Jeff Goodell Debates the Rolling Stone Article on CNBC

The guy is very well-spoken.

Guess where he got that “recycled natural gas quote.” 🙂

17 thoughts on “Jeff Goodell Debates the Rolling Stone Article on CNBC”

  1. What cracks me up, is how people hold up statements by George W. Bush as having any bearing on reality. You’d think with his track record people would by now go: “That’s nice, Georg(i)e. Now eat your veggies! Need to go poo-poo?”

  2. Robert,

    Here’s another question for you. In a previous post on this blog you make the following claim in response to the “accusation” that your opposition to ethanol is motivated by your employment in “Big Oil”:

    The tripling of natural gas prices since 2002 happened just as we had a dramatic increase in ethanol production. Coincidence? No.

    1. Are you seriously suggesting that natural gas prices have risen in response to ethanol production?

    2. Doesn’t Matt Simmons have a different theory as to why natural gas prices are rising in North America?

    I hope that you don’t mind these questions. The Peak Oil movement has earned a bit of skepticism because its main proponents portray Peak Oil as a civilization-ending catastrophe even though you don’t actually believe it when you are busy speaking to each other.

    Peak Oil must benefit the oil industry in some way. Perhaps you could explain why the oil industry is hyping Peak Oil. They must perceive some benefit, mustn’t they?

    David Mathews

  3. I wonder if the average listener is going to notice that no one defends corn ethanol, but that “cellulosic” is repeated as if it defends corn ethanol.

  4. Isn’t that true? Correct me if I am wrong.

    Dave, truly what color is the sky in your world. My company does support ethanol. It is making my company, and other oil companies, lots of money. But no matter how many times I tell you, or what my track record is, you are going to believe what you want to believe. You have got this image in your head, and nothing will ever shake it.

    Are you seriously suggesting that natural gas prices have risen in response to ethanol production?

    Dave, did you read the comments from the ethanol producer’s magazine? Here, if you missed them:

    One source tells EPM that when ethanol production reaches 7.5 billion gallons (assuming all of that capacity was fueled by natural gas) demand from the industry could represent a 1.2 percent increase in total U.S. demand for natural gas. That’s a significant rise when you consider that the total increase in natural gas consumption from 2004 to 2005 was only about 1.4 percent. Ultimately, increased natural gas use resulting from the ethanol industry’s expansion affects total U.S. demand of fossil energy, helping to keep supplies tight and prices elevated.

    Just another inconvenient truth, Dave? I am beginning to understand that you can’t handle the truth, so you just spin into whatever you want to spin it into.

    The Peak Oil movement has earned a bit of skepticism because its main proponents portray Peak Oil as a civilization-ending catastrophe

    From your time at TOD, you should know that there are very different opinions on this. I am not a Doomer. If you ever actually absorbed anything I said, then you would know that. But I do think Peak Oil is very serious business, and if it happens in the next few years, and then the decline is steep, I see no way that we don’t have big problems.

    But, again, you are faced with a disconnect. The oil industry denies Peak Oil. They earn scorn over this issue at TOD, because people believe they are lying about the whole thing.

    Dave, spend some time getting up to speed. It is clear that nearly everything you hold sacred as true is wrong.

  5. Incidentally, Dave, in case you haven’t noticed I don’t write that much about Peak Oil, and when I do it isn’t from the “we are all doomed” perspective. Even my Peak Oil Primer, in the link over to the right, is an objective analysis: Here’s what both sides believe.

    The problem, Dave, which you won’t listen to, is that you think you know me and what I am about. You are certain that I am driven by a profit motive and loyalty to the oil industry. But, you operate under your misconceptions, which is why you are typically viewed as making bizarre statements.

    It’s worse than just having blinders on and filtering out that which you don’t want to believe. You actually change the stuff that does filter in so that it fits your preconceptions, even though they are horribly inaccurate. It causes you to make some of the incredibly uninformed statements that are your norm, such as “If ethanol could profit the oil corporations rather than ADM you would support it.”

    You can’t envision a world in which I care about the environment and the future and try to make a difference, so you resort to calling me a liar – even though you don’t know the first thing about me. For you, my brief stint in the oil industry has provided you a name and face for the venom you feel toward the oil industry, so you feel justified in blaming me for every bad thing ever associated with the oil industry. You, on the other hand, are guilt-free because “they made you use oil.”

    As someone else said, you are a sad little man.

  6. Lou Ann Hammond sells what the software industry would call “vaporware”. She talks as if most of the ethanol being produced outside of the United States is based on cellulosic feedstock. That is simply not true. There are some pilot plants in Brazil. But 99% of its ethanol is produced from fermenting sucrose.

    By the way, the six cellulosic plants under construction in the USA are being massively subsidized by the federal government. And with that much federal money invested in them, the private investors can be pretty sure the government won’t let them fail.

