How the Petroleum Age Will End

The system is not designed for convenience or economy. I could not buy near my job and there were no similar jobs closer. People gotta eat.

We saw a lot of those little bitty 'smart cars' when we were in London. Teeny tiny little things. Made you want to pick one up and put it in your pocket.

There are multiple alternative fuel products on the horizon that claim to be sustainable at the equivalent of $1.50/gallon of gasoline. And they'll run in current cars with few, if any, modifications.

Higher efficiency solar equipment is coming down the road, too.

Cheaper energy has been a huge driving factor in industrialization; domesticated animals, wind and water mills, steam, now diesel and gasoline, next solar via various methods.

Speaking of Carter, I was just reading his energy speech. Here is the part about energy.

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What I have to say to you now about energy is simple and vitally important.

Point one: I am tonight setting a clear goal for the energy policy of the United States. Beginning this moment, this nation will never use more foreign oil than we did in 1977 — never. From now on, every new addition to our demand for energy will be met from our own production and our own conservation. The generation-long growth in our dependence on foreign oil will be stopped dead in its tracks right now and then reversed as we move through the 1980s, for I am tonight setting the further goal of cutting our dependence on foreign oil by one-half by the end of the next decade — a saving of over 4-1/2 million barrels of imported oil per day.

Point two: To ensure that we meet these targets, I will use my presidential authority to set import quotas. I’m announcing tonight that for 1979 and 1980, I will forbid the entry into this country of one drop of foreign oil more than these goals allow. These quotas will ensure a reduction in imports even below the ambitious levels we set at the recent Tokyo summit.

Point three: To give us energy security, I am asking for the most massive peacetime commitment of funds and resources in our nation’s history to develop America’s own alternative sources of fuel — from coal, from oil shale, from plant products for gasohol, from unconventional gas, from the sun.

I propose the creation of an energy security corporation to lead this effort to replace 2-1/2 million barrels of imported oil per day by 1990. The corporation I will issue up to $5 billion in energy bonds, and I especially want them to be in small denominations so that average Americans can invest directly in America’s energy security.

Just as a similar synthetic rubber corporation helped us win World War II, so will we mobilize American determination and ability to win the energy war. Moreover, I will soon submit legislation to Congress calling for the creation of this nation’s first solar bank, which will help us achieve the crucial goal of 20 percent of our energy coming from solar power by the year 2000.

These efforts will cost money, a lot of money, and that is why Congress must enact the windfall profits tax without delay. It will be money well spent. Unlike the billions of dollars that we ship to foreign countries to pay for foreign oil, these funds will be paid by Americans to Americans. These funds will go to fight, not to increase, inflation and unemployment.

Point four: I’m asking Congress to mandate, to require as a matter of law, that our nation’s utility companies cut their massive use of oil by 50 percent within the next decade and switch to other fuels, especially coal, our most abundant energy source.

Point five: To make absolutely certain that nothing stands in the way of achieving these goals, I will urge Congress to create an energy mobilization board which, like the War Production Board in World War II, will have the responsibility and authority to cut through the red tape, the delays, and the endless roadblocks to completing key energy projects.

We will protect our environment. But when this nation critically needs a refinery or a pipeline, we will build it.

Point six: I’m proposing a bold conservation program to involve every state, county, and city and every average American in our energy battle. This effort will permit you to build conservation into your homes and your lives at a cost you can afford.

I ask Congress to give me authority for mandatory conservation and for standby gasoline rationing. To further conserve energy, I’m proposing tonight an extra $10 billion over the next decade to strengthen our public transportation systems. And I’m asking you for your good and for your nation’s security to take no unnecessary trips, to use carpools or public transportation whenever you can, to park your car one extra day per week, to obey the speed limit, and to set your thermostats to save fuel. Every act of energy conservation like this is more than just common sense — I tell you it is an act of patriotism.

Our nation must be fair to the poorest among us, so we will increase aid to needy Americans to cope with rising energy prices. We often think of conservation only in terms of sacrifice. In fact, it is the most painless and immediate way of rebuilding our nation’s strength. Every gallon of oil each one of us saves is a new form of production. It gives us more freedom, more confidence, that much more control over our own lives.

So, the solution of our energy crisis can also help us to conquer the crisis of the spirit in our country. It can rekindle our sense of unity, our confidence in the future, and give our nation and all of us individually a new sense of purpose.

You know we can do it. We have the natural resources. We have more oil in our shale alone than several Saudi Arabias. We have more coal than any nation on Earth. We have the world’s highest level of technology. We have the most skilled work force, with innovative genius, and I firmly believe that we have the national will to win this war.

