King Coal

We are being hosed. Recently, Bloviating Zeppelin had a post on the real amounts of energy within the USA borders

http://bloviatingzeppelin.blogspot.com/2011/03/us-oil-national-abomination-writ.html

In years past, many towns and cities were heated and lit by “coal gas” or “water gas”. Each municipality had a plant to convert coal to gas. Once natural gas became available at a lower cost, this technology was abandoned.

In 1925 two European scientists, Fischer and Tropsch, came up with a process to convert coat into liquid fuel suitable for internal combustion engines. By 1941, Germany had commercial plants up and running. By the end of WWII, a large part of their military vehicles and aircraft were operating on synthetic fuels.

South Africa, responding to years of international embargoes, used this technology to provide about 50% of their energy needs. Today, they lead the world in this technology. Not only coal, but natural gas, is turned into liquid fuels.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sasol

Looking at our own Department of Energy websites, you can find they are looking into it in an uncoordinated manner. No focus that I can see.

What I am unable to find is how much water is required for these processes. We have huge coal deposits. Most are in arid regions where “whiskey is for drinking; water is for fighting”.

The benefits of developing our resources are many. One, stop funding the Islamists. We are giving them the rope to strangle ourselves. Two, free up these energy sources for the rest of the world. Hungry bellies fuel wars. Prosperity encourages peace.

Obstacles to developing our resources are not technology but social. How many “greens” are from the lowest economic strata? They come from affluence and are well schooled in pushing their agenda.

Time the rest of us pushed back and take back our destiny. Easy to say. Someone smarter than me needs to figure out how.

A quote from another source.

America's corporate, political, media, academic and other leaders aren't. They're not leaders — because they refuse to stand tall, be bold, offer vision, inspire and ... well, lead. We've got too many 5-watt bulbs sitting in 100-watt sockets. They're squishing the historic can-do spirit of the American people, reducing it to a dispiriting ethic of surrender that says we-shouldn't-even-try.

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2011/03/16-7

From Jim Hightower. A progressive? Possibly. A man with a grasp of the real world? Most assuredly.