Follow-up thoughts on “The 6 Myths About Oil”

My recent article, “The 6 Myths About Oil,” attracted a lot of attention on FOXNews.com (over 200 comments and 2000 recommendations). It may surprise you that, given my article’s pro-oil stance and FOX’s right-wing reputation, most of the comments were negative. In any case, I’m glad that a wide spectrum of readers read the piece.

There was one common thread among the comments that I would like to discuss, since it comes up a lot in energy discussions. It was the claim that there are superior alternatives to oil that, given my strong support of oil, I am opposing and helping to suppress.

It should go without saying that I and any other decent person would welcome any superior substitute for oil. But when discussing potential substitutes, the question is: Is there one and how do you prove it? My answer to the latter is: you prove it by actually outcompeting oil–that is, by actually convincing users of gasoline, diesel fuel, plastics, oil-based fertilizer, etc that, given their needs and budgets, your product is better. Too much energy discussion treats the question of oil substitutes as one to be debated by pundits and then imposed by government. But government-mandated energy schemes are a violation of the rights of producers and consumers and a prescription for a central-planning debacle.

Case in point: one particularly frequent poster was a staunch advocate of methanol (note: not the same thing as ethanol), which is a form of alcohol-based fuel that can be created from coal, natural gas, or plant matter. The commenter claimed it was cheaper than oil (the equivalent of $1.60 a gallon) and that it requires a mere $130 added expense for auto manufacturers–which he declared should be mandatory. But if the case for methanol is so economically open and shut, he wouldn’t need to call for government mandates. Investors would be racing to put billions of dollars into this oil-beater.

The fact that this methanol-booster is demanding a mandate is a dead giveaway that there are real, serious obstacles to methanol becoming a viable substitute. In his comprehensive book Oil 101, industry expert Morgan Downey makes several relevant point on this matter: “Methanol contains only 50% of the energy of an equivalent volume of conventional gasoline. In addition, methanol is poisonous to humans in relatively small volumes.” The book also discusses methanol’s challenges with engine corrosion and myriad safety hazards associated with it.

Note that in dozens of posts, the methanol booster, who was quite intelligent and educated, did not see fit to mention these challenges of methanol–nor did he raise countless other questions that would arise in creating large-scale methanol operations on anywhere near the scale of oil (of which we use one billion gallons a day). I have nothing against methanol per se. What I am against is people ignoring the fact that there are reasons why we use oil instead of other sources of energy, and who demand we submit to their arbitrary schemes to “get off oil.”

Those who believe strongly in the viability of methanol or anything else should go prove their ideas by outcompeting oil for our dollars on the market (without subsidies). If they’re right, they will get rich and we all win. But if they’re wrong, and their brilliant ideas aren’t as brilliant as they thought, we don’t have to go down with their ship.

Image: Wikimedia Commons

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