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Comment by asteroidz | Hacker News Reader

The important question that matters is: Is the cost close to competitive vs. Bitumen, or is there any hope of reaching that threshold?

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Bitumen is getting more and more expensive, so I guess unless it’s crazy expensive it’s just a matter of time..

We’re using increasingly less gasoline to drive cars a given distance. For EVs it’s essentially zero. So we refine less oil for fuel, which means we’re also getting less bitumen. Not hard to see that using bitumen is completely unsustainable in the long term.

I guess it depends on regulations/carbon credits related to CO2 emissions too

That price differential may be even less if subsidies for fossil fuels are removed.

https://www.budget.senate.gov/chairman/newsroom/press/sen-wh....

As if there is any realistic chance of that.

I get that the subsidies themselves aren't going anywhere, but in evaluating the cost effectiveness of this alternative it should be part of the math in comparing to the previous version.

In the video the CTO is stacking up the pros, like it is safer to handle and the Russians. Usually when that happens, there is a catch.

Nevertheless, I think we are way beyond to compare on price like this and should include the footprint into the cost.

In the video I used closed captioning (English) since I am only fluent in Texas English. I have to say that the CC translation on that was pretty funny. Whatever they used did not produce a meaningful translation. It was impressively disjointed nonsense. It was easier for me to listen closely to his speech to peel out the root words and try to infer the rest.

I am not familiar with conventional bitumen processing or preparation for use on roads but if this process allows creation of an asphalt product that eliminates the need to mine low gravity petroleum resources then it is a great development. Perhaps it eliminates a lot of the incentive to continue mining the tar sands in Canada. Maybe?

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