Film-Tech Cinema Systems
  Home     Products     Store     Forum     Warehouse     Contact Us    
Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE


  
my profile | my password | search | faq & rules | forum home
  next oldest topic   next newest topic
» Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE   » Community   » Film-Yak   » Gas Prices in your area (Page 44)

 
This topic comprises 55 pages: 1  2  3  ...  41  42  43  44  45  46  47  ...  53  54  55   
Author Topic: Gas Prices in your area
Lyle Romer
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1400
From: Davie, FL, USA
Registered: May 2002

- posted 06-09-2008 10:46 AM      Profile for Lyle Romer   Email Lyle Romer   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
quote: Frank Angel
And I was recently in Florida where EVERYONE drives at freakin 80 - 90 mph on I95. Not a lot of people seem to get it that they need to CHANGE their habits and drive more conservatively.
I'm one of those people. In my avalanche, driving 70 MPH I get about 19.7 MPG highway. Driving 80 MPH I get about 16.7 MPG. I know that I can get 3 MPG more driving 10 MPH less BUT....

On a 330 Mile drive that I do pretty often, driving 80 MPH gets me there in 4 hours, 7 minutes. The same drive takes 4 hours, 43 minutes at 70 MPH. At 80 MPH I use about 19.76 gallons of gas vs 16.75 gallons at 70 MPH. I make a concious choice to use about $12 more gas to save 36 minutes on the trip. You might think I'm stupid but in reality even at 70 MPH my gas cost is going to be $67 anyway so why not add another $12 and save a lot of time.

I can save that $12 by eating at home and cooking my own food instead of eating out.

Honestly, the biggest problem with fuel prices isn't on the consumer filling up the car level, it's on the adding cost to everything else level. People can adjust and adapt to prices at the pump. The issue is that with diesel and petroleum based fertilizer costing more (combined with so much farm land being dedicated to corn to make pointless ethanol) it is raising prices of food and other goods considerably.

 |  IP: Logged
Chad Souder
Jedi Master Film Handler

Posts: 962
From: Waterloo, IA, USA
Registered: Feb 2000

- posted 06-09-2008 11:59 AM      Profile for Chad Souder   Email Chad Souder   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
quote: Lyle Romer
combined with so much farm land being dedicated to corn to make pointless ethanol
Could you please explain why ethanol is pointless?

 |  IP: Logged
Richard Hamilton
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1341
From: Evansville, Indiana
Registered: Jan 2000

- posted 06-09-2008 12:03 PM      Profile for Richard Hamilton   Email Richard Hamilton   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
quote: Frank Angel
And I was recently in Florida where EVERYONE drives at freakin 80 - 90 mph on I95.
It's like that on every interstate. Try driving through Atlanta on I75 at any given time of the day

 |  IP: Logged
David Stambaugh
Film God

Posts: 4021
From: Eugene, Oregon
Registered: Jan 2002

- posted 06-09-2008 12:14 PM      Profile for David Stambaugh   Author's Homepage   Email David Stambaugh   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
quote: Chad Souder
Could you please explain why ethanol is pointless?
Yes, let's use food to fuel our cars. [uhoh]

 |  IP: Logged
Lyle Romer
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1400
From: Davie, FL, USA
Registered: May 2002

- posted 06-09-2008 01:15 PM      Profile for Lyle Romer   Email Lyle Romer   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
quote: Chad Souder
Could you please explain why ethanol is pointless?
Many reasons:

1) Corn-based ethanol provides best case a 25% energy gain. You can't just look at the end result of x number of gallons of ethanol. You have to look at the energy used to plant the corn, harvest the corn, process it into ehtanol and ship it. You must also take into account that petroleum based fertilizer is used to fertilize the corn fields.

There are many studies that actually say it takes more energy to produce it than you get out of it.

2) Since corn is a food crop, planting "ethanol corn" instead of animal feed and food corn is causing the price of corn based food and corn fed livestock products to go up.

Basically, corn-based ethanol is just a giant farm subsidy hidden under the guise of energy independence and environmentalism.

