tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9430835.post3058642612289963506..comments2024-03-28T16:22:14.888-07:00Comments on Steve Sailer: iSteve: Tidal wave or meltdown?Unknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger103125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9430835.post-88692033057654029052011-03-20T15:31:52.553-07:002011-03-20T15:31:52.553-07:00How about a scuba-gear for everyone in a tsunami r...How about a scuba-gear for everyone in a tsunami region?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9430835.post-37960420123700392402011-03-19T09:15:20.933-07:002011-03-19T09:15:20.933-07:00"That's part of what scares me about TSHT...<i>"That's part of what scares me about TSHTF scenarios; there's so much important knowledge that's proprietary, and so much knowledge in the wrong format for this kind of application."</i><br /><br />Well, dang. I'm thinking in an uber hard-core way again but this time, <i>it's your fault!</i><br /><br />Back to basics means just that to me. How to hunt or grow and preserve and store food. How to maintain arms and make ammo (the latter being incredibly easy, like making meth in one's car--that easy)--and how to develop the will to use them when necessary. How to do first aid, minor medical procedures (I've seen survival blogs that show that), how to make and mend clothes, how to build, maintain and heat shelters and how to do animal husbandry.<br /><br />I know I've said it before but my favorite passage in <i>Doctor Zhivago</i> (the novel, not the film) is when Yuri writes in his journal about all the food they've grown and stored for winter. <br /><br />There is great info online already, no thanks to the gov't, so dive in, look around and print it out. (I wouldn't be at all surprised to find one day that those survivalist blogs have been shut down.)<br /><br />Two great preparation tips: if you have an ocular condition that can be corrected by surgery, have it done now. And if you can then dispense with glasses altogether, all the better. Also, make sure your teeth are in the best possible shape. There won't be many opportunites to have cataract, lasik or dental surgery after TSHTF.<br /><br />Sorry I can't help with, say, getting a fast Internet connection or performing any of the minor techonological miracles that Mr. Spock uses to construct a "processor interface" in "The City on the Edge of Forever". But there's definitely info out there in the public domain that will keep the stalwart and savvy alive.Kylienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9430835.post-80471060939709764032011-03-18T18:27:25.279-07:002011-03-18T18:27:25.279-07:00Apologies if I talked your ear off, Svigor. But I,...<i>Apologies if I talked your ear off, Svigor. But I, like you, am interested in energy.</i><br /><br />Not at all, I learned a couple new things so it was my pleasure.Svigorhttp://majorityrights.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9430835.post-56057720027386140732011-03-18T18:25:44.646-07:002011-03-18T18:25:44.646-07:00We don't need the government to provide us wit...<i>We don't need the government to provide us with that info, we have the Internet. There are some great blogs out there about various survival scenarios with lots of useful information, really detailed stuff.</i><br /><br />I'd like to see the Encyclopedia TSHTFania published. Not just how to survive, but how to start from scratch and create a manufacturing base from nothing. Covering everything from mining to smelting to...well, what have you.<br /><br />I.e., not just survive, but recreate the whole thing writ small from scratch. That's part of what scares me about TSHTF scenarios; there's so much important knowledge that's proprietary, and so much knowledge in the wrong format for this kind of application.Svigorhttp://majorityrights.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9430835.post-61970273778193481872011-03-18T11:25:56.704-07:002011-03-18T11:25:56.704-07:00It's MORE PEOPLE, HAVE LESS vs FEWER PEOPLE, H...It's MORE PEOPLE, HAVE LESS vs FEWER PEOPLE, HAVE MORE. In our materialist world, people may prize the possession of things more than the company of people. <br />Of course, if there are fewer and fewer people, everyone will eventually have nothing.