More Signs of Demand Destruction

This time, the news comes from the API:

U.S. oil demand drops in first half of 2008

WASHINGTON – U.S. oil demand was significantly down for the first six months of 2008, API said today in its Monthly Statistical Report. While U.S. refiners churned out record and near-record amounts of oil products, imports – especially product imports — fell substantially.

Deliveries of all oil products – a measure of demand – fell 3.0 percent compared with the same first-half-year period in 2007, with gasoline deliveries slipping 1.7 percent. For the preceding three years, oil demand had essentially held steady.

API statistics manager Ron Planting said, “At 20.08 million barrels per day, total demand was the lowest in five years. And the decline in gasoline demand was the first significant one recorded in 17 years. Higher pump prices and a slowing economy were undoubtedly factors.”

Those are significant numbers. This should not be lost on those who think we should tap the SPR to push prices back down.

America’s Energy IQ 2008

Update: I was on the call, asked the first question (about the disconnect in the EIA projections for ethanol usage of less than 10% in 2030 versus the mandate of 36 billion gallons by 2022) and then I had a phone problem. I e-mailed in the rest of my questions, which did get answered. They were on the drilling question:

1. How big is a lease? Is it a standard size?
2. Are there OCS areas that aren’t off-limits that are still eligible for sale?
3. Are there other highly promising areas around the world that are off limits?
4. What exactly has to take place to open up the areas that are off-limits?

Answers were 1). No standard size; 2). Yes; 3). Yes, but the answer wasn’t what I had in mind (mentioned Saudi, Venezuela, etc.); 4). Congressional action required.

I will post a link to the call when it is available.

—————————

In about half an hour, I will participate in a blogger’s conference call to discuss the results of the second survey, done by Harris Interactive on behalf of the API, on America’s energy IQ. I reported on the results of last year’s survey here:

America’s Energy IQ

The API has released a podcast discussing the results. I will withhold comment until some time after the conference call. The podcast is (theoretically) embedded below, but here is the link just in case.

America’s Energy IQ 2008

Update: I was on the call, asked the first question (about the disconnect in the EIA projections for ethanol usage of less than 10% in 2030 versus the mandate of 36 billion gallons by 2022) and then I had a phone problem. I e-mailed in the rest of my questions, which did get answered. They were on the drilling question:

1. How big is a lease? Is it a standard size?
2. Are there OCS areas that aren’t off-limits that are still eligible for sale?
3. Are there other highly promising areas around the world that are off limits?
4. What exactly has to take place to open up the areas that are off-limits?

Answers were 1). No standard size; 2). Yes; 3). Yes, but the answer wasn’t what I had in mind (mentioned Saudi, Venezuela, etc.); 4). Congressional action required.

I will post a link to the call when it is available.

—————————

In about half an hour, I will participate in a blogger’s conference call to discuss the results of the second survey, done by Harris Interactive on behalf of the API, on America’s energy IQ. I reported on the results of last year’s survey here:

America’s Energy IQ

The API has released a podcast discussing the results. I will withhold comment until some time after the conference call. The podcast is (theoretically) embedded below, but here is the link just in case.

API Conference Call on Biofuels

After missing about 10 API conference calls in a row, I finally found time yesterday to participate in one on biofuels. Participants per the API web site were:

Devil’s Advocate of Copious Dissent, Nate Hagens of The Oil Drum, Bruce McQuain of The QandO Blog, Robert Rapier of The Oil Drum and R-Squared, Geoff Styles of Energy Outlook, Gail Tverberg of The Oil Drum, and Brian Westenhaus of New Energy and Fuel.

Let me first say that I felt like I was in an episode of the Twilight Zone. The API was defending ethanol against an angry mob of bloggers who thought it was a bad idea. Nate Hagens actually asked “Did I hear you right? The API supports ethanol?”

Unfortunately, there were some technical difficulties, and only the first few minutes of the call were transcribed. First off, here were the questions I asked, and the answers:

00:02:54 ROBERT RAPIER: Hi, this is Robert Rapier. I’ve got a few questions. I am going to have to drop out at about the 45-minute mark, so just to warn you. Is there a change in the corn ethanol tax credit? Does that get phased down over the years here? I haven’t seen anything about that.

00:03:14 MR. MANNATO: Yeah, I’m not aware that it does. The tax credit is limited in nature, so it only goes for a couple years, but typically has been renewed on a very regular basis. So it’s due to sunset and I’m not sure when. It may be 2010. But again, it’s not like it’s ramping down.

