NationStates Jolt Archive

So, I've only just started to research the validity of the idea of "Peak Oil", but already it is starting to look pretty scary. The concept of the U.S. economically collapsing due to oil shortages (the market is nearly completely dependant on cheap and increasing oil), triggering a world-wide depression strikes me as somewhat of a downturn in human events.

What are your thoughts on the subject? ie Are we screwed?

So, I've only just started to research the validity of the idea of "Peak Oil", but already it is starting to look pretty scary.

:rolleyes:

The concept of the U.S. economically collapsing due to oil shortages (the market is nearly completely dependant on cheap and increasing oil)

No its not.

triggering a world-wide depression strikes me as somewhat of a downturn in human events.

What are your thoughts on the subject? ie Are we screwed?

No

:rolleyes:
Unnecessary and arrogant provocation.

No its not.
Then it is indeed interesting how much the people in charge (Greenspan, European Governments etc) worry about such a prospect.
It is true that there is plastic in pretty much everything, and plastic is made from oil.
Oil is essential to the way the world economy works right now. And I doubt there is going to be a smooth change-over into other materials if there is a sudden cut in oil supply (a revolution in Saudi Arabia might come to mind).

Ok, one, if the US economy collapses, it will not mean the end of the world, only the US. The rest of the world is not dependent on the US. Two, oil is the least of your problems right now, as there is still plenty left; I would be more worried about the US pissing off the rest of the world (it's sooo very close). Plus we can make many types of artificial substances, not based on crude oil.

When you look at what prices people are paying for oil on the futures markets it shows that they expect the price of oil to remain fairly high, but to decline very slightly from the current price. If you believe the price of oil is going to massively increase in the future, buy now.

However, I think the price is unlikely to massively increase due to people adapting to the current, fairly high, price of oil. For example the number of SUV sales have declined (by 2.8%, I think) while the sales of cars have increased. People now are more likely to carefully consider fuel economy when buying a new vehicle than they did five years ago. China's inefficent use of energy is also likely to improve as their infrastructure improves. Most of China's recent increase in demand has been a result of companies using on site diesel generators to make up for the inability of the national grid to supply enough power.

Ok, one, if the US economy collapses, it will not mean the end of the world, only the US. The rest of the world is not dependent on the US

The U.S. is a huge market for consumer goods and we absorb a great deal of investment from abroad.

The world will feel a collapse of the U.S. economy should it come to pass.

Unnecessary and arrogant provocation.

:rolleyes:

Then it is indeed interesting how much the people in charge (Greenspan, European Governments etc) worry about such a prospect.

Greenspan is a political appointee who failed at every job given to him in the private sector. European governments are socialist pains in the ass who think Koyoto would actually work.

It is true that there is plastic in pretty much everything, and plastic is made from oil.

Yep

Oil is essential to the way the world economy works right now. And I doubt there is going to be a smooth change-over into other materials if there is a sudden cut in oil supply (a revolution in Saudi Arabia might come to mind).

A sudden cut in oil supply from say, Saudi Arabia, would be rectified relatively quickly (within 2-3 years) by force by any number of nations (America, Germany, France, UK, China, Japan, Russia, Turkey, Italy, Spain, South Korea and on and on we go...). A sudden cut in oil supply does not but 'shock' the world in the same manner that a clean bullet wound 'wounds' the human body. Heals up nicely after some panic and pain.

In reality what we get is a nice and fairly steady decrease in oil supply, if we stop finding new reserves (which we seem to be finding often enough that even as our use increases, our expected 'you're fucked' time keeps on extending out) and as we devise new methods to refine oil that we currently don't use do to its quality/difficulty to get. Likewise there are entire fields in America that we simply don't drill because it costs too much. Every time prices go up we start running those drills until prices go down again. As supply decreases price goes up and these fields suddenly become profitable and hey, we get some more oil.

Further, as oil prices rise there is more and more cash to be made by replacing it with a new fuel, a new method, a new power source. More pressure to switch to nuclear power. Etc...