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9430835.post-64817113777154755342011-03-18T11:24:05.314-07:002011-03-18T11:24:05.314-07:00I heard that 25% of Japanese population is 65 or o...I heard that 25% of Japanese population is 65 or over. <br /><br />Could there be an internal logic as to why some nations have so few kids? Maybe once population control kicks into gear(even for a single generation), it has a psychological effect of reducing of birthrates of future generations. <br /><br />If a community has families where each family has five children, there will be lots of kids intermingling with one another, and this mean social interaction and less solitude(and less of a culture of solitude). But, if a husband and wife have only one child or two children, the parents will shower special attention on the kid(s), and the kid(s) will grow up thinking he or she is the center of the world. If a family has five children, kids will grow up with less special attention and will be more accustomed to 'lots of people in the house' as a norm.<br />Once the kid grows up and goes off on his or her own, he or she may long for a large family since he or she remembers his or her family life that way. <br /> <br />But if a kid grows up as the only child or with only one sibling, he or she will think the norm is a small household. Or, the kid, having been doted and valued as an 'only child', won't be satisfied with anything but the 'very best'. So, unless he or she meets the perfect Other, he or she would rather live alone than get married.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9430835.post-80623453194144833442011-03-17T21:51:31.217-07:002011-03-17T21:51:31.217-07:00"If ND has that much wind, no need for offsho..."If ND has that much wind, no need for offshore anything. We could just build a zillion windmills in ND and produce loads of ammonia." <br /><br />Yeah, I think Mr. Simmons suggested the ocean because it's a ready source of the vast quantities of water we'll need to get the hydrogen to make enough ammonia to meet America's humongous transportation fuels requirement. Also, offshore wind blows pretty much constantly.<br /><br /> "Ammonia isn't ideal (deadly poison, has to be stored under pressure; bad combination), but it's better than nothing" Yeah, my understanding is that the dangers are comparable with gasoline or liquid propane gas as a fuel. In a wreck, the ammonia might poison you -- but it won't explode and turn you into a crispy critter. Prevention of atmospheric release in a wreck is one of the few technical challenges left.<br /><br />Apologies if I talked your ear off, Svigor. But I, like you, am interested in energy.JSMnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9430835.post-92135231422929756092011-03-17T19:10:36.958-07:002011-03-17T19:10:36.958-07:00Svigor said, "I'm thinking in terms of &#...Svigor said, <i>"I'm thinking in terms of 'whelp, the gubbmint steals about a third of my money, the least they could do is publish a book or website with comprehensive TSHTF survival/rebuilding info.' But yeah, of course they'd just make an institution, union, and welfare program out of it."</i><br /><br />Thanks for a civil reply to a slightly overwrought comment. I get pretty torqued about this subject. <br /><br />We don't need the government to provide us with that info, we have the Internet. There are some great blogs out there about various survival scenarios with lots of useful information, really detailed stuff.Kylienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9430835.post-12190668159568821552011-03-17T17:44:23.035-07:002011-03-17T17:44:23.035-07:00I just think that the fact that corn ethanol requi...<i>I just think that the fact that corn ethanol requires gov't subsidy, or else nobody wants to bother, is proof enough that it's not a viable solution.<br /><br />Stephen Leeb in his book, The Oil Factor, said we have enough wind resources in North Dakota to power everything in America. Problems are: power loss in long transmission lines, and how do we store it, because wind blows intermittently?<br /><br />That's why Matt Simmons' idea sounds so good: Make ammonia, using wind and ocean energy, send it down a pipeline, and burn it in passenger car engines.</i><br /><br />If ND has that much wind, no need for offshore anything. We could just build a zillion windmills in ND and produce loads of ammonia. Ammonia isn't ideal (deadly poison, has to be stored under pressure; bad combination), but it's better than nothing. Interesting stuff. It all comes down to how much wind there really is, of course, and how much ammonia a windmill can produce, and how much a windmill costs, though.Svigorhttp://majorityrights.