Hello again,
I know I don’t really need to rub this in any more than it already is, but good god this is ridiculous!
How is it that just a year ago we were only around $2 a gallon, and now we are creeping on to $3.50? I just filled my car recently, and it cost me almost $50.00! Something is seriously wrong here in my opinion, and we need to start doing something about it.
How are any of us going to get to work, the store, or anywhere else if this trend keeps up? It’s not bad enough that groceries, housing, and other goods are inflating with the economy, but come on, do we really need to pay almost $4.00 a gallon?
Why are there not more economic alternative fuels being currently experimented with? I mean, I don’t want to sound like a tree hugger or anything, (not that there is anything wrong with hugging trees) but not only is it waaaayyy too expensive to even drive now, but we are literally killing the planet. Slowly but surely, we are in fact exhausting it of it’s natural resources. I am not trying to be Al Gore here, but I do want people’s awareness to be raised, simply because it’s not like we have two or three other planets to go live on right? This is home for us all, and it pisses me off that no one seems to care enough about it to want to change anything! When I can’t even go outside without getting a headache after just a little while because there is too much smog in the air, it tends to ruin my day. And it makes me sick (literally) that we just accept it and that it’s o.k.
The older I get, the more I tend to realize and actually care about this kind of stuff. I don’t want to be preachy, but what costs are we willing to pay to have all of the conveniences that we enjoy so much? I guess I am just another concerned citizen is all. And I know for damn sure that I do not want to spend $4.00 for a gallon of gas, anymore than I need a case of genital warts on my ass!
That’s all, I just had to vent for a minute. I just hope we can figure something out, and soon, because there are many other things to worry about in life than gasoline right? Or is there?
Let me know what you all think about it.
Later,
L.I.
There really isn’t any experimentation needed – we already have the technology to instantly increase fuel economy by 25-50% in nearly every car made, while running just as clean as today’s cleanest cars do. So what is this mysterious technology I speak of? Ethanol? Nope. Hybrids? Nope. That $49 gadget you saw on TV at 3am Tuesday night, promising to double your gas mileage? Nope.
The technology I’m talking about is almost as old as the automobile itself – Diesel. No, not those slow, stinky, smoking, clattering diesels of 20 or 30 years ago. I’m talking about the new CLEAN diesel technology being made available by the likes of VW, Audi, BMW, Mercedes, and even Chrysler. I’m talking about diesel engines so clean and quiet, you can’t even tell that they aren’t burning gasoline. Plus, many of these cars can even run on Biodiesel or Biodiesel blends, which are manufactured by processing used cooking oil.
So where are all of these diesel-powered cars and trucks I am speaking of? Well most of them are on the road today – in Europe. Did you know that Chrysler offers a diesel engine in nearly every model of car they make, other than the Viper? They do – in Europe. Did you know that 70% of the Audi cars sold today are diesels – in France? Many of these models offer fuel savings of 30% or more as compared to the comparable gas models, while sacrificing nothing in terms of driveability.
As a Jeep lover, I’ve been saying for years that a diesel-powered Jeep Wrangler would make the ultimate 4×4 – gobs of low end torque in an already capable 4WD vehicle. You can imagine my excitement when I heard that Jeep announced it would produce such a model, only to be followed by my disappointment when I learned it would be available everywhere else in the world, other than the U.S. Even Canada gets diesel Jeeps.
You are probably asking yourself, “So why don’t we have more diesels here?” The answer is simple – it’s mostly politics. Until recently, the oil companies and car manufacturers were involved in what amounted to a game of chicken to see who would flinch first. Due to the EPA tightening the standards on diesel engine emissions, a new type of low-sulfur fuel was needed. The car companies didn’t want to import cars that nobody could buy fuel for, and the oil companies didn’t want to spend extra money on refining fuel that no cars needed. So, as a result of poor planning on the part of the EPA to phase in the new restrictions, we as consumers got screwed. Business as usual for the U.S. government.
Despite Al Gore wanting us to believe differently, the world has an adequate supply of oil to last us several hundred years, even factoring in increasing demand from countries like China and India. The ‘Global Warming’ crowd, while making some compelling arguments, still hasn’t passed the basic test of proving anything more than correlation, and as any good student of science knows, correlation does not always equal causation. Even with those things being said, conservation, efficiency, and generally leaving behind a better planet than we inherited are all important and noble goals. Certainly one can also make a case that our increasing dependency on foreign oil does present some inherent security risks to our nation – after all, we are at war right now over oil. I believe that the rapid adoption of diesel technology would go a long way to solve many of these issues.
So working for the oil companies i know that when gas is cheap the wells are shut down to save the oil so they can get the most money for it. like right now they’re drilling more wells in wyoming and caping them and closing down others there isn’t any oil shortages here in the U.S.A just money to be made.
It would figure that OPEC and other organizations wold contribute to such crimes against Americans, like stealing from them every day by making them pay 4.25 plus for a gallon of gas. Especially when there is no shortage whatsoever.