Ask AP: Leaded gas and college football poll votes

Is there anywhere at all in the U.S. where you can still pump leaded gas into the family car?

That's one of three questions in this edition of "Ask AP," a weekly Q&A column where AP journalists respond to readers' questions about the news.

If you have your own news-related question that you'd like to see answered by an AP reporter or editor, send it to newsquestions@ap.org, with "Ask AP" in the subject line. And please include your full name and hometown so they can be published with your question.

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The AP College Football Poll prides itself on the fact that its voters' ballots are made public every week during the college football season in the fall. (Unlike, say, USA Today's Coaches Poll.) Where can I go to find the voting results from the sportswriters who vote in the AP poll?

Bruce Adams Jr.

Lafayette, La.

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The AP college football poll voters do agree to release their votes each week during the season. The AP puts together an online interactive featuring each poll voter's ballot. In fact, that link's still active on certain Web sites, including the one run by your hometown paper, The Daily Advertiser of Lafayette, La.:

This is all very outdated, of course -the season ended months ago -and this link only shows the results for the final vote of the year. But when college football teams are in action, the results are posted each week.

Mary Byrne

AP Deputy Sports Editor

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With all the ink that is being given to the subject of gasoline, why is the adjective "unleaded" still being used to describe it? I can't remember when I last bought "leaded" gasoline. Is it still available in the U.S.?

John More

Kingston, N.Y.

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No, it's not available anymore -not even in race cars or any type of gasoline engine. It was phased out in the '80s for environmental reasons.

Lead additives can be mixed with unleaded gas to fuel cars designed for leaded gas, but the additives are only intended for off-road use, at least in the U.S.

John Wilen

AP Energy and Transportation Writer, New York

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The world appears to have an insatiable thirst for oil. Millions of barrels of oil are pumped from the Earth each day, but does anyone know the "replenishment" rate? Is the prospect of depleting all the Earth's oil a legitimate concern, or is new oil being created at a rate which will sustain us "forever"?

Gary Wagner

Morton, Ill.

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Oil is a finite resource and eventually there will be a point where reservoirs are depleted and new ones become more and more difficult to locate and develop.

The International Energy Agency estimates the world has 7 trillion barrels of conventional oil, of which 3.3 trillion barrels are technically recoverable. It projects global need between now and 2030 will total 1 trillion, about as much oil as already has been pumped.

How much of the world's oil will be pumped depends on price and technology. With prices high, more oil will be pursued.

There is a view known as the "peak oil" theory that suggests production -now 87 million barrels a day -already is at its maximum and is beginning a permanent decline. Others say that point is still 20 or 30 years away and may be extended further by high prices and new technology.

What about the formation of additional petroleum within the Earth? Don't hold your breath. It's an excruciatingly slow process -so slow it doesn't even enter into the equation of how much oil is available for human consumption.

H. Josef Hebert

AP Energy Writer, Washington

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Have questions of your own? Send them to newsquestions@ap.org.