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9430835.post-36973032964214355832011-03-17T15:15:28.685-07:002011-03-17T15:15:28.685-07:00"And finding non-fossil-fuel ways to generate..."And finding non-fossil-fuel ways to generate electricity (solar, nuclear, hydro, wood gas, wind, etc). And given the solar infrastructure to heat that ethanol, it's not too much of a stretch to think it could power the rail lines to bring in the corn from the breadbasket."<br /><br />I'm with ya that we somehow must find our way past oil-dependency. I'm convinced that Peak Oil is here.<br /><br />I just think that the fact that corn ethanol requires gov't subsidy, or else nobody wants to bother, is proof enough that it's not a viable solution.<br /><br />Stephen Leeb in his book, The Oil Factor, said we have enough wind resources in North Dakota to power everything in America. Problems are: power loss in long transmission lines, and how do we store it, because wind blows intermittently?<br /><br />That's why Matt Simmons' idea sounds so good: Make ammonia, using wind and ocean energy, send it down a pipeline, and burn it in passenger car engines. That truly is a direct sunlight-to-transportation-fuels conversion (because the wind and the ocean currents are, in the final analysis, driven by the warmth of the sun.) (And use nuclear to electrify the rail system for goods transport. I hear ya on getting semis off the highway - what a COLOSSAL waste. We could only be so wasteful of valuable petroleum when it seemed we were drowning in the stuff). <br /><br />The other tiny, unmentionable problem, of course: You can't have a first world country with a third world population. If White guys go extinct, who's going to invent, design, build and pay for all this post-oil infrastructure?JSMnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9430835.post-63563620164382720182011-03-17T13:38:41.423-07:002011-03-17T13:38:41.423-07:00Are you serious?
I'm thinking in terms of &qu...<i><br />Are you serious?</i><br /><br />I'm thinking in terms of "whelp, the gubbmint steals about a third of my money, the least they could do is publish a book or website with comprehensive TSHTF survival/rebuilding info." But yeah, of course they'd just make an institution, union, and welfare program out of it.<br /><br />Even Saddam seemed to care about and prepare for TSHTF more than the US gov.<br /><br /><i>MY real argument is: the coal, from America's own coal fields in Powder River Basin, WY, ought to be Fischer-Tropsch'ed straight to synfuel gasoline and diesel, rather than used to boil corn into ethanol.<br />This is the most efficient use of scarce, valuable, energy-dense fossil fuels.</i><br /><br />Yeah, if coal to gas is more efficient, I say go with it. But that stuff's not renewable, either. Ethanol, using sustainable agriculture as heating fuel, is renewable. Probably won't support the number of cars we want, but, them's the breaks unless we get solar going (or nuclear, but I'm not really up on how much fissible material we have in the ground) and switch to electric cars. I already think we need to yank all the tractor trailers off the road and put that stuff on electric trains.<br /><br /><i>But it would require massive reconstruction of our infrastructure to set -- and all that infrastructure-building would require massive amounts of oil to run the construction equipment and haul the building supplies. Also, what are you going to burn to make the steam to move the trains? Coal, again.</i><br /><br />You can burn anything to make steam. Again, I think rail is long-term better than trucks because we can use electricity, which is much more versatile in terms of energy sources. And rail would allow for better long-distance mass transit, too.<br /><br /><i>Pebble-bed reactors burning thorium MAY still be the solution.</i><br /><br />The Japanese meltdown hasn't put me off nuk'ler power one iota. Accidents happen. How many people die in cars every year? That doesn't stop anyone from advocating cars, much less the concept of traveling at high speed.<br /><br /><i>But it would require massive amounts of diesel to haul that much corn to the desert to distill it and then haul it to the pumps across the nation.</i><br /><br />Again, long term, we have to plan on using electricity, over liquid fuels in combustion engines. That means switching to electric rail, over trucks. And finding non-fossil-fuel ways to generate electricity (solar, nuclear, hydro, wood gas, wind, etc). And given the solar infrastructure to heat that ethanol, it's not too much of a stretch to think it could power the rail lines to bring in the corn from the breadbasket.<br /><br />I think the real problem with ethanol is that it competes with the food supply, so there are hard limits on how much we can produce.Svigorhttp://majorityrights.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9430835.post-31200276732487876272011-03-17T11:44:32.597-07:002011-03-17T11:44:32.597-07:00Hi, Svig,
