Re: Target unit pricing - Here's the real point

Don Klipstein wrote:

>In article <DkL9k.6574$i55.1426@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>, clams_casino wrote:
>  
>
>>Don Klipstein wrote:
>>
>>    
>>
>>>>>(I don't remember the figures, but the billions of one-use plastic 
>>>>>water bottles take a horrendous amount of oil to manufacture.
>>>>>     
>>>>>
>>>>>          
>>>>>
>>>>US production is about 5B lbs/yr for bottles, but the paraxylene used
in 
>>>>its production is a minor byproduct in the cracking of oil.   If all
the 
>>>>paraxylene was eliminated, there would be an insignificant reduction
in 
>>>>the US consumption of oil.
>>>>        
>>>>
>>> 5B pounds per year sounds to me like about .03% of worldwide
consumption 
>>>of all fossil fuels.
>>> Keep in mind that most plastic beverage bottles are made of
polyethylene 
>>>terephthalate or polyethylene, and ethylene is obtained more from
natural 
>>>gas - something else that USA im****ts and is experiencing 
>>>hyperinflationary price increases of.
>>>
>>>- Don Klipstein (don@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
)
>>>      
>>>
>>5B pounds (assuming perhaps half is paraxylene from oil) with a 30% 
>>recycled rate is perhaps 500k barrels of new oil / yr.
>>    
>>
>
>  I get more like 5M.
>
>  5B times .7 times .5 divided by 42 (gallons in a barrel) divided by 8
(a 
>fairly typical density of crude petroleum in pounds per gallon) is a 
>little over 5M.
>
>  
>

You are correct - too many decimal places to keep up with.

>>The US uses 21M barrels of oil  / day.
>>
>>With the average being less than 1 plastic bottle of water per person 
>>per day in the US, it would be far more effective to simply eliminate an

>>average of a mile of driving per day.
>>    
>>
>
>  Of course, it would be good if everyone could drive a mile a day less. 

>Most days I don't drive combustion-engine vehicles at all.  I also buy 
>maybe 3 bottles of water a year and recycle them, and I recycle all of my

>soda, milk and juice bottles.
>  
>

At about 12 gms/bottle and a gallon of gas at 6 lbs (2724 gms), each 
gallon of gas is about 227 bottles.

The average plastic bottle usage is re****ted to be about 1/person/day 
(365/yr).  To offset the weight of bottles, one actually needs to save 
1.6 gallons of gas/yr or about 1 mile  each 11 days.  With a 30% recycle 
rate, that becomes closer to about 3/4 mile / week.


>  Meanwhile, I think that 30% recycling rate is something to improve 
>bigtime on - not only for water bottles, but also for other beverage 
>bottles, and those plastic grocery bags.
>  
>

Fully agree, but that will depend entirely on local recycling programs.  
We recycle most all our plastic bottles due to the ease of local 
curbside recycling.

>  It will also do good if we shop more for fuel efficiency when in the
car 
>market, more for energy efficiency when in the market for refrigerators 
>and air conditioners, and replace incandescents with CFLs where they work

>well.  (All of the general lighting in my home is from CFLs.)
>
>  Meanwhile, how about the ****tion other than paraxylene?  You are 
>assuming half of PET is paraxylene.  The other whatever-the-****tion-is 
>also comes from fossil fuels, mainly natural gas.
>
> 
>
The other half is natural gas - a much more abundant US supply is 
available vs. oil.  Notice that natural gas has not increased anywhere 
near what oil has. Whereas oil supplies have been essentially stagnate, 
natural gas supplies have significantly increased in recent years.
 
OK - reducing driving about 6 miles/ month will easily offset any gas / 
oil required for polyester bottles.

IMO, the use of any oil beyond chemicals is an abusive use of oil.   I'd 
like to see at least another $1-2 tax on gasoline (offsetting other 
taxes, possible FICA) to drive down the wasteful abuse of oil just to 
drive around in cars.  

I'm in full agreement with recycling as much as possible, but when put 
into prospective, recycling is a drop in the bucket relative to the  
wasteful use of oil just to move cars around.