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Page added on January 10, 2013
Keeping Peak Oil Reality In Mind # 21: The Trade-Off
An observation worth noting … and pondering, from Kurt Cobb:
No one–not the fossil fuel industry, not government, not private forecasters–can know for certain what our future supplies of fossil fuels will be. If those supplies are constrained as current trends and data suggest, then we will be forced to make an energy transition whether we want to or not. If fossil fuels turn out to be more abundant than current trends portend and we make a rapid transition to renewable energy starting now, the worst that can happen is that we will have completed that transition a little earlier than was absolutely necessary.
All things considered, that’s not such a bad deal … for all of us.
Fervent protests and denials notwithstanding, we are going to be making a transition at some point – voluntarily or otherwise [“otherwise” is not the preferred option]. For all the talk about our “vast” resources, etc., etc., the facts about extraction and production of our unconventional fossil fuel resources tell us that the promised abundance and elimination of energy supply concerns are not nearly as certain as some may wish … not even close.
For the umpteenth time I’ll state that no one outside of the few poor souls who delight in misery welcomes the thought that life as we’ve known it for decades will all-too-soon become something far different than our optimistic expectations for the future. A diminished supply of the very energy resource which made life as we’ve known possible in the first place makes that inevitable. It really doesn’t matter when, either.
The reality is that almost everything we use—personally or commercially—has always been dependent on everyone up and down the supply chain having readily available and affordable fossil fuel at the ready to design, test, manufacture, transport, supply, acquire, and then use the products and services we’ve long taken for granted.
So when the supply we’ve all been drawing from shrinks, and more of us are demanding the same benefits—if not more—math tells us we’ll have some issues.
Starting to think about, preparing for it, and then implementing the myriad Plan B’s we’ll all depend on at some point down the road ought to be taking place right about now. If, as Kurt Cobb suggests, the worst that will happen is that life under Plan B starts a bit sooner, we’ll all be the better for it.
It remains, as always, a choice….
9 Comments on "Keeping Peak Oil Reality In Mind # 21: The Trade-Off"
Read on Thu, 10th Jan 2013 2:24 pm
Unfortunately, the energy density of alternatives and the EROI are significantly less than fossil fuels.
A transition really requires an end to industrial capitalism as we understand it, and so it will be forced upon us by nature. We are, as a species, incapable of making an orderly change to a less energy intensive world.
Read on Thu, 10th Jan 2013 2:24 pm
Unfortunately, the energy density of alternatives and the EROI are significantly less than fossil fuels.
A transition really requires an end to industrial capitalism as we understand it, and so it will be forced upon us by nature. We are, as a species, incapable of making an orderly change to a less energy intensive world.
econ101 on Thu, 10th Jan 2013 2:46 pm
No one–not the fossil fuel industry, not government, not private forecasters–can know for certain what our future supplies of fossil fuels will be.
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This author claims to know what our future energy supplies will be and the conclusion is not enough. That’s wrong of course. The crack-pot that proposed peak oil was certainly wrong too. Not even in the ball park.
Exploding production figures from oil/gas fields around the world are not wrong.
Some are adopting alternatives, at a huge cost to society and themselves. This money is made available because it is politically expediant not world saving.
The switch to other forms of energy will take place when there is a more suitable alternative. We don’t have that yet. Continuing to pay people to use alternatives and transfer huge amounts of wealth to companies willing to play the game supplying the industry will not help these expensive and difficult to implement energy supplies survive.
BillT on Thu, 10th Jan 2013 3:32 pm
“… the few poor souls who delight in misery …” may just want something to be left for their grand kids and their grand kid’s future. Collapse now and get it over with while there are still some accessible resources left to start over. Yes, billions will die. They will die anyway. Maybe I will be one of them. So?
econ101/ SOS, whatever you are calling yourself today, you are a fool. A pimp for big oil. We passed peak oil years ago. Calling moonshine oil and sludge barely more fluid than asphalt, oil is a joke. NET energy has been falling for a long time. NET energy is all that is important. Wither it comes from oil or pig shit doesn’t matter. Our way of life is about over. Fraking is a bubble that depends on a never ending line of suckers to keep ‘investing’ in a losing deal. The end of line is in sight. Be patient.
BTW: The oil companies have had huge subsidies since the first well. Without them, they would not exist. No? Take the Us military out of oil producing countries and stop sending them aid and see what happens to the oil companies and their profits. Not to mention tax breaks by the billions every year. see how l
rollin on Thu, 10th Jan 2013 5:55 pm
A fair assessment of the current oil situation, and a plea to make the first baby steps toward a better world. Still steeped in techno wonder, but the way to the future must avoid collapses. Collapse leads to total destruction at this point. The word is bandied about like it’s a cure or vaccine, just take a collapse pill and the world will start working right. The collapse pill is just as dangerous as the fossil/nuclear/BAU pill. Take a careful look at what will really happen during modern collapses and you will run away screaming if you have any sanity left. Both directions lead to horrible dead ends. Only a slow descent gives a chance at survival.
BillT on Fri, 11th Jan 2013 3:52 am
rollin, collapse is coming whether you want it to or not. It needs to come now while there is still something left to rebuild a lower standard of living. Yes, it will be horrendous for Westerners and bad for the others, but it IS inevitable. There will be no ‘slow decent’. I once thought that it could happen slowly, but as time goes on, I see that that is not possible.
And, yes, perhaps total extinction of homo sapiens is the end result of our stupidity. If so, we asked for it. Wishing that it will not happen will not change the ending. Wishes and beliefs change nothing. Only time will tell.
Arthur on Fri, 11th Jan 2013 12:12 pm
We have to be carefull with spraying the word ‘collapse’ around. What does that mean? Will suddenly people drop dead in large numbers? No. It means long qeues at gas stations, ATMs displaying out of order messages, empty shelves at the supermarket. It does not mean starvation, at least not in the west. You do not need very much to physically survive, a liter of water, a few apples, carrots, potatoes, meat once a week. My mother survived on tulips bulbs in 1945 in Amsterdam for months, always hungry, always cold. But survived without damage for her health. Today there is no war in the west. The divide between reality now and Amsterdam 1945 is so enormous, there is so much fat on the bones, so much capacity for contraction, that I am a little allergic to too much doomerism. To add insult to injury, looking back, my mother described the last year of the war as one of the most intense or her life and in a certain sense as one of the happiest in her life.. ‘Everybody sticked together’. Scenes like grown up men lying on their bellies on the floor, by candle light, listening to the English radio, hidden under the wooden floor, my mother in the evening, slipping into the basement, after the quartered German soldiers were gone to bring soup to a nasty demanding family of German jews. To sum it up: invest a few hundred dollar in bulk food like rice, pasta and tins with soup, stuff you kan keep for 2-3 years and you will be fine. Most likely you will throw it away in 2-3 years, unused.
econ101 on Fri, 11th Jan 2013 5:18 pm
Net energy is a flase measure for an abundant number of reasons but mainly it assumes energy use is interchangable and there is no value put on the work the energy output is doing. We have all the energy we need. You find that out everytime you turn on a light, buy gas, turn on your furnace, light a match, use a flashlight. There is no shortage except the shortages that have been caused by the politics of peak oil.
I will refrain from reinforcing my devestatingly effective arguments with name calling. Its not needed to prove my points.
Arthur on Sat, 12th Jan 2013 10:51 am
econ, you are completely ignoring with your ‘devastating effective arguments’ that oil and gas sooner or later run out.