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Originally Posted by Daox
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And then you also need to watch out when they talk about energy vs electricity. Before there was an electric transmission grid you had to get and then use energy at the source. So windmills were common to power water pumps, hydro common to power a mill. Wind was the only way to move across the ocean. As it pertains to cars, if you count the fossil fuels being used to make propulsion energy I think it would throw all those charts again for a loop. That said what if 100% of cars, trucks, trains, ships, aircraft etc. were battery powered, what if natural gas wasn't available for heating, how much more power would have to be in the grid?
By any calculation I'd say the biggest thing reducing air pollution has been the switch from coal to natural gas. The natural gas is sort of a byproduct of getting oil though. I also wonder what we would do with the leftover unleaded gasoline if we didn't use it in cars, or would we also have to find replacements for lubricants, rubbers, plastics, and all the other things derived from oil? Isn't already 100% of those products also used from the refining process? It's not like there is some big stockpile of any level of the refining process stockpiling up somewhere.
Even if tomorrow there was a new super powerful cold fusion energy supply along with 1000% better batteries do we still have to get just as much oil for the other things? Maybe the continued Japanese whaling "research" will pay off. Probably better to open up free liposuction clinics and use the excess human blubber out there.