Advice To Pres. Obama (#2): Yes We Can, But Will We?
Posted by nate hagens on January 15, 2009 - 12:49pm
The below post/letter is very important to me, as it brings together much of what I have worked on the past few years. We are at a major crossroads in the history of our nation and our world - the juncture where financial capital no longer can function as an effective marker for real capital. The crisis we face is the product of our own success - therefore it is highly unlikely to be fixed with the same policies and thinking that steered us to the present precipice. There are dozens if not hundreds of salient aspects of our supply and demand situation, each with its own cheerleaders, opponents and unaware. Unless one casts a wide boundary net, myopic focus on any particular issue runs the risk of creating more long term harm than good. In this letter, I attempt to highlight our situation's most critical components, not claiming other issues are unimportant, but that the following principles likely trump/supercede the others:
1) It is energy, not money, that powers our economies. Money is only a marker for real capital and the divergence is large and growing at an accelerating pace.
2) All energy is not equal- each energy investment entails different input costs, and has different output quality, often not recognized by the market system, nor by many environmentalists. We are at peak oil globally and are likely approaching the net energy cliff for the USA
3) We can likely deal with energy decline, but our current economic system of claims and wealth distribution cannot. It is likely that collective policy responses to resource depletion (more debt) will create another form of bottleneck in the form of currency dislocations or social reactions to jubiliee.
4)The highest odds for arriving at a better energy future lie in exploration of, understanding of, and ultimate jettisoning of our cultural addiction/habituation to conspicuous consumption. Ends and then means.
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Dear President Obama,
Let me start by explaining where I am coming from. Until a few years ago, I worked as a Wall Street trader and hedge fund manager. I am now finishing a PhD. in Natural Resources from the University of Vermont with a specialization in Ecological Economics. I am neither capitalist nor communist nor Republican nor Democrat, but just a concerned citizen of this country and this planet. I have recently come to see that there is a great deal hidden from view both about our energy resources and our energy consumption. In this letter, I would like to explain what some of these things are. In addition to this overview, there are over 3,000 essays and analyses in theoildrum.com archives, written by a staff of extremely bright civically minded volunteers, outlining the myriad energy challenges and opportunities we face.
INTRODUCTION
Imagine two scenarios - 1)in the first 2 years of your Presidency, the US Treasury 'prints' $100 trillion** of new 'capital' to be spent on infrastructure, reviving the economy, etc. - far in excess of the $1.2 trillion budget deficit you expect to incur in 2009 (and even in excess of the $24 trillion the IEA has suggested needs to be spent to assure future oil flows) - and 2)instead of issuing this new debt, all the world's billionaires and nations in monetary surplus donate this $100 trillion to the US Treasury – effectively for you/Congress to spend and allocate.
In the second scenario, we are not only out of hock but rich again! All problems solved right? DJIA 30,000? Not so fast - there is another important fact connected to this thought experiment. The energy surplus (gross energy less energy costs) we derive from world fossil fuels is declining, possibly approaching energy break-even for new fields in the US. It requires about 245 kilojoules to lift 5kg of oil 5 km out of the ground - a physical (minimum) fact that will not vary whether the number of digits in the worlds banks increases or shrinks. As such, the above two scenarios would both be equally ineffective at reviving the economy for any period of time- even with plenty of 'money' - the first would likely just add an extra digit or two to the nominal lack of goods affordability. Energy and natural resources are what we have to spend - in the long run a transfer of money from rich to poor (or vice versa) is just a transfer of one abstraction to another abstraction - those altruistic billionaires will feel poorer and the government dole recipients will feel successfully bailed out, but the real assets constraining future trajectories didn't change. In the (very) short run however, whoever holds the money, does control the energy. Due to our belief in fiat, short run changes to monetary system (rules, leverage, margin, debt, derivatives, etc), CAN increase the energy spigot. But at a steep price.
Oil Supply Costs Based on CERA Analysis - From Horizon Energy November Investor Presentation
-Click to EnlargeENERGY QUANTITY
Our society survives as any living organism does, on top of harnessing daily solar ecosystem services we convert carbon from a low state of entropy to a higher state of entropy and live off the heat produced by the reaction. The easy carbon (fossil fuel) pickings have largely been picked. Though costs have been coming down in past few months, the above graph gives a flavor of the problem that until recently the IEA/CERA/Bodmans of the world would not voice - the horizon of overall affordability for social democracies is receding, and though the manifestation may be in currencies and debt, the origins are in energy / natural resources. The average replacement cost of oil is far in excess of the current commodity price, especially in non-OPEC countries. To increase reserves and maintain flow rates, we must drill in the oceans, off continental shelves, use expensive horizontal laterals, drill deeper and in more environmentally sensitive areas and define more things as oil. Technology is always in a race with depletion, and in the late innings loses at an accelerated rate (due to complexity). Because of this, costs have risen much faster than revenues. The fact that US oil and gas stocks have plummeted while oil is still 400% higher than a decade ago, is suggestive we are far closer to energy break-even than the DOE or API might admit, and $ break-even will occur before energy break-even. The heavy economic lifting so long undertaken by the energy sector will soon need help from the rest of 'productive' society, or from exporting countries which face similar problems. With new investments being unaffordable and/or unfinanceable, the global oil production rate will increasingly align with it's natural decline rate - approaching 7-8% and rising as small/offshore fields replace giant/onshore ones. This suggests even with current deflationary forces due to credit unwind, we likely have a few short years before depletion again overtakes even reduced demand, and this time, there will be no new peak in supply when prices rise. If the economic system remains intact, we will have a series of high amplitude price swings in oil and natural gas, getting sharper and shorter as depletion/high costs dominate. Indeed, it is probably the slope of the net energy cliff which will shape our future more than anything else (assuming social stability is maintained through paper currency reform). Essentially Mr. President, though there is undoubtedly a great deal of oil and gas remaining, a lower aggregate energy surplus means it may cost more to procure than society has the ability to pay, at least in the currencies that matter: energy and other limited natural resources. (An example of a hypothetical society encountering lower energy surplus can be read here). Debt and cheap energy have allowed positional goods consumption to increase for the majority of Americans who are not in the top tiers of society -without cheap energy or available (fiat) credit, the camouflaged social barriers within our country are likely to fade away.
High quality, low cost energy has enabled our economic engine, and kept our social democracy intact. There is a high correlation between energy consumption per person and GDP over the past 50 years. If energy costs continue to increase in energy terms, even with trillions of new credit injected via your government entities, it will eventually require more in energy inputs to procure a new barrel of oil from domestic territory than the amount of joules contained in that barrel. Of course, most energy 'analysts', trained in economic concepts will say 'all we need is $30,40,50 trillion and we will have enough energy for decades'. Don't fall for it Mr. President. At some point between $1.2 trillion and the $100 trillion thought experiment, even Rush Limbaugh and Larry Kudlow will recognize that ‘money’ can't procure ‘resources’. Marginal costs of growth now likely exceed marginal benefits, so that real physical growth makes us poorer, not richer. Bite the bullet now and admit that growth was great while it was possible but now each additional trillion you create from thin air to feed the current constituency, makes their childrens future so much worse. Without increases in energy we cannot grow (unless we conserve or become more efficient), without growth we cannot repay debt, without debt we won't finance future energy development. And every additional debt dollar is already adding less and less to GDP. The sooner we educate policymakers about this constraint the better choices we will make - Energy and scarce resources are what we have to spend – money is just who has the energy (for now).
-Click to EnlargeThe fundamental principles of net energy are ignored by most in Washington (and the energy industry) where costs in terms of dollars and market signal via current price have been the lone decision criteria that have brought us to this energy precipice. The energy return on the energy we are spending is declining, possibly rapidly (we can only estimate these figures because data is no longer kept in non-$ terms). As we replace 'old, high energy surplus' sources with 'new, lower energy surplus' alternatives, our energy cash flow decreases. At some minimum aggregate threshold (red line in graph), the entire surplus is spent on maintenance, repair, etc. and there can no longer be growth - I believe we are past this point. (We do know we've gone from over 100:1 in the 1930's to 30:1 in the 1970s to a range of 10-17:1 in 2000 (primer) and something anecdotally much less today (note: this is total energy return, which is fixed plus marginal - marginal costs for oil are very low -basic lifting and some labor-, raising the possibility we are in the midst of a stealth energy cliff -since most energy infrastructure was built and paid for when oil/natural gas prices were low, we are still 'spending' the cheap marginal flow rates from earlier days, even though we can't afford their replacements!) It is logical that financial analysts, or even Presidents, don't start to notice our decline in physical return until the lack of continued energy surplus eats into the economy, forcing the 'profit' to be made up different ways (no-doc loans, leverage for banks, easy credit, etc.) - essentially in abstract ways not tethered to anything physical. Lead into gold but in reverse. The situation is even more dire on the natural gas treadmill, as it is largely a domestic market, overall decline is approximately 40% per year, and the commodity price is far below both average and marginal cost. Drilling and exploration will crash befor your Presidency ends, and production with it.
In a sentence, we have lots of energy, but not enough cheap energy to continue a social democracy 300 million strong pursuing growth and possessing the claims and aspirations they believe are theirs.
(*Note In the Journal - Energies, there is an upcoming paper by Hall, Murphy et al. titled "What is the Minimum EROI that a Sustainable Society Must Have?" that looks at the above concepts in greater detail.
ENERGY QUALITY
Modern society has been built and developed not only on a large annual energy surplus, but also become dependent on specific energy properties. Light sweet crude oil is incredibly energy dense, transportable at room temperature, and can be procured from a very small land footprint -drilling under the earths surface. Energy quality, such as differences in power density, gravimetric and volumetric density, conversion efficiencies, intermittency, storability, environmental externalities, spatial distribution, transportability, etc. is not equal - even (and especially) because an energy alternative is labeled as 'green'. A successful energy transition will match up the energy asset/liability balance sheet of our built infrastructure. The new post-fossil fuel era will require huge changes, as the mismatch currently is so large as to be virtually impossible once depletion catches up with the fall in demand (barring a war-time scaling of nuclear/(thorium?) plants).
Finally, Energy Return on Energy Invested(EROI or ERoEI) times scale added up over energy types gives us a rough idea of our energy budget, but we can (and should) calculate similar ratios for other limiting resources – Energy Return on Water Invested, Energy Return on Land invested, etc. As net energy declines, it stands to reason that the Energy return on NON-ENERGY inputs will decline faster. (examples are going from concentrated light sweet oil fields to tar sands, needing both more land, and water inputs – ditto with biofuels.) Once we approach and sink into a single digit average EROEI era, a higher % of energy AND non-energy resources (water, labor, land, etc.) will have to be devoted to energy production. This is the as yet unseen tragedy of biofuels and similar low energy gain technologies. On the surface, they seem better (renewable), but a) the inputs allocated to their procurement previously generated far more energy - (returns that are no longer available yet continue to be spent being the key point), b)they require more land, water, NPK, and generate negative externalities (large scale windpower a notable exception). Each attempt to buttress the energy supply side of our situation should be measured in a multi-criteria framework.
DEBT
Debt serves as a spatial and temporal re-allocator of goods and services from the future and periphery to the present and center. In every single year I've been alive our country has increased its debt more than we grew our output. The amount of debt, depending on assumptions is north of $60 trillion, and over $100 trillion if we include unfunded social security and medicare benefits. Austerity measures and new social goals are what are called for, yet the growth treadmill demands constant new debt issuance to service the aggregate of prior claims or the whole house of cards implodes. Remember that money is created by the will of our bankers - a loan and deposit are both simultaneously willed into existence and our 'money as debt' balance sheet increases both ledgers - however the loan is issued with terms 'plus interest' so over time debt at time T requires higher output at time T+1 otherwise a deflationary cycle begins absent new aggregate credit creation. New debt that is injected into the economy, as long as it is spent somewhere on something (anything), will create GDP that wouldn’t otherwise exist. You will face this Keynesian carrot early on as a seeming answer to our problems. It is not. Keynesianism dies in the face of resource depletion and net energy decline. New (net) debt at the end of a paradigm will feed hungry mouths but at a cost of destroying our currency. I should point out you are not alone in facing this problem. Essentially the whole developed world creates leveraged credit without tether.
Supply side summary ===> Maximize the quality adjusted, non-energy input equalized, 'energy cash flow'. This is your real 'budget'. (A stricter, 'greener' budget would also internalize the externalities.) In order to do this you need to get away from people measuring 'wealth' in digits. As seen below, this will not be easy, but certainly is doable.
THE BIG KAHUNA (DEMAND)
Our species in general and Americans in particular have the wiring and drive to be consumptive machines. No matter how many goods we acquire over time, our pecuniary desires seem to increase faster than our acquisitions. Combine this with our mirror neurons(video), between-and-within-nation aspiration gaps (based on biologic underpinnings of relative fitness), an evolutionary penchant for waste, a built in drive to outcompete, a culture that fosters keeping up with the Joneses with a high % of Veblen goods, and the result is a frenetic feedback loop that has a vast plurality of Americans now Jonesing, many nearly broke, obese, and a fair number realizing, without knowing the details, that something is amiss. Alternative measures of 'keeping score' other than GDP concur that we are losing ground. Fortunately, subjective well being studies show we are equally happy as the average Phillipino, yet use 39 times the primary energy. This I view (as should you) as a great opportunity. In the end, humans are 'adaptation-executors', not utility maximizers. (This is really an ace in the hole - because it strongly suggests we do not need the economic 'utility' machine to make us happy).
