News When will the world reach peak fossil fuel production?

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Steve Mohr's extensive study from Newcastle University projects a peak in global fossil fuel production between 2016 and 2018, with coal and oil peaking in 2019 and 2011-2012, respectively. The study highlights that current energy consumption equates to every person on Earth having 90 slaves, emphasizing the unsustainable nature of fossil fuel reliance. Unconventional oil and gas are expected to extend production curves but won't alter peak dates. Concerns are raised about the rapid depletion of coal, particularly given its reliance in countries like China and India, while natural gas is projected to play a significant role in future energy scenarios. Overall, the findings underscore the urgent need for addressing energy sustainability and carbon footprint limits.
  • #151
Sounds about right. I looked into this in depth eleven years ago, researching a lot of data (raw data (not results from other studies), and from many different sources. I wound up with much the same, with peak oil around 2018, but my conclusions included severe shortages in the mid to late 20s, with a virtual cessation due to depletion by the mid-40s (2046). That was a decade ago, though, so the supplies and usage may have changed somewhat from what was being predicted back then.
 
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  • #152
mugaliens said:
Sounds about right. I looked into this in depth eleven years ago, researching a lot of data (raw data (not results from other studies), and from many different sources. I wound up with much the same, with peak oil around 2018, but my conclusions included severe shortages in the mid to late 20s, with a virtual cessation due to depletion by the mid-40s (2046). That was a decade ago, though, so the supplies and usage may have changed somewhat from what was being predicted back then.

So are you battening down the hatches? Do you have a view on how the next 30 years are going to work out in terms of energy/economy/politics?
 
  • #153
apeiron said:
So are you battening down the hatches? Do you have a view on how the next 30 years are going to work out in terms of energy/economy/politics?

Somewhat. http://www.aptera.com/". Given its efficiency and the low $/erg of electricity, it's well worth it.

I must admit, though, I'm more partial to http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nLV8WA-5PKo"... :)
 
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  • #154
After the US JOE report, now the German army is talking about peak oil...

http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/0,1518,715138,00.html

The study is a product of the Future Analysis department of the Bundeswehr Transformation Center, a think tank tasked with fixing a direction for the German military. The team of authors, led by Lieutenant Colonel Thomas Will, uses sometimes-dramatic language to depict the consequences of an irreversible depletion of raw materials. It warns of shifts in the global balance of power, of the formation of new relationships based on interdependency, of a decline in importance of the western industrial nations, of the "total collapse of the markets" and of serious political and economic crises.

According to the German report, there is "some probability that peak oil will occur around the year 2010 and that the impact on security is expected to be felt 15 to 30 years later."

In the long run, the study goes on, the global oil market, will only be able to follow the laws of the free market in a restricted way. "Bilateral, conditioned supply agreements and privileged partnerships, such as those seen prior to the oil crises of the 1970s, will once again come to the fore."

Since virtually all economic sectors rely heavily on oil, peak oil could lead to a "partial or complete failure of markets," says the study. "A conceivable alternative would be government rationing and the allocation of important goods or the setting of production schedules and other short-term coercive measures to replace market-based mechanisms in times of crisis."

Even more explosive politically are recommendations to the government that the energy experts have put forward based on these scenarios. They argue that "states dependent on oil imports" will be forced to "show more pragmatism toward oil-producing states in their foreign policy." Political priorities will have to be somewhat subordinated, they claim, to the overriding concern of securing energy supplies.
For example: Germany would have to be more flexible in relation toward Russia's foreign policy objectives. It would also have to show more restraint in its foreign policy toward Israel, to avoid alienating Arab oil-producing nations. Unconditional support for Israel and its right to exist is currently a cornerstone of German foreign policy.
 
  • #155
Most of the news in the OP Mahr study is regarding peak coal. Mahr has world peak coal at between 2010 and 2050. Yet from EIA we have:
Based on U.S. coal consumption for 2008, the U.S. recoverable coal reserves represent enough coal to last 234 years. However, EIA projects in the most recent Annual Energy Outlook (April 2009) that U.S. coal consumption will increase at about 0.6% per year for the period 2007-2030. If that growth rate continues into the future, U.S. recoverable coal reserves would be exhausted in about 146 years if no new reserves are added.
http://www.eia.doe.gov/energyexplained/index.cfm?page=coal_reserves
I'm not certain about the definition of 'last', likely EIA is referring to exhaustion and certainly not years to peak. And this is just a US estimate. However, Mahr's peak is mainly based on a nebulous country category he labels 'Rest', for which production is high for a a couple of decades and then vanishes. If we take away the 'Rest' category of coal producers, then world coal production is relatively flat out to 2100 even using his model.
 
