Peak Oil is You
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Page added on June 5, 2014
Time to be honest about our energy prospects
THE problem is not that there is not enough coal left underground; there is. But the task of lifting it, transporting it and using it depends on many other factors, most importantly on the continued availability of oil as a lubricant for all the machines involved in the supply chain, and as a fuel for transportation. It is reckoned that there are some 109 years of coal left under current consumption assumptions according to a new report by BP, an energy producer. Broadly that is in line with forecasts by the International Energy Agency (IEA) in Paris which also predicts the availability of other fuels.
Discussions about fossil fuel reserves start by aggregating firm and expected supplies from known and almost unknown sources, equating the resulting volume against fairly loose forecasts of economic activity including the assumption that rising costs will be accepted by consumers. While the EROEI (Energy Returned over Energy Invested) ratio logically suggests that the lifting of fuel will cease when it costs too much (that is, when EROEI becomes less than one) the reality is that the ratio needs to be calculated at the point of consumption, and not at the source. Take oil as an example. Oil is increasingly produced from smaller fields in deep offshore wells, or from wells in difficult climatic conditions. Their well-head cost will be high – but we ought to add in the costs of transportation to the refinery, transforming the crude oil, and then transporting the oil products to users. Well-head EROEI was 100:1 in the days of Texan gushers, but now it has fallen to below 10:1, maybe less. Some reckon the tar-sand oil of Canada has a ratio of less than 5:1. I wonder, after adding in the costs of pressurising and pumping this oil 3,500 km to the refineries of Louisiana along the Keystone XL pipeline, if the EROEI has turned negative!
Academics Ajay Gupta and Charles Hall, writing in Sustainability in 2011 state that the available data for EROEI calculations across the energy resource spectrum (oil and natural gas, coal, tar sands, shale oil, nuclear, wind, solar, hydropower, geothermal, wave/tidal and corn ethanol) are sparse and unreliable. Good analyses are important as politicians must guide nations towards a good future, and it is nonsense to blurt out that coal supplies will last for 109 years. The IEA by 2012 had accepted that globally we had passed the “peak oil” – that is, we had consumed half of all our known oil potential. The peak for gas supply might be 2014-2019, and the coal peak sometime later.
Of course, we can transform one source of fossil fuel into another (as with coal gasification), but this will come at a cost as no transformation is ever 100 per cent efficient. It is important to recognise in general terms that coal is used to power electricity generators or other heavy industrial needs, oil is used for most transport systems, and gas for space heating. Coal consumption is decreasing somewhat under international pressure to reduce CO2 output by using more acceptable fuels and by using more efficient machinery. Yet, if carbon capturing and sequestration (CCS) were available on a commercial scale, coal would be more acceptable.
26 Comments on "Time to be honest about our energy prospects"
bobinget on Thu, 5th Jun 2014 12:31 pm
If we can keep from exporting it, (pissing it away) gas can continue to keep home fires going while we figure out what works best.
http://ir.eia.gov/ngs/ngs.html
Due to cooler than normal weather,natty gas injections were higher last week than expected.
meld on Thu, 5th Jun 2014 12:35 pm
“THE problem is not that there is not enough coal left underground, there is”
enough for what? causing even worse effects of global warming? clap…..clap…..clap
chilyb on Thu, 5th Jun 2014 12:49 pm
I love a good slow clap.
Kenz300 on Thu, 5th Jun 2014 1:26 pm
It will be cheaper to deal with the cause of Climate Change than to deal with the cost FROM Climate Change.
NRDC: The Cost of Climate Change
http://www.nrdc.org/globalWarming/cost/contents.asp
GregT on Thu, 5th Jun 2014 2:23 pm
Less life will be lost by stopping the use of all fossil fuels, than will be lost if we continue to burn them.
Plantagenet on Thu, 5th Jun 2014 2:31 pm
Time to be honest. Oil can be replaced with coal, NG, nukes, solar, etc.
Time to be forward looking—lets start building the post-oil world.
rockman on Thu, 5th Jun 2014 2:40 pm
Well said, amigos. Now, who amongst us is ready to forego the use of fossil fuels and the products that use ff in their production/transportation to us? IOW who’s ready to invest in a 100% alt supported life?
Not trying to be an ass but that’s the predicament we all face, isn’t it?
Northwest Resident on Thu, 5th Jun 2014 3:09 pm
“Oil can be replaced with coal, NG, nukes, solar, etc.”