00:03:41 MR. KOCH: Robert, this is Matt Koch. To take that a little further, as they worked through this last energy bill, there was a lot of attempts to – the numbers changed significantly and there was a lot of efforts to try to find how they were going to pay for these broader bills as they were moving through Congress. There was – we saw tax bills from anywhere from 14 billion (dollars) up to $28 billion that had come through Congress. And in an attempt to get these numbers to match up, there were discussions about do they extend that tax credit, do they phase it down to a lower number? A lot of that was just all that was in play in the fall as they worked through these trying to get a bill done. But nothing was ever completed; there was no tax component attached to this bill. So we never saw anything come to fruition.

00:04:33 MR. MANNATO: Right, those pieces were stripped out in the end.

So essentially, the corn ethanol credit runs out, and is renewed each time (unlike the wind and solar credits, which have a more difficult time of it).

00:08:05 MR. MANNATO: And this is Al Mannato again. The other point I’d make is I think part of that concern is reflected in the cap for conventional ethanol or corn ethanol that was put into the legislation. So they’ve attempted to deal with those substantive concerns you’ve raised in that technical way by putting a cap on the corn ethanol so it can’t continue to grow, and we won’t need 15 percent. In theory, that 15 billion (gallons) is where some say the sustainable level is; and some say we’re past that already with where we are. So that’s an ongoing debate. But that was the intent behind the cap.

00:08:47 MR. RAPIER: I’d like for you to talk about that cap just a bit. If it’s capped at 15 billion and the mandated limit keeps going up and we don’t have cellulosic ethanol in any commercial volumes, what happens then?

00:09:07 MR. MANNATO: Well, one of the things we really felt strongly about was we wanted a reasonable and workable standard. And the primary concern we had was the one you just mentioned. The technology doesn’t keep up with the promise. So what we have in the bill is a technology review in 2015 where the EPA will do a review of the technology that is out there in 2015 and determine how many billions of gallons of cellulosic ethanol will be produced in 2016.

And what the legislation allows the agency to do is to adjust the standard for cellulosic ethanol to be equal to the amount of production that they project for the following year. So we’re not looking forward five years and trying to predict what’s going to happen. The legislation requires the agency to look forward, in effect, just a few months into the following year and then peg the standard to be equal to the amount that will be produced. We think that’s an important safety valve that was built into this legislation and one that we pushed for very forcefully.

00:10:21 MR. RAPIER: Well, but at 2015, the RFS is already at 20.5 billion gallons. So if the cap is at 15, I mean, they’re saying we must have 5 billion extra gallons before we’re even going to review this. We’re not going to review it until 2015. I think you’re going to have a big problem.

00:10:41 MR. MANNATO: Yeah, I think that’s exactly right. And I think that’s one of the concerns we’ve got moving into the future. And we’re going to try and work through that through the regulatory process to see if we can get some flexibility built in for – there are other – in terms of the bio-diesel provision, which is a billion of that 5 billion you mentioned, that there is the ability to have waivers for that one billion if there are problems with the supply. And there are also general waiver provisions that provide if the fuel isn’t available, if there is a general availability issue, there are general waiver provisions. So there are some safety valves in there. But we will continue to work with the agency to better fine-tune those mechanisms.

I thought it was pretty interesting that there is a multi-billion gallon deficit between the corn ethanol cap and how much cellulosic must be produced by the time they get around to reviewing it. I would think they would have wanted to review just as soon as cellulosic was supposed to be scaling up. To use the hover car analogy, they aren’t trying to determine the feasibility after just a few hover cars have been mandated. They will review after demanding that we have a few million out flying around. So what’s going to happen? Lawmakers are going to scramble to undo the provisions when they find out that they can’t mandate technology breakthroughs.

There was a bit of confusion by one blogger.I will let you spot the problem:

00:04:37 DEVIL’S ADVOCATE: Hi, this is Devil’s Advocate from Copious Dissent. I’m going to be candid for just a moment. I really cannot figure out why the government is promoting ethanol in the first place. According to David Pimentel, a professor at the College of Agriculture at Cornell University, it takes 1.29 gallons of gasoline to produce one gallon of ethanol.

