Petroleum is a remarkable substance. Everyone loves the stuff too - don't deny it. Unless you are part of an indigenous undiscovered tribe in the Amazon River Basin, you are part of the international community that relies on it for everything one can think of. At $4 per gallon, I still think it is relatively inexpensive especially when compared to other essential and non-essential items. Let's take a look at the macro and micro world economy down to the way we live our lives and then discuss the positives for why the rising cost of gas can either be viewed as a gas tank half full or half empty.

Although the price of petroleum is generally viewed as negative, there are a tremendous amount of positives that immediately and in future will result of its rising cost. Here are just a few:

• Higher gasoline prices will immediately result in less demand. This will result in less traffic, less air pollution, less vehicular accidents and less wear and tear on the roads. Lower vehicular emissions will also result in higher air qualities within urban and suburban communities.



• Higher international shipping costs, completely due to the rising cost of fueling cargo container ships and higher jet fuel, will result in the return of manufacturing jobs to local markets. There will be a reinvestment in locally manufactured goods, in local manufacturing jobs, in local capital and in local trade skills. Jobs that were shipped overseas for the difference in labor costs will return to variety of international markets.



• A return to locally produced food will also occur. There will be a locally connected market now that unites the city's office worker to the farmer in the local, rural community.



• Due to the rising cost of gasoline, Mass transit ridership is up across the country. The South Eastern Pennsylvania Transportation Administration, SEPTA, just signed a deal with New Jersey Transit to lease its unused passenger cars due to a 30% increase in ridership over the past year. This is only a short term solution while it awaits its current order of new rail cars to increase its rider capacity. There will be a re-birth in public transportation systems.



• There will also be a rebirth in urban and suburban areas as the workforce chooses to live where it works or the reciprocal occurs. Major metropolitan markets will look to successfully developed cities like Portland and Sacramento as blueprints.



• Preservation of open space, of natural habitat and land conservation will occur do to the rising cost of Black Gold.



• Lastly and most importantly, the current cost of petroleum will be the impetus to weening our country's dependence upon foreign powers for energy. This will also dramatically reduce the volatility that occurs in the energy markets. Now, the cost of a gallon of gasoline won't spike $0.25 overnight due to fears that Israel may strike Iran's nuclear power plants, or when four foreign Nigerian Delta Platform Oil rig workers are abducted and held for ransom. The cost of petroleum will finally spark a serious investment into developing renewable energy sources.

So, I ask you, is your gas tank half full or half empty?