[Pops]

Actually I just read that O signed something into law in 2011 that requires the EIA to report on spare capacity every 2 months. I found it about halfway down the page under "OPEC Supply"
http://www.eia.gov/forecasts/steo/report/global_oil.cfm

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'E')IA estimates that OPEC surplus capacity, which is concentrated in Saudi Arabia, averaged about 2.7 million bbl/d in the first quarter of 2013. This was higher than the 2.1-million-bbl/d average during the same period last year but lower than the first-quarter average of 3.8 million bbl/d from 2009 through 2011

[Palpatine]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('agramante', 'I')ncreases in efficiency can only account for so much of a decrease in consumption.

[Loki]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('pstarr', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Palpatine', 'f')alse presumption that gasoline or diesel is the only way to get from point A to point B. That has already been thoroughly discredited.

[Palpatine]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('pstarr', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Palpatine', 'f')alse presumption that gasoline or diesel is the only way to get from point A to point B. That has already been thoroughly discredited.

[John_A]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('pstarr', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Palpatine', 'f')alse presumption that gasoline or diesel is the only way to get from point A to point B. That has already been thoroughly discredited.

[John_A]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Loki', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('pstarr', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Palpatine', 'f')alse presumption that gasoline or diesel is the only way to get from point A to point B. That has already been thoroughly discredited.

[Palpatine]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('John_A', '
')
What you quoted does not appear to be restricted to EVs. Just the false presumption that gasoline and diesel are required...certainly a bicycle does not require either, and as we know some cities are doing quite well in their bicycling ways. And enjoy doing it nakkid!

http://www.katu.com/news/local/Police-W ... 73671.html

[Palpatine]

pstarr, even if your numbers were correct, which they likely are not, you act as if that is difficult. It is not. If the demand is there, businesses and individuals will install them.

Here is one example, a company that owns a bunch of malls just announced with Tesla Motors that they are installing Tesla Superchargers.
http://www.teslamotors.com/forum/forums ... -cbl-malls

They are doing it because they want to attract the income demographic of people that drive Tesla cars. Businesses and restaurants have an incentive to install these on their own in order to attract customers.

I am really surprised that you think this is so overwhelming. It really isn't. It is happening naturally because there is demand for it. There is now a critical mass of EVs on the roads that companies are looking for ways to attract those customers so they patronize those businesses.

Companies like Blink are doing this in order to make a profit. This is the company that seems to have a bunch of chargers around my city. You just sign up for a membership, the card is on your keychain. If you need a recharge, either use your membership card or a credit card to pay for one time use. It is easy.
http://www.blinknetwork.com/index.html

76% of homes have garages, so recharging is already available. Even houses that don't have garages will likely have an outlet easily available outside. 46% of townhomes have garages. There is a huge number of potential EV capable residences where recharging is already an available fact. No extra infrastructure needed at all for probably over 50% of the population.

This stuff is common sense. I don't quite see why you are so dead set against a solution that is so easy and practical. This stuff is happening. It is not a hypothetical in the future like was discussed as an abstract years ago. All you have to do is go out and look.

The simple fact is, gasoline is now optional for the bulk of the US population. There are affordable EVs out there like the Nissan Leaf that handle fine 98% of the daily trips that the typical person makes.

98% of trips are 50 miles or less.
99% of trips are 70 miles or less.
In Europe those distances are even lower.

[Palpatine]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('pstarr', '
')The numbers are quite correct, probably conservative. And yes, it would not be difficult to do the necessary installation, just astronomically costly. The few dozen charger installations you point to are promotional gimmicks, to jump start sales for the Tesla, Leaf, etc. But no one company has the means to convert our transport system.

[Palpatine]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('pstarr', '
')Did you read my numbers?? Hundreds of billions of dollars just for the necessary charger system.

[agramante]

Palpatine - do you expect all transportation to go electric? I'm not aware of anything feasible yet in the realms of heavy trucking, or work vehicles like tractors and earth movers, ships, or air travel. (And let's forget for a moment what would be involved in replacing the entire worldwide IC car fleet.) Freight trains might be feasible since it's not as difficult to electrify rail lines. But if you've read any studies on the fossil fuels used in producing electric vehicles, you know that they're not without carbon footprints either. (To say nothing of the scarcity of some of the elements involved.) Besides, electricity is still energy, and while more efficient than other forms, electrical generation isn't 100% efficient either.

On your point about public chargers not being too necessary--having a vehicle with maybe 200 miles' range (a little better for the Teslas, if you can afford $70K--a little over twice the mean American household income right now) and having limited options to charge it away from home makes it a much less attractive option. (To say nothing of service vehicles which would need to recharge too.) Highway stops and city stops will remain necessary as long as people are driving anything at all.

[Paleo]

That last diagram by Pops and the discussion up-thread resonates with my vocation as a systems engineer. The world is of course an interconnected set of complex systems. Complex systems to an extent share characteristics, including they consist of a number of disparate components working together to achieve a set of goals. They generally incorporate mechanisms that promote homeostasis and equifinality - they adapt to the world so as to continue to accomplish the goals; they "do what they can to keep doing what they're supposed do".