Facing our bigger problems requires that we individually and collectively become better able to consider and more heavily weight the future vis-a-vis the present. However, recent research suggests that addicts, and many other social groups (including men), have steeper discount rates - less able to access longer term thinking and action. Furthermore, there are numerous cognitive biases, ideological immunity (the Planck Problem), and belief systems that stand in the way of change.
Demand Side Summary===> We are hard-wired to compete, and our brains are easily hijacked and confused by modern stimuli. Both these aspects lead to incredible wastes of energy and resources. It is the most politically difficult area, but also the one with lots of low hanging fruit.
CONCLUSION AND SOME SUGGESTIONS
We are trained to believe that "money" is to the economy what "energy" is to the physical world. Your current advisers extrapolate what is "economically" possible to be "physically" possible too - but this is patently untrue. If energy is what we have to spend, we are even running more of a deficit that commonly known. We import 70% of our oil and pay for it with dollars. Someday soon someone will recognize this trick. "Replacing" this quantity and quality of energy is not possible, nor affordable by a long shot. Admit this, devote resources to accurately determining what our energy and natural resource principal and cash flows are and then make difficult choices on how to allocate these. A great many marginal industries are going to have to be stopped. Greener substitutions will require multi-criteria analysis: e.g. a move from ICE to electric cars would still need to consider the metals used and the significant water requirements vis-a-vis what they replace.
A birds-eye view will see our system as little more than satisfying short term cravings, turning resources rapidly into garbage, and concentrating wealth claims in fewer and larger hands. Repeat every day. Wealth itself is not bad, but a social democracy will stretch only so far in its GINI coefficient before snapping - (look to some European peers for (more) successful models). From a prescriptive standpoint, looking beyond putting out the Presidential short term fires du jour, the long term strategy should be some sort of Ecological Keynesianism, that is, spending of financial capital to best maximize future real capital. If we can’t get enough current flow rate from surplus energy we will borrow from poor countries, from environments, and increasingly, from the future.
The demand side is where the real opportunities lie: the main points are that we need to understand why humans behave the way they do, otherwise we are not going anywhere. Missing on your staff are neuroscientists, behavioral economists, and evolutionary psychologists – three disciplines that will eventually, given time and energy, converge on a unified theme of human nature. One driver that is already clear is that we cannot change our neural drive to want ‘more’ – but we can, via cultural transmission, via example and via strong visionary leadership, change how we ‘define’ more.
Here is a sampling of some ideas that may help. As radical as some may seem, these are the types of steps needed to turn in the right direction. Almost by definition they are all politically untenable, but that is the point we have reached:
1)Put a floor on energy prices. The marginal barrel is killing future production. However, wait 6 months or so in doing this. Then the market will show you how many of these 'alternative energies' are actually viable, given that we don't have accurate energy input output data. However, if oil (and particularly natural gas) prices remain below average cost for long, depletion is going to accelerate beyond what we can judiciously manage.
2) Scale wind turbines everywhere that they can be scaled, particularly those places with offsetting hydro-electric backup. On a long term basis they are a far better investment than new money towards oil or natural gas, provided that updating the grid receives commensurate attention. But that means moving away from liquid fuels in a timely fashion and eventually moving away from 24/7 365 electricity on demand. (Wind has added benefit of not increasing water requirements for electric vehicles)
3a) Focusing energy policy and social change on anthropogenic global warming is at best a half-measure and at worst could have negative repercussions, for two reasons: First, if there is a cold winter or three for whatever reason, and in a period of severe economic hardships high quality energy is being used to mitigate GHGs that might be spent on other needs then the populace may quickly lose their buy-in to carbon taxes etc. and behavioral changes that were enacted DUE to global warming. But more importantly: it removes focus and responsibility from the larger problems we face: as long as we compete for conspicuous consumption, the non-GHG externalities from more consumption will increase to offset GHG reduction policies (kind of like quitting drinking and taking up sugar – 'serotonin deficiency' is root cause not alcoholism). In sum, we should definitely be concerned about our impact on planetary ecosystems (our nest) and what toxins we emit, but this should be part of a larger science based roadmap not the entire roadmap. This will have the positive externality of mitigating climate change as well! In a sentence, we can't fight AGW by compromising our energy predicament, but can fight both by reducing consumption.
3b) On the spectrum of carbon taxes, cap and trade ,etc. consider gradually introducing a consumption tax instead. Subsidize basic needs and severely tax Veblen goods.
4)Gradually move to 100% reserve requirements in the banking system and once a new social goal other than GDP is set, eliminate the Basel II haircut advantages for sovereign, AAA debt etc. Creating money (and debt) only partially out of thin air is preferable to completely out of thin air. .
5)Our behaviour and ability to plan for the future is impacted by the poor nutrition most accessible in our current food system. We need healthier choices in our schools, convenience stores and supermarkets, perhaps even a subsidy for growing home gardens. In addition to having an obesity epidemic that is accelerating, sugar has now been shown to be a gateway drug (Hoebel, Princeton) and chronic use results in lowered serotonin levels which in turn increases discount rates which has been shown to increase our focus of thinking about what they want/need today at a cost to the future. Exactly the opposite of what we need to impact longer term sustainability. (So a meaningful chunk of both basic needs procurement and behavioural change can be accomplished by moving away from industrial agriculture/ processed food and towards more locally intensive, whole food production). If we can't grow the food locally and provide appropriate nutrition, I would consider taxing or eliminating altogether refined sugar products, and refined carbohydrate foods in our grocery stores and convenience stores. Instituting national exercise programs (like in Naperville IL), would also pay neural dividends. America has lost our ability to wait for the second marshmallow, and our diets are at least partially to blame.
6)In the same vein, biophysical facts are going to require economic triage - some businesses and sectors are going to have to go. Consider directing this inevitability by taxing or eliminating any industry promoting products that lead to addiction, making us culturally less able to act for the long term; e.g. the gambling industry, indian casinos, Vegas, online poker rooms etc. The easy access millions of young people worldwide have to online poker contributes (as do many things) to hijacking our neural dopamine highways, which we then habituate to and consume more in other areas. People will continue to gamble anyways but at least the revenues will filter locally. Most neuroscientists and evolutionary biologists would agree we are not 'intelligent' enough to overcome the smorgasbord of impulses offered. I recommend reading "American Mania" by Dr Peter Whybrow at UCLA or contacting him directly. In a sentence, in addition to positive examples, we're going to need negative reinforcements as well. Sticks and carrots, directed away from waste and towards primary needs. It has been done before.
7 Eliminate leverage on Wall street. Yes this will remove 'income' opportunities, but it will deter future volatility, and inherently transfer human talent into more productive sectors Derivatives are creative ways up squeezing more social amplitude out of nothing, by creating nothing and the vast majority aren't helping manage future risks but enlarging them.
8. I expect you will soon advocate a large fiscal stimulus program. Instead of $500 stimulus checks that will be spent on short term stuff, please consider something out of the box, like gifting a quality bicycle to each American instead. Bicycles are the most energy efficient invention known to man, better than walking, far better than driving, and slightly better than a full double decker bus. They represent a long term investment in energy infrastructure, improved health, and a statement of change. Those too young, old or infirm to use the bicycles can trade them for other necessities, but the bikes will be out there, as part of future energy savings. If this is too radical perhaps start by giving corporate tax incentives for those who bike to work.
Please take seriously the task of matching our real assets with our real liabilities as soon as possible. You are a very smart man and well understand the implications of acting later as opposed to sooner on these tough choices, when our liabilities have increased and our assets have shrunk. Just ahead of us is a waterfall that few can clearly see. Even our scientists are focused on measuring the water speed, distance to the waterfall, building bigger canoes and larger life preservers, etc. But one path that hasn't been duly considered, is just paddling towards shore, and walking the rest of the way. You're the President, so if anyone in politics can resist the pressure to conform, you can.
Yes we can, but we need to use lateral thinking, be realistic, and be bold.
Sincerely,
Nate Hagens
Gund Institute for Ecological Economics
Rubenstein School of Environment and Natural Resources
Editor - www.theoildrum.comp.s. If ever in doubt, Herman Daly is just a cab ride away.
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Excellent points about demand.
The whole consumption paradigm is massively out of whack with ecological limits and reality. But people are much more willing to talk about alternative energy than tackle the main things we have to do--use a whole lot less energy and consume a whole lot less stuff. How to sell such a program as "redefining more" is beyond me.
On the supply side, I would like to add to your prescriptions
8) Negotiate a rapid reduction to zero of global fossil fuel extraction (especially coal and oil). Doing this consciously--rather than letting resource depletion do it for us--will let us feel that we are still in some kind of control (a deep psychological need, for now) of the power down, and may help avoid runaway GW (to the extent that that cat isn't already out of the bag.)
Sure, that might be politically impossible, but not much more than many other things on your (excellent, IMHO) wish list.
Typo - 3rd line down after ENERGY QUALITY
Light sweet crude oil in incredibly energy dense, transportable at room temperature,
I think you mean "is"
2020
thanks -fixed- i wrote half of this since 5 am - (Gail was very helpful in pointing out many such typos btw thanks Gail)
Since power has a physical meaning, "It is energy, not money, that powers our economies" has one too: it is energy, not money, that is required if our economies are to continue consuming energy at a certain greater-than-zero rate.
Similarly, it is water, not money, that wets our economies; it is zinc, not money, that galvanizes them; etc. If your advice gets to Obama and you get no response, you can be fairly confident that it got all the attention it deserves.
And from me, more than it deserves. For 15 kg oil lifted 5 m to Earth's surface, mgh is 735 J, not 750000 J. If "5 m" is a typo for "5 km", the larger value would be about right: assuming terrain denser than oil didn't settle as it was extracted, and push it up for us, 0.004 of its energy would be used in lifting it.
--- G.R.L. Cowan (How fire can be domesticated)
I sense some snideness in your writing, but if you're trying to make a factual point, you've either forgotten it, obfuscated it, or simply left it up the imagination of the reader. I also wouldn't be too quick to advertise that website as any kind of indicator of your ability to communicate or do anything more than simply confound the reader. It's the writer's responsibility to be understandable if he wants to be understood.
Nate: outstanding, readable synthesis of many threads. Cynics will rain on your optimism, with some valid points; but if we don't try, in the current situation, where are we? That's the message of this moment in time.
Over my now several years on TOD, I've been increasingly fascinated by the connection between Homo sapiens' propensity for religious belief and practice in relation to group cooperation and adaptation to resource constraints. I'll confess that this has not risen to top priority for me yet, but I intend to move more systematically in this direction in the next year or two. As most TODers are scientists/engineers, they've been inattentive if not hostile to this facet of the human condition. There is interesting work in anthropology on the relationship between religiosity, cooperation and adaptation. A key insight is that religious rituals promote group cohesion by requiring members to engage in behavior that is too costly to fake.
Thanks LO - I too have become fascinated with the explosion of recent books on fundamentalism, belief systems and cognitive explanations why we 'feel' we know something irrespective of the facts. It would have to be the largest explanation of why 1/2 people will rain on me for being too optimistic and the other 1/2 will rail on me for being too pessimistic. Everyone has their viewpoint and it only changes slightly around the edges.
My biggest latest 'a-ha', which I alluded to above and will be topic of next post is the linkage between industrial ag (as opposed to locally grown food), serotonin deficiency, cravings (for food AND goods) and steep discount rates - all related to diet.
Excellent as always Nate.
To a pessimist, a realist looks like an optimist. To an optimist, a realist looks like a pessimist. You can't win in the perceptions game. But science will prevail on the truth of things. Unless of course we kill off all the scientists. I think Shakespeare had a better idea, but I don't want to piss anyone off.
George
Excellent Nate. Your usual eloquence outstanding and I agree with everything you say.
Those of us on this site and especially those on the "Killer Ape Peak Oil" list will recognize the hundreds/thousands of hours of reading and learning condensed into this single post. To take the contents of this post on-board requires is an implicit understanding of a very wide array of knowledge, which the broad masses simply do not have. Neither do our political leaders. Even if some do, they will place more importance on representing their constituents than initiating action. This is the real logjam.
This problem can and does exist at a personal level. My wife accuses me of being a pessimist. She is an intelligent person (a psycho-therapist) who is simply bored by the myriad and arcane detail such as the laws of thermodynamics, oil production data, energy sources, energy options, EROI, ecology etc etc. The result is I read something different into events and problems than she does. She tends to see things as a string of unrelated discreet issues, whereas I "connect the dots" and if I start a discussion about the possible underlying causes and the likely impacts I am accused of being a "pessimist". When I then point out that the economic problems of the last six months, while not unexpected, have have occurred far more swiftly and have been far more damaging in a shorter period of time than anything I previously envisaged, say as recently as last June. (I therefore must be an optimist, but have little chance of persuading her of this).
My point is: If my wife, who lives with someone who understands the human thermodynamic challenge (and even recently received a Master of Sustainability Sciences degree), but nevertheless refuses to take the knowledge or implications on board, what hope do we have of shifting the mindset of the masses?
None! (I would suggest)
Ask her to read it and what are the parts she disagrees with or doesn't understand. Perhaps buy her the book "On Being Certain - Believing You are Right, Even When You are Not"
But I have come to similar conclusions - the answers lie in behaviour, and belief systems and both are nearly impossible to change. So the leverage is in learning the cultural mechanism of change. In so many ways we are still very 'rich', but under current paradigm we're beyond bankrupt.
