House Proceeding 02-06-07 on Feb 6th, 2007 :: 5:34:08 to 5:53:30
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5:19:50 to 5:34:08( Edit History Discussion )
Speech By: Wayne T. Gilchrest

5:33:53 to 5:34:08( Edit History Discussion )

Wayne T. Gilchrest: and we solve some of the problems. and i want to thank congressman bartlett for the time and for his enormous interest in this issue and his skill and expertise. and i yield to mr. bartlett. mr. bartlett:

5:34:08 to 5:34:24( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: i want to thank my colleague very much for joining us here. congressman gilchrest mentioned market forces, they are very powerful and they have provided for us the highest quality of life of any place

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Speech By: Roscoe G. Bartlett

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Roscoe G. Bartlett: in the world. but market forces are limited. they cannot do what they cannot do. as i have noted that there are some things that even god can't do. god can't make a square circle, for instance.

5:34:36 to 5:34:50( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: and the market forces are powerful. and as long there are unlimited resources, market forces will work. i remember mentioning to one of our high government officials the problem of limited oil

5:34:50 to 5:35:05( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: supply in the future. and his response was, gee, i guess the market will take care of that. i guess when oil gets more expensive, we'll use less of it and then we'll find alternatives. that's

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Roscoe G. Bartlett: true. when oil prices get higher, we will use less of it and we'll look for alternatives. but when you look for the potential of exploiting these alternatives, you see that a large amount of time and energy

5:35:20 to 5:35:36( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: must be invested in these alternatives before they yield any meaningful amount of replacement for the fossil fuels which are so abundant and so energy rich. let me give you just one little

5:35:36 to 5:35:52( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: example of some of the unintended consequences of trying to do this. there's a big push to make ethanol from corn in our country. we have noted that the brazilians are making ethanol

5:35:52 to 5:36:07( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: from sugar cane and they don't have to import any oil and we would like to imitate them and make ethanol corn -- that, by the way is the impossible dream. that won't happen. with the relatively

5:36:07 to 5:36:29( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: small amount of ethanol that we're now making and there aren't very much e-85 pumps in this part of the country. there are in the midwest. but with the relatively small amount of ethanol we're

5:36:29 to 5:36:43( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: making, the demand for corn raised the price of corn from $2.11 a bushel in september to $4.08 it was in december. that's causing a huge problem for our people that raise animals. we are having

5:36:43 to 5:36:58( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: a meeting in a few days with our dairy people in maryland. unless oil goes up -- it needs to be at least 18 before they can break even with this kind of a price for food for animals, they're going

5:36:58 to 5:37:18( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: to go bankrupt. and so the relatively small demand for corn to make the relatively small amount of ethanol that we're making now has essentially doubled the price of corn. what this douse

5:37:18 to 5:37:36( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: is to reflect the enormous amount of energy that's in these fossil fuels. they are really energy dense. this chart shows something about what's happened to our world as a result of the incredible

5:37:36 to 5:37:52( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: energy density in these fossil fuels. rick over-- and let me get a copy of his paper. it wasn't a paper but a talk that he gave, to a group of physicians 50 ears ago. the anniversary will

5:37:52 to 5:38:07( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: be may 14 of this year. and that was at a meeting of the annual scientific assembly of the minnesota state association, which had nothing to do with medicine and apologized for that, but he thought

5:38:07 to 5:38:24( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: the physicians might enjoy some diversion. he was talking about the enormous energy in these fossil fuels. and what he said was so well done. rick overis the father of our nuclear submarine.

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Roscoe G. Bartlett: i had no idea he had given this talk. it just appeared in the energy bulletin of december 2 of last year, 2006. so it has only been out in the general public for these couple of months.

5:38:35 to 5:38:50( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: i noted this the other night, you know, we need to hear this again, because this is so revealing as to what this energy has done for us. with high energy consumption goes a high standard

5:38:50 to 5:39:04( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: of living. thus enormous fossil fuel energy, which we in this country controls, feeds machines, which makes each of us a master of an army of mechanical slaves. at that time, we didn't import

5:39:04 to 5:39:22( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: it. now, when i am port almost 2/3 of what we use. another writer has indicated the incredible amount of energy in fossil fuels and oil. let me give you the analing he uses and i'll read

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Roscoe G. Bartlett: the ones that rick overgave. one barrel of oil produces the energy equivalent of 12 men working all year for you. if you figure the price that you could hire a man, equivalent of a man to work for

5:39:45 to 5:40:01( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: you by buying $10 of fossil fuel, of oil, he'll work a full year for you. let me read to you what herman rickover said. man's muscle power is rated at 35 watts continuously, 1/20th of a horse

5:40:01 to 5:40:17( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: power. you can do a little better than that when you're working but you have to eat and sleep. machines furnish every american and industrial worker with energy equivalent of that of 244 men.

