Crisis, what energy crisis?
Posted by Euan Mearns on July 3, 2007 - 10:19am in The Oil Drum: Europe
Topic: Supply/Production
Tags: energy, fossil fuels, fossil solar, fossil supernova, fusion, natural gas, nuclear energy, oil, peak oil, solar energy, wave power, wind power [list all tags]
The energy gap left by declining fossil Solar fuels may be filled by alternative sources of energy. In short, the Earth has ample supplies of energy to sustain human population and economic growth. Discuss....
This post is intended to provide a structured background to energy matters for new readers and hopefully to provide a provocative debate with seasoned Oil Drum veterans. A listing of over 50 links to Oil Drum articles from the past year is provided which combined provide a comprehensive overview of the issues surrounding peak oil and energy decline. If you are new to the site or have been lurking and want to ask a question then all you have to do is sign up and post your query. The Oil Drum is here to educate--and we are here to help.
Will Nuclear Fusion Fill the Gap Left by Peak Oil? Guest post by Nick Rouse posted by Chris Vernon.
Report: Brazilian Ethanol is Sustainable Posted by Robert Rapier.
Corn-Based Ethanol: Is This a Solution? Posted by Gail the Actuary.
Cellulosic Ethanol vs. Biomass Gasification Posted by Robert Rapier.
Has the Algae Cavalry Arrived? Guest post by Fireangel, posted by Heading Out.
How the Energy Crisis Will Help My Diet Guest post by seismobob, posted by Prof Goose.
Why wind power works in Denmark Guest post by Cry Wolf, posted by SuperG.
The First Ever Off-Shore Wind Farm Financed by Banks... Guest post by Jerome a Paris, posted by Prof. K. Goose.
Energy from Wind: A Discussion of the EROI Research Guest post by Cutler Cleveland, posted by Nate Hagens.
Pelamis: a Shot in the Dark? Guest post by Luis de Sousa, posted by Prof Goose.
Outsourcing Solar Roofs Posted by Glenn
Concentrating Solar Power Guest post by Gerry Wolff posted by Chris Vernon.
Peak Oil Overview - June 2007 Posted by Gail the Actuary.
Oilwatch Monthly - May 2007 Posted by Rembrandt.
Peak Oil Update - February 2007: Production Forecasts and EIA Oil Production Numbers Posted by Khebab.
Is There A Painless Way To Fill The Oil Supply Gap? Guest post by Michael Smith, posted by Euan Mearns.
World Oil Exports: A Comprehensive Projection Guest post by Luis de Sousa, posted by Prof Goose.
Natural gas: how big is the problem? Posted by Luis de Sousa.
What Does an Undulating Plateau Really Mean? Posted by Glenn
Simple mathematics - The Saudi reserves, GOSPs and water injection Posted by Heading Out.
The Status of North Ghawar Posted by Stuart Staniford.
Depletion Levels in Ghawar Posted by Stuart Staniford.
GHAWAR: an estimate of remaining oil reserves and production decline (Part 2 - results) Posted by Euan Mearns.
Ghawar reserves update and revisions (1) Posted by Euan Mearns.
An Update on Mexico's Oil Production--The Rapid Collapse of Cantarell by the Numbers Posted by Khebab.
Flesh on the bones of Mexican oil production Posted by Euan Mearns.
A primer on Caspian Oil Posted by Jerome a Paris.
Canadian Oil Sands Production Update Posted by Khebab.
Oh, Canada! -- Natural Gas and the Future of Tar Sands Production Posted by Dave Cohen.
Getting a Grasp on Oil Production Volumes Posted by Khebab.
The Loglet Analysis Posted by Khebab.
The Shock Model: A Review (Part I) Posted by Khebab.
Does the Hubbert Linearization Ever Work? Posted by Robert Rapier.
Norway and the Parabolic Fractal Law Posted by Khebab.
Peak Coal - Coming Soon? Guest post by Shaun Chamberlin Posted by Chris Vernon.
Implications of "Peak Oil" for Atmospheric CO2 and Climate Posted by Chris Vernon.
Dr James Hansen: Can We Still Avoid Dangerous Human-Made Climate Change? Posted by Chris Vernon.
Greenland, or why you might care about ice physics Posted by Stuart Staniford.
And a series of 26 technical posts by Heading Out.
The electric wheel - a breakthrough in car efficiency Posted by Rembrandt.
Why we Drive Posted by Stuart Staniford.
The Auto Efficiency Wedge Posted by Stuart Staniford.
Aviation and Oil Depletion Guest post by Christopher Smith, posted by Euan Mearns.
Is Nuclear Power a Viable Option for Our Energy Needs? Guest post by Martin Sevior posted by Prof Goose.
Uranium Depletion and Nuclear Power: Are We at Peak Uranium? Guest post by Miquel Torres posted by Prof Goose.
How Uranium Depletion Affects the Economics of Nuclear Power Guest post by Miquel Torres posted by Prof Goose.
A review of the underlying fundamentals of nuclear energy Posted by Jerome a Paris.
Nuclear Power for the Oilsands Guest post by Brian Wang, posted by Stoneleigh.
There are no Oil Drum posts on extracting uranium from seawater as far as I know. However, I feel this is an important topic, so here's a couple of links giving contrasting views:
Annex 8. Evaluation of Cost of Seawater Uranium Recovery and Technical Problems toward Implementation Hat tip Khebab.
Nuclear Power: the energy balance, Storm and Smith (large pdf) Hat tip Nate Hagens.
And finally a few miscellaneous posts on vital energy matters:
Ecological Footprint, Energy Consumption, and the Looming Collapse Guest post by Francois Cellier, posted by Khebab.
Ten Fundamental Principles of Net Energy Guest post by Cutler Cleveland, posted by Nate Hagens.
