 | This Week in Petroleum 9-26-07 | The Oil Drum | Declining net oil exports--a temporary decline or a long term trend? |  |
DrumBeat: September 27, 2007
Posted by Leanan on September 27, 2007 - 9:23am
UK Oil Output Up on Six Oilfield Start-Ups
U.K. crude oil production increased 2.8% during the second quarter compared with the same quarter a year ago due to the start-up of six oil fields, including the very large Buzzard field in the U.K. North Sea, the government's latest energy statistics report showed Thursday....The start-up of the oil fields transformed the U.K. into a net oil exporter during the second quarter of this year, exporting 0.8 million tons more than it imported of oil and oil products. The U.K. was a net oil importer in the second quarter of last year.
Overpopulation could be people, planet problem
Environmentalists have long been concerned about the resources threatened by rapidly growing human populations, focusing on phenomenon such as deforestation, desertification, air pollution and global warming. But the worst-case scenario for people experiencing overpopulation, according to Lawrence Smith, president of the Population Institute, is a lack of fresh, clean water."If the water goes, the species goes," he said.
"That sounds kind of alarmist," Smith conceded, "considering there's water all around us, but 97 percent plus is saltwater, and the freshwater that we use to sustain ourselves is just native to 3 percent. ... So the accessibility of water, the competition for water, the availability of water is going to be a major, major threat," he said, noting world population growth estimates at more than 9 billion people by 2050.
Hunt oil deal creating tension in Iraq: US
A US official on Thursday criticised an oil deal between Texas-based Hunt Oil Company and Iraq's Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG), saying it had "needlessly elevated tensions" in Iraq.
TD report says Alberta boom will continue to bloom, no bust in sight
The report by two TD economists says there are plenty of warning signs on the horizon, but they are not enough to signal the traditional boom-and-bust scenario that has plagued oil and gas producers in the past.
BP's Buncefield fuel bid refused
GLOBAL oil company BP has been dealt a blow to its hopes of resuming the storage of petrol and diesel at the Buncefield fuel depot following the giant blast and fire there in December 2005.Herts County Council decided it would not support the storage of volatile fuel on the site at a meeting last week following concerns which were raised by Dacorum Borough Council when BP submitted plans to reinstate part of the site, which fringes Redbourn, earlier this year.
Eni says one dead, two missing in Nigeria attack
One Saipem worker is dead and two are missing after armed men attacked a Nigerian facility of the Italian oilfield services company on Thursday, Saipem's parent Eni said.
Kazakhstan says higher oil stake not key goal
Kazakhstan said on Thursday that securing a bigger stake in the huge Kashagan oilfield was not its main goal in a row with the project's Italian-led consortium of Western oil majors.
Azerbaijan Ups Reserves for Shah Deniz
Azerbaijan's state oil company announced Thursday that natural gas reserves in a major offshore Caspian Sea field are believed to be nearly twice as large as previously estimated.
Warming linked to 'unprecedented' algae growth in Arctic lake
Global warming is believed to be softening the harsh Arctic environment, causing the algae population in Canada's northernmost lake to spike over the past two centuries, researchers said Wednesday.The team, led by Laval University scientists Warwick Vincent and Reinhard Pienitz, found aquatic life in Ward Hunt Lake, located on island north of Ellesmere Island, increased 500-fold during the period.
Competition for oil and gas reserves heating up, says UN trade body
The emergence of new players in the global market and shifts in the policies of gas and oil producers means that traditional conglomerates from industrialized nations are facing increasing competition in the race to access the world’s reserves, the United Nations agency on trade and development issues said today.With crude oil prices staying well above $70 a barrel, traditional transnational corporations are losing bargaining power to oil-producing countries “eager to use climbing demand to capture a larger share of the rents,” according to the UN Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD).
Saudi's Naimi: Climate Change Policies Unfairly Taxing Oil
Some industrialized countries are unfairly placing high taxes on petroleum products to discourage consumption as a method of addressing climate change, while encouraging greater use of polluting coal and nuclear power, Saudi Arabian Oil Minister Ali Naimi said.
Are sunspots prime suspects in global warming?
Climate-change 'optimists' say complex natural cycles may be at the heart of global warming.
Mouse click could plunge city into darkness, experts say
Economist Scott Borg, who produces security-related data for the federal government, projects that if a third of the country lost power for three months, the economic price tag would be $700 billion."It's equivalent to 40 to 50 large hurricanes striking all at once," Borg said. "It's greater economic damage than any modern economy ever suffered. ... It's greater then the Great Depression. It's greater than the damage we did with strategic bombing on Germany in World War II."
Transport shortage impairs minorities
"Social problems caused by a lack of appropriate transport is a major problem in Australia. The problem is growing as fuel prices increase, suburban-sprawl trends continue and our population ages," he said."The problem is almost an epidemic in the fringe of Australian cities and in rural areas."
Storm threat to Gulf scares oil higher
Oil prices rose by a dollar a barrel Thursday, extending overnight gains as a tropical depression near Mexico raised concerns about possible disruptions to oil and gas production there.
Average Oil Price Seen Hitting Record Next Year
Tight oil supplies, red-hot global demand and a weakening dollar will boost average oil prices to a record level next year, a Reuters poll showed on Wednesday.Analysts raised their average 2008 oil price forecast for U.S. crude to $67 a barrel as many believe the current rally will continue well into next year. The forecast surpasses the record average of $66.24, reached in 2006.
Canada faces NAFTA lawsuit from ExxonMobil
U.S. oil giants ExxonMobil and Murphy Oil are accusing Ottawa of breaching the North American Free Trade Agreement by allowing Newfoundland to require them to spend millions of dollars on research in the province.
How Bush's Iraqi Oil-Grab Went Awry
The primary evidence indicating that the Bush administration coveted Iraqi oil from the start comes from two diverse but impeccably reliable sources: Paul O'Neill, the Treasury Secretary (2001-2003) under President George W. Bush; and Falah Al Jibury, a well-connected Iraqi-American oil consultant, who had acted as President Ronald Reagan's "back channel" to Iraqi President Saddam Hussein during the Iraq-Iran War of 1980-88. The secondary evidence is from the material that can be found in such publications as the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal.
Greenspan sees threat of '70s-style inflation
An important point in Alan Greenspan's much-hyped memoir has gone largely unnoticed: He acknowledges that global economic forces, more than Federal Reserve policy, kept inflation low and manageable for two decades.By global forces he means free trade, the rise of emerging, cheap-labor economies led by China and India and the benefits from information technology and the Internet.
He warns that these forces — "globalization," in shorthand — are weakening as they mature. He fears that could mean a gradual return to persistent 1970s-style inflation over the next 20 years or so.
Chevron extends $5bn programme
Chevron, the second-largest US oil company, is to spend $15bn on its own shares within the next three years, extending a $5bn-a-year programme that began in 2005.The move reflects big oil companies' difficulties in finding uses for their large cash flows, boosted by high oil prices.
Australian coal miners could be gearing up for a huge round of consolidation as Asian demand for the fuel increases, according to UBS.It says as major international miners seek to expand and as Asian power companies look to secure supplies, it expects to see more merger and acquisition activity in the sector.
A shortage of the fuel and surging prices have already prompted some takeover activity.
Shell signs heavy oil deal with Russia's Tatneft
Royal Dutch Shell and Tatneft signed on Thursday a deal which can strengthen the oil major's position in Russia's energy sector and help Tatneft tap hard-to-extract oil.
Kuwait approves $14 bln budget for new oil refinery
Kuwait has approved a budget of 4 billion dinars ($14.29 billion) to build the Middle East’s largest refinery, more than double the initial estimate, state refiner Kuwait National Petroleum Co (KNPC) said.The cost of building new refineries has spiralled as the energy industry strains to increase capacity to meet rising global fuel demand. The Gulf’s top oil producers were all building new refineries and expanding old plants, but costs have hurt budgets and delayed plans.
U.S. officials woo Turkmenistan's president
American officials, striving to weaken the grip of Gazprom, Russia's state-owned energy monopoly, in energy-rich Central Asia, are forcefully wooing the president of Turkmenistan on his first visit to the United States.
South Korea aims to expand tax cuts on energy projects
South Korea's energy ministry is pushing to expand tax cuts for local companies investing in overseas energy projects, a proposal that would encourage firms to seek stakes in major oil and gas fields abroad.
Russian gas: Will there be enough investment?
Approximately $18 billion per year of investment will be needed to ensure that sufficient gas is produced between now and 2030, the majority of which is needed in production assets.
Eating local is a good way to go
The World Bank reports that 15 per cent of the world’s present food supplies, upon which 160 million people depend, are being grown with water drawn from rapidly depleting underground sources or rivers which are drying up.The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change predicts that rain-dependent agriculture globally could be cut in half by 2020 as a result of climate change.
The OECD predicts food price rises of between 20 per cent and 50 per cent over the next decade.
Topic of ethanol has steadily grown
Ironically one of the biggest factors in increased food costs over the past 2 years has been transportation costs due to higher fuel prices. I can make a strong argument that increasing fuel supplies (ethanol can do this) could actually lower food costs by lowering fuel and transportation costs.
ADM and ConocoPhillips to Make Biofuel
Archer Daniels Midland Co. and ConocoPhillips said Thursday they will team up to develop biofuel, creating a partnership between the biggest U.S. ethanol producer and one of the biggest oil refiners.ADM, a Decatur, Ill.-based agricultural processing company, will provide "biomass," or organic material left over from crops, wood or switchgrass. Houston-based ConocoPhillips will convert the materials into "biocrude" fuel for transportation.
Global Warming Not Affected by Man
The mass hysteria over the alleged warming of the planet, with everyone from the president to, reportedly, the Pope buying into the global warming alarms and calling for Draconian steps to stop Mother Nature from turning up the thermostat reminds me of one of the more bizarre examples of widespread panic created by a fictional crisis.
