How Much Will Oil Influence Our Industry?

Over the last few days the price of oil has been heading back down from $83 dollars a barrell to just over $74 today. One thing I was banking on happening was when the price of oil really rocketed up, that profile and systems companies would have taken the opportunity to raise their rates and use that as a very timely excuse. However, much to my surprise this has not happened.

This may not be sustained in the long run. Long-term, oil will only go up in price as supplies start to fall. And because PVCu is half made from oil, surely the price will go up in the future. Based on that hypothesis, the industry has two ways to go. The first path is to heavily invest in recycling old PVCu frames to be used for the same purpose. The downside to that is the public may not take to buying 'used' PVCu when the idea is to replace old tired frames with 'new'. The other tricky problem is that you would almost be trying to create and tool up a whole new industry when the funding isn't readily available. To recycle old frames into new ones on mass will require huge upheaval and expansion of the whole industry. But because we are such a lathargic industry and don't ever move quick enough, that will struggle from the beginning.

The second path we could take would be to start producing polymers from sustainable oil supplies i.e. sustainable crops earmarked for oil dependent industries. There are hectares of land springing up all over the place with crops destined to become oil to fuel other sectors of industry. The same ploymers PVCu needs can be made from these sustainable crops. More investment and research should be carried out to see if this really could be a successful alternative to gutting the earth of it's limited natural resources.

On a completely different note, I'm thinking of (and probably going to do) starting a second blog. The content of the blog isn't going to be industry related in the slightest. Just wanted to get that in there first! I do a lot of thinking when I get spare time, and a lot of that thinking goes on human history and the human condition. Quite a difference from double glazing I know. But I do quite a lot of philosphical thinking, and I think it would be nice to get some of my thoughts about the world, and not just about the job I work in, out there for people to study. There won't be the uber regular posts on my new blog like this one. If I feel some reflectionary thoughts coming on, then it will go straight on the blog. I want you to let me know if this is something you would be interested in reading. I'll put out more specific information about it soon.

Night all!