastic is oil, and that a great deal of energy was used to make it into plastic in the first place.

Similarly, new technology of thermal depolymerization is not a legitimate alternative energy source. This process transforms carbon-based wastes back into hydrocarbon fuel. This technology is useful, and may help us on the downside of the Hubbert curve, but it will never replace fossil fuels. Why? Because the wastes were produced by the use of fossil fuels (my emphasis JC)

EROEI = Energy Returned on Energy Invested.

For more info on the coming Peak Oil crisis see:
www.gulland.ca/depletion/depletion.htm www.peakoil.net www.hubbertpeak.com

[Silverhair]

21. MAJOR error in the analysis.

He used the carbon ONLY. Oil is Hydro-Carbon. You get a LOT of energy from the Hydrogen atoms burning too. And oil has about twice the number of hydrogen atoms as it does carbon. I would not be surprised if 2/3 of the burn energy came from the hydrogen being burned. Back to the chalk board for that analysis.

[JohnyCanuck]

23. I still can't see how it will get by the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics

You'd be expending energy in the planting, fertilizing, weeding and harvesting process and then in the depolymerization process itself to create oil. That oil then has to be used as fuel in cars, trucks, trains and planes, turned into plastics, used to make fertilizers etc. and some of it also used again in the process of planting, fertilizing, weeding and harvesting another crop to be turned into oil.

According to the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics, each time the plants are processed, some energy will be lost and become unrecoverable. Each time energy is burnt to run a tractor towing a mechanical seeder or a harvesting machine energy will be lost and become unrecoverable. I haven't had anything more than high school level physics, so I might be missing something, but to my way of thinking it has to run up against that 2nd Law which means that the energy available in the output product of the depolymerization process will always be less than the energy put into the input product, which in turn means that the output will continually decrease over time (barring any input of energy from outside sources like fossil fuels etc.).

[Silverhair]

25. You start with waste biomass waste.

A TDP plant will process raw sewage. We spend a lot of money processing that stuff now. TDP will take raw sewage and get oil out of it, as well as carbon, pure water, & fertilizer. Depending on what is being put into it, the plant can have up 85% efficiency. That means about 15% of the energy put into the plant is used up in the process. It will also take the stuff that we throw into landfills. The plant in Carthage MO is going to take turkey guts.

I covered this in my post. Please reread the post. There is a link by another DUer that gives the article in Discover. I would recommend reading it.

[quaker bill]

34. Oops

Forget about the sun did we? Plants capture energy and use it to create a higher state of organization, (reverse entropy). This is not a closed system.

That being as it may, it does not solve the essential problem of energy efficiency or cumulative energy consumption. The statememt that the plants can be run at an "energy profit" does not sound all that stunning. However, sewage treatment plants have been run at an energy profit for some time through biogasification. Co-locating them near power plants allows the spare methane to be burned to generate electricty for export to the grid.

Energy captured from sources (especially renewable ones) that are currently landfilled probably would not be a bad thing. It depends on the technology used. This certainly sounds better than incineration which is known to produce some fairly toxic byproducts.

[wuushew]

16. I don't believe the economics

If you could convert and unlimited amount of raw material into oil at $15 a barrel then someone would be doing it. The current price of crude is $28.50 a barrel.

[Silverhair]

18. Please reread my post. You question is addressed.

The first commercial plant is to go online in the next few weeks. In other words, it is being tried. It is a new technology. By your logic you would have said in 1902, "If people could fly, somebody would have done it."

[Greyskye]

17. Link to the Discover magazine article

http://www.discover.com/issues/may-03/features/featoil/

Great article - semi-technical, but extremely readable with plenty of illustrations. Do check this out!

[Silverhair]

19. Thanks. I had trouble finding the link for the article when I posted.

[JohnyCanuck]

22. So they're gonna get oil from Turkey guts.

There's no way they're going to recover the equivalent amount of energy from the turkey gut oil that went into the energy costs of raising the turkeys (growing harvesting, shipping and processing crops for turkey feed, warehousing the turkeys, shipping the turkeys to the slaughterhouse etc)not to mention also recovering the energy used in the depolymerization process itself (even if it is as low as claimed). The same arguments apply to any manufactured products (or plants and animals) turned into oil through depolymerization.