Coal is carbon is emissions is not good
However, there is a way that a global carbon tax could be introduced, and Australia would have a key role. Coal is the biggest greenhouse polluting fossil fuel because it is composed mainly of carbon. Most electricity generation worldwide comes from burning coal. Most of China's projected emission increases will come from coal-fired power stations. Australia, as the world's leading coal exporter, is uniquely placed to play a key role in implementing a global carbon tax, starting with an export tax on coal.
From Papal Indulgences to Carbon Credits: Is Global Warming a Sin?
In a couple of hundred years, historians will be comparing the frenzies over our supposed human contribution to global warming to the tumults at the latter end of the 10th century as the Christian millennium approached. Then, as now, the doomsters identified human sinfulness as the propulsive factor in the planet’s rapid downward slide.
Winemakers heading to the hills
Global warming is forcing vintners in Mediterranean countries like Spain, France and Italy to move to cooler areas, while producers in northern areas like Britain are benefiting from higher temperatures.
Eight Utilities Seek To Increase Energy Efficiency Investment by $500 Million Annually
The Clinton Global Initiative (CGI) announced today that eight utilities -- Con Edison, Duke Energy, Edison International, Great Plains Energy, Pepco Holdings, PNM Resources, Sierra Pacific Resources and Xcel Energy -- are committed to seeking regulatory reforms and approvals to increase their investment in energy efficiency by $500 million annually to about $1.5 billion annually. This increased level of investment in energy efficiency, when fully implemented in 10 years, will reduce carbon dioxide emissions by about 30 million tons -- the equivalent of removing nearly 6 million cars from the road. It will also avoid the need for 50 500-megawatt peaking power plants.
Power play or hot air? Islanders hear Cape Wind project debate
The stakes are high, as are passions on both sides of the debate over the controversial Cape Wind Associates proposal to place wind powered electrical generators in Nantucket Sound. After more than six years of claims, counterclaims, political maneuvering, regulatory hearings, and court cases, there is no shortage of conflicting arguments.
Scientists, Policymakers, and Industry Leaders Gather to Discuss Ocean Iron Fertilization
On September 26-27, scientists at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) will host an international, interdisciplinary conference on the proposed “iron fertilization” of the ocean as a means to combat rising concentrations of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.
The village that could save the planet
How two men plan to extend the ecological miracle that is Gaviotas, Colombia, across the rest of the Third World.
China Warns of Catastrophe from Three Gorges Dam
China's huge Three Gorges Dam hydropower project could spark environmental catastrophe unless accumulating threats are quickly defused, senior officials and experts have warned.
Algae are a promising source of biofuels: besides being easy to grow and handle, some varieties are rich in oil similar to that produced by soybeans. Algae also produce another fuel: hydrogen. They make a small amount of hydrogen naturally during photosynthesis, but Anastasios Melis, a plant- and microbial-biology professor at the University of California, Berkeley, believes that genetically engineered versions of the tiny green organisms have a good shot at being a viable source for hydrogen.
Is there a third route to produce nuclear energy?
Cold fusion has not been accepted by mainstream scientists.
Storing Solar Power Efficiently
Thermal-power plants could solve some of the problems with solar power by turning sunlight into steam and storing heat for cloudy days.
Statoil Ceases Oil Development at Snohvit
The Snohvit partnership has decided to cease all work relating to oil zone development at the Snohvit field in the Barents Sea. Evaluations undertaken show that such a development would not be economically viable...."These analyses show the presence of oil to be significantly less than we expected to find in this structure," says Geir Pettersen, senior vice president for the Tromso Patch business cluster.
"This decision is final, since the start-up of gas production from Snohvit shortly will prevent the oil zone being developed at a later stage."
Politicians are right in suggesting that America faces certain serious energy problems, but they’ve misdiagnosed both the problems and the cure. America’s energy markets, including the infrastructure that makes trading in energy possible (made up of pipelines, oil and gas terminals, and refineries), are clogged with the debris of almost a hundred years of state and federal regulation. This “regulatory cholesterol” is as damaging to our economy as the “cholesterol” analogy suggests. Remaining within the analogy, the proposals that have been made by politicians are the equivalent of recommending that a heart patient in need of a triple bypass eat more steak instead of undergoing surgery. If we are going to meet our future energy needs, we need to unleash entrepreneurs on the problem. And that means politicians need to get out of the way, not add another layer of regulation.
Energy market ruling opens way for consumer payback
California consumers could recover hundreds of millions of dollars in damages from the state's 2000 energy crisis following a recent court decision.The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco issued a decision that clears the way to hold natural gas suppliers accountable for manipulating the market and tripling energy prices during 2000-2001.
Planning saves oil money this winter
If you haven't done it, do it now because with winter on the way, Vermonters should be prepared for record high heating oil costs, according to those in the industry. This season, local fuel oil companies report that the earlier people have signed contracts for oil the better deal they are getting, as the price continues to rise.
Freight railroad customers complain about prices, service
In the late 1800s, railroad robber barons enjoyed monopolies in many rural markets before regulation and the trucking industry tempered high freight prices.Now, businesses contend the nation's major railroads are trying to resurrect that Gilded Age.
Wood is the future, says architect
The 21st century will be the “era of renewable timber”, architect Alex de Rijke told delegates at the Building With Wood conference.Mr de Rijke was one of 27 speakers who addressed the conference, which attracted over 260 building professionals to the University of Exeter, and said that the move towards the greater use of timber was being driven by the “global energy crisis”.
Ireland: Is it time to join the nuclear family?
With rising energy costs, global warming directly linked to the burning of fossil fuels which power our electricity stations and the political uncertainty of the Middle East, isn't it time we re-opened the debate about building an Irish nuclear reactor, especially now that the age of cheaper, more efficient and, most importantly, safer and more reliable nuclear power is here?
Turkey pledges a greener future
Turkey is seriously considering signing a key international agreement, the Kyoto Protocol, which sets binding targets for levels of greenhouse gas emissions that spur global warming, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has declared, stressing this could happen provided that its special circumstances, setting it apart from highly industrialized countries, are taken under consideration.
Presentation analyzes oil prices
About 30 people gathered in the Collins Center yesterday for a lecture entitled "Energy: An Industry of Opportunity." Bruce Bullock, the director of the Maguire Energy Institute, and James L. Smith, the Cary M. Maguire chair in oil and gas management, were the featured speakers. The lecture was the first of six presentations on the energy industry.Smith focused his remarks on the July report from the National Petroleum Council, which showcased an 18-month study about energy use for the future. Smith discussed topics like oil prices and peak oil time periods.
Lester R. Brown: Learning From the Past
Our twenty-first century global civilization is not the first to face the prospect of environmentally induced economic decline. The question is how we will respond. We do have one unique asset at our command—an archaeological record that shows us what happened to earlier civilizations that got into environmental trouble and failed to respond.As Jared Diamond points out in his book Collapse, some of the early societies that were in environmental trouble were able to change their ways in time to avoid decline and collapse. Six centuries ago, for example, Icelanders realized that overgrazing on their grass-covered highlands was leading to extensive soil loss from the inherently thin soils of the region. Rather than lose the grasslands and face economic decline, farmers joined together to determine how many sheep the highlands could sustain and then allocated quotas among themselves, thus preserving their grasslands and avoiding what Garrett Hardin later termed the “tragedy of the commons.”
John Michael Greer: Civilization and succession
Thus humanity is no more exempt from ecological processes than from the law of gravity. The invention of airplanes doesn’t mean that gravity no longer affects us; it means that if we use a lot of energy, we can overcome the force of gravity and lift ourselves off the ground for a while. The same principle holds with the laws of ecology. Using an immense amount of energy, we lifted a minority of the world’s population high above the subsistence level for a while, but that doesn’t mean that ecological laws no longer affect us. It means that for three hundred years, we’ve been able to push past the limits normally imposed by those laws, by burning up huge amounts of fossil fuels. When the fossil fuels are gone, the laws will still be there.
Weak dollar central to oil price boom
The weak dollar's leading role in oil's ascent to record highs is partly due to a tide of financial flows into commodity investments but also reflects a shift in the greenback's relationship with crude.
Grain stockpiles at a 30-year low
Australian Farm Institute executive director Mick Keogh said the growing affluence of the developing world and the demand for biofuels, as well as the weather, were behind the substantial price rises in international wheat, dairy and oilseed prices.The US Agriculture Department estimates that world wheat stocks, at the end of the current crop year, will fall to their lowest level since 1977-78.
Greenspan, oil, and Osama bin Laden
Alan Greenspan, the anti-war U.S. left, virtually the entire Arab world, and Osama bin Laden have something in common: they think the war in Iraq is mainly about oil.
Iran warns India over Pakistan gas pipeline deal
Iran warned India that it would sign a multi-billion dollar gas pipeline deal with Pakistan alone if New Dehli did not swiftly agree terms on transit pricing with Islamabad.
Gov't computer fails to track royalties
A $150 million computer system that is supposed to help the government keep track of oil and gas royalties has been a "profound failure," contributing to possibly millions of dollars in lost revenue, according to Interior Department investigators.
US slams Gulf laws restricting migrant workers
A senior US human rights official on Wednesday criticised laws in the oil-rich Gulf states that restrict migrant workers under a system that some campaigners say is akin to slave labour.
China's Hydropower May be Global Warming Time Bomb
China is scrambling to build massive hydropower dams to curb pollution and slake its thirst for energy, but scientists warn that reservoirs can also worsen global warming by emitting a powerful greenhouse gas.
EU Lawmakers Eye Bold Targets for Renewable Energy
European Union lawmakers agreed on Tuesday to seek ambitious targets for renewable energy sources in negotiations next year on details of the bloc's programme to fight climate change.