Nate-
Just finished "On Being Certain"
I enjoyed it, but the book seemed to digress into relativism.
The author is certain about certain political and economic realities, that maybe are not something to be certain about.
The science is excellent, but selective.
Ya - that's the thing about science....;-)
Below is a sampling of the recent books related to the evolutionary roots of belief, self-deception and how we change our decisions (the sample that I own -which I actually haven't gotten to all of them yet. Suffice it to say I'm a bit obsessed with the topic..;-)
Vital Lies, Simple Truths: The Psychology of Self-Deception Daniel Goleman
Why We Lie: The Evolutionary Roots of Deception and the Unconscious Mind David Livingstone Smith
Why We Believe What We Believe: Uncovering our Biological Need for Meaning, Spirituality, and Truth Newberg
Making Up the Mind: How the Brain Creates our Mental World Chris Frith
Lying and Deception in Everyday Life Michael Lewis
Gut Feelings - The Intelligence of the Unconscious Gerd Gizerenzer
Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking Malcom Gladwell
Mirroring People: The New Science of How We Connect With OthersMarco Iacaboni
How God Changes Your Brain - Breakthrough Findings from a Leading Neuroscientist
Huma: The Science of What Makes us Unique Michael Gazzaniga
Kluge: The Haphazard Construction of the Human Mind Dr. Gary Marcus.
Predictably Irrational: The Hidden Forces that Shape our Decisions Professor Dan Ariely (MIT)
The Happiness Hypothesis: Finding Truth in Ancient Wisdom Prof Jonathan Haidt
Religious Thought and Behavior As Byproducts of Brain FunctionPascal Boyer (pdf)
Why People Believe Weird Things: PseudoScience, Superstition and Other Confusions of our Time Shermer
The Demon Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark Carl Sagan and Ann Druyan
How We Know What Isn't So: The Fallibility of Human Reason in Everyday LifeThomas Gilovich
Don't Believe Everything You Think: The Six Basic Mistakes We Make in ThinkingThomas Kida
(and, just arrived...;-)
un-Spun - Finding Facts in a World of Disinformation
Once and Future Myths - The Power of Ancient Stories in Our Lives
A Mind of It's Own - How the Brain Distorts and Deceives
The Tenacity of Unreasonable Beliefs
I plan on revisiting this topic in depth. The groups that REALLY believe (in something) are going to become more prevalent in near future. In my opinion (and experience), beliefs die hard. The sooner new beliefs (via education) come about, the less polarized things will be once events become less manageable.
But that's just my belief...;-)
Nate, have you seen any of these lectures? you might like them.
Enlightenment 2.0
Nate-
You should add Daniel Dennett to your list.
I just attended a lecture at Stanford by Dennett on Monday.
The Sagen book is excellent.
Dennett is brilliant - "Darwin's Dangerous Idea" and "Conciousness Explained" are terrific books. Haven't read "Breaking the Spell" yet.
Hello my name is Michelle,
I have been reading this site for some time now.
You have a very interesting list of books there in order to understand religion.
These all skirt the issue, providing intellect to an aspect of humanity that is chaotic and metamorphic, umm and dreamy.
May I suggest some reading that may bear more feasible fruit for your adventure?
Joseph Campbell. If you get deep into his scholarly books, rather than his layman ones. I think it will reveal this world to you with a wholism that these novel books miss.
Thanks Michelle
Hi Michelle,
My name is Airdale. Not my real name but a 'handle' as it were.
I wonder if you will come back to this location and see if you received any replies.
I see you have been a member for 55 minutes so I am doubtful.
"Might I suggest some reading that may also bear feasible fruit for you" in what ever adventure YOU are on.
I suggest reading the Old Testament in Hebrew. Its a bit tough and you have to cross some barriers. The best way is with Robert Atler's book
The Five Books of Moses...
This will get you started on a revelation. That what the Kings James version says is the way it is, is not really the way it is at all.
The result of many translations of the English King James version is full of omissions, translates badly and comments wrong fully.
To read in Hebrew is breath taking as to the real truth of the symbolic and real truth of the Old Testament.
Now if you get started on that and make some progress then you need to proceed on to the to Kaballah in its various forms. Zohar and so forth but the best is the Sefer Yetzirah by say...Aryeh Kaplan.
The kaballah in several books is the ultra orthodox Jewish view of what reality via the Godhead is all about.
It you are the least bit interested in spirituality that is...and so I ask this question...Who would you think might have a better understanding of God(Elohim or Adoni)? A guy who walks out of the hills or backwoods and says "I been called by God to preach"..and his has just some emotions but no background at all..in fact he is a egotist who sense a way to make money with an easy job.....
Or would you go to the people know as God's Chosen People who have been studying this area for over 3,000 years? Who might have a real good insight then?
So the essence of my advice to you.
Or others who may wish to follow the thread far more closely and with a view to those who have studied in far far more in depth that blow-dried tele-evangalists who have not even been to a theological apprenticeship nor much else.
There are many books today in the bookstores on the kaballah. Very difficult reading. Skip the gemetria parts. Go for the sefirot. Go for the rest.
I have spent most of my life in church. I learned very little. When I really started as above I spent 6 weeks on just the first several w verses of Genesis 1. I spent months on just Genesis itself.
Its not for everybody. Likely you will go to the bookstore and do a quick scan and lay it down and walk out.
Good luck then on the rest of your life.
Airdale-of course what I find worthy is not what even my kinfolks think is worthy. In fact I don't discuss it with them. They sit in the pews. I sit in the woods instead.
PS. There is the material. And there is the spiritual. One can be explained to a large degree by laws and rules we make up as we go along. There are few if any rules for spirituality. I think it should be that way else we would rapidly trash it and make a soap opera out of it...in fact there probably already is one.
We are dying or soon will for following the one and not the other or merging them in some way that works. The Native Americans did so.
We took their land and killed most of them. They are still around but we don't care about them anymore. Thats what we do. We kill things. We trash the rest. We are dumb. We will perhaps learn the hard way,,,the very very hard way. Maybe.
PPS. Welcome btw to TOD.
To read in Hebrew is breath taking as to the real truth of the symbolic and real truth of the Old Testament.
Do you believe the Old Testament to be 100% fact, part fact and part fiction, or 100% fiction but inspiring?
Do I sense some critic in your statement ;)?
What do you think yourself? Do you think your perception of "reality" around you is
a) 100% what you see
b) 50% what you see and 50% "something else"
c) 100% belief
Keep working on expanding your spirituality - maybe this is the moment you become enlightened, who knows, maybe you start looking
beacuse of this thread today... ;)
I thought it was a perfectly legitimate and interesting question.
Yours is not.
I am sorry - it is difficult to express always what a person thinks. Sorry to have offended you.
I mean: there are at least two ways to look at reality (about example: an old book).
1) vision, physical senses
A book reads a story. Pretty much as described in post answer below. The names are roughly correct.
Rest is fiction.
2) spiritual
What does the author really try to teach the reader? What did the author know/feel/think?
Can that be conveyed in any other way than option 1) above? I feel that, personally.
To separate that feeling from 1) is very difficult. It could be connected (by reading, images are constructed solely by
my known information in my brain).
Few people like to discuss this, so if you find my thoughts to be nonsense, thats fine. Thoughts in this direction (training) has a tendency
to change profondly how option 1) appears to an individual. Its like switches
in the brain changing state. I tend to define it as "an individual starts to appreciate to believe".
Makes sense?
Do I sense some critic in your statement ;)?
I will likely make a critical statement if the poster replies that the Old Testament is 100% true or something close to it.
What do you think yourself?
The family tree info, murders, marriages, births, battles could be passed on fairly accurately and remain more fact than fiction. Adam and Eve and the Garden of Eden, Jonah and the whale, Noah and the ark, Moses parting the Red Sea and getting a tablet given to him from a higher being, God creating the universe in 7 days, God choosing the Israelites - fiction.
Do you think your perception of "reality" around you is
a) 100% what you see
b) 50% what you see and 50% "something else"
c) 100% belief
Out of those three I pick a).
Keep working on expanding your spirituality - maybe this is the moment you become enlightened, who knows, maybe you start looking
because of this thread today... ;)
What should I do to expand my spirituality?
"What should I do to expand my spirituality?"
Is a possible answer: Keep asking yourself that question throughout your life? I try going down that road myself. Should work fine.
Michelle - thanks for bringing up Joseph Campbell. I have read him for most of my adult life and I continue to find his thinking inspirational as well as realistic. His explorations of comparative mythology changed the cultural paradigm for westerners whether you've heard of him or not.
For those uninitiated with Campbell may I suggest starting with his most accessible work: Hero With A Thousand Faces. His philosophy of life was:
What Joe Campbell might have to say about Peak Oil or Climate Change will have to be left to conjecture since he's been dead for over 15 years.
Joe
You missed a good one:
Six Impossible Things Before Breakfast: The Evolutionary Origins of Belief by Lewis Wolpert.
That's a lot of reading (and I read a lot). I suppose we're not totally off topic, so do any of those books get into the thorny question of why some people virtually take it for granted (some times) that the feeling of certainty is untrustworthy, while others won't even consider the idea? Or, how is it that we can be blind to our own stubborn refusal to consider alternatives to some ideas, but perfectly happy to jettison others at a moment's notice?
It's that line of inquiry that I suspect (believe? ;-) will bear the most fruit in trying to figure out how to successfully communicate foreign ideas without smashing into peoples' biases. It is interesting to think that our attitudes to ideas may be highly dependent on our state of mind, itself dependent as much or more on environmental (diet, exercise, rest, safety, etc.) as genetic factors.
Long time lurker, first time post...
Your letter is the best integration of the key issues that I have seen. Well done!
I too have concluded that behavior change is required for any answer. Unfortunatley the path we are on will only result in behavior change after much hardship and loss of life.
I have been thinking about less painful paths to change and have concluded that a new religion might be the answer.
As an aetheist I am amazed at the power that religion holds over the majority of our species. The need for religion is clearly wired into our brains. And my reading of history suggests that new religious ideas like Christianity and Islam can spread very fast in the right circumstances.
I am thinking we need a new global science based religion that marvels at the beauty and improbability of our existence and that worships our planet and ecosystem.
I recommmend a new book that I am part way through titled "Reinventing the Sacred" by Stuart A. Kauffman. He makes a specific proposal along these lines.
Hope you don't think I'm a wacko, I'm not. I'm just trying to think of something that might actually work on a large scale, and that does not involve mass starvation or slaughter.
Keep up the good work!
I don't think you're a wacko. I think you're right.
John Michael Greer is a Druid, I suspect at least partly because he thinks we need a new religion for a resource-constrained world.
Druids are an AD&D character class, not a religion for the 21st century.
I have trouble with the idea myself - but Greer is a great writer about some very interesting subjects (that relate to this site very well) - so I am a fan, but unlikely to convert any time soon (all my solstices are just booked up)
- don't hate on people who roll 12-sided dice mos ;-)
It's interesting to me how time seems to give respectability to religion - nobody thinks Judism, Christianity, Islam or Buddhism are anything but mainstream belief systems. But LDS, well, a bit more recent, seems a bit suspect to many (poll #'s in the last election support this) - and then even more modern religions like Scientology and the neo-paganism of Wicca and Druids seem pretty far-fetched to most. I wonder if our culture survives another 500 years, would Travolta's or Greer's beliefs seem pretty mainstream?
I'd certainly like to see a new religion sweep the globe that respects the planet we live on a little more than the others have - can we work some birth control and limits to growth into the tenets while we are at it? - Deus Lo Volt!
I agree with you! There are people in my family who are very educated, with graduate degrees, etc. but the whole thermodynamics thing (incl. peak oil, debt, how this affects economics, etc.) doesn't interest them at all. They can't focus on what I try to tell them. It is frustrating. I also have noticed my coworkers aren't interested either. My conclusion is that very few people are able and willing to process this information. I think it is something to do with the brain. People just want to wait until their own situation becomes impossible before they make any changes in their world view. I don' know why that is. Call it extreme conservatism???
For most of recent history things have always gotten better. This makes it hard for people to believe that things could get worse. Bit probably more important - people are very sheep-like. They yield to whatever there government tells them is important and true. Did we hear about Peak Oil in the Presidential debates? Did any of those frauds that try and pass for journalists ask questions about Peak Oil? If you think about it, it's pretty natural for someone to assume that Jim Lehrer, John McCain and Barack Obama, with all the additional inputs they get from their staff and lobbyists and assorted contacts with movers and shakers and what have you, know more about what the problems we are facing than a co-worker or family member.
3.14159 & F Q
Tonight I had a conversation with a young lad that had enough hardware in his face to open up a shop, perhaps to distract from one missing front tooth. He sat down and nodded. I was polite, put my book aside and said hello. The conversation that ensued was a revelation.
He was eloquent and well aware of peak oil and the general situation of resource limits. He was sanguine about our upcoming travails. He didn't flinch when I talked about significant pending contractions.
It was only when I talked about unintended consequences and females of many species pissing estrogens into the water, affecting our reproductive viability that he cracked. The concept that we are just another species that is subject to our own actions and that the vagaries of natural selection could end our existence was unacceptable to him.
He asserted that even if a male only produces one viable spermatozoan out of 1,000,000, we could isolate it and carry on.