  • #156
mheslep said:
Most of the news in the OP Mahr study is regarding peak coal. Mahr has world peak coal at between 2010 and 2050. Yet from EIA we have:

http://www.eia.doe.gov/energyexplained/index.cfm?page=coal_reserves
I'm not certain about the definition of 'last', likely EIA is referring to exhaustion and certainly not years to peak. And this is just a US estimate.

This is based upon known and anticipated coal reserves at expected coal usage rates, not the rates of usage if coal were required to replace petroleum usage after peak oil.
 
  • #157
mugaliens said:
This is based upon known and anticipated coal reserves at expected coal usage rates, not the rates of usage if coal were required to replace petroleum usage after peak oil.
I saw nothing about replacing oil with coal in the Mahr study per the OP.
 
  • #158
I remember a few years ago they said the fossil fuels will last by 2040. I guess this was a combination of all types of fuels?

LOL. This is scary. But there are new sites being discovered...
One thing that I don't understand about nuclear energy. How do they power it up, without electricity? LOL
 
  • #159
mheslep said:
I saw nothing about replacing oil with coal in the Mahr study per the OP.

Exactly. If we had to do that, we'd be through the coal in much less time.
 
  • #160
Forbes interviews Charles Maxwell, senior energy analyst at Weeden & Co, on peak oil (and why to invest in oil sand companies).

http://www.forbes.com/2010/09/13/suncor-energy-oil-intelligent-investing-cenovus.html

snippet...

The use of petroleum in the world is now up to about 30 billion barrels per year. The rate at which we have found new supplies of petroleum over the last 10 years has fallen to an average, of only about 10 billion barrels per year.
We're obviously in an unsustainable situation. We are now using up a greater number of barrels that we have found in the recent past and that we have reserved in the ground. We are now beginning to use it up relatively quickly--with scary consequences for the future.

A bind is clearly coming. We think that the peak in production will actually occur in the period 2015 to 2020. And if I had to pick a particular year, I might use 2017 or 2018. That would suggest that around 2015, we will hit a near-plateau of production around the world, and we will hold it for maybe four or five years. On the other side of that plateau, production will begin slowly moving down. By 2020, we should be headed in a downward direction for oil output in the world each year instead of an upward direction, as we are today.
 
  • #161
apeiron said:
Forbes interviews Charles Maxwell, senior energy analyst at Weeden & Co, on peak oil (and why to invest in oil sand companies).

http://www.forbes.com/2010/09/13/suncor-energy-oil-intelligent-investing-cenovus.html

snippet...

The use of petroleum in the world is now up to about 30 billion barrels per year. The rate at which we have found new supplies of petroleum over the last 10 years has fallen to an average, of only about 10 billion barrels per year.
We're obviously in an unsustainable situation. We are now using up a greater number of barrels that we have found in the recent past and that we have reserved in the ground. We are now beginning to use it up relatively quickly--with scary consequences for the future.

A bind is clearly coming. We think that the peak in production will actually occur in the period 2015 to 2020. And if I had to pick a particular year, I might use 2017 or 2018. That would suggest that around 2015, we will hit a near-plateau of production around the world, and we will hold it for maybe four or five years. On the other side of that plateau, production will begin slowly moving down. By 2020, we should be headed in a downward direction for oil output in the world each year instead of an upward direction, as we are today.

Well, that should make for a nice brisk world war... :cry:
 
  • #162
From what I've read, we can replace a lot of uses for petroleum with natural gas, we also have nuclear power, also there is a tremendous amount of shale oil and tar sands oil, extraction is just more costly, I've read we can actually synthesize our own hydrocarbons by taking carbon from the air and hydrogen from the water, it is just very costly right now and the infrastructure isn't there.

They are also experimenting with ways to produce hydrocarbons from I think forms of algae or something like that in the oceans (don't know how much could be produced from them though).
 
  • #163
CAC1001 said:
From what I've read, we can replace a lot of uses for petroleum with natural gas, we also have nuclear power, also there is a tremendous amount of shale oil and tar sands oil, extraction is just more costly, I've read we can actually synthesize our own hydrocarbons by taking carbon from the air and hydrogen from the water, it is just very costly right now and the infrastructure isn't there.

