That's what I was talking about. Hydrogen internal combustion engine's. Didnt know they had a V10 though. There is no shortage right now. The oil fields in Alberta here will be good for another 190 or so yrs. That number was based on consumption rates a couple yrs ago, but even with consumption rates where they are, we will have oil for a very long time to come. We should start looking for alternative energy scources for home heating, and other such large consumers of petrol.

That's not true, natural gas is currently the way which is used to manufacture hydrogen - and this method is still ok to use so we can get the technology and development rolling, but I'm pretty sure I read that hydrogen did not require any petro energy expenditure at all during the manufacturing process.
It's a method of using electricity to seperate the two components of water - electrolysis.

Autos and machines consume the vast bulk of petroleum and oil in this country. Oil respresents a very small percentage of our electrical energy today. Most of our electricity is produced by hydropowerplants, coal, or biomass. Solar energy is even getting into the mix - it's represents 8% as of right now. These are the energy sources which would be used to produce hydrogen in a manufacturing plant.

Getting beyond this - how could seawater consume any petrol energy? This is'int theory I'm talking about - it's not science fiction. It's been proven again and again that even a regular gasoline powered generator can be made to run on water with minimum engine modification. We need this technology to be made mass produced and available in autos within the next 5-10 years at most.

The problem with oil is it is running out. At the same time as supply is dwindling, population projections put us at double our current world population within the next 50 years - this means roughly twice the demand with half as much supply. I'd say that oil is not the answer. Water covers like 70-80% of the earths surface? Even if our world population increased 5 fold - we would exhaust the land production capacity long before we'd ever have to worry about a water shortage.

Sure cars and trucks, and machines would still require oil as a lubricant, coal based synthetics being mixed in with fossil oil could take care of that for a long time. If we can eliminate oil as the main source of fuel in vehicles it should last indefinately longer.

Here are a few links

http://www.theautochannel.com/news/2005/02/25/005425.html

http://www.ford.com/en/innovation/engineFuelTechnology/hydrogenInternalCombustion.htm

http://www.germancarfans.com/news.cfm/NewsID/2040920.001/bmw/1.html

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6272039/

http://www.spiritofmaat.com/archive/watercar/h20car2.htm

I know this subject may be taboo to some, but if our vehicles sounded, drove, and performed for the most part just as they do on gasoline - why not?
Add to this that we arent killing the environment with air polluting toxins and that the fuel is SUPER CHEAP - where's the downside? I guess they'ed have to invent a new tax to make up for lost revenue in fuel taxes though.

On a final note - it's my belief that electric cars are a total waste - including the hybrids - they still consume fossil fuel, and electricity will never replace petro as a real viable energy source in even the smallest cars. Hydrogen by contrast, could be used to power the largest 18 wheelers.

What I don't get....
 

What I don't understand is why there is not a bigger push for bio? It can be a recycled fuel from the food industry, it is renewable and can be made cheap. We have the technology NOW, no waiting for some fuel cell or more research on new motors.
If a tax credit and other incentives were offered to run it like maybe some seed money to encourage someone to manufacture it on a major scale (not big oil but a new company) and no road tax on it for the first few years maybe we could lower our dependance on foriegn oil. At least it would lower the cost of goods by truck and rail, not to mention the nice smell of fries up and down the highway!
There has got to be a way to get pump bio cheaper and run it almost 100%.

tj_82, if bio was a reasonable replacement for petro - I'd be all for it, in fact maybe once hydrogen takes over, there will remain a small niche for bio diesel. But bio will never become a replacement for petro on a grand scale. You'd need MUCH MUCH more than can be made available from food waste. Whole crops would have to be devoted to it - and taking the rates of soil errosion into account, your looking at about 35% of North American landmass to be set aside for it's production - and this would be good only for domestic supply.

So who do you want to give your dollars to, the farmer in Kansas or the guy in Saudi Arabia that has a terrorist for a brother?

Meg- There are a number of potentially VAST energy reserves worldwide just waiting to be exploited. I'll darn near guarantee you that the Amazon delta and basin will be found to hold oil reserves on par with those in Middle East.
Gas-to-liquids technology is aleady proving economical, eg. Shell's MDS (middle distillate synthesis) plant at Bintulu LNG in Sarawak.

Oil reserves numbers are very misleading in that they are calculated at current oil price with exisiting production infrastructure. Whereas, at a higher oil price, formerly marginally economic development prospects become quite profitable. It's not simply a matter of finding new oil fields...but also about extracting more oil from currently producing fields. A number of technologies can be used to extract more oil from the same reservoir that would otherwise be left in the ground at a lower oil price. Remember...50-60% of the discovered oil typically remains in the ground following primary extraction, and can only be produced through secondary and tertiary recovery technologies, the implementation of which is purely a matter of economics.

There's massive reserves in the Canadian tar sands, as well as large reserves in oil shales up and down the Rockies. Several multi-billion $$ oil sands projects are currently producing and more are being built. A buddy in Edmonton is currently working on a major oil sands project.

http://www.wtrg.com/EnergyCrisis/index.html

Clearly, the slide in US production coincides precisely with the oil glut and price crash in 1986. Oil then began a steady decline in real-dollar terms until the past couple of years.

Remember, 60% of the discovered oil alone (eg. reserves) is still in the ground waiting for secondary and tertiary recovery methods to become economically attractive. Producable reserves are as much a function of oil price as finding the oil in the first place. What we're faced with is a production shortage, not reserves shortage. All that's keeping us from converting "reserves" into "production" is more wells and production infrastructure....and that's a simple economic issue.

Higher oil prices will solve the energy shortage, and in several years time we may have another glut.

If you can think of another explanation of the 1986-2002 decline in US production, please lemme know.

