<Welcome to the New Digs...(an open thread...)The Oil DrumEconbrowser on Sweet and Sour...>

13 comments on Leave the SPR alone already

Comments can no longer be added to this story.

ericy on August 22, 2005 - 12:12pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
There may be something to this, I suppose.  I imagine that everyone here would categorize driving an SUV as wasting fuel, but try telling someone to do without heat in New England.  Yet this winter, people may end up having to do exactly that.

I know that I have always focussed on vehicles in relation to oil, but in reality getting people off of home heating oil is likely to be somewhat easier.  There aren't the technical obstacles that there are with vehicles.  I haven't even thought about what the optimum types of heating systems would be, really.

I have this idea rattling around in my brain like a loose marble - that if fuel prices reach a certain point (not sure what that point is), that governments would institute rationing in an attempt to hold down demand, and thereby control inflation.  The problem is of course that this would almost need to be instituted on an international level first or otherwise prices would never stabilize.  What would make this even harder is coming up with an equitable way determining who gets how much.  Just like everything else, people would try and figure out ways to game the system to get more than the system intended.

0
Comments can no longer be added to this story.
Yankee on August 22, 2005 - 12:25pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
It may be easier to target residential heating oil, but MUCH more effective to try to change consumption patterns in transportation. This chart from the DOE shows the breakdown of oil consumption by product:


In this graph, as far as I can tell, residential and commercial heating oil is represented by the white bar in the distillate category. Overall, that's not very much, especially compared to the giant blue bar in motor gasoline.

I don't know how much proportional use has changed since 2002, but probably not too much.

0
Comments can no longer be added to this story.
ericy on August 22, 2005 - 2:22pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top

It would almost certainly be true that you get more bang for the buck by targetting transportation.  I guess I am thinking that you might have elderly folks out there who don't drive much and still have oil heat, and these people are going to be in a real fix if heating oil prices go up.

For the rest of us though, vehicles are probably where we need to focus our attention.

0
Comments can no longer be added to this story.
markincalgary on August 22, 2005 - 6:05pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
Why worry, Eric?  Won't the market take care of these "elderly folks"? ;)

Seriously though, there's a lot of low hanging fruit in increasing a home's thermal efficiency.  Checking weather stripping on doors and replacing it where necessary is a good place to start.  Making a cheap frame out of 3/4"x3/4" wood to fit in the inside and/or outside window well, stretching and stapling clear plastic across the frame, and tacking the whole structure in place with finishing nails (so you can remove it come spring) gets you a fair buck for the bang too.  This worked surprisingly well on my basement windows.  A day later the basement was comfortable rather than chilly.  But natural gas would have to get pretty darned expensive before my wife would accept such "window treatments" on our more visible windows.

It won't change the big picture like focusing on transportation, but it's still worth doing.  I don't think a retired couple that turns off the heat in February so that they can afford March's medication is thinking much about that big picture.  (And I've consoled several members of such couples at the bus stop the last two winters.)

0
Comments can no longer be added to this story.
fatbear on August 23, 2005 - 6:51am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
I don't look at this as a conservation issue, at least not with regard to the politicasl pressure to open the SPR.  It is purely and simply that all politicians in the Northeast will be under heavy pressure to "do something" about the HO pricing - imagine Murdoch outlet's  "GranMom Freezes to Death While Warming Baby in Her Arms as Hilary and Chuck Dance at New Year's Ball" and the other sensationalist stories on the local news in these markets.

HO is a minor portion of total usage, but it is a true life-and-death use.

0
Comments can no longer be added to this story.