A Net Energy Parable: Why is ERoEI Important? Posted by Nate Hagens.
Living for the Moment while Devaluing the Future Posted by Nate Hagens.
Burning Buried Sunshine Posted by Dave Cohen.
Sustainability, Energy Independence and Agricultural Policy Posted by Engineer Poet.
That cubic mile Posted by Engineer Poet.
More on the Units of Energy Posted by Heading Out.
Entropy and Empire Posted by Stoneleigh.
Peak Oil, Carrying Capacity and Overshoot: Population, the Elephant in the Room Guest post by GliderGuider, posted by Stoneleigh.
DrumBeat posted daily by Leanan provides a menu of peak oil news and links that is second to none combined with an open discussion thread - that is often not recommended for the faint hearted.
My current position on the looming energy gap is this. The OECD faces unprecedented peril from energy decline (oil first, then gas, coal and uranium) and energy insecurity - increasing amounts of oil and natural gas are being imported into the OECD. However, there is ample fossil energy contained in and solar energy arriving at Earth to sustain current population and economic growth. The challenge lies in real energy conservation measures, rebuilding our energy gathering and distribution infrastructure, redesigning our transportation networks and stabilising global population below 7 billion. A momentous task, but can this be done?
Or is industrial civilisation doomed to decay in a maelstrom of civil unrest, resource wars, famine, terrorism and pestilence?
You can always count on Americans to do the right thing - after they've tried everything else. Winston Churchill
I joined The Oil Drum one year ago in June 2006. I was aked to join as a contributor to TOD UK in September 2006 which has since evolved into TOD Europe. This year has been an amazing voyage of discovery.
Dear EM
Thanks for this great summary of the TOD debate. The gathering of world class general- and sometimes incredible detailed information collected here is simply stunning.
I agree with your comments- conservation and restructuring of energy use, supply, infrastructure, economy, taxation etc on a masive scale must be initiated soon. We all are in for interesting times. Activity tend to create jobs and wealth, so if managed well, the changes could be beneficial for many, maybe all. Doom and gloom not unavoidable.
Regarding conservation. The EU has invented a word for this-NegaJoules - energy not used. See effect on slide 12 in this EU paper. http://ec.europa.eu/energy/efficiency/doc/2005_slide_presentation_en.pdf
Without the marginal improvments in conservation +energy efficiency since 1971 the EU would use almost 50% more energy today.
Kind regards/And1
WOW!!!!
Great Post. I have it bookmarked and will refer to it often.
Love it.
However :(
The world is not headed for a peaceful future of powerdown.
This is a geek fantasy.
Name ONE civilization of any importance (and large) that has powered down successfully.
If we were to realize our fate as a global society and take measures to powerdown together we might have chance to bring in a new world.
But anyone can see that this is not happening. ALL nations seem to be preparing for war, we are just waiting for the go signal....
I remember on this site a reference to a study that said that we need 20yrs to prepare for Peak Oil, in order to transition peacefully away from Fossil Fuels.
We have squandered that time.
It seems we now have no option but to fight to the death for the remaining Fossil Fuel reserves in order to try and sustain our country's lifestyles (what ever country you choose to live in).
It is OVER. No amount of technofixes will save us now. It is too late. We need to realize this in order to have a chance to move forward. Forward to an ugly future. A future of countinual WAR. War for oil. War for Water. War for all of Earth's resources.
This will be the last great war. After this there will not be enough resources left to support a world-wide war on this scale. The USA is very aware of this and is trying to prepare. China and Russia are preparing as well. Seen through this lense the events of the last 6yrs make perfect sense.
Soon the world players will make their move and we will see what happens after the dust settles.
One thing is for certain: The world will not PEACEFULLY powerdown for the next 25yrs as some ivory tower fuckheads suggest. WAR is in mankind's blood and WAR it shall be.
Korg, before you meet your doom though, you can say you listened to this.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=En0A8KGMgq8
stay until the very end for the last comment by Simon for kicks.
amazing.
Even if you are correct the journey and the knowledge is still useful.
Quid Clarius Astris
Ubi Bene ibi patria
PrisonerX
I was expecting some sarcastic but realistic comment but Simon Cowell was 100% pleasant. Did I miss something?
A six year old girl was "pitch perfect", thru the whole performance.
That is an amazing comment.
Quid Clarius Astris
Ubi Bene ibi patria
I want my 4 minutes and 57 seconds back.
Don't become a Buddhist. The world doesn't need more Buddhists. Do practice compassion. The world does need more compassion. -- Dalai Lama
Korg - you definitely need to listen to Connie singing "Somewhere over the Rainbow"
I guess I do too, because I'm with Korg. We're on the Highway to Hell. The most perverse aspect of this is that the Highway will be paved with gold for those with the right connections.
I do thank you for your efforts, Euan. I will bookmark this.
I agree there...
I think the most ironic aspect of this will be if the USA and co-conspirators decide to stay on that highway whilst turning down opportunities to change direction.
My fear is that the USA is toast. Your fear has to be that we don't take you with us.
Hahahahahah....
But Connie has provided my nation with hope and inspiration for a better future.
Perhaps the humble phone salesman in his brown suit, well worn, ill fitting, would do for them.
That guy blew me away. I like the first show the best. The finals were great, but the little banter and that that that that came from that figure.
amazing.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9oxTy7KIAaA
Never judge a book by its cover, and people can do surprising things.
Quid Clarius Astris
Ubi Bene ibi patria
But in the July 2 Drumbeat:
Japan: Oil imports decline for 13th month
Crude oil imports fell 11 percent in May from a year earlier, declining for a 13th month.
Crude oil imports fell to 17.5 million kiloliters last month, the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry said in a report Friday.