Ok, one, if the US economy collapses, it will not mean the end of the world, only the US. The rest of the world is not dependent on the US.
If the US economy collapses. It means a collapse of the economies of Europe, China and Japan. Which also happens to mean the collapse of the rest of the economies in the world. And just imagine if we decided to default on our debts. :evilgrin:

Cheers.

:rolleyes:
:rolleyes:


Greenspan is a political appointee who failed at every job given to him in the private sector. European governments are socialist pains in the ass who think Koyoto would actually work.
How is the private sector a measure of anything? He is an economist, a very good one, with a long experience, and he is the orchestrator of the current good performance in the US Economy.
As for the EU - Spare me your sorry tantrums. I pity you.


A sudden cut in oil supply does not but 'shock' the world in the same manner that a clean bullet wound 'wounds' the human body.
It's called a supply shock, it causes aggregate supply to pull back, decreasing GDP, hurting short- and medium-term growth and eventually is absorbed by lower wages.
What are your credentials for going :rolleyes: at someone?

Further, as oil prices rise there is more and more cash to be made by replacing it with a new fuel, a new method, a new power source. More pressure to switch to nuclear power. Etc...

You still need energy to mine and transport uranium.

From the reading I've done (admittedly, not a whole lot, so I could be dead wrong) the only viable solution I've come across are massive arrays of space-based solar panels. But first we have to get those panels made and put in space. Then the planet needs to adapt to be able to utilize this energy.

Hey Salvodonia, I don't know what your mother taught you, but it's downright rude to just sarcastically and insultingly respond to a fairly legitimate post with somebody who is not going "OMG GEOGRE BU$H iS TEH SUXORS!" If you want to refute my concerns, in other words allay them, by all means do it. Hell, I encourage you to. But do it in a civil manner.

Originally Posted by Evil Arch Conservative
From the reading I've done (admittedly, not a whole lot, so I could be dead wrong) the only viable solution I've come across are massive arrays of space-based solar panels. But first we have to get those panels made and put in space. Then the planet needs to adapt to be able to utilize this energy. The only difficulty is such technology is decades away, and our problem appears to be somewhat more immediate.

The only difficulty is such technology is decades away, and our problem appears to be somewhat more immediate.

I found something else that seems to be a bit more of a short term solution. Fast breeder reactors. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fast_breeder) Would anyone care to comment on those?

massive arrays of space-based solar panels.You could try putting them on your roof instead. It's pricey to set up, but not as expensive as putting them in space at the moment.

Fast breeder reactors. Would anyone care to comment on those? If people think they can develop commercial breeder reactors, them good good luck to them. All I know is that Japan, with very good inventive to build breeder reactors, has mostly normal reactors, so it sounds like a difficult task.

Coal burning combined with geo sequestation of CO2 could be a source of "eco-friendly" power in the near future.

If people think they can develop commercial breeder reactors, them good good luck to them. All I know is that Japan, with very good inventive to build breeder reactors, has mostly normal reactors, so it sounds like a difficult task.

Coal burning combined with geo sequestation of CO2 could be a source of "eco-friendly" power in the near future.

That didn't sound like nearly as good of an option, but I guess it's making a big leap of faith to hope for something that sounds as good as a fast breeder reactor. I'll stop my leap where I am and keep the little bit of hope I have now tucked away in a corner.

What about offshore windfarms? We could use the power supplied by those to mine the uranium and such we need for nuclear reactors or produce hydrogen through electrolysis.

As for oil, we need to start cutting back now, so we'll be prepared when oil production does peak and start to decline. The prime candidate for that would be replacing petrol hungry cars with hydrogen. If we were to have a viable alternative to petrol fueled cars, the economic effects of a decline in oil supply could be reduced.

As for space-based solar panels, how exactly are we supposed to efficiently transfer the power generated by them back to earth. We'd probly be better spending the money used to launch them into space developing better nuclear and alternative energy sources.

As for space-based solar panels, how exactly are we supposed to efficiently transfer the power generated by them back to earth. We'd probly be better spending the money used to launch them into space developing better nuclear and alternative energy sources.

As far as I recall, the plan was to convert the energy into microwaves and beam them to a reciever on the planetary surface. Of course you will also have a orbital quasi death ray if you decide to point that transmitter somewhere else.

What about offshore windfarms? We could use the power supplied by those to mine the uranium and such we need for nuclear reactors or produce hydrogen through electrolysis.

What are we going to do with the hydrogen when we have it? Hydrogen fuel cells are extremely expensive and apparently the price hasn't gone down significantly. Also, they require platinum. It's estimated that there's not enough platinum to sustain hydrogen fuel cell use just in transportation for more then one year. However, I just did a quick Google search and the first result that came up was this. (http://www.newstarget.com/004578.html) It says that platinum may be able to be replaced with iron, which we have quite a bit more of (understatement). Interestingly, it says that fuel cells currently use "expensive metals, such as platinum". This implies that the web site I read that mentioned only platinum was a bit off.

Originally Posted by Project Azureus
The prime candidate for that would be replacing petrol hungry cars with hydrogen. It's my understanding that Hydreogen Fuel Cell technology is still fiendishly expensive and requires too much energy to produce a viable fuel source.

Personally I doubt hydrogen will replace gasoline. Even if oil prices double or triple I don't think there will be a big rush to switch to hydrogen because of the high cost of being the first in your area with a hydrogen powered car. I think vehicles that make use of current infrastructure will replace current internal combustion engines. I imagine that hybrid vehicles will be improved on on become even more fuel efficent and popular. I also think all electric cars could become popular as improvements are made in engines and energy storage. It is possible these electric cars would store energy in a fuel cell of some descrition. Of course, electric cars would require increases in electrical generation. This could be provided by "clean" CO2 sequestering coal burning power plants, or possibly by nuclear power. Currently the cost of burning coal and trapping the CO2 seems to be cheaper than nuclear power according to a recent study in Australia. However nuclear power could be the cheapest option in countries with lower capital costs and higher coal costs.

Personally I doubt hydrogen will replace gasoline. Even if oil prices double or triple I don't think there will be a big rush to switch to hydrogen because of the high cost of being the first in your area with a hydrogen powered car. I think vehicles that make use of current infrastructure will replace current internal combustion engines. I imagine that hybrid vehicles will be improved on on become even more fuel efficent and popular. I also think all electric cars could become popular as improvements are made in engines and energy storage. It is possible these electric cars would store energy in a fuel cell of some descrition. Of course, electric cars would require increases in electrical generation. This could be provided by "clean" CO2 sequestering coal burning power plants, or possibly by nuclear power. Currently the cost of burning coal and trapping the CO2 seems to be cheaper than nuclear power according to a recent study in Australia. However nuclear power could be the cheapest option in countries with lower capital costs and higher coal costs.

One of the major costs and hurdles to Nuclear Power is the Lawsuit Externality. It's cheaper to build a boiler out of gold, fueld by burning diamonds, than a nuclear plant thanks to the use and abuse of lawsuits, protests, and other excesses, which drive up the price at each stage and have effectively killed new N-plant power generation in the United States.

Many of the same people responsible for this, are hyping "Peak Oil" as a scare tactic.

read some of the things in this site: www.lifeaftertheoilcrash.net/
there is many intresting (scary) information. at the first I try to see it from cricitizing view, but it seems too real to ignore it.
it is the most realistic "end of the world" theory I ever seen, and it deal with all the other options to deal with it. main line: we are screwed.

Mankind has survived massive natural disasters, the plague, supervolcanic erruptions, asteroid impacts (One apparently occured during the dark ages), two world wars, the cold war, and modern times. I think that we're perfectly capable of surviving a little economic collapse.

No, we're not screwed. We will have to adapt.

read some of the things in this site: www.lifeaftertheoilcrash.net/
there is many intresting (scary) information. at the first I try to see it from cricitizing view, but it seems too real to ignore it.
it is the most realistic "end of the world" theory I ever seen, and it deal with all the other options to deal with it. main line: we are screwed.

'Realistic' is relative. You have to accept every assumption made as fact first.

