We won't quickly replace oil completely, but there's nothing so exclusive about petroleum as a source of hydrocarbons. For example, petrochemicals can be used to make pharmaceuticals but these days it's over 80% plant chemicals. Oil is great for plastics, but not always necessary or desirable. Vinyl flooring, remember, was developed as a replacement for linoleum, which is made from linseed oil (flax). Linoleum is experiencing a huge revival right now as a part of the green building boom. Latex paint is being replaced with clay-based wall surfaces (and of course latex too can come from plants).

Conventional builders have seen their businesses dry up, while Green Building is experiencing huge growth. This is because, surprise, buyers are exercising the “green option” which includes solar power and sometimes wind, but also nonpetroleum based treatments for interior surfaces and both interior and exterior coatings, and greatly enhanced increases in insulation and other energy-saving inclusions. Those who formerly slapped up energy hog homes, such as homebuilders Pulte and McStain have plunged full force into green homebuilding.

The biggest challenge for replacing oil is in transportation. But there are new technologies there, which I've pointed out before, including hydrogen from starch technology and biofuels based on non-food sources, for example microalgae, cellulose and jatropha. Conservation works there to, as buyers shift to more fuel-efficient cars. A little government incentive would be very good for business and the environment, and in fact automakers are now asking that the government step in with the very thing they've been fighting all these years, average fuel efficiency standards. Electric vehicles, plug-in hybrids and increased commitment to public transportation can all contribute to reducing our reliance on petroleum.

I could go on, but I'm not sure if you really care, or are just making talking points. I'm not trying to be insulting, but you seem entirely dismissive of opinions other than your own. If you want links to serious proposals for reducing petroleum dependence, I am glad to provide them, but if you're just throwing stones, I won't bother.

I have repeatedly asked what will replace OIL. You want energy independence.

HOW? Come on genius. HOW? The world anxiously awaits the great wisdom of Jim. Other then once again calling Bush Names…..how about some answers.

Move away from dependence on foreign oil? Great…………HOW……..what is going to replace oil?

1.5 percent of our electricity is generated by oil……….How are we going to replace the other 98.5 percent?

What? Come one. WHAT??

I know. Lets call Bush a liar. That will solve our problems.
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And yes, Bush is a liar. I never believe anything he says without hearing the same things from reliable sources that don't include the RNC or blogs like LGF, Powerlines or Hot Air. Don't like it? Maybe he and his friends should have tried the truth a few more times.

8 Dollar per gallon gasoline does not hurt those who people want to hurt……GOP.

8 Dollar a gallon gas hurts the poor people, the struggling people. Those who live from paycheck to paycheck and dont have public transportation to work.

People are sick to want to inflict this on America and that is precisely what the advertisement about Obama was all about. Those who support Barak obama want this for America and by default HE WANTS THIS FOR AMERICA.

However, since the rich elite consider places like Branson to be for stupid hicks, I guess that they will cheer that the middle class does not get to take vacations while they still get to back pack around the Andes.

We fail to see eye to eye on this issue because the underlying premise is something we cannot even agree upon.

The above is your premise. My premise is that fear is driving the prices. So I disagree with your premise and I assume you disagree with mine.

Until left and right can agree on the premise then its hard to make progress in talks.

Thus I propose that any new drilling has to be in concert with firm money being sent to alternatives. Id vote for huge government incentives for people to install their own wind generators.

For example I live in the country. I have 30 acres. About 4 years ago I installed a wind turbine and 3 solar panels at the cost to me of close to 44,000 dollars. Thats a huge investment. So once the power coop saw this they started begging me to join their grid.

I did and now I provide enough electricity to the grid to light up 22 homes. If people all over the country were to receive assistance in this endeavor then wind would become online very fast. Once you have your own electricity capacity then you could eliminate gas hotwater and stove. Gas heaters could become electric.

Its a long process but unless private enterprise gets involved then it will become difficult to do. However be warned that the Oil and Gas industry will buy off YOUR congressmen………..be they Democrats or Republicans. And nothing will get done and in the meantime we will argue about whose fault it is that this is not being done.

Electric cars and plug-in hybrids are here already, and are saving their drivers a ton of money. The cost of charging your electric car from the grid equates to around $.75 a gallon gasoline. That's with current battery technology, and will only improve.

