$4 a gal. gas by Memorial Day -- global warming, corn crop

[donsu]

http://www.nypost.com/business/66501.htm


ETHANOL FUELS GAS TROUBLES

The pain of $4-a-gallon gasoline for your beach trips is already on its way to New York gas pumps - thanks to corn fields in the often-parched Midwest.

Excluding geopolitical troubles, the new culprit being blamed for picking the pockets of motorists this season is a colorless, environmentally friendly liquid called ethanol - distilled from corn or sugar cane into a volatile explosive that soups up gasoline.

Even without threats of hurricanes that typically wreak gas-pump havoc, energy traders are betting - by nearly three to one - they'll see the highest prices ever for gasoline by Memorial Day.

-snip-

Most motorists are unaware of what they're facing this summer driving season when they gas up.

To the anxiety of many energy-watchers, America is switching all its gasoline by May 5 to a new blended gasoline that uses 10 percent ethanol to create its octane rating.

--
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we are so screwed

if there is not enough corn they will try to put MTBE back in the gas: " The old octane booster, MTBE (methyl tertiary butyl ether), has been virtually outlawed as a cancer-causing pollutant and won't be used after May 5. "


they predict that $3 and $4 a gal gas for an extended period would cause americans to have to make life altering decisions.


EDIT: COPYRIGHT--PLEASE POST ONLY FOUR OR FIVE
PARAGRAPHS FROM THE COPYRIGHTED NEWS SOURCE
PER DU RULES.

[sabbat hunter]

1. consider the source

the post is owned by murdoch, it is a piece of shit rag that is a bush mouth piece just like faux news. the * regime probably wants to scare NYers and then say we need to go to war with Iran to secure the persian gulf, ie oil.

also if gas does go that high, look for a democratic landslide in the house and senate.

[MADem]

4. If gas does go that high, those Hummers are going to look stupider still

Incredible, how so many people didn't see this coming. I'm glad I drive compact cars!

[SpiralHawk]

2. My life-altering decision: Impeach Bush & corrupt Republicon oil cronies

And the problem is -- at last -- manageable.

[AndyA]

5. HERE, HERE! I agree!!

We must go to the top to get relief from the problem.

[porphyrian]

3. Like junkies, we'll have to hit bottom to make things better.

The sooner this happens, the sooner we can get to fixing shit.

[joefree1]

6. So maybe trash the SUV penis extender

I have no pity for other Americans and their love of the gas hogs. Oink if you love your hummer.

[SoulGlo]

11. Oink if you love your hummer...

is hilarious. If it's not already a bumper sticker it should be.

[newyawker99]

15. Hi SoulGlo!!

Welcome to DU!! :toast:

[robinlynne]

7. Ethanol is used without problems in Brasil.

Are you sure these ethanol "problems" exist? Ethanol is sued more than 505 in Brasil, where it is always hot. never heard fo separation, or any toher rpoblems with ethanol. Mihgt it be that the ethanol problem is a "problem" only for exxonmobil?

[donsu]

10. the problem is the drought causing corn production to go down

and further loss do to storms

[NickB79]

21. Unless you consider deforestation a problem

Then ethanol causes HUGE problems in Brazil, as they clearcut and plow forests and grasslands for sugarcane production.

[KevinJH87]

8. what's it going to take?

at what point do these people stop driving these crazy SUVs? $3.50? $4.00? When will they learn?

[dipsydoodle]

9. Something odd here

In the UK they are trialing ethanol mixes in one particular part of the country which is East Anglia - the 3 counties opposite Holland ! Anyway - as far as I'm aware it's being marketed for LESS than ordinary petrol or diesel with a downside that apparently only a few cars can currently cope with it presumably due to their engine management sytems.

This is a general link : http://www.envocare.co.uk/ethanol.htm

[joefree1]

12. See post #1

More Faux news.

[dipsydoodle]

13. Yes

See what you mean - thanks.

[Cobalt Violet]

14. I wonder how this poll would do today.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=364&topic_id=683102


I predicted +6.00 which I still believe.

[RB TexLa]

16. What about that poor guy near the foot of the Brooklyn Bridge?

the one who's tanks aren't big enough to get the bulk discount from his gas supplier? Anyone in Brooklyn seen what his prices are like?