They are also experimenting with ways to produce hydrocarbons from I think forms of algae or something like that in the oceans (don't know how much could be produced from them though).

Ahh, the magic of science, unchecked by the laws of thermodynamics.

All sorts of things are chemically possible. The debate here is about what is economically practical.
 
  • #164
apeiron said:
Ahh, the magic of science, unchecked by the laws of thermodynamics.

All sorts of things are chemically possible. The debate here is about what is economically practical.

Maybe the debate should also be about what is fear-technical emotional feasible? Without that factor, we might have been happily enjoying nuclear power in prosperity and not worry a second about peak fuels and emissions.
 
  • #165
apeiron said:
Ahh, the magic of science, unchecked by the laws of thermodynamics.

All sorts of things are chemically possible. The debate here is about what is economically practical.

Shale oil and tar sands, or even sythesizing oil, are not economically viable now, but by the time we will need to start using them, they probably will be; also the technologies will be significantly more advanced by then I'd imagine.
 
  • #166
CAC1001 said:
Shale oil and tar sands, or even sythesizing oil, are not economically viable now, but by the time we will need to start using them, they probably will be; also the technologies will be significantly more advanced by then I'd imagine.

I know with shale oil and tar sands the most cutting edge way of processing them is with wet steam in situ. And the biggest cost in synthetic oil is the process heat.

So to get the costs of these fuel sources down just requires a large amount of cheep low cost per Mw unit of heat. There is a technology out there that dose it, just need to get the "fear" of it straighted out.
 
  • #167
Andre said:
Maybe the debate should also be about what is fear-technical emotional feasible? Without that factor, we might have been happily enjoying nuclear power in prosperity and not worry a second about peak fuels and emissions.

Agreed. Unfortunately, a significant portion of litigation is unnecessary, in part fueled by fears originally held by the litigants, and in part fuelde by fears artificially exacerbated by legal representation. Not all lawyers do this, and most probably do not. It is, however, a factor.

I'm not sure how much of the litigation which halted nuclear development here in the US was either overinflated or unnecessarily raised the cost of nuclear power so much that it was no longer economically feasible as compared to other forms of power production. I do know that at one time it was being billed as cheap power.
 
  • #168
Cheap energy = easy economic growth. So peak fossil fuels can be read as a century-long economic super-bubble. And a super correction is thus what we soon face.

So if you want to put your faith in nuclear or alternatives, you have to come up with a credible analysis both of their basic EROEI (energy returned on energy invested - cheap energy has got to be better than 10:1), and whether they can be ramped up fast enough to fill the coming energy gap.

Here are some remarks on this issue from the current ASPO-USA meeting...

http://www.theoildrum.com/node/7035

Following a break, Dr Robert Hirsch chaired a session on the link between Energy and the Economy, and it was possibly the bleakest of the meeting. Chris Martenson talked about looking at the economy as a straight highway, and then hitting a bend. While models often see progress in linear terms life does not turn out that way. Money is loaned into existence and credit (and thus debt) has increased over time. Since 1970 it has doubled five times. Money and energy have been tied, but while money must continue to grow, energy cannot. Credit market growth (with an R^2 of 0.98) has an exponential relationship with time. He sees the problem not with the individual smaller bubble causes of housing, etc but rather the overall credit size itself.

He sees the problems coming in the 2014-2015 time frame when Peak Oil will be recognized and while growth may continue, prosperity may not.

He was followed by Nicole Foss- who many of us have read under the pen name Stoneleigh. She sees fossil fuels as generating the largest bubble in history. The economy has been driven up by energy, but as that declines what will take its place? In the sense that bubbles are Ponzi schemes where only early investors make a return on their investment, as this one comes to an end as the largest suckers get fleeced, so they collapse to general hurt.

Markets are driven by perception rather than reality. But by the time the general public hears of “a good thing” it is generally over. Hearing the “it’s a new paradigm” should warn you to sell the stock. But the world is driven on emotion. And when there is a collapse it is often sudden, bringing the value down below what it was before the bubble began. (And oil prices are following this model.) From this she could see nothing ahead but progress into a deflation and depression. We are already in a large debt and liquidity trap and as credit disappears the depression will develop and be sustained. The huge derivatives market may be the first to go, given its insignificant intrinsic value.

