The relationship between the price of diesel and gasoline

[Niner1190]

Originally Posted by checkthisout

The next Presidents platform should focus solely on this issue.

Why give me back 1200 bucks of my own money when you can put people to work building nukes and put some people in detroit back to work developing the worlds most efficient cars, solar panels and wind turbines?

The media will probably put words in his mouth to discredit him and make him look crazy like they did to Ron Paul.

[FleetMan]

Originally Posted by roofeditor

All presidents and all parties have ignored this at least for the past 20 years. I seriously doubt that any of the candidates have a clue on any of this.

The change begins at the top AND at the bottom!

I don't want to make any political implications but I do want to correct some information with fact and keep this thread above the fray which they generally degenerate into.

Remember the early stages of the Bush Administration and all the hubub over Bush and Cheney and the oil executives holding secret meetings on energy policy and the fact that they would not release their meeting information to Tom Daschle and the political opposition? Have you read the energy policy that was proposed and subsequently defeated by members of Congress, primarily on partisan grounds. Virtually everything discussed in this thread to help the US be energy independent was included in those proposals. What bothers me is that once defeated in Congress, seemingly all efforts to pursue that goal were taken off the table and the general public was left to endure the what we have been seeing. Was that a long term strategy to insure the American public finally wakes up and begins to demand their politicians make some tough decisions and make safe and efficient use of all those alternatives roofeditor highlights?

[Rick M]

Originally Posted by roofeditor

We have basically 2 types.

Type A is a thin film covered with very thin stainless steel, It works out to about $7 to $8 per watt but it's in a roll like peal and stick roofing, you roll it out, stick it down and 60 seconds later it's installed and you can WALK ON IT! AND 150 mil per hour winds can't blow it off. It makes less wattage than some of the others but it's simple and quite durable. The rolls are 16 inches wide by 14 feet long and the only limits are how much roof you have and how much money you have! They basically have jumpers on the ends and you connect them.

Type B is an array of highly polished concave mirrors that focus on a power bar receiver about 4 feet from THAT mirror. All the mirrors are in an array that is gimbaled with trackers that rotate north/south and east west to follow the sun. More expensive but way more efficient bringing the cost down to about $5 per AC watt. In that this has small motors that rotate the unit there is some possible maintenance here. This unit is for commercial roofs only or in the back yard of a home. The units are a 40 foot circle and each 40 foot circle makes 17KW in Florida. Arizona more.........Vermont less. If I put the peal and stick on the roof AND one array in the yard I'd be hitting about 27 KW total which is way more than the house could ever use.

We can back meter to the power company but the restrictions they put on this are quite complicated.

There are units that make over 10 watts per foot but they are costly.

The max commercial rebate is 200K the max home rebate is 20K.

Until the laws are changed about cogen selling energy back will never take off to the scale that it could. The way I understand it currently any excess energy I put into the system is credited to my account at the wholesale rate while all I consume is at the retail rate and they will not credit my account kW for kW. If the government was serious about diminishing the dependence they could start with the passage of a law that simply mandates credit on a kW for kW basis and outlaws wholesale/retail exchange. IMO

[short_stuff]

Originally Posted by Rick M

Until the laws are changed about cogen selling energy back will never take off to the scale that it could. The way I understand it currently any excess energy I put into the system is credited to my account at the wholesale rate while all I consume is at the retail rate and they will not credit my account kW for kW. If the government was serious about diminishing the dependence they could start with the passage of a law that simply mandates credit on a kW for kW basis and outlaws wholesale/retail exchange. IMO

My lake house electricty is powered by an electric co-op. The good news is that the rate that they provide my power is less than half per kw hour than what I am forced to pay in the Houston area. Co-ops are not-for-profit, so they keep costs at a minimum. The bad news is that in Texas, electric co-ops are exempt from having to purchase excess capacity from residential meters.

short_stuff

[Hook'em Horns!]

Originally Posted by short_stuff

My lake house electricty is powered by an electric co-op. The good news is that the rate that they provide my power is less than half per kw hour than what I am forced to pay in the Houston area. Co-ops are not-for-profit, so they keep costs at a minimum. The bad news is that in Texas, electric co-ops are exempt from having to purchase excess capacity from residential meters.

short_stuff

Unless your talking about Board Members of Pedernales Co-Op...

[Hook'em Horns!]

Originally Posted by PRDATR

I can't even remember when the last time I saw either. Around here it's mostly Shell, ARCO a few Chevron and Sinclairs.
Lots of Quick Stops popping up but they don't sell Diesel.
Face it were hosed. Prices are going up and the value of the $ is going down. The value of the $ will continue to errode and the cost of oil will continue to drive the price of everything that is transported / harvested higher.
Don't expect a solution from Detroit or Capitol Hill. It is up to the individual to tighten our belts and find our personal economic niche.
Most of us only have so much $ to go around and as food and fuel prices increase it diverts $$ away from things like savings and depletes available expendable cash.
The whole economy is putting on the brakes and not just from the sub-prime dilemma. I see contractors starting to layoff workers in the construction market too.

At least The Media is beginning to report the true nature of the beast that is the Corn Ethanol scam and it's downside effects rippling throughout the economy.

[roofeditor]

Originally Posted by Rick M

Until the laws are changed about cogen selling energy back will never take off to the scale that it could. The way I understand it currently any excess energy I put into the system is credited to my account at the wholesale rate while all I consume is at the retail rate and they will not credit my account kW for kW. If the government was serious about diminishing the dependence they could start with the passage of a law that simply mandates credit on a kW for kW basis and outlaws wholesale/retail exchange. IMO

You sell back to the power company at wholesale usually.

You can sell back at super premium during peak load hours.

You can sell to your next door company!

I agree it's quite complicated but the systems we have with the Florida subsidies, the federal tax credit and 5 year deduction depreciation are economically sound.

You also get a bunch of free press for your company you couldn't but at any price.

[Conner]

I think alot of this has to do with the economy being low. And whos to blame WE
ARE. Think about it all these american based companies are moving over seas because they can make it cheaper. Now do you think that all the employees that were laid off are going to move to a new country to work, dont think so. What do you think people are going to do. My opinion on the thing is to stop buying all this crap from overseas, put americans back to work and get the economy back going. Bio fuels are great if they can ever get started but the price of corn and fertilizer is up which in turns the cost of alternatives is going to be up. These foriegn countries are controlling america in the long run. The oil companies could do something about the cost of fuel if they wanted to but they dont. Their making millions of dollars doing nothing. The other night on the news they said that oil companies have more supply on hand than they have had in 14 years yet they raise the price because they are money hungry. Stop and look at yourself and your job, everything is going up in price from food to the cloths that your wearing, the cost of living has gone up considerably in the last few years, but have you received a raise to compinsate for the increase in living. Something has to change and it starts with you the consumer. Look back 20 years or so at the amount of things that were imported to the country compared to today. I would rather pay alittle more money for something that was made in the US and paying americans to feed their families and buy things that they cant live without. Everybody has a choice on what they do in life and things wont ever change as long as this county imports all the things that could be made right here in america, and wal mart is one of the largest contributers to the chinese economy, they contribut $1.00 of every $5.00 in their economy, and the stuff they send us is junk. Thats my $0.02 worth.