"That said, yeah, but that's ...Hi, Svig,<br /><br /><br />"That said, yeah, but that's kinda my point. WHY would we count all inputs?"<br /><br />We have to count all fossil-fuel inputs. Because all fossil fuels can be Fischer-Tropsch'ed to turn one into another. Germany invented the process during WWII when they couldn't get oil imports but had plenty of domestic coal supplies.<br /><br /><br /> "Natural gas doesn't run cars (maybe it can be used to run cars more efficiently, but that's not what we're discussing;"<br /><br />It can. It can be liquified and run cars. If we burn the natural gas to make the heat to boil the corn to get the ethanol, that's a collossal inefficiency / waste of natural gas.<br /><br /><br /> "and NG isn't renewable, so I'd rather save it for fertilizer)."<br /><br />But ethanol, itself, requires HUGE amounts of NG-derived fertilizer to grow all that corn.<br /><br />As an aside, in point of fact a Gillette, WY high school student (!) did a science project that proves coal-bed methane can be "farmed." (Water and microbes added to the coal to make natural gas which can be brought up through a well bore.) So NG may, in fact, be a "renewable" or at least long-term sustainable, resource. Her idea has gotten tremendous interest from the industry.<br /><br /><br /><br />" Trucks to haul it doesn't do anything for me, since we can haul it in trains running on steam if we want to. " <br /><br />But it would require massive reconstruction of our infrastructure to set -- and all that infrastructure-building would require massive amounts of oil to run the construction equipment and haul the building supplies. Also, what are you going to burn to make the steam to move the trains? Coal, again.<br /><br /><br /><br />What I thought *might* make sense, before this Japanese disaster, is build nuke plants to make electricity to electrify the rail system. With nuclear power, because it's such an intense source of power, you can do just about anything you want electrically, as the electrons are readily available. <br />But with Japan's catastrophe, now I'm going hm. Pebble-bed reactors burning thorium MAY still be the solution. <br /><br /><br /><br />"Fossil fuels aren't required to run a still - you can use wood or anything else (solar is GREAT for heat, and the breadbasket isn't that far from the desert)."<br /><br />But it would require massive amounts of diesel to haul that much corn to the desert to distill it and then haul it to the pumps across the nation.<br /><br /><br /><br /><br /> "Natural gas for ferts is a wash since you have to use it for any corn, not just the corn you convert to ethanol."<br />No, the farmers during the ethanol boom converted huge amounts of farmland from growing less fertilizer-intensive crops to corn to meet the demand for corn. The demand for NG-derived ferts soared. Which is one factor that drove NG to quadruple in price to $14 an mmbtu in 2008. <br />So, maybe NG for fertilizer for ethanol will end up sounding ok, but condensing and burning NG directly in the car engine sounds more sensible to me.<br /><br />I *do* have a dog in this fight, sorta, in this respect:<br />As a WY resident, I'd like to see our WY coal and nat gas used to supply my fellow Americans with transportation fuels (along with an immigration moratorium and throw the invaders out so "American" means something again) so we don't HAVE to maintain a vastly expensive military might to keep ME oil flowing -- and see economic development for jobs for my fellow Wyomingites.JSMnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9430835.post-3270912204399712932011-03-17T07:44:00.462-07:002011-03-17T07:44:00.462-07:00"making apples-to-oranges arguments about the..."making apples-to-oranges arguments about the crap burned to heat the still (who cares?)"