This is not meant to cause panic (LOL)--gas prices.

[Reya]

I'm going to see if we can convert our fireplaces into a masonry heater before winter. For us, that's the big thing. But electricity is outrageous here, too! I pale every time I get our electric bill--and it's not even summer.

[Kari C in SC]

I am potty training my toddler. Diapers are expensive! I am planting my first garden this year. If it would quit freezing that could actually get going.

 

I loved your post because I am doing (trying anyway) to do the same thing. My little guy is 3.5 and he NEEDS to be potty trained so I can quit buying diapers. We also planted our very first big garden this year. It is actually my dh's hobby, but I am excited about it.

[mcconnellboys]

We're actually thinking of buying a scooter for short trips to the store, Jean. Now I'm trying to decide whether I think that might be more costly in terms of life and limb if some idiot hits us while we're trying to drive it, LOL..... I really, really wish we had more extensive sidewalks or bike lanes around here..... We're getting baskets for our bikes, too, so we can make better use of them where we can.

 

We've just put our screens back on our windows for the first time in several years. The trees around our house are finally big enough to give us some shade and help with cool breezes more often during the year, so we're going to try to stop using central heat and air when we can.

 

I just added tomatoes to my beds for the first time ever. I wish I did live on some land where I could put in more crops, but I can add a few things here and there in my yard that will probably be enough to help out our small family.

 

I'm going to start cutting milk half and half with powdered milk to cut milk costs.

 

We have a fireplace and a decent pile of wood, but we don't use it that often as all the heat seems to go up the chimney. Is there some contraption I can buy that will direct the heat into the house better? Seems that I've heard of such......

 

We're still brainstorming other things we might do to help cut back.

[mcconnellboys]

At least some car manufacturers, such as GM, are claiming that they will have fuel cell cars ready to roll by about 2010. Isn't that odd, just a couple of years ago, they all said that couldn't be done?

[Old Dominion Heather]

Is using powdered milk that much less expensive? It seems that when I priced it, it didn't seem much less at least here. A big box, the size of a cereal box was about $7. Is that what you are paying? How much does that make?

[JennifersLost]

Dh is actually researching getting a windmill, LOL.

 

I'm not too "into" it if truth be told, but I'm withholding judgement for now.

[beansprouts]

Dh is actually researching getting a windmill, LOL.

 

 

They kill birds you know :D

 

(Sorry, Libs, I couldn't help it...)

[LizzyBee]

Dh is actually researching getting a windmill, LOL.

 

This is a huge controversy where I grew up. The county only has one weekly newspaper, and for at least the past year, half the letters to the editors are about the windmills. One week, one side dominates; the next week, the other side rebuts, and so it goes. It's been entertaining. :D

[hsmom]

Dh is actually researching getting a windmill, LOL.

 

If I had one of these we would have mega power forever! The wind is always blowing in Wyoming.LOL

[Anne/Ankara]

That's interesting! $10 by Christmas-- I wonder if that will happen, and what that will mean. In Europe/Middle East it is already $8-10/gallon, and has been for some time.

 

Let's see what happens!

[mcconnellboys]

I don't know yet. I've still got to go price it. If it's not less, then I won't use it. I think it used to be a lot, lot less.....Ask me next week and I'll tell you what I've found out! Hey, I even bought dried beans for the first time last weekend - I might even actually learn to cook after all this, LOL....

[Aubrey]

We can handle slow increases in the cost of living because our wages will also rise to keep up with it.

 

But that's part of the problem right now--since 9/11, wages have *not* risent to keep up w/ costs. Worker productivity has gone up while wages have stayed the same & benefits have been dropped. If you remember, unemployment was really bad at the time, & many people took work that was beneath their skill level. From what I've heard, we've never fully recovered from that. People are still working below the income/education level they would have expected pre 9/11. (Although things were already getting difficult then, so I'm not nec. blaming that event for the subsequent economics.)

[RebeccaC]

Well, I don't think gas prices are going to stay high for very long and I am not worried at all :D There is new technology and dh has been in contact with this company and he thinks this is ligt. If it is, spot on right, it is one of the biggest discoveries probably in our lifetime.

 

After three years of clandestine development, a Georgia company is now going public with a simple, natural way to convert anything that grows out of the Earth into oil.

 

J.C. Bell, an agricultural researcher and CEO of Bell Bio-Energy, Inc., says he's isolated and modified specific bacteria that will, on a very large scale, naturally change plant material – including the leftovers from food – into hydrocarbons to fuel cars and trucks.