So, which one of those is going to power transportation and construction machinery? Coal-powered cars, one billion of them — bad idea. NG powered cars — you gotta be kidding me. That leaves nuke or solar powered cars, both equally absurd as the other two.
Sorry, Plant, a “post-oil” world will be a post-collapse world, and there won’t be much if any nukes, coal, NG or solar powered anything left.
rockman — You first!
Davey on Thu, 5th Jun 2014 3:48 pm
Second that motion NR
J on Thu, 5th Jun 2014 3:49 pm
Most people would hold on to the lifestyle that FF enables – until they can’t anymore. I.e. you would heat your house/condo as long as you could afford it etc.
Or is there anything I’m missing?
The question is what happens to the people that no longer have jobs. It’s getting a little shaky around where I live – tent cities etc, and that’s only a few years +- peak oil.
Northwest Resident on Thu, 5th Jun 2014 3:59 pm
J — To be honest, I would be ready to go full-on post-collapse mode at just about any time that everybody else does it. Obviously, I’m not going to be one to quit my good paying job and “go post-collapse” when everybody else is still doing the usual 9-to-5 (including bill collectors). In other words, as long as it is a shared experience, I would be okay just making the leap right now. Or tomorrow. Not that I’m completely ready — who is? Not that those people in the tent cities were completely ready, or that anybody else will ever be completely ready. But you know, every day of BAU destroys more of the future that whatever humans live post-collapse might have to work with. So, my point of view is, the sooner the better — not that I’m in a big hurry…
GregT on Thu, 5th Jun 2014 4:02 pm
Yes Rock,
That Is our predicament. Damned if we do, and damned if we don’t.
drwater on Thu, 5th Jun 2014 4:03 pm
“It will be cheaper to deal with the cause of Climate Change than to deal with the cost FROM Climate Change”
From the report:
“We calculate the annual loss of real estate from inundation due to the projected sea-level rise, which
reaches 45 inches by 2100 in the business-as-usual case. ”
I’ll bet 45″ is too low. We keep getting surprised by the rate of sea level rise, stability of the West Antarctic Ice shelf, etc. If it comes in at 2 meters or more, California is effectively cut in half by the innundation of the Sacramento River Delta and surrounding areas. Now that would be really expensive, not to mention all the other losses of ports and low lying coastal city areas around the world.
J-Gav on Thu, 5th Jun 2014 4:19 pm
Rockman – Yep, but, on the other hand, if coal and nuke continue to play a significant role, we could be in for a double frying. Oil and natgas are bad enough and would require a long, hard social rehab to get beyond them … Do we have the time, the will or the means?
Plantagenet on Thu, 5th Jun 2014 5:38 pm
I’m amazed that the people posting at this site are ignorant of the existence of electric and NG cars!
I’m further amazed that they don’t know that nukes and solar produce the electricity that powers electric cars.
The claim that only gasoline can power cars is just silly. Open your eyes and look around you—there! thats an electric car!!! Over there—-thats another one!
WOW! Imagine that!
Aaron on Thu, 5th Jun 2014 6:16 pm
My business involves the importation of stainless steel cooking equipment from the far east. Do I have a future?
R1verat on Thu, 5th Jun 2014 6:31 pm
The following link is to “IEA Says the Party’s Over”, written by Richard Heinberg:
http://www.resilience.org/stories/2014-06-05/iea-says-the-party-s-over
The below is a sampling of this piece & addresses the possibility of alternative energy sources.
******
What about renewables? The IEA forecasts that only 15 percent of the needed $48 trillion will go to renewable energy. All the rest is required just to patch up our current oil-coal-gas energy system so that it doesn’t run into the ditch for lack of fuel. But how much investment would be required if climate change were to be seriously addressed? Most estimates look only at electricity (that is, they gloss over the pivotal and problematic transportation sector) and ignore the question of energy returned on energy invested. Even when we artificially simplify the problem this way, $7.2 trillion spread out over twenty years simply doesn’t cut it. One researcher estimates that investments will have to ramp up to $1.5 to $2.5 trillion per year. In effect, the IEA is telling us that we don’t have what it takes to sustain our current energy regime, and we’re not likely to invest enough to switch to a different one.
If you look at the trends cited and ignore misleading explicit price forecasts, the IEA’s implicit message is clear: continued oil price stability looks problematic. And with fossil fuel prices high and volatile, governments will likely find it even more difficult to devote increasingly scarce investment capital toward the development of renewable energy capacity.
As you read this report, imagine yourself in the shoes of a high-level policy maker. Wouldn’t you want to start thinking about early retirement?
MSN Fanboy on Thu, 5th Jun 2014 7:37 pm
My business involves the importation of stainless steel cooking equipment from the far east. Do I have a future?
Yes: You do have a future, just not in the stainless steel cooking equipment business.
However until that fateful day when the orders cease: stay at it. Make as much profit/growth as you can; no need to leave the party early.
Just invest that profit in the future (i.e. farm land) that way, even if we are all proven wrong, land value goes up either way making more money.
Thank me later 🙂
Bones on Thu, 5th Jun 2014 7:47 pm
Hi Aaron,
Yes you do.
Go west dear boy!
Northwest Resident on Thu, 5th Jun 2014 9:07 pm
Plantagenet said: I’m amazed that the people posting at this site are ignorant of the existence of electric and NG cars!
What makes you think we’re ignorant of those alternately powered vehicles, Plant? In my case, I am well aware of the tiny, miniscule and totally insignificant number of NG and (semi-) electric powered cars on the road. What you seem to be ignorant of is that it is IMPOSSIBLE to replace any significant percentage of the one billion passenger vehicles in the world with NG or electric powered cars. The investment and energy required just isn’t there, not even close. Not to mention the trillion$ that would be required to replace gas stations with NG and recharge stations. In fact, the only reason we have as many electric and NG vehicles on the road as we do today is because of government incentives — those vehicles don’t pay for themselves, you know. Now, think about powering tractors, trucks, heavy machinery and ships with NG or electricity. Not likely. This subject has been hashed over repeatedly on this site over the last few months — did you miss it? Or do you still believe that NG and electric powered transportation is the wave of the future?
farmlad on Thu, 5th Jun 2014 9:44 pm
ya plant; It makes a real dent in my wallet to replace the battery that starts the engine in my truck, now imagine buying a battery big enough to drive that truck with a loaded trailer down the road for a couple of hours.oh and almost forgot, I would need a lot bigger truck just to haul that huge battery around. and then imagine all the other drivers needing huge batteries all at the same time could only make the price of batteries to skyrocket. And we might not be able to charge batteries on hot days when everybody is running their airconditioners.
Norm on Fri, 6th Jun 2014 12:04 am
Hey, look at the first paragraph !!! He’s worried about lubricating the supply chain !! Everybody knows, use a can of WD-40 for that !!! LOL. There will always be plenty of oil for the bearing-grease and the crankcase. You could get that out of an olive oil grove. What’ll be missing is enough oil for the fuel ! Oops!
Norm on Fri, 6th Jun 2014 12:16 am
All this worry about peak oil is over-blown. You can run all 1 billion cars on WOOD. See for yourself:
http://www.choppix.com/index.php?action=gallery;sa=view;id=4004
Race ya, 0 to 60 ! However, we might have to worry about ‘Peak Wood’. :o( But as long as I got enough wood for my car, i dont care if you have enough wood for yours.
GregT on Fri, 6th Jun 2014 12:58 am
But Norm,
Wouldn’t all of the creosote from that wood dull the gold plated finish of your bullet proofed Lamborghini?
Yah, I guess you’re right, there will be trade offs. 0 to 60 however, appears to be non-negotiable.
Dragon Oil on Fri, 6th Jun 2014 11:07 am
All shortmterm thinking. Methane hydrates will supply methane for many decades in over supply. Using that methane to get GTL tech for supper clean diesel supplies mobile fuel for the foreseeable future. Using VW’s TDI technology reduces emmissions to very low levels and greatly improves MPG. Stationary use of energy can be greatly improved through electrification. The electricity should be generated by thorium reactors which are scaleable. No carbon footprint or waste disposal problems and no meltdown problems either or gamma ray emmissions to speak of. Thorium is plentiful. Final solution. There are too many of us. Birthrates in developing countries need to be reduced to less than replacement rates. This is already happening in developed countries. Who do we see about all the above?
Juan Pueblo on Fri, 6th Jun 2014 11:42 am
Rock, I consume little, but my answer is I am not.
NR, saying if everyone else does it, then… Is going into fairy dust stuff, it is not realistic. Let’s stick to what is real, though I agree with you.
And that is the point Rock was making, I believe, that humanity will never make this choice.