Nancy Pelosi’s Gassy Ignorance
By Jimmie on Aug 25, 2008 in Our New Democratic Overlords, Thinking About Energy
We voters ought to be at least a little bit ashamed that we’ve let a nincompoop like Nancy Pelosi get her hands on our national energy policy. It’s not enough that we let someone who believes she’s on a mission to “save the planet” get her delusional mitts on the levers of political power. That would be bad enough, considering that we’ve seen what happens when an old-school progressive starts getting Messianic aspirations.
No, we should be ashamed because our Speaker of the House thinks that natural gas is a pefectly cromulent alternative to fossil fuels. She dropped that little nugget a couple times yesterday on Meet the Press while defending the fact that she stands to profit quite handsomely from the policies she’s pushing.
I’m, I’m, I’m investing in something I believe in. I believe in natural gas as a clean, cheap alternative to fossil fuels.
MR. BROKAW: But you’re also in a position to influence where the emphasis will be in where we’re moving.
REP. PELOSI: Well, that’s not–that is, that is the marketplace. The fact is, the supply of natural gas is so big, and you do need a transition if you’re going to go from fossil fuels, as you say, you can’t do it overnight, but you must transition. These investments in wind, in solar and biofuels and focus on natural gas, these are the real alternatives…
[emphasis mine]
For the love of God, is there no one on her staff capable of informing her where natural gas comes from? For that matter, what the heck happened to Tom Brokaw? How did that manage to slip by him twice in a matter of a minute without getting so much as a blink from him? Maybe he was so hypnotized by those perennially surprised-looking eyes that he completely missed what she said. I’d prefer to think that than to think that he served up a softball on her conflict of interest and had already moved on to the next question.
However, they can both be glad there’s a blogosphere. We’re here and we’re ready to help. Conn Carroll at the Heritage Foundation’s Foundry Blog found a helpful page written for kids that probably wouldn’t be too difficult for Pelosi to understand. There are pictures and everything.
via the US Energy Information Agency
You know what else she’d learn if she read that EIA link? She’d learn that natural gas isn’t brought to us by magic fuel fairies but by the same arrangement that brings us oil. She’d learn how you drill for gas using the same equipment as you do for oil and that sometimes we drill for gas and oil at the same time using just one well. She’d also learn how natural gas is carried by evil pipelines, just like the oily pipelines that might endanger caribou if they didn’t like them so darned much.
Of course, that all assumes that she’s the least bit interested in learning anything that might demolish her own infantile view of how we get energy in this country and what we’re going to need to do to keep ourselves supplied well into the future. Based on her behavior in the last few weeks, it seems the only thing she’s interested in is making herself a couple more million dollars and scoring cheap political points.
UPDATE: Instalanche! Thank you.
for those of you who’ve never visited before, take a couple minutes and click around the place. There are some posts that might make you laugh, make you wonder why there seems to be open war between the MSM and their fellow Democrats. Feel free to leave constructive comments and buy plenty of Amazon loot for yourself and your loves ones. It’s all good here.
Stumble it!
To get oil, you stick the big straw in the ground, and out comes the oil. To get natural gas, you stick the big straw in the ground, and out comes the natural gas. The difference is that if you put your mouth over the straw for the natural gas, you can inhale and talk like Minnie Mouse!
OCBill | Aug 25, 2008 | Reply
How can this be? How can the most powerful nation the world has ever seen be governed at the highest levels by someone like Pelosi? Are we insane?
This woman is in line for the Presidency directly behind the Vice President! What has happened to this country?
Sam | Aug 25, 2008 | Reply
Now, natural gas does have an _air pollution_ advantage over oil, and a larger one over coal–that is, it’s cheaper to burn NG cleanly than to do the same with oil or coal–but when it comes to greenhouse gas emissions, there’s no advantage. Actually, NG itself contains greenhouse gases, so if it leaks before being used, it’s worse for the environment than if it gets burned. The trouble is in transportation–you can pump gas through a pipeline, much like oil; but with oil, you don’t need much pressure. So a NG pipeline can be switched to oil with a minimum of effort, but the opposite isn’t necessarily true. The other alternative is to liquefy the natural gas, but then it has to be kept cold, which means a different set of technologies for the tankers and pipelines. With oil prices where they are, the market (including Rep. Pelosi) is putting those technologies in place in the next several years–after that initial investment, natural gas becomes a competitive alternative to oil.
Mr. Science Guy | Aug 25, 2008 | Reply
If natural gas is a fossil fuel, then how come it shows up on a bunch of other bodies floating around our solar system?
I am guessing the dinosaurs really had a thriving existence on Titan back in the day.
WiseOlBird | Aug 25, 2008 | Reply
Mr. Science Guy – There’s no question that natural gas is a cleaner-burning fossil fuel, but it is still one. I’d be fine if the market was driving the options here, but the Speaker isn’t about to let that happen.
WiseOlBird – Please tell me your comment was a joke.
Jimmie | Aug 25, 2008 | Reply
I was much more embarassed by her remarks concerning the catholic church and abortion. Actually I was enraged. But I get that way every time that ignorant bitch opens her piehole. God, what a disgrace.
Jewells | Aug 25, 2008 | Reply
Nancy Polosi probably thinks vehicles running on natural gas would be a good thing. Trouble is, to store enough fuel on a vehicle to have a decent range, you have to pack gas into the vehicle fuel tank to a pressure of at least 3,000 psi. Where do you get the 20 horsepower to compress that gas? If you are not lucky enough to own a gas well to drive your compressor, you have to use – gasoline! All these alternative fuel fanatics should be required to take a course in basic thermodynamics.
william | Aug 25, 2008 | Reply
You need to bone up on “fossil” fuels, NG and Oil are not “fossil” fuels but are renewalable resources. Drill!!
john
John | Aug 25, 2008 | Reply
In spite of the snark, WiseOlBird asks a relevant question, I’ll try to be brief in answering it.
On Earth, NG is considered a fossil fuel, because the underground gas fields where we find it are the result of biological decomposition, dating back thousands of millenia.
Methane (the primary component of NG) apparently used to be plentiful in Earth’s atmosphere, as it still is in Titan’s, but that was before plants started releasing free oxygen. In the presence of oxygen, methane breaks down into CO2 and water (slowly on a human timescale, almost instantly in geologic terms). Titan, lacking plants, still has a methane atmosphere.
On Earth, now that we have an atmosphere full of oxygen, the only places to find natural gas are where it’s been kept away from the air (i.e. trapped underground), and where it’s just been produced from decomposition (which is now called biogas).
To address John’s comment–all fossil fuels are renewable, by strict definition of the word, but not in the way we commonly refer to “renewable resources.”
Mr. Science Guy | Aug 25, 2008 | Reply
Ok, this is funny. i just read your blog on this subject and asked my son what are fossil fuels? His response, without my prodding, was, coal, oil, and….(wait for it) natural gas. Dang! I nearly died! He is only a sixth grader and knows more than our beloved third in line for the presidency.
OsoRojo | Aug 25, 2008 | Reply