<br /><br />Right, the crap burned to heat the still, if it were not fossil fuels, if it were, say, cowchips, whothehellcares? <br /><br />But it takes a LOT of heat to boil enough corn to make enough ethanol to make a dent in America's need for transportation fuels. And that means burn the fossil fuel of coal. <br /><br /><br />All you've done by switching to ethanol is gone from using one fossil fuel, oil, ultimately, to another, ultimately -- burn coal to make ethanol -- with a concomitant loss of available fossil-fuel energy from the inefficiency of it all. <br /><br />Because if, when you count all the fossil-fuel inputs, ethanol takes more energy than you get back, you're better off to just directly burn the fossil fuels in the most efficient way possible, without all the extra to-do of growing, making, and trucking the ethanol.<br /><br />Also, coal means greenhouse gases. <br /><br />Now, don't get me wrong. I *like* GHGs; I think they've maybe staved off the next ice age awhile. But LIBTARDS don't like GHGs. So if we're going to stop using oil because of GHGs, it makes no sense to burn coal to make ethanol. (Which ends up pumping out MORE GHGs because coal has a higher carbon content than oil.)<br /><br />MY real argument is: the coal, from America's own coal fields in Powder River Basin, WY, ought to be Fischer-Tropsch'ed straight to synfuel gasoline and diesel, rather than used to boil corn into ethanol.<br />This is the most efficient use of scarce, valuable, energy-dense fossil fuels. <br /><br />But will such a thing happen? Heck, no. AIPAC has an interest in keeping America dependent on foreign oil. <br /><br /> See, if we MUST have our navy in the Middle East to keep the oil flowing, we're told by Israel-firsters that we need Israel as our bestest-buddy-forever, in order to use them as "an unsinkable aircraft carrier." And therefore, they assure us, its in OUR interest to keep handing over all the foreign-aid goodies to them. <br /> <br />And Christian Zionists buy the argument. (Never mind that we've NEVER ONCE used that "unsinkable aircraft carrier" despite ALL the trouble and oil shocks that have gone in the Middle East in the last 4 decades.)JSMnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9430835.post-501453938429143882011-03-16T22:40:56.666-07:002011-03-16T22:40:56.666-07:00"Don't even get me started on what I thin...<i>"Don't even get me started on what I think of the government doing nothing to prepare people, either."</i><br /><br />Are you serious? <br /><br />I'm glad the government isn't doing anything to prepare people. Think about it. Do you really want the government stepping in? Who do you think the government would focus on saving? What do you think the cost/benefit of government-sponsered preparation would be to the average taxpayer? How do you think precious resources would be allocated? I sure as hell don't think anyone in the federal, state or local government gives a rat's ass about my demographic. I'd just as soon it be left up to the individual.Kylienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9430835.post-69175346080945719362011-03-16T20:40:10.873-07:002011-03-16T20:40:10.873-07:00I lived in Los Osos (just north of MDO) while I we...I lived in Los Osos (just north of MDO) while I went to college. The prevailing winds are from the northwest so you would probably not be in any danger nuke-wise. As for tsunamis, you don't have very far to run at the state park to be on high enough ground.<br /><br />One strange thing about the central coast - 10pm to 4am is the best part of the day. Usually very calm and a steady 55-65 degrees. During the day the winds really kick up, esp after noon.harkinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12073907403358616607noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9430835.post-79865894744538114382011-03-16T20:04:48.267-07:002011-03-16T20:04:48.267-07:00"I feel a little sorry for the wench. I think...<i>"I feel a little sorry for the wench. I think we've just seen the first Youtube public lynching of a white girl. And it's been thumbed up by a huge majority of the internet.<br /><br />Just more evidence that we live in a new world."</i><br /><br />I have trouble wrapping my mind around the idea that this girl, going to college in 21st century California, actually thought she could post this video and get away with it. <br /><br />Come to think of it, since her complaints were about Asians (those who used to be called "Orientals"), I think a lot of the animus against her was not actually due to anything she said. The left ignores Asians when trumpeting the need for social justice for non-whites. And as recently as the mid-90s when I lived in a college town, neither blacks nor Hispanics had anything good to say about Asians.