The API defended against this charge:

00:05:09 MR. MANNATO: In terms of that Pimentel analysis, I think there is a debate over that whole issue and there is various views about the energy balance and how much gasoline it does take to produce – or how much oil it takes to produce a gallon of ethanol. And I think the bottom line from our perspective is, we think that the net energy balance is slightly positive for ethanol because of a lot of byproduct issues. But again, it’s slightly positive, but I think there are policy reasons why Congress has moved forward with it – energy security reasons.

There were a lot of good questions asked, so it is too bad about the audio. Nate asked a great question about water usage. As I had to drop out early, I did e-mail them 3 additional questions, and I am told they will get back to me. They were:

1). Can you explain the anti-backsliding rules?

2). There was an outcry by certain politicians when ConocoPhillips received the tax credit for the renewable diesel project they are doing with Tyson Foods. A quote from Lloyd Doggett “There appears to be abuse that demands legislative correction.” My question: Were they successful in denying that credit for renewable diesel processes like hydrocracking?

3). Who is going to evalaute the greenhouse gas reduction? You can’t even get scientists to agree on the parameters, how is anyone going to stack hands on this? It will become a hot political issue.

That 3rd one relates to the fact that there is a requirement for a certain percentage GHG reduction for advanced biofuels. When you can’t even get agreement on the energy balance, how on earth will you get agreement on the GHG reduction?

API Year End Statistics

The API has released their year end report on consumption, and some of the results were quite interesting. They held a blogger call today to discuss the results, but I got tied up and couldn’t make it. If they post a transcript, I will check it out and may excerpt some portions.

The summary of the statistical report may be found here, and the press release discussing the report is here. But here is the press release in full:

U.S. fuel production at record-high in 2007, demand flat - API

WASHINGTON – U.S. fuel production reached a record high in 2007 as refinery capacity expanded for the 11th straight year, API data show. U.S. crude oil production also rose in 2007, the first annual increase since 1991, according to API’s year-end Monthly Statistical Report.

The API statistics also showed that U.S. oil demand was flat in 2007, the third straight year of stagnant or lower oil demand in the world’s largest oil-consuming nation.

“While much of the increase in crude oil production represents a recovery from 2006’s depressed levels, our latest drilling figures show tremendous industry efforts to develop additional supplies from those regions that are open to exploration.,” said Ron Planting, manager, information and analysis, for API.

Given the higher domestic production and flat demand, total oil imports fell 1.9 percent from year-ago levels, though imports still cover about 65 percent of U.S. oil demand.

“Despite high oil prices, the industry worked hard to meet the needs of consumers by producing record amounts of fuel,” said API Chief Economist John Felmy. “Consumers appear to be responding to the higher prices at the margin.”

Total U.S. petroleum deliveries, a proxy for demand, averaged 20.7 million barrels per day, the same level seen in 2006, following a decline of 0.6 percent in that year. In the fourth quarter alone, deliveries slumped 0.4 percent.

Despite a one percent year-on-year increase in the first quarter, gasoline demand was lagging about half a percent below 2006 levels by the fourth quarter. On the other hand, distillate fuel oil demand rose 1.5 percent in the year amid rising diesel demand and higher home heating demand.

The demand data includes an increase in the amount of ethanol blended into gasoline, which averaged more than 400,000 barrels per day. Excluding ethanol, which accounted for nearly five percent of all gasoline sales during the year, total domestic oil deliveries in 2007 actually fell half a percent. An estimated 6.7 billon gallons of fuel ethanol were used by refiners in 2007, some two billion gallons more than the 4.7 billion gallons required by law but more than two billion gallons less than the recently-passed requirement for 2008.

So, three years in a row of stagnant oil demand. Is that because production has been flat, or have high prices caused demand to stay flat? Gasoline demand also reportedly fell, which would (I believe) be the first decline in quite some time. Are higher prices responsible, or is ethanol primarily responsible? Increased ethanol production is certain to be putting some pressure on natural gas prices; besides corn farmers, natural gas producers benefit from the ethanol mandates.

And does our government really think we should bump up the 2008 usage of ethanol to 9 billion gallons? (Yes, they do). Egads, I am going to plant some corn and get rich quick.

Who Owns Big Oil?

When politicians promise to “stick it to Big Oil”, just who do they think they are sticking it to? A new study commissioned by the API, and done by Robert J. Shapiro of the former Clinton administration, indicates that “Big Oil” is largely middle class. The API is hosting a conference call today to discuss the findings, which unfortunately I was unable to make. But below is the press release summarizing the findings.

