Book Review: Peak Oil Prep
Posted by Robert Rapier on December 27, 2006 - 11:29am
For some reason I especially like to read books on Peak Oil, sustainability, and energy issues while traveling. Part of the reason is that traveling always makes me reflective. Part of the reason is that these books are often an ice-breaker that allows me to talk about energy with other travelers. On previous trips I read Jared Diamond's Collapse and John Howe's The End of Fossil Energy (reviewed here). On my latest trip I read Mick Winter's Peak Oil Prep and Al Gore's An Inconvenient Truth. I started reading Peak Oil Prep during my first flight, and while the man sitting across the aisle from me reading the National Enquirer didn't show much interest in what I was reading, the woman sitting next to me reading about Christina Aguilera's confessions in Glamour kept glancing at the book. But unfortunately, she never asked about it and we never struck up a conversation. Opportunity missed.
The book contained a lot of information that will be familiar to TOD readers. In fact, there was even a plug for TOD on Page 19. However, each section is chock full of links to additional resources. This was the strength of the book, in my opinion. There were a lot of practical tips, but then the author linked to additional information so you could research a topic to your heart's content. Want to learn to garden using permaculture? Read the permaculture summary on Page 78, and then follow up with one or more of the ten references on permaculture.
This is not a book to convince people of Peak Oil or of climate change. There is a short section in the beginning that discusses these topics, but those are more appropriate for someone who is already familiar with those issues. This is a book for those who have at least a basic grasp, and who are wondering "What can I do?" And that is answered from "A" (acupressure) to "Z" (zoning). This book is essentially a user's manual for sustainable living.
The book could be repetitive over certain points. While I think it is incredibly valuable advice to tell people to change out their incandescent bulbs for compact fluorescents (and I have done so in the past 3 homes I lived in), I counted no fewer than 7 times this was mentioned in the book. There were also some topics that seemed to be out of place in a peak oil book (e.g. "get more sleep"). But, by and large, the advice is topical, worthwhile, and could probably benefit all of us.
Taking Notes
I took 3 pages of notes as I read this book on things that were of particular interest to me. In this section I will share some of those issues.
In the early part of the book, the author makes the case that demand is likely to outstrip supply (which I also think is very likely), and that conflict with China appears possible. He also commented that China is outlawing bicycles in some areas, which came a surprise to me. This is the last thing one should do when fossil fuel resources are diminishing.
On Page 18, the author mentions something that I think we frequently forget about - plastics are made from petroleum. We often think of Peak Oil in terms of energy, but we are dependent on petroleum in many other ways.
On Page 20, he mentions a theme that I don't think gets enough attention: Even if you don't believe that Peak Oil is an imminent problem, implementing solutions that reduce your energy usage will lower greenhouse gas emissions. The author calls this a "two-fer", but given that many of these solutions will also save you money it could very well be a "three-fer".
On Page 30, the author discusses the benefits of walking, and then describes 10 keys to walkable communities. As I worked my way down the list, I was struck by how most European villages would be aptly described by these 10 keys, but the typical town in the U.S. would not.
On Page 43, Winter starts to hammer home the "localize" theme, which is a familiar one to TOD readers. This something I have put more effort into this past year, as I spent much more time at farmers' markets.
On Page 61, one of the references caught my eye. It was Dan Chiras' 31 Ways to Create Sustainable Neighborhoods. That sounded like one to add to my library.
That is probably enough to give a good flavor of the book. Some of the topics covered through the rest of the book were how to compost, solar ovens, beer making, growing your own coffee, and making your house more energy efficient. One point that really caught my attention was the author's claim that over 50% of the vegetables consumed in Havana (population 2 million) are produced in local gardens. That gives me great hope for the future.
Addressing a Misconception
There was one oil company misconception that I want to address, because I see it frequently. On Page 17, the author states that no new oil refineries have been built in the U.S. since 1976. He then suggests that this may be because there's no sense expanding facilities if the feedstock is starting to diminish.
I can tell you that the reason no new refineries have been built is not because oil companies are concerned about Peak Oil. When ExxonMobil tells you that there is plenty of oil, they are not just throwing out a smokescreen. This is what they honestly believe. The vast majority of oil companies, in my opinion, believe that we have adequate supplies of oil for quite some time.
The reason no new refineries have been built is that the permitting process is lengthy. A group in Arizona, Arizona Clean Fuels Yuma LLC, applied for a permit to build a new refinery in 1999. It was finally granted in 2005. So, instead of going through the lengthy permitting process, refiners simply expand their existing refineries. The permitting process for this is significantly simpler.
The EIA has written extensively on this issue. The bottom line on refinery capacity:
Much has been made of the fact that no significant grassroots refinery has been built in the United States in nearly 3 decades other than some small simple refineries. Yet, U.S. refinery capacity has increased 1.9 million barrels per day over the last 10 years, which is equivalent to the addition of 1 medium-size refinery per year on average, as refiners attempt to de-bottleneck and make their refineries more efficient, change feedstocks, and add capacity to meet market opportunities. In EIA's latest Petroleum Supply Annual, Volume 1, although the number of refineries stayed the same between January 1, 2003 and January 1, 2004, capacity increased by 137,000 barrels per day, adding, again, the equivalent of another medium-sized refinery!
So, refiners are expanding capacity. This should tell you that, while they may be wrong, they are betting against an imminent peak.
Conclusion
Overall, this was a solid book that was full of useful resources. This is a good book for anyone trying to live sustainably. For more information, the author hosts 2 Peak Oil websites: DryDipstick.com and BeyondPeak.com.
Contact
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License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.
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I posted this on my blog as well, and a lot of the comments were directed at Al Gore's new book. Several posters questioned the reality of Global Warming. It is interesting to me that some people still deny this. See the comments at:
Global Warming Debate
One good volcano burp and we could be heading towards an Ice Age instead of a global metldown. We still do not have a good grasp of how the whole system comes together.
I will gladly read your next peer reviewed paper on this hypothesis once it is published in "Science" or "Nature". Until then I will simply treat your comment as the kind of nonsense it is.
:-)
We do not "believe" in scientific hypothesis because they are not religion. If we have a scientific hypothesis we try to find experimental or observational data in its support or data that invalidates it. So if you have any data in favor of your idea that a global volcanic catatrophy is going to happen shortly that could have the potential of leading to a new ice age, I would like to see some geological data for that. But something tells me, you don't.
From Wiki: Year without Summer
And on the topic of GD: how about here, Real Climate April 2006 admitting that GD makes the GW model "complex"?
Or here, the NOVA documentary?
Or here, wiki page on GD?
So how do you predict the inevitable occurence of a volcanic event a hundred times worse than Mount Tambora just at the right time to exactly counter all of AGW?
May I ask what brand of a crystal ball you are using? It seems to be fairly advanced...
:-)
I never said I'm "predicting" anything. I just said that it is a chaotic system that could tip either way.
Consider the possibility that we dramatically increase our use of coal once oil starts drying up. That puts more soot into the atmosphere. Now imagine that a mega-volcano decides to blow at the same time. No one is saying it definitely "will" happen. It is among the infinite possibilities of what could happen under Murphy's Laws.
Greenland has, in the past, warmed by as much as 7-8 degrees centigrade in under 50 years, and yet Greenland has also shown shifts towards ice age temperature ranges that have occurred in less than 5 years.
This is all basic climate science. Rapid climate change in both directions is the admission that climate scientists have had to make to themselves mostly from the early 1990s forward although a number of pioneers have explored this idea even earlier while the dominant thinking still restricted itself to climate changes occurring only over thousands of years. The truth is that climate can change drastically in a few decades to levels either hot or cold not experienced by homo sapiens since the advent of agriculture and modern civilization. A significant shift in either direction would be a catastrophe for the current global civilization and yet we go on playing with GHGs as if we are exempt from the consequences of that action. In reality, it may not be our children or our grandchildren who suffer these consequences but ourselves. And frankly, that would be most fitting, wouldn't it?
P.S. Rises in GHGs and temperature are correlated for the ends of prior ice ages although which is cause and which is effect remains unclear. They also happen to be correlated for the ends of several prior warm periods as well. While I personally still believe that, barring other factors, current GHG emissions will lead to inevitable global warming, it remains possible that this is simply prelude to yet another ice age. One thing is dramatically clear - no current model has been accurate about the extent and rate of warming to date. All models have consistently underestimated what is happening.
We've had a number of volcano belches (El Chichon, Pinatubo, Krakatoa, Tambora) and none plunged us into an ice age.
However, Pinatubo did put our warming trend on hold for a couple of years and even levelled the Keeling curve briefly. This is something the critics of Paul Cruzen might want to think about.
We've had a number of volcano belches (El Chichon, Pinatubo, Krakatoa, Tambora) and none plunged us into an ice age.
Not recently, but Toba was a success, ice ages are "good for you" just as Global Warming : A mini ice age may have warmed human relationships.
Do not despair, Yellowstone is promising.
"Do not despair, Yellowstone is promising."
Except for the fact that it will probably kill 90+% of the population in North America... but I guess that would solve PO for a little while... or at least make it seem somewhat less of a problem...
:-)
and the ash cloud would cause major global cooling so you fix GW as well.
I think "Get more sleep" is relevant. One, if you're asleep, the lights, TV, computer, etc., are presumably off or at least in sleep mode. The thermostat may even be lower. So you're conserving energy. Two, there's some fascinating new research that links lack of enough sleep to health problems like obesity, heart disease, cancer and diabetes. Something to keep in mind, if we're heading to a future where healthcare will be unavailable, or at least way more expensive.
I think "Get more sleep" is relevant.
Agreed. Another reason we all could use more sleep is clear-headedness. I've recommended to a number of people who are freaked upon first finding out about oil peaking that they get more sleep, go for a walk, and get more exercise. I think all three of those are basic human needs that many people undervalue. I haven't found anything better than a good walk for dealing with anxiety.
Perhaps this is not relevant, but I've long been intrigued by our family's sleep paterns in response to seasonal changes. Decreasing daylength and the long nites of winter always get longer sleep times, whereas the reverse holds true for the short nights of summer. Is it boredom, less work, or just a natural response? It must help to lower winter energy consumption, though that is not a deliberate response.
The evidence points to "natural response" as the reason why we northerners sleep more in winter and less in summer. People who live within the tropics do not display different sleep amounts at different times of year because day length varies so little in the tropics.
My body wants to hibernate during Minnesota winters, while during the summer I have manic energy and can get by on four or five hours of sleep.
Minnesota winters? Perhaps you have a scandinavian heritage? Back here in south Sweden, dawn is at around 0800-0900, and dusk at 1500-1600. I go to work in pitch black, sit indoors, get back home in total darkness. Literaly put on my peak oil hat, go feed the sheep in total darkness, bring in a days worth of firewood, clean away the droves of rodents left by the cats on the front porch, do some logging, go inside play with the children, make dinner, make love to my beautiful wife, do some logging, go to sleep. Thank god for my portable rechargeable LED lights, and without the physical activity I would be in hibernation 15 hours every day. And it's even worse further up north, but at least they have some snow to light up their existence. Global warming has killed the snow, so here comes winter and pitch black depressions.
Used to be in Vermont and other New England states the suicide rate went up during the winter. Then the snowmobile was invented. Now the death rate from snowmobile accidents is replacing the suicide rate :-}
Must be great in the summer though.:)
I was in the state of commenting on this, and as often, you already replied fast with a documented reponse.
Sleep is one of my favorite subjects when I try to help my patients. Sleep is primordial for your attentionnal system. If you want to remain creative and take appropriate steps in preparing for PO, you should definitely take enough sleep.
We all know what sleep deprivation can cause : attention disorder (very well documented by research done on drivers), headache, nervousness, disruption of the need-satisfaction cycle because of hypothalamic induced perturbations hence the risk of obesity and diabetes, anxiety, depression or aggressivity, tremor, imprecision of motricity, increased muscular tone ...
All of these consequences will increase energy consumption : food, medication, TV, inappropriate driving and so on.
The first thing we will need to learn when dealing with decreasing energy resources is that everything in life goes in cycles. We need to recognise them (our brains are framed for that) and to live with them, not against them. The wake-sleep cycle is one of them and I would indeed suggest that it is one of the first we need to learn to know.
Lack of sleep may be associated with those diseases, but the cause is already quite clear for anyone willing to weight the thousands of scientific studies in an objective manner. A crappy diet of meat, dairy, and junk food causes a pandora's box of chronic diseases. The cure is obvious too: whole plant foods. The mountain of studies show this, and I guarantee that when peak oil forces industrialized folks to eat healthier (less environmentally disastrous and inefficient meat/dairy, more whole plants) - the result will be a rapid reversal of the diseases you mention above. In fact, in addition to science, history provides examples like WWII - the rates of chronic, lifestyle diseases went down when europeans were forced to eat lower on the food chain. This is the ultimate irony: that peak everything will actually improve the physical health of the richest 20% of human beings on the planet. Check out Dean Ornish, who first proved that heart disease is totally reversible via a basically vegan diet. Then just last year I think it was, his newer study showed that a vegan diet reverses prostate cancer (those on the vegan diet got better and none of them got full blown cancer). So in a way it's kind of absurd that energy descent will improve the health of the already-richest segment of the human population! :)
I wouldn't be surprised. Have you seen the research about calorie restriction and longevity? Critters from rotifers to rats live 30%-100% longer if kept on a low-calorie diet. For obvious reasons, most research has been done on animals, but many scientists suspect it holds for humans, as well. Preliminary studies have been promising, and there are a lot of people actually practicing it already.
Why would this be? One theory is that our cells have to "choose" between reproduction and cell repair. Sex is metabolically expensive, and if we use some of our historically limited energy toward it, something else has to go - cellular maintenance. If you're eating well, the body thinks, "Hey, time to reproduce - might never be a better chance." Energy goes into the hormones, etc., that make sex and reproduction possible.
But if times are bad - you aren't eating well - it's a better strategy to wait until times are better in order to reproduce. Energy goes into cellular repair instead.
Of course, nature never foresaw our current situation, where there's plenty of food for both reproduction and cell repair, and where long periods of revved-up sex hormones can actually be bad for you.
A data point that may support this theory: it's long been noted that people who have a lot of kids have shorter lifespans.
What do you get when you starve a monkey?
A monkey that is 30% longer hungry!
"There is always an easy solution to every human problem — neat, plausible and wrong."
H._L._Mencken
One can always recognize a pornucopian by his habit of "improving" the texts he quotes :
For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong.
H. L. Mencken
Actually... I was quoting what many people believe to be the original by H.L. Mencken and you are quoting the popular version. I can't say I am the authority on this, but at least I tried to find the original quote with a citation:
http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/H._L._Mencken
He might have said the same thing twice using different language...
Anyway... you are totally wrong about me being a cornucopian. IMHO the peak occurred, for all practical puproses, in 2006, or, if it didn't, will occur well before 2010. I constantly suggest a $1/gallon gas tax in the US with an automatic 10% annual increase until at least 50% of the retail price of gas is tax, an allocation of those funds for a fleet of high efficiency cars, a luxury tax on SUVs and increasing government investment in renewable energy sources like wind and solar. I think all forms of energy should cost twice as much as they do right now and there should be a global tax on carbon.
Hardly cornucopian standpoints... wouldn't you agree?
Also, I believe, the health of the Cubans improved when they were forced to live lower on the food chain as a result of their oil being cut off with the collapse of the soviet union. Although I am vegan and believe that this approach could help solve many of our problems, including global warming, I fear that our human population would just expand to take up the land freed up thereby.
My guess also, however, is that lack of energy will cause millions of people to starve who are already on the edge as it is. The so called green revolution has been primarily successful because of petroleum inputs; millions will not be able to adjust in time as the Cubans did. Also, Cuba's climate and high level of education probably also contributed to their ability to transition to a largely organic system with very small inputs of petroleum energy.
Another issue is the contention that organic agriculture would make it necessary to expand the amount of land devoted to agricuture, thus further impinging on areas like the rain forest. Of course, if we experience a significant decrease in the amount of petroleum available, the millions who might did from that would potentially free up a countervailing amount of land.
The people who are starving today have not had any upside from the green revolution. They can not afford to buy GM seeds from Monsanto, fertilizer, herbicides, pesticides, fungicides and the usual tech toys of the northern hemisphere farmer.
On the other hand, the people who have been given these riches will make a simple decision: to take the bus OR to see their kids starve while they fill'er up for a few hundred a week. In my books that is a really simple decision to make... and something tells me it will be just as easy for everyone else.
The people who are starving today have not had any upside from the green revolution.
Yes, the "green revolution" was kinda upside-down :
For most of them, hybrid rice was more difficult to cultivate and "inferior in terms of grain price, profitability, consumer demand, and head rice recovery."
They can not afford to buy GM seeds from Monsanto, fertilizer, herbicides, pesticides, fungicides and the usual tech toys of the northern hemisphere farmer.
Of course they "cannot afford" that, this is probably why Monsanto used to give hybrid seeds for free :
Often, it is the government which buys from Monsanto or its distributors the Bt corn seeds, which are then given for free or at subsidized prices to unsuspecting farmers.
Now that the free ride has vanished they cannot cope, how silly!
Yet they found a smart solution, suicide!
I must emphasize that this is also a neat solution to the overpopulation problem, Heil Monsanto!
Disclaimer: I am not a leftist and I don't like the so-called "democracy" but to quote Mencken (not much of a leftist either) again :
Every normal man must be tempted at times to spit on his hands, hoist the black flag, and begin to slit throats.
H. L. Mencken
I think we totally agree with every sane person that Monsanto's strategies in developing countries are criminal. The company should be prosecuted for a lot of what it did in the past and is doing right now.
The point I was trying to make is that the green revolution has not had as benign an effect on much of the world as it had on the developed countries. Indeed... without the green revolution much of the world would be starving to death, but even with it there is hunger. Part of the problem is technical (not all parts of the world are equally productive eco-systems for agriculture), part is economic and part is political.
Unlike you I will always agree that part of me, like of every honest man, is a leftist. The other part of me is conservative... conservative as in "conservation of (natural) resources and human life and values", not as in neo-conservative fascist.
"I think "Get more sleep" is relevant."
More sleep, in a cold house, with the lights off....hmmm..."lack of enough sleep to health problems like obesity, heart disease, cancer and diabetes." (Sounds an awful alot like exercize to me, but hey what do I know)... :-?
...more sleep...sounds...er...great to me!
;-)
More sleep, in a cold house, with the lights off....hmmm
Also a very good reason for a vasectomy
I spent nearly 20 years in the IT world. The "falling asleep" ritual took at least 30 minutes every evening. The mornings were a challenge, and I usually slept 6.5-7 hours.
I retired almost 5 years ago and became a builder. Trust me, 10 hours a day with a tool belt on, getting enough sleep is the last of your worries. The "falling asleep" ritual is now measured in seconds. I would say I fall asleep in less than 2-3 minutes. I don't use an alarm clock, and my body dictates how long I sleep, usally 7.5-8.5 hours.
If people are going to physically work for a living, getting enough sleep will not be a problem. It will be a requirement to survive.
I am now 42, and do not miss the white shirt, tie, coat and slacks.
I spring out of bed in the morning! I love the physical work!
So the moral is take more naps, and that turkey sandwitch may fuel a bout of lewd behaviour. Starving oneself may not make you live forever, but its sure going to seem like it!
The cultural obsession with longevity is amusing,considering the extremely poor quality of life of almost anyone over the age of 90.
Obviously, what people want is to be healthy into old age.
That appears to be genetic, though. If you do everything right - exercise, eat a vegetarian diet, don't smoke, etc. - the average person will live to be about 86. The people who live to be over 100 tend to be quite healthy and happy for most of that time. If you have cancer or a heart attack at 56, you probably won't live to be 100.
Its not that bad since the number of good years have increased a lot.
One complex economical and moral problem is that we now have very manny medical treatments to get some more months or better quality of life for a short while when we are near the end of our lives. This is a good problem since we did not have these options before but using all of them for everybody cost a lot and will probably cost more then can be afforded.
This prompts the need for some kind of moral/cultural development to ratio these medical treatments in a way that gives a nice society to live in with good quality of life for most people.
I have a living will in the hands of each of my children, my doctor and my lawyer. The gist of it is that before age seventy it is all right to spend a lot of money to keep me going, between seventy and eighty I want to rule out very elaborate procedures, and after age eighty all I want in the way of additional medical care is antibiotics and painkillers. With the help of my lawyer I put in strong wording to the effect that I am not afraid of death, but I am afraid of pain or of being kept alive on a ventilator near the end of my life. At all ages I have specified "DNR" "Do Not Resuscitate" because dying once is enough for me;-)
My body is going to go to the U. of Minnesota medical school to provide an educational corpse for future doctors. Why waste a perfectly good body by burying or burning it?
Not necessarily. Consumption has increased during the last ten years and refineries have expanded capacity to keep pace. If we are at peak oil right now, then refineries will find themselves sitting pretty. They will not need to build more refineries or expand capacity and older refineries, going out of service, will keep refining capacity at about the level of production for many years. The only thing that will increase will be refinery profits.
Ron Patterson
Consumption has increased during the last ten years and refineries have expanded capacity to keep pace.
But if they thought peak was imminent, they wouldn't believe that consumption could increase. No way would they spend money on capacity that promises to remain idle as oil production decreases.
Besides that, I have had numerous discussions on Peak Oil with people at work - right up to the very top of the organization. I can tell you that the consistent response is "We have 30 years before we have anything to worry about."
Yeah, you are probably right. But that expansion will not be a total loss because of the reasons I stated above. And I have no doubt that almost everyone in the oil business believes we have many years to go before the peak. The only exceptions are a few oil geologists, but who listens to them?
Ron Patteson
Assuming we're talking here about individuals with high intelligence and above-average analytical skills, a couple of questions come to mind:
1) Have they actually looked at the various arguments and reached this conclusion, or is a near-term peak considered so improbable that they don't even consider the subject worth investigating?
2) What do you think it would take to make them see things differently?
Have they actually looked at the various arguments and reached this conclusion, or is a near-term peak considered so improbable that they don't even consider the subject worth investigating?
I think the latter accurately describes the situation. Sometimes I wonder if it is just hard to see the overall picture, and they are making some assumptions that aren't warranted. I have heard some rumblings lately, though, that indicate that they see the problem on the horizon.
What do you think it would take to make them see things differently?
I don't know. What we do here is a start. By going over the arguments here, we raise visibility and we force the XOMs to deal with the issue. Of course when they make a blanket denial, we have to confront that as well.
"No matter what happens, the U.S. Navy is not going to be caught napping"
- Frank Knox, U.S. Secretary of Navy, December 4, 1941
Of course, depending on your viewpoint, the U.S. Navy wasn't napping, it was just enjoying a nice peacetime Sunday morning.
Luckily, we can all look forward to a flood of oil, though it seems like the flood is a now more likely to be 2008 than 2007, but like Godot, we can certainly have faith it will arrive, as long as we stand around doing nothing. Maybe napping is a good idea.
Thanks for the review, Robert. Did Winter go into the "economic collapse" topic much? I always appreciate reading other's views on that.
If anything gives me pause on worrying about an imminent peak, it's Exxon's position. BP, Chevron, and others seem to see a problem, but Exxon is acting like the Titanic. I can't decide if they're saying there is no problem, or there is no solution so why bother doing things differently? How can the "vast majority of oil companies" get it so wrong? Or is it that, regardless of the effects of oil peaking on society, they will still be in the business of providing oil, so why rock the boat?
It would be better if they were right, but the Titanic turned out to be vulnerable after all. It would have been better if someone had turned the wheel a bit.
Did Winter go into the "economic collapse" topic much? I always appreciate reading other's views on that.
Not in great detail. He did provide lots of good advice that would help people survive an economic collapse. I actually worried about "Economic Collapse" being in the subtitle, because I was afraid that would scare some people off. Most people don't want to hear a message like that, but this was a book with a message that most people should hear.
How can the "vast majority of oil companies" get it so wrong?
This is an interesting question. I have spent many years pondering the question of "corporate intelligence", or lack thereof, while sitting in my cubicle. Simply put, corporations are much more like a dumb machine than a thinking entity. Suggesting otherwise is really just anthropomorphism.
Companies have a tendency to just keep doing what they did last year. To maintain quality, procedures are followed. This leads to inflexibility. One of the big lessons of the last century for industry was that it is simply not possible to continue with that approach, and expect to remain in business. The 20th century saw the collapse of many companies and even whole industries that failed to adapt to changing conditions.
Adapting to change was the new buzzphrase. This is something that does not come naturally to large companies. CEOs are generally pretty conservative types, CEOs with the vision of Richard Branson are notable for their rarity.
Therefore it does not surprise me that companies like Exxon have their head in the sand. I think it interesting, and a sign of the recent change in philosophy, that companies like BP are adopting a more flexible approach. They may have no better crystal ball than the rest of the industry, but at least they are prepared to adapt.
This is a general problem for any institution/organization. A history of decisions and previous investments appears to lock them into a set of working assumptions and priorities. New information that calls into question the validity of their operations is extremely difficult to hear.
I tried to break the ice recently at a city council meeting by quoting a country song.
We have a lot invested in our current living arrangment, we've placed our bets on the table, but Kenny Rogers sang:
You've got to know when to hold them, know when to fold them, know when to walk away, know when to run.
A lot of wisdom in Kenny there. Folks, we've been delt some new cards.
Speaking from the perspective of a local government employee involved in long range planning, I can definately agree with the inability for governments to change their approaches when presented with new and conflictory evidence. I faced it when I worked for a conservative-oriented county and still see it in a more progressive one I currently am employed by.
Grass-roots change can only go so far unless the political establishment is 100% on board with your ideals. Then they can direct their employees to change course (or change employees) if need be.
Read a good example of arguing with the brick wall that can be local government:
http://unplanning.blogspot.com/2005/05/conversation-with-denial.html
Just curious... how does this square with (some) state governments being more flexible regarding energy policy and environmental protection than the federal government? Is there an inversion in the system on some level where states are more willing to implement change than counties? Or is it simply a matter of resources and legal authority?
Political expediency. The states and localities that engage in more proactive planning and mitigation do because the constituents expected it. Witness the governator's moves to combat global warming. Californians expect this approach to dealing with environmental issues so as a consequence you have action. Plus California gets a little more leeway to set environmental law than other states as our CALEPA was established earlier than the national EPA.
A good example of adapting to change is the story of engineer William Bailey as related in A Golden Thread: Twentyfive Hundred Years of Solar Architecture and Technology. He was making a lot of money selling the Day and Night solar water heater in California prior to 1920. Over the next decade, large oil and gas discoveries in the LA basin doomed that business, so he adapted his technology for use in gas water heaters. His business grew in that direction instead.
>Therefore it does not surprise me that companies like Exxon have their head in the sand.
Its very unlikely Exxon has its head in the sand. More likely that Exxon is trying to preserve its overseas investments from getting nationalized.
There seems to be a optimism bias amongst large organizations. Or, perhaps a bias towards expecting the outcome you would prefer. Examples include NASA, Enron, CIA, BushCheneyRumsfeld. People at lower levels see problems, but the big thinkers at the top don't want to hear about it. Interestingly, some of them are hedging their bets by investing in alternate energy, whilest still maintaining a rosy forecast for oil in the near term (keep those stock prices up). One doesn't rise to the top with a downbeat message. Plus, subscribing to uplifting reports from CERA provides them with effective cover.
Absolutly. What do you expect them to do? Stand on their chairs and start screaming about how the world is peaking, and we're all well and truly f@#ked? Short term, that might boost oil prices, but it would also initiate massive infrastructure changes away from oil. If you're an oil company CEO that's the last thing you want.
Much better to hang your hat on CERA's predictions, talk about $40 oil returning in a few years, and let the sheeple keep buying SUV's. I expect when we are two three years past peak (not a plateau, but actual declining production) you will start to see recognition of the problem. At that point any federal programs put in place to conserve energy will have their hands full just keeping up with the decline rate, insuring massive profits for years to come.
A statement of the part of the chairman of Exxon Mobil that oil supply problems are a long way off should be taken in the same vein as a statement by the chairman of Phillip Morris that smoking is not addictive.
I don't think either BP or Toyota are getting it wrong. They are doing all the right things on the right time scale to prepare for a transition to smaller cars and renewable energy. They also have to be very careful not to get ahead of themselves AND the actual situation. Nothing in corporate life is worse than being two years too early, burning a lot of credibility and money and ending up broke while others with better timing cream off the market.
Exxon, like GM, Ford, etc. seems to be setting on "the future being an extrapolation of the present" strategy. That works most of the times. And some times it will kill you. GM and Ford are already feeling the pain. If PO hits, so will Exxon, unless they can turn around on a dime. If they have enough dimes, that is probably what they will do by buying into renewable energy when the time comes. It will cost them billions and some market share, but I have no indication to believe they can't live with either loss.
In terms of consumer options, there is nothing wrong with some players behaving one way and another set of players behaving another. Exxon playing a different tune would not change a thing about the onset of PO. Unless you are one of their investors, we got nothing to worry about.
Exxon is an interesting example of oil company scizophrenia. My family has owned their stock since 1950, and made a lot of money from them.
They tend to hold their cards close to their vest, but they have a deal with Qatar, the largest world NG reserves and the probable site of a gas-to diesel refinery. They may very well have the largest coal reserves in the world, with 1.6 billion tons in the Powder River Basin in Federal Leases, and own the minerals under a couple of West Virginia Counties that they picked up when they bought Carter, as I recall. They also own about 1/2 of the coal reserves in Columbia, most of South America's coal. Hence their religeous crusade against CO2-Global warming.Coal to liquids is closer to economic viability than tar, IMHO. Exxon holds immense political power in the US, the Alkek family (some of the founders of Exxon's predecessor, the Humble Co.) were part of the original G.H.W. Bush contributors, also the Farish family and the Blaffers and the Fondrens, all old Humble familys.
The main culprit in oil company dinosaur behaviour seems to be the way our corporate officers are paid.They recieve giant stock options, valuable only if the stock goes up. They mostly don't get them until they are 10 years or so out from retirement, so the officers and directors are only interested in short term returns. So, be honest, would you possibly pass up a $300 million bonus if by keeping your mouth shut and keeping on with a proven business model worked? It did for the last Exxon President. 'Nuff said, you whores and rapists of the environment.
Who was it that said "It is difficult to get someone to believe something when his paycheck depends on his not believing it?"
I believe that is a slight misquote of Upton Sinclair. Replace "paycheck" with "job" and it might be right.
Al Gore used it in his movie in reference to the denial of climate change by the major car and energy corporations.
Given the expansion of US refining capacity, it's interesting to compare refinery inputs to inventory levels. Just for comparison purposes, I compared 12/17/82 (the first year that the EIA has data for) to 12/15/06 (the most recent data). (Four week running average for inputs.)
The respective inputs were 11.36 mbpd (1982) and 15.37 mbpd (2006), versus respective crude oil inventories of 363 million barrels (31.3 days consumption) and 329 million barrels (21.4 days consumption). Relative to consumption, crude oil inventories have fallen by about one-third from December, 1982 to December, 2006.
In regard to oil companies betting against an imminent peak, Robert is of course right. For example, according to Matt Simmons, the top 10 majors working the North Sea were not predicting a North Sea peak until about 2009.
As usual, the North Sea peak fit the HL model. I have recently noted that the top major oil companies, using the very best technology available, have succeeded in keeping the North Sea crude + condensate post-peak decline rate down to only about three times more than the Lower 48 post-peak decline rate.
The most notorious (confirmed) recent case of a major missing a peak was Shell's efforts to expand the surface facilities at the Yibal Field, to handle an expected flood of new oil, when instead they were confronted with an unexpected flood of new water. IMO, this is what is happening at Ghawar today. We just can't confirm it.
I suspect some of the guys who work on Ghawar do read TOD. A lot of them are non-Saudi's in any case and work for the Schlumbergers of this world. If my hypothesis is correct, why are they being so reticent? Do they only talk about women, when they socialize?
There have been a lot of rumors. Morton cites rumors of a 50% plus water cut at SPE conventions: http://home.entouch.net/dmd/ghawar.htm
Richard Heinberg cited what he described as an industry source as saying that Ghawar was down to 3 mbpd this year. A lot of people note that it was unlikely for Ghawar to go quickly from 5 to 3 mbpd. However, we do not know what Ghawar's recent production has been. It may have been dropping at 100,000 to 200,000 bpd per month for the past few months, and the Saudis have been making up for the decline by depleting inventories and pushing the other fields as hard as they dared.
In any case, this spring (conincidentally, at the same stage of depletion at which Texas started its "volunary" production cuts) the Saudis announced that they could not find buyers for all of their oil, "Even their light, sweet oil." To which I replied that Texas has also "voluntarily" cut its production, by about 73% since 1972, because of a persistent inability to find buyers for all of our oil.
The nice thing about exponential decay processes is that it is impossible for them to go unnoticed for a much longer amount of time than some fraction of the decay time. Ghawar will be no exception. We will get news about it shortly, within a year or two, once the decay has set in for real. While I feel some curiosity and this tingly feeling of "wanting to know NOW!", the actual logical side of my brain tells me that this is not necessary. To be right about something in hindsight is just as sweet as having been right about it while it happened. Probably even more so because those who were trying to hide the truth are being creamed even worse.
It makes a difference for me.
I live in Tokyo as an engineer. I consider my position here untenable in a post peak world.
I have an escape plan to move to my fathers farm in the US and become semi subsistent.
A one or two year heads up will make a huge difference to me and my family. Heck, it will take a year just to get my wife the necessary visa. Not to mention the work needed to prepare the farm.
I need to know if I should go ahead and pull the trigger now or do I still have more time?
I don't care about how sweet being right it.
I need to know if I should go ahead and pull the trigger now or do I still have more time?
Heck, if you think the consequences of PO will be that severe, then why are you delaying? If you wait til it becomes obvious to all, you will be competing with thousands of others trying to do the same thing. The sooner you start your preparations, the better. Unless there is a major downside to moving, do it now.
Who says I'm delaying? I'm making preparations now.
The major downside to moving now is pretty simple, I don't want to live on a stinking farm. I don't want to give up on my life and abandon a skill set its taken me most of my lifetime to build up.
Moving back to the States and onto a farm is my lifeboat, a plan of last resort. If I can make do without it I surely will try.
Of course the future is impossible to predict. That doesn't mean we just have to go blindly though life.
Wouldn't it be great if we had reliable numbers from Ghwahar? If we had enough reliable stats on oil production to get a rough idea of Peak Oil?
Then we could narrow the possibilities down much further than the fog we have now.
My dilemma is my options are an all or nothing thing. If PO is a decade away and/or the decline rate is shallow I continue on with my (very enjoyable) life here in Tokyo.
However if PO was Dec '05,if WT is right, and if the US economy implodes my position here in Japan is untenable.
I don't have much of a middle ground here. I have to throw my resources into one plan or the other.
I don't have IP's luxury of watching PO in the real view mirror.
If you hate the idea of living on a farm, then don't plan on doing that--no matter what. Figure out another Plan B in case TSHTF next year. IMO, farms will be highly vulnerable in case the future of the U.S. looks like Louisiana after Katrina. For many plausible scenarios, urban dwellers will do better than farmers will do if social order breaks down. During the Great Depression more farmers and their families starved to death than did urban dwellers in the U.S. The isolation of most farms is not a plus factor if it comes to The End Of The World As We Know it. Many suburbs will also fare poorly.
The twentieth century saw huge social disruptions. In most cases farmers and rural residents suffered the most (with the obvious exception of strategic bombing victims in World War Two). Sometimes farmers do well, as in the German hyperinflation of 1923, but deflation destroys farmers. Any remnants of government are likely to look first to pacifying the cities while life in rural areas may go to hell in a handbasket pretty much unnoticed.
I live in an apartment owned by my company (very common in Japan). If the economy goes in the crapper I figure I'm gone in the first round or two of layoffs. Now I am homeless and the possibilities of getting another job here would be pretty grim. Not to mention I am not a Japanese citizen in a country that barely tolerates foreigners.
My father owns a farm. I figure my best chance would be to go back home. Ie a farm.
And if PO is all its cracked up to be ie a long slow decline, I don't see job prospects being much better in the US. At any rate people will stop buying the consumer electronics that my career depends on.
I open for suggestions. If you have an idea please let me know, I'm all ears.
I understand what you are saying about farms. But my old man owns his land and house outright. He won't be losing it to forclosure (the problem with farmers in the great depression). At any rate I figure my chances are better there than a homeless foreigner in Tokyo.
Try to think of some way to make a living on a farm without farming. Can you fix stuff? Could you run a trading post? Could you become a black marketeer of gasoline that is allocated to farmers (as happened big-time during World War II in the U.S.)? Could you get a job at a feed mill? Could you manage a rural co-operative store that sells gasoline? Can you work in a hardware store? Can you do welding? Could you learn to become a diesel mechanic? Is there an ethanol plant near the farm? Could you teach school in a rural area? Can you preach? Can you cook for large numbers of people? Can you do roofing?
There are very few ways to make a good living in rural areas, but often there can be ways of scraping by.
Oh, I understand what you mean now.
And yeah, I have very little intention to become a farmer by trade (vegetable garden for sure though).
I am working on a couple possibilities for a fall back trade. I brew beer for a hobby and could turn this into a trade easily. There are other possibilities as well (you listed several)
But that's besides the point. I don't want to leave Tokyo. I don't want to give up my career as an engineer (currently designing cmos image senors for digital cameras.) Its taken me a lifetime to build up the skill set I need for my career (including my Japanese skills). My whole life is in this town. IMHO Tokyo is the greatest place to live on Earth.
Its still an all or nothing thing. Either things stay rosy and I can continue my (very enjoyable) life in Tokyo or TSHTF and I have to flee and invent a new lifestyle.
I don't know what kind of cozy deal IP has, but I sure would like to know what's going on in SA. Its not academic to me.
Have you read "Twilight in the Desert"? I think Simmons gives us a solid idea of what has been happening what is happening and what will happen in Saudi Arabia.
If I were you I'd stay in Tokyo as long as possible and gamble on the chance of getting one of the last planes out of there if THSHTF. You have to take some risks in this world, because otherwise you're just a vegetable headed for the stewpot.
That is the current plan. The disadvantages are many however. One is I will show up in the post TSHTF US with no viable income and what not. The second is my wife will require a visa which is not a trivial thing to get.
This keeps coming back to reliable indicators. If only I had some decent numbers that would help me narrow my decision down.
Surely I am not unique in this regard.
This keeps coming back to reliable indicators. If only I had some decent numbers that would help me narrow my decision down.
Surely I am not unique in this regard.
Ok, now I understand your dilemma. We are all in the same boat regarding lack of data. I don't think we will ever have reliable indicators, PO will only be evident in the rear view mirror. A major recession could take place anytime (even without PO).
Therefore I don't think your decision will ever be made any easier, until the day you lose your job. I would plan to be ready to fly out the day after.
Is there any way you can get her a visa now, just in case?
I can pre file some of the paperwork, but I can't apply in advance.
Pre filing will speed things up a bit, but its still a lengthy proccess (I'm in the proccess of pre filing now).
The US immigration system is draconian at best. It is much simplier just to enter illegally. Anyone who says illegal immigrants should just go home and re-enter the legal way has no idea what they are talking about.
Because it is impossible to predict the future with accuracy I try to follow the following rule in regard to the advent of Peak Oil:
Act as if there is a fifty percent probability that TSHTF and it is TEOTWAWKI next year and a fifty percent probability of business pretty much as usual for the next half century.
Wasting mental energy trying to predict "the" future is counterproductive; making preparations for a wide variety of possible outcomes can relieve worry. My belief is that if one prepares for both extremes, then one is relatively well off for any "in between" scenario.
In preparing for the worst, I try to do only things that will improve my life even if the "business as usual" scenario turns out to be true. In other words, no matter what happens it is excellent advice to Economize, Localize, and Produce in the nondiscretionary sector.
Its overall a good way to plan ones life. You dont realy know of you will be run over by a bus tomorrow or if you will live until you are 101 years old. Mix short term goals and nice to do things and long range ones. Its especially important if you dont believe in a paradise afterlife and have to do the nice things and make your life worthwile while you live. ;-)
One simple answer is that they are professionals and keep their mouth shut about their client/employer.
Truer words were never written. Some decades ago I worked for the U.S. Government as a Data Processing Systems Engineer at Sharpe General Depot in Tracy, California. I had to sign an agreement that I would never ever divulge anything--and I never have. Until now;-)
I never have. Until now;-)
Do you mean you breached the agreement by just mentionning it?
Sort of: I broached the agreement by allowing anybody to know where I worked and what I did--because this was forbidden. I positively must not and will not talk about the ludicrous inefficiencies I found at the only general depot on the West Coast of the U.S. Nor can I mention the top-secret system of inventory control I devised, which is very similar to one my father invented for Sears Roebuck back in the 1920s.
Itching to brag about being good at keeping secrets is not especially constructive. :-)
brag about being good at keeping secrets
I don't read Don's comment the way you do.
I see it more as a sarcastic way to disclose ongoing mess without "officially" spilling the beans.
Thank you. One of the hugely frustrating things about being a government employee with a security clearance is that it is impossible to blow the whistle on gross incompetence and grotesque mismanagement without facing serious prison time.
At Sharpe General Depot (This was before the Vietnam War.) nobody knew:
1. What they had in stock.
2. Where the stuff was that they thought they had.
3. What various branches of the Armed Forces were likely to want in case of a military buildup or emergency.
4. How to transfer stuff from one category to another.
5. How to keep college-educated employees in the data-processing department.
6. How to fire utterly incompetent and dishonest employees.
7. How and when to restock inventory so as not to run out of vital items.
I was asked to resign because of a "bad attitude" when I tried to help out with point #7 and when I complained to my supervisor of not having enough work to do.
Sir,
Obviously you do no understand basic economics ... especially when it comes to "cost plus" contracts. :-)
The goal sir, is to hire even more such employees.
Most big executives have a large portion of their compensation as stock options. These are usually granted once a year. If you were a big wig, would you start projecting declining production 2 years in advance (triggering flat or declining stock prices) or would you keep talking about increasing production, boosting stock untill such time as actual production figures showed declines?
This is how Wall Street operates.
Garth
A prediction of declining supplies may not be bad for stockholders. Selling 10% less at a price 20% higher means even higher profits. An oil company that plans to be a diversified energy company in the future will be a company that grows. Those who diversify early will have a competitive advantage in the next few decades.
But if all the other major oil companies are predicting expanding production, your company shares will get hammered.
And if they all came out together there would be cries of collusion!
Garth
What will matter to executives after PO is to convince analysts that their companies are getting an ever expanding section of the ever shrinking pie!
Any kind of book that gets "peak oil" in the national dialogue is a good book. The mainstream media avoids using the phrase "peak oil".
One of the reasons for this avoidance is the unfortunate association of PO with www.TheEndIsNear.com.. An even cursory look around TOD will uncover any number of posts which feed on suppressed or open fears of a total destruction of technological civilization and/or The American Way of life. Some of it might simply be driven by the need to justify that purchase of the chainsaw/wood chipper/wood burning oven/shotgun/signal flare survival kit to the wife. Others might be going through real emotional crisis. Many others are simply extrapolating faulty information using faulty logic, thus proving once more that the US school system is not doing a good job teaching critical reasoning skills.
And all of this is in the face of the fact that PO is a well established and technically well defined phenomenon. Sadly, in this world, media attention has much more to do with HOW the message is presented than with the message itself. One could even say that they still shoot the messenger unless the messenger is a sexy youg lady with legs all the way and a chest to die for. PO, unfortunately, on some level, has chosen to present itself as the unshaven shotgun carrying survivalist who holds up the sign saying
"The World As You Know It Is Coming To an End!".
That message simply does not sell. It would be better to sell it as:
"Your Baby Will Breath Easier In A World Without Oversized Internal Combustion Engines!"
Just a thought...
I am currently reading a book called "How To Live Well Without Owning A Car." The book begins by stressing the amount of money you can save and how you could literally become a millionaire in 30 years with the money you save. It stresses finances and health and then goes on to the usual environmental and peak oil arguments. The point is that this book does a good job of showing how we can all enhance our quality of life by either not owning a car, getting rid of at least one car or at least cutting back on our car use.
While it is probably counterproductive to just come out and say that the American way of life is ending, it is productive to show out how we can enhance our way of life while also doing positive things for the environment and global warming.
At the end of the day, however, I believe that our so called way of life needs to be radically altered in many ways. The challenge, however, is how to get to that end state without freaking people out or creating a backlash.
The American Way of Life is just a proxy for what is ultimately important -- a sense of happiness and well being. The bad thing about our devotion to our current way of life is that most people believe it is the end all and be all in how a society and an economy should be run. This is primarily a function of the thousands of commericals pounded into our heads 24/7 from birth to grave. It is no surprise that an extreme negative, emotion reaction is engendered when people think that way of life is threatened.
To counter all these false paradigms is probably an impossible task, however. How does one counteract the billions of dollars in advertising that attempts to equate happiness with consumption of all things trivial?
Curious... I never had to read a book to know all about living without a car. I never had a car. I still managed. The hardest problem is usually to cross a highway as a pedestrian... it is close to impossible in many areas because they did not build any crossings... somebody should write a survival guide about that!
:-)
"The American Way of Life is just a proxy for what is ultimately important -- a sense of happiness and well being."
So why are there more murders in some US cities than in many other countries in total? Must be the happiness that's created by the American Way of Life!
The flip-side of that coin is 30% without health insurance of any kind... I guess being afraid to get medical help is another expression of universal happiness... after all, isn't driving around in a car supposed cure tuberculosis and cancer?
Honestly... I don't think the American Way of Life is much of a proxy for anything, except maybe the results of leaving a large bunch of greedy people unchecked.
And that will ultimately have to go the way of the Dodo. Not because of PO, but because it is not good for a large majority of the population.
Its not rocket science, a car costs at least $500/month in depreciation, gasoline, insurance and maintainence. Invest that much for 30 years in a reasonable mutual fund...
But have you ever tried to talk someone into having sex in the back seat of a bus? Whats higher status-a new Cadilac Escalade or a million dollar bus? Doom, Doom, we're all doomed!
I always considered having sex in my own bedroom far superior to the sex I could have in the back of a car, including a stretch limo. I guess I am just not very impressed with practising the Kamasutra when it is made necessary by sheet metal barriers...
In my books a Cadilac Escalade is a sign of really bad taste, at best, penis envy, at worst. If you want to impress me with a car, it better be a Ferrari or a Lamborghini. Those cars are simply good design... as in the sense of FORM OVER FUNCTION AND COST.
"Doom, Doom, we're all doomed!"
I like playing Doom... my favorite weapon is the shotgun. The rocket launcher is not bad, but it is too easy to get killed by a shot fired at a nearby wall... firing the rocket launcher is like driving an SUV where a hybrid would do...
Heh. Notice in DOOM, the research that unleashed the demons was on energy. In particular, creating new hydrocarbons to replace the depleted oil reserves of earth...
Darn! We are DOOMED!
The Energy Bulletin has an article that suggests that Avatars consume more energy per capita than real Brazilians.
This is a modest proposal from an average consumer - I'm a dad with a wife and kids living in the suburbs. I'm not in the oil industry, and I'm not a mathematics professor so I tend to read this site with trepidation. The effect of oil and gas increases on me will come directly out of my wallet. So I have recently signed a contract to lock in natural gas prices for five years. The price is about 5 cents more than im paying now, but if (when) we do hit the brick wall, it will be a bargain. You can go to www.energyshop.com to compare rates from suppliers across the US and Canada.
I'd like to hear comments from others on the benefits of locking in a five year contract.
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So I have recently signed a contract to lock in natural gas prices for five years. The price is about 5 cents more than im paying now, but if (when) we do hit the brick wall, it will be a bargain.
Wow, that's bound to be a good deal. How did you find such a contract? I thought that for NG you are stuck with the supplier that owns the pipe that reaches your house, no?
So I have recently signed a contract to lock in natural gas prices for five years. The price is about 5 cents more than im paying now, but if (when) we do hit the brick wall, it will be a bargain.
yes thats what I thought - a lot of this TOD website is slightly esoteric / academic (not that there is anything wrong with that!) but I am more concerned with the here and now - and what does this mean to me, and what can I do
I dont really want to build a house of rammed tyres - or wattle and daub - (with all respect - although that may come)
I was at a party and broached this subject of peak oil/gas - big mistake - the vast majority was of the opinion of 'undulating plateau' and that prices would come back down. This was for both gasoline and natural gas. So my supposition is that very few are aware of these issues.
so I would say to the Mighty Goose and the other powers that be on this site:
the battle is over - we are aware of the peak and we agree - so now what?
yes we can conserve. and we can also pray. what else can we do?
where are prices going? i.e. you have focused on supply - what about demand
we = the masses. the great unwashed. those who will be in the gasoline lineups. or the soup kitchens.
In some areas you buy your gas from "gas marketers" rather than from the gas company. It is an attempt to make the residential natural gas market work like the long distance telephone market where there is still only one line coming into your house but you decide which company you connect to. In the natural gas market, this means that there is a company that builds and maintains the physical infrastructure and they get paid a certain amount for that, either by the consumer (at a rate set by the public service commission) or by the marketer (at a rate set by negotiation, which may give one marketer a better deal than others). In theory the way it is suppose to work is that consumers make deals with the marketers for a certain rate. If a consumer uses 1000 units of gas during a month, that marketer is obligated to pump 1000 units of gas into the system. So the customer most likely won't receive gas that actually came from the marketer but it doesn't matter since it all is suppose to be of the same chemical makeup.
The competition comes from whatever marketer can best convince consumers to buy gas from them. The challenge for the marketer is to set the rates to where they are more attractive to the consumer than the competition without selling for less than their cost.
We've had this system here in metro Atlanta for a couple of years now. People complain about it like crazy and want to go back to the monopoly days of the Atlanta Gas Light company. I suspect this is for two reasons: 1) NG rates are higher than they were before competition and even if that's because of changes in the market price rather than because of the deregulated system, it is perceived as being the fault of the new system. 2) People have too many choice in their lives as it is. It use to be that the gas bill arrived, you'd grumble, pay it and go watch tv. Now you have to figure out what is the best contract from the dozens of marketers with dozens of different plan each with dozens of variable to consider. People talk around the watercooler about what rate they locked in for how long, while folks who got lesser deals get upset.
Around here they do that for residential telephone service, and the "competitive" companies keep raising their rates and/or going bankrupt. Funny how the company that actually maintains the lines (Verizon) doesn't offer the service at a comparable price, given that they do sell it indirectly even cheaper (if those other companies make a profit).
This may turn out to be a good deal. But if the increase in prices are truly astronomical, how will you ensure that the supplier doesn't back out of the contract?
Green Mountain Energy did the same with electric accounts about a year and a half ago in deregulated parts of Texas. Prices tripled, and they got stung.
A gas contract is contract law. If they renig, the company can be sued for triple damages for fraud here in Texas and its a great idea for a Class Action suit. The company can protect themselves by buying futures contracts for delivery for five years in the future.
My guess is its a great deal for the consumer, we have a 32% depletion rate on new gas wells, and I believe prices will at least double by the end of the contract, plus it would help a family budget. Sign the contract quick before the fools wake up!
Exactly. Indeed, that has happened to some consumers here in the northeast. The companies they bought long-term contracts from either fled in the dark of night with their money, or declared bankruptcy.
There's also the possibility that gas prices will go way down (hey, it happened this year), and you'll be paying more than everyone else.
Editors,
Since you are reviewing books, why not review the year? What are the top Peak Oil related stories of the year '06?
Hmm, let me think back ...
1. George Bush says that US must stay in Iraq otherwise the oil region will be destablized
2. Cambrige Associates estitmates?
3.
... You choose
Hello TODers,
For me: Top Peakoil Story of 2006 was WT's ELM writings, and the ongoing debate over the possible validity of his ELModel. It has generated tremendous TOD discussion. Wish we could get Putin, Chavez, Calderon, the Saudi Princes, Ahmadinejad, and the other energy exporters to reply on how ELM has affected their strategies going forward.
Next candidate was the RR vs Khosla ethanol debate.
Bob Shaw in Phx,Az Are Humans Smarter than Yeast?
"In the early part of the book, the author makes the case that demand is likely to outstrip supply (which I also think is very likely), and that conflict with China appears possible."
A sentence like this always raises the hair on my neck for its naive interpretation of the terms "supply" and "demand". Let me give an example:
There is an enormous naive demand for 20ct diamonds. Probably every other woman would want one if she could have it. Therefor theoretically over a billion of these stones could be sold. On the other hand, there is a very small actual demand for them as any jeweler can witness. Most jewelers, it turns out, will not even dream about having one of these in their store - the insurance alone would bancrupt them. I have seen maybe three or four in my life.
We also do not see a serious effort of the diamond mining industry to find more of these large stones. They are fully aware that doubling the output of large diamonds will not lead to an increase in revenue proportional to the increase in cost per stone. One can even predict that the price for these stones would have to drop to less than $100 for there to be any chance to reach the bottom half of all customers and probably less than $1000 to reach the bottom 90%! It is therefor much easier to reach the top 0.00001% of all potential customers at a price level closer to $10,000,000 per stone than to go for more sales volume.
The same dynamics that exists for the luxury good diamonds exists for the luxury good oil. There might be a naive perception of there being much more real demand (by a factor of two) than there is supply but that is not so. To burn oil and gas one needs something to burn it in. The technical contraptions to do so that produce some return in functionality (like cars, boats and planes) do not come for free and they can not be operated for an infinite amount of time. Large cars, boats, planes etc. are simply luxury items which few people have access to on a global scale.
The demand for gas created by SUVs, is not real in a technological or economic sense. Few people actually need a 5.8l V8 engine and a four wheel drive to get to work. The availability of cheap gas (which was really an over-supply) has simply created a niche for the car industry to sell oversized cars that satisfy a psychological need (which is indeed not the same as a true demand). The end of this over-supply will therefor first eat into psychological need before it even gets close to the real needs of a mobile society like the US.
We will as simply learn to live with smaller cars as our women have learned to live without 20ct diamond rings.
Diamonds and energy needs are two totally different things. How can the laws of supply and demand be applied to a commodity which is the basis for all other goods?
The laws of supply and demand are the same for oil and diamonds. A cheap supply of anything plus a "well oiled" advertising machinery will create a "demand" even if there is no vital need for that particular good. See diamonds, television sets, mp3 players. Oil is no different. 80+% of all the oil we use is burnt for pleasure, not to satisfy vital needs like growing food, filtering water, heating our homes or even secondary needs like transportation. But to be wasteful is not the same thing as to be dependent.
There are good substitutes for diamonds, such as emeralds and rubies and synthetic diamonds. There are no good or close substitutes for conventional oil. That is a huge difference.
"There are no good or close substitutes for conventional oil."
Sure there is. It is called electricity. From an engineering perspective an ICE is an incredibly messy affair compared to a battery and an electric motor. All chemical forms of energy storage are extremely wasteful and batteries are as good as it gets. Capacitors, magnetic coils, gyros, hydroelectric storage are all far superior. The only reason ICEs exist in the first place is the abundance of cheap oil (see my post on how cheap supply creates demand... even for things that are as messy as oil). Cheap oil is coming to a close... and so is the ICE except in applications where its power density is superior and necessary.
Electricity is not a source of energy as much as it is a way of carrying energy. In the U.S., most electricity is generated from coal or natural gas. Natural gas is near peak. Coal is dirty. Neither is a satisfactory or close substitute for oil, though if natural gas were superabundant (which it most emphatically is not), we could substitute LNG and NG-generated electricity for much of oil. If conventional oil peaked in Dec. 2005 (as may have been the case) I suspect that the global peak in natural gas cannot be more than ten years after that--and possibly less.
I repeat: There are no good or close substitutes for conventional oil.
Many economists do not understand this point, because they have a trained incapacity to do so.
Oil is not a source of energy, either... it is nature's wasteful energy storage of million years of photosynthesis. Total effeciciency probably hovers around 10^-6. For a comparison: Solar cells including battery efficiency 5-10%...
All energy in the universe either comes from nuclear fusion or gravitational collapse. The best way to make use of fusion is to put a solar panel on your roof... 15% efficiency and no need to produce any toxic by-products. The "ash" generated by stars is the stuff life is made off... heavy elements. A win-win... and reliable for billions of years.
:-)
"I repeat: There are no good or close substitutes for conventional oil."
Why do you like to repeat falsehoods? Is it fun?
"Many economists do not understand this point, because they have a trained incapacity to do so."
I am not an economist. I am a physicist. I am trained to deal in all things related to energy transfer.
:-)
Except for lightning, how can you consider electricity a "source" of energy, when it is almost invariably generated from solar or hydro or fossil fuels or nuclear energy?
Neither solar nor wind nor any other interruptible renewable source of energy is a good subsitute for oil. The least bad substitutes are coal and natural gas--because from them you can make synthetic diesel and gasoline and kerosine.
I'm an economist, and I know about substitutes;-)
Like I said... I am a physicist. As such I have learned that there are no "sources of energy", unless you consider whatever started the big bang "The Source". From the very first trillionth of a trillionth of a trillionth of a second on energy only changed form, none was created or destroyed. Most of the energy of the universe came to rest in gravitation, matter and dark matter.
Much of what is being released in star forming processes in the galaxies we observe is gravitational energy, none of which is of much use to us.
A smaller portion is bound in hydrogen which can undergo fusion all the way to iron before nuclear physics runs out of steam (and gravitational collapse to neutron stars/black holes releases whatever energy is left in ordinary matter and spacetime).
Almost all energy transfer to systems on Earth (except for tides) come from the solar thermal radiation which is fueled to most part by hydrogen fusion (and some of it is gravitational contraction of the sun). This we can tap into more easily and on a technological scale that is useful.
Oil came ultimately from solar energy and it stores this energy in form of electronic wave functions inside organic compounds AND the oxygen molecules in Earth's atmosphere. To release the energy you combine both, move electrons from the organic compound into the energetically lower forms in CO2 and you get energy out... in form of an electromagnetic field in a fuel cell or as heat (molecular motion) in an ICE, steam turbine etc..
The process of converting solar energy into oil and back into electricity and/or mechanical energy is extremely wasteful, especially if nature does it unsupervised. It just happens that nature had a long time to be wasteful and we are burning things at tens of thousands of times the speed at which they were collected...
If, on the other hand, you take a solar cell, it will convert the energy in the electromagnetic radiation of the sun immediatelly into an electromagentic field from which it can be easily converted into practically every other form of energy.
"Neither solar nor wind nor any other interruptible renewable source of energy is a good subsitute for oil."
You seem to like mantras... here is another one that is just as helpful:
"om mani padme om...om mani padme om...om mani padme om..."
Just keep repeating it a million times and it will solve the world's energy problems as well as
"There is no good substitute for oil...There is no good substitute for oil...There is no good substitute for oil..."
Interestingly, your mindset has a very close analogy in this sentence:
"There is no good substitute for slave labor..."
Just like the developed world ran out of slave labor, it is running out of oil. And just like there turned out to be much better replacements for slave labor than most slave owners thought, there are way better replacements for oil than you think.
:-)
"I'm an economist, and I know about substitutes"
I used to teach economics students about electricity... most of them did very poorly and failed the class the first time. I can still hear their whinning and pleas to our teaching staff to let them pass. They did better the next year, though, after they discovered that one could actually pass the class quite easily by LEARNING the facts rather than trying to cheat on the test.
:-)
As a physicist, please explain how electricity is any more a "source" of energy than is hydrogen.
Thank you.
Please explain how, after reading my post, you did not understand that there are no sources of energy at all beyond whatever produced the big bang? From there it is all a giant nuclear/gravity step ladder down to thermalisation and a cold universe in radiative equilibrium.
Proof: energy conservation in ALL fundamental equations of motion and ALL experiments that test it.
Oil is not an energy source. It is simply intermediate chemical energy storage for energy from fusion processes in the sun. For all practical puproses I can get at that energy much easier and more efficiently with a solar cell, a battery and an electric motor than with photosynthesis, geological oil production, drilling, refining and burning in an ICE. It just does not seem to you like that because other people have solved all these problems for you and nature has given you A ONE-TIME GIFT. Once that gift is gone, all you will have to play with is the solar cell, battery and an electric motor... for the rest of the lifetime of the solar system, at least (excluding nucear fusion which is as much the technology of the future as it was 50 years ago). After that... things will go rather dark...
:-)
Author Thom Hartmann called our remaining fossil fuels, the "Last Hours of Ancient Sunlight."
How poetic! I love that. Fossilized sunlight...
and that reminds me of the famous German tales about the "Citizens of Schilda". In one of them the foolish citizens build a town hall without windows. After the building is completed they discover that it is pitch dark inside. They call in a town meeting and the suggestion is made that everyone bring buckets, sacks, shovels and other tools to "carry the daylight" into the building. Needless to say, the fools work all day long very hard, yet the building stays dark.
I just remembered why so many economists failed my class... they ASSUMED that I would act economically (or what their definition of "economical" was) and re-use last year's test questions. But unlike lazy TAs before me, I decided to make new questions. This was in accordance with my habit of teaching the practical exercizes of the class with completely new materials. So the people who were not able to extrapolate from the change of exercize materials that there would also be a change of exam questions simple relied on learning the answers to last year's exam. Of course they were caught by surprise and failed.
Interestingly enough, there were two students who solved ALL questions in that final exam correctly, even the teaser at the end which was so hard that none of the TAs thought anyone would have the time and nerves to give it a shot (you would have gotten an A even without it!). Yet, here we were with over half the class failed, most other people getting by and two students with perfect score... so it was not me who caused the problem. The year after, with another set of new questions which were just as hard, overall scores were much better... which proved that people can learn... if they are being incentivised peoperly. Since everyone had to pass that particular class to get a diploma, the incentives to actually learn the materials were probably quite high.
:-)
PS: hydrogen is a mediocre energy storage medium, just like oil, but for different reasons. At least it is not carcinogenic...
Are you hereby implying that hydrogen is therefore a good substitute for oil?
Very interesting.
How does the sentence "... hydrogen is a mediocre energy storage medium, like oil, just for different reasons..." imply that I would suggest is a good substitute?
Any takers among the sematics community who can make sense of that? I can't. I simply call your question the result of poor reading comprehension OR the attempt to defuse a lost discussion topic by presenting a straw man.
Anyway... once you try to get up to speed on the problem with oil, you will understand that the task is not to find a substitute, at all. The technological (and economic) solution to PO is not to replace the "waste of oil" with the "waste of X" but to eliminate the waste.
But I guess it will take some economists a few more years years to figure that one out... in the meantime the energy conservation, solar and wind energy markets will grow to hundred billion annual revenue each and "silently" and slowly take over the world (as far as energy is concerned, at least).
:-)
I do have to wonder if you know the meaning of the term "good substitute." Using your reasoning and words, it seems quite clear that hydrogen must necessarily be a good substitute for oil. One small problem: Everybody knows that it is not.
The problems of physics are relatively easy to solve. The problems of political, econaomic and social change are not tractable ones.
The essential problem of Peak Oil is that there are no good substitutes for conventional oil. I am puzzled as to why you cannot grasop this simple point, which is accepted, I believe, by the great majority of contributors and posters on this site.
Like I said... the solution is not "to find a good substitute". Your thinking is pretty one dimensional, in my opinnion.
"Using your reasoning and words, it seems quite clear that hydrogen must necessarily be a good substitute for oil."
I did not say a word about hydrogen that would indicate that it is a substitute. You brought that one up... sorry, but please cut the strawman crap out.
"The problems of physics are relatively easy to solve. The problems of political, econaomic and social change are not tractable ones."
I was not aware that social change was harder than quantum chromo-dynamics. The world has had social changes since the days of the Australopithecus (and before), yet QCD is only a few decades old without being even close to being solved. Never mind...
Not that I call the switch from an SUV to a Prius much of a social change. Do you? To me it is simply the switch from a vehicle that my penis wants to a vehicle that my vallet can afford in a post PO world. Both the penis and the vallet will be able to deal with that. If not, I suggest consulting a shrink. They can help with the penis problem.
The switch from getting your juice from the wall plug to getting some of your juice from a solar panel on your roof is also not exactly a social change, in my books. It does require a little bit of thinking as in "Gee, do I really care if the power company owns the production facilities and I pay their loan with the monthly check to them or if I own some of the production facilities and pay my loan with a monthly check to the bank?". This might sound scary to some, but in the end how different is it from "renting vs. home ownership", really?
"The essential problem of Peak Oil is that there are no good substitutes for conventional oil."
In Python my reply would be expressed as:
while(True):
print "Om mane padme om!"
"I am puzzled as to why you cannot grasop this simple point, which is accepted, I believe, by the great majority of contributors and posters on this site."
I never side with the majority of people if I know that they are wrong about reality. I have both the brains and the guts to side with reality. How much of a puzzle is that?
Perhaps if you paid attention to the postings of petroleum geologists and petroleum and chemical engineers (not to mention some economists) people might take your comments more seriously than they now do.
Do you really believe the majority of editors and contributors on this site are ignorant when it comes to Peak Oil and the undeniable fact that there are no good substitutes for conventional oil?
BTW, your ad hominem attacks detract from your already absurd (in the sense of self-contradictry) argument. Also, you should note that there is such a thing as the fallacy of invincible ignorance.
I can assure you that plenty of people take my opinnions plenty seriously. :-)
"Do you really believe the majority of editors and contributors on this site are ignorant when it comes to Peak Oil and the undeniable fact that there are no good substitutes for conventional oil?"
Like many editors here I believe that the peak was in 2006 or will, for all practical purposes happen very shortly. I can't really say that the overwhelming majority of serious editors here calls oil an irreplaceable commodity. I have seen a lot of confused people say that. The well informed ones usually don't. They simply point out that we have to find ways to use less and less of it. That, in my mind, is not the same as doom and gloom.
"Also, you should note that there is such a thing as the fallacy of invincible ignorance."
Then you would be profoundly guilty of it. You have ignored any and all of my arguments relating to the physics of energy conversion. Maybe you want to ask another physicist about it... just in case you don't remember your high school science any more.
:-)
You have made it abundantly clear that you are invincibly ignorant when it comes to economics. Oil is highly price inelastic. A resource with good or close substitutes is NEVER (by definition) price inelastic.
Q.E.D.
The technological (and economic) solution to PO is not to replace the "waste of oil" with the "waste of X" but to eliminate the waste.
Sure, very consistent with your previous statement :
And just like there turned out to be much better replacements for slave labor than most slave owners thought, there are way better replacements for oil than you think.
Shall we "replace" or "eliminate" ?
I think we should eliminate trolls, SHOW OFF YOU BOZO!
Just like the developed world ran out of slave labor, it is running out of oil. And just like there turned out to be much better replacements for slave labor than most slave owners thought, there are way better replacements for oil than you think.
Oh! Yeah?
My dear pornucopian WHAT are the "better replacements for oil" ?
Respond while also keeping with your OWN statement in the next post :
Please explain how, after reading my post, you did not understand that there are no sources of energy at all beyond whatever produced the big bang?
You will not be able to hide and cheat much longer if you are that clumsy in your arguments, you will go the way of odograph and Hothgor, a recognized nuisance.
"The best way to make use of fusion is to put a solar panel on your roof... 15% efficiency and no need to produce any toxic by-products."
This is something I always wondered about.
efficiency: How much energy goes into producing solar panels? I trust it's a good bit less than what they produce over their lifetimes. Isn't it?
toxic by-products: Are there any unpleasant waste products resulting from the production of solar cells? Since they are being touted as a "clean" source of energy, just how clean are they?
Just trying to cause trouble, and maybe I'll learn something if somebody feels provoked into answering.
Solar panels are rather easy to produce and the total amount of energy can be claimed back in three to five years for cells that retain reasonable efficiency for 30 years or more. The EROEI is therefor somewhere between 5-10, getting better all the time. It is not as good as for wind, but with a bit of progress, it will be. You have to keep in mind that we are at the very beginning of the solar age, not at its most mature point. There is plenty of optimization space in both the physics of the cells and the economy of the panel manufacturing processes.
"toxic by-products: Are there any unpleasant waste products resulting from the production of solar cells?"
Not if you do it right. Some of the vapor deposition of semiconductors requires toxic gases but it is my understanding that this is less so today than it used to be in the past. Processes are moving from ultra-high vacuum processing of ultra-clean materials towards chemical wet processing and relatively low purity requirements. You have to keep in mind that even the lower purity techiques require closely controlled processes. If you don't want anything to get into your stuff, you are usually also concerned about not letting anything get out. I don't see a practical problem. Certainly not any worse than what goes into the production of your TV sceeen... and most likely much better.
Is regulation of the industry required? YES! As with any other industry, strict regulation and environmental quality standards are required and need to be enforced. But even in case of an accident the long term effects will certainly be more easily contained than with, say, nuclear. And if you think down the electricity chain... there were enormous amounts of highly toxic PCBs in transfomers in the past
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transformer_oil
With proper regulation this has been cleaned up. With proper regulation a similar problem won't even happen with solar.
InfinitePossibilities, gasoline was a waste product from refining kerosene and lamp oil when the internal combustion engine became standard in cars. And cars didn't take off as transportation instead of rich man's toys until the 1920's.
All the arguments against electric personal transportation aren't real. How many people really need to go 200 miles between recharges?Electric cars easily get 100 mpg with current technology. And if we had decent trains between cities and rental car agencies at the train stations,and bus hook-ups, who's going to notice much difference.
Huge doomer projections are nuts, we just need an attitude adjustment and American can-do attitude.We can fix our security problem by not buying 70% of the transportation fuel from overseas, and clean the air and be more prosperous. All that transportation fuel money would stay in the US making US jobs!
No, it won't be cheap-we'll all have to get new cars and motor scooters. We need nuclear power, wind turbines, solar panels and modern electric grids. And, we need leadership in the US, not the current venial bunch of morons.
I have made no argument against electric transportation. It's great... I just got a ride in a Prius and I love the sound of the electric engine before the ICE takes over.
I agree... we do need an attitude adjustment. I am afraid it will come AFTER another round of price adjustments for oil, not before.
I also agree that it won't be cheap. But I think we can afford it. What we can't afford is more of the same.
"There are no good or close substitutes for conventional oil."
Exactly correct. Oil has the highest energy density of any fuel short of nuclear. It is easily obtained (you stick a pipe in the ground). It is easy to transport, you can carry it in a bucket. It is easy to use, simply light a match to it. No other fuel has this combination of characteristics.
Nuclear fuel requires extensive mining, processing and enhancement then it requires incredibly specialized reactors to burn. Solar is very diffuse and requires a high tech collector to convert to electricity. Coal comes close but the energy density is much lower and it needs conversion to liquid to be used in cars.
The doomers may or may not be correct. What drives them is that so much of our society is predicated on the wonderful characteristics of oil. Once it becomes scarce and we start switching to alternatives it is unknown how society will react. Hence the many discussions we have. It could be that we will cooperate with each other, adopt aggressive conservation and solar energy as well as some coal and nuclear and muddle through this. Maybe not. This is the basic problem. Society is extremely complex. We can see that it is likely that oil will become scarce (aka expensive) but it is difficult to predict accurately how that will change society.
Try to imagine that oil is at $200 a bbl and rising. What would that do to society? Could we adapt? Would some people simply give up their cars? If they did and car sales plummeted which people would lose their jobs? It is really difficult to think this through. How does the world change when there is not enough oil for everyone at any price?
neutrino23, said,
"There are no good or close substitutes for conventional oil.",
To which many of us would say, thank goodness! What’ja’ have with oil is a carbon laden goo that is geographically placed in the absolutely most unstable areas of the world politically and culturally, and concentrated in such a way as to assure misery, abuse of power and warlordism. It is garbage until it is found (not always easy), extracted (“you stick a pipe in the ground”, you say? Gee, tell that to the oil companies spending billions on water injection and gas oil seperators to push it out...), refined (which requires some of the most intricate mechanical engineering, high pressure piping, pumps, stills, catalysts and seperators ever concieved), haul it about ("It is easy to transport, you can carry it in a bucket"? Boy, you sure can build a world industry of 85 million barrels a day by transport in buckets! Look at the art that is fuel transportation sometime, maybe you will develop a bit more respect for what they do), store it and retail it....
Oil only seems simple because for a century hard working and damm smart people have given their lives work to this effort). And I love the line “It is easy to use, simply light a match to it”...!!! Have you ever known of a gallon of oil being “used” this way, except in arson? “Using” crude oil required the development of one of the most complex, intricate, constantly improving industries yet known to man....the miracle of a multi cylinder internal combustion engine able to turn thousands of RPM’s, with full control of valving, ignition, lubrication and cooling is nothing less than a work of art on which generations of mechanics, foundry specialists, tool and die makers, designers and draftspeople spent their entire career. I know people who collect only the blueprint drawings of engines, so artistic are they made, and names like Coventry Climax, Ferrari, Cosworth, Cummins, Rolls Royce, Bristol, Harley Davidson and Moto Guzzi can bring a smile to the face of a connisour just due to the engines they bring to mind.
Oil is good because a century has been spent on making it good, and not due to any inherent superiority.
Spend a century of the kind of money, mind power, effort, and combined improvement that has been spent on the oil/internal combustion complex on solar, wind, plug electric hybrid drivetrains, advanced trains, and methane production by waste recapture, and we will all be singing the praises of the “advanced renewable age”, as us fans of the great age of the internal combustion engine can wax poetic now.
In one of my earliest posts on TOD, I made this remark: “Oil is good, very good. But it is not that damm good.”
We have got to kick the “oil worship” before we can ever kick the oil habit. Respect the hard efforts of the people in industry, science and technical craft that made a sticky, filthy goo into the fuel it has become. But get off the oil worship....so we can preserve what is a very, very special natural molecule (and it certainly is that, priceless and irreplacable in certain applications) for something much more valuable than burning and blowing out the smokestack.
"Try to imagine that oil is at $200 a bbl and rising. What would that do to society? Could we adapt?"
We would sure have to try, wouldn't we? The problem with oil at $200 a bbl a gallon and rising is that at that point, it would be practically worthless, because it would be more expensive than many already well known alternatives.
"How does the world change when there is not enough oil for everyone at any price?"
I don't know if you have noticed, but that is true now. I know it is hard for Americans to believe, but the majority of the people in the world do not drive to work, or use oil in any real quantity, if at all. There is not enough oil for that now, and never was.
Roger Conner known to you as ThatsItImout
This sounds a lot like something I began writing some months back:
This is something I have to get back to.
Not so. Most of the alternatives are in relatively short supply themselves (looked at the per-acre productivity of most biodiesel feedstocks?) and would be priced up right along with the petroleum. Further, any substitute which fits in the existing liquid-fuel model would be subject to the same high losses and require just as much or more raw energy input. The real "substitutes" are going to be things like electricity, which bypass liquid fuels and combustion engines completely.
Sorry IP you are quite wrong here. Let me explain. Diamonds in no way give the ability to generate energy. Supply and demand laws apply differently to all types of goods and services. You say that 80% of oil is burnt for pleasure but that is a sleight of hand. Oil is the backbone of the economy. Other commodities are not. No matter what comparisons you make or examples you give you cannot show me another commodity that is directly tied to the growth and the backbone of the world economy. The consumption of oil is tied to the growth of all other goods and commodities. You frequently state that we can just lower our consumption or switch to other technologies but if that is so easy why didn't we do it to begin with. Why 5000 years ago did we not use solar or wind?? The answer is we did not know how to exploit the hydrocarbon molecule and as that starts diminishing so will our ability to use other sources of energy storage.
"Let me explain. Diamonds in no way give the ability to generate energy."
That would be a strawman. I never said that.
"Supply and demand laws apply differently to all types of goods and services."
Just because they produce different results does not mean they act differently.
"You say that 80% of oil is burnt for pleasure but that is a sleight of hand."
How so? Let's take transportation. I can get to work in an SUV with 18mpg or in a Prius or Yaris with close to 50mpg. I can get to work all by myself or by sharing a ride. In all these cases I am getting to work. Just that in the worst case the mile driven will cost me five times as much as in the best case. As long as the difference is $1 per day vs. $5 per day, nobody in the US will care. Once it is $$5 a day vs. $25 a day, it will get many people's attention.
Let's take heating: I can waste energy in a poorly insulated home or I can save energy in a well insulated home. I can even build a close to zero-energy home that gives me warmth and warm water and electricity without using any oil at all once it is built. The difference in energy required to build both homes is far less than your annual heating bill is right now.
Let's take farming: I can produce nitrates using NG or I can use electricity generated from renewables... again, no oil needed, whatsoever.
I do not have to cheat saying that we can get by with much less oil or even no oil at all. People got by with much less energy for most of history. Oil bought us some cheap luxuries, that's all. Some of these luxuries will be getting somewhat more expensive. A nation which spends $450 billion on holiday shopping and some $150 billion per year on a war can afford that. $600 billion is $2000 per capita. You can buy a lot of solar cells for that much money...
"No matter what comparisons you make or examples you give you cannot show me another commodity that is directly tied to the growth and the backbone of the world economy."
Neither did you or anyone else prove that oil is the backbone of the economy. If I listen to serious economists, they constantly talk about cost of labor being the real problem. If you look at the major cost drivers in industrial societies, it is health and the aging of the working class. Energy, at best, is a far, far third or fourth or fifth factor.
"The consumption of oil is tied to the growth of all other goods and commodities."
Proof, please.
"You frequently state that we can just lower our consumption or switch to other technologies but if that is so easy why didn't we do it to begin with."
Because people are lazy-minded and advertising a cheapo built SUV is far more attractive to car manufacturers than advertising a well built economy car.
"Why 5000 years ago did we not use solar or wind?"
Huh????
http://southface.org/solar/solar-roadmap/solar_how-to/history-of-solar.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sailing_ship
"The answer is we did not know how to exploit the hydrocarbon molecule and as that starts diminishing so will our ability to use other sources of energy storage."
How exactly will the relative scarcity (not total absence) of oil prevent you from building a south facing home or from generating warm water with a solar collector and electricity with solar cells or thermal solar power plants? We can put up 5MW wind turbines by the hundreds without even a sweat. Those things have an EROEI far beyond 10, i.e. they can replicate themselves roughly every other year. If you re-invest the energy from renewables in renewables, exponential growth would get you a factor of thousand within a generation. The remaining oil, as far as I can tell will last far longer than that. You got to stop wasting ever more, at some point, of course...
"That would be a strawman. I never said that."
No it would not be a strawman as you are comparing diamonds and oil and how the laws of supply and demand apply to both the same. My point is that energy is unique because it is NOT a commodity in the sense that a diamond is.
"How so? Let's take transportation. I can get to work in an SUV with 18mpg or in a Prius or Yaris with close to 50mpg. I can get to work all by myself or by sharing a ride. In all these cases I am getting to work. Just that in the worst case the mile driven will cost me five times as much as in the best case. As long as the difference is $1 per day vs. $5 per day, nobody in the US will care. Once it is $$5 a day vs. $25 a day, it will get many people's attention."
So what, 15% of the population of the US buys a Yaris and some carpool. You aren't taking into effect population growth, infrastructure problems causing traffic delays, etc.
"Oil bought us some cheap luxuries, that's all."
Right.
"Neither did you or anyone else prove that oil is the backbone of the economy. If I listen to serious economists, they constantly talk about cost of labor being the real problem. If you look at the major cost drivers in industrial societies, it is health and the aging of the working class. Energy, at best, is a far, far third or fourth or fifth factor."
Ok then how about cheap energy or in other words conventinal oil. Cheap energy has fueled the growth of everything. Living systems do not grow without energy. I am sure you have seen the graphs on TOD and other sources showing population growth over time. Since the discovery of oil (or cheap easy to exploit energy) growth increased exponentially more than the years prior. I am not talking about cost drives I am talking about things that have to exist for growth. Discovery of oil is the reason we are were we are today. Show me a living system that is not entirely dependend on energy.
"Proof, please"
Wow. Ok. Here is a short summary from this link but check it out.
http://www.worldenergy.org/wec-geis/publications/default/tech_papers/17t...
"The close relationship between energy consumption and economic growth as measured by growth of GDP has been demonstrated by many researchers in the past (Eden, Darmstadler etc). This paper goes a step further and argues that the cost and availability of energy is a major factor promoting economic growth. Consequently, the classical production function should include an energy term in addition to land, capital, labour and technical progress.
In pre-1750 Europe, in countries where land was relatively constant, growth of GDP has been estimated to be about 0.5% per annum - very similar to the growth in population. From 1760 to 1820 as Britain started to use coal to fuel its early industrial age, GDP growth rose to 1.5% with a population growth of 1% (population growth in the rest of Europe remained about 0.5%). Then from 1820 to 1913 as the industrialised world adopted the steam engine fueled by coal, GDP growth rose to 2.5%, population growth (excluding the USA) was 0.5 to 1.0%, capital growth (where recorded) 1.2 - 2.6%. This illustrates the effect of fossil fuel utilisation.
In the period from 1950 to 1973 when the world turned to extremely cheap petroleum, GDP growth rates doubled to around 5% (nearly 10% in Japan). Then after petroleum prices rose dramatically between 1973 and 1979 and the world returned to coal and nuclear fuels in addition to petroleum, GDP growth rates dropped back to 2 to 2.5% per annum.
If, as this paper postulates, low energy prices stimulate economic growth and if economic growth rates greater than population growth are desired, nations should adopt a policy of promoting the supply of energy sources at the lowest possible prices."
Look I agree with you that conservation is the key. Society did that for thousands of years but now there are too many people to support. Conservation and increases in efficiecy will help but there is a limit and that limit is carrying capacity. Everything has to be kept in a balance and I don't feel our energy use and needs are in balance with what can be provided in the past going forward.
There is indeed some kind of "side benefit" in arguing with trolls in that it allows for more exhibits of relevant infos, but as far as the "argument proper" goes it's a waste.
They will always come up with absurdities which can be disconcerting to casual readers.
Though the very style of those absurdities is quite recognisable, there seems to be a trolls training program of some sort.
Hello there,
Here's a "Top 10" list of Sustainability happenings from the past year, "from the perspective of sustainability in state and local government, presented in order of importance"
http://karlenzig.typepad.com/karlenzig/2006/12/top_ten_sustain.html
This is more for government officials but we're all citizens so it seems relevant.
I've enjoyed reading TOD since about this time last year. Keep up the good work!
Cheers.
Ken
RR says:
When ExxonMobil tells you that there is plenty of oil, they are not just throwing out a smokescreen. This is what they honestly believe. The vast majority of oil companies, in my opinion, believe that we have adequate supplies of oil for quite some time.
I am puzzled that the oil companies that should know best about oil reserves differ so markedly from the best contributors to TOD. Any ideas?