<br /><br />I think this was the mob's chance to bring down an attractive blonde white girl, no more and no less. Every NAM who's been turned down by a white girl, every left-winger who thinks a white girl is the unworthy recipient of white privilege, every NAM female who's lost a man to a white girl, every homely white girl who couldn't possibly compete against that and knows it, every white beta male who's been turned down by a pretty blonde.<br /><br />She's the personification of white (and even worse, blonde) privilege. <br /><br />To me, the evidence that we live in a new world came in back when OJ was found not guilty of murdering his pretty blonde ex-wife. No way was that jury going to convict him, not just because of who he was but also because of who--and what--she was.<br /><br />Similar thing here. Expect to see more of it.Kylienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9430835.post-64597854039788606082011-03-16T19:06:49.006-07:002011-03-16T19:06:49.006-07:00Apologize for the "plantation" crack. I ...<i>Apologize for the "plantation" crack. I was attempting to score cheap rhetorical points with the libtard lurkers (THAT WE ALL KNOW YOU GUYS ARE HERE, READING STEVE).</i><br /><br />Didn't bother me none. :)<br /><br /><i>But you're a serious debated and deserved better. When they say ethanol is a net-loss, they are referring to all fossil-fuel inputs necessary to make and transport corn ethanol.<br /><br />Because ethanol is lower in energy density than gasoline, it takes a larger volume of the stuff to run the same numbers of cars the same numbers of miles as compared to gasoline. So ethanol requires more trucks for hauling, so more diesel is spent getting it from the distillery to the pump.</i><br /><br />That's what I'm doubting. I suspect it's more like the argument you summarize above, making apples-to-oranges arguments about the crap burned to heat the still (who cares?), etc. I could absolutely be wrong, because I'm definitely speculating. I'm just trying to be a good skeptic.<br /><br /><i>That sounds fun. I mean, as long as the fertilizers and the fan stay apart it would be fun. But useful even more than fun. In fact, I think it should be the centerpiece of a new group I like to call Coed Eagles Scouts for Right-Wing Adults, which is ... *man* that is one fine name I thought up. (I'm not actually kidding here even if it sounds like it.)</i><br /><br />Yep. I'm a survivalist at heart. Not a <i>prepared survivalist</i>, but thinking about it is one of my secondary hobbies. It's not that I want or even expect TStHTF. I just think there's something profoundly stupid about everyone's assumption that it <i>won't</i> HTF. That it <i>can't</i> HTF. I don't have a problem with advanced, complex supply chains; I have a problem with no plan B. Don't even get me started on what I think of the government doing nothing to prepare people, either.<br /><br />Anyway, I was really pleasantly surprised to discover how easy/viable it is to survive by trapping game. Here's the site I read:<br /><a href="http://www.usrsog.org/index.htm" rel="nofollow">usrsog.org</a>Svigorhttp://majorityrights.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9430835.post-48141114732468220852011-03-16T19:04:40.255-07:002011-03-16T19:04:40.255-07:00Can't show you the numbers, SVig, but Puplava ...<i>Can't show you the numbers, SVig, but Puplava says counting ALL imputs, not just the diesel to run the tractor, but the natural gas converted to fertilizer to grow the corn, the fossil fuels required to run the still to turn the corn into ethanol, the energy required for trucks to haul the ethanol to the station (ethanol can't be pumped through a pipeline because of its corrosiveness), and others I can't remember off the top of my head, that counting ALL the fossil-fuel energy inputs, corn ethanol is a net loss; that you'd do better just burning the fossil fuels directly than turning them into ethanol -- with the concomitant losses required by the laws of thermodynamics -- and THEN burning them.</i><br /><br />Caveat: I'm going to read the PDF but until I do I'm still just yakking speculatively.