I found it courageous that he had a "never say die" attitude, but I found it sad that he accepted that we may fall that far before we rise again, rather than believing that we can make a difference now. Call it Nihilism with limits if you will.
Perhaps "market confidence" in all its hubris, has more value than we perceive. Not for the market per se but for us as a whole. Doom can be a call to arms or it can be a depressant.
Just a late night musing.
"The government"? Come on. Lots of people don't believe "the government". But they believe something or someone else, possibly just their own imaginations/wishes/hopes/desires.
More to the point, exactly what does "there government" tell people? My government doesn't tell me much of anything. The government is a collection of loosely-related institutions which by-and-large have pretty cold, distant relationships with average people. Governments create and enforce laws, collect taxes, and spend that money, usually with little or no overt justification or explanation. Once in a while they go on TV to say a lot of nothing.
You can always ask people in government for their rationale for what they do; it's usually free in book or website form. How many people do you know who read government publications? Human behaviour is complex. One of Nate's points is that many people aren't in their right minds, but it isn't the government that caused that. It's just society. Mostly, family and neighbours are who we look to when making choices. What is everyone else doing?
We may be herd animals, but no one is doing the herding except us. Stop trying to create a false "them" to blame.
The government tells us plenty, through the public schools, and through the laws that we take for granted. The gov't tells us that we live in a democracy, that we conquered this 'empty continent' which was our 'manifest destiny'. It tells us that we must worship at the altar of GDP growth at all costs. That to send our economically disadvantaged youth off to kill and die in order to keep shipping lanes open is 'patriotic'. That 'terrorists' carried out the attacks of 9/11. That we need to fear those same terrorists striking us again. That in order to prevent that from happening we need to spend billions on weapons systems, give up our right to privacy, and be suspicious of anyone who appears different from ourselves. The gov't tells us that it is right and proper to live 'as man and wife' only, and each 'family unit' in our own separate box, mesmerized by the electronic box on the wall that beams to us the message of the gov't (which is one and the same with that of the corporatocracy) 24 hours a day, on a zillion channels, and now in HD. The gov't tells us that the private automobile deserves to control the way we live, work, travel, and recreate. The gov't tells us that 'drill baby drill' is an appropriate 'energy policy' to continue to support our 'non-negotiable lifestyle'. The gov't tells us that 'it's the economy, stupid', when a simple look at reality tells us that using ever more energy and consuming ever more 'goods' is in fact not good for us, not sustainable, not wise, and does not even contribute to our happiness, beyond the minimal level of basic necessities achieved at about $10,000 per capita. The gov't tells us that private property is sacrosanct, and that there is no other way for a human being - a flesh and blood animal after all - to live on this planet than to conform to the rules as handed down, to not walk on the grass, to protest only within the designated ropes, to give our very lives over to the perpetuation of the machine. The gov't tells us plenty, and we buy it hook, line and sinker, and don't even feel ourselves being reeled in. Just a few thoughts from one fillet to another.
"our political leaders... will place more importance on representing their constituents"
Agree. So long as 'their constituents' are recognized to be the monied corporatocracy. Politicians care not one whit about the public, for in our system they need not garner votes, but rather financial backing by powerful interests.
I'm not sure what your final post script is meant to imply. Is it an endorsement or a rejection of H. Daly's ideas. I haven't read him lately, so I can't remember whether or not he is intent on continuing high levels of consumption. In general, I remember being quite impressed by his ideas, especially by his critiques of many of the assumptions behind standard economic theories.
Herman is a mentor and an elder of my tribe. He has brilliant ideas and has had them since I was eating Pop Rocks and playing Donkey Kong. It was meant as an endorsement - University of Maryland is very close to White House. (I expect/hope that Herman will win Nobel Prize in Economics, and soon, for showing among other things that the economy is a subset of the environment, as opposed to vice versa)
I disagree Nate; Daly deserves the big kahuna, the Peace Prize, for taking Economics out of its neoclassical silo and applying it holistically. He could share it with Gaia; I'd be OK with that.
cfm in Gray, ME
Nate, there is no Nobel Prize in economics.
There's a reason for that, and that is, as you know, that most economics is voodoo and most economists are stuffed shirts.
Note I say most. I'm not versed in ecological economics, but judging by the term, if there's a direction for economics to go, it's that direction.
Cheers
Do you mean that you don't recognize it, or are you betraying your belief despite evidence?
Nobel Laureates in Economics.
I think it's a dubious award, myself, but I got that belief from others who are better versed in economics' failings.
Do more research. I repeat: there is no Nobel Prize in economics. Many people do not know this.
Hell, it's right in your own link: The Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel
Those folks who hand out the peace prize, the physics prize, etc? That ain't them.
That's them.
That ain't. Yeah, it's all weird. Doesn't matter, really. Economics is voodoo.
Cheers
LAUGH OUT LOUD. You think I read web pages I link to??
That level of audacity exceeds my tolerance levels. I have to re-calibrate in a hurry.
Good sense of humor and even better sense of humility.
I bet he's Canadian...;P
Can we just cut to the chase and have an entropy tax? We can estimate how much entropy is created each day by the sun. Put a tax on using a fixed amount of that energy (creating entropy) per unit of time - something miniscule. We can easily estimate how much of that energy went into creating "a barrel of oil", "a kwh of electricity generated by wave/wind", "a bushel of corn" - whatever.
Then tax those sources of energy based on the baseline tax you put on using the sun energy directly.
Done.
Love the concept, but lotsa luck teaching the public what entropy is. How about an oxygen tax? O2 is the actual fuel, after all.
Won't happen, but the effects would be interesting and mostly salutary.
and BTW, brilliant post, Nate.
No. O is an electron acceptor. In becoming reduced (gaining electrons) O oxidizes fuel and this exergonic reaction releases free energy. Every oxidation is coupled with a reduction. The relatively high electronegativity (affinity of the nucleus for electrons) of O makes it a good oxidizing agent.
You say electron acceptor, I say potahto.
I don't disagree that oxygen accepts electrons, my point is that it's a rather arbitrary convention to consider "stuff that oxidizes" to be fuel rather than considering free O2 to be fuel. Free O2 is the odd thing, not the existence of stuff that will oxidize. The free O2 is only possible due to ongoing photosynthesis powered by the sun. Oxidizable stuff occurs naturally, significant free oxygen in a planetary atmosphere is a wild aberration.
So I'll consider oxygen fuel. Don't worry, it's not like my brief post here will cause a mass movement toward oxygen taxes. But a man can dream...
I, for one, think that an oxygen tax is at worst a perfectly acceptable way of taxing CO2 production and at best a brilliant way of throttling fossil fuel energy use. After all, O2 is obviously a resource of the commons. Why should a fellow who commutes in a big dually truck get free use of several thousand times as much as I do by cycling the same commute?
Yes, that's the bit I like. Not that we've been all that great at dealing with the global commons, but it would put a different conceptual spin on it. Those with coal don't have a "right" to burn it.
Mark, it's an intriguing thought but it assumes that all combustion is equal.
Consuming an equivalent amount of O2 burning coal or hydrogen have drastically different results to the environment (H2 generation issues aside).
To use the issue of the commons; Taking flowers from a park diminishes the commons, but so does leaving behind candy wrappers and dog crap.
I prefer to target the dog crap.
Not to beat this to death, but there is no free hydrogen, so generation issues can't be put aside. The amount of O in CO2 is a quite fixed ratio. It is the common denominator to "burning stuff" and is easy to quantify in principle.
Not sure where to go with the "flowers and dog crap" except to note that reasoning by metaphor sometimes fails us.
Hey Green:
I did, as a caveat say "H2 generation issues aside", because it is possible to produce hydrogen without emitting CO2. (To be clear, I am not advocating a hydrogen economy by any means!)
And yes, by definition the ratio of O in CO2 is fixed. My point was that it is possible to combust something without generating CO2 so an O2 tax would penalize a process that does not produce CO2 with no benefit.
I thought it was a pretty good metaphor :-).
I think it is better to address the problem directly and tax processes that produce detrimental byproducts.
Or IOW, I might miss the aesthetics of flowers but that is preferable to have to miss (or clean up) someone else's crap.
Cheers
Prag,
I haven't been crusading for an O2 tax, I have long experience in what will fly in human society and what won't, but in some ways it would have an advantage over carbon taxes. Play with the idea a little on your own.
I can't give you a pass on "generation aside", because otherwise one could just run civilization on D cell batteries, which give free electricity, generation aside. Likewise nuclear plants (which I suppose might endorse oxygen taxes).
I have my doubts about current approaches to carbon taxation, and sequestration ain't gonna happen. So it can't hurt to throw out ideas in a forum like this, which I did in response to an "entropy tax", a notion as good as it is unworkable.
And maybe it's the dog crap that makes the flowers grow. I seem to recall some loose correlation between scat patterns and dandelions....
...but be that as it may, the world's problem is the byproduct of runaway human-directed extra-somatic oxidation. So I'll call for an oxygen tax, with waivers for personal respiratory use. Why not?
It would be awesome except for a few niggles. Few things are as freely available as oxygen. Maybe sunlight (in some regions). And rocks. And sea water (in some regions). Nitrogen, of course. Some oxidants are less harmful than others. Adding CO2 has a dramatically larger impact on the atmosphere than removing O2 (or so I've heard).
What's less hard to come by is clean air. If you could tax the clean air going into something (like a car, or a factory), I should think you'd get a lot less dirty air (whether its particulate, CO, CO2, sulphur compounds) coming out. Same for clean water being converted into dirty water. We need less dirty water and less dirty air. If cars and factories could instead output nice, dry lumps of stuff, instead of diffuse or dissolved stuff, it would be much easier to cope with. But entropy is against us.
Aye, beware analogies! Much falsehood has been propagated by the incorrect equivalence drawn between things of little or no structural similarity. But people seem to have a kind of weakness to well-spoken analogies, and kind of inability to see them critically--especially if they support existing beliefs.
What part of, "We are passing tipping points now" doesn't compute for you, Nate? Can you square what you wrote with the idea that tipping points are very likely being crossed right now? Have you done a risk analysis on this, or followed the links posted here to good risk analysis on ACC?
My only conclusion here is that you dismiss the idea that tipping points are being passed and/or that rapid climate change can't be starting now or in the next few years. And, perhaps even that you don't believe at its worst it can result in destabilizing civilization. Would some or all of these characterizations be accurate?
Let me turn this around for you and show where your analysis is bullocks:
IF we have passed tipping points AND the Arctic Sea Ice is going to keep melting 50% or even completely each year THEN the carry on effects on the ecosystem will lead to warming at an accelerated rate and we may get a flip into a climate change on a global scale that completely changes some or all world climates significantly greatly disrupting, well, everything. There would likely be a crash in food production, migrations on scales the world has never seen before, and armed conflicts as nations scrambled to preserve their own well-being. All this could happen in less than ten years. Much less, in fact.
It's not worth the risk, Mr. President. This is especially true since we must get as close to sustainable societies - globally - as we can and there's really nothing we would do for PO that we wouldn't also do for ACC given this restriction.
Cheers
None of those characterizations would be accurate. My main point is that if we make climate change the entire focus of energy policy we still have to deal with all the other consumptive drivers. We are far past many many tipping points. I also know how politics works. What if we get a couple cold winters and people say 'but we canceled all the coal plants because it was warming!!'. If we find change to demand system that doesn't need the coal to begin with because we are healthier and happier without it, then everyone is better off right? Look - we have chosen to not have posts on climate change here because our focus is energy - the conversations get polarized and don't accomplish anything other than losing volunteer staff members - I tried to articulate here that our problem is greater than both climate change and peak oil and many of the answers are the same (reduced consumption). If you understand the net energy cliff, you know that these two issues are going to collide like speeding freight trains in the not too distant future. I'm on your side (the side of the planet). Lets leave it at that please.
We could say we need to do most everything you recommend and then add a, "by the way, this will have the side benefit of addressing climate change." People concerned with climate change are constituents too. And, by the way also, this would be good for our energy security and, therefore, our overall security. Further, not having to run the whole world so we can be "secure" in energy, might actually go along way for funding a program of alternative and conservation.
Good! I was caught by surprise by that paragraph.
But that's a straw man or red herring. 1. You were writing to Obama who, if anything, is too bent towards the economic issues. He has stated the economic crisis comes first. 2. The audience here knows both sides of the problem, even if some don't agree that both sides are real problems. I think this just clouds your argument. If you haven't already submitted this to Obama, I'd encourage you to restructure the paragraph.
Whew! Then you know we can't afford not to confront this head-on. (Though not necessarily as I might.)
One of the things we gain with an Obama administration is one that will not ignore the science. Rather than the lying, muzzling and obfuscation of the last 8 years, we will see real activism here - despite Obama's idiocy on "economy first." Did you happen to see H. Clinton's very strong statement on AGW in the last day or two? So, this worry is now banished. At least for the next four years.
Yes, economic realities will make it hard, but that makes power down and my home vs. grid argument that much stronger. we can do it (relatively) cheaply and quickly.
I absolutely agree with this and apologize for the thread growing on this, but I felt your characterizations were too far off to ignore. I absolutely believe we can build out a micro-grid quickly, efficiently and cheaply. We CAN and MUST address AGW and Energy concomitantly to avoid solutions that don't address both.
I have no proof, Nate, but I've a very bad feeling about climate change. The risk analysis supports my cautious stance. It can't be ignored in any way. Doing so will just leave us in the same place that denialists wish us to be. We must risk speaking the truth and hope the collective risks we face now shake people loose from their stupor and fear of reality and encourages them to action. For, if not, we are doomed anyway.
We must think, speak and act more like Churchill than, say, B. Clinton.
Cheers
Churchill was good at cheering the people on and extremely important early in the war but it becomes obvious while reading his little memoir (World War II) that he was kept out of the strategic loop by the time the tide began to turn in 1943. Later he was infatuated with and overpowered by Stalin (and overawed by old Joe's capacity to imbibe).
When the rubber met the road hard Winston's head tended to the glorious past. Churchill is not the one to emulate at this point of the game. We need to turn now while maintaining forward vision. My god I hope we don't need to be more like Stalin.
My goodness. People really do tend to take analogies and such much too far. Isn't it OK to just take the obvious reference as I intended it, and I think was obvious, and leave it at that?
Cheers
One must have a little fun here once in a while, the subject matter can get a might heavy.
enjoy
The other evening my son and I were discussing + vs. - feedbacks re: climatic warming. We identified quite a few + feedbacks but were hard pressed to identify any - ones. The obvious theoretical - feedback is, of course, that increased atmospheric CO2 could conceivably promote increased primary productivity. The reality, however, is that photosynthesis is seldom CO2 limited and a warmer & wetter climate likewise promotes decomposition, canceling any net gains in C sequestration as biomass. Another possible - feedback might involve increased albedo due to increased cloud and snow cover. Once again, this - feedback is apt to be offset by reduced albedo due to the melting of Arctic sea ice & mountain glaciers worldwide. Examples of + feedbacks include:
1. Increased evapotransporation resulting in a net increase of high heat capacity H2O vapor in the atmosphere.
2. Net decrease in albedo as mentioned above.
3. Increased CH4 release to the atmosphere from thawing permafrost.
4. Reduced uptake of CO2 as CaCO3 by marine organisms due to lowered oceanic pH.
5. Increased forest fires in a warmer world.
6. Increased decomposition rate in a warmer & wetter world, as mentioned above.
7. UV induced decline in global primary productivity due to reduced stratospheric O3.
This list is presented in no particular order and isn't meant to be inclusive. My intention here is merely to show that + feedbacks swamp - feedback mitigators to climatic warming, resulting in a situation more dire than it may appear. More dire, indeed, when one considers that the net impact of these feedbacks isn't merely additive.
As for "tipping points": I dislike the term because it implies equilibrium dynamics. Atmospheric chemistry and the relationship of the atmosphere to the biosphere, hydrosphere and lithosphere are Complex. Nonlinear dynamics prevail. Outcomes are extremely sensitive to initial conditions which aren't well known, a situation that renders prediction of outcomes impossible. When we can't predict outcomes we can't know what actions on our part may result in desirable outcomes. Hence, to my way of thinking, it's preferable to simply allow nature to take it's course. Any actions we -- or president elect Obama -- take, are more likely to result in harm than in "good" (however "good" is defined). Perhaps human nature insists that "something be done before it's too late." I would say that it's already "too late" and even if it isn't, we can't know how our actions -- however well intentioned -- will turn out. Perturbations of a Complex system may be buffered or they may result in + feedbacks of the type listed above. Best not to interfere with a system we poorly understand, especially when previous unintended interference has resulted in nothing but unpredictable fluxuation and disruption.
I'm unclear on your final recommendation, "Best not to interfere with a system we poorly understand, especially when previous unintended interference has resulted in nothing but unpredictable fluxuation and disruption." Does that "interfere" pertain to actions we might take to mitigate climate change, or to actions we're now taking which (probably) cause climate change?
I'm thinking specifically of plans designed to mitigate climatic warming such as fertilizing the ocean with iron in order to promote C uptake by Fe limited phytoplankton, or injecting aerosols into the stratosphere to increase albedo. Things like that. But more generally I'm warning against the all-too-human tendency to meddle with natural processes we only poorly understand. I detect this perceived exigency to "do something" about PO & AGW and am only saying that it's better to do nothing than take hasty action that will end up doing more harm than good.
I'd give that a +5.
I do not know what it is going to take for people to stop trying to negotiate with the biosphere. This mindset is rampant throughout much of the world:
"I gorge myself often, so I go to the gym to work it off."
"I know smoking is bad for me, but I eat lots of fresh veggies and take vitamins."
"If we suck CO2 out of the air, we can keep burning fossil fuels."
Have we become such an adolescent society that even the notion of limits is not considered?
To answer the top of the post question, only with a huge change in mindset, which I think is highly unlikely, and even less so in the timeframe required.
More likely is that, like an alcoholic, we will need to hit bottom before the majority "get it". This is not pessimism, just an extrapolation of observed behaviour.
As an alcoholic I agree with you! but not having hit bottom yet(close)I think that we will continue to follow the course of the lemmings, the cliff keeps getting closer.
I would read that as a restatement of the Precautionary Principle
If you want to do a big thing like remove fossil fuels from the economy, it is better to make MANY arguments in support of it.
I agree with you about tipping points. I also think that if the world was aggressive enough with climate change targets (e.g., 350 ppm co2 by 2060) then it would force us to be ahead of the depletion rate. However, I think Nate is saying that to overcome short-term bias, have in your political arsenal multiple long-term benefits to back up your position when people waver.
I think that over the medium to long-term climate change concerns will be an even greater political force, and probably within the next few years we could see more major temperature records smashed, but we have no slack left...time is precious, so to keep us on the wagon we can't afford any doubts and hesitations to creep in and weaken the resolve for a new direction. Making the supply side argument well (e.g., peak oil) and working on demand side at the same time is very prudent.
Hey Jason,
I addressed that in my response to Nate, which came after your response. In short, this administration is going to drive the point on climate change, not deny it. I don't think short-term bias is the problem it was prior to Nov. 4 and we need not be so cautious. We should get some very stark language on climate change on Inauguration Day.
Cheers
BTW: Here is my post to Obama's Citizen's Briefing Book. Vote it up if you're of a mind, folks:
http://citizensbriefingbook.change.gov/ideas/viewIdea.apexp?id=087800000...
There are the fossil fuel miners extracting the ancient sunlight
and there plants that are using/converting the daily sunlight
The rest of the beings are just consuming those sources of energy
Nate:
In para. 2 of the introduction you said:
The energy actually stored in a mass of 15 kg lifted 5 meters is 750 Joules is it not?
Perhaps you meant to say 5 kilometers for the height of the lift?
Sad to say the days of 5 meter deep oil wells are long gone :-)
thats what I had in an old paper I wrote. I will track down source but you are probably correct. In any case, my point is there is a specific physical amount of energy that is only increasing the deeper we go, etc. Thanks.
If my high school physics has not failed me the formula is:
Ep= MGH
where:
Ep = Gravitational potential energy in Joules
M = Mass in kilos
G = Gravitational constant (aprox. 9.8 meters /sec / sec)
H = Height in meters
yeah thats correct, but it assumes you are merely lifting it (like with a crane through the air). SO really this is if we were 100% efficient at extracting oil, as in this is the least energy we could ever use EVER.
-to lift 15kg of oil 5 kilometers (5000m) out of the ground:
PE=mgh
=(15kg)*(9.81m/s^2)*(5000m)
=735750 Joules
GEE WIZ Batman......Do you actually read the comments in other sections? Maybe...I wrote this on Jan 9 in regards to Gail The Actuary and her "UPGRADING THE ELECTRIC GRID".
"Can't you guys (and gals), see any other path in your educated brains? Why not just say no? Step off the techno fix merry-go-round. Look for a way to smooth the downward slide that is already coming. How can we make the electrical distro that we have, smaller and better. It's always been easier to get to the other side of the bank in a fast moving stream, by swimming with the current a little, and working in the direction you need to go. This constant idea that we need more, more, more, is just struggle against the current, and rapidly heading for the waterfall."
Your letter is a bit of verbiage.....
Pronunciation: \ˈvər-bē-ij also -bij\
Function: noun
Etymology: French, from Middle French verbier to chatter, alteration of Old French verboier, verbloier, from Old French (Picard dialect) werbler to trill — more at warble
Date: circa 1721
1 : a profusion of words usually of little or obscure content
2 : manner of expressing oneself in words : diction
And in so, will never be read by the Big O, or any of the other half wits in Congress. ONLY when they go over the waterfall, will they even begin to remotely understand that what is happening now, is out of their control. Please post a list for us, of the thank you notes you get back, after you send it to your government. The time for polite discourse has come to an end in this country. The fires of revolution are being lit, with each day passing.
Respectfully..
C_A
Perhaps it was never intended to be read by Obama...thanks for your comments, though I doubt you read the post because I did anything but call for a techno-fix.
Yup, did read it.The whole thing is tech based. Where is it that you call for anything other than a modification of current tech/BAU?
"1)Put a floor on energy prices. The marginal barrel is killing future production. However, wait 6 months or so in doing this. Then the market will show you how many of these 'alternative energies' are actually viable, given that we don't have accurate energy input output data. However, if oil (and particularly natural gas) prices remain below average cost for long, depletion is going to roar its head beyond what we can judiciously manage."
"2) Scale wind turbines everywhere that they can be scaled as soon as possible. On a long term basis they are a far better investment than new money towards oil or natural gas. But that means moving away from liquid fuels."
And so on........complex discussion but underneath it all, is a basic conversation similar to rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic. We have already hit the iceberg. Bigger and more complex is not better. The fastest and most economical payback is conservation/insulation. Power Down now. Why not take a real stand and tell him to bring the military down 50%? It will have the same effect as what you listed. The guy on the street, who will not be able to get food for his family, will not give a rats a$$ for Carbon Tax issues or 100% reserve requirements. Ideas of the educated elite. The need for a completely different way of thinking is what we need, and what we will get, with or without the Big O's help. Only when the Swords are hammered into plowshares...
(implied conversation above) "and the plowshares are used by the proletariate to beat the elites / bourgeoise to death."
I'm no communist, but an avowed democratic socialist. No solution to any society-wide problem can work unless its voluntary. If the large majority of others in your society are not acting the way you think they should then either you're thinking wrong or they need to be educated to the knowledge which underpins your thinking. No other long-term ways, including coersion.
Nate did a wonderful job of synthesis, but yeah, I tend to agree here with ccpo - take a real stand. One of the rules I learned in sales training - NEVER NEGOTIATE WITH YOURSELF - because you can only lose. The outcome of hammering those swords into plowshares is why I nominated Daly upthread for the Peace Prize, not the fake Nobel Economics. I don't know that ccpo would disagree with building windmills if that were indicated within an overall framework of swords into plowshares (my own favorite not so metaphorical is Public Health). Taking the strong stand
puts the prescriptions (eg elimination of fractional banking) on sounder footing. The way this reads now, the prescription are the various stands. It might be that your strong stand is missing only for editorial reasons. I know it's there; but it's not stated front and center.
Something like "The financial crisis is first and foremost an ecological crisis. It is the product of our own success and therefore we cannot fix it with any amount of "more" of the same." Something like that - a one liner above the introduction that states the basic thesis.
FWIW, Heilbronner makes a clear distinction between objects of virtue and wealth. Wealth is owned privately and use of it may be denied. Objects of virtue - libraries - are not what he would call wealth. Nor would he call a healthy environment wealth. Though it's not easy to see a healthy environment as an object of virtue, still, it shouldn't be ownable or subject to concentration. If I can go fishing and bring home some good healthy fish, I don't need so much "wealth" to live well. It starts to look to me like "wealth" is a product of concentration and power so it starts to look bad to me, at least beyond the threshold where modesty turns to excess. Certainly wealth as you describe it in that paragraph is criminal.
cfm in Gray, ME
I think that per usual, Nate's a brilliant synthesist and this is a great post.
I think the odds of Obama reading it off this website, or in toto, are low.
Thus, I'll put forward a thought. Clean this up, streamline it, cut out anything which might be misconstrued as minimizing the threat of AGW, lose for now the cool stuff about sugar and gambling, and post it as a full-page ad in a major DC-read paper. That would give it a good chance of actually being read by the president and other movers & shakers, not to mention shaking a number of others out of the woodwork and getting them focused on a more-workable worldview.
If the nonprofit rates are still in effect, this is not as expensive as one might think; I've done it in the past with good success.
There are lurkers reading this site who have significant resources, but haven't had a clear direction for personal activism. I'd suggest chipping in to get a modified version of this put up in some well-designed full-page ads. Having done it before, I'd be happy to advise.
Feel free to contact me by clicking on my username if you'd like to see this happen and can kick some resources in; if so, it could be made to happen.
Hey, what's the downside?
I think this is a great idea. The editing suggestions and the ad.
Newspapers are going bankrupt left and right. Gannett is furloughing employees, the Boston Globe is laying off 12% of their workers, the Rocky Mountain News and the Seattle Post-Intelligencer warned they may have to shut down.
In short...they need money. We can probably get a bargain.
Hmmm...fundraiser?
I'd chip in. TOD shouldn't be afraid to ask for money when it needs it. This is something many of us would support.
I, too, will contribute in a heartbeat.
Pete
Let's see a few of the more affluent lurkers kick in 5-10-25k for buy-in. You can remain confidential if you care to, and I can arrange tax deductibility for gifts of that size.
Obama did it with much smaller contributions so I am led to believe. You just need to get folk on board. up here in Canada
Well, you start the grassroots campaign if you care to.
Having had to generate significant donated funds as a necessary exercise for 3+ decades, I might venture to suggest that Obama has been in a somewhat different situation.
Still, kudos for the good attitude.
So, are you affluent readers gonna make him sell T-shirts door-to-door?
"Clean this up, streamline it, cut out anything which might be misconstrued as minimizing the threat of AGW, lose for now the cool stuff about sugar and gambling, and post it as a full-page ad in a major DC-read paper. That would give it a good chance of actually being read by the president and other movers & shakers, not to mention shaking a number of others out of the woodwork and getting them focused on a more-workable worldview."
Totally agree with this critique of Nate's post.
Would add that wind and solar power need more explanation(ie both have high EROEI unlike biofuels)
I had a similar thought. While a comprehensive post flush with links is useful for the dedicated student, politics requires an entirely different style. Size this down to one page with zero links and very tight text, and you've got something you can run with. Twitter is a great example of why a post in 140 chars or less can be more effective than a deep and thorough essay.
Agreed, however...:
http://citizensbriefingbook.change.gov/home
That seems to be a slightly different iteration of the things they had before.
Cheers
83,000 votes for legalizing the reefer. Because when everyone is stoned, so much meaningful work gets done. I suppose if we all got high a bit more often, we'd be less greedy and competitive and have time to contemplate the wonder of the universe instead of trying to mess it up?
Bringing back the constitution comes in around 45,000 votes. Gl(These were both in the economy category, for some unknown reason.)
Many excellent points Nate.
But in one area I tend to disagree with you: I think that were people given the true poop on the whole situation confronting us, they would go along with the measures necessary to deal with it, change and sacrifice, as long as sacrifice was shared by all.
The problem is systemic. Capitalism is no longer working, and it's no longer working because growth is no longer possible (as you so well argue). Capitalism worked well, more or less, for the first world as long as growth was possible. (For the third world it's always been disastrous.)
What's required is shrinking in a planned way, retrenchment. I repeat what I've said elsewhere. But there is a big conflict with the profit motive in doing that. That's the root cause of opposition to doing the right things.
All of the things you say about people are true, but they'll only change in the course of the struggle to change the direction we are going. With so many people's lives being thrown into turmoil, there will be a great deal of openness to change. But in what direction? That's the problem. Obama is an improvement over what might have been -- he's speaks in whole sentences, is charismatic and smart. But so far there is no sign whatsover that he will make a fundamental break with what prevails -- he will tweak, fix lesser things, but the odds of his stepping out of the box seem extremely small. It's almost a negative that he's charismatic, because it will lull many into thinking the YES, WE WILL. But it looks like WE AIN'T.
Hello Nate,
Thxs for this keypost--Kudos! Recall that I have been tirelessly promoting a new cultural tradition of the yeasty beverage, half-glass Peakoil shoutout for many years now. I would like to see Obama move this into the mainstream by encouraging all of his partying Inaugural Ball participants to do so likewise. It could have an instantaneous, dramatic effect on moving your proposals into greater MSM recognition.
Bob Shaw in Phx,Az Are Humans Smarter than Yeast?
In your chart which shows the net energy cliff there are no arrows for nuclear. I suspect that is because it would be very very far to the left all the others. In addition the heat energy of nuclear is converted to electric which is a far more useful form of energy than say the chemical energy contained in fossil fuels. As I have posted many times before the new electric vehicles which are now on the very short term horizon will get about 5-10x the mileage of an energy equivalent gasoline powered engine.
Yes, at some time the world would run out of oil, and at some further point it would run out of nat gas, and at some further point it would run out of coal and yes even at some very very distant point in the future we might run out of fissile material and way way after that we might run out of fusion fodder and after that the sun will go red giant, but none of these things are terribly important to current policy.
Fortunately the president elect chose as his energy secretary a man who ran one of the national labs and he along with the other national lab heads cosigned a position paper calling for very much the right prescription, one where nuclear power is a key driver to both create new energy and get us away from adding to the green house gas burden.
nukes + electrification of transport = radical reduction of green house gases and a radical reduction in political radicals.
As for the more 'political' of the points about the only one I would agree with would be removing the ability of private banks to create dollars. That is a power which is far to great to be vested in some politically connected few. It should remain only with the federal reserve and they're use of it should be as transparent as possible with the best mechanism probably being an algorithmic one which tries to grow the base money supply at a fixed rate and allows the price for money to be set in the market.
The idea that we should use the tax code or anything else to regulate peoples self behavior I find abhorrent but then again I am a social libertarian. I don't really care what people want to do to themselves (gamble, drugs, prostitution, crappy food, video games, blogging...) as long as they do no harm to anyone but themselves, are of majority age and don't risk the lives or property of others. Most everything else turns into dictatorship of one kind or another and who really needs that.
The chart was not all inclusive - was mainly meant to show a)decline in EROI on oil and gas, b) paltry return on biofuels, c) high return on wind, d)there is SOME undefined minimum that our current infrastructure requires.
Regarding nuclear, I think we are going to need it, but the EROI numbers, partially due to boundaries are unclear. Another very important aspect with scaling nuclear is water. And regarding electric cars, there may be more externalities other than GHGs
Ever hear of economics and neuromarketing?
That was a fine sentiment on an empty and growing planet, but we are running straight into the Tragedy of the Commons and you may not have that luxury for as long as you think. We're either all in this together or we're clearly not.
Thanks for the link to the water consumption paper on thermo-electrics.
One of the other technologies which is probably going to come into play is that of superconducting cables. These are just starting to make their way into the grid in high density applications but may one day be used for long spans which would allow for the location of power plants in more remote locations because the transmission losses would become very small.
Whatever the EROI numbers are for nuclear they are obviously way way higher than for say coal. The easiest way to see this is just pure cost. The uranium fuel cost (that includes all the mining and concentrating but not fuel rod manufacture) comes in at less than .2 cents per KWH. Total fuel costs for US nukes are around .5 cents per KWH and total operation cost about 2 cents per KWH about the same as for coal.
When I say that I don't mind what people do to themselves I mean to themselves. The tragedy of the commons refers to a shared resource with no ownership. I am very much for non shared ownership. To the extent that we are all stewards of the atmosphere and oceans we need very much to have good policy to administer these places. However I don't think what goes on in my house or bedroom or body is the domain of the 'commons'. I find the idea that someone else is going to vote on how or what I do in my own domain pretty repulsive. In all of history that concept has ALWAYS lead to pain, suffering and conflict. One would have thought by now that most people would have figured this out. I can't quite fathom the appeal in telling other people how to behave when their behavior has virtually no effect on anyone but themselves or other people who willingly join them in that behavior. The idea that somehow other people 'owe' you something and therefore better diet, exercise, say their prayers or do what ever else you prescribe is one that can only work by dint of force.
Totally not true - Tokogawa Japan? Etc.
The point is that there aren't enough resources for everyone to do what naturally goes on in 'their own house or bedroom' on the current trajectory. I'm sorry but that is a fact backed by many data points. Ayn Rand had it wrong.
300 years ago and I might agree with you but the landscape has changed.
"The point is that there aren't enough resources for everyone to do what naturally goes on in 'their own house or bedroom' on the current trajectory."
And let me guess, you or some other wise men are going to figure out for myself and my family just what permissible behavior is going to be and if we don't like it then its going to be jack boots and a late night knock on the door.
Glorious.
Nope
It is more likely conflict will decide it for everyone. A large enough conflict would deal with so many of the problem issues, though few who read such stuff as these posts would find the results very appealing. Suggesting we try to govern our appetites to avoid such a scenario is sensible, the odds against that happening--I'll leave that to the think tanks, trying to calculate that stuff would be a waste of my life.
As long a reading lists have been making this post I thought I would add one collection of essays.
"The Federalist Papers"
Those old boys couldn't see how fast transport and communication would impact the world so a few of their views on how to balance the way we govern ourselves don't quite wash today but their solid, practicle analysis of that problem is landmark and more than a mere worthwhile read.
And Storing's "Anti-Federalist" papers. There is a thin one and a fatter, more comprehensive version. LOTS of the old boys could see where this was going. It reads like Wendell Berry.
Thanks, I was remiss in not mentioning them, though the pro version always seemed to present itself as a coherent work better than the anti version did, or at least it seemed so to me.
I found that the three writers had their own agendas, and coherency was weak at best between Madison and Hamilton/Jay (with other nuances within the latter comparison).
Hello David_in_ct,
IMO, Optimal Overshoot Decline is best achieved when every 'raindrop' is truly cognizant of its contribution to the 'flood'.
I don't believe that any more. A big chunk of The Problem is that we do extend our administration over them. And policy is more mining and more dispersal. Administration inevitably fails because humans cannot match Gaia. Good policy would be to reinforce Gaia's work, but even that is hubris. Any process where we can measure anthropogenic influence is already beyond "sustainable", but we can't really tell when/if it goes beyond tipping.
Scale
cfm in Gray, ME
If we use either IFR, MSTR or both, the 100:1 improvement in output per unit fuel pushes those issues way off; existing inventory of uranium (including DU) will serve the US for a century or more.
If the high-side temperature is high enough, open-cycle gas turbines can be used with air as the working fluid. This eliminates water as a consideration.
Obviously, this is not something that can be done with existing PWR plants, but if we are going to build where water is scarce or unavailable for power production such advances radically increase the possibilities.
There is one limiting factor that nuclear simply can't overcome: time. Liebig's minimum applies to time, too. We have to hit around zero net emissions by 2050. (Personally, I think that's a couple decades too late.) Do the math for me:
400 - 1,000 plants for the US alone. In 41 years.
Up to 10k plants for the planet. In 41 years.
There are places, such as Korea, that have no viable alternatives. Korea is, and should, add more nuclear. But it's a limited scale for a limited area where the need for, and application of, the solution is appropriate.
In terms of peak, it is also too late. I think there is a very, very strong argument for peak being 2008. Can we wait 30 to 100 or more years to replace FFs?
Finally, systems that are either too complex or too rigid are more prone to failure. There is little redundancy in a nuclear-based build-out (though the power supply, once in place is relatively robust.)
Cheers
ccpo,
What are the resource limitations that would prevent all FF to be replaced by wind and solar in 20years?
For wind power, the major component is steel(85%), US vehicle sales have dropped by 6 million units( approx 6million tonnes of steel), that could be used to produce 10,000, 5MW turbines; 50 GW capacity per year( about X10 last years build), providing enough additional electricity to power an additional 12 million electric vehicles per year. Once most of the oil use was replaced additional wind and solar could be used to replace coal and some of the NG(from 2028 to 2050).
The limitation will be the time to switch vehicle manufacturing to 100% EV or PHEV(5-7 years to bring in new model changes). In a national emergency surely this could a little faster than BAU.
God help us if we are still thinking along the lines of keeping everyone in their own vehicles. We can't put rail everywhere, certainly, but we can greatly expand it and reduce vehicles by some percentage I don't know. (Perhaps Alan has worked on that metric.)
Steel is a concern, as would be anything steel needs for production. I don't know if anyone has done that calculation, either.
Cheers
"There is one limiting factor that nuclear simply can't overcome: time. Liebig's minimum applies to time, too. We have to hit around zero net emissions by 2050. (Personally, I think that's a couple decades too late.) Do the math for me:
400 - 1,000 plants for the US alone. In 41 years"
I like doing math, here's mine:
The US produces about 2100 billion KWH of electricity from coal each year.
A 1GW nuke plant running 24 * 365 * .9 produces about 8 billion KWH per year.
2,100 / 8 = 262 nuclear plants to replace all existing coal fired plants.
This also assumes only 1GW nameplate designs. The newest AP1000 reactor from Westinghouse now has a nameplate capacity of 1.7 GW. If over the next 40 years the average nameplate capacity was 1.5 GW we would need only about 175 reactors to replace all the coal fired plants or about 4.4 per year.
I'll allow you your numbers since I don't keep track of such things. This issue has been done to death on these forums and the numbers are higher than that, iirc. For example, you don't account for much, or most, of the current plants needing replacement within that time frame. There are 67 currently operating as power producers, more than that if you include decommissioned. That's 329, perhaps less with your 1.7's.
That's 8.02 per year. And how many years for ramping up? Oh...ten to fifteen. Now we're up to more than ten per year.
And so on, and so on.
Let's also acknowledge the cost of, last I heard on threads here some goodly months back, of 12 billion per. That's just about 4 trillion dollars. And not one single nuclear power station on the entire planet has ever been paid for with private funds. Oh, and the subsidies...
Blah, blah, blah...
There is no time.
Cheers
Instead of hand-having and saying your numbers are wrong if IIRC why not track down conflicting numbers? The coal generation numbers are available everywhere (including in the paper that Nate linked in above) the rest is simple math.
Yes you are right that there will probably need to be some retrofitting to existing plants.
As for the cost argument and the 10 -15 years to ramp up those are totally political items. China ordered and is in the process of constructing 4 AP1000 plants right now. The cost for all four was reported as $5.2 billion. The schedule is 3 years from first concrete pour to first plant operation. Like in just about every high tech field out there the technology marches on.
http://www.ap1000.westinghousenuclear.com/
Because I don't care to? As I already said, "This subject has been done to death." There is nothing to be gained by repeating it all with no new data to add.
Does it matter? Nothing's going to change the time frame much.
In China. You don't think the costs would be at least double in the US? See, this is why I don't give a darn about carrying on this topic. Nonsense just gets repeated over and over. Why would you bother attempting to equate costs in China to costs in the US? It's intellectually dishonest.
Again, in China. See above.
My stance is what it was, as, I'm sure, is yours. Nuclear has limited appeal and use. It will and should be used where appropriate. It should not be made the core of our energy production.
Done. Carry on if you wish, or you can just go read the archives.
Cheers
I'm an old fart and I don't know if I represent the other oldsters on TOD. But, the younger posters/readers have never lived in a different reality. They have no ties to the Depression. They have no ties to WWII where society was turned upside down. They have no ties to living low on the hog and what that means...while believing life was good - as a kid it was good. All they know is growth/greed/new stuff.
I see all of this as a psychological problem rather than an energy or economic problem. In fact, my expectation is that it will be the generation following the current one that will finally come to grips with the new reality.
It will be spitting into the wind in the mean time. By this I mean, nothing of real consequence will happen.
Todd
I'm also an old fart (68), but not so old as to have directly experienced the Depression. However, I do not envy the younger generations, nor do any of my friends. We, I, had it so easy. It was possible to live on the minimum wage, have a old car, an apartment, eat, etc. It was typical that the father worked, the mother stayed home -- single salary sufficed. Plus it was far easier to get a job most of those years than it is now, even before the current meltdown. College was cheap, and there was no big hurry to get a career going -- there was time to smell the roses.
Back in those days, a lot of us went to college to get an education, not training. What is the world like? It's totally incomprehenisble to modern college kids.
Also, it was in the post-war period that the whole consumerist binge started to get really rolling. The one advantage was that everything was hands on. In the Mid West every teenage guy knew how to do a ring job. I didn't, but I knew how to design and build a single side-band transmitter. Nowadays the kids believe everything operates by magic.
So you see, I really am an old fart too.
Interesting comment about every teenager. I also grew up in a world where it was good to know how to do things. My dad usd to mend our shoes on a last, a three cornered metal unit that had three sizes of shoes for fitting the size of the day. how many of our "modern" generation even undertand how to keep our footing on this shaky ground?
I'm eighteen. I live in a CT suburb and I am also the only one of my friends and peers who knows "how to do stuff". By stuff, I mean I know carpentry (built my own wooden boat, very seaworthy), welding, metalworking and smelting, I can take apart and put together anything, electronics, and a whole host of other skills that my friends couldn't even begin to name, let alone do. I don't usually brag about it, but I feel like I have to stand up for myself when I hear old farts talking about what a waste this new generation is. However you are right, and I consider myself an exception from all of my skill-less friends. Just know that I am out here, fighting the status quo.
Additionally, I was just accepted to the Sustainable Development MA Honors program at the University of St Andrews in Scotland. Sadly, i know little about the curriculum details. Does anyone know what they are really doing there? Is it intense stuff like what Nate is doing or just talking up solar panels?
"Is it intense stuff like what Nate is doing or just talking up solar panels?"
If you want to do 'intense' stuff go get yourself a degree in a hard science, engineering or mathematics. Then unlike the vast vast majority of the folks around here you will be able to really understand the reality of the situations and have some chance of not confusing romantic and religious beliefs with science and policy.
I don't see how being a general arse is helpful or necessary. If you've got a legitimate call to make, make it. By all means. I don't let anti-AGW crap slide by without a quick slap upside the head, for example. But today, you're just being an arse.
Take a pill.
Cheers
He?
Here you got one of the smartest youth on the line and you give him guidance in the form of an
agressive dismissive answer, that even doesnt answer his question??
Do better.
I dont know the masters program in question neither. StAndrews is a "normal" university I think. Check the list of courses out for the program (ask the university to send a list); do they contain a few in math, basic physics and chemistry -
then it is probably ok (they write concerning your program "Geography & Geosciences, Biology, Management, Chemistry,
Economics & Finance and Mathematics & Statistics.". Important is also that you like the topics of the courses - that you want to study.
Here is a link to PDF about the program; that you might already have ofcourse:
http://www.st-andrews.ac.uk/sasi/media/ugsustaindevel.pdf
and here to the institute http://www.st-andrews.ac.uk/sasi/undergraduate/
Good luck - and fix the mess our parents got us into.
Cheers
"Here you got one of the smartest youth on the line and you give him guidance in the form of an aggressive dismissive answer, that even doesn't answer his question??
Do better."
You are right. I certainly did not mean to be dismissive and was too abrupt because I am somewhat put off by a lot of what seems to pass as 'wisdom' around here. So I will go slowly.
I have no first hand knowledge of the program to which you have been accepted so I can give no direct advice there. If it were me and I was serious about maybe attending I would try to find other students who were currently enrolled and ask them. In addition I would find out the names of some of my would be professors and write to them directly. Its pretty rare not to find someone willing to share their domain with you especially if they might become your teacher.
First a little of my background so that you know where I am coming from. I myself am a college dropout as is one of my current partners (the third has a phd in bio-statistics). Much of my work life revolves around quantitative financial matters. I have been doing this for about 20 years. For about 10- 15 years prior I did a lot of computer related work, digital electronics, real time operating systems, application development environments etc. I also had a really fun stint working as a research assistant in a solid state physics lab and would go back to something like that in a heartbeat were it not for having to support a family. I also deal in fine art and restore paintings as a hobby so I am more than sympathetic to the idea that the arts matter a great deal.
My academic advice to you would be the same as I would give my own children though they are not yet of the age to be making the decisions which you are.
In just about any field of endeavor you can organize it as some kind of a dependency graph. If you know the stuff at the root of the tree you can build upon it and know the stuff at the dependent levels. By and large, you can't go in the other direction.
If you want to have a career in what I would call a 'hard' field, and that is one where the end product is something that either works or doesn't then I would suggest a huge investment in math and computer science, followed on by physics. I would tend to spend more of my time on the 'basics' rather than the esoterica.
Learning to build simple mathematical models, thinking algorithmically and understanding the basic laws of physics (not basic as in quantum mechanics, or general relativity or string theory) but just the stuff that was pretty well understood by the end of the 19th century, will get you a very very strong foundation upon which to stand when you are analyzing problems in the real world.
It will also give you a huge advantage in being able to make what I call 80-20 decisions. A lot of doing research, experimentation and problem solving is about figuring out which paths to pursue. Some of it comes with experience but a lot of it comes with being able to make good back of the envelope calculations to get you on the higher probability paths to success.
Spend time with people who 'do' science. At whatever university you end up attending, leave yourself a lighter academic schedule and spend some time working for a professor who is doing some research that interests you. Even if you are no more than a gofer at the beginning you will have an opportunity to ask questions and to get a taste of the 'real' world. If you enjoyed woodworking and it was the late 18th century I'd tell you to see if you could get a job sweeping the floor at the Goddard Townsend shop. Same idea.
As far as general life here are a few ideas.
Stay in good physical shape. Do sports, solo or team. Millions of years of hunter/gathering has left a strong imprint in our DNA. Get with the program. After spending an hour at the gym sweating or doing some other physical activity you will always feel better.
Never do anything in your private life that you would feel embarrassed about if it was on the front page of the new york times.
Spend some time doing volunteer work even if it is just a few minutes a week or month. Helping people that are in some sort of need will feel great to them and will give you some perspective.
Go swim in the ocean, hike up a mountain, climb a tree or just sit in the grass and look at the stars.
Do all that you can to keep the trust of the people you love and the people that love you.
Breathe deeply, smell the roses and make a little kid smile, the rest will take care of itself.
There has always been poetic allure in the idea of investing 110% dedication and passion into the people and ideals you like/love.
It sounds like "sound" logic.
But it's not. It's magical thinking.
The better approach is 98%.
Always leave behind at least a 1% chance that the opposing position may have merit.
Always leave behind at least a 1% further chance that what you are thinking now, or how you are feeling now, or what you accept as an incontrovertible "fact" may be wrong.
Sure almost all here at TOD believe with 100% conviction that Peak Oil is inevitable (because under the scientific laws of conservation of mass and energy there is no alternate possibility).
But I would leave room for the 1% chance that PO is not "now" or already behind us.
I would leave room for the 1% chance that doom and gloom is not inevitable.
I would leave room for the 1% chance that the people you love and who seem to love you back may turn on you at any random moment (because that's the way the human animal operates; unlike a dog, a human's love is not unconditional; there is a treacherous, corrupt side to each of us).
As for: "Learning to build simple mathematical models, thinking algorithmically and understanding the basic laws of physics" --a true scientist understands that experimental results always trump mathematical models and algorithmic thinking. Mother Nature doesn't care about what we "think". She does her own thing irrespectively. The mere fact that a same outcome occurred 99 out of the last 99 tries does not mean that it will 100% occur again on the 100th try, even if our mathematical model says so. The "simple" math model is just a comforting story we tell ourselves. The real world is much more complex than what our senses tell us.
Totally, totally TOTALLY disagree about the value of "hard science" over other fields of study!!!
Hard science has its place. For those who are into it, great.
I was an English Lit. major. I loved it and luckily I am working in this field now (OK the pay is terrible but other than that!)
I have had great fun with the connection between peak oil and PO-related concepts and some of the things writers have been trying to tell us for centuries. Themes such as complexity, Maximum power, PO, industrialization....I have found some authors grasping these concepts (way before cars were invented in some cases, before Tainter or Hubbert in other cases) and presenting them IN FICTIONAL form where they can be conveyed in symbolic ways. I have brought these into the classroom and (together with my students) explored their messages. I am very happy to have literature training so that I can enjoy this experience!!
A few weeks ago NYT Fashion Editor Bill Cunningham presented a slide show of the way hemlines dramatically dropped right before the credit crisis started in September. He said it was a once-in-a-century opportunity to see fashion change in a sudden drastic response to financial problems. He said he was glad to be alive to see it. He's into fashion, not hard science or literature. But he loves clothes and sees the world through clothes.
You can't change your brain to be a hard scientist if you're not really one. You should do what you like. I did (although my dad was pestering me to major in science or economics)and I have no regrets!
Did your father really equate economics with science? Must have been a man of faith.
pi,
i was in no way making a value judgment in terms of a course of study except to say that if someone is interested in tackling what is basically a science/engineering problem it is best to do so armed with the best tools of science and engineering.
i am a huge fan of the arts. if someone asked me for advice on being painter i would tell them to enroll in a course of study along the lines of the 19th century academic tradition. i would not have them go to the MOMA to see Rothko and Pollack. The really good artists even in a new genre still are grounded in the technical skills of their craft. Same goes for writing.
Ashton,
You've asked very good questions (don't stop asking them throughout your life).
The Sustainable Development MA program is run out of the School of Geography and Geosciences, so at least it has a science backing.
http://www.st-andrews.ac.uk/gg/courses/ug/sustain_dev.shtml
If you want to be hands-on in a design sense, it depends on the partner coursework you take as well. The courses in SD seem broad, but if you take Thermodynamics, Fluid Dynamics, and perhaps a renewable energy elective, you would be well on the way to understanding the potential for renewable energy systems at the macro and micro level.
You might try finding out one of the professors and emailing him with a question about the content level of the coursework and what you would like to get out of it.
Keep us posted!
It's interesting that after posting, I went over to Financial Sense to look at their editorials. One by Cassey seemed appropriate to my post since most of it revolved around Strauss and Howe's book, The Fourth Turning. I got my copy of it way back when it came out. But, I'd forgotten about it but it seems to parallel my comments above.
Maybe someone has time to do a Wiki search for it. I think it is very germane. I'd do it but it's bedtime.
Todd
Ashton, as a 47year old guy, (born in the early 60's, teen through the 70's, 20's through the 80's.) etc, I think you get the idea. I am glad to see a young one here. I thought all 18yr olds were into Guitar Hero etc. Well, let me say I am really impressed that your beyond the stereotype of 18 yr olds and have progressed into finance and oil and gas information. financial sense is a good site, esp the podcasts. check out automaticearth.comhttp://theautomaticearth.blogspot.com/ in addition to http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com/ they are finance related sites, but they seem to give a good macro of how things are. short term as well as long term.
these 2 sites are a good read. should be mandatory reading for all people.
dude, let me tell you the world has changed drastically in the past few yrs. and it will continue to change. garaunteed. billy joel had that song "we didn't start the fire". boy was he right.
I could give advice all day for you as well as the others here. If you have questions, this is the place to ask. there is prolly a Gazillion years of experience here to help guide you in the right direction.
just remember we have been there, (we were all 18 at some time, at different generations) we have the hat and T-shirt. we encourage you to share your ideas and experiences with us all. you will not be slammed like other sites. we are here to share info.
you have come to a very, very good place!
Well, here we go again, into the generational dissonance thing.
I suspect most TOD readers are Baby Boomers and then the generational participation graph drops off exponentially for younger people. (Yeah, D'Oh, there are no 2 year olds reading this blog.)
Kids born in the last 30 years (1979 to now) have seen nothing but perpetual forward "progress".
They missed the oil shock of the early 70's. (When was it again? 1973? This old fart forgets easily these days.)
They saw the personal home computer take root in the 1980's.
They saw the Internet take off in the 1990's (Netscape debuted in 1995.)
The dot.com bust of 2001 seems to have been only a hiccup as "globalization" and off-shoring became all the rage in the early 2000's. Besides, financial "innovation" solved everything ... or so it seemed.
Can you blame them (the younger folk) for not seeing the bigger picture?
I am thirty years old and I certainly blame the younger people for not seeing the bigger picture.
That's because our generation is going to live for decades. I can understand why baby boomers don't care - their best years are behind them, but why twenty or thirty year olds don't give a damn is simply beyond me.
This generation has been using internet for more than a decade now and has all the information available just in front of their noses. Not that just dumb people don't get it, even many smart ones don't get it (or don't want to, because they are happy with the BAU, as they make quite a nice living out of it).
Nate, you should really try online poker. In reality it's quite dull if you do it for money. You are not going to raise your dopamine levels ;)
I have played online poker and I see the hundreds of thousands that are online 24/7. The activity itself is benign, other than most people lose and the house and the good ones win (like anything else). The big downside is that our brains quickly habituate to 'unexpected reward' and if you can't get that in poker you seek it elsewhere in life. This combined with economic and psyhcological research suggests habituated people CAN'T access long term thinking. I am just looking ahead when times start getting tougher and we need to band together to build local food/energy infrastructure etc. and the 20-30 something males (mostly) don't have the patience to work a monotonous task for more than 5 minutes.
'
"we need to band together to build local food/energy infrastructure"
Farmers in my area are all in wine/olive oil business. Reason for this is of course specific mediterrenan soil/climate. My friend is in wine and he doesn't think about diversifying at all. He is developing his brand and when I mentioned crisis to him, he didn't seem too preoccupied.
Good that we have a port, so we might import some food. We are going to need it.
Nate,
So you're saying that because we Baby Boomers gave our kids the things we didn't have, like Nintendo and PlayStation, that killed their ability to engage in patient, long term thinking?
Interesting.
Could very will be the case. My kids always complain that I think and talk too slowly for their likes.
Also they don't like to read. They want information delivered to them as action packed video.
Ah, the unintended consequences of "technology".
Step-
If you are under 40 years old, you have grown up in a casino, and have not been outside yet. Soon the doors will be opened, and you will hear the screams as reality becomes clear, and the sobs of the delusional whimper from the fetal positions on the ground (sorry Plato, your cave analogy was the best thing you ever wrote)
Ah Plato. Actually I thought the best line he every wrote was "never trust the poet" or so I recall its translantion. Of course in all reality he was "the poet," whether he actually meant his quip that way I was never sharp enough to fathom.
So where do you think we are in the cave. I believe we have been looking at the fire for some time. It seems Plato thought we needed a guide to get beyond that point.
The human brain is the cave. The shadows are the illusions we get in our brains. We will never escape the cave. That's why we are and always will be cavemen. :-)
That's the beauty of a good allegory it keeps on working on so many levels in so many different ways. But 'don't trust the poet.'
None the less, I do believe we have turned to contemplate the fire and when we did that much changed. You do have a good point though, guides out of the cave do seem in short supply.
At some point between $1.2 trillion and the $100 trillion thought experiment, even Rush Limbaugh and Larry Kudlow will recognize that ‘money’ can't procure ‘resources’. Marginal costs of growth now likely exceed marginal benefits, so that real physical growth makes us poorer, not richer.
Nice essay.
Just remarking briefly on your point above, I would argue that oil at 34.00 is now essentially free. Unless of course we enter a world where oil is 5 bucks a barrel and bread is 25 cents a loaf. Which could happen.
G
then it will be 'more free'.
1)Put a floor on energy prices.
I agree with all of your recommendations except this one. Past experience has told us that cash reserves do not necessarily encourage development (XOM simply buys back stock, for example).
The recommendations probably need a matrix - for if the other 7 are enacted, then this one might not need be. But if not, then a depression will cause steep decline rates starting in 2010ish - then what? We will have to follow decline curve down and buttress with renewables - but we need reasonably high production and international peace to build out solar/wind - IOW if decline rates are double digit, other priorities might take precedence. However, the longer we stay at low rates, the truer signals we will get what renewable flows will actually be 'profitable'. I was on API conference call today and asked their economist if they had done a sensitivity analysis on what price-break points for US oil production at different oil prices and he said no (third time I asked). Also asked if oil stayed at $35 indefinitely if that wouldn't imply we would become MORE energy dependent because cheap reserves are non-US. He said lots of things are cheap elsewhere but we trade for them, or some such.
Will -it gets down to how steep of decline rate on oil and gas can we handle. Subsidizing any energy probably is a clue that we are living beyond our means - the more we reward energy companies with dollars they can't make on their own the more we are borrowing from future
Nate,
"but we need reasonably high production and international peace to build out solar/wind "
The Gore challenge to replace coal and oil by wind generated electricity in 12 years calculates only modest amounts(8%) of US annual steel production. Short of WWIII why is international peace necessary to build wind and solar in US, it hasn't stopped present wind construction?? I can understanding not building wind or solar in Iraq or Afghanistan, but why not in US?
Yes, I should have finished my thought. While a floor provides a minimum price signal, a carbon tax (or even cap and trade with a real auction) with a freebate or a reduction in income tax will provide (I believe) greater incentives. So it provides the substance of your intent (higher prices) with an added kick (freebate). This can be introduced over a series of quarters, so that people aren't hit all at once, but they know not to run out and buy marked-down SUVs.
I don't have a problem with investing (carrot) in at least the first steps of the transition, though an RPS can be the stick.
He said lots of things are cheap elsewhere but we trade for them, or some such.
The typical avoidance answer. The obvious answer which he took pains to avoid was "greater foreign dependence and a return to profligate ways", as we are starting to see in vehicle purchases.
Allow me to plug my own essay of this week, where I talk about oil prices and the critical importance of developing an infrastructure plan now that emphasizes rail and not more roads and cars: "Time to Take the Long View on Energy - Is Obama’s Infrastructure Plan Built to Last?"
If we assume that global oil production is going to be less than 50Mb/d in 2030, (with exports being about a quater of what they are today) and base planning decisions on this fact that it becomes increasingly obvious what courses of action need to be taken.
The advantages of rail as Alan Drake has repeatedly stated is that you get lots of use from the same infrastructure, passenger transport, freight transport, transmission grids which would be fairly simple to add fibre optic data services to. Rail can provide the link between the rural areas and city centres. Using short range electric transport as connections at each end the areas served by the development can be increased.
Yes, and at the well attended forum in Portland Maine last night, Sustainable Portland 2030 or some such, Peak Oil was only mentioned once. In a question posed by my friend Alastair - the area trainer for Transition Towns. And not answered by any of the panelists of speakers.
Decline rate 8% means we go from where we are now to 1/4 in 18 years by rule of 72. That's a lot less than 50MBD. And it assumes a smooth downhill slide, nothing like Global Gaza.
Sustainable Portland? Ankle biting developers, bankers, real estate agents and businesses looking to grow on being green.
cfm in Gray, ME
One can argue that this is ok since we take that energy and produce useful services such as providing large commercial banking services to the world ( irony intended ).
The point is these value add services themselves are of value only for a economy with a energy surplus. Your standard third world farmer has no need for a MBA,CDO etc.
I'm using the worst case example our corrupt banking system as the sort of service we provide in exchange for oil but the point stands all of them from computers to esoteric financial garbage sold for big fees have no value in a energy constrained economy.
The problem is we are using these value add services to pay for energy as they become of less value we will pay more for energy either via higher prices or simply less money regardless as you state more of our economy goes to service energy but since we are a big importer and can only pay with the baubles and magic potions we create we have a bit of a problem as people look behind the curtain. Not only does what we produce become less and less valuable but we have less and less excess capitol to produce it to sell for real energy.
This devaluation of our goods and services is highly deflationary and will result in extreme loss of employment. Revitalizing infrastructure won't solve the problem and alternative energy does not solve it. We need to think hard about what we actually do in exchange for imported energy and what we plan to sell. Right not there is no plan and given the serious nature of the problem thats in my opinion alarming.
Anyway thats my take on the matter. I think your close in your article but you have to address I think this problem a bit more clearly. Your saying it and I understand but its a hard sell but we need to convince people that as we go into a energy constrained world what we can do is value added goods and services thats worth money or in reality energy is quite different from what we have been doing. I'd suggest the current bout of deflation is making this obvious and its not going to end even as you point out if they eventually manage to inflate the currency. This does nothing from keeping the amount of energy you get in return for goods and services from declining and thus decreasing the amount you can provide because simply living is energy dependent.
Selling expensive baubles and magic alphabet soup potions is not going to work.
Excellent work Nate as always. I agreed with every word you said but that might be the problem. My views are considered extreme and out of the mainstream.
For instance the above statement is pure Malthusian. Obama is a politician and a Malthusian is scorned by mainstream politicians. Perpetual growth and optimism is the paradigm. Consider running for office and telling your constituents that you're going lead them to a smaller and less consumptive way of life. I would vote for you but I doubt if anybody else would.
Until the Sh#t actually hits the fan people on this site can expect to be ignored by TPTB. That doesn't mean that I believe we should do nothing. On the contrary...when TSHTF people will need individuals from this site to speak to them realistically about what is happening to them.
Thanks again - Joe
It may sound Malthusian but is now backed up by science - the link is to Richard Easterlins cohort study that showed over 18 years people would attain many of the things they had desired early in life but at the same time their 'new desires' increased faster!. Also - the Overspent American - sociologist Juliet Schor explains these same phenomenon. And it is witnessed in nature over and over - at root is when chimps and gorillas brains light up in the same areas when they find a nut or berry that humans when they make a winning stock trade we can see the connections, even though we can't yet bring fMRIs into peoples homes. NONE of this is 100% true nor 100% applicable to everyone -but if we wait to get 100%, we'll have consumed a heck of a lot of remaining resources.
Great article Nate!
But I wonder if you missed a cost here?
Sincerely
Kjell Arne
Im sure I missed some words due to time pressure but that is not one of them - what I meant was that we are close to double digit natural decline now, and this number (whatever it is, there are numerous confusions on defintion) will RISE because smaller fields AND offshore fields (the direction of new drilling) have higher depletion rates.
I’m late in the game to make a comment on this thread so I’ll only focus on a few points I think have not been highlighted very much.
1. The intent of the advice should be applauded, but I think it is far too heavy on suggested solutions before a convincing case has been made regarding the urgency of the problem. Decline rates may be obvious to TOD folks, but the decline rates are going to have to be spelled out much more clearly for the average policy maker. I find the single biggest impediment to meaningful action regarding PO and GW is the lack of understanding about the scientific fundamentals involved in the problem itself. Also, the media people who deny the problems and spread dis-information must be firmly countered. Also, it seems that a solid set of overarching objectives would better set the stage for the recommendations. I don’t feel these objectives have been clearly articulated. I find recommended solutions to be ineffective without clear and quantifiable objectives.
2. Now for a suggestion that causes involuntary rolling of the eyes: Human Power Vehicles (bikes, trikes, etc) could play a huge roll in this whole equation. Talk about getting people to adopt new mindsets – why bikes are so readily dismissed is a total mystery (and I've heard it all about distances, weather, fitness, etc).
3. The amount of space in this thread devoted to a discussion of religion is most discouraging. Religious beliefs are one of the biggest reasons that the PO and GW are not taken seriously - why worry if prayer can get supernatural spirits to intervene? Climate is the provence of the gods. Be fruitful and multiple so more souls can get to heaven, etc.
bicycle, religion was introduced (I guess), because we can solve this mess only with top->down approach, not viceversa. People won't change their behavior overnight, except if some respected person tells them to. As some poster above noted, everybody now wants to have freedom to decide his/her own actions and burn as much oil as needed. With peak oil, we certainly will see peak freedom. Heck, a big freedom, a freedom to take credit, has been already taken away from the majority. It is just the beginning. Obama may close the Guantanamo (which is great), but that would be just another illusion of having more freedom, but I digress...
Religion could be pretty different from the kind we are witnessing right now. Let's say religion could deal with life on earth, not necesarilly life after death.
But of course, I am a realist - I don't expect it to happen. However, anybody can even now take bits from existing religions that in my view improve life. I am an 100% atheist, but I certainly can appreciate why some religious rules make sense...
bicycle, religion was introduced (I guess), because we can solve this mess only with top->down approach, not viceversa.
You have this utterly backwards. The gov't is fundamentally unable to deal with these issues successfully. The vested interests make it so.
Cheers
Once I thought like you too, but if this vested interests want to remain on power, they have to be very careful in next 10/20 years, as the world is going to change profoundly and they may not remain in power anymore.
For now, the living despite economic crisis is pretty good, in a few years time with oil imports rapidly diminishing - I just don't know.
Who do you think is more aware of PO and its implications - our leaders or J6pack? TOD readership is just a small subset and PO threat hardly reaches anyone. But if leaders got the message (and I suppose at least Obama is slightly aware of it) we could have gotten somewhere.
You have made my point perfectly. Screw the leaders; they are lapdogs to money and power. They will change course only when made to. If left to their own devices, the ship won't turn fast enough to miss the ice berg.
Cheers
The change in boldness and color when providing a link kills the readability of the essay. Excessive use of italics has the same drawback.
In such an extensively referenced piece, I think it is much better to simply add a superscript numeral at the end of a sentence, which could also be the link.
doug
I'm sorry about that - this was time consuming enough - I actually don't know how to do as you suggest, but will find out and try to adjust the essay - thanks for your feedback - it is difficult to summarize these ideas in one document.