Ever-prepared, Mormon canning enthusiasts furnish their homes with stockpiles of long-lasting foods
National news events of the past decade — Hurricane Katrina, the World Trade Center collapse and Y2K panic at the turn of the millennium — brought the idea of planning for disasters into public consciousness.It’s a novel idea for many people in an age when preparing for a long, hard winter means making sure to drain the swimming pool. But the Mormons have a long history of hoping for the best and preparing for the worst.
They know how much food will last you through a year and how you must store it.
They know how to fit piles of cans in small apartments by covering them with mattresses, comforters, glass tabletops and tapestries — and using them as furniture. And the whole process starts at a cannery.
Jane Goodall says biofuel crops hurt rain forests
Primate scientist Jane Goodall said on Wednesday the race to grow crops for vehicle fuels is damaging rain forests in Asia, Africa and South America and adding to the emissions blamed for global warming.
Bush climate goals marked by bureaucracy
The United States is lining up with China, India and the world's other biggest polluters in opposition to mandatory cuts in Earth-warming greenhouse gases sought by the United Nations and European countries.
Biggest polluters gather for US-led climate forum
The United States on Thursday was launching talks among the world's biggest greenhouse-gas polluters in the quest to spur action against dangerous climate change.Representatives from leading industrial and emerging economies, the UN and European Union (EU) were to meet for two days under the chairmanship of US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.
Diplomats accuse Bush of attempting to derail UN climate conference
President George Bush was yesterday criticised by diplomats for attempting to derail a UN initiative on climate change by pressing ahead with his own conference, which starts in Washington today.
Deeper level of interest in climate fix
High-level climate-change summits this week reveal a supportive environment for action.
Banks Urging U.S. to Adopt the Trading of Emissions
A group representing some of the world’s leading banks will urge the United States and other industrial nations this week to move quickly to introduce a lightly regulated system for trading carbon emissions permits.
Scientists question computerised climate-change models
As world leaders gathered in New York for a high-level UN meeting on climate change, a new report by some of the world's most renowned scientists urges policymakers to keep their eyes on the "science grapevine", arguing that their understanding of global warming is still far from complete.
For all this talk, still we head steadfastly for catastrophe
If talking could cut greenhouse gas emissions, then this would be a good week for international action on climate change. It opened with more than 80 speeches from governments at a special session on the issue at the UN, and will close with a two-day "summit" in the White House bringing together all the world's major emitters. The bad news is that we are still heading steadfastly in the direction of an avoidable climate catastrophe.
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A new guest post - Modeling Oil Production to Estimate URR - Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and the World - by Apparent Peak has been posted at TOD:Canada.
Figure 17: World production for crude plus condensate (seven logistics)
EIA crude oil data for Saudi Arabia (year to date for 2007):
2005: 9.6 mbpd
2006: 9.2 mbpd (-4.3%/year)
2007: 8.6 mbpd (-6.7%/year)
If Saudi Arabia were to average 9.0 mbpd in the fourth quarter, the decline rate would still be -5.6%/year.
FYI, net export decline rates (total liquids, EIA), actual for 2006 and estimated for 2007 based on year to date production and +9% increase in consumption (Rembrandt's estimate for first half):
2006: -5.5%/year
2007: -11.0%/year
WT, as usual...the net export number is definitely the one we need to fear.
As you mention, even if they increase production by 400Kbpd in 4Q (4/5ths of the quota change) they won't show an increase this year.
By May 2008, we will have 3 years of declining world oil production. When does the rear view kick in?
However, I suspect that many factors will in play in the economic, oil, food, global political arenas before we get to then.
Crude oil STILL is only 11.7 cents(US) a cup.
I like that kind of number. It makes me wonder how much cheaper that same cup has gotten in Europe and Canada this September.
Or, as Mr. Colbert put it last night:
"Our first president now has the same value as their first president, a duck."
(Canada's 1 dollar coin features a loon)
Still, I'm asking myself what both your comments have to do with the graph from Apparent Peak's article.
Mine - nothing in particular...I was responding to WT's post.
My post below and on TOD Canada refers to the Apparent peak and his logistics analysis.
The peak is just behind us (11/2005?) and the mortgage scam unwinding may allow the signal to remain mixed up in the noise for a while. I just hope we don't go into a new president 1/2009 with the administration able to hand wave and waste more time on this most pressing issue.
Posted before but here is the nice graph of just how ugly stuff gets from 1/2008 through 7/2008 on the ARM scam front.
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2007/8/28/172611/602
WT--
OPEC numbers for KSA give averages of:
Year Production Quota
2005 9.406 8.984
2006 9.141 9.035
2007 8.552 8.587
Is the production decline due to geological limitations or due to quota declines (and part of that decline will simply be getting within the quota since they had been pumping in excess of quota)? Are the quota declines intended to mask geological limitations or because the world economies aren't crashing as OPEC thought they would in the face of $40+ oil prices, so why should OPEC sell oil this year for $70 a barrel that it could sell next year for $90?
Also, if KSA could average 9 mbpd for the last half of 2007 (its quota is 8.9), doesn't that support the argument that the declines are political, not geological?
Rick
(copy of post from TOD Canada)
Great analysis!
Your logistics analysis seems to reinforce the need for accurate URR estimates, as usual. Although, I think the lower numbers 'seem' to reflect the political realities we are witnessing.
IMO, your "APPARENT PEAK" concept has immense value and is reinforced by the realities of global interaction. The supply rate of change is slowing dramatically while the opposite is true for demand.
Even if we obtain a minor increase in production in All liquids in the next couple years...it will have to be offset by a dramatic decrease in demand BEFORE then...so the APPARENT PEAK(all liquids) is now or slightly in the past.
I haven't seen this Blog in the Oil Drum Blog listing. It may be of value.
http://netoilexports.blogspot.com/
That's the ugly graph
This graph is horrible - although most of the underlying issues will be very familiar to all us oil-nuts here at TOD this is still a very well presented powerful graphic. The spreadsheet behind it is also available (follow the link) and is very well organized and clear. I love me them well-organized spreadsheets :-)
Cuchulainn
Franciscan dairy outside Petaluma goes green by converting methane from cow manure into energy
St. Anthony Farm, a 315-acre dairy west of Petaluma, is the first in Sonoma County to convert cow doo-doo into renewable bio-gas.
So long as 250 dairy cows keep up with their end of the bargain, the farm will have an inexhaustible supply of energy for milking operations, a new creamery and many other needs.
http://www1.pressdemocrat.com/article/20070926/NEWS/709260331/1033/NEWS01
http://energybulletin.net/35127.html
The ASPO conference in Ireland seemed to have reached some consensus, together with the IEA that global peak will hit before 2012.
It seems this conclusion is based on anticipated new field production (i.e. so-called "bottoms up") analysis. No mention in the article about the export availability of oil.
It is often stated on this forum that we had a C&C peak in 2005, and an all-liquids peak in 2006. So is there really a 5 year discrepancy, or is it just a matter of oranges and apples?
They forecast the current peaks will be exceeded.
Here we have another example of bickering about exact dates...
before 2012 = 2011?
Therefore, 3 years(ok maybe 4).
Action taken = NONE!
Therefore, everyone = toast!
:-P
PS: See TOD Canada's Key post today...if 3-4 years to actually peak = APPARENT PEAK NOW! Therefore, pain begins NOW.
Righty-0...so, they nailed down a peak date. Give them a pat on the back and NOW...get to frickin work!!
Calling a peak is the easy part...doing something about it takes some sweat and tears.
Alan Drake For President
I can write Alan's name in on the ballot, correct?
I Have only little time to post give the time ddiffernece from Germany and that I post from work. I have had the following idea for a while now. To do a sort of local assessment of my local area by googling around and getting up a lot of information to be able to do a sort of "Transition Town" planning. I thought perhaps if a wiki was made with following template or similar as a template, everybody could participate. For instance the template could be standard with links to various cities.In every town or city different peiople with knowledge of an area (public transit, farming, electricity generation, water resources, foot or bike paths, hman resources) could edit the wiki according to theeir knowledge. This could orgaincally grow and be available ot local transition groups for lanning and eventually political purposes. Given the first two links above by Leanan I thought it was an appropriate day to make the contribution.
PEAK OIL REGIONAL ASSESSMENT
POST PEAK LOCAL RESOURCES CATALOGUE
1) Arable land in and around city
a)Gardening plots/allottments
b)Farms
c) Lawns
d)Parks
e)Forests- berries, animals, mushrooms
f)number of trees in city dispersed along streets, lawns, parks for cooling
g)fruit trees
h) food sources –where does most food come from?
i)farm animals available –sheeps, goats , cows, chickens- number
j) how much local per capita production possible given available arable land and precipitation-can the existing population survive on the 100 mile diet?
k) Horses for transport and carts
2)Water resources
a) rivers, streams
b)lakes
c) ponds
d) canals(transport of goods))
e) natural water table depths, aquifers
f) water collectors manmade, dams,etc.
g) precipitation total –distribution physically, seasonally
h)fishing grounds- types of fish and amount available as renewable resource, fish farming
i) water works
3)Human resources
a)population density and distribution
b) zoning, mixed business residential or separated
c) housing density, apartment buildings or SFH, DFH
d) sidewalks, bike paths along most or all streets
e) public transport available-buses, subway, trams with plans
f) shopping for foodstuffs in walking biking distance to residential areas
g)schools, hospitals, entertainment, churches mixed into residential areas
h)noise pollution from traffic
i)Psychological and physical fitness of population
j)average/mean age, educational level and types
k) Training programmes for community adjustment in terms of education in simple agricultural/horticultural techniques or making of own clothing from traditional techniques
4)Energy resources-electrical systems/networks
a) Coal- area and amounts available for mining, power plants-capacity, avg. output total and per capita
b) Nuclear –plants- sources of uranium, enrichment, power pants capacity, output total and per capita
c) Hydropower-source power plants-capacity, avg. output total and per capita
d) Is source politically reliable?
e) Maintenance standard and replacement costs of electrical systems and power plants- are resources to replace and maintain available locally(copper wire, steel smelter)?
f) renewables-wind,solar,etc.