<br /><br />That said, yeah, but that's kinda my point. WHY would we count all inputs? Natural gas doesn't run cars (maybe it can be used to run cars more efficiently, but that's not what we're discussing; and NG isn't renewable, so I'd rather save it for fertilizer). Ethanol does. Trucks to haul it doesn't do anything for me, since we can haul it in trains running on <i>steam</i> if we want to. Fossil fuels aren't required to run a still - you can use wood or anything else (solar is GREAT for heat, and the breadbasket isn't that far from the desert). Natural gas for ferts is a wash since you have to use it for any corn, not just the corn you convert to ethanol.<br /><br />I'm not some ethanol guy (TBH, I'm more interested in wood-gas these days). I don't have a dog in this fight, except that I'm interested in energy and do a bit of reading now and then and like to do my own thinking and math on the subject. Which is why I want to see the numbers for myself - does anyone else find it fishy that, given the enormous importance of the subject, and the ubiquity of the argument in question, I couldn't G**gle up a simple breakdown of the numbers, despite several tries? My G**gle-Fu is pretty advanced.<br /><br /><i>What WILL work?<br /><br />Maybe this:<br /><br />Matt Simmons, an old fossil-fuel energy investment banker who wrote Twilight in the Desert arguing that the Sauds don't have the petro reserves they claim they do, (written before he was mysteriously found drowned in his own bathtub) started Ocean Energy Institute to study the feasibility of using offshore wind and ocean currents to make ammonia and burn THAT in internal combustion engines.</i><br /><br />There's lots of stuff. Solar is the long-term solution; if we can cost-efficiently tap even a small fraction of its potential, electricity will be so abundant that we can use hydrogen (via electrolysis) in our cars. Hell, maybe nuclear can offer something similar if we grow a brain and put the environmentalist luddite wackos out to pasture. There's algae and bacteria. There's coal to gas. There's wood-gas. There's the increasingly viable extraction and processing of shale oil and other lesser fossil fuels. I would just like to see ethanol criticized fairly, and something about that "you get out less than you put in" argument strikes me as rotten.Svigorhttp://majorityrights.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9430835.post-15091492010223446722011-03-16T16:59:30.908-07:002011-03-16T16:59:30.908-07:00Someone needs to combine redneck and SWPL sensibil...<i>Someone needs to combine redneck and SWPL sensibilities and invent TSHTF-prep backpacking; light (or ultralight, but no need to get obsessive about it) backpacking, plus trapping/fishing/shooting.</i> - Svigor<br /><br />That sounds fun. I mean, as long as the fertilizers and the fan stay apart it would be fun. But useful even more than fun. In fact, I think it should be the centerpiece of a new group I like to call Coed Eagles Scouts for Right-Wing Adults, which is ... *man* that is one fine name I thought up. (I'm not actually kidding here even if it sounds like it.)<br /><br /><i>You can survive indefinitely on trapping in an area with a decent amount of small game....</i><br /><br />A decent amount of small game and a limited amount of humans. Best to live out of range of big cities during The End of the Power Grid as We Know It. AKA, the end of deliveries to major grocery chains, the end of free sushi for punks, the end of cops willing to take a bullet for citizens who compare them to squealy farm animals, etc.<br /><br />This is one thing that has always made me a little worried for the Amish. Famine won't touch them but hungry Philadelphians might. Me, I'm probably not quite out of range of big cities but I think my town is a little better armed than the Amish.<br />- B LodeB322https://www.blogger.com/profile/18257802768718375656noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9430835.post-73302271607216876842011-03-16T16:50:41.410-07:002011-03-16T16:50:41.410-07:00"Kylie, that's more like uber-hardcore. I...<i>"Kylie, that's more like uber-hardcore. I wouldn't go that light. I mean, they call it backpacking because you fill the backpack with stuff."</i><br /><br />I know it. I weighed my backpack and contents once, the grand total was 13 lbs. Not much stuff.<br /><br />I'm almost afraid to mention that some of this camping took place on a creek bank in Missouri during the Great Flood of 1993. So when I mention camping in the rain, there was a lot of rain.