DrumBeat: July 30, 2007
Posted by Leanan on July 30, 2007 - 9:01am
Saudi to add half-million bpd to output capacity
State oil giant Saudi Aramco said Monday that it expects to add half-a-million barrels per day (bpd) of crude to its maximum production capacity of 10.8 million bpd next December."Saudi Aramco's maximum sustainable production capacity is 10.8 million bpd," the company said in a statement on a midyear meeting of the executive committee of its board of directors in Vienna.
"The grassroots Khursaniyah Crude Increment is expected to be in operation in December 2007, with a capacity of 500,000 barrels per day of Arabian Light Crude blend from the Abu Hadriya, Fadhili, and Khursaniyah fields" in the oil-rich Eastern Province, it said.
The price of North Sea Brent has risen from $50 a barrel at the beginning of the year and recently crossed the record price threshold that was set last summer, during the Israeli war against Lebanon, namely $78 a barrel. It began to approach, for the first time, the level of $80, then fell to around $70.What is behind this high level of prices?
Debate on a broad range of energy proposals is set to begin in the House of Representatives this week, a month after the Senate passed a big increase in vehicle efficiency standards.Whether the House will vote on its own fuel efficiency standards is unclear, and will be perhaps the most watched item in the legislation.
Have you driven a Fjord lately?
Think's zippy little Web-enabled, carbon-free electric driving machine could help reverse 100 years of automotive history.
Current oil prices are inflated by around $7 per barrel because of concerns about supply security, OPEC's Secretary-General Abdullah al-Badri was reported as saying in a newspaper interview on Monday....Badri said Western concerns about possible production bottlenecks due to political instability in oil-producing countries were overdone and OPEC had scope to increase production if necessary.
"There are such concerns, but in our view they are exaggerated," he told WirtschaftsBlatt. "There is much talk about production bottlenecks - but in reality we have free capacities of around 3.5 million barrels per day."
"We can activate this cushion any day."
...He said OPEC did not plan to reintroduce an official price band for oil, but added: "I believe I can say that we feel comfortable if the oil price doesn't fall below $50. A price above $80 wouldn't please us either."
A revolutionary report on the future of oil
In the debate over oil supplies, July 2007 may be seen as a turning point. The International Energy Agency, a body set up to advise OECD nations on energy supply and security, broke with its previous optimistic projections of world oil supply and threw the future of oil into doubt. The IEA’s recently released “Medium-Term Oil Market Report” (PDF 1.87MB) reads like a summary of peak oil concerns made acceptable for the ears of government by occasional disclaimers to the contrary. However, its central declaration is clear:
Despite four years of high oil prices, this report sees increasing market tightness beyond 2010, with OPEC spare capacity declining to minimal levels by 2012 … It is possible that the supply crunch could be deferred [by decreased demand growth] - but not by much.
Rise in diesel consumption sparks concerns in Algeria
As Algeria's diesel consumption overtakes domestic production, the Algerian government looks for ways to reduce losses from the fuel's falling exports and rising imports.
Turkey: Water shortage warning in electricity dams
With the air conditioners boosting the usage of electricity, hydroelectric power plants are being used in addition to natural gas and coal; therefore, the water level in the dams has decreased from 80% to 52% in 2.5 months. Electricity usage has risen up to 606 million kw/h, and all plans are being shaken.
Bombings in Mexico — A Sign of Upcoming Unrest?
The way this guerrilla force reappeared represents a qualitative leap in their strategy, and in the focus of their objectives of not only making the country more violent but towards the destabilization of Mexico and its institutions as well. In the media, the government has sought to minimize the attacks and damages by playing them down, but its media strategy and other actions taken in the fight against insecurity have not had the expected results. As a result, the situation in Mexico is becoming more complex and difficult day by day.And these elements, along with others, could be the first symptoms of a future social explosion.
The Real Reason Why Gasoline Costs More
If you want to know why gasoline and everything made from oil is going to cost more in the years ahead, I give you, ladies and gentlemen, Hugo Chavez, dictator of Venezuela, and a number of other nations who have engaged in extortion.
Gas-station owners' profits hinge on thirsty customers
Convenience-store owner David Malik earns about as much on a can of Coke as he does on a typical 10-gallon purchase of gas.Malik's gross profit on gasoline is roughly 3 cents a gallon after paying for supplies and credit-card fees, but he earns 30 cents on the soft drink.
And when trouble in a faraway oil-producing nation spikes energy prices, his profits here are squeezed even more.
Long green seen in algae in city lakes
Biodiesel is a liquid fuel equivalent of regular diesel, except that it is made from sources such as vegetable oil instead of petroleum. Currently, biodiesel comes mostly from soybeans, canola oil and waste oils from restaurant kitchens. While these sources are adequate for now, experts agree they could not support any transition to green fuel on a large scale.This has led to a search for "second generation" biofuels which might meet a larger percentage of our demand.
"Algae has serious potential," said Kenneth Walz, a chemistry instructor at Madison Area Technical College who teaches a course on biodiesel, "because compared to the current agricultural crops we use, algae can produce magnitudes more oil per acre."
Since the 1950s, the nuclear industry has promised energy "too cheap to meter," inherently safe reactors and immediate clean-up and storage of hazardous waste. But nuclear power is hardly cheap -- and far more dangerous than wind, solar and other forms of power generation. Recent French experience shows a reactor will top $3 billion to build. Standard construction techniques have not stemmed rising costs or shortened lead time. Industry spokespeople insist they can erect components in assembly-line fashion a la Henry Ford to hold prices down. But the one effort to achieve this end, the Russian "Atommash" reactor factory, literally collapsed into the muck.The industry has also underestimated how expensive it will be to operate stations safely against terrorist threat and accident. New reactors will require vast exclusion zones, doubly reinforced containment structures, the employment of large armed private security forces and fail-safe electronic safeguards. How will all of these and other costs be paid and by whom?
Cameco Quarterly Net Reaches Record on Uranium Price
Cameco Corp., the world's largest uranium producer, said second-quarter profit rose 36 percent to a record on increased shipments of the raw material used in nuclear-reactor fuel.
Israel - An armed force or a trade union?
The announcements by the Israel Electric Company that the heat wave had pushed the national power grid to maximum capacity and that any technical failure would lead to blackouts around the country, was almost the mirror image of the IDF's protestations that it needed another NIS 7 billion to ensure it was prepared for the next war.
Transmeridian Exploration: Attractive E&P Player From Kazakhstan
Kazakhstan is located at a central intersection between Europe, India, and China. India and China are massive importers of oil, which should continue to rise at a steady 2-3% rate over the next decade. Matthew Simmons, an energy investment banker and a former adviser to US president George W. Bush believes that oil production in Saudi Arabia will soon peak, meaning it will not be able to supply the world's growing energy needs. Someone must step in. To add to that point, Kazakhstan is expected to be come the fifth largest exporter of oil over the next decade. In this case, the top five would likely be Saudi Arabia, Venezuela, Russia, Iran, and Kazakhstan. That will put Kazakhstan in front of Kuwait, Iraq, Nigeria, and all other major oil exporting countries.
If the American empire is to continue it will have to maintain control of the other oil riches of the Middle East. These are the crown jewels of the empire, and with peak oil here or coming soon, control of that oil will be essential to world domination. But the United States will have a hard time maintaining control of the rest of the Middle East when it withdraws from Iraq. Iraqi bases were meant to substitute for bases in Saudi Arabia when the Saudis objected to bases so close to their holy sites. So where will the United States put the bases now?
Climate change rage a lot of hot air?
A survey by the Public Policy Institute of California shows most residents think dirty air from cars is helping foster disasters such as drought and hurting their health through ailments such as asthma.They want immediate action from government officials and presidential candidates with strong environmental protection stands. They support current attempts to lower greenhouse gas emissions from autos.
...But the poll released last week also found two-thirds of workers put up with pain at the gasoline pump so they can drive solo to jobs — a fourth in SUVs.
Economists Find Current Biofuel Potential In Oregon May Be Costly And Limited
The adoption of biofuels in Oregon could reduce the state's fossil fuel use by less than one percent, but at a much higher cost to society than more direct approaches such as a gasoline tax or raising fuel economy standards. That is the conclusion of a study published by the Oregon State University Extension Service.
'Sustainable' parking: A 21st-century oxymoron?
The automobile may do us in eventually, but for now we are content to ignore all that. The Europeans have responded differently, but they were never as dependent on cars as North Americans. Furthermore, land is at a premium in Europe, which means the appeal, not to mention the practicality, of sprawl is not as great.
“Peak Oil” is a useful hoax, based on a 51-year-old theory by Dr. M. King Hubbert, perpetuated by the oil multinationals and petrol juntas — What! (Hold that objection).Among other official fictions like “WMD,” Palast shows that all that sloganeering about spreading democracy in Iraq was just happy talk and hot air to sell the ill-fated invasion to a frightened, vengeful and patriotic post-9/11 public.
We’re in Mesopotamia and we’re staying in Mess-o-potamia, regardless of the invasion’s horrific costs and abject failures, to make sure Iraq’s oil is not privatized and over-produced. We are there, Palast says, not to open up the spikot but to protect OPEC quotas and the House of Saud’s price-fix racket.
The New World Order: The Bilderberg plan -- control oil, control people (Part 23)
There are arguments from both sides of the oil issue: either we are quickly running out of oil or we have adequate oil to meet our requirements for generations. Both sides offer evidence, witnesses, experts and documentation to validate their assertions. Some peak-oil projects, funded by oil companies, are highly suspect. The very credible Lindsey Williams maintains that the North Slope in Alaska has as much crude oil as Saudi Arabia. Governor Frank H. Murkowski said in 2005 that there is enough oil on the North Slope to supply the entire United States for 200 years. Antony Sutton, author of Energy, the Created Crisis, is adamant that we have sufficient oil. Conversely, I have read reports which support the peak oil theory. I personally believe, after research, that "there is enough and to spare." Doom and gloom, Chicken Little oil scarcity claims have been propagated from the beginning. A scarcity, authentic or manufactured, of any crucial commodity accomplishes the following...
Global warming doubles number of hurricanes, study finds
Global warming's effect on wind patterns and sea temperatures have nearly doubled the number of hurricanes a year in the Atlantic Ocean over the past century, says a new study by US scientists.
OPEC not expected to discuss output change: Iran
Iran does not expect OPEC to discuss changing output levels at its next regular meeting in Vienna in September, Oil Minister Kazem Vaziri-Hamaneh was quoted as saying on Sunday."Crude oil price fluctuations are related to geopolitical issues and a shortage of gasoline in America, and I do not imagine that, at its next regular annual meeting, OPEC would put the issue of changing its output level on the agenda," he was quoted as saying by the Iranian oil ministry's Web site Shana.
Gasoline prices fall 17 cents over two weeks
U.S. average retail gasoline prices fell 17 cents per gallon over the past two weeks as Midwest refiners recovered from recent difficulties and produced more gas, an industry analyst reported Sunday.
Esso reckons 20 more years of oil left in Bass Strait
SUCCESS in life extension work by Bass Strait operator Esso has prompted the ExxonMobil subsidiary to predict that the region still has more than 20 years left of oil production and more than 30 years of gas.A $400 million seismic data and infill drilling program, involving wells at the Kingfish, Bream, Halibut and Fortescue fields, is adding 30,000 barrels of crude oil to daily production, worth close to $1 billion a year on current prices.
But Esso's success has implications for the planned $5 billion Monash Energy coal-to-liquids project in the Latrobe Valley, a joint venture between Shell and Anglo American.
German Hard-Coal Production to Cease by 2018
About a half-mile under the Earth's surface here, dozens of soot-faced miners scrape coal from some of the richest seams in the world, just as their forebears had done for generations. Conveyor belts funnel the shiny black rock through crushing machines and up to the surface, where it helps to power the globe's third-biggest economy.Germany's 500-year-old tradition of hard-coal mining, however, is dying out. With domestic coal long unprofitable because of cheap imports from Africa and Asia, the German government this year decided to gradually withdraw expensive subsidies that have kept its mines open for nearly a half-century.
Chavez accuses former oil officials
President Hugo Chavez on Sunday accused former Venezuelan officials of allowing foreign oil companies to "rob" Venezuela's immense petroleum wealth, saying they should be charged with crimes.
Taming Iran and Russia through Europe's pocketbook
Not only has Bush destroyed Iran's most formidable enemy and bogged down U.S. troops in a hopeless cause, he also has enriched energy-abundant Iran and Russia by pursuing a war that has dramatically raised energy prices. High crude oil prices make it easier for Iran to build nuclear weapons and for Russia to use energy blackmail to threaten Europe.But Europe can fight back. By imposing a stiff tax on energy consumption, Europeans would reduce both consumption of energy and its price in world markets, in turn cutting the flow of funds to Russia and Iran.