The problem is in part that it will be based on reducing volumes of oil, and with that reduction there is no possibility of a rebound, since the resource is not there to develop it. Oil has thus hegemonic power. The depression will, however, sustain its dominance since reduced demand will allow it to remain dominant.

The final speaker of the evening was Robert Hirsch, who has also recently co-authored a book – The Impending World Energy Mess which was available in signed copy at the meeting. In large measure his talk followed the book (from which you may gather that I did buy, and have half-read, a copy – and it is worth doing so, I may do a review later). He noted that the economy depends on energy, not the other way around. Further we should expect that the general public will still be surprised when oil supplies start to decline in the next 2 – 5 years. From then they will continue to decline for at least a decade, until alternate sources of fuel become sufficiently available. He covered the oil problem, including their forecast of how it will develop, and what an individual could do about it.

The story is a familiar one to the peak oil community: we are over reliant on a few giant oil fields that are depleting and not being replaced. We have been sensibly in a production plateau since 2005, something not predicted by earlier models, but there are an increasing number of reputable sources that see an end to the plateau, and the consequent decline, coming relatively soon. This will impact GDP and hurt national economies. The recent recession and drop in oil demand may have only shifted the onset of the decline by a few weeks.

It is unrealistic to expect a rapid answer to the decline from politicians. Looking at the likely rate of decline, a 2% fall could be easily handled, a 4% fall could be handled with difficulty, but at 6% it is going to be bad. They have had to guess, and think, at the moment that it will likely be at around 4%.

China, having foreseen this problem, are doing smart things to prepare for it. We in the West are not. It will lead to increased tensions – though they did not look at the potential for resource wars, or the likelihood that producers would withhold production for political or economic reasons.

Looking at individual response, we should all expect to be impacted, and because of the lack of political ability to resolve the issue (or even to address it yet) we should expect that the result will be very similar to the oil shortages of the 70s. There was a degree of panic – this will happen again. This time, however, there will be no North Sea or North Slope to come to the rescue. Nor can the oil taps be opened wider to remediate the problems. As a result he has got out of the market – since good stocks and bonds will be hurt as well as bad. He has added annuities to his portfolio, bought some gold, and moved closer to mass transit and the shops.

He reminded us that this is a liquid fuels problem, while most renewables (wind and solar and hydro) deal with the electricity supply, which is not helpful to the crisis. We also have enough food. The issue is in transportation where we need a substitute for oil.

In questions he was asked about rationing. He fully anticipates it happening, but it will be very complicated to develop and impose. Countries will respond in different ways and become more independent. The United States will have to reindustrialize, since it will not be able to rely on foreign manufacture. We increased productivity by having oil help labor. Now this must reverse.

He did not see the problem being deflation, but rather in the control of inflation. But then it is easier to write a history book than a forecast. He could only see that many people will get hurt in the coming years.
 
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  • #169
apeiron said:
Ahh, the magic of science, unchecked by the laws of thermodynamics.

All sorts of things are chemically possible. The debate here is about what is economically practical.
I suspect you intended to highlight the point that energy is required to produce chemical fuels (and/or to extract them), but nothing CACI said violated the laws of thermodynamics.
 
  • #170
CAC1001 said:
Shale oil and tar sands, or even sythesizing oil, are not economically viable now,
Tar sands certainly are viable now with $80/bbl oil, as the Canadians demonstrate daily. Wiki cites $28/bbl production costs (not including diffuse environmental externalities).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oil_sands#Canada
 
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  • #171
apeiron said:
Here are some remarks on this issue from the current ASPO-USA meeting...

http://www.theoildrum.com/node/7035
Remarks by who? (Dave Summers. Who?). And I don't mean the speaker who Summers(?) remarks upon. I see the speakers included Bianca Jagger?
 
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  • #172
Looking at individual response, we should all expect to be impacted, and because of the lack of political ability to resolve the issue (or even to address it yet) we should expect that the result will be very similar to the oil shortages of the 70s. There was a degree of panic – this will happen again. This time, however, there will be no North Sea or North Slope to come to the rescue. Nor can the oil taps be opened wider to remediate the problems.

:confused: Is he aware of the shale oil? Tar sands? Natural gas? (we can make fuels from that and from my understanding, we have a ton of it). We also have a tremendous supply of coal, and if required, can turn coal into oil (while the political support isn't there for big domestic mining of coal right now, if things got really bad, I think public concern would override anything the environmentalists would say). We also have oil off the coastlines as well that we do not drill for at the moment.