“Without a video the people perish”-Is. 13:24
Your thinking and local survival/sustainability inventory matches how I see real value in a post peak world. The small community I live in has great water and arable land in and around the city. The real fight locally will come when we try to use the designated "open space" lands for local food production. I think people will come around once the depth of the cluster-f*ck becomes apparent. But on the human time scale, it's pretty easy to get into fights and legal battles and totally miss one or two planting seasons. Once everyone is hungry and can't afford to drive their SUV's then we may get down to real community collective action. Until then I think the Mormons have the right idea about storing at least one year of food. It could take at least that long for the depth of this mess to sink into peoples minds and for them to try different occupations and priorities. How will the $120k/year programmers react when it sinks in that software is not a product or service we need to survive? Will they see the value in farming or manual trades? There will be a lot of wailing and gnashing of teeth as the depth of the mess sinks in and the amount of change it will require creeps into awareness. But heck, it looks like we have until 2012 so party on til then!!!
It still amazes me how many people believe horses are more efficient at converting biomass into work than simple steam engines. Mammals are incredibly inefficient machines somewhere on the order of 1% compared to the 5-8% efficiency of 19th century steam tractors. On top of their poor efficiency horses must still be fed even when there is no work to do. Their maintenance is also a complex task if they are to be at all able to perform when needed. The use of ethanol or biodiesel in ICEs is several times more efficient than steamers. Electric tractors which can use wind or solar power remove the needed to grow and process biofuels.
Yes, all true. But draft horses are SO COOL to watch!
And the other advantage is that horses are self-replicating.
Maybe some of you ag experts out there can correct me if I'm wrong, but as far as I know, you can leave two tractors together for as long as you want, and you still won't get little baby tractors.
Horses generally have to be at least 3 to 5 years old before they can do any substantial work and have to be trained like mad from the time they're old enough to be trained and kept trained or they're 1000lbs of completely useless skittish creature. Each horse has a different personality and some horses can never be trained to do anything useful, or are too dangerous to be handled on a daily, casual basis (mostly stallions, though some mares as well). Horses only generally live to be about 20, and by that time they're creaky and basically useless for work. They can trip in a hole and break a leg and have to be put down. They can panic and crash through trees/fence/etc and break a leg/stab themselves/etc and have to be put down. If there is a frost, the grass can get too sugary and cause a horse to founder, and it will be useless from then on for work and may have to be put down. If it eats too much feed it can colic, founder and die/be useless. If they transition too quickly from hay to pasture they can colic and die, if they drink cold water after a hard workout they can colic and die, if they're suffering from mild colic they can roll and twist their gut - and die. They require hay in the winter, and supplementary feed and always a large, fresh supply of water and shelter, and need to be constantly wormed. You'll want at least 3 acres per horse in a decent climate for pasture and hay production or you'll have serious problems in drought years. The average lifespan for a horse in the wild is about 5 years. "Healthy as a horse" is a bit of a joke...you never see unhealthy horses - because an unhealthy horse is generally dead.
So for 3-5 years you feed and train them getting no work in return, for 10-15 years (if you're lucky) you work them (each capable of maybe 10% of what a tractor can do), then you send them to the rendering plant or put them out to pasture. In between you have to constantly be alert to whats happening to them or they'll up and die on you. They will get sick or have problems and lots of down time to recover. You will have your foot stepped on, get bitten, and be thrown off, and you may get kicked. They will trample your fences, they will get loose, they may try to walk onto your porch.
There's a reason tractors and horseless carriages got to be quite popular...
You're kidding right? How much energy went into making the coal that powers the steam engines? If steam engines are so easy to maintain, why are/were there specialists for just that purpose? Finally, what kind of crappy steam engine are you using that is less efficient than an ICE?
Mechanical devices save time. They do not save energy.
- Scott
"Try sour grapes; you might like them."
Mechanical devices save time. They do not save energy.
Sure they do. The energy *I* can put into 'work' is 10-400 watts (via hand tool or peddling a bike as hard as I can) A simple hand drill or roto-tiller can do soil breaking up that I can not do myself. The energy 'saved' is my own.
A mechanical device powered by PV panels would be the most efficient conversion of Photons to mechanical motion.
It's a good thing you put that 'save' in hyphens.
You're just swapping the situation as follows:
- don't drain energy well 1 (personal chemical energy) NOW
- instead drain energy well 2 (stored primary energy source)
Saving is an illusion. It really is a well-temporal (sic) swap.
I think this is an important point regarding overall farm and crop planning. It's quite possible to grow the feedstock to fuel one or two diesel tractors and to harvest enough electricity to power a pair of electric ones (although hybrid diesel/electric tractors are what I want). However, I would also plan on using a few draft animals too. I should note this is for an @80 acre operation whose plots are not contiguous and is about 40 miles away from the nearest urban area.
"It's quite possible to grow the feedstock to fuel one or two diesel tractors and to harvest enough electricity to power a pair of electric ones"
Where did this info come from ??
I would point out you can keep horses alive on forrage and a very little grain when they are not working- they are only heavy feeders when under heavy work.
Also, consider:
Anything mechanical, say a tractor for this argument, enevitably contains much steel, not just iron (which requires less energy to produce)caluculate the energy cost of production of the said tractor/s into the equation, vs. the energy from the amount of grain needed for a draft horse to produce more draughthorses and i would suspect (though i dont know) that the relative energy efficiencies of the two sources of work would become more ballanced.
That said, i do recognise that you can do with one tractor far more than you can do with one horse, especially on unworked land. Ideally there will be enough energy and common sense to break in land with a large horsepower tractor before it has to be continued to be worked with a two horsepower team.
Just my 2c. :-)
A well built tractor (1950s John Deere, Massey Ferguson being examples) can give 50 to 80 years of service from the frame & hydraulic system with good care. The engine can be rebuilt with minimum materials (a few lbs) and skilled labor.
Best Hopes,
Alan
Alan. First thanks for all your good contributions!
I have in front of me the book "Bicycling Science" by David
Gordon Wilson, a very well known expert in the field and a retired MIT prof. of ME who knows about things like that.
In it he notes that a human is a fuel cell, not a heat engine, and its efficiency of turning oat meal into mechanical power has been measured to be over 20% for really good people of the kind that flew the man-powered airplanes over the channel and from Crete to Greece.
I asume horses do about as well as people. So do tractors. which of course do use heat engines, not fuel cells. But during the late great war in europe, over a million vehicles were operated on wood gas, and that art became quite successful. Too bad we have mostly forgotten it. Any old spark ignition engine will run well on a simple wood gasifier. In fact, I have been toying with the idea of making a mini town gasifier system on my farm, from which I could supply my tractor and my car, with a little compressor taking the gas out of a big floating storage tank, the kind that used to be in most towns when I was a kid. That way you wouldn't have to tote that gasifier around on the vehicle.
And Right, you can keep a big heavy old tractor running almost forever, esp if there are a lot of dead ones lying around to rip parts off of. And, if things get tough, you can copy the Indians and make a long train of one old tractor pulling a bunch of wagons full of people, goats, pigs, melons and other market goods goin' to town on the cheap. With wood gas smells wafting over all. Fun! Togetherness! Aromas !
According to the '80s FEMA report on wood gasification, one reason that they are not in common use is that they are relatively inefficient. You might be wasting a lot of fuel. Assuming the country doesn't collapse, I'd prefer that the wood be burned with coal in a large-scale generator.
The following link was posted earlier:
http://www.webpal.org/webpal/b_recovery/3_alternate_energy/woodgas/fema_...
A quick search says that a heavy working horse provides ~750W of work, and a heavy working man provides 75W. The horse will need about 33000kCal, and the human will require 3700kCal. Given that horses eat hay and grains, and humans eat bread and beer, horses work better.
A diesel engine is 3x as efficient and doesn't need fed during the down time.
Couple of quick comments here.
First, wasting wood. Around here, tons and tons are wasted by being ignored, and even worse, hauled to the dump to do nothing but turn into pollution. Gasifiers could hardly waste as much as is being wasted.
Wilson says people are 20-25% efficient. Three times that is 60-75%. Diesels are not. Maybe if you are lucky, 30% on a farm tractor-burning diesel, not wood.
BTW, Wilson says an american can put out 75 watts steady state for 6 hours. Europeans do better- maybe 100watts. Supermen can of course, do way better -300-400 watts- (but only on dope?).
As for "need fed", does something need said about that?
Sorry--I wasn't totally clear. 50% for large scale diesel, 60% for combined cycle, 19% for people, rounded a little. This is thermal efficiency--people are much less efficient than that given their 1600kCal or so base energy requirements. Say 12%. Baseline "small" engines are about 40%, and even the US government hopes to bring fleet efficiencies to 45%.
My point is that a farm that uses strictly human manual labor is going to waste far more resources than one that uses diesel where possible; whether the "waste" is 3x or 5x or 10x isn't as important.
http://www.climatetechnology.gov/library/2005/tech-options/tor2005-112.pdf
has some info on the diesel, but I've not read the entire thing.
Wood gasification does seem interesting, but I worry about it--it may be useful for a couple of years during a spike in requirements if oil distribution stops, but if it catches on large scale, the forests will be depleted really really quick (think about the Fertile Crescent-we used it up, and the vast forests of Europe too), and the few who survive for future generations will curse your name as a wasteful spendthrift.
Getting even 75% efficiency (just a number--I can't find really accurate values) turning wood into gas, times a 20% efficiency ICE just seems wrong. Its not even as efficient as a human being.
