Wednesday, January 21, 2009

The cost of gas

I didn't intend for this photo to have any social/ political significance. I was just out taking pictures. We are having an inversion here and that's when high pressure keeps the air stagnant in the valleys and that reduces air quality, so they enforce buring bans. Unfortunately it also gets cold as there are few clouds and we suffer radiational cooling at the same time. So right when you need your woodstove to stay warm they say you can't use it. I have an EPA approved one BTW as it burns cleaner but even those are banned sometimes. They have different stages of burning bans. You can see the polution in the air next to the horizon.

I think it's a trade off. If we use electricity something has to make it, and gas isn't without it's cost to produce and either. Just like with CFL bulbs, I don't think there is really any free lunch to heating either.

I wish I could remember that quote from the Russian physicist who said about Chernobyl something like; nothing is free and you pay when you check out. Something like that...

And why would anyone pay $1.79 for Super+ when you can get gas for $1.59 ? It seems like a lot to pay now. People are complaining about gas rising ten cents while oil is actually dropping in price. How quickly we have forgotten about $4.50 a gallon.

2 comments:

Diane Lowe said...

We've forgotten about $4.50/gallon because no one wants to pay that for gas. :)

Cool photo though.

I do think people forget what it costs for things. Even the hybrid cars have a cost to the environment, in terms of producing and disposing those batteries.

don said...

exactly