<br /><br />I wanted to experience a kind of solitude and self-reliance that's hard to find nowadays.<br /><br />And of course, being hard-core, I never let myself forget that I actually hadn't made my back-pack or any of its contents so how self-reliant was I, really?<br /><br />It was an experience I'm glad I gave myself and looking back, I don't think I'll ever feel freer (or wetter) than I did then.Kylienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9430835.post-32522749800214588662011-03-16T16:28:41.345-07:002011-03-16T16:28:41.345-07:00What will happen a comet hits the ocean? God help ...What will happen a comet hits the ocean? God help us.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9430835.post-80050880600607302182011-03-16T16:21:47.259-07:002011-03-16T16:21:47.259-07:00"Just in scoring cheap points. Well, better y..."Just in scoring cheap points. Well, better you should try to score here than on a playground."<br /><br />Don't like scoring cheap points, except on a basketball court. <br /><br />I don't think what happened to the girl is cheap. I feel a little sorry for the wench. I think we've just seen the first Youtube public lynching of a white girl. And it's been thumbed up by a huge majority of the internet.<br /><br />Just more evidence that we live in a new world.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9430835.post-56192075529199132582011-03-16T15:52:45.834-07:002011-03-16T15:52:45.834-07:00Svig,
Apologize for the "plantation" cr...Svig,<br /><br />Apologize for the "plantation" crack. I was attempting to score cheap rhetorical points with the libtard lurkers (THAT WE ALL KNOW YOU GUYS ARE HERE, READING STEVE).<br /><br />But you're a serious debated and deserved better. When they say ethanol is a net-loss, they are referring to all fossil-fuel inputs necessary to make and transport corn ethanol. <br /><br />Because ethanol is lower in energy density than gasoline, it takes a larger volume of the stuff to run the same numbers of cars the same numbers of miles as compared to gasoline. So ethanol requires more trucks for hauling, so more diesel is spent getting it from the distillery to the pump.JSMnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9430835.post-7217914315600154252011-03-16T15:44:12.501-07:002011-03-16T15:44:12.501-07:00In a tsunami it's good to be a bird and it'...In a tsunami it's good to be a bird and it's good to be a fish but not anything that crawls on land.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9430835.post-58206705363229826642011-03-16T15:29:44.824-07:002011-03-16T15:29:44.824-07:00"It doesn't take that much gas to run a t..."It doesn't take that much gas to run a tractor and bring in a harvest (I'm no farmer, but the impression I get is that you only have to run a tractor over a crop a few times, mostly at planting and harvest). Maybe they're referring to BTUs and whatever they have to burn to make ethanol from corn, but that's the kind of thing that smells like a rat to me; it's not as if burning immature pine or whatever is going to cost us at the gas pump, so while technically it's "energy" and might factor into a result of "net energy consumer," I'd call bullshit in that case."<br /><br />Can't show you the numbers, SVig, but Puplava says counting ALL imputs, not just the diesel to run the tractor, but the natural gas converted to fertilizer to grow the corn, the fossil fuels required to run the still to turn the corn into ethanol, the energy required for trucks to haul the ethanol to the station (ethanol can't be pumped through a pipeline because of its corrosiveness), and others I can't remember off the top of my head, that counting ALL the fossil-fuel energy inputs, corn ethanol is a net loss; that you'd do better just burning the fossil fuels directly than turning them into ethanol -- with the concomitant losses required by the laws of thermodynamics -- and THEN burning them.<br /><br />What WILL work? <br /><br />Maybe this: <br /><br />Matt Simmons, an old fossil-fuel energy investment banker who wrote Twilight in the Desert arguing that the Sauds don't have the petro reserves they claim they do, (written before he was mysteriously found drowned in his own bathtub) started Ocean Energy Institute to study the feasibility of using offshore wind and ocean currents to make ammonia and burn THAT in internal combustion engines.JSMnoreply@blogger.com