Do high gas prices really help the planet?

Government mandated clean food, safe drugs, (not to mention effective!)? What country do you live in? The last few administrations, current on particularly, have gutted EPA, FDA, FAA, FCC, BLM, FEMA, and, I suspect most any other regulatory agency out there!

Tainted tomatoes, E-coli hamburger, GMA corn, HGH milk, and on and on! Don't get me wrong, I want the government to mandate/regulate these things, but in todays world they aren't!

Icarus

 

Certainly agree with the concept. The really nasty problem is that a large amount of oil is (presently) needed to keep the worlds food supply growing and distributed. It's very easy to see the direct effect on our wallets of increasing oil demand/supply mismatch. What is far harder to see is the effect on Asia and Africa since a lot of oil supported fertilizer, tractors, etc. are essential for even a minimal standard of living. There is a lot more than just energy supplied by oil.

OK

The chemical uses of oil for drugs, lubricants, fertilizers, plastics, and non-energy uses are very, very hard to make without oil. Powering vehicles without oil is very easy, just not economically and culturally accepted. As some point, oil will not be burned on massive scales like it is now.

This leaves the future of coal as a mystery. The amount of CO2 that could be released by burning most of the world's coal would be make CO2 level rise to insane levels, far higher than what burning oil can do. Will the world do this? Will it figure out a better answer? I don't know.

 

I think the point being made is that if it wasn't for the government, you'd never even hear about any of this stuff. Because when it comes to making a buck versus cost of safety/recalls/bad PR, free market, capitalistic corporations are NOT going to regulate themselves voluntarily. No matter what Bill Gates thinks. They are going to choose making a buck. Even if it means cutting corners, a few people getting sick, a little lead paint in toys. They reason the regulatory agencies can't keep up is their budgets are being cut, they don't have enough people to oversee the vast amount of stuff companies are trying to squeak by.

Look at the recent meat recall in California. Recall. Big deal. Most of that meat was already consumed (by school children and teachers) by the time it was finally recalled. And why? Because there were so few inspectors it took a sting by the Humane Society to catch them in the act. That's going on all over in every business. There are some that regulate themselves quite well. Especially the small and/or organic farmers. They take pride in what they produce. But the huge commercial farms relying on migrant workers? No one cares about anything but keeping the bottom line as low as possible and the profits as high as possible.

The EPA, FDA, FAA, FCC, BLM, FEMA, need their teeth back and they need enough budget to operate and hire the personel they need to do their job adequately. Boy, that will help with the current job market won't it?

 

There is a bubble right now in the oil futures price caused by speculation, and that has resulted in high gas prices. When a commodity price rises uncontrollably--out of line with supply and demand, the government has in the past stepped in with regulations--and that should happen soon. When the bubble bursts, gas and oil prices should fall about 25%. This is based on the Congressional testimony I've seen on CSpan the past two weeks. It has to be soon, as the stock market is crashing right now because of uncontrolled oil prices.

The oil companies have benefited from the inflated oil price with huge profits. A surtax is needed to recover some of these profits and maybe return them to the taxpayers in return for getting ripped off at the pumps. That probably won't happen, but anything the Congress tries to do about gas prices which the Republicans obstruct will kill them in November at the polls. And if gas goes much higher, there could be a March on Washington.

To answer the thread question. Yes, a carbon tax is needed to reduce carbon emissions. What forms this takes I don't know. Probably many forms. Gas taxes, corporate taxes, etc. It will happen in the near future. A question of survival. Not a lot to do with the short term oil futures and gas price problem. It's a longer range thing.

Alternative energy sources need to be developed quickly, as well. There should be corresponding tax incentives offsetting the carbon emissions penalties.The current jump in gas and oil prices is helping to spur developement of new technologies vitally needed in the future.

 

My point exactly. Past and CURRENT administrations (Read Reagan, Bush, to some extent Clinton, but really read GWB have torn the heart out our social safety network! Whistle bowers fired, or black listed, incompetence at the highest level leading to complete collapse of moral. Not to mention 1/2 trillion wasted in Iraq, so there is no money left for ANYTHING.

Icarus

 

Your original question is exactly Jevons Paradox, a economist who lived in Britain in the 1800's and noticed that improved steam engines because of high coal prices actually made shipping more economical and more coal was ultimately used.

The main benefit I think you're missing is that more work is being done with a given amount of resource. So even if the Chinese or Indians or whoever use the oil that would have gone into our SUV, it's being used to provide somebody a better lifestyle, maybe a new well for a village that never had one (in the best scenario), and we still get to work in our Prius, or bike, or carpool. So overall, more people benefit.

Also, if we just slow the consumption of oil, just to use it later, we might give nature a chance to absorb more CO2 as we spit it out. Not sure if that works, but at least the smog will get rained out of the atmosphere at a constant rate.

And finally, all that works with a somewhat constant supply of the resource. If we hit peak oil, the price will go up and the supply goes down regardless of demand. So we save gas by driving less or driving more efficient vehicles, but there still isn't a resulting glut of oil that would encourage people to go back to SUVs. In fact, we become better prepared for a post-fossil-fuel world, and just might get thru it with only a prolonged recession.

 

As fuels, no. It is not feasible (maybe not even physically possible) to capture and sequester a usefully large fraction of the CO2 they produce.

As raw materials for a variety of chemicals including plastics, stuff which does not have to wind up in the air, yes. That use may continue for some time after we stop using them for fuels.