[newswolf56]

17. The worst part of this apocalyptic equation is that the construction of...

effective mass transport -- that is, electrically powered high-speed rail service (as opposed to herky-jerky Third World bus operations) -- is now and forever impossible. This is because of (1) the prohibitive and ever-skyrocketing cost of real estate (the real yardstick of the increasing worthlessness of the dollar); (2) equally soaring material and equipment costs and shortages due to the outsourcing of manufacturing and raw-material processing; and (3) the savage greed inherent in capitalism.

In the context of public transport, "the savage greed inherent in capitalism" is expressed by the refusal of the ruling class to "squander" money on services to the working class -- "working class" defined as all of us who depend on paychecks for survival. This is a refusal that (A) has been a mostly unacknowledged fact of U.S. policy since the 1940s and is (B) why the U.S. has the most expensive, most viciously discriminatory and least efficient mass transport system in the industrial world -- bitter truths of which I'm painfully aware because such transportation has been (and remains) one of the major focuses of my journalism career -- a career that began a half-century ago this coming November.

Bottom line, the U.S. is dependent upon the automobile because its politicians give us no other choice.

An especially revealing case in point is the urban Puget Sound area which -- due to nearly four decades of politicians and power-brokers who have repeatedly sabotaged effective transport plans -- has the worst urban public transportation (and by some reckonings the worst traffic jams) in the entire nation.

Electric powered high-speed rail service make especially good sense in this region because it has the nation's second-cheapest and second-most-abundant electricity. (America's cheapest and most abundant electricity is produced by the Tennessee Valley Authority.) But for three reasons -- the malevolent xenophobia of Seattle's ruling clique (who oppose ANY construction of rail-based mass transport as "Manhattanization" and "Californication"); petty bureaucratic jealousies (the opposition of local bus systems to creation of a regional transit authority); and simple greed (too many politicians clandestinely on the payrolls of Big Oil and Big Automotive) -- the Puget Sound urban area is the only major urban area in the U.S. without at least a core light-rail system.

After a viciously fought battle that began in the late 1960s and lasted nearly 25 years, the Sound Transit light rail system was approved by the legislature in 1991 and by the voters in 1996. But it is already nine years behind schedule due entirely to political and bureaucratic sabotage, and now because of wildly escalating costs it will NEVER be built as planned. Which not only dooms the Puget Sound area to the definitively Third World reality of bus-transport only, but proves forever the ultimate (and ultimately damning) hypocrisy of the region's longstanding but utterly false claim to superior environmental consciousness.

Thus the abysmal state of U.S. public transport: the unique and now-utterly-inescapable reality upon which the apocalypse of Peak Oil is already beginning to wreak unprecedented ruination.

As a freelance writer in the Puget Sound area, I am utterly dependent upon an automoble to make up for the region's infuriating lack of effective public transport. Buses are abysmally slow and hideously uncomfortable: a 30-minute automobile trip typically takes three hours by bus and may -- depending on the number of transfers and the frequency of bus service -- take six or seven hours. Thus I regard my annual automobile expenses -- several thousand dollars each year gouged from an increasingly difficult budget -- as a hidden, viciously regressive tax in which the costs soar ever higher and the returns (that is, the services-to-dollars ratio) are already the world's lowest. Moreover, having lived in New York City, I know the benefits of effective public transport -- one of which is the infinite blessing of removal of the automotive albatross from one's neck. But now by age and income I am stuck here for the duration, where gasoline at $4 a gallon will literally put me out of business. And I have no doubt the price will rise far far far beyond $4 -- and never come down again.

[Brewman_Jax]

18. That's not impossible

I watched the gas prices jump 10 cents between 9am and 12noon yesterday. Doesn't look like relief is in sight. :(

[ieoeja]

19. It's called "startup costs".

You thought the switch to bio-fuel would be FREE? Yes, in the long run it saves money (plus other advantages). But the refineries still have to be built. Indiana is in the process of breaking ground on nine such refineries. The transport system has to be established, etc.

This will take time and money. That doesn't make it a bad idea.

The artificial time limit may have been a bad idea. Or maybe not. Without it, would gas companies have simply waited to the last minute figuring the legislator would suspend/repeal the requirement after the current mideast crisis passes? And would the gas companies figuring have been correct?

Once the price has been paid, we are NOT going to go back. So this pain is probably necessary.

Of course, that doesn't stop us from getting in some digs at the republicans over it. They will happily assault US for raising taxes to pay off THEIR debts. So we might as well get in a few shots at them for hurting people even if they are doing the right thing for some odd reason.

[donsu]

20. NINE new refineries????

being built all at once?

who knew?