I just saw an ad on TV for the pickensplan.org. I watched the video. Boone Pickens is a big oilman, and he is telling us we cannot drill our way out of this energy crisis. He has a plan, and it looks good for a start. It isn't a long term fix and he admits that, but it is a great start. Check it out!

He has some interesting ideas. I heard another oil executive say that we could drill our way out of this situation in the short term. He asked Boone Pickens to change his statement about drilling. We do need alternative sources to power our vehicles. Prices will drop like a rock when we start drilling and/or come up with alternatives to oil. We are the largest consumers of oil in the world. Take the U.S. out of the mix and prices will tumble.

It comes down to supply and demand.
I hope we can expand our drilling, while we further develop alternative resources, including energy conservation programs.
Right now, the solution is bigger than one energy policy, and we have to cut the political crap.

I just watched the 2 videos on CNBC and Boone said that he was taken out of context on the drilling and Joe pointed out that the left have latched onto that sound bite. He said it is true that we cannot drill out way out as far as the supply and demand, but that we do have to drill everywhere we can and get every resource we have online. Basically the problem is too big... Here are the video links from the interview:

Pt 1:
http://www.cnbc.com/id/15840232?video=817210254
Pt 2:
http://www.cnbc.com/id/15840232?video=817208663

I don't think the problem is that complex. It is the implementation that is the real challenge.

The problem isn't complex, but as they say "the devil is in the details". I am all for breaking this dependence situation. I liked his idea about meeting with both McCain and Obama's teams and talking about the plan and answering questions. He held a couple of townhalls and it was a packed house. Maybe if enough people ask about this plan the candidates will put this on the agenda.

My concern is regarding the natural gas supplies that he is suggesting we use. We still import a chunk of our natural gas, so I don't know just how plentiful these supplies are.

We do know that world oil production has been falling since 2005. So the question isn't if there is a Peak Oil(demand outstripping supply), but what we are going to do about it. So if we don't move with a purpose on this we very well could be in a permanent energy supply problem.

Wind is great, and cheap, but you have to have a way to store the energy and use it when you need it. I know there are companies developing this technology for solar to store the power as heat. One company I am watching the story with is Solar Reserve. They basically store the heat from the solar collectors in a collector that uses some type of salt to hold the heat and then use the heat as needed to run turbines to generate power. Very interesting idea that is being explored right now in AZ and CA if I understand the news correctly. I haven't heard if they are talking about something similar for capturing the power generated by wind.

Longsnowsm

They think that they have discovered the largest natural gas deposits ever discovered. They are drilling everywhere you look around Ft Worth and further South.

:lol: Wouldn't you just like to slap the crap out of Politicians, and tell them to shape up, and simply do their job? It's madness.

Longsnowsm wrote:

"Wind is great, and cheap, but you have to have a way to store the energy and use it when you need it. "

I have often thought that wind energy could be used to pump water to a higher elevation. The energy generated by the wind would then be stored in the water as kinetic energy.

I am sure there must be a hitch in this process somewhere or it would have been utilized by now.

I have thought the same thing on the water idea. I have seen some YouTube video's with an old Stirling Engine they used to use to pump water into a holding tank for cabins and hotels. The stirling just uses heat to power it. So they used to fire it up first thing in the morning by lighting a fire under it and then just let it run until the fire went out. That would pump enough water to supply the buildings. So imagine using something like a fresnel lens to heat that engine and pump water or run a generator? You can see a fresnel lens used on a small stirling engine also on YouTube. It is almost a no brainer! There are a couple of videos showing the fresnel lens "melting" concrete!

To me it looks like you would just need something to allow the fresnel to move and track the sun to keep the stirling running. The stirling is an old technology. The one video on YouTube shows a Sterling from 1895 that was used to pump water.

Wind to pump water has been done for a long time, and again seems like a no brainer. Not sure why this isn't being discussed. Probably makes too much sense!

Longsnowsm