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Is oil evil ?

By: Shaina S., Dimitry S., Shane M.

1. Is your personal consumption of oil part of the problem?

There is no doubt in my mind that I have personally abused the use of oil. From heat for our homes to fuel for our cars, we have all abused oil one way or another. I think the biggest problem would come from cars. Every morning either my mom or my carpool has to drive 25 minutes for us to get to school and the same thing on the way back home after school. After a few days of this, we need to go to the gas station again. This is just coming from a couple cars. Think about all of the cars today and how much oil they are burning from their cars. Now this problem is just from cars. One solution that can help a little is to carpool. Another solution is,as stated in the youtube, to get hybrid cars. Every little difference counts. There is also the major problem in winter from heating our homes. A good portion of the US has a cold winter in which they need to burn oil by heating homes. If you add up all of the oil being burned for reasons that can be fixed, that's a lot of oil! In conclusion, I do abuse the use of oil and I am sure a lot of you do to even if you don't even know it.

-Shane- 12/11/07

This is a video that gives more information on hybrid cars and biodiesel.

Oil has many impacts on our environment. During the process of transporting oil, it can be spilled into our oceans. This kills thousands of marine animals and causes harm to the health of the people in the area. Although this is always accidental, it is deadly and unnescessary. As shown in the video below, some companies are not

careful and choose to dump their waste from oil production into water and areas where it might be harmful, because it is cheaper to do this.

The United States has the biggest emissions of greenhouse gases in the world. These gases are coming from our large consumption of oil. All most all our forms of transportation involve polluting our atmosphere. These emmisions are depleting our ozone layer, causing more sun rays to come in, heating up our planet. This is changing the flow of currents and melting our icecaps. Humans are polluting the environment and causing harm to themselves and the environment. In some cities, such as Mexico City, it is dangerous to even leave your home because of the pollution in the air from the burning of fossil fuels.

The actual process of extracting oil from the ground can cause harm to the environment. This is why there is so much controversy about taking oil out of Alaska. Machinery and industrialization will take up a lot of room and will hurt the wildlife of the area. Building machines to extract oil from the ground is very expensive as well as being dangerous to animals and humans in the area.

-Shaina- 12/11/07

This video shows how fast oil spills can spread throughout. Oil spills like this one happen all over the world, killing thousands.

3. Are there any viable energy alternatives?

Discuss and include a live link to a credible website.

The link must show how this is being addressed in a specific country

From reading blogs on this website, it is very easy to say, that there are many energy alternatives. Yet, many students read this question too quickly and answered incorrectly. What is it asking? The question is asking about the viable energy alternatives. Remember, viable is defined as practical or applicable. It pains me to say it, but, in reality, there are no viable alternatives at the present time.

People have a weakness, called greed. It’s human nature. One, if not the biggest motivation in most people’s lives is money. Everything boils back to it. It is exactly because of this flaw that energy alternatives will not be used by our nation in the near future.

Let’s think about it. There are many different types of energy alternatives that are suggested to replace oil: solar energy, butanol gasoline, and thermonuclear energy, to name a few. Solar energy is great. It doesn’t harm the environment and is perfect for lowering the use of fossil fuels. Reading this, one would think that solar energy is a great alternative resource for the nation. There’s only one problem- money. Making solar plants costs millions of dollars. For the government to make them, it needs to buy materials and hire construction workers/architects. Where does the government get the money? It gets it from the tax dollars of citizens like me and you. Most people wouldn’t want to pay the higher taxes to make the solar plants. Like I said before, people are greedy and would rather save their money than spend it on alternative energy sources, even if those energy sources help the environment.

Butanol gasoline is another suggestion. Butanol is made from farming waste. Burning buatnol is a pretty efficient way to get energy and isn’t harmful to the environment. Again, this sounds like a good idea. There of course, is the ongoing problem of money. Presently, butanol sells for about $3.70 a gallon. Gasoline, on the other hand sells for about $2.90 a gallon. People wouldn’t buy it. They wouldn’t want to spend the extra eighty cents per gallon. Why would the consumer want to pay for butanol when he/she can get the same energy from oil for cheaper?

The last suggestion mentioned is thermonuclear energy. Thermonuclear reaction is a process by which atoms of deuterium (heavy hydrogen) combine to form one atom of helium. This process releases massive amounts of energy. This would be a very efficient and plentiful renewable energy source. Remember, it is made out of hydrogen and there is plenty of water on the Earth. Thus, there is plenty of thermonuclear energy. Money isn’t the biggest problem here. It is very difficult to achieve a controlled thermonuclear reaction, and the way to produce electric energy from thermonuclear reaction has not been found yet.

In conclusion, there are many energy alternatives going around, but they are impractical at the current time. It all boils down to money and unless these alternatives become cheaper or more practical than oil and other fossil fuels, there is little chance that we will see them being used on a large scale in our nation today.

-Dimitry- 12/11/07

The alternative energy source, solar power, may not work throughout the whole nation, but it still can help certain areas, like Arizona, greatly. To learn more about Arizona solar power follow this link: http://www.azsolarcenter.com/

Biofuels are impractical in America where gasoline is comparitively cheap, but in Europe the gas prices are soaring and biofuels are cheaper. To learn more visit: http://www.biofuelstp.eu/home.html

Though I did not talk about windpower. Germany, a country in Western Europe is using it quite effectively. To learn more visit: http://www.ecoworld.com/home/articles2.cfm?tid=361

A place where solar energy has been used effectively is Nevada. Watch this video for some interesting information:

Germany is also big contributor to solar power. Check out this video. It talks about the good and the bad of solar power.

4. Is there a connection between oil and violence in the Middle East?

There is a very strong connection between oil and violence in the Middle East. There are many people working long, hard hours in oil wells in the Middle East. They find their lives meaningless and pointless. People tell these workers to go to 'preachers.' These 'preachers' tell that the only way to feel good about themselves and to bring justice is to hurt the people that made their lives so miserable and unfair. They tell the workers to attack countries who are making their lives hard such as the United States, United Kingdom, and Israel. This is closely related to terrorism. Violence is starting to effect younger crowds these days too. Children as young as 10 years old are shown videos and are becoming suicide bombers. Now terrorists are beginning to recruit young women for suicide bombing also.

-Shaina, Dimitry, Shane 12/11/07

5. Time for some interesting facts about oil!!!

How much oil was there in the world in 1996?

In 1996 there were 1,047,200 million barrels of proven crude oil reserves, of which 76.6 percent was in OPEC Member Countries. (from OPEC Annual Statistical Bulletin: 1996).

What is Ghawar?

Ghawar in Saudi Arabia the largest oil field in the world and it produces 75- 85 billion barrels of oil. That is six times more that the largest oil field in the U.S.!!!

Check out these crazy statistics! Who has the most Oil Reserves? Take a wild guess!