The Ugly side of Tar Sands

It'll be cheaper for Americans just to move to Canada.

 

All of you? No thanks. Send recent pictures and banking information first, then we'll let you know.

 

Icarus- I would concede it is generically true here in the US anyways that some pollutant sources in our society (municipal, non-point source, utilities, mining/extractive ) have not faced the strict environmental regulations thay say the petro-chemical plants and auto industry have faced. So there could be some gaps. Hence for example a recent CNBC 60-minutes on energy, EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson explained that coal ash is not a regulated substance, so it can be used anywhere. This is an example of the regulatory gaps - basically congressional exemptions- out there for the extractive segment. Other than this possible gap, the tar sands seem to me to be making great socio-economic sense right now.

 

I hope oil from the tar sands doesn't go into generating electricity to power an EV while the owner would be feeling good about his zero emission vehicle.

 

Question is, without malice, is what research, reading have you done on the dilemma of the Tar sands oil? Are you aware of the strip mining issue? Are you aware of the vast amounts of water required? Are you aware of the MASSIVE amounts of waste water and tailing ponds that are toxic? Are you aware of down stream water quality issues? Are you aware of the vast amount of natural gas that needs to be burned to "extract" a given quantity of oil from the tar sands? Are you aware that the carbon foot print of tar sands "oil" is absolutely huge?

Just for starters.

Icarus

 

Avoid the middle man, take the natural gas, and use it directly in vehicles. This whole process is just insanity,,, gone insane,,,,

Icarus

 

Very little oil is used to create electricity in the US.

 

Here's a technology no one's talking about yet:
Thorium Reactors.
USA sits on 1000+ years worth of the stuff. Seems like a great alternative energy resource.

 

We've discussed thorium a bit on here. I agree that it is a very interesting alternative. Sadly, the US abandoned thorium reactors in the 50's because it's so hard to weaponize it.

 

Exactly. Who wants to run a reactor if you can't make a bomb from the waste. Oh, wait a minute, what did I just say?

Tom

 

Aww, i didn't know that'd been on here before (obviously a junior member). The not being able to weaponize is what's best about it. and much less likely to have japan and 3mile and ukraine "incidents".

how do you reverse the infernal beeping reverse. HATE IT.

 

Do a search on this site, it is here somewhere.

Icarus

 

World resources of Thorium: 6 million tons (US resources 440,000 tons)
Energy available: 3.6 Billion kWh / ton
Total energy: 2.1 x 10^16 kWh
World energy usage (2008): 1.3 x 10^14 kWh/ year
is 164 years (at today's usage rates. ha!)
at a 2.2% growth rate it should last until 2077.

 

Nat Gas is my favorite fossil fuel too. I had an opportunity to live a few months in New Zealand in the 1980's, and many folks had nat gas cars 25-years ago, simple conversion kits were used to convert cars from gasoline. Don't know if the fancy engines of today could be converted quite so easily to nat gas. But I view that society will need liquid fuels for some time. Liquid energy has important technical/practical advantages. Some day we may have to use coal to make liquid fuels, but that will be costly. I get that you feel that tar sands are the worst possible liquid fuels option. You have not convinced me yet but I will keep an ear on it.

 

It is indeed, not my job to "convince" you! In fact, my desire would be for you to come to your own conclusion based on a modicum of research from readily available sources. With no offense to you, people who rely on the opinion of admittedly opinionated posters on these kind of forums
to form their own opinions is silly.

If you follow some of the links posted' or do your own search you can form that opinion not influenced by folks like me.

I am certainy not arguing that we can walk away from liquid fuels anytime ithe near future. That said, liquid fuel at any (environmental) price is not acceptable. The faster we recognize this as a society, the faster we begin to solve some of the issues before us.

Icarus

 

I don't know that you mean to imply this, but natural gas is not a liquid fuel. Natural gas is stored as a compressed gas at very high pressure, much like welding gas or scuba tanks. This is one of the principle disadvantages of natural gas as a fuel in mobile applications. The tanks are large and heavy for the amount of stored fuel.

Of course natural gas can be liquefied at very low temperatures, but at present this is only practical for bulk transportation.

Tom

 

Perhaps confusing NG w/propane?

 

I'm not saying that a down side of thorium is the fact it's hard to weaponize!! that's a distinct plus. The reason it's not a household word is down to that fact. The US abandoned research on thorium when it became obvious that Uranium was the element for the purpose we sought develop.

 

Natural gas seems to work quite well when piped, although an earthquake will make an ugly mess of all that. Whether pipes are safer than bombs on wheels, I'm not sure.

Developing tar sands only appears feasible because we ignore some huge costs. Through a magic accounting trick called an 'externality', we intentionally fail to account for some all-too-real and devastating effects. Perhaps a 'leftist capitalism' system would take these costs into account, and help us see that renewable energy sources are in fact the cheapest long-term option.