In questions he was asked about rationing. He fully anticipates it happening, but it will be very complicated to develop and impose. Countries will respond in different ways and become more independent. The United States will have to reindustrialize, since it will not be able to rely on foreign manufacture. We increased productivity by having oil help labor. Now this must reverse.

The United States never deindustrialized. We manufacture more than any other nation on the planet. Not too long ago, our manufacturing sector alone was larger than China's entire economy.
 
  • #173
mheslep said:
I suspect you intended to highlight the point that energy is required to produce chemical fuels (and/or to extract them), but nothing CACI said violated the laws of thermodynamics.

The point many people fail to get is that the world we are accustomed to has been built on cheap energy. So discussion of alternatives is meaningless unless the full EROEI equation is considered.
 
  • #174
mheslep said:
Remarks by who? (Dave Summers. Who?). And I don't mean the speaker who Summers(?) remarks upon. I see the speakers included Bianca Jagger?

How can you be confused? All the speakers are named in the snippet.
 
  • #175
CAC1001 said:
:confused: Is he aware of the shale oil? Tar sands? Natural gas? (we can make fuels from that and from my understanding, we have a ton of it). We also have a tremendous supply of coal, and if required, can turn coal into oil (while the political support isn't there for big domestic mining of coal right now, if things got really bad, I think public concern would override anything the environmentalists would say). We also have oil off the coastlines as well that we do not drill for at the moment.

If you refer back to the OP you will see that people are well-aware of such things. But even those who believe that such resources can be practically exploited are worried that they cannot be brought online in time to avoid real economic and social disruption.

CAC1001 said:
The United States never deindustrialized. We manufacture more than any other nation on the planet. Not too long ago, our manufacturing sector alone was larger than China's entire economy.

True. But that is a minor point in this context. Or rather, reindustrialisation would be "good news" for those who hope for business as usual because it would mean that the economic disruption was proving pretty minor. Peak oilers would instead see "relocalisation" as the coming business model - if we are lucky.
 
  • #176
apeiron said:
How can you be confused? All the speakers are named in the snippet.
The question is about the source. There's no quote or transcript of Hirsch's remarks provided here, just an effectively anonymous interpretation from someone who claimed to be there.
 
  • #177
mheslep said:
The question is about the source. There's no quote or transcript of Hirsch's remarks provided here, just an effectively anonymous interpretation from someone who claimed to be there.

It was written by David Summers, Curators Professor of Mining Engineering and Director
Rock Mechanics and Explosives Research Center, Missouri University of Science and Technology, who chaired the coal session.

It is unlikely he is wildly misrepresenting anything that was said :smile:.

I can't see how you can maintain that the report is "effectively anonymous", etc. But I suppose it deflects attention away from the actual content of what was (allegedly :zzz:) said.
 
  • #178
apeiron said:
It was written by David Summers, Curators Professor of Mining Engineering and Director
Rock Mechanics and Explosives Research Center, Missouri University of Science and Technology, who chaired the coal session.

It is unlikely he is wildly misrepresenting anything that was said :smile:.
I agree it is unlikely (now that you've identified him), but credentials are not the final http://wtc7.net/articles/stevenjones_b7.html" on these matters. See, e.g.:
I present evidence for the controlled-demolition hypothesis [of the World Trade Center on 911], which is suggested by the available data, and can be tested scientifically, and yet has not been analyzed in any of the reports funded by the US government.
Dr Steve Jones, Professor of Physics, BYU, speciallizing in Muon-catalyzed fusion, metal-catalyzed fusion, archaeometry, solar energy. (since placed on leave by BYU).
I can't see how you can maintain that the report is "effectively anonymous", etc.
Because you didn't reference the author originally and the article doesn't contain any byline or signature (at least not in plain view)!

You are apparently operating under the principle that the burden is on the reader to both identify the source and discover whether or not it is independent and reliable, instead of on the poster. This is contrary to the guidelines, and tedious, as we've been through this https://www.physicsforums.com/showpost.php?p=2810729&postcount=22".
 
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  • #179
mheslep said:
You are apparently operating under the principle that the burden is on the reader to both identify the source and discover whether or not it is independent and reliable, instead of on the poster. This is contrary to the guidelines, and tedious, as we've been through this https://www.physicsforums.com/showpost.php?p=2810729&postcount=22".