Saudi Arabia to focus on renewable energy
A multimillion-riyal world-class research centre for renewable energy has been set up at the Dhahran-based King Fahd University of Petroleum and Minerals (KFUPM).The aim of the research centre is to help the country play the role of world energy leader for years to come. The centre is currently working on resource mobilisation before its premier research activities kick off in a year’s time.
Trinidad and Tobago: Peak oil - expensive food
We have to grow more food. Our experience with steel down-streamers suggests that the production of fertilisers by foreign direct investors in T&T will not mean cheaper fertilisers to local farmers. T&T will have no alternative but to follow in Cuba's footsteps and develop an agricultural industry that moves progressively away from energy intensive techniques into small family lots and co-ops.
Building Circles of Community: 'Lone Rangers' Cannot Survive Collapse
In facing collapse it is important to develop skills that will be useful in navigating it. We hear a great deal about learning permaculture, organic gardening, woodworking, composting, catching rainwater, and utilizing alternative energy sources, but the two skills without which communities cannot be created or sustained, deep listening and compassionate truthtelling, are rarely discussed.As I have stated repeatedly, I do not know how collapse will play out. It may culminate in instantaneous nuclear annihilation, sudden economic devastation, or some other form of civilization plunging blatantly off a cliff. It may also unfold more slowly with consequences equally as dire. Therefore, it is important not to embrace the illusion that skills provide magic bullets of survival. Who knows who if any of us will survive no matter what we know or have experienced?
Global warming blamed as China endures freak weather
Global warming was under a fierce spotlight in China on Monday as forecasters said Shanghai was set for its hottest summer on record, while flood and drought wreaked havoc in other parts of the country.
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A new Round-Up has been posted at TOD:Canada.
One could also argue that the collapse of the housing market will help the market. People who otherwise would invest in the real estate will invest in the market instead, its a valid theory.
The decline of US housing is good for peak oil mitigation in my view. i.e. The last thing we need to be doing right now is building infrastructure that is obviously unsuited for a post peak world.
A recession would be good too. They almost always lead to decreased oil consumption in the US and they tend to wake people up to the fact that living at the bleeding edge of your income is a recipe for pain. Recessions also force people to work less overall, which is good too, because production consumes limited resources just like consumption does.
All in all, perhaps one of the better possible cases going forward is a normal recession in the OECD with persistently high crude prices. That combo has brought welcome changes in the past.
Unless like me you've just found yourself in a potential job hole and you are suddenly hoping ANY temporary respite is good to buy some time... cos if you fall now - there is no waiting it out... it goes from bad to worse around here....
Woohoo! I could become a peak oil casualty (okay not so good for the wife & kids though)
--
When no-one around you understands
start your own revolution
and cut out the middle man
Noting the top article about hurricanes, you may have the first legit system coming together in the central Atlantic. Here is a picture from the floater. A long way to go before it would be a storm, a lot of dry air out there. Still something to watch.
Here is a link to a PDF from the authors cited in the newstory:
http://www.ncar.ucar.edu/research/assets/Holland_AMS_Jan_2007.pdf
It is featured on the NCAR website so I assume it is the one referred to in the news story. According to the presentation, the majority of the work done was to establish an understanding of past observations - given that satellites are relative recent as observational tools. Given that, the authors claim that there is indeed a relationship between Atlantic SST and hurricane frequency.
Oh, and there is a better (than Yahoo) synopsis of this work here:
http://environment.newscientist.com/article/dn12377-tropical-storms-step...
The local weather person pointed this out Sunday evening and used an adjective similar to "likely" or "quite possibly" to develop into a tropical depression.
Best Hopes for upper level shear in the Gulf of Mexico,
Alan
Just to keep you thinking check out the second one
Here is the tracks. Still kind of meaningless at this point.
And there's another Typhoon that should threaten Japan in 4-5 days. Not what they need right now!
http://typhoon.yahoo.co.jp/weather/jp/typhoon/typha.html (it appears to be deepening, was 980hpa last night)
Kyuushuu has had amazing amounts of rainfall this year.
It has been said that Global Warming and Climate Change can cause in increase in the severity and strength of hurricanes, now we have this evidence of the increase in frequency. This is too big a topic with too large a downside risk to ignore. We need to reduce our use of fossil fuels anyway for a lot of reasons, here is yet another good reason to get on with doing what we need to do. Let us not put it off even one more day.
Another place of unimaginable beauty is also showing effects from GW http://news.aol.com/story/_a/mighty-lake-superior-mystifies/200707291346... or as some in the article surmise is it really GWB?
OFF TOPIC
See what TOD CAN look like
Sunday, the crew came around my block and advised everyone that they would be filming the new Fox Series "K-Town" (a New Orleans Police drama) this Tuesday. And just my block, so we should be the focus.
I will give details later as I know them for the curious.
Best Hopes for accuracy in media (fat chance I know),
Alan
Maybe you should audition to be the street-wise informant, or at least the streetcar-wise informant.
TOD CAN - The Oil Drum: Canada?
See what Transit Oriented Development can look like.
That was my first thought too... i was confused...
--
When no-one around you understands
start your own revolution
and cut out the middle man
Man Rows to Work, Leaving Car Behind
By SARAH KARUSH (Associated Press Writer)
From Associated Press
July 30, 2007 2:11 AM EDT
I got a kick out of this because I thought about rowing part of the way to work on the Potomac back in the 70s, when I was commuting from Arlington to Bethesda. But I didn't have flextime, a shower at work, a boathouse, or a boat. :-(
I remember when they closed the Solomons Island bridge, and a bunch of people were commuting by boat to the Patuxent navy base from the island. Ahh, those were the days of low security alerts....heavy sigh. (cue dream sequence: people sharing a ride, talking to each other without cell phones, traveling with a smile on their faces (except when it rained), entering a government installation without going through metal detectors and Blackwater security drones...what a world...what a world....)
DC Metro is also part of the equation.
Best Hopes for non-oil Transportation of ALL types !,
Alan
Re: SA's focus on renewable energy. Further evidence that oil has peaked or will peak soon. SA finally gets it; this stuff ain't gonna last forever. And they have sun out the wazoo.
Hey, the energy problem is solved! Look at the NYT today (monday 30july) about the fast growing salvinia weed on caddo lake in texas. Says it doubles area covered every two or three days! Talk about exponential growth! Find a big body of water, dump sewage in it, suck up the resulting weed, smash the water out of it, and stuff it into a power plant. Off we go- under way on weed power- forever.
And so much for nuclear power. Sorry about that, Rickover.
From the Economist:
http://www.economist.com/opinion/displaystory.cfm?story_id=9545933
This is a concern ? Cause for celebration, maybe. QUICK!! EVERYBODY HAVE SEX!!!
It's a definite concern for an Economist...the very basis of some economic theories depends on continual growth, often implicitly the continual growth of the consumer base. If population growth ever stopped, they'd have to worry about finding ways to add consumers by bringing larger numbers of people out of crushing poverty. It's much easier if the already affluent just keep having babies, which seems to be what the author is pushing for. Because women who aren't having kids are clearly spending their time "...their 20s clubbing rather than child-rearing, and their cash on handbags rather than nappies...". Not that there's anything wrong with that, say the authors. Condescending tripe, this whole article.
To write an article on population growth without even mentioning China, India, or anywhere in Africa is impressive. You know, where half of the people in the world live, and their populations are still growing. Please, please, can we stop letting economists have such important roles in planning societal policies. Let's leave it actual scientists (sorry, minority of economists who do actual science, I'm lumping you in the non-scientist group until your field as a whole acknowledges the utter failure of past economic filed tests; i.e., the World Bank/IMF cluster----s), with tested and testable ideas based on the actual physical world.
I'm not an economist. Took several courses in it, though, since I was an econ major for a while. But I read economics blogs all the time these days -- many of the most active ones would be classed as centre-left (at least).
Take Dani Rodrik, for instance. He's no globalization shill.
http://rodrik.typepad.com/dani_rodriks_weblog/
I wish I had a link to the precise post, but he mentioned in passing once that these days an economist's career goes nowhere without some serious empirical work.
As far as how scientific economics is, I can speak from personal experience that some of it is pretty hardcore. I remember a prof once presenting my class with a statistical math problem for homework. Next day he asked if anybody had solved it. Nobody had. "That's a pity," he said, "Because if somebody had, it would have meant a more or less instant Phd and likely more. Nobody has ever solved that problem and it matters." Economists regularly make contributions to scientific fields.
In my view, if powerdown becomes necessary, economists will contribute a lot to making it happen.
Don't forget, the field is known as the dismal science and, in fact, I first studied Malthus in an economics course. (late 80's)
I should point out that so long as the scientific method is followed, you are practicing science, and contributing.
Cheers.
So get a Mathematician or a Statistician, we can use the work. ;)
I would agree that there are a lot of economists out there doing good work, particularly on "small-scale" problems. One of the tenets of the scientific method is repeatability, though, and many economic experiments (trade treaties, taxes) are basically unrepeatable; try it once, hope it works, no do-overs. Despite wide-spread evidence that heavy internal regulation and government support is almost the only way to ever get a "first world" economy off the ground (see: Europe, North America, South Korea, China, Japan), the majority view in many economic departments is that de-regulating and free market approaches are the way to go. It's always "oh, they didn't make the market free enough", or "Now we just need every other country to play by the same rules, and we're set". Total detachment from reality.
Economics wasn't called the dismal science because of realistic (often confused with pessimistic) notions,
http://www.economics.unimelb.edu.au/TLdevelopment/econochat/Dixonecon00....
it was called that, as I read it, because Carlyle thought supply and demand was a horrible way to do things and used this as an argument for continued slavery. The dismal science is of pure supply and demand.
Many good points. I wasn't aware of the Carlyle connection but it certainly makes sense. Thanks.
I would note that with climate science we don't have repeatability either where it matters. ie. the big picture.
And we are agreed that much mainstream economic advice about free-markets is offered rather recklessly. "Maximize growth" is their mantra. But, to be fair, that is the assignment society has given them.
The profession as a whole needs to be given a new homework problem! I'm pretty sure we can't do without them -- i.e. for attempting to predict the effects of peak oil and policies in response.
For instance, economist Dr. James Hamilton of the Econbrowser blog used a term recently that I hadn't heard in decades, "Scarcity Rents".
Is OPEC relevant?
http://www.econbrowser.com/archives/2007/07/is_opec_relevan.html#comments
That definitely has application to peak oil (which Hamilton takes seriously btw with no ax to grind that I'm aware of).
...the very basis of some economic theories depends on continual growth, often implicitly the continual growth of the consumer base. If population growth ever stopped, they'd have to worry about finding ways to add consumers by bringing larger numbers of people out of crushing poverty.
TTBOMK, none of the mainstream economic growth models require population growth -- all of them allow per-capita economic output to grow in a stable population. However, all economic growth models have to describe the past 300 years, in which Europe, North America, then later Japan and some other economies, have exhibited exponential per-capita output growth. That is, any model which does not predict exponential per-capita growth over long periods of time is demonstrably wrong.
It is possible, even likely, that these models are incomplete. Newton's physics were incomplete, but that didn't show up in the data until you got close to the speed of light. Today's growth theory is probably incomplete, but it won't show up in the data until we get close to resource limits.
Sorry, but Putinland has beaten you to the idea. In an eerie shadow of Fascism, Putin is promoting Russian procreation at Nashi youth sex camps
I would venture that Bushland is much far ahead of Putinland in that race. Especially after you consider illegal (but oh, so much welcomed) immigration.
.... for the time being - that is ?
Another quotation:
Newsflash: The Economist and Bob Shaw see eye to eye! ;-)
ARE humans smarter than yeast?
Well, they aren't any smarter than bugs, that's for sure...;-)
Leanan, thanks a million for posting the story about “The New World Order: The Bilderberg plan -- control oil, control people (Part 23)” Just as I have always suspected, Peak Oil is nothing more than a Bilderberg conspiracy plot. All you peak oilers are part of this conspiracy, either as duped pawns or as active knowing co-conspirators. It all started back in the seventies. There was plenty of domestic supply, the US never actually peaked.
And it is all the brainchild of Herr Kissinger as Ms. Spingola calls him.
Okay seriously now, Leanan should you be posting this kind of garbage? It was funny, really funny, and perhaps you did it out of humor. After all it turns the tables on the conspiracy theory nutcases and makes them part of the Bilderberg New World Order conspiracy plan. Now that is poetic justice if it ever existed. They, the conspiracy theory nutcases, are part of the conspiracy. And I guess that makes me part of the conspiracy also. Just call me Herr Patterson. And yes, I do plan on attending the next meeting of the Bilderberg conspirators.
And here is one of Ms. Spingola's sources: Lindsey Williams - The Energy Non-Crisis It is a video of Lindsey Williams laying out the facts concerning the 200 years of oil supply the US has in Alaska. Don't miss it. And do it quick before the folks from the Bilderberg conspiracy shut down the site. (snicker, snicker)
Ron Patterson
Ron: FYI, global oil depletion qualifies as a "conspiracy theory". A "conspiracy theory" is commonly defined as any belief that important information is purposely being withheld from the public, with the cooperation of a large part of the MSM. I am not sure if you are actually aware of your personal status as a full fledged "conspiracy nut".