New study finds ownership of America’s oil and natural gas companies “broadly middle class”

WASHINGTON – Who owns ‘Big Oil?’ It’s not who you think. As Congress debates national energy policy, a new study finds that ownership of oil and natural gas company shares is made up of a broad cross section of Americans.

“This study disproves the popular misconception that ‘Big Oil’ is owned by a small group of industry insiders. In reality, across the oil and natural gas industry only 1.5 percent of shares of public companies are owned by company executives,” said study author Robert J. Shapiro, undersecretary of commerce for economic affairs under President Bill Clinton. “The data show that ownership of industry shares is broadly middle class, with the majority of industry shares held by institutional investors, often on behalf of millions of Americans through mutual funds, pension funds and individual retirement accounts.”

API Chief Economist John Felmy added: “When politicians seek to punish these companies and ‘take their profits,’ they are not targeting industry executives but the hard-earned savings of working people.”

Shapiro and economist Nam D. Pham’s study was commissioned by API. The study shows that:

1. Almost 43 percent of oil and natural gas company shares are owned by mutual funds and asset management companies that have mutual funds. Mutual funds manage accounts for 55 million U.S. households with a median income of $68,700.

2. Twenty seven percent of shares are owned by other institutional investors like pension funds. In 2004, more than 2,600 pension funds run by federal, state and local governments held almost $64 billion in shares of U.S. oil and natural gas companies. These funds represent the major retirement security for the nation’s current and retired soldiers, teachers, and police and fire personnel at every level of government.

3. Fourteen percent of shares are held in IRA and other personal retirement accounts. Forty five million U.S. households have IRA and other personal retirement accounts, with an average account value of just over $22,000.

I doubt that this will impact much on the legislation being debated, but one wonders if congress understands that oil companies are not owned by a handful of rich white guys. Sure, there are some rich white guys who own lots of shares, but that’s not who will be primarily impacted by punitive legislation.

America’s Energy IQ

I already knew that the general population has a poor understanding of energy issues. For that matter, politicians have a poor understanding as well, which is why we find ourselves burdened with irresponsible energy policies.

The API has validated my impressions with a survey that they had commissioned by HarrisInteractive. To such questions as “Who supplies the U.S. with the most imported oil?”, respondents floundered. They grossly overestimated the size of publicly traded oil companies like ExxonMobil in relation to national oil companies like Saudi Aramco. And they grossly overestimated the potential for biofuels to displace fossil fuel usage. In fairness, some of the questions were quite difficult, such as “How many years does Oil and Gas Journal think our oil will last?” After all, how many people outside the oil industry read OGJ?

While some of the questions were clearly self-serving (and I don’t like lumping spending on CTL, GTL, and shale oil with spending on biomass, wind, and solar in one category called “emerging energy technologies”, or “alternative energy”), they do provide an indication of the energy IQ of the general public. There were 20 questions in the quiz. On 9 of the questions, the incorrect answer was given by at least 89% of the respondents. On 16 questions, the incorrect answer was given by at least 75% of the respondents. On none of the questions was the correct answer given by more than 46% of the respondents. And on many of the questions, people favored the answer that was farthest from the correct answer.

You can take the quiz yourself here. You can see the answer key here. And you can read the transcript of a conference call here, in which the API discusses the results of the call.

One question was missing, though, in my opinion: “How much interest do you have on energy issues?” I have been in Oklahoma for the past week, talking with relatives and old friends about energy issues at every opportunity. Despite the fact that energy ranks up there with food and water in importance in our daily lives (and in fact is intertwined with both food and water), people just don’t care. They are content to let special interests and uninformed politicians (who are easily influenced by special interests) draw up energy policy. They want their gas prices to go down, and they don’t want to hear about oil companies making multi-billion dollar profits while they pay $3.00 a gallon for gasoline. My Mom asked me yesterday, “Just how many billions did Exxon make last year?”

To the extent that I can get people engaged, they think that renewables will be a drop-in solution as fossil fuels deplete. In fact, my brother-in-law actually said to me “Brazil transitioned to alternative energy, and by God so can we.” Of course I explained to him that Brazil still derives 90% of their transportation fuel from fossil fuels, that they use 1/7th of the per capita energy usage that we use in the U.S., and they have a much better crop for producing ethanol in sugarcane. This was all news to him, and he certainly didn’t know how to respond to that.