I'd be happier if wood gasification were done efficiently at industrial scale; it has been used to run turbines with good efficiency. Of course, this only works if prices are scaled accordingly. $1--5/kWh seems fair.
A quick search says that a heavy working horse provides ~750W of work
Oddly enough 750Watts is the definition of 1 Horsepower ;)
(actually more like 745.gobledygookytoolazytolookup Watts)
Under 1) Arable land, add 'seed sources'
Under 3) Human resources, add 'skills inventory, incl. food preservation, hand carpentry, stonemasonry, etc.'
If projected requirements could be identified for a community, a fairly straightforward gap analysis could then assist with prioritization during planning.
For projected requirements, there may well be some starting points in the gaming world, eg. Simcity simulations.
That's an idea: What we need is for someone to come out with SimSustainableCommunity
Great idea. I posted it with my post over at TOD Eaurope. They had some stuff about Transition TOWNS: Here is the WIKI. http://www.transitiontowns.org/
http://europe.theoildrum.com/node/3022
“Without a video the people perish”-Is. 13:24
Good idea, but your template probably already exists in some format at The Relocalization Network. If you are in Germany, you'd be the first to start one, according to their map. :-)
They just released a sample of their Post Carbon Cities: Planning for Energy and Climate Uncertainty:
The city of Portland has also published an excellent study, entitled "Descending the Oil Peak: Navigating the Transition from Oil and Natural Gas". The free 86-page final report contains recommendations to reduce oil use and strengthen the community’s ability to respond to social and economic stress.
Great Links. I am saving the links and the links to Transition Towns in UK which seem similar concepts.
http://transitiontowns.org/TransitionNetwork/Mulling#RestOfWorld
list of towns and ctiies worldwide interested in becoming transition towns.
“Without a video the people perish”-Is. 13:24
I think this is a great idea. Another post today suggested the Relocalization network. There is some useful stuff out there, but it would not be as good as a wiki resource.
How does one start a wiki on a topic like this?
I got the following from Transition Towns Wiki instructions on how to Wiki:
http://www.transitiontowns.org/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wiki
http://transitiontowns.org/Main/EditorDocs
http://www.pmwiki.org/wiki/PmWiki/PmWiki
“Without a video the people perish”-Is. 13:24
Pretty amazing that anyone thinks a switch to timber will save us... more likely simply denuding the Earth to the point that soil renewal fails completely and we just all eat each other.
ciao,
Bruce
Actually, his point is a bit different - wood as a building material, combined with good design and the implicit long term management of forests, could allow adequate shelter. I realize that in many areas, people have ruined forests, and that the few areas that have practiced decent forestry (Germany, Japan, Scandinavia) are not that large.
Nonetheless, wood is a better building material than most materials common in the U.S. And even if you don't agree with his point, do you see the sort of large scale building material recycling that is common in Germany happening in your community? And if you recycle buildings that way, trying to eliminate materials which cause major expenses when the building is torn down is a goal which is supported by many in Germany.
Rammed earth could work. need timber pretty much only for the forms, which can be reused.
Excellent thermal mass, if built well can last for litraly 100's of years. cheap. renewable non-toxic materials.
Granted they are efficient only if sutible soil types are in your area, not if they have to be trucked in from miles away.
Still, a part solution?
I wonder if it is possible to get historical data of the price of a barrel of oil in other currencies, like Canadian dollars, or Euros. (Or a US dollar index).
I was curious to see if this would help me see what part of the current run-up in oil prices was due to the falling of the US dollar against other currencies.
riconroy - select different ref currencies as you please from drop-down-curtain.
Dollar vs Norwegian Kroner- 10 years chart ps- allow 10 seconds for the chart to be generated ....
Oil/gasoline is not regarded particularly expensive in Norway today, more or less same price at the pump for the last “10” years - little up and then little down … and we are most expensive on the planet.
An admittedly quick search on Monday only provided this little chart, which at least charts oil prices in $US vs Norwegian krone/$US. It's a start....
However, as Jeffrey correctly stated, it's not very satisfactory. Not only is it just 3 months, you would also have to chart NOK vs €, and then € vs $US.
Perhaps Rembrandt or Euan, who are in Europe, have something more satisfactory?!
Brent Spot/dollar commodity charts
- development last 3 month(s)
Euro vs Dollar Oil prices 199-2004
Don't look at images like this, that have a fixed euro-to-dollar scale and still run as a time series (braindead or what?)
After reading the articles 'Learning from the Past' and 'Civilization and Succession', I was particularly interested in the concept of R- and K-selected species or economies, if you will. What most interested me is that Hunter/Gatherer Native Americans were placed in the same grouping as a K-selected as modern organic farmers.
It seems to me, after reading the article 'Learning from the Past', that it is possible to make the connection that agriculture is actually an R-selected quality. It is not sustainable in most areas over the long term. Of course, there appears to be some forms of agriculture that work, sans large energy inputs, over a long term, but that they only support a small population.
As such, just out of interest, would it be more prudent to refer to organic farmers as a transition R- to K-selected sere, or do you feel that organic farming might be sustainable for a moderately sized population (perhaps 1 billion humans) over a long span?
Or should future generations instead plan on a much smaller population and true K-selected lifestyles (something more like the Hunter/Gatherer Native Americans), as we may find agriculture unsustainable due to the damage that modern humans are causing?
Agriculture has been unsustainable in Germany for a couple of thousand years, it seems.
And ironically, Germany is also the society invented the fertlizers that people now claim are critical to our way of life.
'Fritz Haber (9 December 1868 – 29 January 1934) was a German chemist, who received the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1918 for his development of synthetic ammonia, important for fertilisers and explosives. He is also credited as the "father of chemical warfare" for his work developing and deploying chlorine and other poison gases during World War I. He is also credited for creating Methylenedioxymethamphetamine, commonly known as Ecstasy.
Despite his contributions to the German war effort, Haber was forced to emigrate from Germany during 1933 by the Nazis because of his Jewish ancestry; many of his relatives were killed by the Nazis in concentration camps, gassed by Zyklon B, which he invented. He died during the process of emigration.'
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fritz_Haber
Sometimes, those opposed to agriculture may have a point, but then, I always wonder how they plan to go from billions of humans to maybe 100 million. As you can see from Fritz Haber's life, it is hard to separate the good from the bad, which often leads people to attempt to find a solution to this dilemna.
There is some evidence that organic agriculture can be sustainable and as productive per hectare as fossil-fuel-based farming. However it requires more labour which means shifting towards an agricultural economy, and degraded soils which now require heavy dosing with fertilizers can take decades to restore to health.
In other words it will need the sort of community or government planning and incentives that we have failed to see for climate change. Almost every Drumbeat has articles about topsoil or aquifer damage. When will people wake up?
The Shock Doctrine by Naomi Klein. I just bought ten copies to give to friends. I have not read a book so relevant to what's going on in the world today.
I agree. I'm listening to the audio version now. This book is incredibly important. There's a video interview of the author, Naomi Klein, and Cusack at Huff Post.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/john-cusack/huffpost-exclusive-my-in_b_659...
A central thesis, that new economic models are usually instituted in times of crisis only makes sense. As Klein says, when she first started research, she thought this was something new, ala Iraq and Katrina, but quickly changed her thinking when she looked more at the past, and cites Chile.
Go further...The central thesis of Shock Doctrine is not a revelation. It describes good old fashioned plunder...though the rape and pillage elements are more subtle these days.
Genghis Kahn and the Visigoths were at it centuries ago. The English did it to India. The Canadians are doing it (via tar sands) to Alberta, the Spanish in Peru... We set up "Homeland Security" and in doing so, commercialized terrorism. Now it's a big, vested interest, business sector like any other.
If you like Klein, look into Chalmers Johnson. He's written three books on it.
I think Klein is not looking at plunder for plunder's sake, or old colonial models, but rather viewing a forced change in the nature of the US economy.
This is going from a mixed economy of private and social ventures, to one of purely private ventures, where private industry takes on the most basic, social functions of the state.
Experimental "labs" are first tried in areas of collapse. Importantly, this requires massive state subsidy. These are then shifted into the economy to replace old state functions. In this shift, these services are lost to the poor and middle class, for they can no longer afford them.
Another instance where fortunes are legislated, not made.
If you like Klein, look into Chalmers Johnson. He's written three books on it.
Yes, and David Ray Griffin too. In mathematics there are sometimes very general and powerful theorems which have immediate corollaries: that IMHO is the relationship of "the shock doctrine" to 9-11.
Dave--
Griffin is a theologian, who's expertise is Talking Snakes and invisible Space Daddy's---
I'm sorry, not the best of sources, and not up to par with Klein and Johnson.
Not to say one should not be skeptical of BushCo's version of events, as they certainly were a "convergence of interests" so to speak.
HT-
You've done Griffin a grave injustice -- you cannot possibly have read him to have said those things. His scholarship is fully equal to Klein's -- in fact, if anything, he's more academic -- almost too much so, Klein is the better writer -- and extremely careful and thorough. He would be dry reading were it not for the subject matter. Religion is not mentioned at all in several of his works on 9-11.
I, by the way, am an atheist and very much into science.
Also Kevin Phillips 'Wealth and Democracy' deals with plunder developed wealth.
You could also read Volume 1 of
Capital. Which silly me always
thought was a history text. About
pillage plunder shock & crisis
Bingo. Chile is definitely some kind of transition point between two eras in capitalist conservatism, from a bloody
"realism" (Ike/Nixon/Kissinger) to a psychotic Neo-Victorian cultism.
We know that in the late '60s creepy right-wing families began creating ideological foundations to combat the advances of civil rights and the Great Society, with a goal of tricking Americans into dismantling the entire New Deal (Eisenhower wrote his brother that only a few Texas oilmen plotted such absurdity - look who runs his Party now). The University of Chicago (Strauss and Friedman) and Orange County (Reagan) were other key monasteries of the new theology.
