Andrew McKillop
Re: Oil news GETTING THE NUMBERS RIGHT
Thu Mar 25 16:16:06 2004
63.228.144.66

-------- Original Message --------
Subject: Re: Oil news GETTING THE NUMBERS RIGHT
Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2004 06:20:54 -0500
From: Andrew MacKillop AndrewMcKillop@compuserve.com

Anybody who cant be friggin bothered to check out the real world, and real
world NUMBERS, is condemned to talk garbage

Coal gasification, organic waste gasification, kelp gasification, anything
gasification has a problem of SCALE

The (below extract) makes gaification seem attractive, feasible, workable -
doesnt it ?

In 1944 General George S. Patton's Third Army was racing across southern
France. In his haste to be the first U.S. commander to cross into Germany,
however, Patton overextended his supply lines. His armored columns ground
to a dead stop. Faced the choice of waiting until he could be resupplied or
draining the fuel of captured German vehicles, Patton chose the latter. His
tanks and armored personnel carriers continued to steamroll toward Germany,
powered by the German's own ersatz gasoline –
synthetic fuel manufactured from coal. When Allied bombing of the German
synfuels plants began taking its toll in late 1944 and early 1945, the
entire Nazi war machine began grinding to a halt. More than 92 percent of
Germany's aviation gasoline and half its total petroleum during World War
II had come from synthetic fuel plants. At its peak in early 1944, the
German synfuels effort produced more than 124,000 barrels per day from 25
plants.

Now lets check up a little REALITY about oil needs for 'waging' war, in an
Oil War called I-raq

http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A36843-2004Mar6?language=printer

[this is a three Part article by an embedded reporter about
General Petraeus][Iraq war]
Petraeus's first task was to build at least two forward
refueling bases so that the division's 72 AH-64 Apache
helicopters could attack Iraqi defenses on the southern and
western approaches to Baghdad, helping clear a path for the
3rd ID and then the rest of the 101st.
A pair of Apache battalions can drink more than 60,000
gallons of fuel in a single night's attack; the Army
calculated that it would burn 40 million gallons in three
weeks of combat, an amount equivalent to the gasoline
consumed by all Allied armies combined during the four
years of World War One.

You read that right ! In 2003-04 the US needs at least 350 000 barrels/day
to not very successfully kill and oppress Iraqis and not suck out too much
oil, either. What do you expect from a two-bit lickspittle fascist like GWB
?

World oil demand is increasing at about 1.8 Million barrels/day per year
(record high since 10 years). World oil import demand is increasing at
least 1.5 times faster, at about 2.7 Mbd/year (record high since nearly 15
years).

Work out the number of Fischer-Tropf gasification plants needed to be built
each year to satisfy that, then check out exactly how many are being built
!!!

Almost none at all BECAUSE oil is too cheap. Sorry about that. You need
either endgame war (the Nazi case) or oil at over 60 USD/barrel to
kicktstart the construction of gasification plants.


Best regards
Andrew McKillop

===================================

What had struck me more forcefully than Petraeus's subtle mind, however, was his description of a recent electronic war game in which an exceptionally robust "enemy" had inflicted substantial casualties on U.S. forces. "Yet at the end of the day the board is swept clean. You start over and send the electrons into battle again," Petraeus said. "In this" -- and he gestured to the little world we were about to leave behind in Kuwait -- "it's real, and real people will die."
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A36843-2004Mar6?language=printer