A closed system relying solely on thermal depolymerization to recycle carbon between waste products and oil would eventually grind to a halt simply due to the laws of physics (laws of thermodynamics). Each time energy is used or transformed some energy is permanently lost in the process and becomes unrecoverable. As long as there is still relatively cheap and plentiful sources of outside oil or energy available to supplement the energy derived from the oil obtained by depolymerization it might make economic sense to process turkey guts into oil, but it would be a mistake to think that this process will be a panacea for our energy woes.

Even using turkey offal, one must account for 1) the feed, 2) what fertilized the feed (natural gas), 3) how the feed was planted, 4) harvested, 5) irrigated (oil and gas), and 5) how the turkey got to market (oil). Thermal depolymerization should be more properly viewed as a form of recycling. But this process will never have the net energy of the original fossil fuels. As fossil fuels dwindle, so will the source material.

Nine Critical Questions to Ask About Alternative Energy

[DavidMS]

26. I think its a good thing...

Its not a perfect mono-cultural solution. Its part of the solution. Wind power, solar power, improved mass transit, smaller cars and shorter commutes will help also. And don't forget walking, good for you and good for the earth. The idea is to deversisfy our energy base and this is a cheap way to do it, as the raw materials are someone else's waste. As I understand it the raw materials are any carbon based waste. So nasty organic polutants, chicken guts, etc can be used for somthing better than compost.

[ParanoidPat]

28. You seem to conveniently forget.....

.....that the turkeys get eaten and the rest just gets dumped right now!
Nobody is saying that they are going to raise turkeys just to turn them into oil. :crazy:

If they come up with a way of using the offal to some advantage that's a plus in my book. You sound just like the idiots that say solar power is not an alternative because it can't replace ALL of the oil that we use. If ALL of the different types of alternative energy concepts available now were used where they can be, our reliance on oil would be drastically reduced. That is a GOOD thing!

Nice of you to bring up the concept of a "closed system"! ANY "closed system" would be considered 'perpetual motion', something that this system is not purported to be, so why did you throw that in there? Can you name one "closed system" that would not "eventually grind to a halt simply due to the laws of physics"?

You can't change the laws of physics, but if you pay attention can use them to your advantage. :)

[JohnyCanuck]

32. I throw in a closed system because of Peak Oil

Once Peak Oil occurs, world oil prices will start to rise and oil production will drop and continue to drop in perpetuity. The age of cheap and plentiful fossil fuels will be gone for good and while today we can use the TDP process to manufacture oil from various feedstocks ignoring the energy costs of producing those feedstocks, that will not always be the case. Making oil from sewage sludge sounds like a good deal, but consider that sewage sludge is human waste derived from plant material grown mainly with our very energy intensive factory farming methods.

As fossil fuel production decreases a greater and greater proportion of the oil used in agriculture, industry and in the manufacturing of TDP feedstocks will have to come from the TDP process itself and the energy costs of producing the TPD feedstocks will start to become more and more significant.

Before we ever got to a closed system, we would find ourselves using more and more TDP oil (due to the shortage of fossil fuels) to produce the feedstocks that are then turned back into TDP oil. At some point we will start running into the effects of the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics and find that EROEI (energy returned on energy invested) is no longer the great deal that it was when we could ignore the energy costs of producing TPD feedstocks ( because the feedstocks were made with cheap and plentiful fossil hydrocarbon based oil).

I used the example of a closed system to help convey the message that I did not believe the TDP process was by itself a self-sustaining process and that therefore inputs of energy would be needed from outside the TDP process. While we would never reach the point where the TDP process becomes a completely closed system, we will be moving in that direction and the closer we get to a closed system the more the constraints imposed on us by the nature and the laws of physics will become apparent and the less efficient the TDP process will become.