How have they done this without everyone hearing the noise of their economy collapsing? (No it's not a rhetorical question - I'd be grateful for any comment on what has happened there). I'm not cynical enough about governments - at least in Europe - to believe they will let our economies collapse due to peak oil, if avoiding measures can be taken. In my view, the problem is partly one of conditioning the public to accept the changes that will be necessary and this will take time together with some "shocks" that will alert people to the need for change.
It may be that some actions being taken by governments in the guise of climate change prevention, have a hidden peak oil agenda. However, there are still too many signals and trends going in the wrong direction - road building, plans for airport expansion, weak investment in public transport. The most optimistic scenario is that the current steady increase in peak oil awareness in the MSM will continue and main political parties will soon get the message that they must address the issue properly.
Edit: Korg wrote "... fight to the death", "... a future of continual war". I can see why Euan wrote "not recommended for the faint hearted"!
Re: Japan, there was amention later in the Jily 2 Drumbeat: "Japan's population is aging. Old people don't drive much if at all. Japan's population is shrinking. Less people, less cars. People are moving from the rural areas to the city area. You need a car in the boonies but in the city its a huge pain."
So there you have it: electrify transport (politically OK, but you need the investment); move people into cities ("End of Suburbia" - not popular idea in USA, not much more so in UK, better in rest of Europe); end "car culture" (big problems - powerful lobbies, people's freedom, aspirations, etc.).
The other issue was "fuel switching", in that the Japanese are changing over to an "all electric" housing situation, thus reducing consumption of kerosene and oil used for heating. The problem is that coal consumption and strain on the nuclear power plants of the electric grid are becoming a real problem.
The nation that is the home of the city of Kyoto may run into real issues with the Kyoto treay obligations. So oil consumption declines, but leaves yet another liability.
RC
Remember we are only one cubic mile from freedom
Not quite. There is that stupid switch campain
http://www.tepco-switch.com/
but its a relativly new thing and hasn't had much of an impact.
In my experience fuel switching is almost non existant in Japan so far.
The biggest impact the all electric house will have is on gas (ng and lpg) consumption. Not oil.
The grid in Japan is incredibly robust. Blackouts are almost unheard of.
I have been out of the market for a while but the Japanese import crude (sweet) to burn in their thermal power plants. The reason for the sweet is because the emissions are less...
I am sure that is going p off a lot of people...what a waste...The time of peak imports is when the nukes are not running full...a couple of years ago they had some terrible problems with nuke maintainence which prompted a large proportion of their nuke genration down.
Now i have been out of the market for a bit so the market maybe changing (hence the reduction in crude imports) as they switch to to alternatives, however I dont think because crude imports are down is a sign necessarily of lower demand...it needs more research it maybe a fuel switch.
That fits nicely with my anecdotal experience as well. There has been no major change in Japanese consumer habits (that I have seen) that would lead to lower consumption. And as someone in another thread pointed out, demographics would change much to slowly to show such a large month to month decline.
Japan does use a surprisingly large amount of oil to generate electricity. The nuke explanation is the best one I've heard so far.
The bit with the oil peak is real stealth. Governments are keeping it hidden even as they use global warming as the excuse to pull off the policies to try to deal with the peak. A government will want to keep the oil peak hidden so as not to panic the financial markets. But nonetheless, the oil peak is needed to understand why the world operates as it does.
Without knowing about the oil peak, the world makes no sense. But once you know about it, suddenly, the world makes, well, all the sense in the world. The prime example is the Iraq war. The war makes no sense until you find out about the global oil peak. "It's the oil, stupid!" That paraphrase sums up the bit with the war.
The original Iraq war of 1992 was also about oil. Saddam got greedy and we had to push him out of that oil patch called Kuwaut. We could not let Saddam Hussein corner the market. Once Saddam sent in the troops into Kuwait, we had to act. We had no other choice. And now, with the repeat Iraq war, we had to act. After all, Iraq represents the last largely untapped oil reserve of a significant size. Of course, we want to plateau the peak. The only way to do that is to tap the reserve in Iraq.
But beware. The repeat Iraq war is not working out. But it could end up being a good thing. Plateauing the peak might help a politician, but it also means a steeper decline. You don't want a steep decline. A 3%/year decline is going to be maddening enough. A 10%/year decline would be absolutely disasterous.
Petrol prices high enough yet? Just wait!
*IF* iraq has that much oil
and thats a pretty big iff.
Iraq certainly could be the worlds #1 producer in 5-6 years.
I find that incredulous. Even if Iraq had the potential (debatable) the time frame you stipulate seems incredible.
Boris
London
I pretty much agree with this and don't see a future with everyone living once again on family farms and communes that don't currently exist.
The real question I'm posing here:- "is powerdown essential?" Are there sufficient alternative energy supplies (nuclear, wind and direct solar) to enable industrial civilisation to adapt to a new, sustainable energy future? If the answer is no then we are well and truly stuffed. If the answer is yes then does our industrial society have the will and wherewithall to grasp the opportunity?
Or is it easier to overcome the problem by force? And the elephant in the room is population.
Our only hope
Is to get the Pope
TO HAND OUT CONDOMS
Get Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict v.16 to hand out condoms? He will not do it for an incredibly simple reason: More followers means more power. Any preacher will preach "be fruitful and multiply" because it means more people to brainwash with crap. All the successful religions preach overpopulation.
This is a major reason I hate organised religion. I have come to the conclusion that religion if organised is a force of evil that must be removed. Islam only serves as the present example. Religion is enough to get someone to want to drive an airliner into a building. If there is ANY damn lesson to be learned with the 9/11 disaster, it is that. Organised religion is evil. Pure and simple.