5:40:17 to 5:40:36( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: wow. how many men months of work without energy from fossil fuels would it have taken to build your automobile? while at 2,000 men pushes automobiles along the road and his family is supplied

5:40:36 to 5:40:54( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: with 33 faithful household helpers. each engineer controls energy equivalent of that of 100,000 men. each jet pilot of 700,000 men. thinking of that jet pilot and that plane up there, and i look

5:40:54 to 5:41:21( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: at those trails and sometimes they are the only cloud-like things in the sky. and just the other day it finally occurred to me, the dynamics of the co-2 thing that congressman gilchrest was talking

5:41:21 to 5:41:40( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: about, carbon and that's what is in these fuels, carbon has walingte of 12 and when you bind the carbon it combines with oxygen. oxygen weighs 16. so what that says, congressman gilchrest, if you weigh

5:41:40 to 5:41:53( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: the gasoline that goes in your car, you produce three times that wargetel weight in carbon dioxide. that is incredible. . i didn't know as a little boy where oil came from. i knew where coal

5:41:53 to 5:42:09( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: came from because we had a coal furnace in our house. i had to break a lump of coal. there would be a fern leaf. nobody had to tell me where coal came from. i knew very well it came from. it

5:42:09 to 5:42:29( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: came from plants that grew a very long time ago. they fell over under pressure in time and became -- they became coal. so we're releasing incredible amounts of carbon dioxide, which is a greenhouse

5:42:29 to 5:42:51( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: gas, which will change the acidity of the ocean. it still changes the p.h. of the water because it forms a very weak acid, carbonic acid when it gets in the water. truly, the humblest american, admiral

5:42:51 to 5:43:13( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: rickover says, lives better than most ancient kings. in retrospect and despite wars, revolutions and disasters, the 100 years just gone by -- that was 1950. that's right here. the 100 years just

5:43:13 to 5:43:31( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: gone by may well seem like a golden age. and what this chart shows here is the history of the world energywise for only about 400 years out of that 8,000 years that admiral rickover talks about.

5:43:31 to 5:43:47( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: and the industrial revolution began with wood, the brown curve here, and it didn't produce very many quadrillion of b.t.u.'s of coal. but look what happened. it exploded when we found gas and

5:43:47 to 5:44:03( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: oil. and that's because gas and oil are so easy to change into compounds that we can readily get energy from. and they're much more adaptable and flexible than coal. although, you can get gas

5:44:03 to 5:44:15( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: and oil from coal. hitler had to do that when we cut off his oil supplies and under embargos south africa had to do that. we may be turning to that again shortly. as i mentioned, madam speaker,

5:44:15 to 5:44:30( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: there are three groups that really have common cause in talking about the use of these fossil fuels. one is that very large and growing group of people, including our secretary of state,

5:44:30 to 5:44:43( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: who are concerned that our growing dependence on foreign oil is a very serious national security risk. well, what do we do? we obviously need to use less of it. the president says we're hooked

5:44:43 to 5:44:58( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: on it. we need to use less of it. and we can use less of it two ways. one, we can simply conserve and be more efficient. we have done that. we can certainly do more of that. and the second thing

5:44:58 to 5:45:15( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: we can do is to get energy from alternatives. and as this chart shows and as dr. rickover mentioned, there will come a time when the world will be getting less and less energy from fossil fuels

5:45:15 to 5:45:34( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: and finally at some point in history down the road we will be getting essentially no energy from fossil fuels because obviously they are not infinity in their supply and -- infinite in their

5:45:34 to 5:45:49( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: supply. the age of oil will represent but a blip in terms of energy pro -- but a blip. in terms of energy production, a pretty big blip. in another 100, 150 years, if m. king hubbard was correct, it

5:45:49 to 5:46:05( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: will peak and go down the other side, commonly called hubbard's peak, oil will get ever more difficult to get and ever more costly. in another 100, 150 years, we will have transitioned to

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Roscoe G. Bartlett: renewables, having gotten all of the energy we can from these unconventional oil sources, like the tar sands of can dand the oil shells of the united states. the -- canada, and the oil shells

5:46:17 to 5:46:27( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: of the united states. the next chart is addressing this. now whether you believe that we need to reduce our use of fossil fuels because it's a national security problem, whether you believe

5:46:27 to 5:46:41( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: we need to reduce our use of fossil fuels because it's causing climate change, or whether you believe you need to reduce the use of fossil fuels because they just aren't going to be there

5:46:41 to 5:46:55( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: and the quantities that we're using today and the future, you still must do the same things. first thing you need to do is to buy some time. we now knowing we should have known at least by

5:46:55 to 5:47:12( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: 1980 that we were going to be here today because we were already 10 years down the other side of our hubbard's peak in this country. and then king hubbard had already predicted that the world would

5:47:12 to 5:47:27( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: be peaking about now. and so for these last 27 years we should have been addressing this problem and investing energy and time and alternatives. unfortunately, we in large measure have not

5:47:27 to 5:47:40( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: done that. and so today we're faced with a problem. we have no excess oil, no excess oil energy to invest in alternatives. if there was any excess it wouldn't be $55, $60 a barrel and we

5:47:40 to 5:47:55( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: would essentially run out of time. we can buy some time and free up some oil with an aggressive program in conservation. and you really can't do that. europe uses half the energy that we use.

