His latest endeavor, "Landman," centers on the oil industry and contrasts the lives of Texas-based tycoons and workers, and one clip is already going viral. Billy Bob Thorton, who plays "Tommy Norris" in the show, lays out the reality of wind turbines and the human need for fossil fuels in a way that will have you fist-pumping. //

TOMMY NORRIS: Do you have any idea how much diesel they have to burn to mix that much concrete? Or make that steel and haul this ** out here and put it together with a 450-foot crane? Do you want to guess how much oil it takes to lubricate that ***** thing? Or winterize it? In its 20-year lifespan, it won't offset the carbon footprint of making it. And don't get me started on solar panels and the lithium in your Telsa battery. //

TOMMY NORRIS: And never mind the fact that if the whole world decided to go electric tomorrow, we don't have the transmission lines to get the electricity to the cities. It'd take 30 years if we started tomorrow. And unfortunately for your grandkids, we have a 120-year petroleum-based infrastructure. Our lives depend on it. And hell, it's in everything. That road we came in on. The wheels on every car, including yours. It's in tennis rackets and lipstick, refrigerators and antihistamines, pretty much anything plastic, your cellphone case, artificial heart valves, any kind of clothing that's not made with animal or plant fibers, soap, hand lotion, garbage bags, fishing boats, you name it. Every thing, and you want to know what the kicker is? We're gonna run out of it before we find its replacement. //

I will mention that some people have questioned that last sentence which states "We're gonna run out of it before we find its replacement." Is that true? In a macro sense, sure. Humans will eventually reach a point where they can't get to what is left of the Earth's fossil fuels. With that said, past hysteria surrounding the specific timeline has proven to be false and will likely continue to be proven to be false as more reserves are discovered and newer extraction techniques are developed. //

TOMMY NORRIS: No, the thing that's gonna kill us all is running out before we find an alternative, and believe me, if Exxon thought them things right there were the future, they'd be putting them all over the place. Getting oil out of the ground is the most dangerous job in the world. We don't do it because we like it. We do it because we've run out of options.

For my money, this is the most important part of the clip. No one has more of an incentive to pursue and dominate the market for "renewables" than the oil companies. They also happen to have the most capital to do so.

If the oil companies thought wind turbines or solar panels were a viable alternative to fossil fuels, they'd be first in line to seize the market because, in the end, it's all about sustainability in making money for them. That they aren't is the biggest tell. Yes, Chevron and Exxon dabble in the sector, mostly for public relations reasons, but it's clear they aren't believers. //

DavidW
14 hours ago
If the wind is not blowing hard enough to get the turbines to turn, they have to use electricity (from gas/coal) to turn the blades, otherwise they will warp if they are in one position too long. In the winter they have to use electricity to keep the gear boxes unfrozen (if they are using oil-based gearboxes). AND, while the life of the turbine might be 20 years, the life of the blades are less thanks to the sandpaper effect of dust-laden wind on them. And of course ethanol isn't the miracle either - I read that it can take several gallons of "fossil" fuel (diesel or gas) to create one gallon of ethanol.

Let's hope that Trump can break this cycle of stupidity and get us on the right track toward real energy independence. //

headhunt DavidW
13 hours ago
The amount of water needed to produce ethanol dwarfs what is needed from oil based product.
Huge areas of the Midwest/west have sunk well over 20' all to feed a political, ineffective, fuel additive. //

mopani Geowhiziker
a few minutes ago
Given how essential and useful they are for so many non-fuel products, people in the future will look back on this era with astonishment that we wasted hydrocarbons by burning them. //

mopani Jason A Jones
10 minutes ago
Look at the distribution of the most common elements in the universe: hydrogen, oxygen, and carbon are in the top 5 (H2 is #1 of course).

Assume that this same distribution existed when the earth was formed and the large amounts of hydrogen, oxygen and carbon were trapped inside our planet.

H2+O2 + heat+ pressure = water

H2 + C + heat + pressure= hydrocarbons (not fossil fuel!)

Is being squeezed out of the earth under pressure.