If there are some breakthroughs in cellulostic ethanol which can use switchgrass (a weed basically), agricultural waste and even trees to produce ethanol then it may become viable. Using a vitally important food crop to produce fuel is pointless and stupid.

 |  IP: Logged
Monte L Fullmer
Film God

Posts: 8367
From: Nampa, Idaho, USA
Registered: Nov 2004

- posted 06-09-2008 01:32 PM      Profile for Monte L Fullmer   Email Monte L Fullmer   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
Saw in the paper today the GM is contemplating of either selling it off, or putting the axe on the HUMMER line. They're losing money big time on this line.

I always wonder why the E85 craze took off when you know that ethanol has less BTU putput than regular fuels. Thus, the trade off of cheaper fuel is less MPG in the long run.

 |  IP: Logged
Bobby Henderson
"Ask me about Trajan."

Posts: 10973
From: Lawton, OK, USA
Registered: Apr 2001

- posted 06-09-2008 01:34 PM      Profile for Bobby Henderson   Email Bobby Henderson   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
It currently takes nearly a gallon of fuel to create a gallon of ethanol. There's very little gain, making the whole ethanol fad a very stupid, wasteful thing. We're not gaining fuel efficiency. We're just making corn-based products, including most life stock feed, a lot more expensive. Corn producers are doing a great job scamming the government and consumers.

Sugar cane and sugar beets can be used to make alcohol based fuel. The Brazilians do it and get a roughly 8 to 1 ratio on the return (8 gallons of alcohol for every gallon of fuel burned in the production process).

There's a lot of promises being made about converting everything from trash to switch grass into ethanol, but the technology is far from being able to deliver on those promises.

I think methods like hydrogen fuel cell technology show more potential.

 |  IP: Logged
Stephen Furley
Film God

Posts: 3059
From: Coulsdon, Croydon, England
Registered: May 2002

- posted 06-09-2008 02:24 PM      Profile for Stephen Furley   Email Stephen Furley   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
quote: Bobby Henderson
I think methods like hydrogen fuel cell technology show more potential.
But where are you going to get the Hydrogen from? You won't find it naturally, and the only two processes which I'm aware of for making it on an industrial scale are electrolysis of water, for which you need a lot of electric power which could probably be better used powering electric vehicles, and steam reforming of natural gas, which could probably also be better used directly. We had a few fuel cell buses on trial in London, but I they've gone now, and they were very expensive.

Unless you've got large amounts of electric power available from non-fossil sources, such as hydro or nuclear, then I think fuel cells are a non-starter.

 |  IP: Logged
Mike Blakesley
Film God

Posts: 12767
From: Forsyth, Montana
Registered: Jun 99

- posted 06-09-2008 03:35 PM      Profile for Mike Blakesley   Author's Homepage   Email Mike Blakesley   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
quote: Frank Angel
Old habits die hard. The car manufacturers may have gotten the message, but they don't seem be ready yet to admit publicly that we are going to have to change our ideas about cars, driving and efficiency. Instead of offering vehicles which get better mpg, they offer to pay for your gas so you can still buy their inefficient cars and drive they way you're accustomed to....
It has nothing to do with habits. People want to buy more fuel-efficient cars, but the Fords and the GMs of the world can't just get up tomorrow morning and build them -- they have to be designed, tested, approved by a million bean-counters and government authorities, and then the tooling has to be created and assembly set up, and so on and on.

The Fords and GMs and probably working on about the 2015 cars right now. I don't envy those people...having to guess now what people will want years from now. At least in the exhibition business we only have to guess a few weeks ahead!

 |  IP: Logged
Leo Enticknap
Film God

Posts: 7474
From: Loma Linda, CA
Registered: Jul 2000

- posted 06-09-2008 03:55 PM      Profile for Leo Enticknap   Author's Homepage   Email Leo Enticknap   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
quote: Stephen Furley
Unless you've got large amounts of electric power available from non-fossil sources, such as hydro or nuclear, then I think fuel cells are a non-starter.
True, but hydrogen does offer a reasonably efficient way of storing energy for later use in a moving vehicle. Hydrogen production plants could be powered by renewable energy, operating only when the sun is shining, wind is blowing etc. Once you've produced the hydrogen, you can then (i) store it until needed, and (ii) use it to power a moving vehicle.

