Screwindaman said:
Foreign oil is alot greedier and remember, pellet mill money was NEVER used to fund the tragedy on 9/11. Thank you for letting me vent..
Well, things are often much muddier than they seem.
For instance, a pellet company could be owned by an investment group with lots of foreign owners.
Your oil is very likely to have come from the US, Mexico or Canada.
Opium is, and has been, the largest source of revenue for the Taliban and some of Al Queda (especially now)....
There is some truth in all those slogans...go green, go renewable, etc. etc.
But the facts remain - that the marketplace....acts in a certain way with hardly ANY exceptions. People have enough to do....at least MOST people, that they are not going to make a big capital investment (pellet stove) and then pay the same or more for the fuel...and deal with the disadvantages, unless they are gonna save a nice buck.
I have seen this happen numerous times throughout the 30+ years I have burned wood and been in the business.
Now, I am just the messenger here - so don't shoot me. But most people behave in a sane fashion, and that means they are not going to constantly pay more for less.
The same will go for other situations - if gas stays cheap, people will buy bigger cars.
The real solution, IMHO, would be for tax policy (like the coming tax credits, etc) to help even out the fuel costs and allow the alternative energy field to grown without having to worry about being made irrelevant (having rug pulled out) every time oil plummets. The same goes for cars...why do we need 50 MPG cars if gas is $2.20 a gallon? Sure, those who are "green" or very frugal will always try to save, but that is not the majority of the population.