Trains, Planes, Busses, Trucks, Ships - these take even longer to replace and cost even more. We will be using Diesel Oil and Jet-A for a very very long time. It has to come from somewhere. I would rather it be CTL, BioTL, or TrashTL than Opec.

Any path that leads through fleet replacement is a 10 to 20 year process costing many more $Trillions than we have. We ought to start, but it’s only a start, and we need a bridge fuel to get us through the next decades while the fleet turns over.

Realize that fleet replacement only begins AFTER the vehicles are designed, Government Tested, manufactured, and distributed. It takes about 1/2 decade to get a new design done and they are not all done at the same time. Similarly, we can not all run out and buy a new car in the same year. There is not enough copper, steel, and car factories to do it.

I am in favor of the idea, but it needs to be seen as a part of the solution, not as a magic instant bullet.

Bias Disclaimer: I own stock in CLNE the company run by T. Boon Pickens that is converting large vehicles to natural gas and is building out natural gas and hydrogen fueling stations. My bias is toward his plan to deflect natural gas from electricity to vehicles and replace the electricity with wind. I’m just realistic about how long this is going to take and how many vehicles with us today will still be with us in 10 years and still need Diesel.

I also own stock in Capstone Turbine (CPST) who have a natural gas engine package for busses that can run on natural gas or gas from fermenting biomass such as from land fills. While I want them to sell a great number of these, it will take decades. Plural. I’d rather cut the rest of the fleet over to non-OPEC Diesel for that duration.