I'd guess that reason why the fuel cell buses were uneconomic the first time was that burning oil was more cost-effective when the price was lower. The higher it gets, the more viable alternative fuels become.

 |  IP: Logged
Steve Guttag
We forgot the crackers Gromit!!!

Posts: 12814
From: Annapolis, MD
Registered: Dec 1999

- posted 06-09-2008 08:41 PM      Profile for Steve Guttag   Email Steve Guttag   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
What about "Mr. Fusion"? It seemed to work on almost anything. Doc Brown had the technology back in 1985!

 |  IP: Logged
Mark Gulbrandsen
Resident Trollmaster

Posts: 16657
From: Music City
Registered: Jun 99

- posted 06-09-2008 08:52 PM      Profile for Mark Gulbrandsen   Email Mark Gulbrandsen   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
I'll still side with Natural gas. The technology for using that in an automobile existed way before Mr. Fusion! There is supposedly enough Natural Gas on the planet to last us for several centuries(not projctors). By then the visiting aliens will have helped us clean up the planet and shown us a better design for traveling that uses light as the power source... if they already haven't done so... [Eek!]

 |  IP: Logged
Tony Bandiera Jr
Film God

Posts: 3067
From: Moreland Idaho
Registered: Apr 2004

- posted 06-10-2008 01:01 AM      Profile for Tony Bandiera Jr   Email Tony Bandiera Jr   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
We've hit $4.40/gal for reg. unleaded here...and it is said that we will for sure break $5.00 before Labor Day....

Even my Ranger now costs over $50.00 to fill up... [Mad]

 |  IP: Logged
Jon Miller
Jedi Master Film Handler

Posts: 973
From: San Diego, CA, USA
Registered: Sep 1999

- posted 06-10-2008 09:08 PM      Profile for Jon Miller   Email Jon Miller   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
quote: Mark Gulbrandsen
I'll still side with Natural gas.
Agreed. I've been kicking around the natural has vehicle (NGV) conversion idea for the longest time. The ability to fill up with cheap fuel at home using a pump such as the FuelMaker Phill sounds very attractive; a conversion would be just the ticket, along with a rebuilt engine, to clean up the exhaust on my 1964 F-100, a vintage truck devoid of emission controls and destined for the crusher if the state ever manages to get its way with getting old vehicles off the road.

Alas, the pump and an NGV conversion would probably cost as much as a decent used car. Also, aftermarket NGV conversions (and, for that matter, new NGVs) are getting harder to find these days.

 |  IP: Logged
Jim Cassedy
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1661
From: San Francisco, CA
Registered: Dec 2006

- posted 06-11-2008 10:01 AM      Profile for Jim Cassedy   Email Jim Cassedy   Send New Private Message       Edit/Delete Post 
Gasoline is now $4.49(.9)at the gas station near my house by the beach here in San Franciso.

If current trends continue I wouldn't be surprised to see it hit $5/gal by the end of the year here.

 |  IP: Logged


All times are Central (GMT -6:00)
This topic comprises 55 pages: 1  2  3  ...  41  42  43  44  45  46  47  ...  53  54  55   
   Close Topic    Move Topic    Delete Topic    next oldest topic   next newest topic
- Printer-friendly view of this topic
Hop To:



Powered by Infopop Corporation
UBB.classicTM 6.3.1.2

The Film-Tech Forums are designed for various members related to the cinema industry to express their opinions, viewpoints and testimonials on various products, services and events based upon speculation, personal knowledge and factual information through use, therefore all views represented here allow no liability upon the publishers of this web site and the owners of said views assume no liability for any ill will resulting from these postings. The posts made here are for educational as well as entertainment purposes and as such anyone viewing this portion of the website must accept these views as statements of the author of that opinion and agrees to release the authors from any and all liability.

© 1999-2020 Film-Tech Cinema Systems, LLC. All rights reserved.