But Chile was the place where these bastards got the chance to redefine right-wing dictatorship. They jettisoned the Cold War principle that our dictators were to cover for market failures with Bismarck-style state socialism.
I'm having a problem here describing what they actually did. Can we call it the artificial recreation of Dickensian capitalism at gunpoint? Where the normal government turns back the clock to 1850 and laissez-faire, but the "special" government kidnaps and tortures anyone who argues that the past sucks? It's kind of like how other far-right regimes idealized a past that required little in enforcement or bureaucracy, but their attempt to force people to relearn it requires vast amounts of both.
The next part of the story is how the new conservative movement brought the Chilean model home.
Nice quote on the Money Porn channel (CNBC) this morning:
"The economy is on a precipice, and things could go either way"
Hmmmm???
Don't worry- last quarter GDP was growing at 3.8% clip (LOL). As far as I know, this is the first time the Fed has cut the funds rate .50 with the latest GDP number 3.8%.
If you're interested in the Fed's actions you might like to check out these stories from the last Round-Up at TOD:Canada.
The Real Reason For The Fed's 50 bp Cut
Can the Fed Save You from the Credit Crunch?
(free registration required)
Excellent and informative post, Stoneleigh. Thank you.
If the economy is truly on a precipice, I would think that the only direction it could possibly go is DOWN
"Spaniards! Thirty years ago we stood on the edge of an abyss! Today, thanks to God, we have taken a step forward!"
Chevron just gave the Peak Oil camp a 15 BILLION dollar endorsement.
MIKE: IRAQ IS LIKE 1776
""We're the British," the mayor said during an interview with Tom Brokaw at Cooper Union, part of a series featuring potential presidential contenders hosted by former Gov. Mario Cuomo."
http://www.nypost.com/seven/09262007/news/regionalnews/mike__iraq_is_lik...
Sad but true.
http://www.stumbleupon.com/mainpics/1848026.jpg
Oil is poisonous, we shouldn't let it come in contact with our food.
(Uh-oh - oil just breached $82 again...tick, tick, tick...)
Tropical storm Lorenzo has formed in the Gulf of Mexico.
Anyone wants to make a quick buck, make a play for oil to go down the next 48 hours, Lorenzo is a dud heading for mexico.
Are you putting any money in?
"(Uh-oh - oil just breached $82 again...tick, tick, tick...)"
Better make that $83...
Could we reach a "triple Yergin" by year's end? Only if he makes more predictions, I guess.
I am a Baylor University alumni. One of their publications, Baylor Magazine, had a better than average article on green energy with three profs there who seem to understand peak oil. It starts out focusing on the University but quickly expands its outlook:
http://www.baylormag.com/story.php?story=006061
Also included are ten suggestions for going green:
http://www.baylormag.com/story.php?story=006063
I loved the link 'Global warming not affected by man' to Newsmax. On the right is an ad for Anne Coulter and on the left one for K&N filters which will get you 56 more hp out of your Mustang.
The rest is notable only if you want to be abreast of how and why so many consider 'us' to be out to lunch and deluded dupes. I mean, really, how can something that constitutes less than one percent of the atmosphere melt the ice caps. Get real, man!
I think many, even those agreeing with man made climate change, are not concerned because the only changes they perceive are neutral to them.
The bulk of the reported effects concern sea level changes. The changes are too small, too far in the future, and most live far from the coast, where they are "safe" anyway. If it occurs, we move the town inland a little.
Or the changes are actually welcome. Fewer ice and snow storms, no deep freeze weather. "That'll work for me."
Changes in weather patterns, of precipitation regimes, go in one ear and out the other. So many live in the east or midwest, areas blessed with near uniform distribution of 40 inches of ppt. They don't really understand, viscerally, the effects of less precipitation, or of unequal yearly distribution. The myriad of changes that that places on the biota.
In just short travels in the interior west, the first thing that hits one, if observant in the least, is changes in the weather pattern, evidenced by species change in the roadside vegetation. It's so obvious, whether traveling compass direction, or along an altitude gradient. It's a constant reminder how ephemeral that vegetation, and our food supply, really is.
Since there is a story here on the possibility of sunspot activity controlling the weather, I will put together the curves for sunspot and cosmic ray activity reported at Climax
.
With the temperature variations reported over the same period from Cheyenne Wells, CO , which gives a better shot at correlating apples with apples.
I thought I had better move out into the plains a bit, given that low clouds (which get the best correlation) may be harder to find in high mountains.
A nag I suppose:
This constant featuring of discredited climate theories on TOD is discouraging and off putting. (Not that anyone would give R.. A.ss whether I come or go). H.O, your post looks quite lame. What are you claiming to show? Just "stirring the pot"? BTW, the subject is climate, not weather. Ugh.
I totally agree. Can we please stop with the GW-skeptics and deniers? I mean, what's the point? They generally think PO is a bigger crock than GW. And it's not like the criticisms are new or intelligent - they're invariably warmed-over tosh that's been answered years ago by the scientific community.
Like "sunspots"... RealClimate is a source. Newsmax is a joke.
The "sunspots" article is from Christian Science Monitor, which many consider the best newspaper in the country.
Sunspot theory is still bunk.
And the article is needlessly provocative. There's no need to phrase the title as a question, suggesting that this is a major inquiry, when the answer is so clear. This is getting into "Opinions differ on shape of earth" territory.
Despite the suggestion in the quote that there might be a connection to GW, the article states:
At least the CSM author is clear that most of the science discussed points out that any effects are too small for "global warming".
Still, the discussion of cosmic rays relies on Henrik Svensmark's 1997 studies. But that has been largely discredited. Here's a nice response from March 2007.
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2007/03/cosmoclimatology-t...
Note that this response comes from the author of the 2006 study cited in the article, Rasmus Benestad, who writes
So we have a Drumbeat quote that overhypes a CSM article that overhypes the findings of a small minority of researchers who are overhyping the data. Why is this helpful for TOD?
I've explained numerous times why I post the articles I do. It doesn't mean I endorse them. Rather, I think it's important to be aware of all points of view. Think of it as "know thy enemy." Plus, it's often very entertaining.
I posted that abiotic oil article by Engdahl awhile back, and many others have posted it since. Almost no one here believes in abiotic oil, but there's obviously a lot of interest in that article. Why? Because a lot of people share Engdahl's view, and we can't ignore them.
Whereas I'm not a GW-skeptic or denier, quite the opposite, I do however tend to think we're missing something when everyone is on the same side of the argument. The very fact that there is an overwhelming consensus on climate change makes me uneasy.
The scientists climate models are obviously wrong, change is occurring far faster than even their most pessimistic predictions. To me, this indicates that they are not fully cognisant as to what is actually happening, that they're missing something important. We appear to have seen some kind of step-change this year on a global scale which has apparently taken scientists by surprise for example.
Why is lake Superior heating faster than the surrounding air temperature? Why is the sea level rising faster in Northern Australia than the South? Why are countries surrounding the Indian Ocean being inundated although sea level rises have been marginal so far? Sometimes exceptions indicate that their is a flaw in our understanding which will go unnoticed if no one bothers to look at them.
I for one would like to to see other theories thrown up to challenge the orthodox view, just in case.
It's 'cuz aliens park their space ships underwater when they are resting. The hot engines make the water hot.
Just like semi's at the truck stop. They are only allowed so many miles before the pOhlice make them take a safety break.
I think that scientists like to be conservative in their predictions, and share a bias toward optimism (it's a human trait, really) so they will make a prediction "By the year 2100 ... " — when their model predicts a catastrophe by 2010, they tweak the model.
I'm starting to wonder if Defcon 1 is sort-of on the Pollyanna side.
| The problem will solve itself.
| But not in a nice way.
Was actually just providing data, but since there was a story on sunspot activity I thought I would show what it has been. And rather than compare it to global temperature I used local to the measurement site, it allows you to make up your own mind. (Grin)
H.O: "..it allows you to make up you own mind." Right. Guess what, I've made up my mind. I don't squint at a couple of fuzzy charts every other day and think, "How intriguing! Based on this bit of data, I, Roy T. will now re-evaluate my oh so incisive beliefs about AGW" Sure, that's what I do - *not*. (grin)
Nor do I perform such similar "making up my own mind" re the Laffer Curve, WMD's in Iraq, etc. Don't feel the need to know on TOD what the denialists are up to. Though occasional I will visit this spot:
http://scienceblogs.com/denialism/
Oh well, different strokes, etc. (hell it's only the planet future for a few tens of millenium, guess I just need to lighten up) Tired of ughing.
There seems to be an opinion out there that if a subject has been discussed on some other website and judged lacking (I presume this is the realclimate site) then the rest of us should accept that wisdom and remain in blissful ignorance of anything other than the "correct thinking." This dismissive sort of post is counterproductive and does not provide information of any contributory form to the debate. You should note that I provided information on the changes in the cosmic ray count over the past few years, relative to sunspot activity and it is not the constant value that was suggested by one of your ilk the other day. I don't particularly see any correlation between either of those curves and the local temperature (Note that I did not post the graph showing a correlation between cosmic ray count and lower cloud densities), but then the readership has the opportunity to make up its own mind - one of the reasons we provide facts for folk to evaluate on their own instead of dictating opinions. I find the actions of you "thought police" in trying to quell debate quite disturbing.
if a subject has been discussed on some other website and judged lacking then the rest of us should accept that wisdom
If a subject has been discussed on some other website that has the same gravitas and expertise as The Oil Drum (or better) and said website specializes in Global Warming and judged lacking by them, then the rest of us should accept that wisdom.
I generally support side discussions of GW and it's impact on TOD, but when debunking the "abiotic oil" arguments of GW, I think Real Climate and not TOD is the appropriate forum.
I would feel the same way towards an in depth technical discussion of the EROEI and related issues of oil shale and tar sands at Real Climate.
Each forum has it's specialty and resident expertise. The Oil Drum lacks the expertise in GW, just as Real Climate lacks the expertise in PO. As a general rule, we should accept the consensus of Real Climate on basic GW issues and The Oil Drum on PO issues. If there is a challenge to the consensus on either issue, it should br aired in the appropriate venue.
The Oil Drum is, IMHO, NOT the appropriate venue for a challenge to the consensus on Global Warming. Quite frankly, we lack the overall expertise. Take it to Real Climate.
Best Hopes,
Alan
Seconded.
It shouldn't be necessary to rehash every debate in every forum. It distracts from the real dialog here.
Further, our discussion of GW is incomplete - this is not a forum with experts on GW or climate science, so the foundational knowledge and background is lacking. We don't have the data sets ready at hand, we're not conversant with the detailed literature, we don't KNOW whether models or data series already account for certain factors, and we're not able to determine the relative importance of competing mechanisms and forcings.
It's also disingenuous to suggest that these are new arguments, or "controversies" in climate science, when usually the denialist arguments have been answered in the peer-reviewed literature already. If you want to provide links to GW articles, at least try to see if they are in fact new science.
Are we going to be overrun with Israel-Palestine debates? Creation-Evolution? Bush v. Gore Florida? UFOs and Alien Architects of the Pyramids?
Alan:
The one possible exception might be consideration of the extent to which PO causes reductions in FF combustion, which causes mitigation of GW - and the extent to which the GW modeling has or has not taken this into account. That is the one issue that really overlaps the two, and I'm not sure either camp really has a good handle on it.
At this point, the answer is NO. Climate models are not economic models as well. They take a certain (rising)level of annual CO2 production as a given, and then figure out what the effects will be.
Check the IPCC report for a discussion on the specifics of that curve - it may be linear. On the one hand, the shape of the CO2 emissions curve is very important and is easily the most important remaining unknown in the climate equation, save for the behavior of the Greenland and West Antarctic ice sheets. But, on the other hand, while we can be certain that oil and NG consumption will peak/plateau long before 2050, we have no real way of knowing what PO/PNG will do to CO2. Will we give up FF before 2050, or solve carbon sequestration? Or will we fail, and have a massive shift into dirty coal. While PO tells us that things must change, it can't tell us which direction.
Global warming due to increasing GHGs has been able to explain many other observations:
(1) more warming during nights than days
(2) winters warming more than summers
(3) Northern hemisphere warming more than South Hemisphere
(4) Troposphere warming but Stratosphere cooling
Warming induced by increasing solar activity cannot explain any of these observations. That's why GHGs are the leading explanation and any other competitive theory has to predict those observations as well. Actually, a sun induced warming would produce a warming in both the stratosphere and the troposphere. Here is a good recent paper by Muscheler:
Beer, J., M. Vonmoos, and R. Muscheler, 2006: Solar variability over the pst several millennia. Space Science Reviews, DOI: 10.1007/s11214-006-9047-4.
Are sunspots prime suspects in global warming?
Answer: No.
Next question ...
| The problem will solve itself.
| But not in a nice way.
Look I lean toward global warming but to say sunspots are a outright no is just foolish. Of course its a possibility people! we have only studied climate science for 100 years!!! The earth has been aroudn for 5 billion, c'mon a little open mindness and analysis.
NYT:
"Beneath booming cities, China's future is drying up."
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/28/world/asia/28water.html?ex=1348632000&...
All the mitigation schemes, all the solar PV, all the downsizing, educating, humanuring, V2Ging in the world won't make a hill of beans' difference when there's no surface water, and insufficient cheap energy to pull or pump it from deep underground or far away. The northern and western provinces can't withstand the drought that is just beginning now.
According to the article, the North China Plain is home to hundreds of millions of people - Imagine, a whole USA without sufficient water, or any real hope of preventing the dessication of their land.
What seems to be almost universally lacking from the GW debate is the FACT that we're operating at about 290 degrees Kelvin here. One degree C one way or the other is only a shift of .3% in ABSOLUTE temperature. That's where NASA and James Hansen have an advantage; they have to think in absolute temperature terms.
A one percent change in absolute temperature would be about five degrees F. Two percent and the world is a totally different place. Two percent isn't much in any natural system, so we're really dependent upon a fine balance of orbital geometry, solar continuity, and atmospheric stability.
I'm not saying, although the majority of the scientific community seems to be, that emissions are definitely causing warming, but only that it doesn't take much on a percentage basis and we are taking a huge and unprecedented risk that is looking increasingly like a bad bet. Larger forces on the downside may mitigate our actions - or not. Theoretically the next decade should be somewhat colder than this one, but the same held true for the 80's and the temps went sideways not down. Like oil, the downs are sideways now and the ups just get more uppity.
The graph for Whereveritwas, Colorado seems to show a loss of downside potential lately; the high anomalies didn't change much but the lows went away. This is commensurate with my tenet that it isn't about warming but about lack of cooling. All we need is a few percent less cooling ability and it's over. Well, for a few hundred years. An eyeblink of natural history.
But I would think the relevant numbers are not the absolute numbers but rather the numbers within which life can exist. On an absolute scale of temperature, a 3 degree change is a very small percentage, but if the temperature range at which life can exist is only 100 degrees, then a 3 degree change can be a big deal (and most species probably live within a much smaller range than that).
I'm fond of living at 310.15°K myself. With my surroundings about 15° cooler to dissipate any waste heat.
| The problem will solve itself.
| But not in a nice way.
George Ure had this linked on his website. I have no idea about the credibility, but it is an interesting read.
Also, the story has to be evaluated in light of the implied position taken by a senior retired general that officers have a constitutional duty to disobey some orders by Bush.
Interesting times.
http://www.oregontruthalliance.org/?q=node/245
-- SPECIAL REPORT --
Air Force refused to fly weapons to Middle East theater
By Wayne Madsen
Sept. 24, 2007
Author's website
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1181629,00.html
Why Iraq Was a Mistake
Sunday, Apr. 09, 2006 By LIEUT. GENERAL GREG NEWBOLD (RET.)
I read this this morning. If it is true then there is some really scary stuff going on. But is it true?
And this:
It sounds bogus to me. The U.S. wasn't going to attack Iran, and will not do so in the near future for numerous reasons we've discussed before. And even if they were going to do so, it wouldn't be with nuclear weapons, for an even more numerous list of reasons.
WMR is a person, not a giant intelligence agency.
JBT has learned that he doesn't believe it.
JBT believes that if President Bombsalot wants to attack Iran, he'll just do it. It's not like he has a history of seeking consensus or worrying about what his subjects think.
Perhaps the scariest thing about this is that we are even discussing the possibility of senior military officers refusing to carry out orders by the president.
When Newbold wrote his essay last year, Iraq was a done deal. He had to be talking about Iran. I have suggested before that Iran, IMO, is to World War Three as Poland was to World War Two.
But you have to appreciate the irony of the situation. Perhaps the only thing standing between us and World War Three are some senior officers in the Pentagon.
God bless'em...whoever they are!!
This incident involving those wayward nuclear cruise missiles may have been the result of an incredibly unlikely screw-up, or it may have been the tip of the iceberg of something far more sinister. Depending on how things eventually play out, we may never know.
However, one thing that is very difficult for even the most hard-headed skeptics to deny it that Bush and the rabidly zionist neocon faction within his regime have for years been overtly and covertly pushing for the US to 'fix' Iran before the next administration takes office. Many well-respected former high-ranking government officials have publically warned that the Bush regime wants to create a pretext for a massive air attack on Iran by either i) staging a false flag terrorist indicent, or ii) by carrying out limited tactical strikes against Iranian forces supposedly aiding the Iraqi insurgents, in the hope that the expected Iranian retaliation with give then the justification for a major air attack by the US. People like Zbigniew Brezhinski, Paul Craig Roberts, Pat Buchanen, et al, can hardly be accused of being conspiracy nuts.
The one thing about this situation that worries me the most is that the Democratic congress, while opposing Bush on the future course in Iraq, has apparently rolled over to the well-financed, highly-vocal, and enormously powerful American pro-Israel lobby, and through its silence has essentially given Bush carte blanche on Iran. Couple with that is the steadily loudening anti-Iran drumbeat in the mainstream media.
It is all well and good to worry about peaking oil production, the prospect of steeply declining oil exports, global warming, tightening food supply and the like (these are things I worry about all the time), but the single most immediate and pressing concern that Americans need to squarely face is whether their president is going to bring the world to the precipice of WW III through a massive attack on Iran. The consequences of such an action are almost too horrible to ponder.
Westexas,
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/09/22/AR200709...
This is a link to a story couple of days ago. Read it, and the spin spin spin.
Though some things really stuck out.
The guy said 12 bombs were on the plane, six hot eggs, and six cold ones. Six hot on one wing. The guy responsible for checking, checked only one side (and it just happened to be the side with the cold eggs) and then signed off on the other without looking.
(12, I don't know, perhaps someone can verify. I have only seen pictures of that plane and they show 6 total, 3 on each wing., and the room for the 3 more, I dunno)
They claimed that it was only a case of perhaps being lazy etc. (though everything I have read says, NO WAY should this have happened, no way that many screw ups could happen with that many people around.
They said the nukes were in a SOD COVERED bunker with the other plain eggs. Nukes stored in a sod covered bunker. I dunno. Stored with regular eggs, huh. Just one series of guys not doing their job as trained, and it is brushed off as being expected because things were "lax".
SNIP
The plane landed and the crew that flew it in left it and went to dinner.
"It would be another nine hours -- until 8:30 p.m. -- before a Barksdale ground crew turned up at the parked aircraft to begin removing the missiles. At 8:45, 15 minutes into the task, a separate missile transport crew arrived in trucks. One of these airmen noticed something unusual about the missiles. Within an hour, a skeptical supervisor had examined them and ordered them secured.
