An Exxon Mobil green ad was banned in the UK because it was said to be misleading, an ad-industry watch dog reported.

“We concluded that the ad misleadingly implied that natural gas was one of the cleanest sources of energy and that liquefied natural gas was environmentally friendly,” ASA said in a statement.

Exxon on the other hand said “they accurately stated that natural gas is one of the world’s cleanest fuels and that liquefied natural gas will play an important role in delivering new energy supplies.” Just to make up your opinion here is the advertisement.

What do you say?

A friend and I were discussing a couple of days an incident that happened at the Rose Bowl parade. One of the floats ran out of gas. The whole parade was held up because the float sponsor didn’t think to put enough gas in the car that carried the float. The sponsor, one of America’s huge oil company.

Perhaps oil companies should take care of the simple things, get their house in order before they make claims about the ‘other things’ they do, like go green or just put on a pretty face at a parade for example.

What do you think?

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As Bush made a move to protect the world’s largest marine sanctuary, on the other side of the world there is another surprise leader in the protection of the marine environment - China. China held its first international drill against oil spills with South Korea off the coast of Qingdao. Some 500 people, one helicopter, one fixed wing aircraft and 29 vessels were involved … none of them leaking anything, of course.

The Northwest Pacific region is at the highest risk of oil spills and a natural place for pollution prevention training. China gets some 400 oil tankers visiting each day carrying some 420 million tons of crude oil annually. In the past 24 years there have been 79 accidents involving oil spills of at least 50 tons of oil. Gosh, that’s about a year’s worth of crude oil wasted, no?

China lags in maritime firefighting capability and oil cleaning equipment. But, perhaps the Middle Kingdom is turning the corner. South Korea had the most serious oil spill in history last year when 15,000 tons of crude oil leaked into the sea near Hong Kong.

The U.S. Geological Survey has some insight into what lies beneath/near/on the Arctic Circle:

1. An estimated 90 billion barrels of recoverable oil
2. Enough oil to supply the WORLD’s needs for nearly 3 years.
3. Maybe 1.670 trillion cubic fee of natural gas
4. About 13% of the world’s undiscovered oil
5. About 30% of the world’s undiscovered natural gas
6. About 20% of the world’s undiscovered natural gas liquids
7. Some 400 oil and gas fields north of the Arctic Circle
8. The home to polar bears already losing their natural habitat to melting of their land
9. A possible cause for a conflict between Russia, Canada, Norway, Denmark and the United States who are laying claim to chunks of the huge energy resources.

So, should we go drilling or not? Remember what arthroscopic surgery can do before answering that question.

source

There’s going to be a fight and if nobody else wants to take on Bush, California will do it for sure. Bush wants to lift the 27-year old ban on offshore drilling.

Yesterday I brought this topic up at a lunch meeting with friends. (I live in Silicon Valley) One friend immediately blurted out “Fat chance of Bush lifting that ban!” And, I was kind of thinking, why not? My friend went on to say he remembers what it’s like swimming among the oil bubbles off the shore of Galveston, TX. No way was that going to happen in this area. “Save the Puffins!”

Since 1981, America has been prohibited from doing offshore gas drilling and exploration by a federal moratorium. Reasons - protect tourism and lessen the chance of oil spills reaching popular beaches.

Experts (can we trust them?) are telling Bush there are about 18 billion barrels of oil at the Outer Continental Shelf (OCS).

America has a choice - accept the high gas prices and/or watch them go up or start exploring and drilling and cursing and yelling and … On the other hand we can change route to solar or wind power, and electric cars!

FIGHT!

[Source: NYTimes] - Image by visualsushi

Saudi Arabia is calling for a summit between oil producing countries and consumer states, where the main topic going to be, soaring energy prices. The Saudis promised that along with OPEC they will “guarantee the availability of oil supplies now and in the future”.

Gosh, thanks fellows. You will keep gouging the rest of the world as long as they will pay for it, right? How kind of you.

The kingdom also promised there will be no “unwarranted and unnatural oil price hikes that could affect international economies, especially those of developing countries”. Exactly how not-affected are these developing countries when oil hits record price of $139 per barrel? Do we look stupid, that’s why you’re making fun of us?

One more thing the Saudi minister said “there is no justification for the current rise in prices”, but they still make a killing off the rest of it.

I know how to solve the high oil prices. Stop buying the stuff!!

The reason we get charged so much is because people will pay for it. It’s the market laws that says when the demand is high prices soar so better stop buying it and the price will probably go down. However, the best way would be to use alternative power sources. If OPEC realizes we do NOT need them, they’ll come around.

That’s what GreenPacks is all about - there are other ways.

Original image by anachronist

Update:  new oil price record is $122.73 and things sure doesn’t look pink.

The oil prices blasted to a new record of $122.47 a barrel. Buyers were motivated by Goldman Sachs’ predictions that we may see oil selling for $150-$200 prices in a couple of years and the falling dollar.

A grebe is covered in oil after the Korean oil spill. Taean, South Korea. © TDG

From last year, oil prices doubled from $62 a barrel, so I guess this may be the first sign we have to stop paying more and more money for something that is not good for our health and the environment. There seem to be more and more investors to see light at the end of the tunnel for alternative energy technologies.

First step is to make electricity using the sun light and then we should go along with the trend and build better electric/hybrid cars.

We may be on the right track, but we’re moving very slowly.