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Drumbeat: September 11, 2010
Posted by Leanan on September 11, 2010 - 10:44am
OPEC to Enter 50th Year with Diminished Role
The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries is set to mark its 50th anniversary on Tuesday not with a grand ceremony, but with a simple press conference at its Vienna headquarters.This might seem surprising for the world's only oil cartel, but the modest commemoration is fitting in view of the group's diminished importance and the risks it faces amid current technological shifts.
"I think it is still both relevant and powerful," energy expert Andreas Goldthau said about the 12-country organization. OPEC says it pumps a third of the world's oil and controls 80 percent of reserves.
But some experts say that the group founded by Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and Venezuela in 1960 could see demand for its product fall because of the trend towards alternative ways of powering vehicles and policies to curb climate change through new technologies and taxes.
Battle of the think tanks in peak oil reports
Two think tanks, on different sides of the world, published peak oil reports earlier this month – generating very different levels of media and web coverage.
US natgas rig count climbs 3 to 980 - Baker Hughes
NEW YORK (Reuters) - The number of rigs drilling for natural gas in the United States rose by three this week to 980, its second week of gains, according to a report on Friday by oil services firm Baker Hughes in Houston.Horizontal rigs - the type used to extract gas from shale - hit a record high of 911, up eight from the previous week, Baker Hughes said.
The rise came despite a 20 percent fall in U.S. front month gas prices over the past month or so, pressured by ample supply, weak demand and swelling inventories.
Radical steps needed to help the oil majors relight their fire
It is not just equities that have suffered a brutal de-rating over the past decade. So too have Europe’s big integrated oil companies such as BP, Royal Dutch Shell and Total.In 2000, the sector commanded a rating of almost 15 times earnings. It now trades on eight times and, if analysts forecasts are correct, could fall to as little as six over the next couple of years.
The reasons for this dismal performance have been well documented: rising costs and tax demands from producer countries and the increasing scarcity of world-scale opportunities have all contributed, according to Collins Stewart analyst Gordon Gray.
PG&E’s California Gas Blast Probed by Federal Investigators
(Bloomberg) -- Federal investigators and local officials are searching through debris in the California town of San Bruno to determine what caused a PG&E Corp. pipeline explosion that killed four people and destroyed 38 homes in the utility owner’s second deadly natural-gas blast in two years.
Pelosi's Probe: Oil Sands & America's Addiction to Oil
Unless the US undergoes an epiphany and realizes that a paradigm shift is necessary in order to avoid the inevitable collision of growing consumption of oil and other resources with limits imposed by a finite planet, Canadian oil sands will continue to flow. Ms. Pelosi and other politicians may pay lip service to the obvious environmental constraints but the US really doesn’t have many alternatives as long as it is addicted to oil.
New Clue to How Last Ice Age Ended
ScienceDaily — As the last ice age was ending, about 13,000 years ago, a final blast of cold hit Europe, and for a thousand years or more, it felt like the ice age had returned. But oddly, despite bitter cold winters in the north, Antarctica was heating up. For the two decades since ice core records revealed that Europe was cooling at the same time Antarctica was warming over this thousand-year period, scientists have looked for an explanation.A new study in Nature brings them a step closer by establishing that New Zealand was also warming, indicating that the deep freeze up north, called the Younger Dryas for the white flower that grows near glaciers, bypassed much of the southern hemisphere.
Another big-ice Arctic thaw, say experts
Arctic Ocean sea ice has experienced another severe meltdown this year, with the approaching end-of-summer minimum representing the third-biggest thaw since satellite monitoring began about 30 years ago.This year's retreat from a winter maximum of about 15 million square kilometres to a September coverage area of just five million square kilometres also means that the four greatest melts since satellite measurements began in the late 1970s have occurred in the past four years.
'Manhattan' ice island splits in two
(CNN) -- A massive ice island four times the size of Manhattan that broke off the Petermann Glacier early last month has split in two.Satellite images show that the ice island broke in two after repeatedly smashing into Joe Island, a small rocky outcrop in the Nares Strait, west of Greenland.
Tidal bell takes toll of rising sea levels
London, England (CNN) -- A new sound will ring out from the banks of London's River Thames later this month when a bell marking high tides and the threat of rising sea levels is officially unveiled.The bronze bell, which is three meters high and weighs 638 kilos, is being installed at Trinity Buoy Wharf in London's Docklands area as part of the "Time and Tide Bell" project, created by UK sculptor Marcus Vergette.
As high tide approaches, water moves the clapper and sounds the bell.
Global Warming Education in Coastal Communities Gets Funding
Officials from NOAA announce that they have just launched a one-time initiative to educate coastal communities in the United States about the risks they are subjected to as global warming develops.
200-year-old eco-home in Llanidloes in energy drive
A 200-year-old eco-home which has cut carbon emissions by 60% is opening its doors to encourage more houses to become energy efficient.
Germany's EnBW mulls closing nuclear plant - paper
(Reuters) - EnBW is reviewing whether to close the Neckarwestheim I nuclear power plant due to new taxes and upgrade costs, Germany's Stuttgarter Zeitung quoted EnBW's chief executive as saying in an interview.
As North America's electricity grid moves toward a "smart grid" system, the cyber spies, thieves or terrorists determined to attack that grid are sure to get smarter themselves, industry experts warn.
China cancels Japan talks, warns on sea dispute
BEIJING (Reuters) - China called off planned talks with Japan over an undersea gas bed dispute and warned that worse repercussions may follow, state media reported on Saturday, intensifying pressure over the arrest of a Chinese boat captain.The Chinese Foreign Ministry issued its angry warning after a Japanese court authorised a 10-day extension in detaining the Chinese captain whose fishing boat collided with two Japanese coast guard ships in disputed waters this week.
The arrest of the captain and continued detention of 14 crew members has given an emotive focus for long-running territorial quarrels between Beijing and Tokyo over East China Sea islets, called Senkaku in Japan and Diaoyu in China.
The two Asian powers are also at loggerheads over gas beds under another part of the sea.
Crude Gains After U.S. Pipeline Shut, Report Shows Import Surge by China
Oil rose the most in six weeks after a pipeline that carries Canadian crude to refineries in the U.S. Midwest was closed because of a leak.Futures increased as much as 3.2 percent after Enbridge Energy Partners LP shut its Line 6A, part of a system that can transport 670,000 barrels a day from Canada. The country is the largest source of U.S. imports, sending 2.2 million barrels a day in June, according to the Energy Department.
Verdict clearing Chevron in killings is upheld
A federal appeals court on Friday upheld a San Francisco jury's verdict clearing Chevron Corp. of wrongdoing for the shootings of Nigerian villagers who occupied an offshore barge in 1998 to protest the company's hiring and environmental policies.Government security forces summoned by Chevron killed two men and wounded two on a barge tethered to a company platform 9 miles off the coast of the oil-rich Niger Delta after three days of negotiations with leaders of about 150 tribesmen.
India to Vet Vedanta's Oil-Exploration Ability Before Allowing Cairn Deal
India will vet the ability of London-based miner Vedanta Resources Plc to carry out oil exploration before allowing it to buy a majority stake in Cairn Energy Plc’s local unit, the oil ministry’s top bureaucrat said.The ministry must approve any changes to production-sharing contracts signed by Cairn India Ltd., Oil Secretary S. Sundareshan said today.
Enbridge unsure of pipeline restart date
Enbridge Inc. said yesterday it had stopped an oil spill from its 6A pipeline, which delivers up to a third of Canada's crude oil exports to the United States, but it gave no estimate on when the line might resume operations a day after it was shut down. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency said the pipeline was spewing oil at a rate of between 200 and 600 barrels an hour -- the equivalent of up to 14,400 barrels a day, a large spill by U.S. pipeline standards. "The leaking has stopped," said Enbridge spokesman Larry Springer.
Gas pipeline blast injures 50 in Iran: report
An explosion in a gas pipeline near Iran's northeastern city of Mashhad, Khorasan Razavi province, injured over 50 people, the local satellite Press TV reported on Saturday.The blast occurred in the Mazdavand region, 90 km from Mashhad, when an excavator mistakenly struck the pipeline transporting gas from the Khangiran refinery in Sarakhs to Mashhad, Iran Gas Engineering and Development Company Director, Alireza Gharibi, was quoted as saying.
LNG Imports by China to Jump Eightfold Over Next 10 Years, Nikkei Reports
China’s imports of liquefied natural gas will probably rise eightfold in the next 10 years, driving up prices for the commodity, the Nikkei newspaper said, citing a Chinese government official it didn’t name.
Russia Defers Razing of Seed Repository
A quick update on the battle to save a Russian seed bank, the Pavlovsk Research Station outside St. Petersburg:Scientists from across the globe have been appealing to President Dmitri Medvedev to rethink a government decision to allow the seed bank, home to the largest collection of European fruits and berries in the world, to be plowed away to make way for luxury homes. And that has now apparently had some effect: this week, the Russian Housing Development Foundation, the agency auctioning the land for the construction of apartments, decided that it would delay destruction of one parcel, according to the Global Crop Diversity Trust, a group that has been leading the global campaign to halt the project.
A Belated Debate on Modified Beets
Environmentalists and farmers sue the Agriculture Department, seeking to overturn permits it issued that would allow the planting of a seed crop.
After 18 years, Bartlett still ready to serve
He has spoken for years about the theory that the nation’s oil production peaked in 1970 and is declining.“Until we do something meaningful (to address the problem), there will never be a good world economy,” he said.
Bartlett said conservation and efficiency should anchor any plan, along with alternative energy sources.
A third area where the US lacks the leverage to reassert herself is in the area of energy. With peak oil on the immediate horizon, we are doing precious little other than burning a lot of corn to prepare for yet another paradigm shift. As long as we’re dependent on foreigners for one of the most important staples of economic growth, we will not be able to affect meaningful changes.
Peak Oil: Not Just for Conspiracy Theorists Anymore
I understand why people don't listen to wild-eyed conspiracy theorists about the coming calamity of peak oil. Instead, they go to recognized experts like Daniel Yergin (author of The Prize: The Epic Quest for Oil, Money and Power), who tells them that everything is OK and the black gold will keep pumping for many decades to come.But it ain't necessarily so. And would you believe Lloyd's of London? Lloyd's has joined with the well-respected Royal Institute of International Affairs, also known as Chatham House, to say that Britain (and presumably the rest of the world) needs to be ready for peak oil and erratic energy supplies.
Is Peak Oil a Disaster or Are We Just Soft?
Meanwhile, in his NY Times OpEd The Genteel Nation, David Brooks channels the establishment position. Brooks assures us that our troubles are easily fixable if we go back to being hard-nosed and productive. Yes, bad stuff has happened but only because, "the crucial change was in people’s minds."
Only 15 – 30 years to end foreign oil dependence?
By 2025, I’d be willing to bet, that America could be independent of foreign oil via an investment that would more than pay for itself. Sure that might require battery advocates to accept an interim and temporary increase in natural gas vehicles, for instance, but it would also require drill, drill, drill folks to think far outside of their box as well. Nonetheless, I’d bet a compromise exists that a very significant majority of Americans would approve of, and that would also make America much stronger.
Technology as Magic...in an age of pessimism
We can learn from Icarus. All the technology around us is astounding. As I have described, as a society, we have gone from underestimating the possibility of technological advance, to now believing there are no limits. We are told time and again that all of the huge challenges facing our world, be it climate change, peak oil, and future energy crises are all solvable with existing and future technology that will inevitably be developed.But there are limits, and the laws of physics apply today just as they always have. We need to balance our enthusiasm for technology with the critical thinking required to properly evaluate which future technologies make sense and which don’t. We have the power to do this.
Power struggles: Charging tomorrow's cars
Imagine driving across America using a fuel so new you have to carry your own supply wherever you go.At the start of the 20th century, before the era of ubiquitous gas stations, drivers did just that as they tested the limits of cars like the Ford Model T, which ran on gasoline, kerosene, or ethanol and could, if driven carefully, travel more than 150 miles on a full tank.
Now a new generation of drivers is set to embark on a similar kind of experiment. Until recently, most electric vehicles, or EVs as they are often known, have had a range of just a few dozen miles, limiting their usefulness and appeal. That's a big reason the long-talked-about era of electric vehicles has been, well, talked and talked about for so long with little real-world progress.
Low natural gas prices likely to delay U.S. nuclear plant construction
Exelon Corp. chief executive John Rowe said he expects natural gas prices to remain low, pushing back the construction of new U.S. nuclear power plants by a "decade, maybe two." "We think natural gas will stay cheap for a very long time," Mr. Rowe said. "As long as natural gas is anywhere near current price forecasts, you can't economically build a merchant nuclear plant."
White House Spurns Solar Panel
Bill McKibben, an environmental campaigner from Vermont with a flair for showmanship, was rebuffed Friday morning in his effort to get the White House to reinstall one of the solar panels that President Jimmy Carter had placed on the White House roof....Mr. McKibben met with three midlevel White House officials Friday morning who told him, politely, no dice.
They explained that there were various reasons that the White House roof was not available for a gesture with very little energy-saving potential and that the Obama administration was doing more to promote renewable energy and reduce greenhouse gas emissions than any previous government. The word “stunt” may have come up.
A Bear Hug? Nissan Ad Raises Eyebrows
How does it feel to own an all-electric Nissan Leaf sedan? Warm and fuzzy? Like getting a hug from a polar bear threatened by global warming, perhaps?That’s the implication of a new television ad for the Leaf that made its debut Thursday night during a National Football League game. The minute-long spot follows a solitary polar bear on a trek south from a warming Arctic, through forests, along highways and into the city, finally reaching a driveway in the suburbs.
There, as a man prepares to open the door to his Nissan Leaf and set off on his morning commute, the massive bear rears up on its hind legs and — wait for it — gives him a big cuddly hug.
China calls for int'l cooperation in tackling climate change
Chinese Vice Premier Li Keqiang on Friday said the international community should work together to overcome the challenges of climate change.Li made the remarks when meeting with Christiana Figueres, executive secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).
Road to Copenhagen: Why Denmark is home of the green farmer
THEY say necessity is the mother of all invention, and in Denmark that is certainly true of the country's move into renewable energy and its ongoing reductions in greenhouse gas emissions.As the world's attention starts to shift to Denmark in the lead up to next month's United Nations climate negotiations, or COP 15, Rural Press has shone the light on Danish agriculture to better understand its role in and behind this modern environmental success story, known in Europe as "the Danish example".
Governor to EPA: Wyo Can't Regulate Greenhouse Gas
The governor of the state with the most greenhouse gas emissions per person is telling the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency that state law forbids regulation of greenhouse gases.The EPA has told 13 states to toughen up their rules to regulate greenhouse gases by Jan. 2. For states that miss the deadline, the EPA says it is proposing to step in and regulate those emissions instead. The EPA has opened the proposal for comment.
Boxer assails Fiorina over global warming law rollback
The Democratic senator says Fiorina is 'in the pocket of big oil,' while the Republican says the state's climate change law 'isn't the right answer.' Each accuses the other of endangering jobs.
Protest, profit from same hands?
ALBANY -- While one arm of the sprawling business and political empire of two conservative Oklahoma oil billionaires is blasting New York's participation in a program to cut greenhouse gases, another arm is seeking profit from it.Americans for Prosperity, a conservative political action group supported by oilmen David and Charles Koch, gathered angry protesters Wednesday in Manhattan to demand New York and New Jersey leave the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, a 10-state program in the Northeast to cut emissions from power plants.
At the rally outside RGGI's offices, AFP New Jersey State Director Steve Lonegan blasted the two-year-old program as "sketchy, shadowy, clandestine and top-secret" to a booing crowd of AFP supporters, some waving the yellow Gadsden flag ("Don't tread on me") popular with the Tea Party movement.
Vancouver Filmmaker Boils a Frog for Global Warming
Cooksey, who describes himself as a screenwriter and comedian, does an Al Gore and casts himself in the starring role in How to Boil a Frog, an 87-minute "eco-comedy" he hopes to get into North American theatres . He says he can’t afford to put it on the Internet because he has got to recoup some of his personal $450,000 investment in the $1.1 million film.
This summer, the Savannah heat was in the night
If summer seemed relentless this year, blame it on the night. Nocturnal temperatures across Georgia set records in June, July and August, helping to make the summer one of the sultriest on record.It's a little too early to blame these hot nights on global warming, but Georgia State Climatologist David Stooksbury noted nighttime warming is a pattern predicted with man-made global warming.
Rising sea levels - how will Washington cope?
Sea levels around Washington are expected to be six inches higher by 2050, perhaps 13 inches higher by 2100.Is the impact of of a six-inch rise a little or a lot? What should the state do in the meantime to prepare?
Research Shows Continued Decline of Oregon's Largest Glacier
ScienceDaily (Sep. 3, 2010) — An Oregon State University research program has returned to Collier Glacier for the first time in almost 20 years and found that the glacier has decreased more than 20 percent from its size in the late 1980s.The findings are consistent with glacial retreat all over the world and provide some of the critical data needed to help quantify the effects of global change on glacier retreat and associated sea level rise.
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From today's WSJ:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142405274870450580457548408012004319...
Sowing Seeds of Fear
In Russia, Farmers Take to Fields as Supply Concerns Grow
A "What If" scenario (a hypothetical future news item):
Planning to live off food you produce yourself? A cautionary tale...
I live in the boondocks and there are lots of critters. Besides the usual moles and gophers, there are deer, bears, an occasional lion, coons, opossums, bobcats..and wild pigs.
I got a call from a friend Friday morning to say that pigs had gotten into his garden the night before and totally wiped it out. They rooted up everything. There was nothing left. They salvaged some tomatoes and that was about it.
The same thing happened to me a few years ago only over a week's time. It all started one late evening at dusk when I went out to get something in the garden. I was between rows of tomatoes that were over my head when I heard a "Huff-huff." My first thought was that it was a bear. I pulled out my trusty, large pocket knife and back out (like a 4" blade would stop a bear - well, it might). Anyway, as I backed out I saw a shape run toward the fence. I knew it wasn't a bear but never thought of a pig.
To make a long story short, I spent the next week carting a rifle each time I went outside. And, for those who are big on guns, it gets old really fast. Shot a few but they mainly left because there was nothing left.
My point in this is for doomers who think they can always count on their crops for food should always follow the old adage of storing food during the good years for the lean years.
Todd
PS and for those who don't know, pigs have nasty teeth and a sow is more than willing to take you on if she has piglets. I know one guy who got bit in the rear end. He didn't think it was funny at all.
So, between your consumption and porcine consumption, your net food exports were severely constrained? PIFELM--Porcine Impacted Food Export Land Model.
Ain't that the truth. People who haven't had experience with pigs have no idea just how thoroughly they can destroy a garden. The gardener has exported a lot of time and capital but doesn't get to import anything.
Todd
PS I've been lucky so far this year in that I've only had one small bear in the orchard this year and he/she has appeared to move on. The biggest pests are the grouse that perch in the apple trees, take one bite out an apple then try another one. I've only had to whack five so far this year.
About two weeks ago I walked out onto the deck with my morning coffee and was shocked to see our entire backyard torn up - it looked like some teenagers were doing donuts on the lawn with their cars.
First suspects - my 16-year old son and his friends... ;)
Second suspects - tried and convicted - a family of skunks rooting out grubs.
Funny thing is they did not touch the garden.
(another aside - my friend was losing one chicken a week, convinced his dog was the culprit he duct-taped the 7th dead chicken to the dog's neck and left it there for two days for a dose of behavior modification... on day three he caught the real killer - a racoon - in a live trap... he then got drunk, apologized to his dog and shot the coon to death with his BB gun.
sick but true;)
Raccoons are delicious. Bake in a turkey roasting pan till the meat falls apart. Mix in barbeque sauce and have the best sloppy joes you ever tasted. It's a little like bear but more tender.
Plus they make great hats!
DD
I agree completely - especially about the "sloppy 'coon-joes."
I still have my grandmother's recipe.
Koy
Your name indicates that you must be a fan of the remarkable film of the same name.
Every year I show a 25-minute 'highlights' version to my students (Grade 7-8 boys with behavioural & social difficulties).
They are always quite intrigued by the footage: demolition of housing complexes & bridges, the high-speed traffic footage, the fast-food frenzy, etc.
But I am most intrigued by that final sequence... of the rocket exploding.
The film was made in 1982, years before the Challenger disaster.
When the Challenger's O-ring leaked, my recollection is that the public was told that such an O-ring failure had not occurred before.
But the Koy footage (don't know where they got it, but it was surely of an unmanned rocket exploding) clearly shows a flame coming out the side of the rocket where two sections meet (and presumably where an O-ring was placed).
Just wondering why this footage wasn't mentioned (as far as I know) in the Challenger enquiry four years later.
I'm reminded of that sustainable society Jared Diamond wrote about in Collapse. The people got together and decided pigs were more trouble than they were worth. They got into people's gardens and ruined them. And only the rich got to benefit from pigs by eating them. So they killed every pig on the island.
Must have been a heck of a barbecue.
Pigs are easily raised in a barn.
We raise two every winter to sop up excess milk. They have a box stall of their own, with a nice, clean floor with wood shavings and a pile of old hay to hang out in. We close all the barn doors and let them loose in the cow tie-ups while we shovel out their pen.
Then back in they go to a clean floor and bedding.
With a little bit of luck you could import ham and bacon!
Our problem is different but almost as critical. This year we had apple trees in blossom and had a hard frost one night and the next night and the third night then it warmed up. 2009 we had wheel barrels full of eating and baking apples and this year I believe there are four apples in the orchard the birds will get them.
Yesterday we had a killing frost but had some warning. We covered the tomatoes, the squash were about done anyway and the frost finished them. It is not easy gardening in the high desert over 5000’. We have a chain link fence around the garden but squirrels and birds get their share. No pigs, but where you live, I’ll bet there is open season on them.
I put a Simple Pump in our well last week end. The electric pump is at 100’ ,the Simple Pump is at 90’ and the water level is at 30’ so when the lights go out we will have water. It is not elaborate but we can get enough water to survive for ourselves, our garden and a few neighbors.
http://www.simplepump.com/OUR-PUMPS/Hand-Operated.html
IMHO most people will leave here and go back to California (cheers Todd) because almost everything is imported via truck or train. This place produces nothing from scratch. We have a few alfalfa fields and dairy cows within fifty miles of here. This place supported about 3000 Indians on a couple hundred square miles around here before white people showed up. It will support about 3000 of us when the other 297,000 people leave. We will have lots of salvage as Greer suggests will happen.
Tod, Lynford,Jimmygann, and a few others are telling it to you like it is folks.
Those miracle gardens that support you on a quarter acre are as prone to sudden destruction as a little sailboat out on the open ocean during storm season.
If you actually expect to make it on home grown chow, you better have two or three acres per person in a place with an "average " climate and soil.
This is about the minimum that allows for fallowing some land, rotating crops, having storage facilities, tool sheds, wind breaks, fruit and nut trees, some firewood production , maybe a small pond for fish and emergency irrigation water,corn or other grain ample for storage against a bad year, the possibility of supporting a pig, a few chickens, a couple of dairy goats, or a cow.
You will work your axx off even with this all in place , from can't see to can't see at certain times.
And there is this to consider:the more intensive the cultivation regime, ther lower the marginal return per hour devoted to farming.With more land, your return per hour or per day spent in the field is higher, even though your yield per acre may be much lower.
You will still have dozens of essential chores other than production chores to complete in a homestead situation;drying enough apples sufficient to have enough to last to the next harvest season is a chore that could easily consume perhaps a hundred or more hours of labor.
Looking after a single dairy cow will take a minimum of forty five minutes to an hour a day when you milk, feed,wash buckets and jars, and clean up by hand.Churning a little butter every few days will consume another hour at least.
Just getting up enough firewood by hand, even if the woodlot is close by, is an enormous job;we haven't ever had to do it within living memory in my family entirely by hand;there was always at least a horse or mule to drag up trees in my family.But even so, working with a crosscut saw and an axe, it took a full day every week in the winter just to take care of the fuel problem.
Of course we have much better houses and stoves nowadays-but we aren't physically the men and women our great grandparents were, either.My Uncle Scheafer regularly walked twenty four miles or so to a job in a furniture factory in the thirties and worked a sweat shop ten hour shift;my grandfather on my Momma's side traded him equally , for his days pay , occasionally, an equal length day on the farm.This provided both of them with a few dollars actual cash income for taxes and a few essential purchased items at a time when crop prices were most often below production costs.
When these men were sixty, thier hands were as hard as a leather shoe bottom, and while they had small paunches, they could still load a big truck with a couple of hundred bales of hay at a fast clip without a break.
I worked in the fields as a boy and a teenager with these men;when I went away to college, out of about sixty guys in gym class, only two of similar wieght and hieght could handle more wieght on the benches;both of them were gym rats who were all around athletes, playing football and working out on a regular schedule.I had never "worked out"even once in my entire life, I just worked.
It ain't gonna be funny-even if you have all the advantages of a good house and lots of tools and all the infrastructure in place and paid for before tshtf-if it does.
There ain't gonna be enough time to pursue ultra high yield , high labor production strategies;you are going to need an ample amount of land per capita.
This is the reality of low tech semisubsistence agriculture and rural living in a low energy, lopw cash income environment, when there are few or no markets for any salable surplus crops;I saw and lived the tail end of it as a child.We had trucks and tractors and eletricity by then, but old ways die hard and the old folks didn't altogether give them up even long after it was possible to do so.
And unless you have a good bit of land, there ain't gonna be any salable surplus in any case.
You can take this comment to the bank.
Well, you said it.
There is so much to learn. We boarded a neighbor's Shorthorn cow last winter and were astonished at how long it took to churn her cream. It sometimes took over an hour for the butter to come, and we thought we were doing something wrong.
Then our own Devon cow got pregnant, lost a calf, and began producing milk.
Her butter comes in, literally, five minutes.
Shorthorns are milk cows. Devon cream is the best.
About "making it" in a post-peak crisis: We've given up. We farm simply because we like it. We realize there is just no way to predict what will happen when oil supplies go into decline, where the effects will be felt, what those effects will be, or even when it will happen. Peak oil writers who attempt to sketch out the future (most of them are former novelists) don't get the time of day from us.
We realize that we are utterly dependent on the existing industrial infrastructure to run our little farm--even though we grow, process, and preserve close to 90% of our own food, meat included.
People who call themselves "subsistence farmers" in America today make me vomit. There are no true subsistence farmers anymore. It's all a pretense, a kind of pretending to be "down" with the poor folk, "slumming," if you will. Some of them even have blogs. What a joke!
If there is indeed a collapse, we do not feel prepared for it in spite of twenty-five years of farming. We hope only to be around long enough to watch it transpire and say "told you so."
Well, OFM, since it's Sunday and ok to have a little tall story telling on the screen porch, I will toss in my own small one. I grew up in the sweltering south during the depression, and was a non-paid slave on my father's farm. Worked like a real slave in really slavish things like hauling 100 lb sacks over rutty ground all day long in 100F heat. The old guy who was my fellow slave was an immediate descendent of real ones- he was jet black, just like his mule, and had plenty of stories to tell of working to death for nothing, which he did with great humor while he and I had lunch in the shade, watching my father just keep at it in all that heat, bugs and bad smells.
"That man, he plum crazy, wukkin like that in the sun all th' time. white man ain't made fo' that"".
Of course it helped that my father could see some possible personal benefit to killing himself, whereas I and my cohort could not hope for anything but supper. if that.
Then, when I got in the navy and found out there were other kinds of existence, I was astounded to see that most guys in my boot company could barely lift their boots, much less hundred pound loads. And walls they had to struggle to get over were simply not there at all to me.
Maybe that's why my father, who was an infantry officer in both wars, told me that the best infantryman by far was a redneck southern mountain boy, born with a rifle in his hand, totally illiterate, made of nothing but skin and bones, who didn't mind any kind of physical trial because he hadn't yet learned there was anything but.
My father surmised that's why the Japanese infantry were so good- they had an even tougher childhood.
Absolutely. One of the reasons Canadians were so successful in WWI, as well.
I would like to pose a question concerning the two Enbridge pipeline spills for petroleum engineers, scientists, etc:
Is there some type of structural problem with the US pipeline system (such as corrosion)? Or is it suffering from neglect and lack of and/or poor maintenence?
The late Matt Simmons frequently warned us about growing energy infrastructure problems in the US.
As I stated last night, don't look for either closed pipeline to be reopened soon. That is because the necessary regulatory approvals will likely not be quickly coming following these two events - plus the California NG pipeline explosion and GOM oil spill disaster.
http://www.mlive.com/news/kalamazoo/index.ssf/2010/09/enbridge_pipeline_...
As Leanan has previously noted, it's probably symptomatic of the overall severe infrastructure problem. The phrase in commercial real estate is that banks "Extend and pretend." I think that the infrastructure saying is something like "Patch and pretend."
Rust never sleeps, as Matt Simmons said. I think most people have no clue how much maintenance is required to keep our infrastructure working. They think you build it, and you're done.
However, I wonder if Enbridge has just been unlucky, or if their infrastructure is especially bad (due to company culture or situation - rapid expansion left less resources for maintenance, perhaps?)
They've had quite a few spills in the past, but I don't know if that's normal for a company of their size or not.
Rust never sleeps, as Matt Simmons said.
I think that was Neil Young.
Another Simmons quote that bothers me:
The problem with that heuristic attitude is that it forces you always into a forensic mode and you never can make any real predictions.
Think about rust. In the absence of theory, people would notice that their iron tools would turn brown when left out in the rain. People would start collecting this evidence and the tribal knowledge would be to never leave your tools outside because the demons would infect them.
I realize that this is absurd but theory does count.
I think Matt when pressed would likely have acknowledged what you are saying. But his point, I think, is that people generally aren't really rigorous with the data. Plus, they are too ready to gloss over inconvenient facts when they disagree with their world view.
It's a common human mistake and it's worth reminding people how often we do it.
For instance, I'm reviewing Boyce's paper ("What Goes Up Must Come Down? An Economic Analysis of Peak Oil" http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.157.6951&rep=re...) and he appears to be using 1P data for his discovery charts instead of 2P data. That one mistake allows him to draw incorrect conclusions that void the rest of the paper because he thinks discoveries aren't a problem.
Matt was just trying to say, "Get yer facts straight first."
That Boyce paper is just awful. The math is elegantly constructed but woefully misguided. He attacks something he calls the Peak Oil model but that doesn't exist because it is just a heuristic.
Agreed. He is missing many important concepts in his understanding. But it's pretty typical economist-thinking.
Yes the Boyce paper has a lot of exotic math in it, but it makes a lot of invalid assumptions about how the oil industry operates, and the constraints imposed on oil companies by geology.
A lot of the data he uses has problems. For instance, US data is distorted by the Alaska North Slope discoveries, which were by far the biggest oil finds in North America, before or since, and came on production late due to delays in the Trans-Alaska Pipeline. In reality you have two superimposed bell curves, one for the lower 48 and a later one for Alaska.
The rest of his data is similarly lumpy because most of the world's oil is found in big fields and when someone hits a big field, it causes a big spike in reserves. The world "discovery" data is also confounded by the habit of OPEC members of bumping up reserves whenever they need an increase in their allowable production.
Hubbert and Deffeyes had a much better grasp of the basic concepts, although their math wasn't necessarily as fancy. I think Hubbert just drew his original curves freehand.
Nice reference.
In the conclusions:
"While the model predicts that oil
production will eventually peak, it sees this as a natural transition towards the use
of other technologies."
Sounds completely reasonable to me.
It's typical cornucopian economic stuff with a poor grasp of important physical details (like the 1P/2P problem I pointed out). I expect you would have liked it ;-).
You didn't point out much of a problem that isn't systemic. The US primarily is a P1 kind of place, the world more of a P2 kind of place. If you play around with US data, you use one, if you use the world data, you usually play around with the other.
It should be noted that BOTH reserve types grow.
Sorry, I don't understand the distinction you are trying to point out. Can you say more about it?
This is what I'm talking about:
Assessing the date of the global oil peak: The need to use 2P reserves
Reliance on 1P data has led to a number of misconceptions, including the notion that past oil forecasts were incorrect, that oil reserves grow very significantly due to technology gain, and that the global supply of oil is ensured provided sufficient investment is forthcoming to ‘turn resources into reserves’. These misconceptions have been widely held, including within academia, governments, some oil companies, and organisations such as the IEA.
This statement is incorrect. P2's grow as well as P1's do. While some people may not assume this to be true (assuming his list is correct) in reality it is. Certainly any focus on P1's leads quickly to the effect of conversion of resources to reserves because its obvious. It is also obvious at the P2 level, but I have a feeling such data is less readily available for public consumption.
Have you read the paper?
Yes. I haven't formed an opinion yet, and won't on any mathematical formula's, I'm more concerned with assumptions that go into such things. The devil is always in the details. Maybe I can find an economist to run it by this week, I'm working internationally and should have plenty around.
Reserve grows much less elsewhere, see Russia as an example.
Other countries are not as scared to stand by their initial estimates whereas the USA backs way off.
Well no, it's not reasonable at all. You could transition from one form of energy to another form of energy, if another form of energy existed. But you cannot transition from a form of energy to a form of technology. Technology is not energy. Technology cannot replace energy. Only energy can replace energy.
Hell... I thought everyone knew that.
Ron P.
Good point. When talking to others about peak oil issues I have always assumed this, that this was somehow self-evident.
But you cannot transition from a form of energy to a form of technology. Technology is not energy. Technology cannot replace energy. Only energy can replace energy.
I don't read the quote that way at all. Oil does not jump from the ground into our gas tanks. A significant fraction of the worlds GDP goes into the technology which turns an oozing, stinky geologic waste product which once decreased property values into a nice fuel. A natural transition towards other technologies means just that....we'll find some other waste product (be it geologic in nature or, say, sunlight which we aren't using for more than a means to create melanoma) and transition to that technology. The heart of any of these technologies being some sort of useful commodity. Oil certainly isn't special, but the technology which allows us to utilize it so efficiently is.
Hell, like I said, still seems pretty reasonable to me.
Are you seriously going to try to argue that we use energy derived from petroleum in an efficient manner due to our special technology?
What makes crude so special is the energy density which is unequaled by any other source that we have available to us at present. Almost all of our modern technology exists only because of our access to this concentrated energy.
Are you seriously going to try to argue that we use energy derived from petroleum in an efficient manner due to our special technology?
Not quite. But I am seriously trying to argue that mankinds ingenuity in turning some waste geologic ooze into useful commodities is more important than whatever the waste geologic ooze happens to be. Oil isn't special and it isn't all that useful in its original form...it becomes useful because people applied an array of cool ideas and neat science to it and presto....gasoline and diesel and kerosene and asphalt and what have you.
Almost all of our modern technology exists only because of our access to this concentrated energy.
Which came first, the chicken or the egg?
I think it was not only Matt Simmons and Neil Young, but everyone who has ever owned an old car that said that. Neil Young said he got it from the group Devo, and Devo got it from a slogan they created for a Rustoleum ad.
But back to the non-sleeping rust issue. The Lakehead Pipeline system was built over 55 years ago to carry newly-discovered Alberta oil to refineries in Ontario. It was never intended to last as long as it has because the Alberta oil fields were expected to be largely exhausted in two or three decades (which they were), and then Ontario refineries would switch back to imported oil. (Prior to the Alberta discoveries, Canada imported 90% of its oil.)
It was built south of the Great Lakes because it was cheaper to run pipelines through US Mid-West farmland than Canadian Shield granite and peat bogs. It also allowed the oil companies to drop off oil in the Mid-West on the way by, which appealed to both Canadian oil producers and the US Department of Defense. (Memories of WWII U-boat attacks were still strong.)
Back then, nobody every thought that the pipelines would be in service as long as they have been, that they would carry as much oil as they do now, or that Mid-West refineries would become completely dependent on them. Everybody (except for a few lone pessimists) thought that US oil would last forever, Arab oil would always be cheap and plentiful, and oil sands would always be too expensive to produce.
US imports of Canadian oil and products are expected to reach 3 million bpd in the next year, if'n the creek don't rise and the pipelines don't break.
That is really interesting thanks. Do you have a reference for that though? I don't ask to be facetious, but I enjoy arguing with the stupid/people who should know better who like to spout nonsense 'no we won't go backwards like the Romans...cause we got more technology!'. Not that I will win an argument just like to be a knot in their woodworking. :->
Reference for what? I said a number of different things and have no idea whether it's Neil Young or the Lakehead Pipeline that you found interesting.
Maybe pipeline operators' strategy is something like "Watch and pretend."
By "watch," I mean their reliance on computer monitoring to alert them to changes in pressure, etc, which might indicate a leak.
In the case of both the Enbridge crude spill in Michigan and Thursday's gas explosion in San Bruno, the leaks appear to have been first noticed by the noses of local residents, long before it was addressed by whomever was supposed to be monitoring the computerized warning systems.
On the issue of pipeline spill clean-up, the policy of one contractor seems to be "hide and pretend:"
http://michiganmessenger.com/41628/workers-say-garner-environmental-cove...
I am not an expert but I'll give my take on this situation anyway. My opinion is formed from reading news articles and following twitter.
The second pipeline may have sprung a leak because of the extra stress caused from the first pipeline being shutdown and oil being diverted to this pipeline. The two pipelines will not be shut for long. Logistically, I don't believe that the Midwest refineries can continue to be supplied now. Before 6A came offline two days ago, this was the situation.
Pray tell me, how both Midwest pipelines carrying Canadian tar sand oil can stay shutdown for an extended period. For the Midwest, until one of these pipelines open, this is Hurricane Midwest Ike.
Thanks all for your responses, they are very illuminating.
Frankly, the description ‘Hurricane Midwest Ike’ may be appropriate. When Enbridge may possibly have this repaired in as little as a few days (although I doubt that), regulatory authorities will be slow to allow the pipeline system to reopen.
I’m am not a pipeline expert, but after following every pipeline break in the US for more than 7 years, I can firmly say that the recent Enbridge pipeline problems are getting much more attention from regulatory authorities than perhaps any other pipeline problem in recent years.
Approval for various restart steps in the first break are going quite slowly, and the second pipeline break may further slow down the regulatory reopening of the first pipeline.
http://www.etaiwannews.com/etn/news_content.php?id=1372145&lang=eng_news
Regulators may not act until local gasoline shortages start popping up in the Chicago area.
Maybe we should make a bet when 6B comes back online? (Just Joking)
Gasoline prices increased 25-30 cents on average in Indianapolis last night. I would guess that by the end of next week, the EPA will give the go-ahead on restarting 6B. Enbridge has already stated they are ready to start it. The government may not like to be blamed for spiking gasoline prices especially in Obama's hometown. If the EPA holds their ground longer, that could be quite a spectacle.
I would like to pose a question concerning the two Enbridge pipeline spills for petroleum engineers, scientists, etc: Is there some type of structural problem with the US pipeline system (such as corrosion)? Or is it suffering from neglect and lack of and/or poor maintenence?
As someone who qualifies as both a scientist and engineer, I would venture the following.
There is perhaps a reasonable sized pipeline issue about every 2 days in the US. You don't usually hear about them, and for good reason. When I worked in industry we fixed them as fast as they happened. Having said that, quite a bit of the infrastructure in this country is older, and certainly the older the infrastructure gets the more likely corrosion, fatigue, or just someone digging with a backhoe is to cause some catastrophic failure. To a limited extent Simmons was correct. But the hysterical tone he had certainly didn't reflect the actual issues very well, or acknowledge that they are being handled everyday without anyone even noticing.
As compared to other scientists/engineers, you are very vague. Can you be more specific - such as what is a 'reasonable size' pipeline problem? I know that some major pipeline companies dig up existing pipelines to inspect them and look for possible leaks. Is that what you are talking about, that 'patch and pretend' is the industry standard? I am not aware of any ongoing pipeline replacement project if that's what you are implying.
