Are You Ready To Make Due With Little Or No Gas.??

[FarmerJamie]

Thats the thing, it doesn't matter if were sitting on 100 billion gal. of oil reserves.Big oil isn't going to give anyone a break.Any big/serious intruption of middle-east oil imports will rock the world. Even if we only get 16% of our oil from them.It's just an excuse to rape consumers at the pump, any excuse will do.Any big event will sky rocket fuel prices.This will have a serious ripple effect for most everyone.You can drive a horse and buggy, but a farmer somewhere is going to need fuel to grow hay and oats for your horse.If you were Amish, you'd have been doing that for a long time.They go full circle, plant food for people and theirs horses, plow the fields with very comfortable farm implements that they build.They us very little oil products.I'm just saying, big oil SUCKS.....lol, and were all going to pay for their greed.Some SS'ers will do fine, who have refined their lives to do without oil and producete food they need.Most of us will be caught with our pants down,unless your rich and can pay $25.00 a gal for fuel.

I think I might understand what you are trying to say, but it makes no sense to me that "big oil" would do what you describe - no business would price their product out of the reach of the majority of their consumer base. Now the govt interfering in the market and driving up prices to make other energy options more viable, I could believe that.

We've talked about the Amish on here before - based my lifetime of being around Amish and living near a sizable community, I think you are romanticizing their life style and culture just a bit. Their culture is not stuck in the early 1800's. A large amount of their income comes from working for "the English", meaning they pay to be driven to work sites/locations, and count on customers to drive to their shops and places of business. They are very integrated with the community and would suffer greatly, too.

When you talk about doing without oil, are you including not just gasoline, but all of the products derived from petroleum? Plastics, fertilizers, etc. The Amish use a lot of that stuff, too.

 

[redhen]

Not to worry!! If we all go from cars and trucks to horses and mules they will still tax us!!

Poop tax, someone has to scoop the poop!

Horseshoe tax, shoes are hard on the surfaces of the roads, plus the cost to recycle used shoes

Feed tax, gotta make money going in as well as going out

Health inspection, can't let sick animals walk around

Stallion insurance, can't have your stallion covering my mare while we are in Wal-Mart!!

Road worthy horse registration, have to know how many horses are out there and suitable for transportation

 

[nikki4612]

I told my husband I want one of those 3 wheel granny bikes with the big basket on the back. I could take that to the store easily. The only trouble is there is no close store that won't require crossing a highway to get to it. Not the best on a bike. Even Dollar General is across the interstate. Agh.

After Katrina, we saw how tough it is without gasoline. Gas cans were totally sold out and few gas stations could work without electiricity and computers. We actually had a family member bring us gas from Texas all the way to New Orleans. It was pretty tough. Now we live in a smaller place and have a whole house generator tied into the natural gas lines. Of course, if there is no natural gas, then it's going to be pretty much useless.

 

[R2D2]

i don't agree with you thoughts about Big Oil, FJ... They aren't the least bit worried about their consumer base. They know they have most all of us by the short hairs, and what we Americans will not buy, they will simply export.China and Pakistans developing auto craze will ensure high demand for fuel.
Well, i wouldn't say i'm romanticing the Amish lifestyle, FJ...Lets say i admire and respect the way they live.In and around Lancaster,Pa. alone are about 25 different groups of Amish, Mennonites or just Plain People.Each group does somethings a little different.I don't know anything about the Amish in your area using plastic or not.My point was that the Amish use a very small amounts of oil products on the farm, and won't be hurt that much by outragous fuel prices, like the typical north American farmer will be.And yes, we have talked about the Amish here before, so what...? Here is a link that may help to understand better..

800padutch.com/amish.shtml

 

[~gd]

Electric car anyone... ? We would still need fossil fuel to generate electric.Unless we had massive solar/wind farms going, or built more, N_ke plants...
I doubt we would have any alternative's in place, by the time we'd really need it.I suppose we will pay the price for not learning our lessons from the 1970's oil embargo, that was fun.It's also a crying shame that engines capable of getting 100 miles to a gallon of fuel, quickly disappear.Big oil has done a very nice job of keeping such fuel efficient engines out of the market place.I wonder why the wall street protestors don't protest bp and ex_on...their as bad as the banks or worse. Would anyone care for a nice gulf state oyster with a side of oil...? They really are sickening, these few in control of such matters. Sorry for my morning rant folks, guess i got out of the wrong side of my bed...

Is there any myth that you don't beleive? How many BTUs do you think are in a gallon of fuel. take that and calculate the mass that can be moved 100 miles with that amount of energy. I'll bet that it is less than the mass of your -$$. How much to you think it costs to sink a oil well under the ocean? do you think it is a job that you and a couple of your buddies can handle this Weekend. Of course you could do it safer than men with experience right? If you want gas you need someone to dril the deep wells, chemical engineers to refine it, and a whole system to distribute and sell it. OR you could buy a farm and a team of draft horses to help you work it, grow crops rich in sugar or starch that is easy to convert to sugar, After you had put aside enough to feed yourself and your team, learn how to moonshine and get one of those 100mile/gallon mechnics to build you an engine that runs on 'shine. Then you might be SS!
It is more fun to sit and moan about 'Big This' and 'Big That' though is it not?~gd

 

[me&thegals]

If there's a huge disruption to fuel, we will ALL be greatly affected, even if we heat with wood. Massive amounts of oil and gas are used to produce nearly everything in America and around the world. Food would skyrocket, clothing would skyrocket, and there would be fierce competition and high costs for what fuel remained.