Don't be ridiculous. You just didn't look very hard. You are trying to make something out of nothing because fussing about who said these things excuses you from having to deal with what they said.
 
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  • #180
Some elbowing of the 'peak' further out in time:
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/dd1e9400-7ef1-11df-8398-00144feabdc0.html
FT said:
Oil and natural gas markets are set to remain oversupplied until 2015, the International Energy Agency said on Wednesday, forecasting in its annual medium-term outlook report “comfortable spare capacity” for both energy commodities.
and
EIA said:
“For the next few years, the oil market is marked by more comfortable spare capacity than envisaged last year, and the duration of the current gas glut is set to last beyond 2013, at least in some regions.”
 
  • #181
Another commodities bet ala the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simon%E2%80%93Ehrlich_wager" The wager, made in 2005 for US$5000, was that the price of oil would triple by Jan 1, 2011. Mr Simmons' estate paid Mr Tierney his due.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/28/science/28tierney.html

One would think reality would dry up the pool of those willing to bet liberally on calamity against human resourcefulness, or at least have them asking for better odds, but the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malthusian_catastrophe#Traditional_Malthusian_theory" gene appears stubborn. So count me in the Tierney camp, looking for similar wagers.
 
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  • #182
Oversupply? Gas glut?

If that's the case, why are gas prices are nearly 300% higher than they were a decade ago, particularly when inflation over that time has only been 31%, cumulative?
 
  • #183
mugaliens said:
Oversupply? Gas glut?

If that's the case, why are gas prices are nearly 300% higher than they were a decade ago, particularly when inflation over that time has only been 31%, cumulative?

What's your source?
 
  • #184
mheslep said:
Another commodities bet ala the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simon%E2%80%93Ehrlich_wager" The wager, made in 2005 for US$5000, was that the price of oil would triple by Jan 1, 2011. Mr Simmons' estate paid Mr Tierney his due.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/28/science/28tierney.html

One would think reality would dry up the pool of those willing to bet liberally on calamity against human resourcefulness, or at least have them asking for better odds, but the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malthusian_catastrophe#Traditional_Malthusian_theory" gene appears stubborn. So count me in the Tierney camp, looking for similar wagers.

I'm not sure that it's fair to call the eventual expiration of a limited reserve of fossil fuel, "Malthusian". I would say that's just reality, and how you interpret the potential fallout could be construed as Malthusian. Oil is a wasting asset by its very definition, and even if the USA, Western Europe, and some others manage with other power sources, we can see how oil plays a roll in the growth of China, India, and other nations which are becoming ever more industrialized.

Human resourcefulness is great, but you're asking for people to put their FAITH in their fellow man?! :smile: Yeah, I have faith in both the great pumpkin, and that people will suddenly begin to solve more and bigger problems than they create.

Or in the words of Dana Gould, "Maybe the government should figure out how I can get on an airplane with my F*****G eyedrops before I set them loose on global warming!"

Well, I'll wait until I see world governments doing something other than their current and historical behaviour, 'Senators, Rome is overcrowded and too many dwellings are of wooden construction.' RESULT: Rome burns, politicians rebuild. You underestimate the human ability to ignore a problem until its upon us (we do it with our own mortality every days soooo...) and then rebuild. How do you, 'rebuild' a shattered portable energy economy? It's not as though we can go back to unicorn piss gasoline... or can we? Human resourcefulness... build me a gas-pissing unicorn!
 
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  • #185
nismaratwork said:
I'm not sure that it's fair to call the eventual expiration of a limited reserve of fossil fuel, "Malthusian". ...
Tierney did not. Nor did I.
 
  • #186
mugaliens said:
...
If that's the case, why are gas prices are nearly 300% higher than they were a decade ago, particularly when inflation over that time has only been 31%, cumulative?
Really? Care to make a wager on that? :biggrin:

~50-60% increase in real terms over 2000. Same price today in real terms as ~1983
http://www.randomuseless.info/gasprice/gasprice.html
 
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  • #187
mheslep said:
Tierney did not. Nor did I.

What is then?
 
  • #188
nismaratwork said:
What is then?
When the prediction includes something calamitous, like that failed forecast of a tripling of oil prices in only five years, or per Websters, an unavoidable "widespread poverty and degradation."
 
