Joined: Dec 25, 2001 Posts: 32,399 Location: Liberty City
Posted: Wed 28th May 9:38am Post subject:
Oli wrote:
jeremyb wrote:
Oil has to run out eventually, everyone agrees about that, when is the big question, it won't hurt to start looking for alternatives now IMO, anything to make us less dependent on foreign countries with rogue leaders!
Er, clearly "everyone" does NOT agree about that.
I think Jeremy is referring to sane people. Some people still think the earth is flat - we just ignore them.
Joined: Dec 25, 2001 Posts: 32,399 Location: Liberty City
Posted: Wed 28th May 9:53am Post subject:
Oli wrote:
Yes, from the constantly replenished supply under the Earth.
Tended by the magical oil pixies who do their magic oil making dance in the bowels of the Earth every evening. If you put your ear to the ground on a quite summer night you can hear their happy singing as they create more oil out of puppy dreams and mojo dust
we shall see in 20 years where things are at, i do agree that irrespective of when or if Oil may run out. alternatives should be investigate, if only for the simple reason of being dependant on an external source of a critical energy supply.
wonder how long before the results of the exploration in the southern basin will come in. evidently that has potential to be a very large source of oil as well.
Joined: Aug 02, 2005 Posts: 920 Location: In your garden
Posted: Wed 28th May 9:55am Post subject:
Oil will never run out. It's simple supply and demand. If there's bugger-all supply, then the price will be astronomical. Assuming there's still some demand for the stuff
Hey people - sorry to drag on old thread kicking and screaming back on topic - but Axel Wilkie (the CAN guy) is actually a v. good engineer and passionate cyclist. He`s a director of a firm called Viastrada which does some good work teaching recalcitrant roading people (like my old boss) that investment in cycling and alternatives to the passenger car are worthwhile. Bloody good courses, quite alot of detail about international best practise in cycle facility design.
While they can get a bit holier that thou (the helmet issue is one example), there heart is in the right place.
As an aside, and without giving too much away - expact the poo to hit the fan in say 6 montsh time, when the income from fuel duty isn`t enough to fund planned infrastructure improvements.you may remember the 5c a lie regional levy introduced (from memory three years ago) - thats meant to run out in 2011... but most of the funds are over allocated. Same for large capital projects like Waterview in auckland, and Ruby bay in nelson - the money just wont be there to pay for them.
I am an evil roading engineer w/ Transit...(single handedly killing the planet), and even I think that we should`nt be building capacity upgrades in NZ - we should be focusing on route efficiency and safety retrofits and the like. As for taxing private car drivers more - great, have them subsidise the construction of a world class cycle infrastructure in NZ, as well as nationally integrated public transport.
Get the trucks off the road - ramp up investment in rail - sure it`ll be uneconomic in teh sort term, but when the costs are looked at whole of life, across the whole transport network it`ll make sense. One truck stresses the pavement the equivalent of approx 10k cars - our annual spend on maintenance will drop hugeley when we get rail working.
Hopefully with the merger of Transit and Land Transport NZ next month, and the associated integration of transport network planning and funding - with rail to come under that umbrella in a year or two, we can sort NZ`s transport infrastructure into some semblance of a sustainable whole..
Sorry about the rambling...but though some of you might be interested in whats happening behind the scenes...
Hey people - sorry to drag on old thread kicking and screaming back on topic - but Axel Wilkie (the CAN guy) is actually a v. good engineer and passionate cyclist. He`s a director of a firm called Viastrada which does some good work teaching recalcitrant roading people (like my old boss) that investment in cycling and alternatives to the passenger car are worthwhile. Bloody good courses, quite alot of detail about international best practise in cycle facility design.
While they can get a bit holier that thou (the helmet issue is one example), there heart is in the right place.
As an aside, and without giving too much away - expact the poo to hit the fan in say 6 montsh time, when the income from fuel duty isn`t enough to fund planned infrastructure improvements.you may remember the 5c a lie regional levy introduced (from memory three years ago) - thats meant to run out in 2011... but most of the funds are over allocated. Same for large capital projects like Waterview in auckland, and Ruby bay in nelson - the money just wont be there to pay for them.
I am an evil roading engineer w/ Transit...(single handedly killing the planet), and even I think that we should`nt be building capacity upgrades in NZ - we should be focusing on route efficiency and safety retrofits and the like. As for taxing private car drivers more - great, have them subsidise the construction of a world class cycle infrastructure in NZ, as well as nationally integrated public transport.
Get the trucks off the road - ramp up investment in rail - sure it`ll be uneconomic in teh sort term, but when the costs are looked at whole of life, across the whole transport network it`ll make sense. One truck stresses the pavement the equivalent of approx 10k cars - our annual spend on maintenance will drop hugeley when we get rail working.
Hopefully with the merger of Transit and Land Transport NZ next month, and the associated integration of transport network planning and funding - with rail to come under that umbrella in a year or two, we can sort NZ`s transport infrastructure into some semblance of a sustainable whole..
Sorry about the rambling...but though some of you might be interested in whats happening behind the scenes...
Joined: Aug 07, 2007 Posts: 450 Location: Tauranga
Posted: Sat 14th Jun 12:47am Post subject:
One thing that I've noticed recently, while petrol and diesel prices have risen by 30-60% over the last year, which we are told is de to the soaring price of crude, the cost of motor oil has not suffered the same fate, in fact some of the automotive supply chains have oil on special! This I find very..... interesting.
I may be burned at the stake for this (being the most un-kiwi thing a New Zealand could EVER suggest) but I can see the future being dominated by electricity. One 1000MW NUCLEAR (yes, I said it) reactor in the south island, on in the north, would put our country well into the comfort zone for electricity demand vs supply. Transport? An electrified rail system for a start. Development of hydrogen-burning engines - hydrogen gas turbine generators powering electric motors - how's that for a concept? And green too!
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