 

"What we're doing is taking the trash like corn stalks, corn husks, corn cobs – even grass from the yard that goes to the dump – that's what we can turn into oil," Bell told WND. "I'm not going to make asphalt, we're only going to make the things we need. We're going to make gasoline for driving, diesel for our big trucks."

 

Wood pulp is among the many natural materials that can be converted into oil and gasoline, according to Bell Bio-Energy, Inc., of Tifton, Ga.

 

The agricultural researcher made the discovery after standing downwind from his cows at his food-production company, Bell Plantation, in Tifton, Ga.

 

"Cows are like people that eat lots of beans. They're really, really good at making natural gas," he said. "It dawned on me that that natural gas was methane."

 

Bell says he wondered what digestive process inside a cow enabled it to change food into the hydrocarbon molecules of methane, so he began looking into replicating and speeding up the process.

 

"Through genetic manipulation, we've changed the naturally occurring bacteria, so they eat and consume biomass a little more efficiently," he said. "It works. There's not even any debate that it works. It really is an all-natural, simple process that cows use on a daily basis."

 

Naturally occurring bacteria used to convert biomass into hydrocarbons.

 

But does he think it will make environmentalists happy?

 

"They love this. We had one totally recognizable environmentalist from Hollywood say this is everything they ever had hoped for," Bell said. "This could be considered the ultimate recycling of carbon. We are using the energy of the sun through the plant. We're not introducing any new carbon [to the environment]."

 

The research has received strong support from the U.S. Department of Defense, Department of Energy, Department of Agriculture and committees in both chambers of Congress, and Bell plans further discussions in Washington, D.C., next week.

 

 

He expects to have the first pilot plant for the process running within two to three months, and will operate it for a year to collect engineering data to design full-scale production facilities. He thinks the larger facilities will be producing oil "inside the next two years."

 

And just how much oil is in Bell's bio-forecast?

 

"With minor changes in the agricultural and forestry products, we could create two to two and a half billion tons of biomass a year, and you're looking at 5 billion barrels of oil per year. That would be about two-thirds of what we use now."

 

Turning some of nature's produce into energy has been done for years, especially when it comes to the conversion of corn and cellulose-based products into ethanol, used to extend gasoline volume and boost octane.

 

The Energy Information Administration says in 2005, total U.S. ethanol production was 3.9 billion gallons, or 2.9 percent of the total gasoline pool.

 

Bell admits his bacterial breakthrough has been kept under wraps until now, but he plans to explain it all once his website is fully operational.

 

Bell Bio-Energy, Inc., aims to use modified bacteria like this to convert biomass into oil and gasoline within two years.

 

"We're actually gonna tell people how we do it, with streaming video. We're to the point now with our patent that we can say more and we fully intend to.

 

"We want to develop public support so they can understand what we're doing; to develop political support, because this is a combination of making the United States more independent from foreign oil sources; make [the country] healthier from an economic point of view; and it goes a long way to solving the environmental problems a lot of people are concerned about."

 

When asked why he thought no one else has patented this process, Bell answered, "It literally is because it's too simple. Everyone was looking for a real complicated mechanism. We looked at how it occurs naturally. But it's now going to develop in a hurry."

 

Recalling other great inventions, Bell cited on another person with his last name.

 

"Alexander Graham Bell put together stuff that was already on the shelf and made a phone. I don't want to compare myself to the great inventors. I'm not there yet, but to be able to look at simple things and create things from them, that's how we think in this company."

 

[MJN]

like to learn more.

 

Thanks,

 

Molly

[Robin in Tx]

like to learn more.

 

Thanks,

 

Molly

 

Google Bell Bio-Energy. You'll find lots of articles. That's what I did.. I was interested, too.

 

Robin

[Kelli in TN]

This is an interesting conversation.

 

Already we are quitting ballet. That will eliminate two trips out per week. We have no choice but to go out for speech therapy. We will keep going to 4H, but there are only two meetings per month. I think we will use the YMCA for out of house activities more since it is a short drive down the road from us. I am stepping down from leadership at church and I might cut down on Wednesday night services.

 

My husband has already been riding his motorcycle to work when possible. Since his two choices of transportation are the motorcycle and the SUV, the motorcycle is much better on gas! I wonder if we ought to sell the SUV. He could use my van when the weather is bad....

