Weekend Open Thread

Verizon has announced that its mobile network is almost back to full strength in the areas that have been ravaged by Hurricane Sandy, so it should be a bit easier to get in contact with loved ones and friends. As of this morning, Verizon says that 97.2% of its cell sites in the northeastern United States are functional, with the rest hopefully coming back soon.

Verizon says that its coverage in most areas is “approaching pre-storm status,” but clarifies that in some areas that were hit really hard by Hurricane Sandy, such as lower Manhattan, that isn’t the case. Coverage in those areas may not be up to where it was before the storm hit, but Verizon says that service should still be good in those places. It’s also worth pointing out that when Verizon issued this statement earlier, it said it would be bringing more cell sites up to snuff throughout the day.

That means it’s entirely possible that Verizon has boosted its 97.2% figure by now.

Lord help you if you live on a coast.

It's getting where insurance companies aren't even interested in writing a policy, period.

I spoke with a friend from work located in White Plains NY, the issue there: stations with no power to pump gas from the tanks are closed and the stations that do have power have been sucked dry. People drive around trying to find gas and line up if they find one open.

Which begs the question- why don't gas stations have generators?

The oil companies are rich enough, but our station was not owned by any oil company. We get the majority of our profits from people buying stuff inside. Not the gas. Can't afford it.

It depends on who owns the land. The franchise location may lease the station from the oil company landlord, they may lease the land from a real estate investment trust or may own the land outright.
If leasing, a big $$$ chunk goes to the lease.

If that's true, then why doesn't it say "Joe's Filling Station" or something like that on the sign instead of BP, Shell, Sunoco, Texaco, etc?

If the oilco's don't own the gas stations what's to stop the real owner from getting his gas from anybody who gives him the best price instead of from a specific oil company?

I'm not trying to be snarky, I'm just asking...

Wait, so your solution to 'gouging' (or perhaps unneeded tax breaks) is to get on board with the gouging? That is such backward thinking! If your house was on fire would you join in the fun and toss on some gasoline? Broken things should be fixed, not made more broken so they have to be replaced. Your line of thinking is no different than that of people who 'jump aboard' for a free ride via government programs.

Can you actually provide evidence of "gouging" ?

Our Congresscritters and states attorneys have been investigating OilCo "gouging" since time began, and have yet to show anything. I'm not saying there isn't room for some price manipulation, but it isn't significant, and that's not gouging.

My "line of thinking" is to recognize the situation for what it is, not what you might want it to be. Oil discovery, extraction, refining and distribution is a large and complex operation, fraught with risk and peril - those who risk their capital aren't going to do it without some potential for profit. In the end, they earn between 9 and 13 percent - in good years.

The "broken" elements of the current production system are minor - 50 blends of gasoline, mid-grade, and issues with permitting of exploration, development, pipelines, emission control, and refinery plant expansion, and should be fixed - but that won't bring about a massive change in the price of gasoline, nor should it.

"Fixing" the problem doesn't involve condemning the very industry that supplies the fuel you desire. Unless we find a way to wean ourselves off of petrol on a massive scale, we will need the oil industry to continue to produce. And frankly, they will probably still be a part of the production and distribution system long after we use our last drop of gasoline.

As for the cost of running the thing- my 8000 watt generator takes about 5 gallons a day if running for about 12-16 hours. Even if a bigger genny were needed for a gas station, it still wouldn't cost them all that much to run it for say- 12 hours a day, because they would make the money back in profits.

You'd think that any station owner with a lick of sense would race home and take the generator from momma to power the station. There's gold in them thar tanks if I can just pump it out.

You'd think that any station owner with a lick of sense would race home and take the generator from momma to power the station. There's gold in them thar tanks if I can just pump it out.

The gas station I was at had a Natural Gas generator. We had like 12 pumps. In a power outage it could only sustain 8, security equipment, POS equipment and subsequent networking. No hotdogs, no soda, and the cooler full of soda.

So they could still sell gas but in a limited capacity.

Day 5 of no power here.

The power was restored briefly yesterday, and didn't even last an hour before it went out again. PPL estimates it will be Sunday at 11pm at the earliest for most customers- some could be out until next week.

TBH- I think heat is worse than cold.

At least with cold, you can put on more clothes, and bundle up. You can get into bed with extra blankets and warm up to a certain extent.

An extra hour of cold, dark fall mornings is probably the last thing you look forward to when you first wake up—or when you're driving to work, dropping off your children at school, or walking the dog. Similarly in mid-March, when we first "spring forward." So why do we suffer through this?

Supposedly, to save energy. Clever as he was, Benjamin Franklin didn't anticipate the eventual importance of air conditioning, a much more expensive item than lighting. Thanks to daylight-saving time, in the summer people come home from work an hour earlier and crank up their air conditioner in the hottest part of the day.

Profs. Matthew Kotchen of Yale University and Laura Grant of the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee found that daylight-saving time increases energy use by over 1% in Indiana during those months—adding some $9 million to energy bills annually, plus sending an additional 188,000 tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. Daylight-saving time imposes the greatest costs in the fall, the researchers found, when it prompts increases in morning heating without any savings on lighting. But it also imposes high costs in July and August, when increased air-conditioning bills more than offset the savings in lighting.

The United States adopted the annual use of daylight-saving time permanently in 1966, then lengthened its duration on the calendar in 1986 and again in 2007. For the past five years, an extended daylight-saving period has begun the second Sunday of March and ended the first Sunday of November.

Spring forward; Fall back.
Don't forget to set your clocks(those that aren't automatic) back 1 HR tonight before going to bed.

Here is an opinion piece that says we no longer need daylight savings time:
»online.wsj.com/article/SB1000087···news_wsj
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