The Daily Show last night

[whosinpower]

Featured a guy who wrote a book about energy and technology....basically stated that we will always have enough energy - it is technology and the cost of that technology for collecting it, that is holding us back.

It was interesting until the author blabbed about Canada's stockpile of oil. He stated it quite a few times emphatically - until Jon said, "Well then - why did we invade Iraq. Canada is WAY WAY easier. I just have to give em the shoulder and they will crumble!" It was a joke of course, but........

I love the Daily Show....but hey man - please keep your troops south of our border. We always used to think of America as Canada's big brother. Is big brother going to roll over its little northern relative? Not likely - as we, up here in the great white north, sold ourselves out a long time ago and our resources are freely accessable to our southern neighbor. So, don't get any funny ideas that invading Canada would be a good thing to do, ok? Cause, you know.....we have ALOT of angry hockey fans up here, and alot of out of work hockey players that can deliver a deadly power shot......it could get ugly......

[Coventina]

1. Well....OUR oil is under YOUR frozen tundra!

So get the hell outta our way!

:P

Just kidding.

At one time, I would say that there is no way decent citizens of the United States would tolerate bullying Canada. Now, I'm afraid that while it is still true, there are hardly any "decent citizens" in the United States.

:-(

[whosinpower]

2. On the other hand....

After thinking about this - and knowing how liberal we are up here (the majority of us anyways) if the US absorbed Canada, the republicans would likely lose the elections - becasue if Canadians were allowed to vote, we would of voted democrat.

[Aristus]

3. America is a big baby:

"If you have it, and I want it, it's mine!"

[TheFarseer]

4. The insurgencey woud be a bitch

Such a big country and you wouldn't know who the enemy was unless they started saying "eh" and "aboot" or knew a little too much about hockey.

I've always heard there is a load of oil in that oil shale you guys have, but we are not desperate enough to start extracting it yet.

[whosinpower]

5. The oilsands

Are estimated at having over 2 trillion barrels......trillion.
Extracting it is another matter.

[meegbear]

6. But for Quebec ...

we'd have to print our propaganda leaflets in English AND French. It's not worth it.

[RBHam]

7. I don't know,,,we're a pretty tough bunch when we have to be...

The British Empire used Canadian troops as cannon fodder...

[Salviati]

8. That guy was a nut....

he gives physicists a bad name... He reminded me more of Matthew Lesko than an actual scientist...

[Az]

10. Um, not quite

There is plenty of energy out there. And yes our consumption of it will increase. The peace of the puzzle he seemed to be trying to skate by is economic rather than physics. There is all sorts of ways of generating energy. Its just Corporations have vested interests in keeping the current limited means dominant as long as they can derive profit from them.

Our energy crisis is an economically created bottle neck. The interested parties that can make things change simply refuse to jeopardize their finacial base.

[Salviati]

11. The problem was,

he sounded like a shill for the energy co. There was absolutely no talk about the consequences of our choices in energy use. It would be like having a "nutritionist" come on and talk about how plentiful fast food is, and how if you didn't want the stuff that was supposed to be bad for you, they have other things as well, without mentioning that most fast food salads are as bad or worse than hamburgers, or the serious side effects on your health.

I should have been a bit clearer, I wasn't really criticizing his statement of there being plenty of energy, I do believe that. In my mind, the real questions about the future of our energy policy are: how much will it cost to use various sources of energy, and what consequences does using each them have. It seemed like he glossed over the first, and completely neglected the second.

[Stirk]

9. I don't know who that guy was, but his speech was sprinkled with

"free-market magic" themes. Conservatives in the US have a religious faith in the free market that Adam Smith never had. I rather suspect he's from some conservative think tank, but I don't actually know.

[JohnyCanuck]

12. Dissappointed that Jon did not question this expert more closely

The problem with getting oil out of tar sands is that with our current technology it requires lots of energy (currently providec by burning increasingly valuable and increasingly scarce natural gas) and lots of fresh water (also in increasingly short supply in Western Canada where the tar sands are located) and it creates lots of water pollution and greenhouse gasses.

It's nice to think that we can just wave the technology wand to solve all our problems, but I am somewhat less optimistic that the magic solution will appear in time for us to continue our cheap oil induced, SUV commuting, energy intensive lifestyles in perpetuity.

From a July 2004 Toronto Star article on the Tar Sands:

But the tar sands are a more complex energy proposition than a conventional field, in which oil trapped in porous rock is simply pumped to the surface.

The sands are not just a source of energy; they're also a voracious consumer of energy in the form of natural gas — and in that capacity are competing with homeowners and industrial gas users who use natural gas both for heat and as a source of chemicals for products ranging from fertilizer to plastics.

As both a source and a consumer of fossil fuels, the sands also are a big source of greenhouse gases, pushing Canada away from its goals of cutting emissions.

Ontario electricity users have a reason to keep an eye on the oil sands, too. As the province moves to shut down its coal-fired electricity generators, much of the power formerly generated by coal is likely to come from natural gas, tying the electricity sector more closely to the complex energy equation of the tar sands.

http://www.energybulletin.net/1191.html

From the London Free Press March 2004:

In the 2003 book, The Party's Over, Richard Heinburg also believes water is a big problem.

He observes that the wastewater pond for Syncrude is 4.5 miles in diameter and 20-feet deep.

In his book, he calculates that it would take 350 similar plants the size of Syncrude to meet the world's oil needs and together, their wastewater would be half the size of Lake Ontario.

Gallon believes that it takes so much energy to extract the sand from the bitumen that it isn't almost worth it.

He says, "If they were to do a net energy analysis, they would find that it almost takes as much energy to mine, process, refine and upgrade the bitumen oil they get from the tar sands as the energy in the light oil they are producing. There is a small net energy gain, but it is estimated that five to 10 times the greenhouse gases are released processing tar sands as released processing conventional oil."

www.fyilondon.com/perl-bin/niveau2.cgi?s=shopping&p=82637.html&a=1

In considering the issues surrounding growth in demand for oil and energy it's instructive to watch this video (Real Player format) of a lecture by mathematician Al Bartlett giving what I am sure to him would be considered a kinergarten level talk on exponential growth and its effect on resource depletion.

http://edison.ncssm.edu/programs/colloquia/bartlett.ram

[grace0418]

13. I love the way the guy casually glossed over the fact

that extracting oil from Canada, the North Sea, and Alaska just might have an environmental impact in some of the few natural areas we have left on this planet. It sure is easy to support your hypothesis when you conveniently ignore anything that might make it weak.

Using that logic, I would now like to say "I'll never run out of money! All I have to do is rob a few banks and I have all the money I need. Sure it's wrong and it might get a few people killed but I'm just going to ignore that!"

[Lisa]

14. I wonder if that author sells perpetual motion machines in his spare time?

Back in the 1970s, industry promised that they'd be able to extract limitless amounts of petroleum from the Tar Sands "as soon as the technology improves and the price of oil goes up, so it's economical". But even though we've been seeing more expensive oil and natural gas in the intervening years, the government keeps having to bail out the Syncrude operation! Mysterious, isn't it!

And what earlier posters said about needing energy and water to extract that oil. There are already conflicts between Alberta and Saskatchewan, and the ranching and petroleum sectors, over who gets the water. (whisper -- and the area's going to get drier due to global warming)

Even Julian Simon would be surprised by how simplistic the author's arguments were. (I hope that the book is more sophisticated.)

[leftofthedial]

15. no, we restrict ourselves to kicking your ass in hockey

oops. I guess we may have to invade after all

[Arugula Latte]

16. Five words: Celine Dion and Ann Murray

It's payback time, Baby! Watch out! :evilgrin: