I don't watch TV really, so I miss all kinds of things.
Energy independence buys us a lot of clout. For instance, it keeps us from having to respond to crisis all over the world, as well as cutting the influence of some of the world's nastiest dictatorships. Plastic would not be a significant problem. The US still produces 6 million barrels of oil a day, and has significant reserves of oil shale (which is hard to produce, but tolerable). The amount of oil we devote to plastics is essentially negligible compared to our current consumption for vehicle fuel and fuel oil.
I've seen the plastic made from corn. It's pretty tough. We might not need that much corn either if we could stop using it to produce fuel. I think we use less plastic than fuel in a given day.
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Energy independence buys us a lot of clout. For instance, it keeps us from having to respond to crisis all over the world, as well as cutting the influence of some of the world's nastiest dictatorships. Plastic would not be a significant problem. The US still produces 6 million barrels of oil a day, and has significant reserves of oil shale (which is hard to produce, but tolerable). The amount of oil we devote to plastics is essentially negligible compared to our current consumption for vehicle fuel and fuel oil.
I've seen the plastic made from corn. It's pretty tough. We might not need that much corn either if we could stop using it to produce fuel. I think we use less plastic than fuel in a given day.