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Is Oil Evil?

PT.1

Question: Is your personal consumption of oil part of the problem?

Answer: (J): When it really comes down to it, this is a tough question. It depends who the consumer is. If the person drives 10 miles by car for every meal, comes back home, or drives to a friend's house that is down the street, yeah, that's a problem. Now if you're like me, where I ride my bike to school, my mom tries not to make second trips when picking up my brothers, and my dad only makes one "there and back" drive to work, then no, I am definitely not a problem. The amount of gas one uses somewhat effects the overall problem, but you can't complain about the amount of gas a senior citizen uses, they really do need their car to get places. So it depends on whether the person needs to use so much gas or if they're just being a gas hogging idiot.

(B) Well....I really have to say: Not quite right, J. You're not considering the whole picture. Think about this: The majority (if not all) of the products in your house is made in a factory. Guess what the factories use: OIL! Your oil consumption really goes past the scope of just the liquid in your car. Also, you might not have known, but what is plastic made of? OIL! Here's a link: http://www.reachoutmichigan.org/funexperiments/quick/plastic.html (look at the "Petroleum to Plastics section), as well as: http://www.priweb.org/ed/pgws/uses/uses_home.html.

Clearly, many of the appliances used in our homes, the packaging we use, the cosmetics we wear, etc. are all made of oil. You simply may not even realize how many oil-based products one can have in a single house! A single person really can make a difference! I make a difference, you make a difference, if we were to all cut down on consumption, we would make a difference! Also, "it depends on whether the person needs to use so much gas"?! Really, how much you need has nothing to do with the consumption. Consumption is still consumption, either way. Each person's consumption matters! In conclusion, personal consumption really does make a difference.

PT. 2

Question: What impact does oil have on our environment?

Answer: (B.):

       There are quite a few impacts on our environment...like oil spills which are deadly to the lives of marine life. For example, sea otters depend on their fur to insulate them against the cold. If oil makes contact with the fur, the insulation quality is destroyed, and the otters die of the cold (hypothermia). All the marine life are affected, like fish, sea-going birds, and, as mentioned earlier, otters-whether it be death by starvation, hypothermia, or pollution of waters.

Oil refining often releases dangerous substances into the air,causing pollution, because they aren't disposed of properly. Some include lead (which cause learning disabilities), carbon dioxide (which may contribute to global warming), benzene, sulfur dioxide (which causes difficulty in breathing) and carbon monoxide. Also, the oil companies, (in some cases) simply do not treat the waste released. The consumers are at fault as well- unregulated boating could cause leakage into the lakes for boating and improper storage (aka undesignated containers in garages) contributes too.

(http://www.waterencyclopedia.com/Oc-Po/Oil-Spills-Impact-on-the-Ocean.html is some background information and

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=950DEEDC1238F937A35757C0A96F948260 is a recent news article.)

This is an otter that is healthy, and its fur is clean =>This is a dying otter with its fur covered in oil As you can see, it is sickly and thin.

(J) Our environment? Yeah, not a lot of people care too much for it. Considering the amount of oil we use, raw or refined, it creates an extreme problem for the world. When I say "global warming" you say "pollution"? Good try, but no. You SHOULD say oil. When an oil refinery finds oil, they bottle it up, manufacture it, and ship it to the gas stations so people can fill up their cars and give off carbon emissions to tear up the ozone layer which allows lethal ultraviolet rays from the sun to wreack havoc, by increasing the Earth's average temperature which then screws up our weather patterns, and inevitably causes the ice age and ends human life as we know it today. That's a mouth full. Death to all flesh wearers. But it's not just the atmosphere that's affected, the land and the animals can die from overexposure to crude oil. You don't want to see a cute little sea otter drown in a pool of oil, do you? Not only that, when crude or manufactured oil gets soiled onto land, the oil will seep into the ground and cause the plants to die, which could cause the animals to die due to lack of food. So in the end, yes, oil is environmentally bad. 

Pt. 3

Question:Are there any viable energy alternatives? 

Answer: (B.): In Scotland, oil companies are planning to turn natural gas into hydrogen and carbon dioxide. The hydrogen can power fuel stations, and the carbon dioxide can be used to increase oil recovery in North Sea oil fields (it will also be stored there). This project stores 1.3 million tons of carbon dioxide/year. Although this technology is still developing, grants are being issued by governments to aid in the process (Information from http://www.planetark.com/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/31490/story.htm  and http://www.renewableenergyaccess.com/rea/news/story?id=34133). Also, it is estimated that this process will cut out emissions by more than 90% in that particular plant. (Quite a bit, indeed.) Furthermore, this usage of carbon dioxide will extend the use of the oil field and make more extraction possible- about 15-20 years and 40 million barrels more. It's projected that if this process was used in 5% (only 5%!) of the world's projected required energy capacity by 2050, that would save about a billion tons per year.

This is the refinery is Scotland being affected by the change.