Now, if I can only have this same conversation with 300 million other people, we might start to get somewhere on our energy policy. As it is, the energy policy that is currently being debated is a recipe for an endless sea of hearings pondering the questions of why gasoline prices continue to go up, and why switchgrass ethanol is not materializing as has been promised. Maybe they can call Vinod up for an explanation.

America’s Energy IQ

I already knew that the general population has a poor understanding of energy issues. For that matter, politicians have a poor understanding as well, which is why we find ourselves burdened with irresponsible energy policies.

The API has validated my impressions with a survey that they had commissioned by HarrisInteractive. To such questions as “Who supplies the U.S. with the most imported oil?”, respondents floundered. They grossly overestimated the size of publicly traded oil companies like ExxonMobil in relation to national oil companies like Saudi Aramco. And they grossly overestimated the potential for biofuels to displace fossil fuel usage. In fairness, some of the questions were quite difficult, such as “How many years does Oil and Gas Journal think our oil will last?” After all, how many people outside the oil industry read OGJ?

While some of the questions were clearly self-serving (and I don’t like lumping spending on CTL, GTL, and shale oil with spending on biomass, wind, and solar in one category called “emerging energy technologies”, or “alternative energy”), they do provide an indication of the energy IQ of the general public. There were 20 questions in the quiz. On 9 of the questions, the incorrect answer was given by at least 89% of the respondents. On 16 questions, the incorrect answer was given by at least 75% of the respondents. On none of the questions was the correct answer given by more than 46% of the respondents. And on many of the questions, people favored the answer that was farthest from the correct answer.

You can take the quiz yourself here. You can see the answer key here. And you can read the transcript of a conference call here, in which the API discusses the results of the call.

One question was missing, though, in my opinion: “How much interest do you have on energy issues?” I have been in Oklahoma for the past week, talking with relatives and old friends about energy issues at every opportunity. Despite the fact that energy ranks up there with food and water in importance in our daily lives (and in fact is intertwined with both food and water), people just don’t care. They are content to let special interests and uninformed politicians (who are easily influenced by special interests) draw up energy policy. They want their gas prices to go down, and they don’t want to hear about oil companies making multi-billion dollar profits while they pay $3.00 a gallon for gasoline. My Mom asked me yesterday, “Just how many billions did Exxon make last year?”

To the extent that I can get people engaged, they think that renewables will be a drop-in solution as fossil fuels deplete. In fact, my brother-in-law actually said to me “Brazil transitioned to alternative energy, and by God so can we.” Of course I explained to him that Brazil still derives 90% of their transportation fuel from fossil fuels, that they use 1/7th of the per capita energy usage that we use in the U.S., and they have a much better crop for producing ethanol in sugarcane. This was all news to him, and he certainly didn’t know how to respond to that.

Now, if I can only have this same conversation with 300 million other people, we might start to get somewhere on our energy policy. As it is, the energy policy that is currently being debated is a recipe for an endless sea of hearings pondering the questions of why gasoline prices continue to go up, and why switchgrass ethanol is not materializing as has been promised. Maybe they can call Vinod up for an explanation.

America’s Energy IQ

I already knew that the general population has a poor understanding of energy issues. For that matter, politicians have a poor understanding as well, which is why we find ourselves burdened with irresponsible energy policies.

The API has validated my impressions with a survey that they had commissioned by HarrisInteractive. To such questions as “Who supplies the U.S. with the most imported oil?”, respondents floundered. They grossly overestimated the size of publicly traded oil companies like ExxonMobil in relation to national oil companies like Saudi Aramco. And they grossly overestimated the potential for biofuels to displace fossil fuel usage. In fairness, some of the questions were quite difficult, such as “How many years does Oil and Gas Journal think our oil will last?” After all, how many people outside the oil industry read OGJ?

While some of the questions were clearly self-serving (and I don’t like lumping spending on CTL, GTL, and shale oil with spending on biomass, wind, and solar in one category called “emerging energy technologies”, or “alternative energy”), they do provide an indication of the energy IQ of the general public. There were 20 questions in the quiz. On 9 of the questions, the incorrect answer was given by at least 89% of the respondents. On 16 questions, the incorrect answer was given by at least 75% of the respondents. On none of the questions was the correct answer given by more than 46% of the respondents. And on many of the questions, people favored the answer that was farthest from the correct answer.

