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Honolulu Lite
Charles Memminger
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Alternative fuels there for grabbing
A LOT OF PEOPLE blame high gasoline prices on oil producers and state Sen. Ron Menor, when clearly oil producers have nothing to do with it. And to be fair, even Menor's puerile "gas price cap" idea isn't really to blame, except in Hawaii and certain parts of the rest of the developed world. We should place the blame firmly where it belongs, on dinosaurs.
There simply aren't enough dinosaurs to go around. Or weren't when we really needed them, back before humans were even on Earth, during the Dinofartaceous Period. Dinosaurs had one job, to grow large and turn themselves into oil for later use by mankind. But being the big, stupid, selfish creatures they were, they failed to turn themselves into enough oil to allow humans to live in the comfort to which they hoped to become accustomed.
So now we have to find other sources of energy. The way everyone is whining, you'd think they aren't out there. They are, if everyone would just get off Big Oil's back and get serious. Here are some of the obvious solutions to the current oil, gas and energy problems:
» Dilithium crystals. Federation starships ran on dilithium crystals 25 years ago. Why hasn't that technology worked its way down to the family car? We need warp speed, Scottie, we need it NOW!
» Forget cars that run on used french fry oil, we need cars that run on good intentions. The world is full of good intentions, yet no one is processing them into a viable energy source.
» Less gravity. We clearly have too much gravity. If we could reduce gravity by 27 percent, it would take 27 percent less fuel to run trains, planes, buses and cars. This is a no-brainer, people.
» Worm holes. Scientists proved long ago that worm holes can be used not only to traverse great distances, but time itself. We've known about worm holes since Einstein wore a crewcut. And we know which are the biggest worm-producing states in the country: Georgia, Mississippi and Louisiana (the so-called "Catfishin' States"). Why aren't we using all those worm holes to our transportation advantage?
» Ethanol from wild elk. It is well known that the highest-quality ethanol comes from wild elk and that the Arctic National Wildlife Preserve is thick with these ethanol-laden creatures. Luckily, scientists think that harvesting ethanol elk will have little environmental impact on the oil underneath the Alaska wildlife preserve.
Charles Memminger, the National Society of Newspaper Columnists' 2004 First Place Award winner for humor writing, appears Sundays, Tuesdays, Thursdays and Fridays. E-mail
cmemminger@starbulletin.com