  • #189
mheslep said:
One would think reality would dry up the pool of those willing to bet liberally on calamity against human resourcefulness, or at least have them asking for better odds, but the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malthusian_catastrophe#Traditional_Malthusian_theory" gene appears stubborn. So count me in the Tierney camp, looking for similar wagers.
Like playing 777 in the lottery every day or betting on an impending recession 5 years into an expansion period, this is a wager that seems like they must eventually win - not that I'd ever let them forget the years (decades!) of losses to focus on the win if it happens...

...but there are hints that for the US at least, the basic prediction of Peak Oil will never happen but instead may be rendered moot by technology and legislation, with the recession making for a sharp peak. Essentially, recent data suggests that due to that combination, we passed our peak in 2006 and may be starting a long-term and permanent decline, burning 20% less by 2030. And this is starting without a dramatic rise in gas prices.
http://www.boston.com/yourtown/cambridge/articles/2010/12/20/us_gas_demand_should_fall_for_good_after_06_peak/
 
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  • #190
russ_watters said:
Like playing 777 in the lottery every day or betting on an impending recession 5 years into an expansion period, this is a wager that seems like they must eventually win - not that I'd ever let them forget the years (decades!) of losses to focus on the win if it happens...
Absent the abolision of price signals, I seriously doubt the Peakers win ever such bets. All that has to happen is that other transportation energy sources - biofuel, hydrogen, solar/nuclear/whatever/ powered electrics - become as capable and cheaper per mile than petroleum, then the planet never depletes its reserves of oil. In such a case people would leave the (increasingly worthless) stuff in the ground.

...but there are hints that for the US at least, the basic prediction of Peak Oil will never happen but instead may be rendered moot by technology and legislation, with the recession making for a sharp peak. Essentially, recent data suggests that due to that combination, we passed our peak in 2006 and may be starting a long-term and permanent decline, burning 20% less by 2030. And this is starting without a dramatic rise in gas prices.
http://www.boston.com/yourtown/cambridge/articles/2010/12/20/us_gas_demand_should_fall_for_good_after_06_peak/
Thanks for that link.

"People wildly underestimate the effect that all this is going to have" on gasoline demand, says Paul Sankey, an analyst at Deutsche Bank. Sankey predicts by 2030 America will use just 5.4 million barrels a day, the same as in 1969.
:rolleyes:
 
  • #191
Phrak said:
What's your source?

http://www.eia.doe.gov/petroleum/data_publications/wrgp/mogas_history.html" .

http://data.bls.gov/cgi-bin/cpicalc.pl".

Do you not concur with data as published by the U.S. Department of Energy or the U.S. Bureau of Labor and Statistics?
 
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  • #192
mugaliens said:
http://www.eia.doe.gov/petroleum/data_publications/wrgp/mogas_history.html" .

http://data.bls.gov/cgi-bin/cpicalc.pl".

Do you not concur with data as published by the U.S. Department of Energy or the U.S. Bureau of Labor and Statistics?
There is a lot of data in a lot of different tables there. Please be more specific about where you got your numbers. What exact dates and prices did you use?
 
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  • #193
mugaliens said:
http://www.eia.doe.gov/petroleum/data_publications/wrgp/mogas_history.html" .

http://data.bls.gov/cgi-bin/cpicalc.pl".

Do you not concur with data as published by the U.S. Department of Energy or the U.S. Bureau of Labor and Statistics?

And?

US gasoline avg price, regular, retail conventional:
Jan 01, 2001 1.377 (1.75 in 2011 dollars)
Jan 03, 2011 3.034

or a 73% increase over 10 years ago. US premium is similarly up 66%.
 
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  • #194
mheslep said:
Absent the abolision of price signals, I seriously doubt the Peakers win ever such bets. All that has to happen is that other transportation energy sources - biofuel, hydrogen, solar/nuclear/whatever/ powered electrics - become as capable and cheaper per mile than petroleum, then the planet never depletes its reserves of oil. In such a case people would leave the (increasingly worthless) stuff in the ground.

One thing on this though, energy isn't so much what concerns me as usage of petroleum for materials. I mean everything from tires to plastics to laundry detergent, you need petroleum to make. Even if we could power our cities all on solar power, we still need petroleum for making things, right?
 
  • #195
russ_watters said:
There is a lot of data in a lot of different tables there. Please be more specific about where you got your numbers. What exact dates and prices did you use?

Seriously? I understand the need to present a concise citation, but I found that pretty easy to read through, and the calculator was... a calculator. Surely you have more to offer on the subject than this.
 