    These plants will also benefit from the 51¢ per gallon tax credit for any ethanol they produce. And the Range Fuels (Khosla) plant, because it will produce less than 60 million gallons of ethanol per year, will be considered a “small producer” and therefore qualify for an additional 10¢ per gallon subsidy on the first 15 million gallons it produces in any given year.

    Not bad, eh? The government covers up to half of your capital costs, ensures by its participation that you can raise the rest of the capital, guarantees a market for the product, and then subsidizes that product to boot!

    Perhaps all well and good for demonstrating the technical feasibility of a process. But these plants will do little to demonstrate economic feasibility.

    I agree with Odograph: “cellulosic” is repeated as if it defends corn ethanol.

  7. Honestly Robert, I don’t know why you bother. Just ignore him. Every minute you spend responding to him is a minute you could have spent responding to another (sane) comment.

  8. Robert Rapier:

    So you are struggled against Ethanol for moral reasons?

    You are a saint, Robert. Those oil corporations must have similar pure motives, too.

    > The oil industry denies Peak Oil.

    This is not exactly true, Robert. The proponents of Peak Oil are members of the oil industry.

    The oil industry is promoting and denying Peak Oil at the same time, to different audiences. The oil industry must benefit from the Peak Oil message in some way, otherwise Matt Simmons would not spend so much time promoting the message.

    Matt Simmons motives are known because he has said so explicitly on a number of occasions: He wants the oil industry to have unfettered access to ANWR and the outer continental shelf.

    Others (including some contributors at The Oil Drum) have used Peak Oil as an argument against Climate Change, and therefore as a defense against environmental regulation.

    David Mathews

  9. Eobert,

    One more thing.

    You say, “I am not a Doomer.

    I suspect that your hopes regarding the future are unrealistic and poised to fail in a dramatic fashion.

    There are plenty of significant problems appearing on this Earth right now @ 6.6 billion population. Imagine for a moment how harsh life will become when there are 9 billion humans.

    The United States of America is a world-dominating superpower able to consume 25% of the world’s resources now, but somehow I don’t imagine that this will remain the case in the 2040’s.

    Even the most optimistic of futurists acknowledge that the human population will decline dramatically after the human population peak. With declining human population and exhaustion of the Earth’s natural resources it appears altogether likely that our species will sink into the black hole of extinction.

    If you cared about the future of humankind and the health of your grandchildren you would stop working for those who pollute and destroy the world that they will inherit from you.

    Don’t imagine for a moment that wealth will serve to protect your grandchildren from the horror’s of civilization’s collapse. Money and gold aren’t worth much when there is no food and no water.

    ***

    It is good that you are opposed to ethanol, Robert. But you should oppose the oil corporations, too.

    Humankind must break its addiction to energy if our species wishes to survive. Too bad that addicts are often so intoxicated by their drug that it takes a tragedy to motivate them to break the addiction.

    A global tragedy is going to occur in the 21st century. Call it doom & gloom if you wish.

    David Mathews
    David Mathews’ Home Page

  10. Others (including some contributors at The Oil Drum) have used Peak Oil as an argument against Climate Change, and therefore as a defense against environmental regulation.

    I am going to have to call you on that statement. Show a link, or admit you made that up. I say that the “link” is only there in your mind.

    A few other things that don’t fit Dave’s paradigm.

    Where is the profit motive in my support for a fossil fuel tax?

    Where is the profit motive in the many hours I have spent my weekends working with Habitat for Humanity, The United Way, or just volunteering to help pick up trash in the community? I mean, I am all about profit, right? That is the picture that’s in your head.

    Where’s COP’s profit motive in this story from Sunday’s Houston Chronicle?

    Helping the Needy Bury Loved Ones is Her Mission

    Aug. 5–Sugar Land resident Michele Lara started the 3A Bereavement Foundation in Houston in 1997 to help indigent and low-income families bury their loved ones. Shortly before the group celebrated its 10th anniversary luncheon Saturday, Lara spoke with reporter Peggy O’Hare about the group’s mission.

    Q: Are the loved ones these families need help burying the victims of natural deaths or victims of violent crime?

    A: Basically, they’re coming from all categories. But the majority of our families are either people who had cancer or had some kind of illness. We get a lot of cancer patients; we get a lot of AIDS patients. Then we get our crime victims’ families. We get a lot of children — somebody just called me last night, a baby had slipped out of the house, and they found him in the pool. A lot of women who have stillborn babies or babies who are born with illnesses.

    Q: How does the foundation find money to help pay for this?

    A: We get our funds from individual donations. We get donations from churches. We’re really trying to get grants from corporations. Our first corporation to actually give us a grant is Conoco Phillips — so I hope that’s the beginning of opening up the door for corporations.

    Ther has to be a profit motive there, eh Dave? After all, oil companies are EVIL. Now, if Hugo Chavez had done that, you would be cheering him as the people’s hero. Instead, he is trying to expand petroleum consumption – something you profess to abhor – yet Hugo is just peachy in your book.

    The world is not black and white, Dave. It is complex. But that doesn’t stop you from trying to force-fit your stereotypes where they don’t fit. The world is not a place where “Peak Oil proponents are from the oil industry.” The world is a place where Peak Oil proponents, Peak Oil opponents, Christians, Muslims, Hindus, atheists, pacifists, war-mongers, environmentalists, global-warming deniers, greedy people, generous people – all of the above are members of the oil industry. And every other industry. But you only pick out the pieces you like; the rest don’t fit your image so they are discarded.

  11. Honestly Robert, I don’t know why you bother. Just ignore him.

    I know. I am going to do that now.

    He announced over at Kunstler’s blog that we were having a debate, and linked to it. The debate consisted of him drawing up black and white positions, me pointing out that the world is actually gray, and him calling me a liar. Some debate.

  12. Hello Robert Rapier,

    You are working really hard to exonerate the blood-soaked pollution-belching planet-destroying war-mongering oil corporations. I hope that they reward you will for your effort.

    > Where is the profit motive in my support for a fossil fuel tax?

    You want to increase taxes. Either you are a liberal or a Democrat or a saint or you have some other motive. I am guessing: some other motive.

    > Where is the profit motive in the many hours I have spent my weekends working with Habitat for Humanity, The United Way, or just volunteering to help pick up trash in the community? I mean, I am all about profit, right? That is the picture that’s in your head.

    You are a saint, Robert. All this time I thought Big Oil was for greedy, selfish, planet-destroying fools. But you also do a little good in this world and that dispels all of the aforementioned stereotypes.

    > Where’s COP’s profit motive in this story from Sunday’s Houston Chronicle?

    Even Hitler was kind to children and puppies. Little acts of kindness do not mitigate global acts of evil.

    > After all, oil companies are EVIL.

    Yes, absolutely! The oil corporations are evil and everyone employed by an oil corporation has blood-soaked hands.

    > Now, if Hugo Chavez had done that, you would be cheering him as the people’s hero. Instead, he is trying to expand petroleum consumption – something you profess to abhor – yet Hugo is just peachy in your book.

    You’ve changed my mind about this Hugo Chavez guy. He seems pretty evil to the same degree that … Robert Rapier is evil.

    What should we do, Robert? Should we kill Hugo Chavez and bring “Freedom & Democracy” to Venezuela?

    I am certain that the oil corporations really would like to commit this crime against the Venezuelans just as they have committed crimes against the Iranians, the Iraqis and the Nigerians.

    > The world is a place where Peak Oil proponents, Peak Oil opponents, Christians, Muslims, Hindus, atheists, pacifists, war-mongers, environmentalists, global-warming deniers, greedy people, generous people – all of the above are members of the oil industry.

    The world is a complicated place. You are right, Robert. All of these people listed above have allowed either greed or desperation to compel them to participate in a very profitable but also very evil act.

    For the sake of a paycheck these people are destroying the world, addicting humankind to an exhaustible natural resource, and generating the sort of desperation which cannot help but lead to perpetual warfare.

    All of these people in the oil industry have blood-soaked hands. It is time for the oil industry to end. It is time for humankind to break its addiction to energy. It is time for humans to begin adapting to their own local environment rather than burn everything in order to maintain artificial climates and obesity.

    If humankind won’t sacrifice these things humankind will sacrifice everything. What is survival worth?

    David Mathews
    David Mathews’ Home Page

  13. I’m all for a free and open exchange of ideas, and I don’t mind listening to and considering opposing opinions, but this David Mathews guy is just a cretin.

    Please, Robert, for the sake of your readers, could you just remove his posts? They contribute nothing.

  14. Hello Robert,

    > That’s all you have ever been doing, Dave. You are kidding yourself to think otherwise.

    When speaking about your motives, Robert, I cannot help but guess. Except I am going on a little more information than pure speculation.

    You want to tax gasoline. Good. Gasoline should cost $6 a gallon and the federal government should remove all subsidies for the oil corporations and also hold oil corporations liable for any ecological damage that their activities generate throughout the world.

    In other words: If an oil corporation creates an ecological catastrophe in the Ecuadorian rain forest or the Niger Delta, the oil corporations should be forced to clean up their mess.

    Finally, the federal government should tax 90% of the compensation of oil executives and give that money to the people who really need it — the impoverished people whose resources you are exploiting so profitably.

    ***

    I also believe that the Constitution should build a “Wall of Separation” between oil corporations and the state.

    There is a whole lot which can be done to destroy the oil corporations and render the oil industry a broken, bankrupt, powerless entity.

    Can we agree on this much, Robert? Will you join me in my effort to break the oil corporations and hold them liable for their crimes against humanity?

    David Mathews

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