Islam might be the example now, but Christianity is not innocent. After all, the crusades were done up. The only reason more abortion clinics were not blown up is that Americans are on average too stupid to develop a car bomb. We Americans have our own homebrew Al Queda-like group, the "Army of God". The whackos are Christians not Moslems. But they serve as a danger to any abortion doctor. Doctors have been whacked by anti-abortion whack jobs, as well as clinics being torched. So far, they have not yet resorted to the "poor man's air force" of the car bomb.
For peace, the world must give up religion. Religion must be phased out, but it cannot be done by force. We find that out with the former Soviet Union. When the empire collapsed, religion re-started. Sweden is an example of non-force phasing out of religion. We Americans need to get off religion, before we blow ourselves up with the stash of nukes.
Petrol prices high enough yet? Just wait!
Religion is not the problem, human nature is the problem. The new levels of persecution seen in State enforced Marxism amply demonstrate that.
Based on that observation, I think you will find that the backlash from Peak Oil in secular countries such as in Western Europe will be no better than religiously oriented countries. In fact, it could be worse if the individualism so beloved of secular humanism is allowed free course in a crisis.
You're implying that individualism is the opposite of religiosity. It is not; the opposite of religiosity is skepticism.
One look at all the unworkable "solutions" proposed for peak oil, AGW etc. proves that skepticism is a sine qua non.
I was implying that? There are a lot of opposites to religion, not just one thing as you state and individualism, now you mention it, is one.
As for the "sine qua non" of skepticism during a Peak Oil crisis, unfortunately skepticism will cut both ways depending on the prejudices and agendas of the mind exercising it. We already have people applying their form of skepticism to say that Peak Oil is just an engineered scam to send more money flowing to "corporate fascists".
In the secular worldview everything is relative, including skepticism. Excuse my skepticism on skepticism!
Skepticism is demanding that all claims be supported.
Skepticism != nay-saying. Skepticism is most certainly not anti-capitalist dogma. You should know better than to post nonsense like that.
As a skeptic, I'm going to demand that you either support that claim (starting from the implied claim that there is a unified "secular worldview"), retract it, or take the intellectual drubbing you deserve.
You may demand but most people go through life carrying assumptions or an "on balance" approach. Yours is an idealistic approach. Life is too short for idealism as Peak Oil will demonstrate. The post peak oil world will be more the world of the pragmatist than the idealist.
As a free-market capitalist I am not sure where I said skepticism was anti-capitalist "nonsense". If you meant the brand of skeptics who deny peak Oil and say it is a corporate conspiracy, that remains true - whether they are right or wrong. I was merely pointing out that this brand of skeptic exists. You misread me I am afraid.
As a skeptic, you may demand but since you have already hastily misinterpreted me (see above) I am unsure you're not just in this to grab some debating points with no intention of being swayed in your opinions.
In other words, they are using intellectual shortcuts instead of working through all implications and getting facts where they lack them. This means they'll believe many things which are wrong.
"It ain't what you don't know that hurts you; it's what you know that ain't so."
You are a prime example of this:
You "know" this, but you can't support it and won't defend it. If someone calls you on it, you tuck your mental tail between your legs and run away, trying to change the subject.
That's dogma, which is closely allied to religiosity.
Har. One of the things I find annoying about major secular humanist publications is that they are heavily socialist, not individualist. Of course, this doesn't matter to you when you're picking bogeymen.
The USA isn't going to make progress on the energy problem until frank honesty pushes the dogma from center stage and produces a set of responses based on the facts. All the dogmatic beliefs that "ethanol from corn will save us" or "when we throw out the enviros and drilling is allowed in ANWR/off Florida/off California we'll have cheap gas" or "I'll just drive my Excursion until I can buy a hydrogen car" are small variations of the same sort of mental errors you exhibit (and cravenly refuse to address squarely).
Heaven forbid you should change your mind, especially in response to ugly things like facts.
Consider:
(1) Self-imposed population stabilization or even slowing of growth so as to reach an asymptotic limit.
(2) Democracy - rule not according to what's true, but by brute force of the most people voting for the prettiest face on the emptiest head, or the zingiest nonsensical sound bite.
(3) Tribalism and nationalism - nowadays driven by political correctness and ethnic special privileges, ever more firmly enshrined in law. If we can grow to outnumber you, or, failing that, at least grow enough to become able to deafen you with our whining and sniveling, then democracy authorizes us to loot you rather than earn our own living.
So pick any two from the list. You cannot ever have all three unless population magically stabilizes on its own. And if we're in for a rough patch, the often-mooted universal demographic transition based on everybody becoming rich simply will not occur for the foreseeable future. Nor will exhortation have more than a transitory effect, as the subsequent generation will simply consist of those who are not amenable to exhortation.
In reality, the unshakable modern simultaneous insistence upon (2) and (3) renders any serious discussion of population taboo, as we have seen from the periodic fireworks in the Drumbeat thread. No go.
Fortunately, world population appears to be doing exactly that.
If you look at the UN figures on world population, you'll find its growth rate grew until about 1970, but has been falling ever since. Moreover, it's projected to continue falling for decades to come, reaching a growth rate of only 0.36% in 2050, and should become negative before the end of the century.
And if we're in for a patch rough enough that it stops global GDP growth - which even the oil shocks of the 70s could not accomplish - then poor, rapidly-growing countries may become unable to support that rapid population growth. Recent history suggests that will lead to localized starvation (Ethiopia), genocide (Rwanda), voluntary population control (parts of India), and involuntary population control (China).
All of which global civilization has successfully weathered in the past.
I doubt the UN looks into peak oil/NG
if natgas falls down in production, farm production will also drop like a rock!
I assume you are referring to ammonia production requiring natural gas. It doesn't, the Haber-Bosch process originally used coal to produce the hydrogen needed in ammonia production.
C + H2O --> H2 + CO
Any electrolysis of water can make H2 to fix on N2 to make Ammonia. This needs, of course, electricity and water, but can be done in the middle of nowhere without access to the grid - not real cheap, but flexible!
I love ammonia, I really do!!
Huh?
I thought a major reason to discuss these matters was to see if there might be a way to transition out of fossil fuels and out of infinite population growth in a somewhat humane manner. If genocide and mass starvation are satisfactory outcomes, the whole discussion, not only this one but the one on Peak Oil itself, becomes unintelligible, or at least superfluous.
As to the UN figures, they are only educated guesses, not gospel, and I insist that they are predicated on robust economic growth. The "6" in "0.36%" is pure noise, and the "3" is probably pure noise as well. In addition, voluntarism is guaranteed to be transitory, as the volunteers will be represented less and less in each future generation. There are still many large families even in rich countries, and they will "win" out.
Oh, and the Chinese involuntary approach is falling apart.
Oh, and the 1970s were only two transitory blips, with long gas lines for only a few months and really bad only in limited areas.
So, I say, Houston, we really do have a problem.
Genocide and mass starvation have happened throughout human history though - nothing is likely to change that until the entire world is living in prosperous economic conditions (which didn't stop Hitler either, but hopefully our memories aren't so short to allow such a thing to happen again).
Transitioning away from fossil fuels may well happen in a "somewhat humane manner" - if we restrict our focus to developed countries. For developing countries, especially those like China and India that are only just now getting the taste of fossil-fuel power, it's really hard to see how things could be smooth sailing. For truly impoverished countries where fossil fuels are not an integral part of economic conditions, things will probably get worse as developed nations increasing find themselves worrying about their own problems, and aid/tourism/medical assistance/export dollars dry up. I don't hold much hope for sub-Saharan Africa at all, sadly.
The best I think we can realistically hope for is a) prevention of out-and-out large-scale warfare and/or collapse of democracy and b) moderately quick recovery time - perhaps within as little as a decade. Given a major problem with making progress today is the entrenched attitudes of consumers and corporations with vested interests, a decade-long recession should largely rid us of those attitudes.
The biggest unknown is how will various nations deal with huge changes in the global balance of power. If the U.S. does as badly as many here expect it to, and Saudi Arabia becomes an enormously powerful country, global politics will be vastly different.
And the first part of that is seeing if there's a way to transition out at all.
Which, despite the insistence of a few die-hard doomsayers, there is.
False dilemma fallacy.
You're holding peak oil mitigation to an unreasonably high standard. The world already has genocide and mass starvation at times, so expecting a post-peak world to not have those is expecting a substantial improvement. If their prevalence is approximately the same post-peak, I would think that would be a reasonable outcome vis-a-vis peak oil.
Of course; however, they're almost certainly rather more well-founded than most of the population numbers people here throw around.
Meaning population growth is tapering off even without harsh resource constraints, making it basically an upper bound. So the pressures associated with population growth should be assumed to be declining towards zero, rather than increasing towards infinity, as they might with a "constant growth rate" model.
Only if you assume that the reason for not volunteering is genetic and inheritable, rather than cultural and changeable.
Care to back up that assertion with evidence?
Care to back up any of your assertions with evidence?
Oil production fell four years in a row - from 1979 through 1983 - by an average of 3.5% per year, and by almost 5% in the first 3 years.
That that caused only a "transitory blip" is perhaps evidence that declining oil production will not cause the massive disruption you seek, rather than evidence that a sudden 13% decline in oil production was minor.
Yeah, we do - nihilists with a doomsday fetish keep throwing up nonsensical statements without providing a shred of evidence to back them up.
Pitt, do you have UN figures for individual years, going from 2000 to the present? from what I've been able to find out elsewhere, population growth remained only static (in percentage terms) from the UN's 2000 figure, and the latest estimate I've seen shows a slight uptick this year. So I see no evidence for falling growth, at present, even though it clearly fell in the past.
True, but then there was capacity to increase production, which did happen. What evidence is there that oil production will increase in the future?
That doesn't seem to be true recently. I've been following the estimates for the last few years. In 2000, the UN estimated growth at 1.14%. The CIA World Fact Book had the estimate at 1.14% in 2005 and 2006. So it looks as though the growth rate had remained stuck for the first half of this decade. However, the latest estimate is 1.167%. One year doesn't give a trend but I don't think you can rely on those UN estimates of falling growth.
Care to provide a link? Because the one source I can find that does have year-by-year estimates - US Census - disagrees with you, and has year-on-year population growth rate (as % of current) staying the same or decreasing every year for the last two decades.
I gave a link (it's surely not hard to find the CIA World Fact Book on the web). However, you seem to now be placing more faith in the US Census figures than the UN figures. I found a UN estimate for 2000 population growth at 1.14, below the figure given in your linked table. I don't have a link to that at present (I found it about a year ago). That 1.14 figure was identical to the world fact book figure that I saw in 2005 and in 2006. The latest estimate from the fact book has it at 1.167%.
The real question I'm posing here:- "is powerdown essential?"
Powerdown will happen because the collection apparatus for photons when you have to PAY for the externalities of collection. Memory of not having to pay for that act as a block. The present society has alot of energy spent supporting what could be called 'not useful' activity.
The "However, I don't see peak oil as an immediate catastrophe for two reasons. " position seems to ignore how people who remember keeping their homes at 80 degrees in the winter and barely had a balanced budget react when another stressor like a sick child hits. Echos of interviews where people say "I'm gonna do what I have to do" during Katrina, combined with trains being stopped over the theft of 200 feet of wire and 'slogans' like "nuke their ass, take their gas" make me ask
How does this all end well?The memory of how things where and the promises that 'if you just do this and you can get back there' is powerful mojo.