My DH and I were just talking about this this week. I grow organic veggies. He grows conventional crops. He relies on commercial fertilizer for his soil fertility. It's derived from petroleum. Even though I rely more on mulches and cover crops, even my seeds require fuel for the farmer who grew them, the truck that shipped them to the seed company, and the mail carrier that brought them to me. And, no, it would not be at all practical for me to try to put 1/2 of my land into seed production and the other half into vegetable production. It's hard enough to balance 50 different balls in the air with the crop diversity I already have.

We heat our water with LP. You can bet we've already felt the higher prices. Quadrupling that would hurt.

Even though DH only drives 6 miles to his morning job and I only drive 11 to mine, our kids are not in extracurriculars, etc., we still spend up to $300/month on fuel. Doubling, tripling or quadrupling that would be painful. I could bike to work, but it would cost me a lot of time. Time that I simply don't have from April through October. And then, it's pretty stinking cold. We have no biking area, narrow shoulders and steep ditches.

High gas prices would drive up the cost of EVERYthing, not just gas.

 

[FarmerChick]

I told my husband I want one of those 3 wheel granny bikes with the big basket on the back. I could take that to the store easily. The only trouble is there is no close store that won't require crossing a highway to get to it. Not the best on a bike. Even Dollar General is across the interstate. Agh.

After Katrina, we saw how tough it is without gasoline. Gas cans were totally sold out and few gas stations could work without electiricity and computers. We actually had a family member bring us gas from Texas all the way to New Orleans. It was pretty tough. Now we live in a smaller place and have a whole house generator tied into the natural gas lines. Of course, if there is no natural gas, then it's going to be pretty much useless.

I would do this but traffic in area would kill me yet they do it in many other countries with worse traffic
nah not for me but hopeful LOL

 

[FarmerJamie]

i don't agree with you thoughts about Big Oil, FJ... They aren't the least bit worried about their consumer base. They know they have most all of us by the short hairs, and what we Americans will not buy, they will simply export.China and Pakistans developing auto craze will ensure high demand for fuel.
Well, i wouldn't say i'm romanticing the Amish lifestyle, FJ...Lets say i admire and respect the way they live.In and around Lancaster,Pa. alone are about 25 different groups of Amish, Mennonites or just Plain People.Each group does somethings a little different.I don't know anything about the Amish in your area using plastic or not.My point was that the Amish use a very small amounts of oil products on the farm, and won't be hurt that much by outragous fuel prices, like the typical north American farmer will be.And yes, we have talked about the Amish here before, so what...? Here is a link that may help to understand better..

800padutch.com/amish.shtml

Umm, the hay baler I see on the first page is GASOLINE powered. The twine they are using, I'm betting wasn't spun on a spinning wheel by the local ladies.

Look, I'm not trying to argue. The point I'm trying to make is that after initial glimpses are looked past, they are more intertwined with "our" world than one would guess, that's all.

 

[FarmerChick]

of course 'we' are interwined. no 'special group' is exempt.

other than that tribe of 'whatever' living along some river in some african or amazon region that you can't find, and when ya find them, they have no "normal world' contact. (saw this on Discovery channel lol)


no one is exempt from use, except a "special few" and there are laws now on bothering them

 

[moolie]

I live in a city powered by the oil and natural gas industries, in a province with huge reserves of both. We are the headquarters for all Canadian Oil and Natural Gas companies, and the Canadian headquarters for international companies based in the US, Netherlands, and other countries. Hubs works in IT and has worked on contracts for a few of these companies, both Canadian and international. I know a little about how they run and do business.

Gasoline sold at the pump accounts for a mere drop in the bucket when it comes to Oil company profits.

A typical city gas station makes about $150 per day profit off gasoline, and the oil company makes about the same. The profits made at a gas station are all made on chips and soda (the convenience store) and the repair garage (for stations which still have them). One local oil company recently bought 100 or so gas stations back east, and it will take over 20 years to pay off the investment (purchase price plus re-branding).

Gas station profits passed on to the Oil company barely register when it comes to their bottom line. The stations are merely the public face of the company.

Most profit comes from the raw product--crude oil. This is either refined by the company into: gasoline, asphalt, diesel, plastic polymer resins, kerosene and paraffin, propane etc. or sold as crude to outside refiners.

If everyone stopped buying plastic, then the big oil companies would be in trouble, but gasoline and non-commercial diesel count for very little, commercial diesel doesn't add much more profit.

You can google pie charts for what a barrel of oil yields as far as the various products produced if you don't believe me.