Wednesday, April 23, 2008

Six days now reporting...
Little change expected in predictions
Six days are now in and the data has only changed slightly. Numbers are still showing a decrease for stove oils and an increase to gasoline pricing Wednesday night in Newfoundland and Labrador.
Heating oils and diesels may go the same way as stove oils but the last couple of adjustments showed heating oils increasing moreso than stove oils. That could translate into little change in the heating oil or diesel price.
Stove oils now show an expected decline of 1.46 cents a litre from yesterdays 1.55. Gasoline is showing a steady 3.7 up on a litre for Wednesday...
As an afterthought, I do an awful lot of thinking while I'm at this...
If 1) it's possible for heating and stove oil product to become so expensive that Big Oil just may ruin its own market for the commodity, and
2) We find that people can't keep themselves warm as a result of heating oils being unaffordable and people want to make the switch to electricity, then
3) Obviously we're going to presure our own sources of energy like electricity as the most beneficial next to wood some might say, then we have another problem developing for the short-term future, and here it is...
To me there may be trouble down the line for our supply of electricity, particularly on the island portion of the province. The question has to be asked about the supply-demand balance of electricity if we find a lot of people are going to switch from oil-based products to electricity.
With those thoughts in mind, here's a few questions for you all to ponder...
1)Do we have the capacity on the island portion to handle the increased demand in electricity if people/consumers switch?
2) Why haven't we heard of Labrador residents being covered in the provincial energy plan, particularly on the coast in areas that face electricity generated by diesel generation?
3) Natural gas is being eyed closely as an alternate source of energy again in the United States as heating oil pricing has skyrocketed. Does our government still have plans to ship out our natural gas to places far away rather than supply our own people with it first?
4) If more people are going to fall back on wood, what is the government going to do as regards to placing some constraints on wood harvesting for "personal consumption"?
5) How about forest replantation/silviculture programs for the long term?
I could go on but, I'll leave it at that for now...
regards,
george

2 comments:

Table Mountains said...

right now i find myself in an awkward position. i have to replace my oil tank when the fuel runs out in order to get more. i switched from electric heat back in the mid 90's when oil was just .29 a litre. i made the mistake of removing my electric heaters from my home at that time. now i'm wondering if it's more feasible to switch back?

makes me laugh when i think back to then. one oil company gave us a free turkey because we filled our tank up at that price. today they don't want to come unless it's an amount of $200 or more.

im a home care worker and it takes a months wages to fill my tank now.

George said...

I just shiver at the possibility that Hydro may again be on the chopping block according to some sources I've heard from.If Danny gets rid of that then "us eastern bastards will surely freeze in the dark" and then what...Hydro is the last thing to fall back on that is, in the least, affordable if you do switch...