"[I] don't see a future with everyone living once again on family farms and communes.."
Who says 'Everybody' will have to be doing the same thing to solve this problem? That is one of those hyperbolic stereotypes of those who say there are things we CAN do, that there are ways to improve our chances. It's one of the big marketing challenges for solar electric, and even for efficiency measures, which is that it has 'Hippy' written all over it, as much as this is a silly anachronism at this point. Just the same, the image sticks, as shown by your commune comment.
'A problem that was created with intelligence won't be solved with ignorance.' Einstein
The answer is no. We must consider that the harnessing of renewables (I'm discounting nuclear, since it is not renewable) requires non-renewable resources. And that leads to the more general case of the world using up (and usually at growing rates) other finite resources. Yes, population growth is possibly the number one problem (and, the latest CIA World Fact Book estimate has it up to 1.167% growth now), but our refusal to give up economic growth and rising living standards (not necessarily equated to quality of life) is just as big a problem, particularly with the rapid growth in China, India and some other countries.
Unless we change course, in both population and how we organize societies, we're stuffed.
That's why we shouldn't do it. "Power down" means decreasing the standard of living as fossil fuels deplete, and trying to maintain networks without the wherewithal to run them. This would be very difficult to do even without politics in the way.
We have no shortage of energy. A 1/4 acre lot in Kansas receives an average of 1.5 megawatt-hours of sunlight per day. There's an estimated 72 terawatts of available wind power world-wide (current human energy consumption from all sources is roughly 13 TW). We do not need to power down, we ought to re-power.
The US has spent perhaps $500 billion on the Iraq war thus far. That $500 billion could have paid the $3000 premium to put hybrid technology in 100 million cars (roughly 6 years of US purchases), plus buy 40 GW of PV systems at $5/watt. That money could have gone a long way toward eliminating the problem.
It's no wonder your view of the future is so dark; the only cure you can see is more of the disease.
I recommend Thom Hartmann's book, "The Last Rays of Ancient Sunlight". Less energy, simpler living do NOT equate to a lower 'standard' of living, but higher. The current measure of our standard of living seems to be tied to our consumption, rather than quality of life. Instead of measuring property ownership(which equates to additional government protection, disposal, clutter, and overtime worked), we should measure the standard of living by how much time is actually spend working (for someone else?). People who are constantly worried and working are constantly buying and burning energy they don't need to get to places they don't need to go. If we are forced into a more laid-back, conserving lifestyle, perhaps we wouldn't be going to war to prove we can go to war. Just because no other civilization hasn't powered down intelligently doesn't mean we CAN'T. We have the technology, the networks, and the resources to do it. We only need the right motivation. Almost everyone polled wants a simpler life, so why make it complicated? Give people what they want. Turn off the switches, park the cars, set up systems of shared transport and shorter work weeks. Most people are 'working' at jobs that don't produce anything necessary to the future of the human race, anyway.
Put them at home in a garden. It doesn't have to be a commune. $500 billion doesn't even begin to cover the cost of Iraq, especially when depreciation and wear and tear on the equipment is considered. Plus interest.
"Doing more with less" doesn't mean doing things we don't need done. It means doing more USEFUL things with less resources wasted. If we COULD have fusion or some other cheap energy, then what? What, exactly, should be done by humans in the long term. I'm pretty sure it doesn't involve blowing up things for the sake of blowing up things, or buying things (eventully, leading to blowing up things) for the sake of buying things.
Just because it works for you doesnt make it universally true. You have a vision for utopia; Guess what, you arent the first. Millions have died for such dreams over the centuries and we're no closer.
Millions have died for which dreams over the centuries?
Are you talking about the hippies that went off to live off the land or are you talking about the Amish?
(Or are you talking about something that you though he was talking about, but he really wasnt..)
Cheers, Dom
Dont be obtuse. People have fought wars and staged bloody revolutions over ideologies is all. What he views as a happier life will not be shared by the rest of the world, and getting people to fall in line requires force.
Achso!
Now I understand. You were talking about a very specific historic event (ideology) called communism.
< obtusion - pedantism>
It is usually better to give the baby a name than to assume you are talking about the same thing as your partner/opponent.
Now, on communism - wasn't the idea NOT to power down but to take the power away from the few (the capitalists) and give it to the many?
Communism (USSR) industrialized hell-bent, and was not in the least interested in powering down.
Or were you talking about some other specific "event"? Do you mean some other "idealistic" world view? Maybe you could point to islamic fundamentalism or something - but again, the idea here was not powering down, but to TAKE POWER FROM OTHERS.
Nationalism (Nazi Germany and Japan, breaking up of Yugoslavia): TAKING POWER FROM OTHERS
Emperialism: TAKING POWER FROM OTHERS
Terrorism: TAKIMG POWER FROM OTHERS
"getting people to fall in line requires force."
I agree with you 110%! And if there's no open warfare, it's called *Politics*: a subtler from of COERSION.
Who has intentionally powered down in history, other than 3rd century desert monks, a few hippies in the '70s and the Amish?
But please - if you're going to refer to something (refuting someone else's non-differentiated claims), give the baby a name.
< /obtusion - pedantism>
Cheers, Dom
Munich
Or the French Revolution.
Or the English Civil War.
Or the American Civil War.
Or...
You (I hope) get the idea. People have died for many ideologies and views of "how things should be" over the years. Communism, reviled though it may still be in America, is only one of them.
Pitt, now let me get pedantic again.
I get your point, but you don't get mine.
My comment was not about Communism or ideological revolution. My comment was, that Dekazin assumed something was being discussed which wasn't.
The French Revolution was not about powering down, was it?
The English Revolution was not about powering down, was it?
The Am. Civil war was promoting industrialization instead of slaves (powering up), now, wasn't it?