 

I am not likely to grow a big garden, I am too afraid of snakes. (Please don't laugh, it is one of my issues). I am thinking about putting some veggies in my flowerbed, though. I am also thinking of doing a few container veggies, since snakes are less likely to end up in my potted tomato plant than in a garden square.

 

I am going to try to run the air conditioner less. Sigh. That will be hard. I hate the heat.

[Plaid Dad]

I have already told someone who wants to hire me to teach an hour away from here that there is no way I can commute that distance five days a week. I will be raising my tutoring rates in the fall (which I would have done anyway - I was undercharging for this area) and I'm considering adding a travel surcharge for people who live more than a half hour away from me and want me to come to them. I already drive close to 200 miles a week just to teach.

 

My dw and I may also have to rethink our church situation. Both of us go to churches in different towns. Mine is 25 minutes away; hers is 45. There is no church comparable to hers any closer than that, nor is there a Catholic parish with the same standards of orthodoxy anywhere in our end of the diocese. (People come from three states to this particular parish.) Much as we hate to shop on Sunday, dw's church is in a larger town with Target, Whole Foods, Trader Joe's, etc., so we usually do our shopping after her service to save gas.

[Robin in Tx]

http://www.nysun.com/news/business/gas-price-may-soon-cost-sawbuck

 

Found this. I pray it doesn't get this high.

 

 

More and more people are now coming out and saying this... and it is alarming, but I still don't think anyone is saying that they expect this by the end of this year... these all read like predictions out over the next few years. Still bad, and we'll all still have to adapt somehow, but I still don't think it's breathing down our neck quite so immediately.

 

Robin

[Julpost]

I went to a surprise birthday party this weekend and the hostess had a wood burning furnace that heats her whole home and all of their hot water. She has a tankless hot water system and loves it. So I'm thinking of looking into that, maybe that's what we'll spend our tax rebate check on. We have a fireplace insert woodstove that heats our downstairs, maybe we should get one for the upstairs as well. I guess the only downside is that we wouldn't keep it going all night and our pipes might freeze overnight in the winter.

 

I don't know, I feel like we need to do more to be prepared (buying in bulk and storing it, starting a garden this year, canning the excess, and driving a whole lot less) but these issues coupled with trying to eat healthier by grinding our own wheat, baking and cooking more at home, buying grass fed beef, and joining our local CSA ($400 for the season) is starting to overwhelm me. We were supposed to join a Classical Conversations group next year but it's in a town 25 min. away and if gas prices are going to jump, I think we should probably put the money towards something else. It'll be pretty pricey for us to join anyway.

 

Lots to consider for sure......

[Storm Bay]

Gas prices around the world. Very interesting.

 

Perhaps a Canadian can chime in with their gas prices. Of course, they pay per litre, and a litre is a big bigger than an American quart. It's much higher than here, too, because it is heavily taxed. When I spoke with my sil Sunday she quoted price changes that, when multiplied by a bit less than 4 are very similar to the rise in price we see here.

 

Anyway, somehow people adjust. We live very affluent lives here, overall, even many of us who feel frugal. Not that I'm advocating poverty by a long shot, just putting things in perspective. The sad thing is that many people refuse to reduce their unnecessary driving. I'd hate to see laws forcing me to limit my driving. Now that my kids are all old enough to handle a 1-2 mile round trip walk, I think I'll just by one of those rolling shopping cart things and walk to check our mail and pick up local shopping. We do drive to the best and American owned supermarket. We already have all our kids' activities within 3 miles of our house. This may change how often we go to meets (perhaps we can carpool with someone who drives in a safe enough manner that I can accept--I'm rather strict about this as this state has plethora of drivers who follow way too close, etc.)

 

Dh and I have talked about someday getting a solar panel, however with our unbelievably finicky smoke alarms, I don't think a woodstove would be an option. This is why I once asked about the corn burning stoves, but no one had anything positive to say about those (mostly rising corn prices and ethanol, etc). Unless dh put a woodstove in our basement--perhaps a warmer basement would somehow help?????

[StaceyinLA]

because we live a solid 45 minutes from a town where I can really do all my shopping. The town 13 miles away has a Wal-mart, but that just doesn't cut it a lot of the time.

 

Luckily, dh's gas is paid, and, since he is basically running the company for his retired father, that's not likely to change. Also, since they do commercial work, their work load isn't likely to drop big businesses always manage to have money!! ;-p

 

I generally drive to the bigger city a couple times each week and to the smaller town (where our golf course is) a few times/week.

 

We have all electric everything and no real promise of being able to change that so we just have to cut back in that one area. We are re-roofing and re-insulating this summer so that should help us some, although I haven't found our electricity to really go up much.

 

We grow and store what we can and have chickens for eggs. They free-range so they really don't eat a ton of feed, plus I give them lots of scraps. We did have dairy goats and I am getting another goat soon, but I have a lot of trouble milking due to carpal tunnel. I may have to suck it up, or have ds milk because I think we need to go back to milking (milk has gone WAY up and the one we buy is $5.50/gallon). I won't compromise on things like milk/dairy because of hormones so I will have to do what it takes.

 

Dh hunts so we have a freezer full of meat for him (most of the rest of us don't eat meat), and we are considering raising some meat chickens too. When we buy meat, we buy from my sister who raises black angus (free-range with no garbage added). I buy lots of fresh stuff but generally only purchase items that are on sale. The things I can't get fresh I buy frozen.

 

We eat lots of grains and we grind our own. We have a good, cheap honey source too so that helps.

 

I do have 3 kids driving (2 have cars and one will be getting a car soon - we will get one that gets TONS of gas mileage - the other 2 get over 30).

 

I am considering selling my minivan and going to something more economical, but I am not going to panic myself.

[cin]

After looking at the gas prices around the world, and noting that it is under a dollar in Kuwait and Saudi Arabia, I'll be the rebel here and say....Let's drill our own oil!!!! The enviornment is beautiful, but if we aren't here to enjoy it, what difference does it make? Seriously, according to some reports, we have enough oil to supply us for many years but it's been cordoned off as preservation areas. I think it's time we start preserving the HUMAN race.

:leaving: running before the flames hit...

[5knights3maidens]

We were just talking about this (hereJ) and I'm glad you said it. I think we should use what we have. This is just ridiculous. No flames from me.

:iagree:

[LizzyBee]

After looking at the gas prices around the world, and noting that it is under a dollar in Kuwait and Saudi Arabia, I'll be the rebel here and say....Let's drill our own oil!!!! Seriously, according to some reports, we have enough oil to supply us for many years but it's been cordoned off as preservation areas. I think it's time we start preserving the HUMAN race.

 

:iagree:

[LizzyBee]

Unless dh put a woodstove in our basement--perhaps a warmer basement would somehow help?????

 

My mom and brother both heat their houses with woodstoves in the basement and they sometimes have to open windows because it gets too hot. They both have walk out basements and only one story above it, though. If you have an upstairs, you'll get some heat up there but not a lot.

[LizzyBee]

Well, I don't think gas prices are going to stay high for very long and I am not worried at all :D There is new technology and dh has been in contact with this company and he thinks this is ligt. If it is, spot on right, it is one of the biggest discoveries probably in our lifetime.

 

Maybe I'm just cynical, but I bet the government will get involved and regulate the process and make this new stuff just as expensive as gas.

[Robin in Tx]

Maybe I'm just cynical, but I bet the government will get involved and regulate the process and make this new stuff just as expensive as gas.

 

I'm wondering if the opposite won't be true. New technology is so very expensive... somewhere in one of the articles I read about this it said that the only downside is that it's hard to produce for a reasonable price. The govvt. might have to subsidize it to make it affordable at first.

 

I also read that they are now building plants (or a plant somewhere) to make ethanol out of other raw material, like the tops of pine trees that have been harvested for lumber. If so, this might bring ethanol prices down.

 

Lots of promising options on the horizon... but it's going to pinch in the meantime, that's for sure. We're just consolidating trips more, and turning down more opportunities that require cross town commutes. That's about all we can do for now.

 

This all has an eery, Y2K feel to it. I can guarantee you one thing... I'm not going to stock up on a 100 lbs. of beans this time! LOL

[RebeccaC]

This all has an eery, Y2K feel to it. I can guarantee you one thing... I'm not going to stock up on a 100 lbs. of beans this time! LOL

 

 

:smilielol5: Been there done that, still them beans in huge glass jars, and still have no idea how to cook em:001_rolleyes:

[TraceyS/FL]

After looking at the gas prices around the world, and noting that it is under a dollar in Kuwait and Saudi Arabia, I'll be the rebel here and say....Let's drill our own oil!!!! The enviornment is beautiful, but if we aren't here to enjoy it, what difference does it make? Seriously, according to some reports, we have enough oil to supply us for many years but it's been cordoned off as preservation areas. I think it's time we start preserving the HUMAN race.

:leaving: running before the flames hit...