(J) Oh yeah. Don't get me started on all the things that could replace oil. Wind energy- I think this is one of the more realistic and efficient energy alternitives. All you do is place this big ol' windmill in the middle of nowhere, preferably in a high elevated area or where there's a lot of wind, the windwill spins and turns a tubine, which does what turbines do to make electricity. iIve seen two of these up in Mackinaw City right before you get on I-75 that goes on the Mackinaw Bridge- they supply some of the energy for the city. Because they are located by the Straits of Mackinaw, right in the middle of Lakes Michigan and Huron, the wind currents come gushing in and make the windmills produce a lot of energy. The next energy alternative that comes to mind is SOLAR ENERGY. It technically means energy from the sun, I bet you already knew that. Solar panels are placed out in the sun and gather up electricity. That energy is channeled through some wires and is used in homes, offices, schools, and other buildings. out in California, just about everyone has solar panels on their roof. Because California is the 'Sunshine State', the sun shines quite strongly- which gives power to many people in cali-for-ni-a, because they have solar panels. Now because California's on the edge of an ocean, the wind currents should be strong. If they also had a large field of windmills and everyone, literally everyone, had solar panels, they could provide oil free energy for the major cities. Besides, we all know what happens when you answer your cell phone at a gas station. "Can you hear me now?" BOOOOOM. They say you see a white light when you die, all I saw were flying car parts from a Hummer that looked like a lunch box.

PT. 4

Question: Is there a connection between oil and violence in the Middle East?

Answer: (B.): Unfortunately, I really have to say that there is. The control of oil creates a power struggle, which invariably is violent." 'Oil and fuel smuggling networks have grown into a dangerous mafia, threatening the lives of those in charge of fighting corruption,' the former oil minister, Ibrahim Bahr al-Ulum, told reporters."(Wahab, Par. 13)Take Saddam Hussein, for example. In 1993 to 2003, his government took $8 billion in illegal profits from oil (by shipping the oil along with wheat, says Abbud Karim Abbas, who is an expert in oil tankers)...that were supposed to be spent on humanitarian supplies, most particularly the U.N. Oil-for-food program. After the collapse of that regime, corruption from oil spread farther, becuase the collapse simply drove the business underground, rather than actually eradicating it. Fifteen judges were murdered for looking into "corruption and criminality" dealing with oil. The head of the Commission on Public Integrity in Mosul said he was offered $1 million to release contraband oil that was taken from smugglers. Terrorists attack pipelines so that transport must be in trucks...which is controlled by smugglers, who pay insurgents (or terrorists) for protection. It's estimated ten percent of oil is lost this way (considering the vast amount of oil refined in the area, that is a very large portion). Not only that, but the current government is corrupt. Apparently, bribery is common, and top officials recieve money from insurgents who want their own agendas to be pushed through the government, whether it be through law or bribery. In conclusion, the connection between oil and violence is extremely strong- they relate through corruption of both government and transport companies.

(J) Well, this sure is a no duh question, YES. The Persian Gulf War was all about oil. And there's a lot of stuff that goes in the background too, like how our gas station companies bribe the oil distributors to give them private shares to hog over the competitors. People like oil like dogs killing each other over a chew toy- there's no real reason to fight over it, but they just do. After I explained all those energy alternatives, the gas station people should be sitting in their offices twiddling their thumbs and praying to God for someone to come buy some gas. The fighting going on right now in the Middle East isn't too related to oil, but some think that our troops are trying to secure the oil reserves so terrorists don't blow it up. If something similar to that were to happpen, we would lose a lot of oil and people would panic because they couldn't use their cars even though they just need to walk acraoss the street. People are just ignorant to alternative energy because they don't care and they think it's too expensive. If they could open up their ignorant American eyes, they could see the fighting they're causing. That's right, meaning "they" as in the average American who commutes to work everyday. If they stopped using their car all at one and used a bike or a plug-in hybrid, oil companies would lose so much money and wouldn't care too much about oil, which would stop them from fighting...over oil...regular fighting would resume as normal.

Sources:

Allan , Sterling D. "Oil Energy -- Its Impact." FreeEnergyNews.com. 05 Dec 2007. Pure Energy Systems, Inc. 7 Dec. 2007

<http://freeenergynews.com/Directory/Oil/index.html>.

Dying Sea Otter. (Online image). Available <http://www.channel6.dk/native/Grabs%20full/AK4-078V.jpg>. 21 December 2007.

Fire Meaney. (Online image). Available <http://www.nmsu.edu/~safety/images/fire_meaney.gif>. 07 December, 2007.

Grangemouth Oil Refinery at night, Scotland. (Online image). Available <http://www.take-a-view.co.uk/images/2007winners/AY_0001265.jpg>. 21 December 2007.

"Iraq's disappearing oil." The Wilson Quarterly 30.4 (Autumn 2006): p.69(2). (540 words) From General OneFile(2006) 69(2). 07 Dec. 2007 <http://find.galegroup.com/ips/start.do?prodId=IPS>.

Oil and gas well at sunset. (Online image). Available <http://blog.kir.com/archives/oil%20and%20gas%20well%20at%20sunset10.jpg>. 07 December, 2007.

Sea Otter. (Online image). Available <http://www.turtletrack.org/Issues01/Co10202001/Art/SeaOtterFace.jpg>. 21 December 2007.

Wahab, Bilal A. "How Iraqi oil smuggling greases violence." Middle East Quarterly 13.4. Fall 2006. 07 Dec. 2007 <http://find.galegroup.com/ips/start.do?prodId=IPS>.

Contributors: B.S., J.E.

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