Anyway, Do you see Autiegrav saying anything about Revolution?
I see him saying something about using less.
Besides, I agreed 110% with Dekazin, remember?:
"and getting people to fall in line requires force"
Yes, that's right, even for idealists!
Please read my comments in context next time.
Thank you.
Dom
The hell it wasn't. Read it again and stop being obstinate and off topic. Theres no way you will get me or most of the industrialized world to volantarily power down.
There you have it, the pithy epitaph of our arrogant folly.
Equally, you are susceptible to the folly that "powering down" is the best way we can give ourselves a secure future. I certainly don't buy it.
Did you miss the title article? Powerdown is not necissary; We aren't running out of energy.
To wizofaus & Dezakin:
Aye, I am well aware of the article title, but I guess right there is my biggest mistake. Silly me. I was figuring our problems are not just about energy and how much of it there is to be had but rather how and what we do with it on this earth that counts. In short, the reality based contextual interplay between our unlimited desires juxtaposed with our human liabilities and this finite earthly creation is what is crucial. Or so I thought.
Dezakin's sentiment, which amounts to nothing more than, I am and I (we) will have it, is but the individual expression of a supremely self-centered cultural ethic devoid of any context to earthly creation as something humans are dependent upon, and absolutely so. Gee, I'm glad to have it pointed out it just ain't so!
It's great to now know that the western (techno-industrialized) belief that whatever we don't like about how things are we can control it so that one day (much sooner than later, of course; like tomorrow) it'll all be better and all without any repercussions within or upon the human and biotic realm. Man, that's a relief!
What I really don't get is: If there is so much energy to be had for fulfilling such energetic desires as Dezakin makes clear he will not do without, why don't we have it and wizofaus' "secure future" now? After all, it's all there to be had and has been there all along, right?
Ah, what the hell. Screw all this nonsense of energy shortages. You're right, fellas, and that's great! Now excuse me while I run out to buy that Hummer I've always wanted, the diesel powered motorboat and my vacation home in the sun! Man, life's great getting it my way! No powerdown for me either. What a world, baby! I'm the man! Hoooowee!
Beam me up, Scotty.
If human beings had perfect foresight and were even close to rational most of the time, no doubt we would have planned everything perfectly and obtained our "secure future" by now. We don't, and we're not, and we won't ever obtain a truly secure future. But we will keep doing what we do best, which is approaching new challenges with a will to solve them, building on what has come before, and continuing our ambitions for a better future.
Those that believe that the technology we have now (or had 50 years ago, or 100, or whatever) is more than enough are welcome to stick with it, but I can almost guarantee you that if the entire population of the Earth made that same decision, we wouldn't be around much longer - a few centuries at best. At any rate, it simply isn't going to happen, so wishing for it is seems fairly pointless.
I'm glad to see you grasp the essence of our problem as I proposed it. Still, it would help if you defined a "secure future" by your reckoning because I do think there are (or were) ways to, if not to "truly" or completely 'secure' the future, at least 'assure' a more viable future for our species and all the rest of earthly life than our presently arranged prospects grant. Yet, this does not mean living an uncivilized life. Of course, we would have to define what that means for each of us and how we would envision securing it.
I question this proposition of yours, especially the idea of a "better future" built upon our "ambitions." Haven't we already established that such a future as so determined by man (particularly our techno-industrial model of ambitions) is inherently not assured? If so, how does one suppose it can ever be "better" by building upon that which is failing us? By my way of reckoning, better would, of necessity, mean more assurance for our species and all the rest of earthly creation's survival tomorrow (the future), not less.
To which I say: Those that believe that the technology we have now (or might have in 50 years, or 100, or whatever) will be enough are welcome to stick with it, but I guarantee you that if the entire population of the earth makes this decision, we won't be around much longer -- a few decades at best. At any rate, it simply isn't going to happen, so wishing for it seems fairly pointless.
Aside from mirroring hyperbole, the point is simply this: Man's attempt to fulfill his unlimited ambitions built upon a failed model of relationship to the earth is more than tragic, it's insane. But that's where we at. Until mankind (of the 21st century industrial based civilized kind) recognizes the true context of his place on this planet, he'll continue to do not at all what is his best to fit in and better ensure his survival, but continue to ruin it for himself and all the rest of life he is dependent upon.
As Aldo Leopold recognized: "The question is, does the educated citizen know he is only a cog in an ecological mechanism? That if he will work with that mechanism his mental health and material well being can expand indefinitely? But that if he refuses to work with it, it will ultimately grind him to dust?"
No matter how much energy there is to be had, it is all about how and what we use it for -- our survival or our selfish petty ambitions of a "better future" we can never have.
In any event, wizofaus, I would suggest that despite the disagreement of minutia expressed here, based on other thoughts of yours, there is probably a good range of semi, if not total, agreement in some other regards. Nuance is easily misunderstood here. Not so with Dezakin and that is what I thought worth pointing out. And to the extent that his statement encapsulates our culture's self-centered arrogance my original reply still stands.
To the future, better or not...
I guarantee that the experiment with the whole of human population consuming as much as the average american will be tried, and prove you wrong within fifty years.
For a population of, say, 9 billion humans (est. pop in 2050) to be consuming as much as the average American today, we'd effectively be consuming at at least 10 times our current rate. Estimates of many available critical resources give us in the order of 100 or 200 years at current consumption rates, so they would potentially be fall to 10-20 years' supply. The effort that would be required to support the scale of recycling necessary to enable us to continue to make do with what's available would be truly phenomenal, and I can't see how we're going to get there within 50 years.
And that's all without taking into consideration the economic and political reality of transforming the third world into a thriving economy within that time frame.