The suggestion that we will need greatly increased generating capacity is specious, especially since most people will charge their cars at night when electricity demand is the lowest. Even using electricity generated 100% from coal, the pollution is far easier to control at a single source powerplant than individual petroleum powered vehicles. Furthermore, the excess generating capacity available at night is terribly wasteful in the absence of a mechanism to store it. Just keeping the grid hot 24/7 wastes energy that could be charging electric cars (and the utilities, I'm guessing, would rather sell that energy than waste it.)

A very important side benefit of plug-in hybrids that is universally ignored by the oil pushers is “vehicle to grid technology” in which plugged-in hybrids can sell power to the grid when it's needed. There is no cheaper way for a utility to install storage capacity than for their utility customers to buy the batteries already attached to gasoline generators that their customers also buy. That would be a plug-in hybrid.

And about that problem with the limited range of electric cars? How little innovation do these people have? No wonder we're becoming a loser economy. In the 1970s, a friend of mine dropped a Honda generator, the kind rock bands use, into the trunk of his electric car (with ordinary lead/acid batteries, which are over 97% recycled) for a road trip (with an air intake and exhaust outlet, of course). Instant hybrid. Those generators run all day on a few gallons of gas. Pure electric car, simple gas charger when needed. Now how difficult is that? Just going around town? Pull out the generator and set it in the garage if you don't want to haul around the extra 40 lbs.

Domestic production will definitely have a huge effect of the trade balance. If it was not for oil the U.S. would be running a trade surplus. Even if domestic production does not affect the price, it will have other good effects on the ecomy.

Amanda,

Physics is working against an electric Car. Ford has bet the farm on an electric car without having a functional battery. IBattery research has been going on for decades and results in a lot of knowledge about the limits on batteries. Besides, you still have to generate the electric to power the cars and the Obama Administration is probably not going to approve the construction of any new nuclear power plants.

That leaves the U.S. trying to generate all of its electricity during the sunny parts of the day. I wonder how the elite progressives believe an area like the Wisconsin Dells can survive with electric cars and trains.

While that may be true, more domestic drilling will not appreciably affect oil prices. At least that's what the EIA have concluded. Even Bush concedes the point. McCain says it will have a “psychological effect”. But you can't run your SUV on psychology. I know you have a different opinion, but even if you were accurate you yourself have indicated that they aren't likely to see the light of day.

It goes without saying that expanding domestic drilling will eventually enhance domestic supply, add jobs, and reduce the trade deficit. But affect price? That doesn't appear likely. So I really don't understand your point about the “collapse of half of the United States infrastructure. Tourism, automakers, RV sales, Gas stations, Boating, Transportation.”

This is heartless Bull****.

The pain the left seems to be suggesting is the collapse of half of the United States infrastructure. Tourism, automakers, RV sales, Gas stations, Boating, Transportation.

Again what is going to replace oil. THERE IS NOTHING AT THIS TIME THAT CAN or has the POTENTIAL TO REPLACE OIL………NOTHING.

This is mindless, heartless drivel. Pain? 8 dollars a gallon gasoline goes beyond pain. Obama does not have a plan.

He has a plan to get elected.

That is his plan.

Short of that, shining a light on oil speculation and the machinations of the oil industry seem to be the only real way to affect prices.

Legislate and Regulate. Once again the mentality of the left believes we can legislate and regulate our way to energy conservation. At tleast from some on the left Im beginning to hear the “I think drilling is okay, but its not the longer term answer.”

I will agree with that. BUT……it is the short term answer.

I continue to ask and the left continues to shove a stick in my eye……….WHAT will replace oil?

Silence? But if we legislate and regulate something it sure does make us feel better.

McCain says he believes in green jobs. He believes flex fuel vehicles should play a greater role, and believes alcohol-based fuels hold great promise. No mention of any sort of concrete support though. In fact, he wants to eliminate all subsidies for existing (crop-based) biofuels and makes no mention of whether he intends to support replacements. So I'm now sure he expects fuel vehicles and alcohol-based fuels to catch on. He wants to sink $2 billion/yr on clean coal. Okay fine. But that appears to be years away. His support for clean energy alternatives (wind, solar, waves, geothermal) is lukewarm, and they obviously take a back seat to nuclear. But he never talks about how much nuclear power will cost, and never addresses waste treatment and storage. Recently he added some support for zero and low emission vehicles (which is a good thing), but I think that battery prize of his is a waste of money. He still hasn't provided many details about what that entails, but from the sound of it anyone who comes close to what he's talking about is going to get filthy rich anyway.

IMO, Obama's plan is considerably more forward-looking and comprehensive. He has a much better understanding of the advantages of energy efficiency and how to address it. He understands the infrastructure, intellectual capital, and manpower issues in the deployment of clean energy sources. If anything, Obama is over-ambitious. That concerns me. For example, I think his $10 billion/yr private capital fund is a waste of money, because capital is already flowing into clean energy at an incredible rate — $148 billion in clean energy investments worldwide in 2007 alone. And that's the bottom line to me — there is tremendous growth potential worldwide in clean energy: manufacturing, jobs, revenue. Clean energy is the industry of the future, and it makes economic sense to grease the wheels. Just don't overdo it, Obama.

Anyway, with regard to the original topic of vote inflation, McCain was smart to hammer his economic/energy plans in battleground states while Obama is on his world tour. But Obama will be back next week with almost 4 months to regain any ground he may have lost. But I'll bet the significance of his trip will have a lasting effect which McCain can't duplicate. I'm betting McCain wishes he never brought up the idea.

Please explain how tourism in places like Florida, West Virginia, Penn. Dutch country, colonial Williamsburg, Gatlinburg, TN can survive in a zero carbon economy. They cannot be reached in an electric car. They are low density area that depend upon people having a car.

How can something as simple as tour busses survive in DC, NYC, SF, etc. They are too heavy to work as electric vehicles. How do the airlines survive withouth carbon based fuel.

The problem with the progressive yuppies cheering on Al Gore is that they back pack in the Andes. they never go to amusement parks or to go Lancaster , PA.

I was pretty disturbed during the primaries about all the pomises the two Democrats were making., but they all do that for the priamries. It's the general election now, and it's time to expect more reasonable and deliverable promises.

On energy, more than any other issue, Obama makes the most honest and most cogent sense. THERE WILL BE PAIN ( real truth telling) but if we want to work ourselves out of this, we can't fall for short term sops.

The man with the gas tax relief plan is the one with a better economic plan? In a pig's eye. That tax is used for highway ocnstruction and maintenance, and the fund is seriously short of money. The tax should be raised! What good will cheaper gas do if there are no roads to drive on? The trucking industry is in a panic about this.

McCain just moves his policies around for votes, addressing this factor here, another there. Obama has a unified policy, which includes many of the separate pieces of the economy, so we don't hurt one by helping another.

The future for the economy and the planet (energy + jobs + new businesses) is in green and conservation technologies. We can either start doing it now, or delay and start from scratch in another few years. Climate change is very much a part of the economic considerations, as well, , becasue it affects crops, water supplies and health.

McCain's 'better' economic policy is exemplified by his latest ad, which says, in so many exact words, that the prices at the gas pump TODAY are Obama's fault.
'Nuff said.

BTW, I have no problem with including some drilling in a compromise energy package. but folks like McCain would have to produce an honest compromise, (no preferential treatment) before I could believe it. There has been a huge shortage of truth in his truth telling on energy.and the economy.

The idea that people somehow put faith and stock in Bush and oil that deny it to them otherwise is blinded to the fact that economists forced them to essentially admit that it won't work, and their argument hinges on it being a long term solution, but it isn't.

In ten years, it might save you a penny. Oil is the past. It shouldn't dominate our energy. Wind, solar, nuclear, whatever it takes. Oil can be a part of it, but drilling is just delay. It puts us in the same situation we are in now ten years from now. If you want to pass that buck again, then you can go ahead and tout it, but I don't think this generation will go with you.

Drilling is good for the country, because right now oil is going to slip some but not enough. More committment to drilling will make it slip more, bring the prices down and drive gasoline down.

The fact is that Big oil does not want to drill for oil. Good. Thats more for the rest of us to discover and develop. The fact sheet put out by GWB and friends states drilling now wont matter on prices. True that. Thats what big oil wants us to believe so they are in no hurry to drop record prices.

I find it truly amazing how the opponents to drilling use facts hit and miss to support their agenda.

They hate big oil. Big oil is liars. Bush is a liar. Cant trust them

Big oil and Bush says oil drilling now wont matter…….yep thats true says those calling Bush and big oil liars.

However, new drilling will to NOTHING for gas prices anytime soon, 3 to 5 years is the estimate. This is a fact that McCain likes to keeps quiet.

Why not take a real look at where McCain has voted for a realistic energy policy in all his years in the Senate? When was the last time he voted FOR alternative energy funding or research? I remember a bill a few years ago that'd mandate any oil from ANWR be used for domestic markets ONLY… how did he vote on that?

What should we expect from the man who wanted a “gas tax holiday”. Yeah, talk about psychological economic help.