By then it was 10 p.m., more than 36 hours after the warheads left their secure bunker in Minot.
Once the errant warheads were discovered, Air Force officers in Louisiana were alarmed enough to immediately notify the National Military Command Center, a highly secure area of the Pentagon that serves as the nerve center for U.S. nuclear war planning. Such "Bent Spear" events are ranked second in seriousness only to "Broken Arrow" incidents, which involve the loss, destruction or accidental detonation of a nuclear weapon.
The Air Force decided at first to keep the mishap under wraps, in part because of policies that prohibit the confirmation of any details about the storage or movement of nuclear weapons. No public acknowledgment was made until service members leaked the story to the Military Times, which published a brief account Sept. 5.
Officials familiar with the Bent Spear report say Air Force officials apparently did not anticipate that the episode would cause public concern. One passage in the report contains these four words:
"No press interest anticipated.""
END SNIP
NOW THIS IS THE INTERESTING PART.
Right when these guys started to work on the plane ANOTHER group showed up at the base and "discovered" the hot eggs. They stopped the work and alerted authorities and then they determined to keep the lid on it. Then it was leaked to Military times.
Notice that the "number" of eggs keeps changing.
First 5, then six, and its been quiet since, until the story now says 12 eggs with 6 hot and six cold. the first reports only spoke of 5 hot eggs in Louisiana. But that changed when it was discovered six had left. Now 12 is thrown into the mix.
http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_con...
Link has a first story that says 5 eggs were on the plane.
As for Wayne Madsen, He gets info, though if its correct or not and he is being used, or he is intentionally doing it I don't know. Its been a while, but I was put off by Wayne because of some claims he made during "Fitz's" investigation, and what he was about to do. Wayne was wrong. Though there were many that made claims about Fitz's charges. I'm pretty sure it was this. Wayne has a lot to say, and he is not always right.
The web bots. etc. Sorry it is BS. There record stinks. It used to be better, and there was a reason for that. Now that he can't use someone else's predictions, he stinks. Got caught, and I was there.
9/11 conspiracy theorists citing unnamed "sources."
That's something to take cum multi grani salis.
From the same website:
Draw your own conclusions about the credibility of "http://www.oregontruthalliance.org".
jbunt
So, Bill Clinton set it all up, since the operation started
a couple of years before Bush took office??
edit: keep in mind I'm not tying to defend the above mentioned site
I've begged and pleaded to keep 9-11 out of this forum, but to no avail.
if you think three high rise steel structures can be brought to the earth, in their foot print, within a fraction of a second of free fall speed you're a frecken idiot. the laws of physics don't just disappear for a day, or do they? how do pancaking floors vaporize vertical steel beams? several of the"hijackers" are still alive, wtf?
you seem to be an idiot,
please keep 911 out of here
Those three hiigh rise steel structures were brought down, but not in their own footprint (they caused extensive damage to neighboring buildings), nor within a second of free fall speeds (the collapses took over twice as long as free fall). The vertical steel beams did not "vaporize," and none of the hijackers are alive. Arab boys get first names from a very small list of names (those of Muhammad and his Companions), and Arabic surnames are also not very diverse. There are people in Arab countries who have names similar to those of some of the hijackers.
9/11 isn't particularly relevant here, but the paranoid impulse, one that you are displaying, needs to be stomped on whenever it rears its head.
And, when links to news sites are posted here, we have to evaluate the site's general credibility by seeing what else is posted there. If a site is hawking 9/11 conspiracy theories and related paranoia and silliness, it is worth pointing out, for that reason.
9/11 was an inside job, but don't take it from me. on http://www.ae911truth.org/ professional architects and engineers explain better than I can.
watch the WTC7 collapse videos here: http://www.wtc7.net/videos.html and tell me how this steel building, which was hit by no airplane and wasn't blazing on fire, suddenly collapsed neatly into its own footprint at free fall speed.
in Japan today about 200 million people believe that The Rape of Nanking never happened. the textbooks say so. In China, the textbooks all say it happened.
In Vietnamese textbooks, it says that America invaded Vietnam and killed a million or two people. In American textbooks, it talks about how America nobly struggled against a wicked communist minority and sadly lost - with a whopping 50,000 casualties!
Which side is correct?
Be careful who you call a "professional engineer." (Your sentence can be construed as saying that.) In the US, only those with their state's certification can call themselves that. More importantly, those engineers licensed to review structural designs are called structural engineers, and there are none at ae911truth.org.
Now, this link covers the ridiculous "free fall" claim about WTC 1 and 2. No camera recorded the entire collapse of WTC 7 (in the videos you see, the building falls below the sight line of buildings in front, so you only see the start. BUT, the Lamont Doherty seismograph recorded the event. It took 18 seconds. And as if you aren't wrong enough, check it out: it was very much on fire. And while it was not hit by the planes, it was hit by steel beams coming down from it at great height. Also, you made another false factual claim ("into its footprint"). The WTC7 collapse caused severe damage to neighboring buildings.
Which side is correct? The side that can write longer paragraphs before hitting the first factual error, for starters.
Apuleius,
Lets see you claim the high ground by what authority.
As for your "links". BS all of them on many fronts.
lets take only one, ok
the one to "screw loose change" where you claim authority on your link and call the architects BS. Your link starts off with these words.
"I'm not going to get into any extensive structural analysis focusing on the column structure and the collapse of the building; I'm not an engineer and unlike a lot of the folks in the 9-11 "Truth" movement I'm not going to play one on the Internet."
and yet what does he go on and do. THIS is your proof.
be quiet your not helping your cause. There are very strong rebuttals to each and everyone of your claims. Though we can't do it here. So I suggest you quit. You don't wish to have Leanan delete another thread do you.
Lets see you claim the high ground by what authority. If you're going to argue from authority, state yours before you challenge me for mine.
BS all of them on many fronts. If so, list one. Otherwise, don't be so quick to cast aspersions.
lets take only one, ok OK. the one to "screw loose change" where you claim authority on your link and call the architects BS. I have TWO links to SLC, and neither of them claim authority. The first link covers the "free fall" issue. The second shows that WTC was on fire, and that it damaged neighboring buildings.
be quiet your not helping your cause. There are very strong rebuttals to each and everyone of your claims. Actually, no, there aren't. The conspiracy theorists continue to REASSERT various factual claims, but are unable to respond to the ease with which those claims are debunked.
They claim the towers came down at freefall. Video footage, still photos, and the seismograph all show that they did not.
They claim the towers fell onto their footprint. The towners in fact caused severe damage to neighboring buildings.
They claim WTC 7 was not on fire. Photos and firefighter testonimony show that it was.
This kind of paranoid silliness is a major source of discredit for the Peak Oil preparedness movement. It needs to be stamped on.
You are crazy, WTC7 was just sitting there, doing nothing, and then suddenly it fell at freefall speed into its own footprint. Go to http://www.wtc7.net/ and watch the videos and tell me otherwise. It doesn't matter if some odd steel beams hit it. It was just standing there, doing nothing, maybe some smoke and fire coming out, and then suddenly freefall, own footprint. It went vertical, straight down to the ground. Visit http://www.wtc7.net/ and watch the F*CKING videos by CBS, ABC, NBC and tell me it's all good.. Bush is the god king and all the rest are terrorist communist anarchist anti-semitic dictators.
So, Apuleius, you've chosen to believe the nay-sayers. Ok. You may be right, but the site you referenced is hardly definitive, since it has its own issues with credibility IMO.
-
James Gervais
bmcnett made several specific fact claims. THe links I posted are definitive refutations of all of them. THey are not definitive on everything,
this is complete and utter boooolshite
you ether don't understand how
a, how things are built
b, how things are unbuilt
alternatively
c, you're a hack
d, you're a paid hack
e,your just a fecken iiot
f, I've lost my mind and buildings just collapse into dust and molten steel.
read your own links
keep 911 out of here
You need some coffee, some sleep, or some help. Possibly all three.
mbcnett made specific claims. I rebutted all of them. I think that much is done. As to you casting these weird aspersions, please spell and capitalize them better.
And yet you gleefully leap on a neutral post to get your opinion on the matter out there, starting up the very subthread you claim to want to avoid.
There's a reason I used the phrase "draw your own conclusions".
As a hint for next time, part of its meaning is "nobody wants to hear about your ridiculous theories right now, and if having them called ridiculous insults you, we doubly don't want to hear about them, so STFU".
You can fill in your own blanks for what counts as a "ridiculous theory"; some of you will be quite wrong, though.
I tend to be skeptical of any site that includes real or truth in the address.
AAA has added E-85 to their daily Fuel Gauge report. And quite interestingly, the also added the MPG.BTU adjusted price for E-85.
A lot of MSM and other's reference this page everyday.
http://www.fuelgaugereport.com/
"E-85 delivers approximately 25 percent fewer BTUs by volume than conventional gasoline"
BUT - can a conventional engine, even with spark and fuel adjusted for E85, even achieve that 25% reduction? It is my understanding that to properly set up an engine for ethanol, one must also increase the compression ratio. If that is in fact the case, then the theoretical BTUs in gasoline vs. E85 is a deceiving number, as you would not be able to take advantage of that in a typical FFV.
All an FFV is is a conventional engine with spark and fuel control adjusted, and the fuel system materials selected so that ethanol will not attack them. There is basically nothing to it, which is why the automakers make such a hype about it - it's cheap and easy.
I don't buy E-85 for my flex fuel Ranger even though it is readily available around here with all the ethanol plants. It's because the price is never less than 80% of the price of E-10. I get 80% of the mileage with E-85 that I get with E-10.
Here is very good article on the high human cost of Brazilian ethanol production:
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20670001&refer=news&sid=acyvyWb1Sk0Y
EROEI and market prices both leave out a lot of the costs of ethanol in Brazil.