Complex systems, like living organisms, tend to have "sweet spots" where everything clicks along perfectly, "tolerance zones" where they adapt and work well but with some stress, and mortality areas where they can no longer survive. For plants, Liebig's Law of the Minimum captures the sweet spot where the plant grows best AND uses the least overall inputs. Of course a plant can survive well outside the comfort zone, trading off X of this nutrient for 2X of that one plus Y of another, but it doesn't do quite as well. Go too far, though, and it'll start dropping leaves or culling fruit. A little further and it fails completely.

The interesting point out of this, though, is figuring out where you're at on that range. For a population of similar organisms, like plants in a field, families in a town, or companies in a nation, or even nations in the world, you can watch for signs of stress. Farmers are pretty good at this. For companies or nations, it's harder. Somebody once quipped "all the healthy families look a lot alike; but the failed ones all fail differently". These separate modes of failure mask the commonality, as our brains like to look for patterns. We'll intuitively say "something seems wrong" when we see the signs of stress, but if we can't find a pattern, we say "must not be that bad" and take no action.

For a set of systems, you can generally come up with appropriate measurements of stress and of success. In a a healthy set, stressors will vary randomly -- always some stresses here and there, and some variation in success, but most survive nicely over time. Under an environment of stress, though, the picture changes. Some members will do well, perhaps better than ever, while others will falter. The cross-correlation between stressors will become pronounced, and instead of a small random scatter plot of cross-correlated stress (this one suffering a bit from this, and that one suffering a little from something else), you'll end up with a darker pattern of correlated stresses for some and low-stress for other entities along a continuum -- a dark cloud slanting across the plot. If you plot versus output, those stress levels correlate with productivity as well.

Using the field of plants example, under stress many members will struggle, and those with a potassium deficiency will often also have a nitrogen shortfall, and two kinds of bugs and a blight. But some others will still seem fine, as with no shortage of one element there is no overuse of another, and less susceptibility to blight and better tolerance of pests. Push a little harder and a few plants will die, but when you walk up this one will have died from blight, that one from bugs, and another from lack of a mineral. It'll take some work to figure out that potassium deficiency was the root cause.

Up the stress a little more, and many will fail -- the cross-correlation plot explodes into a large random cloud. When you walk up the field it won't be dead, though -- it'll be sprouting up with some type of weed that is a better fit for the new environment. When a complex system fails it is really hard to get it going again, but it is often easy to have some simpler systems spring up in its place.

So, to know when an oil shock is coming, you'll have to understand the system and be tightly attuned to the environment, looking for which stressors are beginning to manifest at the fringes of the comfort zone. As you near the shock, the "chatter" of the population about their issues will increase as they push into their tolerance zone, and the diversity between "healthy" and "ill" will expand. When some members fail and you see different types springing up in their place, you're crossing a threshold.

If spare energy capacity (especially oil) is a resource stress metric, then cost is a good proxy. What's the population of interest? What sorts of systems do you want to track?

[AgentR11]

Not a big fan of EV's myself; but I think I sense a bit of the "all or nothing" fallacy going on here. Transportation never has been, and never will be a single power source exercise. It is not necessary that multifamily apartment dwellers have access to EVs. Its irrelevant. You have two batches of folks to work with there, people who are income restricted, and are renting a cheap apartment because that is all they can afford; thus they aren't buying an EV, aren't maintaining an EV, and aren't charging an EV. They aren't commuting 50 miles, they're walking to Burger Barn to flip burgers and mess up orders. The other batch, rents because they don't want to own a house, they currently drive bmw's and other luxury ICEs&hybrids; the price of liquid fuel is irrelevant to them, they'll buy their 60/gal a month of $3 a gallon, and they'll still be buying their 60gal/month at $20 a gallon. They'll grumble about it over fresh boutique coffee and overpriced pastries, just like they do now, and blame whoever the highest ranking democrat is for their "pain".

To installation locations, focusing on the most expensive possible deployment, eg, parking garages, is silly. Think grocery stores and gas stations at construction and parking repaving times. Put in 5 EV only spots with rechargers when doing a parking lot in an area that the Whole Pricesticker store thinks they can snatch a few extra high end customers; or one of those fancier intestate gas stations with the sit down restaurants, you have a potential for a market win. Not only will the Tesla driver stop to recharge, he'll go in, sit down, spend $50 on lunch for him and friend, etc. It does have potential.

[AgentR11]

To the header topic. Simple answer.

When distributors and producers start whining loudly about losing money, even while prices are high.

[ralfy]

What's also not mentioned about EVs is oil needed not just for energy but for petrochemicals to produce and even deliver components. In fact, the same problem applies to much of the global economy, with manufacturing and mechanized agriculture heavily dependent on oil. Even the JIT system on which that economy relies for cheap goods in turn relies on the same.

Thus, any transition will be complex, involve cooperation between economies, take several decades, and use additional oil to deal with energy traps:

http://www.businessinsider.com/131-year ... il-2010-11

And then there's increasing demand from a growing global middle class, whether it's for gas-driven vehicles or EVs:

http://theautomaticearth.com/Finance/oi ... redit.html

With that, not only significant amounts of new oil will be needed for the transition but also increasing money supply.

[John_A]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('pstarr', '
')We have invested 150 years into an gasoline transport system, and the resulting suburban sprawl will never accept rewiring. It just is not in the cards.

[John_A]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('ralfy', '
')Thus, any transition will be complex, involve cooperation between economies, take several decades, and use additional oil to deal with energy traps:
With that, not only significant amounts of new oil will be needed for the transition but also increasing money supply.