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Post by newschooled on Mar 10, 2011 2:51:14 GMT -5
For those of us who drive and don't have our bills payed for us by our parents:
With gas prices expected to nearly double in the coming months, it really makes the prospect of a hybrid or electric car EXTREMELY attractive. However, we all know that hybrid and electric cars are so bloody expensive that you're almost better off paying $500 for a tank of gas in a regular vehicle.
So...Do you think hybrid/electric vehicles are worth their up front value compared to something typical, when you could be looking at a 500% to 2000% purchase price increase?
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Post by Ryan on Mar 10, 2011 3:13:24 GMT -5
It depends on how much you drive and where you drive.
NUMBERS!!!!!
If you drive a city commute like myself every day, 20 miles round trip, in a non-hybrid this is roughly 1 gallon of gas. In a hybrid this is less than half a gallon of gas. More specifically NH (Non-Hybrid) = .9523 gallons of gas and Hy (Hybrid) = .4347 gallons of gas. Current gas prices near me are $3.50/gal, so my daily commute in my non-hybrid vehicle is currently $3.33/day, in a hybrid it would be $1.52/day. So without raising gas prices at all, I save $1.81 a day. If gas prices are doubling, I'm saving $3.62 a day by driving a hybrid.
The average life of a car is 10 years. In 10 years time I've saved $13,220.24 just by switching to a hybrid car. This is not accounting for any additional increases to gas. If the price increase ends up being 500%, you save $33,050.60 over 10 years. 2000% => $132,202.40 in savings. The higher the price increase on gas, the more economical it will be to switch to a more fuel efficient car.
I don't currently know the price range difference, but I do know that my budget cries every time I fill up with gas, and if I had the opportunity to pay less at the tank every month, I'd drop some of my savings to pay the difference on the car.
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Post by Alex on Mar 10, 2011 17:05:26 GMT -5
We need alternative energy sources. This is odd because we just got a project rubric for an alternative energy presentation. I'm doing Tidal energy (Energy from water waves).
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Flappy
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Post by Flappy on Mar 10, 2011 19:02:01 GMT -5
We need alternative energy sources. This is odd because we just got a project rubric for an alternative energy presentation. I'm doing Tidal energy (Energy from water waves). What we need to do and what we (as a country, in my case, the U.S.) will do are two different stories. We've known about, and have been needing to switch to alternative fuel sources since the 70's (40 years ago). Nothing has really changed since then. What I think we need to do is: 1.Drill in the f***in United States, we have oil/fuel we're not even using. Lots of it at that. 2.Use Nuclear Energy. It's cheap, it's clean (well, for the most part), and it would be a hell of a lot more efficient than what we're using now. I honestly believe we should be spending money to develop alt-energy vehicles. We already know we can do it, why we aren't is beyond me, other than the oil companies paying off the car companies...or what have you. |
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Post by Alex on Mar 10, 2011 20:14:47 GMT -5
Well, my teacher talked about it a lot today. He said that people have been saying we should drill in the US to cut down on foreign dependencies. Too bad that the oil in the US will only account for 3% of our usage. Fossil Fuels will run out in the next 50 years, and then what do we do? We need to develop an alternative energy source that will not hurt the environment or ever run out.
As for Nuclear Energy, it is very efficient, but it is also limited. Once the nuclear rods are used, they must be buried in a completely fortified box, never to be seen again.
Solar, Wind, and Hydro electricity are the way to go. Then, with the electricity we make with those 3 combined resources, we can properly make hydrogen fuel for our cars. You know what water we could use to make the hydrogen? The one we used to generate the power.
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Flappy
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Post by Flappy on Mar 10, 2011 21:03:16 GMT -5
Well, my teacher talked about it a lot today. He said that people have been saying we should drill in the US to cut down on foreign dependencies. Too bad that the oil in the US will only account for 3% of our usage. Right now. If we did drill, it would give us a lot more. Most-likely. We've been saying this for the last couple decades. We still haven't run out. I'm not saying we won't, I'm just saying, I doubt it will happen anytime soon. I don't necessarily agree. I think there are other sources we could be using that we aren't. I do agree about water, though...bout time we bring back the steam engine. |
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Post by newschooled on Mar 10, 2011 23:53:48 GMT -5
2 decades < 50 years
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Flappy
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Post by Flappy on Mar 11, 2011 0:45:21 GMT -5
since the 70's, 40 years (4 decades) ago. If we're saying it now, then it'll be a total of 90 years. |
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Post by Ryan on Mar 11, 2011 2:10:36 GMT -5
Nuclear energy does not affect gas prices at all, we can't use nuclear power to run our cars, so it is irrelevant to the discussion. It's also not relating to elephants so it so happens it is also irrelephant. (sorry that was funny and there and I had to). If we drill in the united states, gas would be considerably cheaper, but our estimated oil reserves here in the United States would be expensive to tap, and the initial price of this oil would be far worse than that of gas we currently get from the middle east. Upon dire need, I do foresee us using these reserves, but not in the near foreseable future. However, again, this is not of direct relation to the topic at hand, which might I remind everyone is the attractive value of a hybrid over a non-hybrid car.
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Post by Alex on Mar 11, 2011 7:31:17 GMT -5
Let's go back in time and herd all the dinosaurs to the US so we can have oil!
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Post by Insane_Zang on Mar 11, 2011 10:13:41 GMT -5
Just to add info to this debate, gas here is up to $4.00 at the cheapest. Also, why the fuck aren't we drilling Alaska? (Miles wished he was drilling Alaska instantrimshot.com/ ) |
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Post by Alex on Mar 11, 2011 10:29:27 GMT -5
We are, but pipelines aren't cheap when you're spanning the biggest US state.
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Post by newschooled on Mar 11, 2011 14:03:34 GMT -5
Also, why the fuck aren't we drilling Alaska? Eh...Why else did you think human beings inhabit that part of the earth? |
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Post by Alex on Mar 11, 2011 14:44:18 GMT -5
Also, why the fuck aren't we drilling Alaska? Eh...Why else did you think human beings inhabit that part of the earth? Because they want to be Canadian but they also want to be American.  |
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Post by Flappy on Mar 11, 2011 15:41:02 GMT -5
The population in Alaska is ridiculously small compared to its square mileage. It is the biggest state after all. If we were to drill there, the people would most likely be unaffected.
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Post by Ryan on Mar 11, 2011 19:33:06 GMT -5
We don't drill in Alaska because there's a ban on it. Why don't we lift the ban? you might ask. We don't lift it because it was put into place due to a massive debate that has been on going for years. The environmental impact would be severe.
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Post by Alex on Mar 11, 2011 20:38:49 GMT -5
We don't drill in Alaska because there's a ban on it. Why don't we lift the ban? you might ask. We don't lift it because it was put into place due to a massive debate that has been on going for years. The environmental impact would be severe. In what way would the environment be damaged? |
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Post by Ryan on Mar 11, 2011 21:45:12 GMT -5
Look up how oil drills work before I even bother answering that question.
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Post by SwimFellow on Mar 11, 2011 22:10:09 GMT -5
Ooh!! I know why they're afraid not allowed to drill in Alaska!!!  And it's banned. If there WAS another oil spill in Alaska, it would hurt the environment even more.. I think that offshore drilling causes more problems and is much more expensive than just fining a new energy source. |
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Post by Flappy on Mar 12, 2011 1:53:24 GMT -5
We have alternative energy sources. We're not using them.
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