True, but recall our thread here is about the price of fuel, not running out of it. The amount of oil recoverable under a different economic circumstance (read: higher oil prices) is a different ball game. For the most part, we have extracted a majority of the "easy" crude, with plenty left that is recoverable under a higher price structure.

Will oil be gone in our lifetime? I seriously doubt it. Will we see $1.00 per gallon again? No.

As I said in a previous post, the US economy will absorb $5.00 fuel. Damn near everything is affected by the oil price, from doughnuts to contraceptives...some things more than others. But a comparitively minor adjustment in consumer goods prices will easily compensate for the more expensive fuel. Other products (such as home heating oil) will certainly take a larger chunk out of home budgets.

Just as higher oil prices will make heretofore marginal fields recoverable, alternative energy sources will now be marketplace viable. These price increases are not entirely bad...

I'm late to this thread, and have not read all. Hydrogen is NOT the way to go. Not now, at least.
First, combustion is not an alternative. Global warming (unless you still have your head in the sand, and don't believe the scientists) is caused by carbon concentration increases in the atmosphere, and heat generated by combustion.
Second, hydrogen is extremely inefficient to produce. Unless it is made by photovoltaics, it will be much much worse than simply burning the fuel we already burn.
The real answer is a decrease in world population. We cannot engineer our way out of this problem.

And in case you don't believe me, I am currently a mechanical engineer involved in a hydrogen fuel cell company.

Well, it seems that no matter how we want to spin it, we are being scammed, have been for a long time! I hate to say this because of the way it makes me sound but we have spent allot of dollars in Iraq and we dam well better get something for it!! Oil that is, black gold, Texas tea!!

jeffwoehrle- good post. The second part of my post was addressing the economics of the current energy crisis. It was the price/production slide that lasted 16 years which brought this on in the first place. I fully expect the price increases will bring subsequent production increases as well.

$1.00 gasoline? Yep, we agree- kiss that goodbye.

I still wonder at how many folks identify this with the Mid East. That geographical area represents a small portion of our oil imports.

True, we have been lead to believe all oil comes from there, when in truth it does not. Things like oil imports and production should have the greatest bearing on price, I do feel that other factors have come in to play for some time to drive up the price while not having a significant increase in production and there for controlling manufacturing overhead. More money for shareholders, more money for CEOs, CFOs, and several others.

Much appreciated...

Mideast oil is playing a decreasing role in all this. Russia has substantial reserves that needed higher prices to make recovery viable. Oil at these prices really does open up a whole new world of possibilities.

We just need nuke-powered Superdutys and we can avoid the whole mess :-X06. Wonder what kind of chips we could get for those???

We just need nuke-powered Superdutys

Not me baby...to much hazard / toxic waste to get rid of...gees...permits, special containers, hole deep enough to put in. I hate to dig.

I'm switching to dylithium crystals. Where is Scotty when you need him?

Now if I cold just find those speed rated tires...for warp nine. :-X10

Where are you guys coming from? You hear the word "hydrogen" and you go thinking Hiroshima or Nagasaki. It's a gas guys - no more and no less. Helium and Oxygen are also gases - non flamable ones albeit. I wonder how flammable gasoline vapors are?
How about propane? Butane? Hydrogen is the only acceptable petro alternative I'm aware of which is renewable and does not rely on petro at all.

Say what you want - there is a future in hydrogen technology, not in those ridiculously expensive and labor intensive fuel cells either - either straight hydrogen
or saline water with a catalyst being fed to an internal combustion engine. The only waste produced by this is water. I think Ford knows a bit more on this issue than any of you would be armchair engineers do - and appanrantely they think there is a future in HICE Hydrogen Internal Comnbustion Engines.

It certainly seems more practical than GM's latest Sierra hybrid or DC's cylinder deactivation - both of these add complication to existing designs and do nothing to address alternative fuel sources.

So you say we are in no danger of running out of oil anytime soon? I am glad to hear that. Personally I'm ok with paying alittle more at the pump. I also have no problem with polluting a bit - gasoline is so easy and convenient - but how can you know you are right?

I have heard of the tar sands in Canada. Optimists and oil execs like to point to these sources, politicians listen to what they want to hear - good news is always welcome. But the ones with true knowledge often have their pleas fall on def ears - the scientists and geologists say that Canada's tar sands are good for only about 3 years production - and this is at the current rate of consumption, within the next 10 years projections put that number at a mere 2 years.

Those new techniques for extraction of which you speak are not considered by most experts to able to meet the growing demands which will be taking place at the same time as these techniques are being implemented - considering the decline in our current peak production of mainstay oil fields.

So much for those two theories.

The middle east may well be past it's peak production capacity even now. If this was not true, than there would be no East/West bidding war on barrels coming from there.
Don't kid yourself about the middle east's importance as the world's major oil supplier.
Remember Kuwait? The reason for Desert Storm? Kuwait practically IS oil. Only 7000 square miles in area and Kuwait has more oil than geologists have determined to exist in the entire North American continent - an area of some 9.3 million square miles.

The world's population has gone from 250 million in AD1 to 6.6 billion today. Scientists predict the world population to roughly double within the next 50 years! This is only possible becuase of oil. Without a viable alternative to take it's place, there is no way to support such a population. Without petroleum products for use in farm machinery and for use as pesticides and fertilizer - there will be a world wide famine. Without the fertilizers made from oil, corn crop yields will dwindle from a current average of 130 bushels per acre to roughly 16 bushels per acre. Labor time per acre will increase from 4 hours per acre to more than 50 hours per acre. If we don't do something about our overpopulation on our own - then when the oil does run out - nature will do it for us.

I choose to play it safe and listen to the experts on the matter - hydro technology needs to come in line.

And after all we did for Kuwait!!! Well, I guess, what have we done for them lately!!!!
LOL