 

No flames here.......

 

And i'm a CA Central Coast Native :D

[mamato3 all-boy boys]

The enviornment is beautiful, but if we aren't here to enjoy it, what difference does it make? Seriously, according to some reports, we have enough oil to supply us for many years but it's been cordoned off as preservation areas. I think it's time we start preserving the HUMAN race.

:leaving: running before the flames hit...

 

..in fact, I'll add that we were watching Glenn Beck's program last night on CNN and he interviewed the governor of Montana. They have coal reserves that can be converted to oil that will last us 200 years. And he mentioned some way to reuse the CO2 emissions so that they aren't totally wasteful (although the exact process and end target escapes me now.

 

IMtotallyHO, I believe we can be good stewards of the environment without turning the environment into a false idol. Ducking for cover with ya!

[Guest Shanna]

..in fact, I'll add that we were watching Glenn Beck's program last night on CNN and he interviewed the governor of Montana. They have coal reserves that can be converted to oil that will last us 200 years. And he mentioned some way to reuse the CO2 emissions so that they aren't totally wasteful (although the exact process and end target escapes me now.

 

IMtotallyHO, I believe we can be good stewards of the environment without turning the environment into a false idol. Ducking for cover with ya!

 

:iagree: It is absolutely ridiculous that this is happening.

[Mrs Mungo]

..in fact, I'll add that we were watching Glenn Beck's program last night on CNN and he interviewed the governor of Montana. They have coal reserves that can be converted to oil that will last us 200 years. And he mentioned some way to reuse the CO2 emissions so that they aren't totally wasteful (although the exact process and end target escapes me now.

 

IMtotallyHO, I believe we can be good stewards of the environment without turning the environment into a false idol. Ducking for cover with ya!

 

I could be wrong but I believe (when I read up on this before) that converting coal to oil is more expensive and wastes more energy than burning coal to produce electricity. Switching to electric cars and using the coal to produce the electricity might be better than converting the coal to oil.

[mamato3 all-boy boys]

I could be wrong but I believe (when I read up on this before) that converting coal to oil is more expensive and wastes more energy than burning coal to produce electricity.

 

Mind you, this was one guy that I heard on TV last night, but I know I've heard it somewhere before (talk radio) that with oil at $120+ per barrel, other technologies that were once expensive are now quite reasonable. In the past when this coal to oil was talked about, gas was a "ridiculous" (for the time) $30 or so a barrel. The governor was saying that the oil producing countries started selling oil at $10 (could've been less) per barrel, which effectively stopped any more research and development into this technology and we just started sucking in more oil from other countries.

 

So, as oil goes up, other technologies that were once too expensive become quite appealling interms of cost to produce.

[Mrs Mungo]

Mind you, this was one guy that I heard on TV last night, but I know I've heard it somewhere before (talk radio) that with oil at $120+ per barrel, other technologies that were once expensive are now quite reasonable. In the past when this coal to oil was talked about, gas was a "ridiculous" (for the time) $30 or so a barrel. The governor was saying that the oil producing countries started selling oil at $10 (could've been less) per barrel, which effectively stopped any more research and development into this technology and we just started sucking in more oil from other countries.

 

So, as oil goes up, other technologies that were once too expensive become quite appealling interms of cost to produce.

 

Right, I agree that at this point it would be cheaper than foreign oil (especially when you factor in the cost of the wars to keep it flowing). However, I think it's still cheaper to burn and convert to electricity than it is to make oil out of it. Although coal is bad for the environment transforming it to oil and then burning it *again* as fuel seems worse.

[Storm Bay]

After looking at the gas prices around the world, and noting that it is under a dollar in Kuwait and Saudi Arabia, I'll be the rebel here and say....Let's drill our own oil!!!! The enviornment is beautiful, but if we aren't here to enjoy it, what difference does it make? Seriously, according to some reports, we have enough oil to supply us for many years but it's been cordoned off as preservation areas. I think it's time we start preserving the HUMAN race.

:leaving: running before the flames hit...

 

Interesting. Canada has enough oil, or the equivalent, to last Canada a couple of hundred years, but because much of it is in the tar sands in Alberta, it's very expensive to process. And it definitely has a nasty environmental impact! But Alberta is a wealthy province that, last time I checked, had no provincial sales tax.

[Jean in Wisc]

I've enjoyed reading this thread. It has given me food for thought. I've also found it interesting that everyone could calmly go about the discussion--whether that is because we generally do not think it is going to happen or if we are simply well grounded in reality! LOL!