I think you misunderstood the point I was trying to convey. I never said that we should not produce TDP oil. I was just trying to convey my concerns that we should not regard TDP as a panacea for all our energy problems in perpetuity. While TDP oil might delay the impact that peak oil will have on our energy intensive economies and societies. I see it as only delaying the consequences of Peak Oil not negating the effects of Peak Oil.

[davekriss]

24. THERMAL DEPOLYMERIZATION: Hard Limits

>>There is enough agricultural waste in this country that ALL of our imported oil needs could come from this process. With additional crops planted targeted for this TDP we could stop using fossil oil completely.<<

I'm sorry I did not save the link to the analysis (come upon recently), but to gain the equivalent energy of one year's oil consumption, we would need to plant TDP crops on a landmass that exceeds all land on the face of the earth by a factor of (IIRC) 6.5. Forget space for food crops, forget living space. There's just not enough land available to grow the inputs into TDP to replace the energy now obtained from oil.

An interesting related point of view (about limits) is available here:
http://www.menomonieethanol.com/Pimentel.doc

An interesting discussion on an alternate board (Urban75, with many useful links and discussion) is available here:
http://www.urban75.net/vbulletin/showthread.php?s=&threadid=45251&perpage=25&pagenumber=1 (the Word document is from a posting late on page 5 of this thread). I highly recommend a look-and-see, but be sure to follow some of the enlightening links (oh, and ignore my political rants on that thread, just pay attention to the science).

[Silverhair]

27. I'm not that good a scientist.

While I do have a B.S. in science, it is from a long time ago. I have tried to keep up by subscribing to Scientific American and Discover. I have found both of them to be extremely good in those areas where I have the ability to check on their science, so I rely on their articles in those areas where I am less informed. I am unable to run any calculations that would have any value, as I don't have the data to begin with. What I can do is follow a line of reasoning to see if logic is in accordance with what I already understand.

We are having to spend a LOT of money now processing and storing waste. That waste could be recycled via TDP. That in itself is a huge major step forward. The article says that there is enough biowaste in the U.S. to eliminate our importation of oil. I trust them on their figures.

The sense of most, (Not all) of the posters is hostile to TDP. The Reps are letting the big coporations take care of development. CWT is a joint venture with Conagra. Conagra is a BIG BUCKS super corporation. They wouldn't put money into this unless their scientists had already decided it would work. The pilot plant in NJ is already working at an energy profit. (More useable energy produced than consumed in the process.) And in a few years posters will be complaining about the big recycling corporations.

[CreekDog]

29. All Well And Good But...

Doesn't it sound like something Al Gore would get excited about?

I can see the talking points now. Where the heck is Darrel Hammond when you need him.

;O)

Don't bash, I volunteered for Gore and voted for him too :O

[Silverhair]

30. No Bash. You're closer to the reason I posted.

I'm not really worried about trying to influence most of the DUers. What I am hoping is that maybe somebody in one of the campaigns just might happen to notice and bring it to the attention of the boss.

It is noteworthy that not one single responder commented on my idea of having the gov't build thousand of the plants, and sell them to the workers at the plant. (If they worked as advertised.)Everybody wanted to talk about whether the plants will actually work. Since the first commercial plant is going on line in a few weeks, we will know shortly.

If it works, I see a big opprotunity for the first side that can jump on it. If it really is connected to the Bush family, as a couple of responders have suggested, then we may assume that they know all about it. If it works, and if they are involved with it, then look for them to brag about it in the campaign.

[CreekDog]

33. No hard feelings...

Wasn't criticizing your idea. Any alternative strategy towards energy is worth pursuing, especially if done in a socially-responsible way.

The Al Gore crack just seemed ripe. It's sad that our system (and I just exhibited it) jumps on complex ideas before giving them a fair hearing.

[Silverhair]

37. OK. Looked at that way it was funny.

[ParanoidPat]

35. You don't have to convince me!

I'm all for anything that will reduce our reliance on oil. :evilgrin:
My only fear about this process is the government getting involved at all! Do a quick Google search for OTEC or Ocean Thermal Energy Conversion. It worked so well the government shut down the plant in Hawaii and scrapped it based on some of the same lame arguments made by others above!