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Roscoe G. Bartlett: it would be hard to argue that they don't live as comfortably as we do. the average californian uses 65% of the electricity that we use, and there are 50 some of those in this congress.

5:48:10 to 5:48:22( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: i doubt any of us would disagree that we live less than we do. what we need to do is use it weissly. what will we do with in energy that we freed up and the time that we bought by this

5:48:22 to 5:48:33( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: aggressive conservation program? we have to invest that wisely in alternatives. now whichever these camps you come from, whether it's the climate change camp or the camp that's concerned that

5:48:33 to 5:48:45( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: we are too dependent on foreign oils, and that's going to be a big national security risk, or whether you believe that we need to move from fossil fuels to alternatives simply because there

5:48:45 to 5:49:02( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: will be less and less and more expensive fossil fuels in the future, you want to do essentially the same thing. enormous benefits can accrue from this. congressman gilchrest mentioned the enormous

5:49:02 to 5:49:17( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: creativity in entrepreneurship of our people. we put a man on the moon in less than a decade. that was a really big feat. we can do this. we were challenged to do that. today, the average

5:49:17 to 5:49:32( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: american doesn't know that oil is probably limited in its future supply. they probably are unaware today. it's an interesting day to talk about potential for global warming because it's the

5:49:32 to 5:49:47( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: coldest day we've had this winter. but i understand that it's 20 degrees above normal in alaska and 20 degrees above normal today in russia. i just wanted to make a comment about some of the potentially

5:49:47 to 5:50:05( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: unexpected consequences of this climate change. if you look at a globe you will see that england is way up there about mid canada. and i had to stop for refueling flight in ireland that really is

5:50:05 to 5:50:23( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: the emerald isle. it is so green. and that has a climate like south carolina. how can you have a climate like south carolina at a latitude of central canada? and the reason for that is a

5:50:23 to 5:50:36( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: huge conveyer belt that carries heat from the tropics to the british isles and europe. and that huge conveyer belt is called the gulf stream. and the gulf stream picks up heat in the gulf

5:50:36 to 5:50:48( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: area, near the equator, and it then carries that like a giant conveyer belt up to the british isles and europe. and they have a very moderate climate compared to what they would have in the

5:50:48 to 5:51:00( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: absence of the gulf stream. now water is not piling up up there around europe and england, so it's obvious that if it flows up there and carries that heat up there it's got to come back. and it

5:51:00 to 5:51:12( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: comes back by going down. and why does it go down? talk about that in just a moment. and then it comes back flowing in just as large a volume and just as fast. it comes back to the lower part

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Roscoe G. Bartlett: of this big conveyer belt. again, in the tropics picking up more heat and continues this transfer of heat to the british isles and england. well, a very interesting thing is happening to this

5:51:30 to 5:51:53( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: conveyer belt. the water as they flow north they're warm and the sun shines on them and water evap waits. and -- evaporates -- evaporates. it produces the rain that drops on our mountains

5:51:53 to 5:52:10( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: and produces the indirect solar energy from the waterfalls that we use that produces electricity. well, two things are happening. a major one is the fact that the polar ice cap is melting. and

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Roscoe G. Bartlett: a lot of that fresh water, water without saline in it, very light compared to this heavy water. it's in addition to the general global warming of the oceans. it's the effect of this polar ice

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Roscoe G. Bartlett: cap melting. and strangely, the melting of the polar ice cap may so dilute the waters in the gulf stream that they do not become dense enough to drop down to continue this conveyer belt on back

5:52:39 to 5:52:53( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: on to the tropics. and the gulf stream could stop. if the gulf stream slows down considerably, or if it's stopped, the climate in the british isles and in europe would be very, very different

5:52:53 to 5:53:08( Edit History Discussion )

Roscoe G. Bartlett: than it is today. now if we were in siberia talking about global warming and so forth, we might have a very different view of it. you might be hard to convince me that a little global warming

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Roscoe G. Bartlett: might be good in living in siberia. but just notice this nine degree fahrenheit change from the ice age has produced the incredible climate changes that we see from that time to this you've seen

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Roscoe G. Bartlett: the potential for really devastating climate changes as a result of very modest changes in temperature. congressman gilchrest, you have an observation. mr. gilchrest: if the gentleman would yield

5:53:30 to 5:53:45( Edit History Discussion )

Wayne T. Gilchrest: on the issue of the gulf stream and the conveyer belt issue. as mr. bartlett described, the congressional vary belt is part of this whole system of the climate that we're used to because

5:53:30 to 5:55:49( Edit History Discussion )
Speech By: Wayne T. Gilchrest