 

It was fun--

 

J

[greenwillow]

But that's part of the problem right now--since 9/11, wages have *not* risent to keep up w/ costs. Worker productivity has gone up while wages have stayed the same & benefits have been dropped. If you remember, unemployment was really bad at the time, & many people took work that was beneath their skill level. From what I've heard, we've never fully recovered from that. People are still working below the income/education level they would have expected pre 9/11. (Although things were already getting difficult then, so I'm not nec. blaming that event for the subsequent economics.)

 

:iagree: Plus, at least for dh, any small cost-of-living increases he gets are ALWAYS sucked up (and then some!) by the huge increases in his medical insurance premiums every year. Guess we could cut insurance out to pay for gas to actually get to work! :eek:

 

I wonder if anyone here has joined a medical co-op in lieu of having insurance, and how it has worked out.....I have looked at those, but not seriously......

[babs]

I look at that big unknown future out there ahead of my husband and I - and our children (and grandchildren?) and I just pray, and I pray, and I pray. I would go crazy worrying about all the possibilities...and I know nothing about a garden! Peace about abiding in Him does not mean I will have it easy - but I believe He will take care of us.

 

That is my 2 cents on the gas increase. (I am praying for a solution!)

[TXMomof4]

Dh is actually researching getting a windmill, LOL.

 

I'm not too "into" it if truth be told, but I'm withholding judgement for now.

 

My parents live in west TX, just off the caprock. They are putting up windmills EVERYWHERE. There was a meeting a few months ago because they are planning to expand the project. To have ONE windmill on your land would get you a $12,000.00/year payment. At no cost to the individual. The company pays to put it up, all maintenance, etc.

It's hard to see the beautiful landscape and scenery ruined with these things, but I told my parents, if you have to look at them anyway, you might as well profit from them. I drove past a field last time I was out there that was full of beautiful cotton, 2 oil wells pumping and at least 10 windmills. Talk about living off the land!

[TXMomof4]

One more thing I just heard this last week....

 

Apparently the military accounts for 50% of all the diesel fuel used in the US. There is a bill that has been introduced to allow military bases to build their own refineries. Now, if the gas companies lost 50% of their demand for diesel, that would have to have a serious impact on prices for the public. Right? Plus, that would mean more jobs because of course the military would more than likely hire civilians to run the refineries.

 

http://www.govtrack.us/congress/billtext.xpd?bill=h110-6125

 

Just thought I'd put that out there.

[Parrothead]

After looking at the gas prices around the world, and noting that it is under a dollar in Kuwait and Saudi Arabia, I'll be the rebel here and say....Let's drill our own oil!!!! The enviornment is beautiful, but if we aren't here to enjoy it, what difference does it make? Seriously, according to some reports, we have enough oil to supply us for many years but it's been cordoned off as preservation areas. I think it's time we start preserving the HUMAN race.

:leaving: running before the flames hit...

 

:iagree:

[Parrothead]

IMtotallyHO, I believe we can be good stewards of the environment without turning the environment into a false idol. Ducking for cover with ya!

:iagree:

[Amy in NY]

First, I've spent this morning reading this thread. It was really very enjoyable and informative. Thanks to all who participated.

 

Now, on to my post....

 

One more thing I just heard this last week....

 

Apparently the military accounts for 50% of all the diesel fuel used in the US. There is a bill that has been introduced to allow military bases to build their own refineries. Now, if the gas companies lost 50% of their demand for diesel, that would have to have a serious impact on prices for the public. Right? Plus, that would mean more jobs because of course the military would more than likely hire civilians to run the refineries.

 

http://www.govtrack.us/congress/billtext.xpd?bill=h110-6125

 

Just thought I'd put that out there.

 

 

So the gov't will be building more refineries...(possibly). Hmmm, makes me think of this recent news clip:

 

 

 

Sorry, this is a bit off of the original topic. But I can't see why only allowing the military (aka gov't) to build refineries would be beneficial to the population as a whole.

 

And, if you haven't guessed, I agree with the others who've said that we need to drill ourselves. Increased production would mean more refineries as well. That said, to save money, we switched to wood heat a few years ago. Dh doubled the size of my garden this summer ("It's less to mow.") And I've finally decided that it is o.k. to ask my bil, a mechanic, to help me find a cheap, reliable commuter car and have him do the maintenance work on it and our Suburban. (I've never wanted to him to feel that we were taking advantage of him b/c he's family.)