"Peak Oil" and End-of-the-world scenarios have been popular since the early nineteen seventies' oil scare. So far, we've bypassed every single predicted date of "Peak Oil" less the latest one.

This doesn't mean you should go out and dig up gramma's 1976 Cadillac Hearse for your daily driver, or start commuting in a 1969 White 6x6 CP van.
What it means, is that you have to approach this kind of hype critically, and use the sources you have available to analyze it without reliance on someone's strident political garbage.

Oil is a finite resource. That's a fact, it's as finite as clean water. it's also a replaceable fuel source- diesels can burn corn-oil/alcohol mixes jsut fine (there's a guy who's built a Harley using a diesel generator engine to run off a bottle of Mazola....)

Further, synthetic lubricants (Castrol, or Turbine Oil Number one is a synthetic, it doesn't utilize petroleum products in the mix... It's derived from Castor-Bean, which also supplies the base ingredient for Ricin, a rather nasty poison) tend to be more reliable anyway.

the big problem is chemical-feedstocks (Solvents, other goodies) derived in the refining process. some of them can be replaced by coal-derivatives, but not all.
Unlike coal and oil, of course, Nuclear fuels can be recycled after use (provided you close the fuel-cycle with breeder reactors), reducing, but not necessarily eliminating, the need for fresh sources of raw fuel.

Plastics have been made from organic components since the beginning of Plastic, it's just that Oil has been so much easier to process. Henry Ford built a car that had a body made of soybean derived polymers-in the 1930's.

Most of the tech necessary to reduce or eliminate oil from key industries have been with us all along-it's just cheaper, because it's simpler, to use Petroleum instead. After all, you don't have men with automatic weapons and "DEA" labels kicking down your door for having an Oil Patch, whereas you just might, if you have a few hundered acres of, say, Hemp growing out back.

Likewise, it doesn't take more money than god to drill for oil on private land. You don't have the DOE, Court Officers, the DoD, and half the "Environmentalist" Luddite fringe either knocking your door down, or protesting outside the gate, like you do with Nuclear power, where the court-orders and Litigation outweigh the cost of the physical plant(including fuel, personnel, and support equipment) by a significant margin.

Direct boiler versions of solar power likely do away with the need for solar arrays. New scalable versions of these are being produced and tested in many communities to great success.

Oil IS a finite resource. And we shouldn't be using it willy-nilly without any eye for its possible foibles. But, and this is coming from a far-leftist, the environmental movement seems to be steered by alarmists who think the end of the world is coming just about as often as Jehovah's Witnesses.

Estimates for oil drought have been wrong in the past, and the current ones may still be wrong. But that date does still exist, and not in some far fictionalized future.

I think Nuclear is a good option. Those self-same environmental alarmists have really done a good job scaring people to death with threats of three-eyed fish and apocalyptic melt-downs but the truth is that only two major events have taken place since nuclear's ingress; and Three Mile Island really wasn't such a big deal.

There are plenty of nuclear reactors running all the time, not only for public advantage but also military. And these examples seem to prove that nuclear hysteria is not all it's cracked up to be.

Direct boiler versions of solar power likely do away with the need for solar arrays. New scalable versions of these are being produced and tested in many communities to great success.

Oil IS a finite resource. And we shouldn't be using it willy-nilly without any eye for its possible foibles. But, and this is coming from a far-leftist, the environmental movement seems to be steered by alarmists who think the end of the world is coming just about as often as Jehovah's Witnesses.

Estimates for oil drought have been wrong in the past, and the current ones may still be wrong. But that date does still exist, and not in some far fictionalized future.

I think Nuclear is a good option. Those self-same environmental alarmists have really done a good job scaring people to death with threats of three-eyed fish and apocalyptic melt-downs but the truth is that only two major events have taken place since nuclear's ingress; and Three Mile Island really wasn't such a big deal.

There are plenty of nuclear reactors running all the time, not only for public advantage but also military. And these examples seem to prove that nuclear hysteria is not all it's cracked up to be.


