Lekos;
I think Wing's unspoken point about rail is that trucks use
up to eight times the fuel per ton KM.

It is long past time that government made some tax or regulation
changes to get interstate trucks off the road. It would be difficult
to do that without such projects as the third track between Newcastle
and Strathfield which is cheap at $800 Million as against $7 Billion
for the F3 <--> M2 link.

Growth; yes every economist and politician is talking about when the
economy recovers and growth resumes.
Do they really believe that ?
Now that oil has peaked and coal is not all that far from peaking
how can we possibly have growth ?
Without an increase in energy we cannot have growth.
From the title pages of Kenneth Deffreys book;

Anyone who believes that exponential growth can go on forever in a
finite world is either a madman or an economist !

There appears to be almost no economists that believe that growth is
to all intents and purposes over. Certainly politicians will reject
the proposition. It always comes back to the politicians unwillingness
to look the problem in the face and acknowledge the unacknowledable.

Bazz: "trucks use up to eight times the fuel per ton KM. ... the third track between Newcastle and Strathfield which is cheap at $800 Million as against $7 Billion for the F3 <--> M2 link."

Fascinating figures, Bazz. Thanks for posting them. Supplying the appropriate references (links) would be nice.

Canada has more oil than the total world usage to date, in the arctic, hence the polar bear campaign. It also has even more oil again, in tar, sand & shale deposits.

The US has more oil than Saudi Arabia ever had, just it has not been exploited, in an attempt to placate [impossible] greenies.
The US has just announced the discovery of enough gas to last 100 years, in 3 seperate deposits. I'm sure the greenies are horrified, but they will find some bull to try to stop its harvest.

We have probably as much oil as Canada, under the reef. If/when the sh1t hits the fan, if we don't harvest it someone else will, with us as forced labour, or worse.

Fairy stories are grate, but they belong in kids books.

Hasbeen: "Fairy stories are grate, but they belong in kids books."

Another aspect of fairy tales is they don't quote facts and figures with references so a sceptical person might check for themselves. A bit like your post, Hasbeen.

Just for you rstuart, & just one reserve.

A recent 10 month test of Electro Thermal Dynamic Stripping of Alberta's bitumen sands proved the production capacity of 600 billion barrels of oil from that one deposit.

This represents a little more than double the Saudi reserve.

If you want to look at something interesting, see if you can find the story of the closing of the Rundel oil sand projects at Gladstone. It seems strange that after spending 200 million, & proving economic production at less than $30 a barrel, the whole thing should disappear without a whimper.

A hidden strategic reserve, perhaps. It is on the edge of the large projected fields, under the reef.

There is more to oil reserves, than all the rubbish we get here.

Have fun

Hasbeen,
do you understand that bitumen sands are not oil! Of course they can be turned into a synthetic fuel but only with huge capital expense (requiring a high oil price), lots of natural gas and water.

The reserves are huge, yes, but reserves are not the problem. Flow rate is the problem. Tar sands and oil shale will never be able to be produced at the same rate as the light sweet crude that forms most of the oil that the world has produced to date. Prior to the GFC, Canada's tar sands were expected to produce around 3 - 4 million barrels (mb/d) a day by 2030. Buckley's chance of that now with all the project cancellations and delays. Yet the decline in conventional oil is likely to be around 2-3% (best case) or say 2mb/d per year. Do the math, tar sands are no solution.

And you talk about Saudi reserves. OPECs reserves are likely overstated by around 300 billion barrels (or a quarter of the worlds known reserves). If you don't believe me, go to BPs Statistical Review of World Energy and chart OPECs oil reserves. You will see a massive jump in the 1980s, this coincided with the OPEC 'quota wars.' Then try and find information on OPEC oil discoveries in the same time. I doubt you will find any because these are most likely 'political reserves.'