I do not promise you that this struggle for freedom will be easy. I do not promise a quick way out of our nation’s problems, when the truth is that the only way out is an all-out effort. What I do promise you is that I will lead our fight, and I will enforce fairness in our struggle, and I will ensure honesty. And above all, I will act. We can manage the short-term shortages more effectively and we will, but there are no short-term solutions to our long-range problems. There is simply no way to avoid sacrifice.

Twelve hours from now I will speak again in Kansas City, to expand and to explain further our energy program. Just as the search for solutions to our energy shortages has now led us to a new awareness of our Nation’s deeper problems, so our willingness to work for those solutions in energy can strengthen us to attack those deeper problems.

I will continue to travel this country, to hear the people of America. You can help me to develop a national agenda for the 1980s. I will listen and I will act. We will act together. These were the promises I made three years ago, and I intend to keep them.

Little by little we can and we must rebuild our confidence. We can spend until we empty our treasuries, and we may summon all the wonders of science. But we can succeed only if we tap our greatest resources — America’s people, America’s values, and America’s confidence.

I have seen the strength of America in the inexhaustible resources of our people. In the days to come, let us renew that strength in the struggle for an energy secure nation.

In closing, let me say this: I will do my best, but I will not do it alone. Let your voice be heard. Whenever you have a chance, say something good about our country. With God’s help and for the sake of our nation, it is time for us to join hands in America. Let us commit ourselves together to a rebirth of the American spirit. Working together with our common faith we cannot fail.

I've ridden in one, they are perfectly fine. Till you look back and there's no backseat.

I'll say this, they park like a dream.

Cycloptichorn

Are they automatic or standard? Automatic uses more gas, no?

Used to be true, not true today.

My Ranger is automatic and uses about the same fuel as the last, manual, Ranger I had. It is really economical, compared to other vehicles I've owned.

I think driving's less boring with a stick shift, though.

Nope, automatic does not use more gas. In modern fuel-injection cars, it's worse to put your car in neutral while going downhill, which was the old recommendation with Standard transmissions.

This is just something that people who like to drive Standard transmissions like to say, to justify their preference for old technology

Cycloptichorn

I hate stick shifts.

Trying to drive one on the hills of San Francisco almost gave me a heart attack. Never again! We did laugh a lot, though

I always thought I should be a transmission repairman out here. They make a killing.

Cycloptichorn

Bumper repair is probably a booming business, too. Crazy experience driving up those hills!

and I prefer them.
It is much more fun than stick shift.

My 48 Chevy was hard to get up those hills. I remember going half way up and then turning on a side road, so I could get up enough speed to go the rest of the way to the top.

Anyone here read James H Kunstler's book The Long Emergency? He gets a little wacky in the end, but the first half of the book is very interesting about how he sees the world dealing with less and less oil.

Jimmy Carter is a member of a very exclusive club, that is, legitimate candidates for stupidest white man ever to walk the earth. That is, stupidest in the sense of his asshole ideas causing the greatest amount of grief and harm. Other member of the club would include Chuck Darwin, Karl Marx and a few others like that.

Nothing makes me feel more secure in my opinion than to have you disagree with me. It's the ultimate validation that I'm correct. Hope you're having nice weather in Bizarro World today, we're having a bit of sleet.

Cyclo--
I disagree because I feel that there will be as much (or more) investment in alternative energy infrastructure as there would be in the original product (full hybrids, capacitor discharge etc). It requires charging stations and new connections. A diesel economy requires no major infrastructure changes.

I own a Ford Escape Hybrid and Im amazed at how little the car dealers are invested in these.Theres only one certified hybrid mechanic in my entire town and ,to me, all these electric and hybrid cars are an afterthought and the technology is not being pushed by US carsmakers (Gm is only coming out with the volt and Chrysler makes none).

I believe that we are market driven,not technology driven. The electric car and even hybrids require a new bunch of investments that arent being made.
The easy answer is"well it will be a big investment after they sell a few hundred thousand electric cars".

Noone has decided on a single format or key technology, hybrids, plug ins, diesel hybrids, cap d, all electric.
Also, batter tech is still ten or more years away from having a car that will make it for >300 miles in a recharge.

NOPE, Im gonna invest in diesel tech, It requires no real infrastructure change, the engines are really just another IC engine , and the fuels carried are dense and easily obtainable. All it takes is a fatty acid, an alcohol, and a base.

That still dont appear on the horizon.