Brian, as you stated, the conspiracy nut is the one who believes the data is being manipulated. I do not believe the data is being manipulated. I do not believe there is a conspiracy to manipulate the data.
CERA, contrary to what a lot of people on this list think, actually believes the crap they are putting out. Yergin actually believed that oil was going to $38 a barrel. The EIA actually believed the projections they put out and so did the IEA.
I do not believe the MSM is manipulating the data. They actually believe the crap they print, they believe that we have perhaps 7 trillion barrels of recoverable oil in the ground. (That counts shale oil which they also actually believe can be recovered.)
No Brian, you are wrong, I am not a conspiracy nut because I do not believe manipulated or withheld from the public by the MSM, the government or even the oil companies. Whatever gave you the idea that I believed that?
What I do believe is that the MSM and the government hasn's a clue as to what is going on. Concerning how much oil is left in the ground, they are as dumb as dirt. And the oil companies are not much better off. Most of them believe that they will go on finding oil for decades. However the light may be slowly dawning upon them. As they find less and less oil, they are starting to get a clue. But not Saudi Arabia and a few other OPEC nations. The people at Aramco actually believe they have 262 billion barrels of reserves with another 200 billion waiting to be found.
Of course there are a few people in Aramco who understand the situation. But they are not the management and the management listens only to those underlings who tell them what they wish to hear. Well, that is my guess anyway. And because the orginization is so secretive, a guess is all we have. I am by no means certain of my position, but I definitely do not believe any kind of a conspiracy is afloat.
Is it now clear what I believe Brian? As you said a conspiracy nut is someone who believes the data is being manipulated to hide the true facts from the general public. I do not believe that at all.
Ron Patterson
What I do believe is that the MSM and the government hasn's a clue as to what is going on. Concerning how much oil is left in the ground, they are as dumb as dirt. And the oil companies are not much better off.
Yes, because group-think is more powerful than ppl usually believe. And not just thru coercion or pressure to conform, indirect or menacing. We all have to live in the present with our co-workers, we all have to ‘belong’, ‘believe.’ However, the US Gvmt. knows, in the sense that some do and very exactly (eg. Cheney, others) - peak oil is a driving fact of both internal and foreign US policy. The oil companies need to believe in their survival. As for the MSM, their business in not to ‘have a clue’ but to follow cues from the PTB and to pander to public opinion. They are very influential - that is where their power resides - but they are followers, and do no independent analysis, have no position, no ‘clue’. They are a burbling echo chamber, servants to many masters.
I think the judge by their actions thing comes into play here...
...i see many on the political left arguing that Bush is literally insane, and Cheney just loves the taste of babies' blood...
...but the truth is their actions look a whole lot more logical (though without doubt egregious in many ways and incompetent in much of the execution) in the light of Peak Oil.
--
When no-one around you understands
start your own revolution
and cut out the middle man
"What I do believe is that the MSM and the government hasn's a clue as to what is going on. Concerning how much oil is left in the ground, they are as dumb as dirt."
Uh, is anybody not dumb as dirt when it comes to KNOWING how much oil is left in the ground?
----
On the conspiracy theory side, I actually spoke to some people who were referenced to the NPC Report recently released, and that convinced them that the oil companies themselves have been responsible for claiming shortage all along so they can get the price higher. One even told me, "but I am not against them doing that, they need the capital so they can go out and discover and drill oil...." (these are financial types I deal with), See the logic implied there?.....he had no doubt the oil is out there, the problem has been that the price of oil has not been high enough in the '80's/'90's to allow the oil companies to look for it and drill in the more difficult places....so they plant the "peak" conspiracy (backed by the NPC Report) to drive the price to where they need it to go after the oil....
The problem is, I can't prove him wrong.
RC
Remember, we are only one cubic mile from freedom
I've been following the data as best I can and in my opinion it supports the claims of Peak Oil's arrival. How can simple observations be a "conspiracy?"
My point exactly!
Ron Patterson
So, all conspiracy theories inherently disqualify themselves by being thought of by 'conspiracy theorists'?
Huh. Funny nobody ever told the FBI that. We could have saved a lot of money investigating all those conspiracies at Enron, National City Lines/GM, Standard Oil, Al Queda, The Roosevelt Coup attempt, TeaPot dome, Iran-Contra, Watergate, and BCCI.
No, that's right, conspiracies never happen if they are thought of by 'nutcases', it automatically means they are invalid, regardless of the evidence to the contrary.
Our Captains of Industry got there because they are all Honest Men who do Upstanding Community Work as part of the Lions, Optimists, and Masons, with nary a wink toward any 'nudge nudge' activities among themselves without the Press finding out about it.
Heaven FORBID they would tell us to put poison in our water in order to dispose of the waste from fertilizer factories, or to support a cockeyed theory that it is really a 'safe' substance to protect a supplier in a critical government weapons program. Nawwwww, that could never happen...It's too mean-spirited for our wonderful Patriotic Leaders of the American Way to even consider such an act.
Hypochondriacs get sick, too.
I'm not paranoid, everyone just says so behind my back.
Just because you're paranoid, it doesn't mean someone ISN'T out to get you.
Even a bad dog gets a bone thrown at it once in a while.
Leanan, I've always thought that one of the strengths of TOD is the willingness to post articles representing all points of view. Personally, I "enjoy" reading the denial literature, I like to see just how they get it wrong.
I agree. One should not be afraid to be exposed to opinions that differ from your own. The piece in question is obviously wacky, but this is the type of information that many people are reading and quoting. I see no harm in posting stories such as this one.
Man, once surrendering his reason, has no remaining guard against the absurdities the most monstrous, and like a ship without rudder, is the sport of every wind. -- Thomas Jefferson
Auntiegrav, please learn how to read and stop putting words in my mouth that I never uttered or wrote.
Did I say anything like that. We have been over this many times before. Must we go over it again every time some new person comes along who is totally ignorant of previous discussions?
A conspiracy must have three things. There must be more than one person involved, it must be covert, and there must be people who are conspired against. The FBI could conspire against the Mafia by planting undercover agents in their midst. In other words, there are conspiracies.
A conspiracy theory nut is someone who sees just about everything as being part of a giant conspiracy. The government, or the oil companies, or whomever, is conspiring to convince us that the world's oil supply is limited. Or unlimited. Choose your conspiracy and there will be some conspiracy theory nut who believes it.
Peak oil is not a conspiracy, only conspiracy theory nuts believe that. Peak oil is something many of us are aware of but most of the world is not. There is no conspiracy involved, only a lot of ignorant people.
Ron Patterson
“Conspiracy theorist” is just a catch phrase to designate non-mainstream (non Fox) opinion, interpretation, or presented fact. It is supposed to make one shudder in fright, shy away, refuse to look, pray to remain untainted. All totalitarian systems have adopted such designations, the traditional and blanket one being ‘infidel.’ Hitler targeted groups, defined by physical, political, ethnic and religious criteria (the handicapped, communists, jews..) The US targets opinion, while at the same time pulling the ethnic card - Muslims, suspect, a real enemy, etc. I just juxtaposed Germany ww2 to the US, while not being a fan of that comparison, heh.
The article about the Bilderbergers melds together several strands of mainstream opinion, in a strange stew: the evil oil companies ripping ppl off; the powerful and rich, the movers and shakers, conspiring to cheat the ppl and deprive them... while throwing in some history and pretense at a ‘balanced’ pov.. basically it aims to reinforce both, a) gripes about the PTB, not entirely unjustified, b) the status quo. That way it is acceptable to all. Presumbaly the author earns some money somehow with this fluff.
I suppose that is a reference to the adding of fluoride to drinking water. This is one of the most ridiculous conspiracy theories I've seen. Like they can't simply dump that specific "waste" in the lake directly, along with the other wastes, without pumping it through the drinking water system first? I am willing to consider some conspiracies, but this one's a hoot.
"It's incredibly obvious, isn't it? A foreign substance is introduced into our precious bodily fluids without the knowledge of the individual. Certainly without any choice. That's the way your hard-core Commie works."
- General Jack D. Ripper
So, was it Professor Goose or HeadingOut who was at the last Bilderberg shindig?
Whichever of you, tell us, how was the caviar?
Oh, those Bilderbergs, my, my, my
I'd forgotten about them since the John Birch Society dried up and blew away.
I'm afraid I'm with Darwinian on this issue. CERA and our government really are too self-deluding and stupid to conspire. Lets not give them magic powers.
Bob Ebersole
Well, if OPEC can increase production so can Texas (The Texas State Geologist told us we "may" be able to match our peak production of 3.5 mbpd). So, a possible future news bulletin follows:
Re: OPEC Comments
http://www.theoildrum.com/node/2767
Net Oil Exports and the "Iron Triangle
I like how OPEC productions capacity seems to grow it went from 2 mbpd to 3.5 I bet they bought some oil reserve growth pills on the internet pretty soon it will be 12mbpd but they don't want to scare us.
Also notice the above 80 comment I'd say 70 is the new 60.
It's entirely reasonable to expect OPEC production capacity to increase dramatically over time. Just like future cash flows based on present investment models, OPEC understands that geology guarantees that there will be more oil to exploit at some point in the future. Just don't think short term. After a few oceans have come and gone and the continents have spun around the globe for a 100 million years or so, there will be more oil to be 'enjoyed' by future sentient beings, such as giant tube worms or cephalized telephathic arachnids or possibly even mutant, brain-eating zombies from another dimension.
My money's on the cephalized telephathic arachnids.
To be fair to the Texas Stage Geologist, he did not specify "when" Texas might again match its 1972 peak production rate of 3.5 mbpd.
On the contrary, I'd expect their production will go up when the new field comes online - got to get a return on the investment. The interesting question will be, will the rise be notable. If it is, that tells something about the production this year, and their capability.
Also, will SA do a production spurt in the next six months till then, as effectively promised already.
Nice catch on that JPOST story about Israel being unable to fund BOTH the grid and the military. It's got Limits to Growth and Tainter written all over it.
The pie is no longer big enough for everyone. And not only is it starting to shrink in absolute terms because of peak oil, but the pressure on the relative sections of the pie is increasing because of diminishing returns - eg, just how big a military does Israel need to "win" and just how much electricity does Israel need both to keep cool and feed that military machine.
cfm in Gray, ME
No worries mate. The US as always will bail our little "ally" out with a new $30 billion military package.
So, let's see, the Dow drops 500 points in two days, and "suddenly" we announce tens-of-billions-of-dollars in arms sales. Buy "defense" stocks, everyone!!
(or is this a "conspiracy theory"?? I never know...)
more likely it is a poorly concieved bid to curry favour with the saudis. a 20 billion investement in their defence for lower oil prices.
It's a Saudi/Iraqi play... did you see Maliki is bitching about the US paying Sunni insurgents (yes the same) to go after Al Qaeda? Combine it with recent stories about our impending betrayal of the Kurds... it's all a continuum
--
When no-one around you understands
start your own revolution
and cut out the middle man
Besides Tainter, I see our relationship to Israel also akin to William Tell. We just keep sending our arrows over there, and sometimes we even hit the Apple.
'Just stand still, son, if you move, it's just gonna hurt worse..those OTHER guys are actually AIMING at your heart, our misses are simply Collateral Damage, AKA the cost of doin' business with the US of A'
Salaam! ..err, Shalom!
Nah, jokuhl,
We sent them the Patriots, and they made the Arrows:
http://www.israeli-weapons.com/weapons/missile_systems/surface_missiles/...
Eh. Back when I lived there, rolling blackouts were deemed a normal part of every summer, and the utility was conscientious about allocating them evenly.
For the markets, global chill...
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Global_Economy/IG31Dj03.html
The 1970s British Broadcasting Corp comedy show Monty Python's Flying Circus once did a skit about a new way that council flats - public housing - were being built near the town of Peterborough in England. Instead of building these 25-story towers through the conventional employment of construction workers, concrete and steel, this council was employing the services of El Mystico (Terry Jones), a magician in cape and top hat, along with his curvaceous assistant, in her sequined leotard, the Amazing Janet.
All it took for El Mystico and the Amazing Janet to put up a block of flats was a wave of his magic wand. According to a council spokesman, Ken Verybigliar, "Well, there is a considerable financial advantage in using the services of El Mystico. A block, like Mystico Point here, would normally cost in the region of 1.5 million pounds [US$3 million]. This was put up for 5 pounds, and 30 bob [shillings] for Janet." ...snip...
"They are as strong, solid and as safe as any other building method in this country - provided, of course, people believe in them."
If tenants did start to doubt the actual existence of the buildings they were then living in, the building would fall down, until their faiths were restored, then the buildings would magically reassemble themselves...snip...
When asset prices rise, it's as if El Mystico has waved his wand. Both the values of the reserves for the lenders and the collateral for the borrowers are rising; that means that commensurately more can be lent and borrowed based on these newly inflated prices. The mechanism becomes virtually self-reinforcing: higher asset prices leading to more borrowing and lending, more liquidity creation, higher asset prices, and so on.
Until, as the residents of Mystico Point were warned not to do, somebody begins to doubt whether this is all real.
Yes, this did all start with the subprimes. It was obvious to everybody (especially the realtors and mortgage brokers) but the prospective buyers that a lot these people were not going to be able to afford the monthly payments on a no-down-payment $1 million ranch house in Orange county, California. When these people started to fall behind on their mortgages, the great money engine ground to a halt and, slowly, went into reverse...snip...
Many have noted that it is the rise in corporate buybacks and private-equity buyouts (see my February 22 article The highs and lows of buyouts) that has greatly supported US, and more recently world, equity prices these past few years. This is not surprising; if one company in a particular sector gets bought out at, say, a 25% premium to current market prices, stock investors come to believe that the rest of the companies in the sector might be similarly bought out by other, greater fools - sorry, canny entrepreneurs...snip...
The whole private equity/buyout phenomenon would not have been possible without the wave of liquidity. The supply of shares is, at least in the short term, fixed; if the supply of money keeps growing exponentially, more of it will be employed to drive stock values up. As the wave of liquidity recedes, so does the argument that you must own stocks so as to profit from the next buyout. No financing means no buyouts, and without buyouts, stocks are just not thought of as valuable as they were previously...snip...
In the meantime, let's look at El Mystico's assistant, the Amazing Janet (Carol Cleveland). According to the Monty Python skit, "as Napoleon has his Josephine ... so Mystico has his Janet. An honors graduate from Harvard University, American junior sprint record holder, ex-world skating champion, Nobel Prize winner, architect, novelist and surgeon. The girl who helped crack the Oppenheimer spy ring in 1947. She gave vital evidence to the Senate Narcotics Commission in 1958 ... In 1967 she became suspicious of the man at the garage, and it was her dogged perseverance and relentless inquiries that two years later finally secured his conviction for not having a license for his car radio. He was hanged at Leeds a year later despite the abolition of capital punishment and the public outcry."
Maybe a young lady this talented is what we need to tell Ben Bernanke that his phone is ringing.
LOL! Perfect.
Except, I'm not so sure this building will ever reassemble itself should lack of faith cause a collapse.
Your selection of Python skit makes a good analogy to current market forces. Python were truly ahead of their time, and also predicted the sentiments of some of us here on the Oil Drum in their "Architect Sketch," wherein an architect mistakenly presents plans for a slaughterhouse to a panel looking for an apartment complex. Ideas on achieving demand destruction such as this would certainly go a long way towards mitigating Peak Oil.
'Philosophy Soccer' was my favorite Python skit. I suppose 'Search For The Holy Grail' was my favorite movie. I have a VHS of Holy Grail that I pull out and watch every few years...it still gets a laugh outta me.
Monty Python's solution to over population ;)
The Architects Sketch
Well, it's been my experience that intentional communities which focus on 'feelings' too much end up with a bunch of idiots who can't bake a cake or till a field, and the mechanically-inclined get fed up from fixing everything and leave for the real world. Apparently, they can't focus on a task long enough to make a decent peace sign, either....;-)
I agree that community is the most important perimeter you can set up against the marauding hordes after Descent happens, but that community has to work together with skill and labor before they will have the time to discuss their 'feeeeeeelings'. The leadership has to be able to lead, and that means understanding feelings and personalities, but everyone doesn't have to share everything "'cause it's all bullshit, and it doesn't cost YOU, ANYTHING!'"--Joe vs. The Volcano
Hmmm...well, there are emotional feelings and there are physical feelings. The first will not make a loaf of bread, the second might make a kid. Most of the communes were peopled by very skinny people so a comeback of the communes might be the remedy for obesity in America. 'Make love, not war' was written on everything, including cows, in the 60s...what has happened to all the skinny protesters? Did the Bilderburgs hatch a diabolical plot to fatten people up, making them immobile and less likely to protest? Is there a PF (peak fat) curve? Have we gone beyond PF? I suppose we will only know by looking in the rear view mirror and seeing some skinny people.
y'know, it'd be really funny if being obese turned out to be the salvation of America, by buying an extra month or two of survival redundancy.
Just hide until the skinny people are done killing one another, and then get on with things.
Ah, the sheep are being herded and made ready for the next fleecing. Here's an email that the secretaries at the office have been passing around. Notice there is no mention of actually cutting back on use of gasoline, just who we should buy the commodity from.
Sorry about the length but I wanted everyone to see it in its full insane glory. Sad thing, for quite a large section of the population, this is what they think is reality and will respond accordingly, just like they did when they bought out all of the duck tape and plastic sheets from Home Depot because they believed the rumors of chemical attacks coming here if we didn't go fight them over there.
I'm just surprised they (whoever was the nutjob that started this email and sent it out as being genuine) didn't work France into it some how.
You could e-mail them back and send them to Snopes, but it probably won't do any good.
The sad thing is, Petro Express is not CitGo, and never has been.
Ah, but everyone knows that Snopes was created by IRANIANS who then cloned it using FRENCH technology and secretly shipped in onto AMERICAN SOIL where it is now spreading misinformation about THE ENEMIES OF FREEDOM. We must boycott all websites that start with the letter 'S' just to be sure that no web clicks fall into the hands of the enemy.
I thought about writing a plug-in for Outlook or Thunderbird that would try to match up incoming emails against a database of pages from Snopes but instead I just had the friends and relatives prone to those types of emails start using a special email address I have set up just for them. It really has decluttered my inbox.
oops there goes slashdot. :P
I love the Kalashnikov part.
'No Way! If I'm gonna die by gunfire, it's gonna be a American gun, dammit! Preferably the one I got in the booze closet, not some commie metric bullet!'
'.. and Why would they aim missiles at us? Ours are only pointed at them because it's the law!'
Why wouldn't this sort of alarmist stunt work in regards to Peak Oil?
What is the fundamental difference between Chavez making war in the US and the issue of Peak Oil?
Perhaps the Peak Oil message isn't sinking in because those who spread the Peak Oil message aren't scary enough?
Tom A-B
AND WHAT ABOUT BODILY FLUIDS! CHAVEZ ALSO WANTS OUR BODILY FLUIDS!
... returns to reading "President Bush or: How I learned to stop voting and love the neocons"
Pretty soon it will be for Chavez
USA: Someone set us up the bomb.
Chavez: How are you gentlemen !!
Chavez: All your base are belong to us.
Chavez: You are on the way to destruction.
USA: What you say !!
Chavez: You have no chance to survive make your time.
USA: For great justice.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qItugh-fFgg
LOL!!
Note: It was a terrible translation of a Japanese game to English that lead to this :)
From Prensa Latina, July 27, 2007:
Petroleos Mexicanos (PEMEX) announced that oil reserves may run out in seven years.
link
(i didn’t see this posted. excuse, if it was.)
edit:typos.
Been posted two or three times already. :)
I don't recall seeing this comment (from the link):
Export Land Model (hypothetical country): http://static.flickr.com/97/240076673_494160e1a0_o.png
I have previously noted that the export decline rate tends to accelerate with time. Following are the initial year over year declines in exports from Export Land, after hitting peak exports (exports decline by 50% in 4.5 years):
Year One: -12.5%
Year Two: -13.0%
Year Three: -15.5%
Year Four: -16.7%
Year Five: -20.6%
Have you, or anybody, published a detailed analysis of future exports, based upon some sort of depletion model consensus, hopefully with coupled economic models of the respective exporting countries?
I'm in the middle of writing up some comments on a regional transportation plan (which plans to spend billions of dollars); said plan has as its scenario for the future a fairly consistent increase in regional car use (based on past population growth) ad infinitum. My key criticism of the plan is that their basic assumptions about the future are in error. Thus their actual plan (to spend tens of billions of dollars over a couple of decades) will fail to meet the public good.
However, their own analysis of the future did cover (in one paragraph out of hundreds of pages of documentation) that even if gasoline were more expensive in the future various changes in automobiles such as better mileage or hybrids or biofuels would more than make up the difference.
Yes, it is a Kunstlerian nightmare.
To me the question comes down to this: less oil imports vs. (increased CAFE + hybrids + non-grain alcohol). If the (absolute value of the) rate of change of the left hand side is significantly greater that of the right then no way will car traffic increase over the coming decades.
HOWEVER, if I am going to make that arguement to the organization responsible for spending the billions of dollars I really would prefer to cite published work, not some vague reference to a work in progress.
Said government body is intending to not only keep spending ad infinitum on freeways, but because they think the highways will still be clogged they are going to spend hundreds of millions of dollars on building dedicated bus lanes and on ramps onto those supposedly packed freeways. Yes, they are doing the BRT approach (with some rail too, which will get a lot of money but for too few rail miles.) I'm opposed to it because (1) I feel it is not in my best interest and (2) their plan (BRT dedicated lanes and ramps) is like putting new wine into old wine bottles.
So... please tell me you have some published sources I can use?
thanks in advance.
http://www.energybulletin.net/22213.html
Published on 10 Nov 2006 by Energy Bulletin. Archived on 10 Nov 2006.
An assessment of world oil exports
by Luis de Sousa
This is probably the most comprehensive forward looking article that I am aware of, although I think that the projection for future exports is on the optimistic side (and I think that Luis probably agrees, given the Saudi decline). You might supplement this with Rembrandt's net export analysis.
Thanks. I am becoming more aware that what is really needed for the gatekeepers of public funding for transportation - those organizations of local government officials which divy up various funding sources and assign them to actual local projects - is both (1) data and well reasoned arguements, and (2) political "cover" so to speak, to help them make decisions to change course. The latter can be found in consensual documents from larger government bodies (e.g. the GAO report).
Taming Iran and Russia through Europe's pocketbook
by San Francisco Chronicle
Link in Header
The editorial has this wonderful advice for our Euro friends
By imposing a stiff tax on energy consumption, Europeans would reduce both consumption of energy and its price in world markets, in turn cutting the flow of funds to Russia and Iran
Certainly a good policy measure !
But why not advocate this step for the readers of the SF Chronicle (few of whom vote in EU elections) ?
A stiff tax on energy use in the State of California and/or the USA ?
Odd & Hypocritical,
Alan
Because the point is to punish Russia and Iran. We Yanks don't have to cut back, because we get our oil from Mexico and Canada. The happy motoring can continue here.
I thought Europe had been doing that since the 1970s - and the U.S. has been freeloading since a certain B-movie actor pulled off his greatest role, with only the occasional nap. And the occasional open mike bombing threat.
What is even more striking is that they are actively advocating that America's industrial competitors increase their own advantages in the market place.
This level of absolute unawareness shows just how far things have slipped in public discourse. Where is the part about the U.S. deciding to raise the price of energy to start to pull itself within reach of Japanese or European efficiency?
Probably not in my lifetime, which is a sad conclusion about the place I come from.
Hello TODers,
Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke has suggested using helicopters to disperse oodles of money to fight deflation. Have the tidy, energy efficient Japanese come up with a better plan?
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20070729/od_afp/lifestylejapancharitymystery...
--------------------------------------
Mystery money in Japan appears in mailboxes, falls from sky
-----------------------------------------
EDIT: My suggested version is to have the lottery and casinos change the game odds to payout to more winners much more often.
Bob Shaw in Phx,Az Are Humans Smarter than Yeast?
Considering all of the problems and expense associated with nuclear power plants costing $3 Billion, etc., has anyone done a head-to-head comparison of solar and nuclear, cost-to-power? If I spend $3 billion on solar, will I get a comparable amount of power for my dollars or no?
I understand that there exist problems with solar such as the unreliable nature of weather and the length of the day, and that perhaps there are strategies (e.g. batteries, pressurized aquifers, etc) to potentially make solar a base-line source of power. Aside from those issues how do they compare power/cost-wise?
Unfortunately the answer is the rather impenetrable 'it depends'
For an end user with grid tie in solar might be just barely competitive with retail electricity prices in sunny areas. Wind is competive with nuclear in some regimes, but it depends on the amount of dispatchable power as wind acts as negative load while nuclear acts as baseload.
It depends what numbers you're using for capital costs, as there have been good experiences with mostly on time on budget projects and there have been experiences with massive cost overruns and delays. If everything goes bad for nuclear and everything goes great for wind, you can paint a picture where nuclear is uncompetitive, but that also depends on low price for dispatchable power and transmission infrastructure.
Here's a report on a debate this year between Amory Lovins and Dr. Burton Richter comparing Nuclear to Wind and other distributed generation techns.. compared largely on economic grounds.
http://news.mongabay.com/2007/0607-nuclear_debate.html
"Lovins said that micropower (i.e. distributed energy generation) now accounts for one-sixth of world power, surpassing nuclear as a source of electricity for the first time in 2006. He noted that in 2005 micropower added four times as much output and eleven times as much capacity as nuclear added.
"Nuclear is dying of incurable attack of market forces despite what the industry wants you to believe," he remarked, adding that micropower offer more climate solution per dollar spent than nuclear."
And here is an essay by Lovins on the same..
( 26 page PDF.. but worth it..)
http://www.rmi.org/images/PDFs/Energy/E05-08_NukePwrEcon.pdf
"Even at such a scale for a diversified renewable portfolio, land-use concerns are unfounded. For example, a rather inefficient PV array covering half of a sunny area
100 by 100 miles could meet all annual U.S. electricity needs.29 Of course, one wouldn’t do it that way; rather, one would use building-integrated and rooftop-retrofitted PVs, and build PVs into parking-lot shades, alongside highways, etc. to avoid marginal land-use and put the power near the load. Specious claims persist comparing (say) the footprint of a nuclear reactor or power station with the [generally miscalculated] land area of which some fraction—from about half for PVs to a few percent for wind turbines—is physically occupied by renewable energy and infrastructure. But ever since the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis’s 1977 Energy in a Finite World, it’s been well known that properly including the relevant fuel cycles, land intensity is quite similar for solar, coal, and nuclear power. An update might even show a modest land advantage to solar."
Bob Fiske
Best Lovins quote re: nuclear, ever:
"Nuclear power is a future technology whose time has passed".
This was in the 70's. He was right then, and in my opinion, right now.
Second best Lovins quote:
"Using nuclear energy to make electricity is like using a chainsaw to cut butter."
Although I think his current efforts to save car-culture are misguided, the man certainly generated some snappy aphorisms!
The one with the snappiest soundbyte is the most correct?
Nuclear is the only large scale energy supply that has been demonstrated as scalable and affordable; It might not be necissary for many locales, if Alan and other wind proponents are right about their hopes, but throwing away nuclear in some places is an obvious mistake:
Two glaring examples: Italy, where a phase out was completed, now has one of the higher carbon-per capita in europe in addition to being an electricity importer, and Germany destined to do the same, with 26 planned coal plants to make up the shortfall.
And the country in Europe thats an electricity exporter with one of the lowest carbon per-capita emissions is France. No surprise there.
Solar is immature and uncompetitive, likely for the next several decades at the least. Wind is just starting to be competitive now, but its premature to bet energy security on wind, especially since it can synergize with nuclear baseload.
Well, solar works well for heating, especially when coupled with an electric heat pump, but that's about it.
You must not drive anymore, congratulations!
Solar works well for Highway Signal Trailers and emergency phones, removing thousands of small, dirty but over-sized generators from the roadways.
Hundreds of Thousands of desk calculators will NEVER need to have a battery replaced in them.. I've never seen one that didn't turn on and work when I hit the button.
"As for Google Inc., today the solar panel installation we announced last October is now producing clean, renewable electricity for our Mountain View, CA headquarters.
The system will offset peak electricity consumption at the solar powered offices and the newly constructed solar carports have charging stations for the plug-in hybrids. At 1.6 megawatts -- with an electricity output capable of powering approximately 1,000 average California homes -- the Google project is the largest solar installation on any corporate campus in the U.S. to date, and one of the largest on any corporate site in the world. To see how much electricity these panels are producing right now, visit our new performance monitoring site."
http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2007/06/clean-energy-update.html
http://www.google.com/corporate/solarpanels
"Well, solar works well for heating, especially when coupled with an electric heat pump, but that's about it."
~~ Starvid.. there are a lot of people who disagree.. (Not enough, sadly) What do you own that will actually pay for itself? The Car? The Fridge? .. Will your Nuclear-supplied powerbill come as a check in 5-10 years?
Bob
Google has built its solar stuff as a PR stunt. Grid power is cheaper, even though I guess the PR is worth more than the difference. Too bad we can't run the economy on PR.
And yes, lots of marginal things like garage gates, highway phones and sail boats can be run on solar. But heating is the only sector where solar can take a big chunk out of demand.
Cars and fridges, contrary to solar cells, do produce something of great utility, transport and refrigeration. Solar cells produce very expensive electricity, something which I have no use of, as cheap (and clean) electricity is available from my grid.
What do I own that will actually pay for itself? Well, my battery-electric scooter for one. And my nuclear supplied dividend check, courtesy of Exeleon. ;)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exelon
I always thought sail boats were run on wind power. I need to do more research.
he means the electrical systems of a boat.
I was being sarcastic, but mainly I disagree with his opinions on solar.
From the Sunday NY Times Week in Review:
Sunny California
Your fridge, your car and your scooter will require inputs every day to keep going.. maybe they'll be 'useful', but you'll keep paying for that use.
Your fridge and scooter, meanwhile, could be charged from PV and what you only once paid for those panels will be repaid steadily and for decades by the panels in the form of that transport and refrigeration.
We'll see if the dividend is still feeding you in 25 years.. maybe you'll be lucky, but it doesn't come warranteed like the PV.
No Google built it because they are true believers in the Singularity and once created they don't want it to die through lack of energy... so they are trying to protect their baby
Google it... :-)
--
When no-one around you understands
start your own revolution
and cut out the middle man
Would you help me understand what you mean by scalable? Nuclear seems to be the least scalable powersource, as it apparently has to be Gigawatt-sized, making it applicable for Cities, Industrial Areas and Large Countries, but unsuitable and unaffordable for Rural and Less-developed areas.
Beyond that, it is not flexible in its output, responding to customer demand changes..
But really, I just don't get the way 'Scalable' is used when I hear this argument.
Thanks,
Bob Fiske
I guess he means "cheap enough to deploy on a massive scale".
Well, so can solar heating, but not solar power. Not with the technology of today at least.
And come to think of it, heat pumps are also solar powered.
"The one with the snappiest soundbyte is the most correct?"
Not my point - his arguments stood on his very detailed and cogenent analyses. I was just saying he could come up with the soundbytes.
Your "solar is immature and will be for several decades at least" is clearly pulled out of your hat.
As far as scalable and affordable - let's see an honest cradle-to-grave analysis, $-wise, energy-wise, and CO2-wise.
Include the mining, refining, transport, security, waste considerations, etc.
Look at the numbers of reactors it would take to make a dent in the energy problem. Look at sources of uranium, and all the countries clamoring for it, and prices skyrocketing.
I think nuclear is the wrong way to go, for a lot of reasons.
Not because of snappy aphorisms.
No, its pulled from cost per watt based on construction contracts over the past decade. None of them approach wind or nuclear. If theres some new process breakthrough that makes everything less expensive but only for solar, its got a chance I suppose, but I've not seen evidence of that yet.
Do you have any idea how many times we've rehashed this here at TOD? This was rehashed in another thread earlier today, but...
Uranium resources as fuel aren't in jeapordy of disapearing anytime in the next several centuries, or even climbing to costs that are worth considering:
http://nuclearinfo.net/Nuclearpower/UraniuamDistribution
As for the energy lifecycle analysis:
http://nuclearinfo.net/Nuclearpower/WebHomeEnergyLifecycleOfNuclear_Power
Indeed this got several posts of its own.
http://www.theoildrum.com/node/2323
I've gone through this so many times...
Not getting anywhere?
Yeah, I had a truck like that once.
The Royal Bank of Scotland's Oil and gas index (PDF)for July is out.
By the way, I notice there's a difference between what BP's World Energy Review reports for UK production and the Royal Bank of Scotland. Is this just a difference in the definition of what constitutes "oil"?
Big Oil spends more, pumps fewer barrels
I just posted a bit on the personal-finance blog Wise Bread. My post aims to give people a low-key heads-up about peak oil, by fitting it into a message about including contingency plans in your budget:
http://www.wisebread.com/plan-for-expensive-fuel
Mexico's current oil production is higher than I would have anticipated a few months back. Their June production of 3.206 million barrels per day was their highest production so far this year, and only 3% below June of last year:
http://www.pemex.com/files/dcpe/eprohidro_ing.pdf
And exports are down by only a couple of percent - looking only at the month of June. When it comes to these sort of things a smoothed curve with a long enough time window is probably best for viewing far term trends.
If I have 5k to invest in oil futures what is my best play?? Maybe invest in 2012 futures?? How much could I leverage. What's the most I could make? What's the most I could lose??
Well, the other day I dropped $4800 on four DEC 08 100 call options. I can lose $4800.
your mileage may vary....
That's me, above and to the left of Axl's head:
Ethanol Scam
See Page 2 and 3 of the article. My kids now think Daddy's cool. :-)
Awesome, RR! Congrats!
Are ya gonna buy 5 copies for your mother?
:-)
Only if my picture was on the cover. But I did tell her to pick me up a copy. I don't think I can get it here in Scotland.
The funny thing is that Guns N' Roses is my all-time favorite band. I yield the cover to them.
RR,
Guns N' Roses, your favorite band? Now I will never trust anything you say.
Congrats
Hi Robert,
Congratulations! Fantastic. Though I'm not sure about the "recycling natural gas" phrase, as funny as it is. (People might think "re-cycling" is a good thing, you know?)
I'd love to see the ASPO conference speakers on the cover.
Scam definition from Webster's: (Slang) To cheat or swindle as in a confidence game.
Here's a partial list of some real scam's:
1. Las Vegas and the gambling industry in general.
2. The Iraq War.
3. Eternity in heaven if you only believe.
4. Of the People, by the People and for the People.
5. The Housing Bubble.
6. The Dot.com bubble.
7. The Federal Reserve System and fractional banking.
8. Fiat Currency.
9. Insurance, especially mandatory as in car and home (to qualify for a mortgage.)
10. The Electoral College.
11. NASA, forever investigating weightlessness.
I could go on and on, but 11 is enough for now. If ethanol is a scam, it has lots of company IMO.
I'm surprised you would list gambling as the #1 "scam". Anyone that enters a casino, buys a lottery ticket, or bets on a sporting event knows that the odds are against them. That is the cost of getting "entertainment". Swindles and confidence games occur when people are taken advantage of unwittingly. Cheating people by phone, identity theft, credit card fraud, three-card monte, insurance fraud (staging an accident, faking an injury etc.) Here is a more detailed list and description of confidence tricks or scams.
IMO none of the things on your list don't fall into the category of "scams". The items listed like ethanol, are less of a scam and more of "business as usual" in the Iron Triangle.
Man, once surrendering his reason, has no remaining guard against the absurdities the most monstrous, and like a ship without rudder, is the sport of every wind. -- Thomas Jefferson
It's a scam in the sense that the massive subsidies that it demands are paid out to companies from your wallet. The subsidies cover the true cost of the fuel and make it competetive. It disguises the real source of the problem with a coat of fresh paint. The underbelly is rotten and weak!
Good Article.
Actually, I'm not sure which way the author assumes this choice will go. I would guess it will go to SUVs. Am I right?
Corn Ethanol production may solve the population problem, but not in a nice way...
G n' R Rules!
Tom A-B
Congrats, and keep on debunking of those laboratory stunts.
-RSM is an imortant stage to get such messages out !
"That's me, above and to the left of Axl's head"
Wierd. I pictured you with short hair.
Seriously, congratulations. I might actually leaf through one at the local Kwik-E-Mart tonight.
Regarding the gasoline retailers and their minimal margins and the credit card fees eating them, I appreciate the problem they have with credit card fees, but, then, whose fault is that? I'm pretty young, but I remember the days when you could fill up your tank and then go in and pay in cash. You can't do that anymore, so it's pay-at-the-pump. I'm sure they hate me in the summer bicycling season, filling up after a week or so with one-point-something gallons, then washing my windows with their precious window fluid. I wouldn't think of buying soda at a gas station, and a 10 gallon fillup? The Prius tank can barely hold that much.
Gas stations in the 50s to early 60s would take only their own credit cards. Texaco would take a Texaco card Esso would take and Esso card, etc. There was no pay at the pump and the card purchase was not entered electonically for approval. The card was entered on a manual machine that imprinted the card on the multi-copy receipt. The cash register attendent had to compare the customers card against pages of 'bad cards.' The scam artists were on this system like white on rice...many went for years without paying for gas, tires, batteries, etc.
I like the airy-fairy circles of communities thing. Long on feel good, short on fact, but that is the engineer in me speaking. It took me forty eight hours of contemplating a crash before I realized I'd need to bank enough heirloom seed for me and my neighbors, or I'd just get jacked as soon as I had a crop.
Crash is inevitable, I just hope its slow motion so we have a few years for people to adapt to new expectations.
There's a saying;
'A vacation house will show you how many friends you have.' That might change to 'Gardens' one day soon.
I agree that it's wise to plant a lot of extra produce, but before the "Your radishes or your life!" begins, I suspect there will be a lot of gardeners teaching neighbors, lending to neighbors, trading some weeding/watering/ pilferer-watch-duty for some of the goods, and helping neighbors to start setting up their own boxes and plots. There are still ample opportunities to build some good relationships before the Tomato Pirates start swooping in for the kill.
Bob
Very rough estimates: $3 billion will get you a nuclear power plant that generates, say, 1.6 GW. In Spain, an 11 MW solar tower cost around $35 million euros to build, and their large-scale plans call for a $1.2 billion investment to build a total of 300 MW solar capacity.
For nuclear to be long-term viable, however, breeder plants are needed, and I have no idea how much they would cost to build or maintain.
What about running costs though? I gather solar panels last about as long as a nuclear power plant. But there are no direct fuel costs, and presumably very low maintenance costs. It's hard to see how it could cost much more than 20-30 million a year to keep a ~1.5GW solar plant running. In contrast, I gather that large nuclear plants cost in the order or 200 million a year to run (would like that confirmed!). So over a 30 year period, that's over 5 billion more for nuclear...sounds like SP genuinely CAN be competitive over its lifetime, assuming my numbers are even approximately in the right order of magnitude!
Well, I think your numbers are off. First, I think solar cells have a working life of about 20 years, while nuclear power plants are around for 60.
Second, the production cost (minus capital expenditure, that is what the plant cost to run after the loans are payed off) is about 1 eurocent per kWh (capital is initially another 2-4 eurocents per kWh, falling as time passes). 1 eurocent per kWh equals €10 million per TWh.
This gives that a 1500 MW nuclear power plant operating at a 90 % capacity factor will produce 1500*1000*24*365*0.9=11.8 TWh per year, which will cost almost €120 million, and then another €240-480 million for the capital.
The beauty here is that after 20-30 years, all the loans are payed off and you can produce power at 1 cent per kWh and selling it for 3-5 cents (or even twice, thrice of four times as much more in madhouses like Italy or California), and you can keep doing this for 30-40 years!
If you can survive the first few decades, you have the ultimate money printing press.
A solar tower doesn't use photovoltaics. It's convection driven:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_updraft_tower
First, I think solar cells have a working life of about 20 years, while nuclear power plants are around for 60
It varies by type and manufacturer, but solar PV panels are usually warranted for 80% output at 20 years (in most cases 90% @ 20 is closer to reality, heat is not a friend of PV, so Arizona heat and output with a safety margin (so no claims are made)).
One could reasonably assume 50% of rated output after 60 years (assuming solder joints, frame, etc hold up) SWAG.
And MANY nukes do not make it to 60 years; many close before then. Design was 30 and 40 years for all US nukes and then "life extension was added). Although Brown's Ferry 1 may make it to 80 years (~24 year shut down after a fire).
IMO, nukes proper place is a secondary new source of electricity (slower to build, problematic) with wind and hopefully solar being primary sources of new power.
Alan
Ok, but I would think that a large solar plant (whether it's CSP or PV) could last more or less indefinitely, replacing bits as needed. Even if you suggest that over a 60 year period, the costs are equivalent to having to rebuild the plant from scratch twice, that's ~5 billion for initial construction, then 10 billion to replace/maintain infrastructure, plus say 10 million a year in basic operating costs (payroll etc.), for a total of 15.6 billion over 60 years. If the nuke plant costs 3 billion to build, and costs 200 million a year to run, that's also 15 billion over 60 years.
On top of that, a large solar plant could potentially start generating electricity and hence income after a short initial construction phase (maybe 2 years), whereas nukes of that size typically take closer to 10 years before they generate commercial electricity.
A nuke takes 5 years to build if the construction is well managed.
Anyway, I don't think a solar power plant will even pay off its loans before it's decomissioned.
Or what am I saying, the things produce power at what, 30-50 cents per kWh (capital included), so no one will ever build the things in the first place. Not even with dirt-cheap credit.
Don't get me wrong. Solar is very useful for heating, but it has no place in generating power for the grid.
Subsidising that is a waste of resources which would be of much greater utility in for example solar heating or nuclear power.
A nuke takes 5 years to build if the construction is well managed
LMAO !!
The TXU nukes ordered this year have vague commercial start-up dates of "2015 to 2020".
I assume that the planned to mismanage them when ordered ?
BTW, I would take a small 50:50 bet that TXU #2 is not commercial by 12/31/2020.
best Hoeps fro Reality Based Plannign,
Alan
The number of decade plus nukes is large, the number of 5 years to completion is very small (perhaps Palo Verde in the USA, can't think of any otehrs).
Delays are a VERY good reason not to bank too heavily on nuke. a nuke ordered today will coem on-line "whenever"
If you want power on a date certain (with potential delays of a week or two) go wind & solar.
We SHOULD start ordering some new nukes, but just don't count on them till they go commercial.
Alan
The long lead times for US nuclear construction is due to bureacracy and red tape. The actual plant construction takes 5 years.
A good example of how a nuclear crash program should be run is of course France.
The energy crisis arrived in 1973. The decision to go nuclear big-time was taken in 1974. The PWR technology was chosen, but at the time France lacked competency in the two crucial PWR (or you might say LWR) technologies, uranium enrichment and heavy boiler work. So these things had to be developed first, or in parallell.
Or to quote Jerome a Paris:
This is how fast construction progressed:
http://dirtyglasses.typepad.com/photos/uncategorized/050410_twh_nucl_730...
http://www.eia.doe.gov/emeu/cabs/images/france-elecprod_large.gif
If the State want something done and fast, that's just what happens. Even if you are in the middle of an oil crisis (like the French were).
Best hopes for the spread of French management. ;)
They build tram lines in 3 to 4 years (Lyon did two in 3 years 5 months).
A construction problem with a tram line (they have had several) can be fixed with no long term adverse effects.
I consider the French nuclear program to have been unsafe and would have rioted in the streets to prevent a duplicate here !
Crash construction of an unfamiliar technology with inexperienced workers, engineers and managers is a recipe for disaster !
And *ALL* to one design creates the possibility of a single design flaw affecting ALL reactors and the nation being forced to run unsafe reactors to keep the lights on ! (This happened to the UK BTW).
There was a common design flaw in French nukes, but it only affected the N4 reactors.
The French got lucky !
The USA cannot build nukes in 5 years.
Simple, that's it !
We can build new wind farms in 36 months, from financial design to commercial operation (and partially completed wind farms generate partial MWh).
Best Hopes for Reality Based Planning (and 5 year nukes is NOT reality),
Alan
Well, we built our nukes in 5 years too. No problem.
As the technology is now tested for a damn long time, we can easily replicate what we did back then, and we can do it far better.
If we want to.
Well, we built our nukes in 5 years too. No problem
Other than Arkansas Nuclear 1 and Palo Verde, I cannot think of any that were built in 5 years (and these were actually construction times; time from order to commercial for US nuke, BEST CASE of 100s, is 7 years AFAIK. vs. 36 months for wind)
1950a and 1960s miniature nukes, I do not know..
So there are zero cases of 5 years from order to commercial, zero cases of 6 years from order to commercial, a couple of cases of 7 years (out of 100s), but you say 5 years for USA nukes and a couple of seven year examples.
I have over 100 contra cases.
You have zero examples AFAIK,
I see a problem !
And I do NOT want a crash program to build unsafe nukes !
Build the new nukes slowly & safely, at an economic rate of construction as the skilled work force recreates itself, suppliers come back on-line, etc. Order 2 or 4 in 2007, another 4 or so in 2008, etc. until bottlenecks and delays appear (as they surely will), then skip a year or two with new orders.
And build wind turbines at a crash "Canadian Tar Sands" rate !
Alan
Wit "we", I meant us folks in Sweden...
Oskarshamn 1: 6 years
Oskarshamn 2: 5 years
Oskarshamn 3: 5 years
Ringhals 1: 7 years
Ringhals 2: 5 years
Ringhals 3: 9 years (startup delayed due to the referndum on nuclear power)
Ringhals 4: 11 years (startup delayed due to the referndum on nuclear power)
Barsebäck 1: 5 years (from ordering, construction time was shorter)
Barsebäck 2: 7 years (from ordering, construction time was shorter)
Forsmark 1: ?
Forsmark 2: ?
Forsmark 3: ?
And the US situation si completely differnet. You had to redesign pretty much all your plants on the fly. We didn't.
The French peak rate was by the way 8 reactors a year. Translate that into US conditions and you get 40 reactors a year.
It also means you're more likely to actually find those design flaws and fix them rather than running silently until failure.
IMO. a mix of common types is the best way to go.
For example;
1.7 GW Mitsubishi
1.6 GW Areva
1.2 GW Toshiba Westinghouse
0.7 GW CANDU or GE or Russian
Build multiple versions of each type, but do not have two plants of the same type close to each other, serving the same load (No more Mitsubishi in Texas for example, build Toshiba or Areva next).
CANDUs MIGHT be built next to other reactors and run on their waste fuel without reprocessing if the bundles are comparable (and allowance is made for expansion).
Build 60 nukes in 20 years of 4 common types (and 100s more of the same types overseas) and there will be enough commonality to take advantage of that factor. And minimal risk of having to decide between blackouts & running unsafe reactors due to common design faults.
Best Hopes for a Good, Slow Nuke Building program,
Alan
Mixing reactor types is a good idea. The granularity of the mix depends on the grid strenght and the main advocates for a strong grid ought to be the wind power people.
Planning with a multi decade timespan for the installations is a good idea but the buildout need to be timed with the post peak oil downslope.
Magnus,
CANDUs are, AFAIK, the most inherently safe design commercially available. And they can be made to run on waste fuel without reprocessing, also AFAIK.
Would a restart of Sweden's nuclear program be easier by building one or two 700 MW CANDUs ?
Just wondering,
Alan
A Swedish nuclear power program like the one in the 70:s with a national private ASEA with a small need for external licenses and almost all of the powerplant supply chain within the local industry will probably not happen again.
It no longer makes sense to do business in that way.
The municipiality power companies are too small to order nuclear powerplants. State owned Vattenfall is big enough and operates nuclear powerplants, Fortum and E-On are big enough and also operates nuclear powerplants. The heavy industry cooperation consortium Basel might have liquidity to buy a nuclear powerplant and then hire someone to operate it.
The supply chain of components and knowledged people is in better shape from upratings and life lenght extensions. New staff is being recruited. I dont know about the heavy component manufacturers, recreating the ability to make heavy preassure vessels could take years. But there is no need to recreate everything. The smart thing is to do what we can do best and then trade components with all the NPP builders. I dont care if private industry cast load bearing components for wind powerplants or preassure vessel segments as long as a lot is being done and hopefully for more then one market.
All new BWR:s and PWR:s ought to be as good or better then those we have. The most elegant one on the market is imho ESBWR. The easiest to buy might be EPR since it is passing thru Finlandian certifiation and reference build. If ABB Atom had not witherd away BWR 90+ would have been a very likely choise. And CANDU:s have some good things about them. If such are built in Sweden we ought to collect the tritium and save it for fusion research.
Building more nuclear powerplant would probably be made easier by not focusing on nuclear power as the only solution for every problem. A continued momentum for more nuclear power is probably made easier if electricity use is regarded as very desireable as something that makes the environmental load smaller. I think there are investments that would encourage such a public opinion, you already advocate some of them...
And then I do believe in a free market. If wind power would beat new nuclear power in economy then so be it. Its the positive effects of the electricity I am seeking, not the implementation if a specific technology regardless of technological development. And it would be very nice to have more healthy industries that makes and export powerplants or powerplant components. If you know how to get people to invest please tell.
My estimate of 4 new nukes/year being finished in the USA by 2027 is based on my estimate of how quickly the USA could rebuild it's nuke construction resources (primarily people) safely and economically.
Regardless of Peak Oil, we should not go faster than that.
Best Hopes for Crash Programs for Wind, et al,
Alan
I guess they're pretty bad at following the recipe then. In spite of working with what was essentially a brand new technology tree, the French nuclear system is less than replete with a catalogue of disaster. The notion that the USA following such a crash program would do substantially worse in spite of having many times more reactor years of operating experience and design strikes me as less than plausible.
They luckily dont depend on coal. The worst case disaster in a French reactor during the construction boom still ends at the containment dome; Capital down the tube and a learning experience, but not a disaster.
No its not average historically; But then, neither is 36 months for multi-GW wind farms with all the dispatchable power and grid-intertie to back it up either.
But then, neither is 36 months for multi-GW wind farms with all the dispatchable power and grid-intertie to back it up either
Three years is more or less the standard from financial decision to commercial operation (sometimes 40 & 42 monthsl but partially built windfarms still generate power). AFAIK, T Boone Pickens will take four years and a few months to get all 4 GW of his new wind farm going, but ramping up production of WTs and towers appears to be the biggest problem.
Wind Turbines are typically built near existing transmission lines (which may have to be enlarged) and a dozen years of building nothing but natural gas fired electrical generation has left a vast surplus of dispatchable power. Non-issues until wind generates more power than nuclear plants in the USA.
The worst case disaster in a French reactor during the construction boom still ends at the containment dome; Capital down the tube and a learning experience, but not a disaster
HARDLY !!
Worst case, see China Syndrome & something like Chernobyl ! (Yes, I know the technical delta between graphite moderated w/o containment dome & LWR, but the risks remain even if diminished).
That is one VERY good reason to go slow on nukes; the techno-arrogance of all too many true believers in an inherently dangerous technology. People like you built Zimmer, assuming they were dealing with an inherently safe technology and not an inherently dangerous one. (For those that do not know. Zimmer, outside Cincinnati, was finished but built so unsafely it could not get an operating license in the USA. Unfortunately, it would have a gotten a license in many other nations).
The notion that the USA following such a crash program would do substantially worse in spite of having many times more reactor years of operating experience and design strikes me as less than plausible
The USA does not have the nuke BUILDING experience any more. They guys that engineered and managed the building of Palo Verde (all experienced on earlier nukes) are dead or long retired now. Palo Verde was the best managed USA nuke build (and the last one to break ground AFAIK, although other delayed nukes completed years after them) that I know of, and the type that we should aspire to build.
There were no young kids on their first nuke there. Since the industry was downsizing, Palo Verde could pick the cream of the crop of experienced engineers and managers. It takes decades to create that cadre.
I would like to see that cadre rebuilt, and the USA taking 4 nukes/year commercial in 2027.
As you said, we should aspire to French Management. But that is not the USA.
I would say that there is a *VERY* good chance of the USA screwing things up VERY BADLY in a crash program to build nukes.
Just look how badly the nuke industry self destructed in the USA ! It was not outside forces shutting down new nukes, it was cost overruns (300+% in some cases) and half decade long delays that killed new and under construction projects.
MUCH less risk in a crash wind program.
Build nukes slow, wind fast.
Alan
New Nuke Application, One 1.6 GW Areva, EDF & Constellation add-on to existing 1970s nukes near DC
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/07/30/AR200707...
Not "firm" order, but quite serious. Details already worked out (EDF buys 9.9% of Constellation, $4 billion estimated cost, Areva choice, no dates for construction yet).
There is talk that this is the first of a "fleet" of common design nukes to be built by Constellation/EDF.
One reason for commonality:
Areva has to get it's design approved.
Best Hopes for Some New Nukes,
Alan
The all capital exclamation of disbelief isn't a sure sale of credibility; Thousands of reactor years of experience disagrees; I'm sure you could paint a bad picture if you hit a plant with an asteroid too, but neither are plausible.
Like pumped hydro or dams?
Unlike nuclear, these have killed thousands overnight.
Chernobyl (as well as 30 sailors on the Lenin).
Chernobyl also took out a large section of farmland.
There are a number of scenarios for a meltdown of a LWR, with equivalent results. Westinghouse designed an inherently safe reactor, no one wanted to buy it, so they upsized it past the point of passive safety. The only way to minimize this awesome risk is a rigorous safety culture that you appear not to support (The French short-circuited the risk and got away with it and you want us to do likewise).
Building new nukes slowly is one way to ensure safety. A crash program stretches regulatory oversight thin, among other safety issues.
Save the crash program for wind,
Alan
In the thousands of reactor years of experience, we've experienced none of them. They're exceptionally unlikely to occur, and even less likely to breach the containment dome.
Unlike dams, which I assume you still support, which have failed and killed thousands. You're exagerating with ridiculous hyperbole that history hasn't borne out after fifty years experience.
Your basic argument is that we have 1X worth of operating experience with 1 serious accident# and 1 or 2 or 3 so-so accidents, so we should then relax standards and do 20X as much as fast as possible.
And what you propose would result in roughly 20 to 100 times the operating hours for large reactors (by the time that the new builds required to generate ~80% of world generation are retired after 60 to 75 years of operation).
Statistically, inferring results from a small sample to a much larger population has low confidence for rarely occurring events. (If we had observed serious 100 accidents in our history, we could infer with good confidence to a population 50 times larger. But we do not).
# Chernobyl has killed and will kill tens to hundreds of thousands. Lenin killed 30 directly. TMI 1 to 3. And yes, we have learned from our mistakes and that type will never be built again. But this generally positive record (only 1 + 3) is the result of a STRONG safety culture that you want to relax.
Aviation is NOT inherently safe. Look at Africa for confirmation. Yet it have been 5 years since a passenger has died in an accident aboard a scheduled commercial jet aircraft in the USA despite the record numbers of people flying. This is a direct result of a strong and consistent safety culture in manufacture, regulation and operations and the skilled people to maintain it.
Nuclear power is NOT inherently safe. We NEED a strong and consistent safety culture in manufacture, regulation and operations and the skilled people to maintain it. It is impossible to do so, due to (among other factors) the shortage of personnel in a crash program.
Boeing tried to speed up their assembly line too quickly (and Boeing has a superlative safety culture) and they could not do so without compromising safety. Their safety systems "snarled" in complexity as "work arounds" multiplied. In the end, they declared force majeure, ceased production and cleared out their production problems and restarted at a slower rate.
A major, multi-billion dollar hit and a major blow to prestige (Airbus picked up significant market share as a result). But safety was never compromised.
Your attitude would have been to "build the dam a/c" as it is to "just build the dam reactors" despite the lack of skilled and experienced personnel to do so (see Zimmer).
BTW, Hydroelectric dams have generated more power than nuclear power and killed fewer people (see Chernobyl). No US Gov't built and designed (US Army & Bureau of Reclamation) has ever collapsed. Like US commercial aviation, they can be built safely.
A second, BTW, should we, in your opinion, have given Zimmer an operating license ? A fully built and 98% ready to go modern nuclear power plant. Very good quality commercial construction, just a relatively small % of it built to coal power plant and not nuke plant specifications.
Best Hopes for more, and safer nuclear power,
Alan
No, we dont have to 'relax standards.' We've had thousands of reactor years of operating experience and design, most of it safe, and learned from potential problems which reflects in new designs with better engineering (EPR is more passively safe than any of the second generation plants.)
With one serious accident in a very bad design, where the staff were honestly doing their very damndest to try to make an accident occur, the plausibility of serious problems in modern reactors after learning many of these hard lessons doesnt strike me as high; Even in a crash program.
Er... now you want to redo epidemiology? This is the conjecture of TORCH hyperbole, which doesn't match any realistic studies. What chernobyl has been conclusivly linked to is some several thousand thyroid cancers, most of which recovered. Not tens or hundreds of thousands dead.
Even the wildest estimates from Greenpeace for Chernobyl dont come close to the death toll from hydroelectric dam failures, which unlike that wild hyperbole, is directly measurable.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banqiao_Dam
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vajont_Dam
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morvi_dam_burst
Being awful weasally about these definitions that go outside the scope of argument. US dams have failed, even pumped storage recently:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taum_Sauk_pumped_storage_plant
http://simscience.org/cracks/intermediate/failures.html
No US power reactor has caused loss of human life either.
However dam failures have killed 25000 overnight with 200000 dead from incidental damage, as opposed to this 'Chernobyl might have hurt people but we cant really tell' hyperbole.
I'm not familiar enough with Zimmer to know how serious the problems in the QA line were to actual safety issues. Betchel's estimate of 1.5 billion to qualify the plant versus the 1 billion for coal conversion seem to imply that in an era of slightly lower interest rates it would have been much wiser to go nuclear.
What you're suggesting is a strawman, that I'm calling for relaxed standards to expediate construction; This isn't even necissary seeing we've learned what works through the pain of design and operation of previous generations of reactors and what fails badly from the accidents that we've had.
What you're suggesting is a strawman, that I'm calling for relaxed standards to expediate construction
That is NOT a straw man, but rock hard reality !
Even if new suppliers can get nuke qualified in a hurry (without any QA problems of course !), there is still a total loss of Nuke qualified experience in managing, engineering, construction and building regulation.
Restarting Browns Ferry I after 24 years was an excellent training ground to get a few qualified people. More can come from those maintenance crews that travel from one refueling outage to another (but not too many, or else newbies will be doing most of that maintenance).
But for senior management, we will be like the US Army in the War of 1812. The only officers with any combat experience were lieutenants during the Revolution. Now generals, they found a vast difference in command and all did poorly.
It simply takes TIME to build up a qualified and experienced workforce of all types, including management and regulation. Decades.
IMO, the main reason that Palo Verde went so well is that the nuke building industry was shutting down and they could staff it with hand picked, experienced personnel. The opposite can, and probably will occur in a rush to nuke.
And you underestimate the long term effects of Chernobyl. A wide variety of radioactive elements were spewed into the atmosphere, and some deaths will not occur for 100 years to people yet unborn. Above ground weapons tests were, of course, worse.
And TMI will/has kill/ed 1 to 3 (not a big deal) long term.
Best Hopes for Slow, Safe Buildup of Nukes,
Alan
People face much higher risks from simply living at high altitudes from cosmic rays. This is just plain dumb.
People face much greater risks from driving to work and smoking and just living in Iraq.
This does NOT reduce the thousands yet to die from Chernobyl.
Something is "safe" if you just ignore deaths ?
I fear and would protest a crash nuke program precisely because of such booster attitudes. I suspect that you would have approved putting Zimmer on-line as is, because, by ordinary standards, it was all well built and should work perfectly well.
Alan
You miss my point and are wrong besides. The extra death to come from the Chernobyl disaster isn't in the thousands; Its lost in the statistical noise and so it becomes a rhetorical tool rather than a worthwhile point to debate.
Nearly all of the problems with Chernobyl were due to the radioiodine exposure, a very short lived effect (weeks), and the only effect that is epidemiologically measurable. The statement that people that arent even born today will die from the Chernobyl disaster is a blustering lie.
It cost a billion dollars to convert it to a coal plant, so I dont even know about that. I wasn't involved with Zimmer, and I'm guessing you weren't either, so I couldn't possibly comment on weather it would be sound or what the risks were. Lets not engage in hypothetical character attacks on what the other person would do if they were emperor.
If 300MW solar costs $1.2 billion, than 1.5GW would cost around $6 billion to build out. This makes the start-up cost double to cost of nuclear, which is one of nuclear's major drawbacks.
Back in the 90's, a study of nuclear plant running costs found the costs to be roughly $100 million/GW, so a 1.6GW plant might cost $160 million/year. Don't know if maintenance costs have gone down or up since then.
It's virtually impossible to know what the operating costs of all those solar towers would be, but though I doubt it'll cost as much as the nuclear plant, I also doubt it will be super cheap.
My hope for solar is that some more innovative ideas come out to cheapen it - either with thin or organic photovoltaics, or some imaginative improvement on these solar tower plans. But there is no doubt in my mind currently that we should be planning at least some nuclear plants and breaking ground now. Cause at the end of the day ... solar stops producing.
But that's assuming the entire plant has to be complete before it can operate. I'd think the ideal way to build a huge solar plant would be to do it in, say, 300MW chunks at a time. Get 300MW up and running, then start adding the next 300MW etc. etc. Given today's manufacturing base and expertise ability, I doubt this would be possible to do in a short time frame, but in 10 or so years time I can see it being feasible to build a 1500MW power station in 5 years, adding a new 300MW chunk each year. The total cost may well be $5 billion, but I still don't see a reason that over a ~20 year time period it couldn't be competitive with a 1500MW nuke plant.
The issue is at what point does it become a profitable venture: if you want to attract private investment of any sort, it realistically has to start paying dividends within 10 years of the initial investment. For that to be possible, the startup costs would really have to be mostly paid for by taxpayers, which I personally have no issue with, but the current economic climate in many western nations (Australia and U.S. included) would make that a non-starter.
That will make even more expensive. six/tenths rule. Costs increase at .6 power as size goes up. The bigger you build it at one time, the cheaper it will be.
You are building it all at one go. But, at least with a PV array, there's no reason you couldn't connect parts of it to the grid as you go, no?
For CSP with a single steam turbine, it wouldn't be possible, but for solar towers, is a single 1.5GW solar tower even physically possible to build?
BTW, the 1000MW solar-thermal plant planned for the Mongolian Desert, supposed to be complete by 2020, has been estimated at a mere US$ 2.5 billion total investment, and that includes an initial 50MW capacity, costing ~$160 million. Guess that's cheap Chinese labour for you.
Fluid fuel fluoride reactors appeal to me aesthetically (use 1/100th the fuel, only 1/100th the waste, complete burnup, utilize thorium) and are probably better economically because you dont have to do fuel fabrication or build massive pressure vessels.
However, they haven't been market tested, nor are they necissary for long term viability of nuclear power unless you mean in the thousands of years. We can utilize CANDU reactors with reprocessing today with exploitable ore grades down to 20ppm for reasonably competitive costs.
By the time the fuel starts to get too expensive I expect we'll have cheap solar, nuclear fusion, inexpensive wind with pumped hydro, or even somehow managed to get breeders less expensive. A lot can happen over centuries of development.
>Very rough estimates: $3 billion will get you a nuclear power plant that generates, say, 1.6 GW. In Spain, an 11 MW solar tower cost around $35 million euros to build, and their large-scale plans call for a $1.2 billion investment to build a total of 300 MW solar capacity.
Solar: ~300 MW for 6 to 7 hours per day in a really sunny area (since the sun isn't aways shining at 100% directly at the panels or mirrors) Nuclear is 1.6 GW 7/24/365. For solar to equal a 1.6 GW Nuke plant, you probably need 4 to 6 times of of the capacity (ie 6 hours * 4 * 1.6 GW ~= 1.6GW per 24 hours). Of course there is the added cost to construct and maintain a storage system, and there are storage losses since no storage system is 100% efficient. I would guestimate a true 1.6 GW 7/24/365 solar plant plant would probably cost between $20 and $35 Billion.
>For nuclear to be long-term viable, however, breeder plants are needed, and I have no idea how much they would cost to build or maintain.
In the late 1970's the estimate for breeders to be economical, the price of natural uraninum would need to be between $3.5K per Kilo. Today Natural U sells for about ~$300 per kilo. If we adjust the breeder cost of U for inflation in today's dollars, we are easily talking $7.5K per kilo. Breeders are a dead end, since they'll never be economical. However they are great for making devices that reduce global populations (aka Nuclear weapons).
Ah, ok, well that was my next question - does the $1.2 billion for a 300 MW solar plant include storage for baseload capacity? If the answer is no then I agree, solar is a while off being competitive for baseload yet. In that case we should be looking at comparing it with natural gas as a peak load only plant, and accept that for the time being coal and nuclear are the only realistic large-scale base-load providers.
Having said that, I still think your guestimate is off-base: how many nukes out there really do supply 1.6GW of electricity 24/7?
And if not breeders, then surely we have a uranium supply problem? Yes, I know it can be extracted from sea-water and all sorts of other exotic places, but no-one really knows how commercially viable this is yet either.
Given the sorts of upheavals in resource supplies and prices we might be expected to see in the next few decades, on top of whatever technical advances we can hope to see, I would never be so sure as to declare any technology an economical dead-end. No doubt dead-ends will be followed, but I'm not picking any winners and losers at this point.
This assumption gets brought up at least once a week if not once a day. Look just a little further up the thread for the uranium distribution.
Next, reprocessing is a viable method of resource multiplication, along with double enrichment and CANDU reactors, all without going to breeders.
If breeders are to compete, they'll need to do it on cheaper lifecycle costs, not more efficient fuel utilization. Theres hope for fluid fuel thorium breeders because they dont require massive pressure vessels or fuel fabrication regimes, but the fact they consume 1/100th of a fuel that's five times cheaper than uranium just isn't enough of a selling point.
Yes I had already noted your previous post, but out of those uranium sources listed, which are currently known to be commercially viable? The IAEA is only projecting 85 years of supply at this point (http://www.iaea.org/NewsCenter/News/2006/uranium_resources.html) based on current levels/methods of nuclear power production. But for nuclear to make serious dint in the CO2 emission situation, it would have to increase to at least 3 times the output it does now (seeing as world electricity demand is only going to go up, in that sort of time-frame, peak-oil-triggered recessions aside), so we presumably need not only significant increases in reprocessing and enrichment but new sources of uranium even before 2050.
I'm not doubting that nuclear fission will be a significant source of baseload power for quite some time, but it strikes me as bit premature to suggest that nuclear's status as a mature/known technology is its main advantage over renewables. The biggest problem with renewables being able to provide serious amounts of power would seem to be manufacturing capability and lack of expert personnel.
No; Reprocessing is a resource multiplier of 2-3 times, and doubling the enrichment step multiplies the resource base further, and both of these can be done without seriously impacting the production price of electricity from nuclear power, in addition to the rather large resource base of spent fuel that can be utilized; They wont be pursued of course, because new sources of uranium will still be much cheaper, if wind or solar dont catch up in competitiveness first.
No, its main advantage is competitive baseload power just about anywhere with process heat to boot. I'd guess it would probably be the best way to power cities in the far north, with cogeneration of steam heating. Wind needs twice as much dispatch capacity because of its behavior as a negative load. This makes wind very competitive in areas with a lot of wind resource and surplus dispatch capacity (natural gas or dam hydro.) but less so where a stable baseload is desired.
On what basis can anyone determine that "new sources" of uranium (assuming we're talking about uranium not included in the 85 years' worth estimated by the IAEA) will be cheap? If enough countries decide to embark on crash-building programs for new nuclear capacity that means in, say, 20 years time we're looking at 3 times current uranium demand (i.e., assuming no reprocessing/extra enrichment), all of a sudden there's not much more than 20 years' supply from conventional sources left, which seems pretty late to be leaving it for ramping up new uranium supply chains.
>On what basis can anyone determine that "new sources" of uranium (assuming we're talking about uranium not included in the 85 years' worth estimated by the IAEA) will be cheap?
I suspect you are correct, that they are figuring 85 years @ current consumption. Since China, India, Russia, Perhaps EU and the US are planning on building many more nukes, I would suspect that there will be a lot less than 85 years of supply.
Second as FF deplete the costs for mining U rise. Some marginal mines may come uneconomical if costs of FF soar (highly probable). This is also probably true of new plant construction. Throw in a few major accidents caused by hasty and poor construction to make nuclear much less promising option in the future.
Mining U from Sea water, coal, phosphate seems like pie in the sky. Its not economical today, and its surely not going to be economical in the future. But gov't futures are always over optimistic. I am still waiting for Pan Am to start offering flights to the moon (original planned to be available around 2000) and my HAL 9000 desktop computer.
As I understood it, the current build (and planned build) rates for nuclear wouldn't barely be enough to keep the existing capacity for much longer, given how many of the world's current nukes are nearing the end of their useful lifetime.
There are some unconventional uranium sources (esp. phosphate) that will almost certainly become economical at some point, but I certainly don't share a certain poster's conviction that there are no long-term uranium supply issues.
LS9 Promises 'Renewable Petroleum'
Man, once surrendering his reason, has no remaining guard against the absurdities the most monstrous, and like a ship without rudder, is the sport of every wind. -- Thomas Jefferson
I wrote to them earlier today, because some of the press releases said they have patents pending. I wanted to read more, so I asked for their patent application numbers. They said that they don't actually have published applications yet. So, it will remain a black box for a while.
Technically, there isn't any reason that one couldn't engineer organisms to do this. I have only half jokingly suggested several times that we need to stop wasting time with ethanol and engineer an organism that eats garbage and excretes gasoline, which would just float to the top. That's not far off of the kind of claims they are making.
From Drudge:
NOVAK: Pentagon plan to forestall Turkey from invading Iraq...
http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=21734
A New Escapade
by Robert Novak
Posted: 07/30/2007
Updated World Total Liquids Forecast to 2012 (for 13 July 2007 IEA Oil Market Report)
Total Liquids Supply & Demand to 2012 (bottom up forecast) - click to enlarge
(for the above chart with no background picture – click here)
According to the 11 October 2006 IEA Oil Market Report Table 3, the current peak production of 86.13 mbd occurred on July 2006. On June 2007, total liquids production fell to an unexpected 84.28 mbd, from the 13 July 2007 IEA Oil Market Report Table 3, which represents a drop of 1.85 mbd, or just over 2%, in only one year.
This 1.85 mbd drop is due to falls in both OPEC and non OPEC total liquids. Unfortunately, OPEC natural gas liquids showed only a small production increase. OPEC-12 crude oil production fell by 1.60 mbd from July 2006 to June 2007. Although Angola crude oil increased by 0.14 mbd, the following significant decreases occurred: Saudi Arabia, 0.76 mbd; Iran, 0.30 mbd; Iraq, 0.12 mbd; Kuwait, 0.12 mbd; Nigeria, 0.18 mbd; and Venezuela, 0.10 mbd. Non OPEC significant total liquids increases were 0.46 mbd from the former USSR (Russia, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan and others) and 0.25 mbd of biofuels from outside of Brazil and USA. Non OPEC significant total liquids decreases were from Mexico, 0.12 mbd; Canada, 0.19 mbd; and Norway, a big decrease of 0.71 mbd.
Is future total liquids production likely to exceed the current peak of 86.13 mbd on July 2006? It might be possible but it appears unlikely. Maintenance in the North Sea would be mainly responsible for the big drop in Norway’s production. After the maintenance is finished, North Sea production should increase in the next few months but then North Sea production should resume its decline. Mexico production is in decline now. The former USSR production might increase by a small amount. Canada production should increase but the tar sands are experiencing infrastructure constraints. Biofuels production should also continue increasing. Non OPEC total liquids production should increase slowly, assuming that no unexpected disruptions occur.
In order for world total liquids production to exceed the current peak, OPEC total liquids production must also increase. OPEC meets next in September to potentially discuss production levels. However, OPEC will increase production if its members agree to increase production and if the many old OPEC oil fields are physically capable of increasing production. However, OPEC member Iran does not expect that production rates will be on the agenda. OPEC may have some capability to increase production but their remaining oil reserves could have a higher monetary value by holding production at current levels and selling remaining oil at higher prices later. It is possible, but unlikely, that world total liquids production will exceed the current peak of 86.13 mbd because this would require simultaneous and significant production increases from both OPEC and non-OPEC countries.
2%!
Jeez, can't this get posted higher up the thread?
He has posted this information in less clear terms before and it was largely ignored then too. After all, if the decline at the start of the post-peak decline process is 2% then maybe, just maybe, all the hunky-dory theorizing about slow decline giving us time to do amazing super technical things just might not happen, eh?
"The greatest shortcoming of the human race is our inability to understand the exponential function." -- Dr. Albert Bartlett
Into the Grey Zone
Why fret?
According to Yergonomics, the ingenuity of the free marketplace will now kick in and develop all sorts of new technologies on a just-in-time-to-save-us basis.
Don't you go to the movies?
It always happens that way.
Things look darkest before the dawn. (/sarcasm off, lights out)
Ace, great post, great chart! Thank you.
Hi Ace,
Yes, thanks.
Re: "...because this would require simultaneous and significant production increases from both OPEC and non-OPEC countries."
Any chance you might expand this section a little and the editors run it as it's own article?
Hi Aniya,
This section will be included as the first part of the next forecast which I will submit to the editors for review once the EIA releases their next production data in about two weeks. The total liquids forecast to 2012 is based on the forecasts of crude oil & lease condensate, NGPL, ethanol/XTL and processing gains as described in the old forecast.
http://www.theoildrum.com/node/2716
I just thought that I would post the comment above early because I was genuinely surprised at such a low number of 84.28 mbd for June 07.
Thanks for the update Ace!
For those that follow this bottom up forecast, it shows a divergence in Sept. 07 supply from demand, growing to almost 4MMBPD by Jan 2008...
And these lines never meet again.
Funny how economic and military actions always seem to increase around these points. I guess we will see if it will be allowed to happen naturally or be disguised by "above ground factors".
Thank you for the updates. Looks like we are getting closer, if not there already, to the start of the down slope.
Re: Have you driven a Fjord lately?
I REALLY, honestly, thought the article was going to be about this kind of Fjord:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/6/63/Cheval_fjord_00001.j...
Fjord horses are pretty tough and versatile. Personally, I drive a Percheron, but I know lots of Fjord drivers.
On the weather topics of the day, July has been a wet month for us here in Arkansas. The water flow through Murray Lock and Dam, which is just up the Arkansas River South of the North Little Rock and just West of the cities edges, has been high since May 2007.
Cubic feet per second.
May normally at 76,000 cfps now 115,000 cfps
June 63,000 cfps now 116,000 cfps
July 34,000 cfps now 200,000 cfps
For July that is 5.88 times normal.
The Article with the information in it, was talking about nesting habits of the Interior Least Tern, on the normal sandbars of the Arkansas River.
July had 3.5 cubic miles of water go through the Dam. The Hydro Plant there has been shut down for several years because of a design flaw makes it useless.
We call it a boondoggle here abouts.
http://www.livescience.com/technology/070730_ap_electric_dragsters.html
For those that love electric motors.
"The KillaCycle runs on 990 lithium-ion battery cells that feed two direct current motors, generating 350 horsepower. The bike accelerates from zero to 60 mph in just under a second -- faster than many professional gas-powered drag motorcycles and within striking distance of the quickest bikes that run on nitromethane. With that hyper-potent racing fuel, riders can get to 60 mph in 0.7 seconds. "
My dad saw it in the local paper, I found a link for you all.
Your argument is still "because we had 1X experience with acceptable results, we can have 20X will similar results".
My position is that we can only have even minimal confidence (some confidence) that 1X will > 20X ONLY if we continually improve quality at all levels, steadily reducing risk (a good example is aviation which has measurably gotten safer with each new generation of a/c).
I am satisfied that the gross design of the next generation of nukes will be safer. But experienced and qualified engineers are required for safer detailed design, experienced managers, experienced electricians, pipefitters, and regulators, etc.
New large forgings are easier to get new qualified experinced people. And forgings are going to be a problem !
Alan
Hi Alan,
I was surprised to see the LATimes come out with a long editorial against nuclear power (second reference).
http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/la-oe-josephson30jul30,1,...
http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/editorials/la-ed-nuclear23jul23,1,71...