I just tried to get to this page, (third link down on the search) but it just times out. :(

NREL: Ocean Thermal Energy Conversion Home Page
... Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) Ocean Thermal Energy Conversion Home Page provides
information about ocean thermal energy conversion (OTEC) technology and ...
Description: From US National Renewable Energy Laboratory. A thorough introduction to OTEC technology and its...
Category: Science > Technology > ... > Ocean Sources > Ocean Thermal Energy
www.nrel.gov/otec/ - 4k - Oct 27, 2003 - Cached - Similar pages

[davekriss]

38. It's All Good

Don't misunderstand, I agree that TDP, if real (and especially at the economics cited in the first post), is good. It could supplement oil consumption and deal with waste issues. However, it cannot supplant all oil consumption. I note that the claim, above, is to replace all oil imports, not all oil consumption. I find even that smaller ambition doubtful given the land mass factor I already cited.

However...

TDP, if it works, would supplement oil consumption, softening the negative slope of Hubbert's Peak, buying us time to reorder society in ways that require less energy, and possibly buying us time to scientific discovery that truly weans us off our oil addiction. TDP, if it works, would be a good thing. But note the investments to do both, reorder society into its post-industrial form, and to discover and harness alternate energy forms, is likely more massive than any investment yet made. Yet the only budget growth I've seen is the U.S. military budget, which has reached the GDP percentage (3.8%) recommended by PNAC.

Panacea or not, what I don't yet see is the political will to exploit alternate energy sources. Instead I see militarization and the quest for imperial empire. The USG seems bent on ensuring the open flow of mideast and Caspian Basin oil and gas for US consumption, even if by gunpoint. It has marshalled the public behind terrorist fears and uber-patriotism to pursue these imperial wars to the point where we can say Karl Rove makes Goebbels proud. At what point, though, does the conflict widen to include energy-hungry nations with genuine retalitory force? When will Russia counter our imperial ventures in the Caspian Basin? When will a united Europe protect its interests in the Middle East? Recall that PNAC, in "Rebuilding America's Defenses", lists China as one of the nations where we'd like to achieve "regime change". We seem to be on the path of military conflict to secure dwindling supplies rather than a search for alternative energies and societal restructuring.

Our Oil President and Oil Vice President are fully informed of the rapid pace and dangers of oil depletion. Matthew Simmons, an international oil investment banker who has written extensively on depletion issues, was a member of Cheney's infamous Energy Task Force. Bush is informed by the Baker Study conducted by the James Baker III Institute at Rice University (Baker, from GHWB's Administration, was the Republithug attorney marshaling the press to conformity in Florida in 2000).

It's clear GWB has made his choice: Invest in the military; draft war plans for Iraq and Afghanistan and who else?; draft USA PATRIOT Act, the means to quell future internal dissent; provoke and LIHOP 9-11; execute aforemention plans; draft USA PATRIOT Act II so that dissenters can lose citizenship and be expatriated; rattle sabres to marshal public around next war (will it by Syria or Iran?).

The only problem with the Chimp's choice is that, though we may grab dwindling supplies of oil for elite consumption, the rest of us are left to face the grim future of a retreating global carrying capacity and mass die-off. So keep waving them flags! I don't think the dystopia has been written yet that captures the future strife that will unfold.

[kimchi]

36. We certainly do need to be the party of new ideas.

And I believe President Clinton was correct in seeing part of our future economy tied to renewable resources. I mean, its do or die time. Even the repubkes know what the score is, and don't think for a minute they aren't quietly developing or buying up future technologies.

So it is smart to want the progressives to be part of the new energy system. Just think if people were actually whining about how those damn treehuggers had control of all the turkey-gut plants?:evilgrin:

And everyone already knows that ideas of conservation and progressive and alternative energies comes from the left. I doubt even those millions in Shrub's pot could erase his obvious disdain for healthy life on this earth.

Earthships, recycling, solar power, whatever--it's always the creative progressives to the rescue. My greatest regret in this arena was being too poor to purchase Real Goods stock when it first went public!