Post by evp5O on Dec 21, 2008 13:46:08 GMT -5
As long as we are sending a message to our overseas suppliers
I think it's a good start. We need our suppliers to know that
Americans are for drilling here and aren't afraid to move forward
even though it may not be cost effective at this time.
We dropped the ball on going deeper into solar, wind and other
alternatives back in the 70s. We were making solar hot water
panels and hot air units in school out of full sheets of plywood
and they worked so well that one of the guys in our shop class
got burned by the water coming out of the unit. Years later
I made two of those same units just as a project for a house
I built and the heat of the southern sun cut the electric bill
in half or more. Those units were extremely old school and
not made to todays standards.
Florida has been on top of solar for years now and there is
a nationally recognized standard that uses their efficiency
criteria. You see panels on many universities and homes in
the south but as you get farther west and away from that
state you don't see them as much and there is no reason
that the rest of the southern states should not be on the
ball with this.
If there is anything our govt. should be encouraging
it is our own self efficiency when it comes to energy.
It may not be cost effective at first and the T Boone Pickens plan
comes right out and says what the cost will be and at what point
it will become cost effective.
A Diesel or gasoline engine provides tremendous return and
is a workhorse. The fuel is still cheap compared to what other
countries have been paying but it's time to get the ball rolling
on other fuels. We are going to need oil for years to come and
it should be a push in all directions to get out of this shadow
we are now under.
We as Americans always find a way. It may take 10 years of
jaw jacking but there is always a guy in his garage or basement
that finds something that everyone missed.