  • #196
CAC1001 said:
One thing on this though, energy isn't so much what concerns me as usage of petroleum for materials. I mean everything from tires to plastics to laundry detergent, you need petroleum to make. Even if we could power our cities all on solar power, we still need petroleum for making things, right?

Well, there is some successful research into using corn byproducts as a substitute. It's hardly a solution, but then, it may be that the supply of petroleum byproducts carries us through until other options are perfected. Others here doubtless are better informed about this issue.
 
  • #197
The malthusian vs the cornucopian mindset is worthy of a more technical discussion here.

Is there any evidence or model that says human ingenuity must run ahead of the game here?

Past civilisations have collapsed because of resource limits. But this time round might be different because we have fully liberated human ingenuity with laisser-faire economics?

Personally I think we are running too many exponential curves at once - consumption of cheap fossil fuels, population growth, water degradation, ecological services run-down, climate change - to not hit the buffers.

For Malthusians, the modelling seems easy in this regard. But what is model for cornucopian analysis?

I guess it could be a Moore's law approach as spun by Kurzweil and the Singularity crew for example. But further thoughts anyone?

Economists always say market signals lead to substitution. Which is fair enough as far as it goes. But is there a model that says ingenuity runs ahead of our problems in some more formal sense?
 
  • #198
CAC1001 said:
One thing on this though, energy isn't so much what concerns me as usage of petroleum for materials. I mean everything from tires to plastics to laundry detergent, you need petroleum to make. Even if we could power our cities all on solar power, we still need petroleum for making things, right?
I see it the other way around, only the energy content is of concern in the long term. Yes hydrocarbon polymers are made from petroleum, http://books.google.com/books?id=84...ymer production world annual OR year&f=false". But they can be recycled or eventually synthesized from some other carbon and hydrogen source given the required energy. That is, the hydrogen and carbon mass is not leaving the planet. The useful energy (i.e. low entropy) from petroleum (or any other source), once spent, is gone forever.
 
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  • #199
This is an elegant, open minded introduction to further discussion, though as you might guess I disagree with some of the assumptions and view point.
apeiron said:
The malthusian vs the cornucopian mindset is worthy of a more technical discussion here.

Is there any evidence or model that says human ingenuity must run ahead of the game here?
Have you http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/13/books/review/Easterly-t.html" I'm about to. He amusingly calls the model "ideas having sex", I gather something about humans being the only species capable of exchange, and once ancient despotism got out of the way of free exchange, displaced haltingly at first, but with time overwhelmingly by classically liberal values and respect for the worth of the individual, prosperity exploded.

I would call the evidence that it does, not that it must, ample, such as the history of http://1366tech.com/v1/mambots/content/multithumb/thumbs/b.0.200.0.0.stories.site.graph_fuels.jpg" without depleting any of them. I gather Ridley's Rationale Optimist provides an onslaught of similar evidence.

Past civilisations have collapsed because of resource limits.
Because? Yes some collapsed, yes there is http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Classic_Maya_collapse#Systemic_ecological_collapse_model", one of many, that these limits caused the collapse, for instance in the case of the Mayans. Even so, I don't know that this means resource consumption was the fundamental cause, as opposed to something else like cultural and government corruption that led to wanton destruction of environmental resources, and that then these conditions in turn provoked a collapse.

That is, allow me to conjure up a modern liberalized nation, suddenly taken over by a reincarnated Mayan King, who immediately ordered all the markets replaced with temples of sacrifice dedicated to him, and who's only standing order was to cut down trees to keep the sacrificial fires burning 24/7. Such a society might quickly hit resource limits, despite every blessing of existing modern technology, but in such a case I would not cite resource consumption as the cause of the collapse.

I guess it could be a Moore's law approach as spun by Kurzweil and the Singularity crew for example.
As spun by Moore, and yes that's more good evidence.
 
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  • #200
nismaratwork said:
Seriously? I understand the need to present a concise citation, but I found that pretty easy to read through, and the calculator was... a calculator.
I figured out exactly what data came from the calculator. I have an idea of where the data came from for the other claim and it appears to me to be at best sloppy and at worst cherry-picked for the purpose of deception. Are you saying you know exactly what data came from the other link and what the resulting calculation was? Seriously? Do share with the rest of the class. We have two vastly different claims and need to reconcile how they can be so different.
 

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