Eventually we may well get to a point where the whole human population is able to enjoy a high standard living with levels of consumption not dissimilar to many in the first world today, but it will take a lot more than 50 years, and most likely a significant reduction in population too.
Now the baby has a name.
Thank you.
No, you don't. My point is that you're the one misunderstanding the discussion.
Dezakin said:
i.e., imagining utopia is easier than achieving it, and muscular attempts to do so have lead to millions of deaths.
All of those wars I listed involved a common thread of one group trying to enforce its vision of the common good - a limited utopia, if you will.
None of them involved powering down, but, then again, that wasn't Dezakin's point, now was it?
You had a good point in your initial post that Dezakin was talking about forcing a lifestyle into people whereas the previous poster had not talked directly about that; however, you tried to take that way, way too far - even after Dezakin explicitly clarified that he was indeed talking about that - and ended up with a non sequitur.
If you were a little more direct and tried to make fewer strained analogies, it'd be harder to make those kinds of errors. Much clearer, too.
I can see that Dezakin and Pitt are off topic in this case. Sorry guys, but something just hasn't clicked for you yet.
Utopia was suggested by Dezakin in response to
This does not mean "ideologies" must be adopted. It mearly suggests there is a different way of looking at quality of life issues that aren't about ideology. This is not about following the Amish or hippies. Bringing civil wars and revolutions into the dialog doesn't make sense (unless something hasn't clicked for you yet).
Civilization isn't the same as humanity. History doesn't begin with the plowing of fields. Cities define people separated from the natural world upon which they depend and/or people living in numbers that exceed the carrying capacity of the land upon which they inhabit (food must be transported to them). By definition, civilization, or city culture, requires work performed by other people or the equivalent in cheap energy.
As cheap energy declines, it means many of us will be sent back to the fields to support this "non negotiable". Unless, of course, we abandon the paradigm of living beyond our natural means. Sure we can get away with it for a good long time, but the longer we keep pretending to be something special in nature, the worst the consequences when our fate finally arrives.
Earth was not "given" to us. We must participate, or face our end (perhaps taking 70% of all other life with us). After Peak Oil and Climate Change, you still have to reckon with Extinction Rates and Overshoot. All the while, life would be much more pleasant without any of this cheap energy. All you have to do is stop fighting to get away from nature. It's silly to think otherwise (not an ideology, just a fact of life).
"...life would be much more pleasant without any of this cheap energy"
That sounds very much an ideology, and one you can't possibly prove.
I agree that cheap energy has been a reason that we've allowed ourselves to get to a point where we have serious problems on our hand, but there's no reason that should necessarily be the case. A few decades of considerably more expensive energy, and a bit of soul-searching might just change attitudes enough to allow us a future where we have ample cheap energy (from whatever source) and a robust pace of technological advance both contributing towards a style of existence that doesn't continually degrade our natural environment.
There will always be a place for those who wish to live "outside the system", and stick with older technologies (and it's all relative - even the Amish rely on sophisticated technologies and agriculture that took millenia to develop and perfect), but it's never going to be a realistic or even desirable option for the bulk of the population.
The word "life" is not exclusive to humanity. Life won't be more pleasant with civilization still around and no more cheap energy. For life to be more pleasant, civilization must go. As it is, Climate Change, Mass Extinction, and Human Population Overshoot will be sad facts in the short history of civilization and long history of humanity.
The Great Forgetting:
http://www.davidsheen.com/b/b1.htm
We gave it a try and cities require somebody having to do the work getting the rest of us food and goods, as if nature never tended to this before we made it into work. If we try to replace this human labor with machines, we will then need cheap energy, which it self only carries the veneer of reducing labor (see "One Straw Revolution" by Masanobu Fukuoka).
As Fukuoka began exploring what "farm work" was "required", he found very little actually required (understand "do nothing" as an overstatement and avoid negligence). In fact, he discovered countless "modern technologies" created ever greater work. The more you understand about human ecology, the more you will understand what I'm typing about.
Humanity has only very recently even known about millions of fungi and millions of bacteria in places our advanced technologies never thought to look. Though our human minds are certainly impressive, we couldn't possibly grok the whole (not even with computers; think unknown quantities of snowflaking many-to-many relations for all you data modelers).
This is not ideology, just telling you that you must breath clean air, drink clean water, and eat healthy food, which science hasn't begun understanding as much as you might think. The Amish have nothing to do with this, as they are just a pre-industrial version of the same culture. After cheap energy is gone, you'll have to consider the Amish lifestyle to continue the failed experiment called civilization. If you'd like a less grim choice, consider your attachment of civilization to humanity.
otherwise....
Begin here: http://www.edibleforestgardens.com/
or here: http://www.tagari.com/
or here: http://fungi.com/
buy a farm: http://permaculture.org.au/2007/03/01/tagari-farm-designed-and-establish...
learn: http://www.spiralseed.co.uk/permaculture/
For the meaning we're discussing, it is.
In world of 7, 8, 9 billion human beings, there will be plenty of room for any of those ideas (permaculture especially, which may go some way towards weaning us off the need for oil/gas-based fertilizers and pesticides).
If you don't care for civilisation, no-one's forcing you to be a part of it. We have a model for what humanity as a whole is like without civilisation - millenia of tribal hunter/gatherer societies, who engaged in constant violent attacks, were constantly susceptible to disease, starvation and predation, forced to practice infanticide to keep their populations in check etc. etc.
Civilisation may be a veneer, but it's a veneer that allows to avoid a style of existence that few would choose voluntarily. You have your utopian vision of what our existence could be like, and are welcome to it. I have mine too, except that I'm realistic enough to accept that human nature is too flawed and the future too unpredictable for it to be likely.
There are too many flaws in your message to get every detail. However, I suggest you actually research some of these claims. I believe one suggested reading was the start to this dialog.
See if you can find this out there: