Time To Wake Up and Smell the Gasoline!

Today's average gas price nationwide hit $3.51/gallon and is on the climb...

Posted by: Noël Jones

I was watching CNN today as the anchor was explaining that gas prices are skyrocketing not as a response to demand, but in response to speculation, due to the civil war that has erupted in Libya. This is ridiculous, as Libya only produces 3% of the world's oil, but the really messed up part about it is that even though the rising prices are all emotion-based, the reality is that we will have to pay for it, possibly for weeks--even months. Today's average national price/gallon at the pump is $3.51 and climbing...projections put the peak at possibly just under $5/gallon. It's going to be an expensive summer. Time to get serious about car pooling!

I was glad to see that the segment focused on how America consumes 25% of all oil produced in the world, and that 10% of all oil produced globally is consumed as gasoline in America's cars, because while the rest of the world is passing us up in concentrating their populations in city centers and developing mass transit, we are still stubbornly attached to our suburban lifestyles and driving everywhere for everything.

Read the details in Mariano Castillo's article for CNN.

On The Daily Show in January, Jon Stewart interviewed T. Boone Pickens, Head of BP, who is trying to convince the government (and says that he's very close to succeeding) to switch us over to domestic natural gas production for our cars. Jon Stewart asked about the dangers of pollution due to fracking for natural gas a couple of times, but Pickens just waved the question off each time, claiming that he's been
fracking since the 50s, and has never know any water well to become contaminated from it. Stewart audience gave him hell in the on line comments after the show for not holding Pickens feet to the fire. We are in a mess folks. No one wants to give up their commuting lifestyle, and so wishful thinking dictates that most Americans will be prone to denial and want to believe oil and gas tycoons like T. Boone Pickens because he's telling them what they want to hear: a) you can keep on driving as much as you always have, b) you can keep on driving gas-guzzling SUV's in fact, c) we have enough natural gas in our country that we can end our dependence on foreign oil, and d) natural gas drilling of hundreds of thousands of wells all over this country will not contaminate anyone's tap water, give them cancer and destroy their property values.

There is no way out of this mess except to invest in passenger rail and other mass transit, and to develop alternative renewable fuels like wind, solar, bio-fuel (of all types) and hydro-power. We can't drink our water if it's contaminated with carcinogens, neurotoxins, endocrine disruptors and radioactive material. Time to wake up and smell the gasoline!