Peak Oil is You
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Page added on May 29, 2013
US agricultural sector in the US uses less than 2% of total energy usage.
It has been just shy of two years since the USDA came out with its last report on energy use in agriculture. The title of this month’s new report is, “Agriculture’s Supply and Demand for Energy and Energy Products.” This time they presented the subject by saying that energy inputs no longer have a linear relationship with agriculture since commodities are now used for the production of biofuels, and that farmers adapt in other ways to rising energy costs.
The agriculture sector in the U.S. uses less than 2 percent of total U.S. energy consumption. However, energy and energy-intensive inputs account for a significant share of agricultural production costs. For example, corn, sorghum, and rice farmers allocated over 30 percent of total production expenditures on energy inputs in 2011.
From 2001 through 2011, direct energy use accounted for 63 percent of agricultural energy consumption, compared with 37 percent for indirect use, as shown in the graph below.
Indirect uses of energy on U.S. farms include energy-intensive inputs such as fertilizers and pesticides.
The following graph shows shows a breakdown of the energy components, both direct and indirect, used in farming from 2001 to 2011.
The energy costs of industrial agriculture may pit farming methods against each other in the future. Because there are so many components within the system, and so many crop choices, gradually the waste in the system will be worked out and more efficient machinery and methods will be adopted. For some production, labor may again be substituted for fossil fuels. But, I’d also expect that the government will subsidize agricultural energy inputs in one way or another, given some future point in time when energy is more expensive. In many ways these costs are already being subsidized or supported through policy.
big picture agrculture
7 Comments on "US agricultural sector in the US uses less than 2% of total energy usage."
Arthur on Wed, 29th May 2013 11:19 pm
That is encouraging news. Ik will take many decades before we would run out of fossil fuel for agriculture. But there is a lot we can and will do during these many decades.
c8 on Thu, 30th May 2013 12:10 am
This conforms my suspicion that climate change is a greater danger ag yields than PO. Drought and floods do incredible damage and are intensifying.
c8 on Thu, 30th May 2013 12:11 am
Gotta check spelling before I submit!
DC on Thu, 30th May 2013 12:16 am
2% RoFL! Food production, storage, cooking and preparation, and ultimate disposal of food, and the massively wasteful distribution system consume far more than 2%. North Americans have 2 basic priorities. Driving vast distances to go nowhere important, and eat. Often times the two activities are combined. Its quite likely up to a 1/5th of all energy use is somehow related to food in some way or another, possibly more.
Airwicky on Thu, 30th May 2013 12:40 am
This hardly seems right when it takes 10 times the amount to produce just a calorie. I doubt food prices would be as high either
BillT on Thu, 30th May 2013 2:29 am
Perhaps the subject of lack of water should have more importance? Or the climate changes that make rain when it is not needed and drought when rain is needed? Or that we are not returning the crop waste back to the soil to keep it fertile? Or that erosion is taking what soil is left back to the oceans?
This looks like a propaganda piece to sooth the fears of the sheeple that we will run out of their favorite junk food.
Juan Pueblo on Thu, 30th May 2013 3:10 pm
As mentioned by other commenters above, Peak Oil is not a problem for agricultural production at this time. Soil erosion, desertification, aquifer depletion, salinization, droughts, floods, urbanization, and climate change are the main obstacles to sustaining agricultural output in the short term future.