You can take the quiz yourself here. You can see the answer key here. And you can read the transcript of a conference call here, in which the API discusses the results of the call.

One question was missing, though, in my opinion: “How much interest do you have on energy issues?” I have been in Oklahoma for the past week, talking with relatives and old friends about energy issues at every opportunity. Despite the fact that energy ranks up there with food and water in importance in our daily lives (and in fact is intertwined with both food and water), people just don’t care. They are content to let special interests and uninformed politicians (who are easily influenced by special interests) draw up energy policy. They want their gas prices to go down, and they don’t want to hear about oil companies making multi-billion dollar profits while they pay $3.00 a gallon for gasoline. My Mom asked me yesterday, “Just how many billions did Exxon make last year?”

To the extent that I can get people engaged, they think that renewables will be a drop-in solution as fossil fuels deplete. In fact, my brother-in-law actually said to me “Brazil transitioned to alternative energy, and by God so can we.” Of course I explained to him that Brazil still derives 90% of their transportation fuel from fossil fuels, that they use 1/7th of the per capita energy usage that we use in the U.S., and they have a much better crop for producing ethanol in sugarcane. This was all news to him, and he certainly didn’t know how to respond to that.

Now, if I can only have this same conversation with 300 million other people, we might start to get somewhere on our energy policy. As it is, the energy policy that is currently being debated is a recipe for an endless sea of hearings pondering the questions of why gasoline prices continue to go up, and why switchgrass ethanol is not materializing as has been promised. Maybe they can call Vinod up for an explanation.

America’s Energy IQ

I already knew that the general population has a poor understanding of energy issues. For that matter, politicians have a poor understanding as well, which is why we find ourselves burdened with irresponsible energy policies.

The API has validated my impressions with a survey that they had commissioned by HarrisInteractive. To such questions as “Who supplies the U.S. with the most imported oil?”, respondents floundered. They grossly overestimated the size of publicly traded oil companies like ExxonMobil in relation to national oil companies like Saudi Aramco. And they grossly overestimated the potential for biofuels to displace fossil fuel usage. In fairness, some of the questions were quite difficult, such as “How many years does Oil and Gas Journal think our oil will last?” After all, how many people outside the oil industry read OGJ?

While some of the questions were clearly self-serving (and I don’t like lumping spending on CTL, GTL, and shale oil with spending on biomass, wind, and solar in one category called “emerging energy technologies”, or “alternative energy”), they do provide an indication of the energy IQ of the general public. There were 20 questions in the quiz. On 9 of the questions, the incorrect answer was given by at least 89% of the respondents. On 16 questions, the incorrect answer was given by at least 75% of the respondents. On none of the questions was the correct answer given by more than 46% of the respondents. And on many of the questions, people favored the answer that was farthest from the correct answer.

You can take the quiz yourself here. You can see the answer key here. And you can read the transcript of a conference call here, in which the API discusses the results of the call.

One question was missing, though, in my opinion: “How much interest do you have on energy issues?” I have been in Oklahoma for the past week, talking with relatives and old friends about energy issues at every opportunity. Despite the fact that energy ranks up there with food and water in importance in our daily lives (and in fact is intertwined with both food and water), people just don’t care. They are content to let special interests and uninformed politicians (who are easily influenced by special interests) draw up energy policy. They want their gas prices to go down, and they don’t want to hear about oil companies making multi-billion dollar profits while they pay $3.00 a gallon for gasoline. My Mom asked me yesterday, “Just how many billions did Exxon make last year?”

To the extent that I can get people engaged, they think that renewables will be a drop-in solution as fossil fuels deplete. In fact, my brother-in-law actually said to me “Brazil transitioned to alternative energy, and by God so can we.” Of course I explained to him that Brazil still derives 90% of their transportation fuel from fossil fuels, that they use 1/7th of the per capita energy usage that we use in the U.S., and they have a much better crop for producing ethanol in sugarcane. This was all news to him, and he certainly didn’t know how to respond to that.

Now, if I can only have this same conversation with 300 million other people, we might start to get somewhere on our energy policy. As it is, the energy policy that is currently being debated is a recipe for an endless sea of hearings pondering the questions of why gasoline prices continue to go up, and why switchgrass ethanol is not materializing as has been promised. Maybe they can call Vinod up for an explanation.