It's interesting to me, that the 'Movement' spends huge amounts of money on Luddite causes and nearly none on finding viable technological replacements for the things they protest.

if a fraction of the money spent on lobbying and lawsuits, were turned toward development of alternative energy sources, those sources might get developed to the point of being viable on the market. This doesn't happen, thinks I, because those groups would lose a lot of their political power and motivational affect if they actually put effort into solving problems instead of being problems.

If you aren't devoting efforts to build a fix that is acceptable to the rest of society, you probably should not be complaining when you see a thing you don't like. bans don't fix things, Hanford now is more dangerous than it was thirty years ago, because it's a practical impossibility to fix it. Burying things don't make the problem go away either-Yucca Mountain is unstable. It's far from where most Environmentalists and Legislators live, but it's unstable geologically. The idea that you can bury waste, and as long as you don't fix problems, it will go away, is classic "Nimby". Western Civilization is less than five thousand years old. The age of Reason was less than four centuries ago, prior to that, the style of culture seen in the bad parts of Africa and the Middle East was the state of most of 'Civilized' humanity.
In the time maps have been made (Less than two thousand years west of the Great Wall), Coastlines have subsided or expanded, cities have been erased, fertile land has become desert (and desert been reclaimed) and whole families of language have become extinct.

What to do? well... in the current climate, there is not a whole lot you CAN do. It's not a technology problem, or a Geology problem, it's a Politics problem-it's easier to be chicken-little than it is to be Henry Ford or Ed Teller.

Chicken-Little doesn't have to contemplate the impacts of his own decisions, he can gain and hold status by blaming others. (in a way, rather Fallwellite as a method... Claiming 'moral superiority' over others through accusation and fault-finding, rather than dealing with a problem?)

The 'Green' movement has all the characteristics of a Religious Cult less one: it lacks a human-shaped god who speaks through his prophets.

The 'Green' movement has all the characteristics of a Religious Cult less one: it lacks a human-shaped god who speaks through his prophets.

Unless you count Mother Nature :D

Mankind has survived massive natural disasters, the plague, supervolcanic erruptions, asteroid impacts (One apparently occured during the dark ages), two world wars, the cold war, and modern times. I think that we're perfectly capable of surviving a little economic collapse.

Mankind, sure. The species will adapt and survive. Our current technological civilization on the other hand...

Anyway, the end of oil is still some ways off. It'll get more and more expensive, though, but we may have just enough time to develop alternatives. None of them will be as cheap and convenient as oil is now, though.

Uranium is also a finit resource. i.e. we one day nuclear power will not be an option.

You need electricity to produce hydrogene.

Mankind will survive but not the current global economy - where possible everything will have to move back to local based economies and production - less transport that way. Small farms will be come the mainstay for the local community. My advice - don't buy shares, buy land.

So, I've only just started to research the validity of the idea of "Peak Oil", but already it is starting to look pretty scary. The concept of the U.S. economically collapsing due to oil shortages (the market is nearly completely dependant on cheap and increasing oil), triggering a world-wide depression strikes me as somewhat of a downturn in human events.

What are your thoughts on the subject? ie Are we screwed?

Yeah, I saw about 15 minutes of that special on cable last week.
It was as badly done as the Y2K cable special...

http://www.fxnetworks.com/shows/originals/oilstorm/main.html

Personally? Yes, we need to build more nuclear plants and wind/solar arrays. We also need to double the miles per gallon we're getting. (I get about 24 with my Chrysler. Not bad, not great. I never have and never will own an SUV.)

with oil the biggest fear (at least for me) is not the lost of gas or oil power plants, if we really needed too, we have ways of replaceing them, but plastics its proibly hard to think about it but imagen everthing made with plastics gone in some short years? that would be devestaing.

I refer people to my archived thread from two years ago, Energy Resource Limits and Industrial Civilisation:

http://forums.jolt.co.uk/showthread.php?t=278375

Around 15 pages of pretty good arguments.

A good up-to-date resource is http://www.peakoil.net/, I'd like to see people argue against some of the sources linked there. :)

A timely note on the subject. How Brazil is rediscovering biofuels: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/4581955.stm