Return of Commercial Sailing ?

[simonmd]

I refer the right honerable gentelman to the answer I gave a few pages ago....

[perchance]

We could go back to making our own cheap crap and eliminate the need to ship foreign cheap crap huge distances and save all that fuel for cruising.

[hpeer]

GOBOATINGNOW,

I think you are completely missing my point. Eurpoe has $10 gas, a lot of that is tax that is being poured back into the economy. So, lets say the real price of gas is $2.50. In the US we are paying about $3. Canada about $4. Europe about $10. But in each case $2.50 is LEAVING the economy.

Now if you raise the cost of gas to $5.00 the US will pay $5.50, Canada $6.50, and Europe $12.50. But..........$5.00 is LEAVING the economy.

Proportionality the US and Canada will be hit harder, but in all cases it will hurt the local economy.

[David_Old_Jersey]

Originally Posted by hpeer

Now if you raise the cost of gas to $5.00 the US will pay $5.50, Canada $6.50, and Europe $12.50. But..........$5.00 is LEAVING the economy.

That doesn't matter as long as we are using the oil to create wealth.

Ooops

[delmarrey]

Originally Posted by David_Old_Jersey

That doesn't matter as long as we are using the oil to create wealth.

I would agree with that.

In the USA we use to use fuel for the production of steel and plastic products. Most of that has now gone over seas due to the labor costs (Exec's and banks are filling their pockets). And the fuel now is mostly being burned in transportation and electrical generation.

Most USAians have gotten fat and don't want to give up the convenances of gas powered vehicles/toys, especially up North here. We really need to build mass transit systems in our cities to eliminate the minor vehicle use in high populated areas.

The bigger they build these ships the more proficient they are, until they can't get them in port anymore. So, sailing merchants will only be good in small ports fairly local but that's what tugs w/barges are doing now, especially here in the PNW/Western Canada.

[Don1500]

Originally Posted by hpeer

GOBOATINGNOW,

I think you are completely missing my point. Eurpoe has $10 gas, a lot of that is tax that is being poured back into the economy. So, lets say the real price of gas is $2.50. In the US we are paying about $3. Canada about $4. Europe about $10. But in each case $2.50 is LEAVING the economy.

Now if you raise the cost of gas to $5.00 the US will pay $5.50, Canada $6.50, and Europe $12.50. But..........$5.00 is LEAVING the economy.
.

What do you mean "LEAVING the economy? Are the people that pump the oil, transport the oil, refine the oil all putting this money under some mattress? Taxes are the only way money LEAVES the economy. The Gov takes money from the people that earn it and give it to people that don't produce. The people that earn the money use what they need and invest the rest. Investment is what fuels the economy, not giving handouts to people that don't produce. And a good economy is like teaching someone to fish, The Gov hands out fish.

[David M]

Originally Posted by David_Old_Jersey

Chinese seem keen on Trains for the future. they might be wind powered

OMG...that's hilarious David. You had me rolling.

[harmonytek]

Cheap fuel is, to put it mildly, cheap. It works out to about $1.40 or less a gallon (but nobody buys it in gallons...). Crude at $90bbl works out to slightly more, $1.60/gallon, but they have to get rid of the refuse after the distilates are separated and sold. 4%-5% profit for the majors, then refinery and transport costs are added on. Everything after that is taxes at one level or another.

[simonmd]

Originally Posted by delmarrey

The bigger they build these ships the more proficient they are, until they can't get them in port anymore.

I believe the only thing limiting the size of container vessels is the actual size of the locks at the Panama Canal. There are plans to rebuild them bigger (I think work has already started) so that a new breed of even bigger and more efficient 'super freighters' can be built.

[delmarrey]

Originally Posted by simonmd

I believe the only thing limiting the size of container vessels is the actual size of the locks at the Panama Canal. There are plans to rebuild them bigger (I think work has already started) so that a new breed of even bigger and more efficient 'super freighters' can be built.

Yes they are! There was an hour long TV doc a short while back.

Link: Panama Canal Expansion - Diagram of Panama Canal Locks - Popular Mechanics

[hpeer]

Originally Posted by Don1500

What do you mean "LEAVING the economy? Are the people that pump the oil, transport the oil, refine the oil all putting this money under some mattress? Taxes are the only way money LEAVES the economy. The Gov takes money from the people that earn it and give it to people that don't produce. The people that earn the money use what they need and invest the rest. Investment is what fuels the economy, not giving handouts to people that don't produce. And a good economy is like teaching someone to fish, The Gov hands out fish.

Leaving the economy as in being shipped to whomever we are buying the stuff from: Canada, Mexico, Venezuela, Nigeria, Saudi Arabia.

If they charge us $2.50 a gallon we pay them $2.50 a gallon.

If they charge us $5.00 a gallon we pay them $5.00 a gallon.

That is money leaving OUR (US, EU, China, etc.) economy.

[goboatingnow]

Originally Posted by hpeer

Leaving the economy as in being shipped to whomever we are buying the stuff from: Canada, Mexico, Venezuela, Nigeria, Saudi Arabia.

If they charge us $2.50 a gallon we pay them $2.50 a gallon.

If they charge us $5.00 a gallon we pay them $5.00 a gallon.

That is money leaving OUR (US, EU, China, etc.) economy.

That's a very narrow minded perspective yes overall trade imbalances build up but it's only a system of barter it all goes around in a circle the Saudis are huge investors in the western economy. Hence the money comes back.

Secondly let's not get into the good versus bad tax debates. Taxes pay for schools , hospitals, firemen, police, etc and also provide a safety net under the least privileged in our society. I don't want to live in a " hand to hand combat " type of society

Getting back to the topic, the lack of hydrocarbon will drive us back to the stone age stuff is really nonsensical, I remember bring told that stuff in the 80,s that it was going to be all over by the end of the century hmmm looking around me now.....

The world has vast reserves of oil both polar regions as yet to be comprehensively explored but surveys suggest big reserves in the Arctic. Equally electrical storage technology proceeds apace and surely as " eggs are eggs" we will reach a tipping point and all transport will go electric. ( I'm looking forward to big electric vehicles as it will be possible to get 0-60 on 4 seconds electric sports cars -fabulous.

The fact is humans don't " progress" backwards we don't " scale back " we're the best solutions orientated animals ever invented. That's what we do, solve and innovate.

I have no time for this new age wooly jumper nonsense that the futures somehow less industrialised less global less consumer orientated , oil is the least of our worries.

Dave

Dave

[hpeer]

Wow Dave, I like your attitude.

If you are gonna drive over a cliff anyway you might as well be happy about it.

"Look, I'm flying!"


Sorry for the sarcasm, I try to curb it, but sometimes........

[boatman61]

[QUOTE=hpeer;584528]Wow Dave, I like your attitude.
If you are gonna drive over a cliff anyway you might as well be happy about it.
"Look, I'm flying!"
QUOTE]

So far... so good....



so far... so good...




So far.. so good...

[Don1500]

Originally Posted by goboatingnow

Getting back to the topic, the lack of hydrocarbon will drive us back to the stone age stuff is really nonsensical, I remember bring told that stuff in the 80,s that it was going to be all over by the end of the century hmmm looking around me now.....

I remember in sociology 101 (1974) being told by a professor that by the year 1984 (OH that terrible year!) we will run out or farm-able land and people will be falling dead in the streets due to starvation. This will be caused in part by population groth, The "stupid way humans want their houses to be on farm land", and the coming of the next Ice Age. (He later changed that to Global Warming, then to "Climate Change").

0 for 4, good record! (And doesn't the climate ALWAYS change?)