If Simmons was wrong, then what are the 'actual issues'? We've also had a number of other major piepline breaks the last few years, including the biggest pipeline of all, the Colonial pipeline, which caused localized gasoline shortages. Is pipeline deterioration not an 'actual issue'?
It brings up for me another part of the Aging Infrastructure question, which is 'are there parts of the infrastructure that are enough 'under the rugs' that they really don't get maintained?'
I would have to assume, with the state of many of our bridges as one indicator, that the answer is clearly yes, but it will nevertheless elicit a very shruggy qualified response from those who are responsible for that maintenance.
Are these 'under the rug' projects also the first to be put on a continual chain of postponements once the profit margins have slimmed a bit?
This is one of my principal concerns about Nuclear Power. When we're robust and in the money, maintaining the plumbing, the concrete and the waste piles is more or less still happening, so we're usually told. But we already have regular stories about oversights and underperformance. What happens to safety when everyone's pinched, and what are the results?
How many here floss as much as they're supposed to? Who still needs to clean out the gutters, declog the drain-tray under the fridge, check the air pressure on their tires?
As compared to other scientists/engineers, you are very vague.
This is cocktail hour. If need to use footnotes I write a paper and publish it.
Reasonable sized pipeline problems can be large or small, and no, they aren't dug up very often for inspections, pigs appear to be accepted practice for inspections on at least the larger lines, assuming there isn't a design issue which would prevent this technique from being used.
I've only installed, operated and tested smaller, intrastate gathering systems. I'm guessing here that the more interstate lines are much more thorough in their maintenance regimes, I tended to wait until I had a verified leak before I fixed anything, being that lackadaisical with a 1200psi transmission line probably violates some interstate rule or another.
Pipeline deterioration is an issue, which is why other techniques like sleeving them is a reasonable and standard industry practice. You run a smaller ID pipe inside the old one, effectively using the old pipe as a tunnel for the new one. I've made some recommendations like this for old Soviet age infrastructure in Afghanistan as a cheaper solution than a new pipeline.
So sure, Simmons was sorta right. Strip away his general hysteria though and what you find is regular pipeline maintenance continuing day in and day out, its just part of the business.
The question I am wondering about is whether the oil that was being transported was a very viscous oil such as the "Western Select" blend (a 50% bitumen, 50% synthetic crude combination), and if so, did that play a role in the leak. Very viscous oil doesn't move through the pipe the same way more liquid crude oil does, and it could theoretically cause a problem, even if the pipelines are in reasonable repair (or could bring about problems that might not otherwise show up until later).
I wrote a post about the first Enbridge pipeline break on August 14. That leak was a leak of very heavy oil (from Canada), along a break in a seam.
One of the problems seems to have been that because the oil was so heavy, it set off false pressure alarms, making it hard to distinguish real problems from false alarms.
There was apparently a similar leak in Minnesota in 2002, also along a seam, when very heavy oil from Canada was being transported through a pipeline there.
I don't know anything about this third leak--if it is at all similar to the other two. I also don't know how different the heavy crude from Canada is from other heavy crudes that are being transported today. It may be that there is no particular problem with transporting very heavy crude--we have been doing it for a while. Or it may be that it makes pipeline deficiencies show up faster than a lighter, less viscous crude would.
Great post on the first Enbridge spill.
As has been mentioned, there have been other pipeline leaks by Enbridge, even earlier this year, with tar sands oil, plus there has been more than a few leaks in the tar sands oil pipelines in Canada and the US the last few years.
The facts suggest that this type of oil is somehow creating more problems. It is possible that we are nearing the end of the useful life of some of the older pipelines, and these breaks are the warning signs?
I was asked to repost this here. Thanks.
I'm curious to hear your informed replies to this email I just received from a relative. They are an executive in the Energy Industry, and these are their counterarguments against Peak Oil being relevant.
Thank you for your consideration. The e-mail follows:
The "Peak Oil" mechanism is sound and no one really knows the date it will happen. Normally when I read about it it is always in a year or two, and its been that way the last 8 years. Using oil as a mechanism is incomplete, it is really an energy question. I imagine at one time people were talk about "peak oil" with regards to whale oil. Some info that I hold and is useful in reading the world.
***wells are shut down when the easy oil is gone, normally about 25% to 40% removed - most of the oil is still there it just cost too much to get it out
***There is "peak oil" for easy oil, and then "peak oil" for all oil and they are different dates - I have no idea when either one will be (nobody will until it is history)
***New technologies are lowering the cost of removing the next 40% of the oil from a specific well, doubling the reserves
***Shale Gas - They have figured out how to get gas out of shale - this is a market changer - since this new technology all forecasts for natural gas price are at $4 (really cheap)
***natural gas and oil are interchangeable with just a little technology that all ready exist - for energy (plastics are a different question)
***it is much cleaner than oil and can be converter to electricity or pumped into your car from your house (if your interested check out www.bloomenergy.com , for a next generation of fuel cells, this could also be a market changer)
***USA natural gas reserves with shale include make us the new Saudi Arabia of energy
***Coal Gasification - technology not commercially viable yet - But the Germans were using it during WWII to power their trucks (gas was for fighting equipment only) - Will be another market changer. There is enough coal in the US for another 1000 years
***The nuclear issue - it is where we have to go, supplies are greater then coal, gas and oil combined, it does not polute our atmosphere and is the safest source. PR is what is holding it back. The French new that 40 years ago and 90+% of their power comes from nuclear sources
It is my reading that "peak oil" is real and completly irrelevent... except for making great rhetoric to sell your agenda or ads. But I will keep watching, it might change.
Probably more than you wanted, but is a complex issue and easily misinterpreted.
You're on to us Galen. It only took you 81 minutes as a member to figure it out!
We have an agenda and ads to sell.
If your relative would use spellcheck and then disseminate the above information we'll be able to fold-up shop here and all go home.
I do apologize for the quick posting - I know it's bad form. I've actually been lurking for a few years. I have my own answers to the points in the e-mail, but I'm looking for outside input for verification.
I think that gaelenb may have an agenda. Did you notice the strategic link that s/he inserted?
Haha. It's not like Bloom's a secret. It was on 60 Minutes twice. And as I said, this not authored by me.
I am sorry, I was confused by the lack of blockquotes. What I said applies to your relative.
I don't think it does. I've heard of Bloom myself multiple times, and "an agenda" would imply that my relative would somehow benefit from the the link to Bloom Energy. I'm saying that not only is it ridiculous to think that a link on TOD would lead to benefit for a single investor, but given the hype they've already gotten, this is irrelevant even if it was a "strategic link."
Oh, wait... I guess I could be some PR drone in India, paid $5/hr to post long discussions on industry forums. I suppose that could be true, since my labor would be essentially free to the oil industry. Darn. You've got an out. You don't have to face the force of the stupidity of your argument. (Wait... that's too much. Can I take that out? No... the Editing Gods say No. Sorry.) (no offense... just joking around)
And you are dead wrong on that point, as well as a few others. We could convert a lot of vehicles to natural gas, at great cost to the consumer and it would take a great deal of time, many years. It would be difficult to convert the trucking fleet to natural gas and impossible for the airline industry.
But I wish to make one very important point, a point that just about everyone overlooks. This line in your post emphasizes that point: "USA natural gas reserves with shale include make us the new Saudi Arabia of energy". To most people it is always about us, always about the USA and our vast natural gas and coal reserves. Peak oil is a worldwide phenomenon.
Japan has no oil, no coal and no natural gas. Ditto for South Korea, Taiwan and perhaps a dozen other countries. We, that is the USA, will not export our coal or natural gas to these countries once the truth comes out. And the truth really is that if we converted everything to coal or natural gas, we would reach the peak of both in very short order.
So is it it irrelevent that billions of people in much of the world will be thrown into chaos even though the US has enough coal and natural gas to allow them to carry on business as usual?
Ron P.
Yeah. I definitely feel the moral argument myself, but the people I'm doing research for wont.
In response to this:
"We could convert a lot of vehicles to natural gas, at great cost to the consumer and it would take a great deal of time, many years. It would be difficult to convert the trucking fleet to natural gas and impossible for the airline industry."
The reply would be: yes, it will be a gradual process that takes years, but so does every transition. The market will handle it better than you're giving it credit for. There'll be cost, but it wont be crippling. We'll use the remaining oil for jet fuel, plastics, etc. We'll transition onto Natural Gas, and then be fine until the 2030 peak. At that point, we'll have had time to develop the various technologies that will lead to real long term sustainability.
I want a fulsome critique of this position, if you're interested in giving it.
Gaelenb, Your reply drives home my very point. WE are not the world! You completely ignored my main point. What will the rest of the world do? Will we regress into isolationism? What will be the cost of that? What will this mean for our imports and exports? Could we build a new manufacturing base if... nay when... world commerce collapses?
If you deal with this problem at all then you must deal with it on a worldwide basis. Either that or explain how the US will fare after we become isolated from the rest of the world.
Ron P.
Well, after Peak Oil, if the US decided to become energy independent and isolationist, we would not need all that military equipment and infrastructure. Shifting that $800B (or whatever the real cost is) in manpower, manufacturing and research effort to "Project Independence" would certainly give a boost to the possibility of a successful transition. As it is, we've already squandered the "Peace Dividend" after the collapse of the USSR, as well as the sense of urgency which resulted from the Arab/OPEC Embargo and the Iranian Crisis. Clearly, TPTB will push BAU as long as possible.
After Peak Oil, the world may find that large scale military adventures, such as WW II, are no longer possible because the resources to conduct them are gone. As a result, the US may become isolationist simply because we can no longer project the sort of military power required to maintain our "empire". One can only hope...
E. Swanson
And you know this exactly how?
Something like: "We're all dealing with theories here. You don't *know* your interpretation is going to come to pass - you can't see the future anymore than I can. But to make the positive argument, I'd say that we "know" this because of a basic confidence in the power of the market to allocate resources. It'll be rough, and poorer areas of the world might be in real trouble, but we'll get through and to a new normal."
Gaelenb,
it actually takes a fair amount of time to understand all the issues related to energy. It's a complex topic and it's taken me years to get the full picture (such as it stands; of course Lynch would say I have the wrong picture). There is the flow rate of the resource, the rate the economy will contract as the oil depletes, the impact of the export land model, hoarding, more resource wars ("I am saddened that it is politically inconvenient to acknowledge what everyone knows. The Iraq war is largely about oil." — Alan Greenspan) and so on.
Ultimately, it comes down to which of the following curves you expect humanity to follow as it deals with converging fiscal, energy and environmental problems. Oil is just one of the prominent problems we face. For instance, we don't discuss depletion of the fisheries much here nor how the ocean is acidifying at an alarming rate thus endangering the entire oceanic ecosystem. We don't talk much about depleting aquifers and so on.
We have a mess of problems on our hands.
I think as fossil fuels decline there is no way we will be able to maintain the size of the current economy so the blue line is right out. (The red line I dismiss almost out of hand.) So it's between the green line and the orange line because it's as though the world economy has been on steroids for several centuries and now it's being cut off. It really is that simple.
Thus, I think Greer's model is our future:
People here will keep helping you but you may want to just keep reading all the peak oil primers until things snap into place for you. There is no replacement for just hunkering down and grappling with the issues on your own time.
Here are mine but TOD has some linked as well:
http://www.postpeakliving.com/peak-oil-primer
http://www.postpeakliving.com/preparing-post-peak-life
The word for this is "faith."
"Allocate resources" is a euphemism for "to all those who have, more will be given, and they will have an abundance; but from those who have nothing, even what they have will be taken away."
Whatever that means.
The problem with the market is it only works on a short time horizon, maybe a couple of years. It is very poor at anticipating things say a decade off, and forcing the current market participants to recognize that say oil may be very very pricy ten years on. And of course the market only "cares" about matching buyers and sellers. So if oil is in short supply, it will match it to demand by raising prices until demand is throttled back. But, how well will our economy function at that point? We already see what a few sick investment banks and underwater mortages have done to our economy. It just isn't the robust thing of your audience's imagination. So an anticipatory response would have gasoline well over $5 per gallon, and everyone and his brother trying to find someone to purchase their SUV. Thats not happening is it?
On the subject of NGVs, http://www.iangv.org/home.html has detailed info. They show an estimated 9.6 million NGVs in 2008, 1.44% of the world total, using a figure of 667,736,000
vehicles I have from another source. This percentage has continued to rise since 2005, but only by about .3%. Extrapolating out I don't see this becoming a dominant factor in world energy consumption soon.
Peak oil is very much a financial phenomenon. At some point, it becomes very expensive to keep raising oil production because of geological limitations. Instead of being to extract oil where it comes out of the ground easily, we have to drill in very deep offshore areas, or in the arctic, or melt bitumen form the tar sands. People's salaries don't go up, so we get recession, rather than the high prices that might be helpful for making it economic to extract this expensive-to-extract oil.
We use a lot more natural gas than oil. Even if we could make some changes, the natural gas would not provide more than part of the shortfall, and would run low fairly quickly, if it is used for its regular uses as well.
Edit: Oops! I meant we use more oil than natural gas.
You need to rethink that one Gail. US Energy Use by Source
Ron P.
I edited my comment to correct it. The second part of the comment was as I intended--we will run short of natural gas, if we try to use it to replace oil.
Transition....It seems to be a buzz word or something. It suggests BAU, a simple change to a new way of living or a new way of using energy or new paradigm or whatever. The word is thrown out there, no one presents a plan, interpretation, costing, timespan or method.
So you have just "thrown out there", "transition"....what do you have to say for yourself.
***wells are shut down when the easy oil is gone, normally about 25% to 40% removed - most of the oil is still there it just cost too much to get it out
If it costs a lot to get out, it will be expensive to buy. The secondary effects of expensive energy (see the last 2 years) makes this oil too costly for typical consumers, so it won't be produced
***There is "peak oil" for easy oil, and then "peak oil" for all oil and they are different dates - I have no idea when either one will be (nobody will until it is history)
With unlimited easy money there is a later peak oil. See a lot of easy money out there for folks to buy expensive oil with ?
***New technologies are lowering the cost of removing the next 40% of the oil from a specific well, doubling the reserves
A bit simplistic. True perhaps in some cases but it's not like every well ever drilled is sitting there with 40% of the oil just waiting for us to suck it out. It's still costly - see above.
***Shale Gas - They have figured out how to get gas out of shale - this is a market changer - since this new technology all forecasts for natural gas price are at $4 (really cheap)
Stay tuned and we'll see how much gas and for how long...
***natural gas and oil are interchangeable with just a little technology that all ready exist - for energy (plastics are a different question)
With some of that easy money lets switch all our cars and gas stations over to NG. Where's the money?
***it is much cleaner than oil and can be converter to electricity or pumped into your car from your house (if your interested check out www.bloomenergy.com , for a next generation of fuel cells, this could also be a market changer)
I want a Bloombox - can I borrow a couple hundred thousand dollars please?
***USA natural gas reserves with shale include make us the new Saudi Arabia of energy
It's that same reserves thing again - but reserves don't equal affordable energy.
***Coal Gasification - technology not commercially viable yet - But the Germans were using it during WWII to power their trucks (gas was for fighting equipment only) - Will be another market changer. There is enough coal in the US for another 1000 years
After 70+ years it's not commercially viable... Maybe another 70 and it will be? Is there enough atmosphere left for a 1000 years of coal use?
***The nuclear issue - it is where we have to go, supplies are greater then coal, gas and oil combined, it does not polute our atmosphere and is the safest source. PR is what is holding it back. The French new that 40 years ago and 90+% of their power comes from nuclear sources
Nuclear electricity is probably a big part of our future. Refer back to earlier discussions about how much capacity we'll need and how fast we can build it...
You know what would be incredibly useful? Reaction quotations from people in response to Hubbert's prediction of Continental US Peak Oil in 65-70. I bet they were saying much of the same things deniers are saying now, and that would be a knock-down point in the the argument for our side.
Searching "Peak Oil" on Google News this morning, two of the top three hits were Peak Oil: Not Just for Conspiracy Theorists Anymore, linked above and A Look at the Peak Oil Belief – Is the End Really Near posted yesterday but drew no comments. These two articles represent opposing sides in the peak oil debate.
It occurred to me that the battle is on. It has reached the mainstream blogs but has not yet reached the mainstream media. But I am sure it will and very soon. Anyway it is interesting that the peak oil denier in the second article is a right wing blogger and the first article in "The Daily Green" is a left wing blog.
Though some on the left deny peak oil and a few on the right accept it, the general battle line is between the left that sees the peak oil light and the right who argue that it is all a myth.
I am going to enjoy seeing this play out in the next five years. I am going to enjoy watching those right wing nut cases eat crow. Not that I am going to enjoy the misery that comes with the collapse, far from it. But I have tried to get people, my people, to prepare. In the end they will come to realize that grandpa was right, rest his soul.
Ron P.
Five years? I think that might be too short a timeline. Way too short.
I expect the economy to be worse shape by then, maybe much worse, but I don't expect many to make the connection with oil.
And I expect the average American will still be more interested in the start of football season than in oil depletion five years hence.
I would bet... ten to one... that peak oil will be accepted by just about everyone by 2015. There is only one way, one possibility, that the world will not realize peak oil has arrived. That is if the economy is so bad, a worldwide depression, that demand drops so low that everyone believes the drop is due to the depression and not peak oil.
Here is how it will play out, barring a worldwide depression of course. Non-OPEC liquids peak this year. OPEC gradually increases production offsetting the drop in non-OPEC production. Then in about 2012 or no later than 2013, OPEC is unable to increase production enough to offset the non-OPEC decline.
Then the bombshell drops. Someone within OPEC leaks to the media that OPEC has no more spare capacity. This leads to the realization, and perhaps admission, that those vast OPEC reserves are largely a myth. Then all hell breaks loose. It is headline news on all networks.
What happens then is unpredictable. But there is a strong possibility that many exporting nations, looking out for their own rear end, will start to cut back on exports, saving their oil for "future generations". Normal oil flow among nations will be disrupted. (This was discussed yesterday.)
But it takes time for total collapse to happen. Perhaps four to five years. My bet is that the year 2017 will be the year of total global financial collapse. Perhaps a year sooner or a year later but that is a good ballpark figure.
Ron P.
There are some on staff who now believe peak oil will never be accepted. Even if it is, it will be under a different name, because the term "peak oil" has too much negative baggage now.
That is indeed what I am expecting.
Ron, I'll take that bet!
I think the "belief map" will look more like this in 2015:
30% will think the bankers screwed the financial system and caused the depression we are entering
30% will think the environmentalists/democrats screwed the free enterprise system and caused the depression we are entering
20% will think the oil companies are withholding oil to keep prices up thus causing the depression we are entering
19% will think speculators are running up the price of oil
1% will understand the nature of resource depletion
I could have subdivided into more pieces, but you get the idea.
That I can agree with. At least in the US.
I think it's also possible that there will be a middling scenario...global recession, but not worse than the Great Depression bad. And more production than we expect, because of new technology or whatever.
I'm not a technocopian, but looking at what happened with shale gas in the U.S., and reading all those articles about how countries all over the world want to try it, and apply similar techniques to oil...I think production might be higher than expected. Obviously, it's not a long-term solution, but it could add years to the plateau.
I mean, just about everyone who knew anything said that U.S. natural gas production was headed for a cliff. Instead, we have a gas glut.
Yes, we could keep ratcheting down oil consumption roughly in line with oil production for a few more years i.e. contracting in stair steps until the stock markets crash. Then the stair steps begin again.
I'm basically taking Colin Campbell's lead that fixating on the exact date of the peak isn't productive. As he puts it:
"We don't have to argue exactly about the precise date. What is important is the vision of the long decline after the peak."
http://www.cbc.ca/thecurrent/2010/06/june-18-2010.html
There are real infrastructure limits to oil demand its difficult to fall below them. The fact US VMT has been flat to rising through most of this recession tends to support that we are at least at one of those infrastructure limits.
I'd argue only very high prices can force another demand contraction. However it seems clear that at each stage the finaly low is much higher than the previous low. The seemingly natural price of 70 now is much higher than the previous 20-30. Even though I loath to use history right now to predict the future the next price spike would then result in a natural low around 140. Using the last price as a metric this would suggest a high near 300 to induce an new floor price of 140.
Obviously the shrunken economy viable at 140 is even less capable of paying back existing debt leading to another round of debt deflation.
Obviously I don't know the future but I suggest that we can expect remaining oil demand to become increasingly inelastic and price insensitive simply on the basis of the nature of our existing infrastructure. On top of this the ability to expand debt to finance conservation will erode as with each round of price changes we are literally poorer. The debt overhang will remain just as large as ever regardless of how much debt is destroyed in a given round as the ability to pay contracts faster than debt is written off.
The real problem is of course we did not pay for the infrastructure designed for a world of cheap oil in the first place therefore we are unable to pay for its replacement. The only way to pay for the existing infrastructure is to eventually write it all off via default. The actual conversion to a renewable energy based infrastructure at any meaningful rate will only happen after these old debts are retired and the existing infrastructure written down to effectively zero.
Of course this would be a much poorer world with tremendous population problems that would still have to be addressed but it would represent the bottom or end of the oil society and start of something new. Until we see real population declines I doubt its better than what we have now but in time it would be.
Whats really interesting in my mind is it seems that the inability to clear defaulted loans seems to be the real problem in the end it is a financial issue not a technical one. Simply resource constraints caused by over population and endemic infrastructure based over consumption force the financial issue.
You know what would be incredibly useful? Reaction quotations from people in response to Hubbert's prediction of Continental US Peak Oil in 65-70. I bet they were saying much of the same things deniers are saying now, and that would be a knock-down point in the the argument for our side.
As usual, I have a problem when two different things are compared, in this case gas and oil. The glut in gas is local, i.e. in the U.S.. Ask Europeans about January if there is a gas glut when Russia does its annual price/supply scare.
Gas is different from oil in that it is not easily transported around the world by ship or pipeline. It requires a special infrastructure of ships and terminals separate from oil to move internationally. Stranded gas is a notorious phenomenon, but stranded oil is almost unheard of.
Generally a gas glut is due to insufficient demand in one area, whereas an oil glut is likely to be worldwide as is an oil shortfall.
I also have a problem when the American recession situation's impact on oil supplies is generalised to the whole world. The rest of the world especially Asia and Middle Eastern Oil exporters are not in the severe recession we are in.
Demand for oil is increasing in these countries, notably China.
What I see happening is recession/slow growth in the U.S. increases oil in storage. This is not a reflection of surplus supply, but of recession depressed demand. If it were due to surplus supply, the price of oil on the world market should be in a downward trend.
It is not, at least yet. We are past the peak driving season and oil prices tend to fall until the January/February time frame.
What I think is happening is demand by those countries with cheap labor, export surpluses and manufacturing based economies will hold up the price of oil. Surplus inventories in the American market are being outweighed by demand in fast growing Asian economies.
We are facing a situation of high American oil inventories due to slack American demand and high oil prices due to rising Asian demand. It is bad for the U.S. since low oil prices are not helping us get out of recession as they have done in the past.
Now comes the Russian heat wave and the Pakistani floods to scare the grain market. Corn for example is making new recovery highs and did it again Friday.
It is already affecting milk prices which are in an uptrend. Dairy price increases will likely affect American food prices in general down the road. This will likely make recovery from recession harder yet.
The coming rise in food prices will be blamed on corn ethanol when it is really climate catastrophes in Russia and Pakistan that are behind the situation.
And those years could provide enough time to get the renewables thing going. And most important they might provide enough time to reset expectations. I think the later is the most important factor, for people whose expectations are not met are likely to look for scapecoats.
Aangel, that is pretty much the way it is today though I would think the percentage that understands resource depletion is slightly higher than you think. However so far we have had only arguments about the subject. And arguments seldom ever change anything. But events are the one thing that can change people's minds. Actual events have a much stronger effect on minds than arguments.
So what you are saying is that the events of the future will have no effect because what you posted for the future is about exactly as things stand today. I strongly believe that opinions in five years will vary greatly from opinions held today. Again, events will be the force that changes people's minds.
Of course I think we all agree that a worldwide depression will, if it happens, give cover to the actual decline in oil production. But assuming that a worldwide depression does not happen, only a long drawn out recession, then things will pan out differently.
I have stated, several times on this list, that an event out of OPEC will be a bombshell of an event. Sometime in the next few years it will leak out that OPEC does not have either the spare capacity claimed or the vast reserves claimed by most members. But I repeat myself. Sorry about that.
Ron P.
The numbers will not be exactly as I propose, certainly. I was merely countering your assertion "that peak oil will be accepted by just about everyone by 2015."
The 1% might go to 10% — even 30% — but I have strong doubts the ratio will get anywhere near "just about everyone" in that timeframe.
Heck, here in the U.S. half of the population still believes in angels:
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2008/sep/19/half-of-americans-believ...
This sort of knowledge disseminates slowly.
Aangel, "just about everyone" was a misstatement on my part. I should have said "a majority of people." But belief in angels is not a fair comparison. That is a supernatural belief and has no connection and no comparison with real events in the real world.
Ron P.
I don't think it's unfair at all. What I'm pointing to is the slow rate information disseminates in our species. We are several centuries past The Age of Enlightenment and many, many decades into universal education and the best we can do is 50% of U.S. adults believe there are supernatural beings walking among us looking after our best interests?
This touches on one of my favorite topics, one that I might introduce when I speak at the ASPO conference in a few weeks.
From a previous comment of mine:
What we are dealing with here are entrenched discourses and they almost always take longer to change than we expect. I don't ever expect humanity will dislodge the binary logic discourse ("This is correct/this is incorrect") — it's simply too convenient and alluring.
And a shocking number of people believe in ghosts...
We're screwed.
If we're screwed, Surf, I have to think it's from far more insidious beliefs than that.
Personally, when 'Grandfather' in Little Big Man said that 'Human Beings believe everything is alive, even rocks and trees; and the White man believes everything is Dead, even himself..' that this absence of Ghosts marks a far more destructive part of our civilization than those who look to 'spirits in the material world'.
Bob
I believe in a angel :-)
lol! Thanks for the compliment.
We tend to overstate the importance of religious beliefs in relation to the way people act and react in the real world.
I live in a religious culture where just about everybody professes to believe in angels, and most actually do.
But hardly anybody ever mentions God in terms of day to day life, except to repeat homilies such as "God helps those who help themselves" or something of that sort;nearly every member of my family is a member of a fundamentalist church, but every parent wants his or her kids to go to college- not "bible" college!
Everybody practices birth control-none of the women of childbearing age have more than three children, and the average is probably less than two.
Everybody believes in conventional doctors, nobody believes in faith healers.
Nobody I know personally wants the story of biblical creationism taught in school;they are satisfied that it is taught in "Sunday school".
They watch television, and they believe in geological time and dinosaurs.most of them, even the ones who dropped out of grade school fifty years ago, understand that the Earth orbits the sun and revolves on its axis, but it is true that that is often about the limit of thier understanding of astronomy
The religious facet of thier world view really only makes it's appearance at times of great stress, as when somebody is dying;then they remember to pray, and derive great comfort from doing so.
So far as I can tell, the sort of fanatics who are so often held up as being representative of evangelical religious people in this country are actually only a very small minority of the larger group.
I certainly cannot discern after long study any substantial differences in the beliefs of my fundamentalist family and the beliefs of a typical college graduate in respect to the physical nature of the world, or our ecological and environmental problems;a hillbilly farmer is actually quicker to accept the concept of peak oil than an economist or a bank officer in my opinion;but this is not to say that said hillbilly doesn't also vehemently believe that the oil companies are "holding back" the remaining oil to keep the price up.
If you explain to such a person that perhaps the reason so many of the current generation of people are cancer victims is pollution, and that his grandparents generation were healthier because the environment was cleaner back then,and our food didn't have so many additives, and so forth, he will run with the idea.
He might even vote for environmental legislation if it were offered up in the form of a referendum, rather than being associated with a whole package of stuff he doesn't believe in, such as gun control and higher taxes and freebies for OTHER people.
Every last one of them believe in the concept and practice of medicare and social security-and lower taxes too!!! ;).
But the younger folks don't believe they are going to collect when the time comes.Maybe they aren't as dumb as some like to think!
They will tell you they believe in the second coming of Jesus, and a siazble minority actually try to live up to his teachings;but every last one lives his life as either a grasshopper spendthrift or an industrious ant, taking care of earthly business as he or she sees fit, trying to lay up treasures here on earth, or consume such treasures as come thier way as fast as possible, according to the individual's temperament.
In short, cognitive dissonace is perhaps the most important and most overlooked aspect of the entire debate in respect to religion in this country.
In short, they are really just about as clueless as the rest of the public.Religious or not.
I am going to put ten bucks in an envelope and put it in my sock drawer.
If, by December 1, 2015, if I am still seeing the sunrise and of sound mind, and any one of the following polls:
Rasmussen Reports
Gallup
Quinnipiac
FOX News
CNN/Opinion Research
ABC News/Wash Post
Reports 'Yes' at the over 90% level to the following question: 'Do you believe that Peak Oil has arrived', then I will endeavor to send you the ten bucks. :)
I do not require a counter-cover...
Hope to be able to either eat crow and send you a ten-spot or talk about the situation otherwise come December 2015!
Don't do it...look what happened to Matt Simmons after a bet.
I'd love to hear your take on the e-mail I posted above, Darwinian.
Ron
I know you always try to make peak oil a left wing vs. a right wing issue but I have never understood that.
All of my friends that understand and are extremely worried about peak oil and all of its implications are definitely conservative or maybe libertarian. Most of them are scientists or engineers but none are liberal or left wing.
It is entirely possible to be conservative politically and fiscally (and yes even religious)but still be an (amateur) ecologist.
Personally I read the Limits to Growth back in the 70's right after leaving college and it rather stunned me. I have returned to it many times since. I am convinced we are on the beginnings of the downslope of world history because of resource depletion. But I still do not view any of this as a political issue. it is simply reality. And a very high percentage of the population is clueless about ecologic thinking - whether they are on the left or right.
To be honest, I always though it was more of a right-wing "thing", since there are so many Peak Oilers who appear to be Climate Change deniers, at least in the sense that they treat Peak Oil as being the greatest near-term threat, while pushing Climate Change out into the far future.
Robert Hirsch comes to mind, as one example.
Climate Change, on the other hand, appears to be a left-wing issue.
Clearly, both issues are a threat, and need to be recognized as such, especially since many folks are relying on the idea of growing food for themselves to try and get through tough times.
Although it now appears "environmentalists" are going to get the blame for Peak Oil, because we "stopped the drilling".
spring - And lots of shades of gray in the middle. When I started 35 years ago my first mentor explained the basis of PO (but we didn't, and still don't, call it PO...it's the reserve replacement issue). Thus PO is an easy given for me. Climate change...no problem there either. My BS was in Earth Sciences...not difficult to connect the dots. Most would describe me as conservative. Two "facts" I have no doubt about: we can't drill our way out of PO and the world economies won't change BAU in any significant degree to lessen the effects of CC. IMHO the future is etched in granite...and granite takes many, many decades to alter.
Sadly, I have to agree - we are, most certainly, deer in the headlights of the oncoming train. The reality being that neither "side" has any idea what to do, and so they fall back on well-worn ideology.
Although it doesn't stop me trying to do what I can, as futile as that might turn out to be, in terms of mobilising folks in my community.
Here is the list of influential progressives (pundits, pols, bloggers, talkers, radicals, etc) who acknowledge Peak Oil
Thom Hartmann
Al Gore (http://www.energybulletin.net/node/17142)
Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.
Paul Krugman (http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/02/19/feeling-a-bit-peaked/)
Markos Molitsas and the entire crew from Daily Kos
Noam Chomsky (http://www.energybulletin.net/node/5489)
Rachel Maddow (http://maddowblog.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2010/07/30/4784404-peak-oil-and-th...)
Bernie Sanders (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/rep-bernie-sanders/its-time-for-a-solar-re...)
Dennis Kucinich (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/rep-dennis-kucinich/our-survival-depends-u...)
Kevin Drum
Every left-wing radio show I have listened to has acknowledged Peak Oil. I also listen to a lot of right-wing for the yucks and they never mention it; moreover, whenever someone calls in they try to shut the caller up.
I have actually followed one of the serious political right-wing sites for several years now and they have never mentioned Peak Oil. Oil for Food scandal, drilling in the Arctic yes, but not peak oil.
Powerlineblog.com
http://www.google.com/search?q=%22peak+oil%3A+site%3Apowerlineblog.com
= O hits
Dailykos.com
http://www.google.com/search?q=%22peak+oil%3A+site%3Adailykos.com
many hits
I know this is gonna hurt a lot of people here, but Glenn Beck has also acknowledged peak oil.
Yes, for real.
That seems like a start. What has he advocated to do about PO? Does he have a plan? Does he advocate someone Else's plan(s)? Did he tie his acknowledgment/understanding of PO to any other statements? Does he advocate PO and related issues be planks for candidates he endorses? Does he see any leadership/bully pulpit/policy/investment role by government?
A few weeks ago I was on business driving to Layton, UT when I saw a big billboard advertising some kind of 25-year food storage system/(with foodstuffs?)...at the bottom of the billboard it said 'Endorsed by Glenn Beck' or words to that effect.
Does his advice wrt PO and related issues extend beyond buying gold and food hoard-stuffs from the companies he endorses?
Without verifying he actually did, I'm going to assume for the sake of argument that he did.
I bet, that shortly afterwards he recieved a bunch of angry emails from conservatives. Peak Oil, destroys the meme, that energy shortages and high prices are the fault of liberal tree hugger types. Driving the anti-environmental wedges is one of the key tactics that the right has taken up. So you can bet that Beck got quite a few earfuls about breaking the solidarity of the conservative position. Has he discussed PO in other than a degrogatory way since it?
That works fine in your current profession. But if you were a politician, or a pundit, who hopes to make his living representing the conservative position you would have a stark chice. Either jetison your views on PO and climate change, or forget about your career in politics/punditry. And these are the professions who are going to have a public megaphone to shout their views from.
You ever heard of Ross Bartlett?
I seem to see a propaganda financing from the energy industry promoting antisciene agenda resrved for rightwing/relgious audience.
In my experience, most people I know who might call themselves Democrats, or liberal, or progressive, or 'left', don't seem to want to talk about the possibility of declining oil availability for them or their kids. They either just block it out, or they harbor techno-rescue/innovation dreams.
Most of the folks I know on the other side of the political spectrum are more willing to talk about the PO idea, and they dismiss it outright, and/or blame it on how environmental protections are strangling America, neo-socialists are strangling the free market, new-world-order fascists want to take folk's freedom to drive whatever they want however much they want away, etc.
This tribe also engages in dreams of techno-rescue, although the specifics tend to revolve more around finding new caches of oil, innovation in using heavy oil, ANWR oil, Deepwater oil, polar oil, African oil, etc.
In all honesty, I don't see a big difference...many people in neither camp accepts the idea that oil is finite and the extraction rate can't increase forever; both camps engage in denial and/or techno-rescue dreams. The easily apparent difference is that the some of folks on the right side of the rainbow have a pre-loaded target list to fire their blame at.
I've injected myself into a few discussions on crookedtimber, which is mostly composed of progressive college professors. They would much rather talk about social issues and economic justice type issues. But, they don't denigrate the concept of PO. They know the argument, but are just more concerned with fighting other battles. At least you can have a rational discussion with them.
EOS,
That is good to know. I agree from my interaction that many progressives are more engaged in issues other than PO. I think two issues are at work:
1) Most progressives are like most conservatives and most everyone else who all feel as if they have no time/money/leeway to leap out of BAU and into some simpler lifestyle: Trapped in mortgages, spousal/family expectations, etc.
2) (Related to #1): They have feel that it would be pointless to 'go Amish' when the vast majority of everyone else will continue BAU.
3) (Related to #2): The price signals and/or gasoline lines/shortages (same can be said for NG and electricity) which would indicate/force the necessity profound lifestyle changes are not there. The price signals seem to not indicate a problem (people have very short memories and adapt quickly)...absent some commonly respected market signal that the down-slope is coming, most people remain hopeful (even if it is almost sub-conscious) that things will remain about like they are now, and that things will work out somehow, at least for their lifetimes.
But the right (at least the US right) views anything that can be construed as supporting a bigger (or just about any) role for government as a communist plot. Thats the dialog they've built around climate change, which in no way ought to be a conservative/liberal thing. But anything in the limits to growth area, which includes resource limitis, and climate change can be placed into that camp. And the tea party movement is profoundly anti-science. It takes advantage of the US distrust of elites and authority, and then portrays scientists as being elitists. I agree that we should try to get these issues out of the left/right battle. But I don't think we will have any success in doing so.
The recently leaked report created by the Bundeswehr, the German military seems to agree with you.
However they also seem to be very concerned about the social and economic consequences of peak oil which they feel will indeed end up being politicized and possibly used by demagogues both on the right and the left to push their own agendas. The only antidote to that, it would seem, is to start putting the truth out there, the sooner the better so as to avoid the issue becoming a divisive political hot potato.
Texas, here is what I wrote: "Though some on the left deny peak oil and a few on the right accept it, the general battle line is between the left that sees the peak oil light and the right who argue that it is all a myth."
That is a true statement in every sense of the word. As I said some on the left deny peak oil and some on the right are keenly aware of peak oil. But... Most of the right wing folks deny peak oil. And, by a wide margin, most of those who accept peak oil are on the left. I cannot really say that most of the left accepts peak oil but for sure that is where most of those who accept peak oil as a fact reside.
That is an anecdotal statement that sounds very suspect. All your friends are extremely worried about peak oil and all of them are either conservative or libertarian. And none of them are liberal or left wing.
Not knowing your friends or how many of them there are, I would not dare comment further on your anecdotal example.
Of course it is. There are always exceptions to every rule. Is it entirely possible for a person raised in a Bible thumping fundamentalist family to, in his early youth, turn to atheism? Usually that does not happen but I am one exception to that rule. I am sure there are others also.
Of course it is not a political issue. It is just that peak oil believers generally come down on one side of the political spectrum and peak oil deniers generally come down on the other. Of course there are exceptions to that rule.
Ron P.
This is a blatant anecdotal lie that has no connection to statistical reality. The only rationale that I can think of for you to say this is that you live in some part of Texas that is a deep conservative enclave, and so your argument holds by exclusion and the lack of a large enough statistical sample.
So I ask you:
Name one conservative talk show host, conservative pundit, conservative politician, or conservative blogger that is of some repute and that will talk about peak oil regularly and knows the implications.
... crickets ...
maybe Roscoe Bartlett
Ask me the same question on the progressive side and I will create a list for you.
Glenn Beck? Pat Robertson? Frosty Wooldridge?
I don't think peak oil is a left/right thing. What's politicized is the reaction to it. Lefties tend to want renewable energy, conservation, mass transit, etc., and big government programs to support them. Wingnuts are more likely to want a doomstead in the boondocks, with guns and canned goods, where they plan to hide out until the pieces of our collapsed society stop bouncing. Some see peak oil as part of the Rapture - something you can't really do anything about, except try to make sure you won't have to live through it.
Of course it is not a left/right thing. No one is claiming that it is. The point I was making was: On which side of the political spectrum do the majority of the fervent peak oil deniers come down? Is there any real question about that? And on which side of the political spectrum do most peak oil adherents come down? Is there any question about that?
The two links I posted above are a perfect example. The peak oil denier who wrote the piece
A Look at the Peak Oil Belief – Is the End Really Near is obviously a right wing nut case. From the link: "Keep in mind that the Obama dollar is worth less now than it was 30 seconds ago, so..." And the whole article was written in that vein. And most peak oil debunking articles are in that vein.
And the article trying to give legitimacy to peak oil was written by The Daily Green and we know where they stand. And I have found that this is the general trend. The deniers are generally on the right and the peak oil advocates are generally on the left. Though there are a few exceptions, a very few.
So no Leanan, it is not a left/right thing. But there is a clear trend here as to which side the advocates for each side comes down on.
Ron P.
I was replying to WHT's post, not yours.
Glenn Beck mentioned it at one time but has since retracted everything he said.
I give you Pat Robertson because of his recent apparent turnaround.
I never heard of Frosty Wooldridge until now.
Peak Oil is definitely a progressive, not reactionary, point-of-view. Talking about oil depletion acknowledges change. So by definition it excludes conservatives who deny or suppress change. That is fundamentally a left and right thing as I read the definitions.
At this point you're really just playing with the definitions of the words Progressive and Conservative.
No, unlike places like HuffP, we tend to deal with parsing empirical data here on TOD. At some point after looking at the data, you have to make some reasonable assertions.
How else to explain that 72% of those teaching at American universities and colleges are liberal and 15% are conservative in 2005. (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A8427-2005Mar28.html)
Universities are the hotbed of creative forward thinking, with the faculty willing to entertain the prospects of change. You can say that there is peer pressure there, but who applies the pressure? It certainly is not some single dictatorial power.
Much of what is taught in universities isn't what I'd call advanced or even beneficial. Look at the sheer number of "soft" degrees offered today. Yet once again, you are playing with the definition of these words. Look at how the article defines "conservative" and "liberal", homosexual rights in the grand scheme of things are rather irrelevant.
Evidently you don't understand that teaching is secondary at most universities. The first priority is research because that is how professors get rewarded. So academic research at the university level is about finding something new. If you don't find something that no one has found before, your credentials suffer. This indicates to me that they are not afraid of new concepts, which matches the progressive mindset. I am not playing with these words. The fact that only 15% of academics at this level classify themselves as conservative has statistical significance that you probably can't logically explain any other way.
The fact that only 15% of academics at this level classify themselves as conservative has statistical significance that you probably can't logically explain any other way.
oh baloney. You should know better than to think only your explanation explains the statistics, its as easy to argue that academics are failures, "those who can do, those who can't teach" and thats why there aren't any conservatives in academia. They are out busy succeeding in the real world.
Corporate researchers and academic researchers have a mutual admiration society. They each think the other has it easier.
Do you claim this from personal experience? Certainly I work with ex-academics, and colleagues I work with move into academia on occasion (although I don't know why, because I don't think your statement is correct) but teaching students and chasing grant money doesn't strike me as a group that has it "easier". I am often amazed by how little resources these people have to do research with, let alone the time they have available to do it because they are busy dealing with students.
I think this is strongly reinforced by the right's dependence upon the so-called think tanks (AEI, Cato, Heritage etc.) These guys are heavily funded by a handfull of very wealthy individuals, especially the Koch's. So they are going to do the bidding of the fossil fuel owners. They generate market research and propaganda that the entire US rightwing relies heavily upon. You can bet that whole world trade center mosqe bro-haha, has manufactured by these institutions after they had done careful focus tested studies about how to trip uo Obama. So the Republican politicians are not going to go against these institutions since relying upon them has been so successful. Polls show a plurality of citizens supporting liberal views, but voting for Republicans nevertheless. So for the most part they have been forced to go with the program, or lose a invaluable ally.
Glenn Beck has mentioned it more than once, and he has a chapter on peak oil in his book.
Pat Robertson's "recent" turnaround was years ago.
And for a progressive who claims peak oil is a crock - Raymond J. Learsy.
I ask you the same question I posed to adamx up thread, on the same topic.
I will extend that question to refer to Pat Robertson as well.
What is the quick thumbnail of Mr. Beck's ideas about how to deal with PO, from the chapter in his book?
I pose the same question about Mr. Robertson's PO views: what is his advocacy/ideas/action plans/policy suggestions wrt PO?.
I did not hear any reports of Mr. Beck speaking about PO during his recent even on the Washington Mall.
I am honestly curious here (not curious enough to watch the 700 Club or buy Glenn's books)...were these citations from Beck and Robertson throw-away/dead-end comments or have they been beating the drum in a big way? If they have, I think it has not been well-covered.
If the intent of their mentioning PO is to build their case for end times and to advocate praying for an answer...then I would not personally judge that to be very helpful...
But...if someone can post a brief point-by-point bullet summary of their action plans/policy recommendations, I would like to read it. If someone want to post a more robust treatise of their ideas (either or both's), I would look forward to reading that/those as well.
Robertson read "Twilight in the Desert" and had Matt Simmons as a guest on his show. Among his ideas: assassinate Hugo Chavez.
I haven't read Beck's book ("An Inconvenient Book"), but those who have say his peak oil chapter basically says, "We're screwed." His articles on CNN have called for "everything" - wind, solar, nuclear, and drill baby drill.
Thank you posting these references.
Robertson's old-school 'might makes right' (or 'right makes might?') idea of offing Chavez is not very helpful.
I cannot fault Beck's approach of 'everything'...maintaining something resembling our conception of civilization in the age of declining oil extraction rates would seem to call for a composite approach of different energy generation and energy use efficiency technologies...as well as the equally important changes in lifestyles needed to learn to be happy using less energy.
Hopefully Glenn has written some articles advocating increased energy efficiency as well as simply being less extravagant in out usage?
I'm not a regular reader of Glenn Beck, and usually turn off the TV or change the channel if he's on TV. My guess would be that he's for increased energy efficiency (via new technology) but against sacrificing convenience for the sake of conservation.
Learsy I would call a populist, not a progressive.
And that becomes a real problem. Because by and large most people who believe in peak oil are indentified with the left, and most that don't with the right, the issue gets polarized. That is what we saw happen with climate change. It is now a litmus test on the right, if you don't loudly claim "it is all a fraud perpetrated by commie scientists" you have zero chance in the primaries. The same thing will happen with PO, the right will proclaim shale-oil, and abiotic oil, and that the only stopping us from tapping them are dirty commie treehuggers. So automatically roughly half of the country becomes antagonistic toward's those who believe because that makes them the enemy.
It has reached the mainstream blogs but has not yet reached the mainstream media. But I am sure it will and very soon.
This was the USA Today, front page, above the fold, 5 years ago.
http://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/energy/2005-10-16-oil-1a-cover-...
Of course its been in the mainstream media, and don't even get me started on Jimmys presidential speeches over the older peak oils/running outs. This debate has been going on for generations now.
I think you are missing Ron's main point. Of course PO occasionally reaches the mainstream media because they echo what the news is with some sense of impartiality.
What Ron is referring to is the polarization in PO beliefs is starting to come to the forefront.
Yes, but now the debate is starting to get very decisive, with the right wing starting to rattle the cage whereas before they have remained pretty quiet about oil depletion. I can kind of believe this because they have had some success in questioning climate change and figure they have some more easy targets associated with the intelligentsia..
I think you are missing Ron's main point. Of course PO occasionally reaches the mainstream media because they echo what the news is with some sense of impartiality.
Ron can speak for himself, and he did NOT use the word "occasionally". I was simply pointing out that even MSM has been talking about peak oil for years now, let alone actual claims of it in official, government announcements like Presidential speeches, or others which predate your birth.
As far as polarization, until peak oil can disassociate itself from being a fantasy Mad Max trigger for the crackpots of the world, of course there will be those who roll their eyes the instant someone starts talking about the subject. You might call it polarization, I view it more as an impediment for science based conversations on resource depletion topics.
Well no they haven't been talking about it for years. Yes there was an article here and there but no one has ever seriously discussed the subject. How many times have you saw it on the nightly news.
I know Jimmy Carter talked about energy but most of the news media paid no attention to him and he has lately been made to look like a fool by the right wing media. They are continually calling him the boy who cried wolf when there was no wolf, no peak oil.
But you are nitpicking RG. There has been no major coverage of peak oil by the media. CNBC has been forced to mention it occasionally as of late, but grudgingly so. I have never heard of it once on the three major networks. But you googled the subject and found an old article on the electronic version of USA today. Well whoop te doo, you have scored a point.
Ron P.
Carter was misinterpreted after the fact in much the same way 'Limits to Growth' was discussed later on. Carter saw a large growth rate in energy demand and said that if that continued, there would be an energy shortage. That rate of growth did not continue of course.
LTG growth was also maligned to say it predicted an energy and resource shortage in the 1970s. Being one of the first persons to read LTG, it said no such thing - only warning about limits in the 21st century.
In that regard, it has been accurate.
Yes there was an article here and there but no one has ever seriously discussed the subject.
Really? So when the government set up the Naval Petroleum Reserve in Alaska near a century ago, you don't think they seriously discussed the subject prior to setting aside the odd 23 million acres on the North Slope?
I know Jimmy Carter talked about energy but most of the news media paid no attention to him and he has lately been made to look like a fool by the right wing media.
When the President talks about something, it becomes difficult to claim that no one paid attention. And when it comes to resource issues, Carter was a fool, unlike regular fools, he passed legislation proving it. (Fuel Use Act)
But you are nitpicking RG. There has been no major coverage of peak oil by the media.
USA Today is about as major as you get for a national paper in the US, and it was front page. Sorry, but you just can't claim that these issues haven't been rattling around all sorts of times before, including in the MSM.
I think this is wrong. I would call papers like USA Today, the NY Times, and the WSJ major media. The front page of USA Today is about as mainstream as it gets.
As for the three "major" networks...I don't think they are very relevant any more. Back in the '60s, the network news was a big deal, but now, not that many people watch it. People get their news from cable channels like CNN, and their corresponding web sites. And CNN has mentioned peak oil, even done some documentaries on it.
When PO receives the kind of attention that the President's birth certificate receives, or the Park 51 Mosque/community center, or the health care reform debacle, or the Arizona 'Papers Plaeas' law, or Brett Favre or Brittany Spears, ...on an enduring basis, then we will know fer sure that PO 'went mainstream'.
I'd settle for the kind of attention climate change gets. It's not reasonable to expect something like peak oil to compete with Britney Spears.
Which part of PO?
See, my position is that the technical definition of PO is not something anyone argues with. The problem isn't that it will happen, everyone except perhaps abiotic enthusiasts have already admitted it and heck its even claimed to now be historical fact. More than once!
The problem lies with the conversion from that technical definition (and even historical fact) to the consequences of peak, which range from solar/renewables utopia (Lovins) to Mad Max and dieoff (and please don't pretend this wasn't a wildly interesting topic prior to the latest peak actually occurring). Because everything but the kitchen sink gets thrown in its difficult to even have a conversation between opposing groups. Throw in a few charlatans trying to make a buck and a royal mess becomes simply ridiculous.
It's not wildly interesting. Mildly interesting is more likely. At least to the average Joe.
Global warming has all the same issues. And some big names arguing for and against it. And it's not even close to Britney Spears.
Of the major media outlets, just my company alone has managed to get coverage in the New York Times, the Washington Post, Le Monde (France), CBC Radio (Canada) and Arte.tv (European Public TV Station with approx. 70 million viewers), plus lots of smaller venues.
There are entire TV specials and magazine issues devoted to the topic as well.
There is a lot of coverage, but it's dispersed in time and space.
Your assertion is very far off the mark, in my view.
I have the NYT bookmarked and read it regularly, especially the science and environmental sections.
I must say that considering the depth and detail the paper goes into in respect to other , related issues, the coverage of peak oil is just about non existent by comparision.
The tone of the occasional piece I have seen has been derogatory, condescending, and dismissive;somebody please point out what I have missed if I'm wrong.
Now others may say that running copy daily preaching the need for renewables is the same thing;I don't agree, but I do agree that nearly every issue pushes renewables in one form or another.
"State investigates 10-mile-long fish kill"
"The Illinois Environmental Protection Agency is investigating a 10-mile-long fish kill in part of the Sangamon River that it has traced to "the state's largest dairy," IEPA officer Bruce Yurdin said Friday night.
The agency would not name the dairy, but Illinois' largest dairy is in East Central McClean County, about 200 miles south of Chicago and close to the fish kill.
Yurdin, who is the IEPA's manager of field operations, said that a complaint came in to the Illinois Department of Natural Resources Monday about "dead fish and frogs and a coffee-colored" discharge in the water."
http://www.chicagobreakingnews.com/2010/09/iepa-investigates-10-mile-lon...
Apparently, there is toxic animal waste - manure from lagoon storage ponds - being illegally released into the creek. Greater-than-average rainfall is cited as being to blame.
spring-tides,
Toxic animal waste is a little bit overblown. If the water is brown the oxygen in the water is consumed and the creatures like fish which depend on dissolved oxygen suffocate.
You and I could probably drink the water in relative safety if we could get beyond the yuck factor. Might be nasty bacteria in the water but they were probably there before the spill.
As a note these ponds are supposed to be designed for water storage due to rain events. Hopefully they will be fined enough to get their attention.
I'm not sure I could get beyond the "yuck" factor ;)
I do, however, own a water filter, so could use river water if push comes to shove.
Eating fish out of the river is another matter - however, I don't eat much meat or fish these days anyway. I do eat eggs and drink milk, though.
Here's another one I find interesting, although I'm wanting to do more research to understand why they are suddenly concerned about volatile organic compounds :-
"State urges water testing in Kendall, McHenry counties"
"Illinois health officials are urging residents in two communities in Kendall and McHenry counties to test their well water for possible contamination.
The recommendations affect the Hollis subdivision in Kendall County and the city of Marengo in McHenry County.
The Illinois Department of Public Health says residents should have private wells tested for volatile organic compounds by a private laboratory."
http://www.chicagobreakingnews.com/2010/09/state-urges-water-testing-in-...
spring-tides,
My experience tells me that after a spill of this type there won't be any fish to eat out of this water until they repopulate. This can take several years even without more spills.
Who knows why they are concerned about VOCs. My respect for the intelligence and technical expertise of public health and safety people long since fell to zero.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conservatism
Conservatives will never accept Peak Oil because it represents an existential threat to their
conception of the world as (ideally) timeless and unchanging.
Peak Oil is just too radical and therefore unthinkable.
This is really poor logic, I hate how the discussions on TOD are becoming more like the comment section on the Huffington Post as time progresses.
In this, I agree with you.
Enough with the Caricatures!
I agree in principle.
However, the Republican Party would do well to distance itself from the 'No-Nothing' faction who seem to only engage in the most simplistic and vague sloganeering and jingoism.
The fact that politicians such as Senator Mitch McConnell and Representative John Boener and Eric Cantor and even the once 'maverick' Senator McCain and others have not distanced themselves from, but have of late openly embraced the lowest-common-denominator faction is a bad direction for the Republican Party to travel.
At this point I would not be surprised if Ms. Palin runs for Pres in 2012 with Mr. Beck as her running mate. Perhaps with Mr. Limbaugh as Secretary of the Interior, Mr. Savage as Secretary of War, and Ms. Angle as Secretary of State? WHat is too far-out nowadaze?
It would be swell if the Republican Party did an about face from its march into la-la-land and actually embraced educated adults who were willing to roll up their sleeves and work to make progress on the important issues of our time.
At one time I though Senator McCain was the kind of person we needed, until he did an about-face on his own previously stated positions and made his deal with the devil and go into survival mode...maybe someone like Chuck Hagel...Heck, I would vote for a Republican like Richard Nixon (minus the criminal acts)...Nixon put us on the path of detente with Russia and normalized relations with China...created the EPA...
Watch this video compilation of interviews from the recent event on the Washington Mall and ask your self how many folks there would be willing to have an adult, enlightened conversation about Peak Oil, Limits to Growth, and so forth (hang on for the whole vid, the comments get more bizarre over time...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ht8PmEjxUfg&feature=player_embedded
I do not represent these folks as being typical of all or most republicans, but it is becoming harder to tell the more they are given the bullhorn.
Republican Party: If you do not want to be caricatured, then stop promoting your worst caricatures front-and-center!
The McCain that ws running in 2000 -before his campaign was hijacked in southe Carolina, might have made a good pres. I don't blame him personally for his recent volte-facia, I think he simply got old and weak and unable to resist his wannabe handlers.
I hate how the comment section is becoming more like the ones at Yahoo or USA Today. No matter what the topic - recipes, serial murderers, cute puppies and kittens - people use it as an excuse to rail against Obama or Bush. You can get that kind of political crap everywhere. I'd rather not see it here.
Actually, I've run into a bible-banger or two who accepts the real possibility of Peak Oil, but only in the context of 'End Times' as they claim is upon us. In one sense, TOD sports a lot of talk about 'End Times' only of the resource, financial and social variety. Seems to me a basic human tendency may be at work here. We even get to choose which version of the 'Rapture' we like, King James version or Ray Kurzweil version.
You may have hit upon something really important here. Just frame Peak Oil in the context of the end times and the rapture and show how the book of revelation predicts peak oil and the eventual demise of civilization accordingly. Put how little cheap paper booklets. Dress in cheap suits. Go door to door and sell this in the bible belt.
I think the "Rapture" has already taken place. There were just so few true Christians that no one noticed.
At the end of August 2010, a study on peak oil by a German military think tank was leaked on the Internet (and discussed on the TOD in the Drumbeat on the 01/09/2010 and in a separate post on the 02/09/2010).
On the 05/09/2010 German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s government agreed to extend the lifespan of nuclear-power plants by as much as 14 years in exchange for renewable-energy funding.
On the 07/09/2010, Der Spiegel International discussed the global Merkel’s Plan for German future energy policy:
http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/0,1518,716221,00.html
Summarizing the main points (from Der Spiegel International):
Renewable Energy Generation , WIND ENERGY: The aim is to increase offshore wind power generation to 25 gigawatts by 2030 in a development drive that would require investment of around €75 billion ($95.6 billion) according to government estimates. The government plans to promote the construction of the first 10 offshore wind farms with €5 billion ($6.4 billion) in low-interest credit made available by Germany's KfW state development bank. The government is also considering increasing the use of feed-in tariffs for offshore wind power as an incentive for new projects, but it did not give figures. It also wants to change existing rules on maritime construction projects to prevent power companies from blocking valuable ocean space for long periods of time without starting the construction of a new wind farm.
Renewable Energy Generation , BIO ENERGY: The German government plans to expand biomass production. As Germany has limited space for growing the necessary raw materials it also plans to promote the import of bio fuels -- but only if they stem from sustainable farming, for example from land where the number of trees cleared is offset by commensurate replanting. But the energy plan doesn't make clear how that sustainability is to be checked. The government also plans to promote the increased use of biofuels for heating -- but only if plant operators increase their own energy efficiency at the same time.
Renewable Energy Generation , SOLAR ENERGY: The energy plan is noticeably vague when it comes to solar power. The government praised the recent decision to cut the feed-in tariff for solar energy, calling it an important step to prevent excessive subsidization of this sector. It didn't say how heavily the government plans to cut back subsidies. But it's already clear that the Environment Ministry in its current long-term projection predicts that solar power capacity with a total output of 51 gigawatts will go on line by 2020. The institutes Prognos, EWI and GWS by contrast expect a smaller increase, by around 33 gigawatts.
Conventional Energy Generation , NUCLEAR POWER: The lifetimes of the 17 nuclear power stations in Germany will be extended by 12 years on average. Nuclear plants that went on line before 1981 will have their lifetimes extended by eight years, and the younger reactors by 14 years. The government's main reason for the extension is that power production must remain affordable. It has had energy scenarios drawn up according to which the nuclear reactors will enable the price of electricity to remain relatively constant. That isn't true from the consumers' point of view because the price of electricity is set by the European Energy Exchange in Leipzig where nuclear power plays virtually no role at all.
Conventional Energy Generation , COAL-FIRE POWER and CCS: This government wants to test this so-called Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) technology by building two test plants with long-term CO2 storage in Germany by 2020. It plans to review in 2017 whether the technology makes environmental and economic sense.
SMART GRID, SUPER GRID AND ELECTRICITY MOTORWAYS: The government plans to develop a concept for a "Target Grid 2050" in 2011 and aims to speed up power grid development on at least three levels: a) The urgently needed construction of north-south power lines feeding power from the wind farms in the north to the main conurbations in the west and south of the country. Without such an electricity motorway the billions of euros of investment in offshore wind parks will be useless. b) The German power grid must be integrated more closely into a European supergrid which allows surplus German power to be stored in hydroelectric plants in Norway or in the Alps, or draw on solar power from Andalusia to cover any power shortfalls. c) Germany needs a smart grid which automatically and immediately balances out overcapacity and shortages. This is the only way the decentralized output of tens of thousands of household solar plants and gas-fired cellar power generators can be used effectively.
POWER STORAGE: The government sees four central areas where action is needed: a) It wants to maximize existing German capacity for pumped storage hydroelectric plants. b) It wants to increase the usage of foreign pumped storage plants, mainly in Norway and the Alps. c) It wants to create investment incentives to enable the targeted use of biomass to offset fluctuations in wind and sun. d) It wants to aid the rapid development of storage technologies such as compressed air energy storage, hydrogen storage and batteries for electric vehicles. It plans to reach these goals through subsidies and other investment incentives.
CONSUMPTION ENERGY SAVINGS. BUILDING REFURBISHMENT: Buildings account for some 40 percent of German power consumption and around a third of Germany's CO2 emissions. A high proportion of buildings are so old that they do not come under energy savings requirements laid down in the 1970s, so the scope to reduce power and heating usage is tremendous. The government wants all buildings in Germany to be refurbished in line with new insulation standards by 2050. It wants to cut the national heating requirement by 20 percent by 2020 and by 80 percent by 2050. It also wants to significantly increase the share renewable energies have in heating, for example through solar heating.
CONSUMPTION ENERGY SAVINGS. MAKING INDUSTRY MORE EFFICIENT: Recent studies show Germany could save €10 billion ($12.7 billion) per year just by boosting energy efficiency. The government has high hopes for energy efficiency systems that enable companies to save power. Here too it plans to offer financial incentives. From 2013 on it will only allow tax relief on energy taxes if companies make a contribution to energy savings. It also plans to offer development programs in this area for the small and medium-sized business sector.
TRANSPORT: The German government aims to have 1 million electric vehicles on German roads by 2020 and some 5 million by 2030. To reach this goal it plans to launch new vehicle registration rules in 2011 that give privileges to people who drive electric cars, such as free parking or the permission to use bus lanes. The government estimates that CO2 emissions for street vehicles can be reduced from 160 grams per kilometer now to 35 grams by 2040 assuming an 80 percent market share for electric and hybrid vehicles by then.
I have two questions for the TOD readers:
1) Are the goals set by the German government reasonable?
2) The study on peak oil by a German military think tank was leaked to sustain the new energy plan, or vice versa the energy plan was based on the study on peak oil (or both)?
(Sorry for the long post!)
WIND ENERGY: Yes
BIO ENERGY: As fuel for cars IMO no. In combined heat power (CHP) yes, but not imported.
SOLAR ENERGY: 10,000 MW total installed, 3,800 MW new installed in 2009. So it's possible. If it's reasonable depends on price development.
SMART GRID: sure.
POWER STORAGE:
a) won't be much.
b) I guess we're not the only ones who'd like to use this capacity.
c) conflicts with use in CHP.
d) maybe air. H2 and batteries, don't think so.
CONSUMPTION ENERGY SAVINGS. BUILDING REFURBISHMENT:
The reduction goals seem very ambitious, I doubt they can be reached. Solar heating doesn't make sense (except passive), solar hot water does.
Missing here: district heating + biomass CHP, heat pumps.
TRANSPORT: This would mean 2-3% of new cars every year are EVs up to 2020, 10% thereafter, don't see it happening.
Totally missing is increased cooperation with North Africa ála DESERTEC.
I also was surprised not to find any mention at the DESERTEC project. I can figure out two possible reasons:
1) too high risks of diplomatic and bureaucratic red tape and expropriation of assets. In the light of energy independence, which is the leit-motiv of the Merkel's plan, outsourcing so much energy production abroad in North-Africa can be extremely risky.
2) Technical problems: the combination of sand and the required water supply can be an engineering nightmare. In this regard, an experimental solar thermal energy plant near Masdar City in UAE did fail, so that they used the less sensitive photovoltaic solar panels.
Of course, the conbination of the two abovementioned problems is even pressing.
Found this.
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=129782098&sc=17&f=1001
Perhaps Simmons was having some mental issues just before his death but as time goes on it seems he did have access to some real information that he at the minimum garbled if not worse.
My interest is that as time passes it does seem that TPTB had a lot of information about the situation that they where not releasing. Which is interesting in and of itself.
I had the same thought when I heard about Oil and Tarballs on the seafloor. Matt's claims have some distinct differences, but the essence is the same.. it went down, not up.
They were finding it at 300' on down to 4-5000'.
Regarding a "timeline" as to when Peak Oil/Economic Collapse might begin to have undeniable effects, the bigger question is whether we (i.e. Homo Sapiens) will survive at all. Two or three months ago I was watching an evening PBS show which featured Oceanographer Dr. Slyvia Earle and two other notables who's names elude me at the moment, but who were in full agreement with Dr. Earle.
The short and the sweet of it was that during the next ten years, we will have chosen the road that leads either to continued survival as a species, or complete extinction. Based on history, we don't have an exemplary record of "choosing wisely"...
So far no events have occurred that seem to be sufficient to shake people out of the coma that they're in to wake them up to the larger realities. But I do like the way it was handled in the novel version of "The Abyss". In the book, the E.T.s who had deepwater bases in the worlds oceans had the capability of controlling water at the molecular level. To get our "attention" they generated Tsunamis in the order of a thousand feet high or so and sent them towards all the major continents, then held them there until we finally did decide that it was their way or the highway...
The special edition release of the movie contains those scenes at the end.
Still, the issue in the story was nuclear war, not ecological destruction.
I found the article on Google Books from G. Gordon Liddy regarding a hypothetical attack on certain U.S. civilian infrastructure...Liddy was into 'Doomer Porn' a long time ago, maybe pre-dating Ron P. :)
I remember reading this article (I used to subscribe to Omni Magazine back then): Omni Magazine Issue January 1989, pages 44-54. {Scroll down to the scanned Omni magazine article...gray background))
http://books.google.com/books?id=graS95RHH3gC&pg=PA43&lpg=PA43&dq=%22G.+...
One might hope that presently the U.S. has a good handle on identifying and protecting critical infrastructure from plausible attack modes and also from natural disaster.
Wat?
*Looks at source*
Rigzone . . Houston, Texas. Ah OK. Yeah, sure. Good luck with that.
OPEC's power will grow & grow with the North Sea, Cantarell, and other non-OPEC fields depleting. Alternative fuel vehicles like EVs will only become popular WHEN oil prices shoot up . . . and that will only occur when OPEC is producing at full capacity.
Green eggs and ham
food producers are growing their profits by shrinking their carbon footprint
Read more: http://www.montrealgazette.com/technology/Green+eggs/3509242/story.html#...
Cheers,
Paul