$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'D')o you think it's easy to build new industrial plants when oil is $100 a barrel? Do you think it's easy when the economy is in recession? There's another problem. Maybe if these plants were built yesterday (figuratively speaking) instead of the day after, they would be ready to go before the going gets tough.
The market is not fast enough to cope with 3% yearly depletion if it waits for $100 or greater oil prices. In just 3 years of 3% yearly depletion, it will mean more than 7% reduction in oil. That's enough for a major recession.
PeakOil is You
All Techno-Messiah Waiters Please Stand Up
by jtmorgan61 » Thu 04 Aug 2005, 14:31:52
Ah yes, this argument again.
When you look at the relative size of investment per year, perhaps $500 billion globally out of an energy market of $3 trillion, it seems like we can do this, even if we are in recession. If there is money to be made and the scale is reasonable then the projects will happen. $100/barrel oil is not going to add enough to construction costs to make the price unreasonable.
Build time is 3-5 years depending on red tape (which will get cut if this is an economic emergency), so we won't get worse than ~10% behind (remember we're in recession, so demand is no longer growing). Remember I don't argue against a major recession, just the end of civilization as we know it (and a major die-off).
This, of course, assumes the market doesn't get a price signal until decline actually begins. When do you think we'll see $100/barrel oil? On the downslope off the back of the peak? I'm betting we'll see it a year or two before peak, when supply is still growing but not fast enough to keep up with demand.
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jtmorgan61 - Lignite
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by Ludi » Thu 04 Aug 2005, 20:20:42
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('jtmorgan61', '
')When you look at the relative size of investment per year, perhaps $500 billion globally out of an energy market of $3 trillion, it seems like we can do this, even if we are in recession. If there is money to be made and the scale is reasonable then the projects will happen. $100/barrel oil is not going to add enough to construction costs to make the price unreasonable.
Build time is 3-5 years depending on red tape (which will get cut if this is an economic emergency), so we won't get worse than ~10% behind (remember we're in recession, so demand is no longer growing). Remember I don't argue against a major recession, just the end of civilization as we know it (and a major die-off).
')When you look at the relative size of investment per year, perhaps $500 billion globally out of an energy market of $3 trillion, it seems like we can do this, even if we are in recession. If there is money to be made and the scale is reasonable then the projects will happen. $100/barrel oil is not going to add enough to construction costs to make the price unreasonable.
Build time is 3-5 years depending on red tape (which will get cut if this is an economic emergency), so we won't get worse than ~10% behind (remember we're in recession, so demand is no longer growing). Remember I don't argue against a major recession, just the end of civilization as we know it (and a major die-off).
If I understand what you're saying, you see alternative energy investments, specifically thermaldepolymerization, continuing in the face of recession, and being able to make up 10% of the energy demand in a period of 3-5 years. This means of course, not merely building the plants (when there is currenlty only one in existence - is that right?) but also either interrupting the "agricultural waste" stream for which there is currently already a market (poultry waste is used to make animal feed), or locating and managing a waste stream from some other industry/industries. Is that correct?
- Ludi
by honeylocust » Thu 04 Aug 2005, 20:44:51
One interesting thing that David Goodstein says in his book Out of Gas: The End of the Age of Oil is that if the carbon in remaining coal reserves is mostly burned, runaway climate change could kill all life above bacteria-a Venus-like transformation.
In otherwords, coal-to-oil may be an omnicidal technology-at least according to the Vice Provost of Cal-Tech.
Seems like a bad idea. Especially since the coal industry will acquire mind-boggling power once they control a large share of both electrical and transportation sectors. They will do whatever it takes to keep the coal coming as long as possible-but then the omnicidal consequences could unfold.
I'm just sayin'-that's what Dr. Goodstein said. Far be it from me to regard such a highly credentialed, well regarded scientist like Dr. Goodstein as being incorrect about the omnicidal nature of coal to oil on an a priori basis....unless I hold stock in Massey Energy.
In otherwords, coal-to-oil may be an omnicidal technology-at least according to the Vice Provost of Cal-Tech.
Seems like a bad idea. Especially since the coal industry will acquire mind-boggling power once they control a large share of both electrical and transportation sectors. They will do whatever it takes to keep the coal coming as long as possible-but then the omnicidal consequences could unfold.
I'm just sayin'-that's what Dr. Goodstein said. Far be it from me to regard such a highly credentialed, well regarded scientist like Dr. Goodstein as being incorrect about the omnicidal nature of coal to oil on an a priori basis....unless I hold stock in Massey Energy.
We must stop crying to the growing economy, "Deliver me,
for thou are my god!" Instead, we must have the courage
to ask with Isaiah, "Is there not a lie in my right hand?"
-- Herman Daly
for thou are my god!" Instead, we must have the courage
to ask with Isaiah, "Is there not a lie in my right hand?"
-- Herman Daly
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honeylocust - Wood
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by ubercynicmeister » Thu 04 Aug 2005, 22:59:28
Welcome back, jtmorgan, though I don't know that others will be as welcoming, LOL!
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('jtmorgan61', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'O')K, jtmorgan, it seems that you beleive that the dopes-in-charge are such WONDERFUL people they'll never let his sort of thing happen?
Indeed, this is your WHOLE point, jtmorgan - and Peak Oil is just the vehicle you're using to make it.
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('jtmorgan61', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'O')K, jtmorgan, it seems that you beleive that the dopes-in-charge are such WONDERFUL people they'll never let his sort of thing happen?
Indeed, this is your WHOLE point, jtmorgan - and Peak Oil is just the vehicle you're using to make it.
This seems to be a common theme in interpretations of what I am saying.
Yes, I wonder why it is you seem to beleive that the dopes-in-charge are such really nice, wonderful people who always think about the bad possibilities, and therefore try to avoid them.
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('jtmorgan', 'I') am saying that as firms they are self-interested and risk-averse since they have a lot to lose. Using coal to oil, etc. is a cheap expedient way to keep things going.
And I pointed out - and you don't seem to have cottoned on to what I said - that those who are actually RUNNING the companies are not at ALL interested in running the company - they are interested in sucking the life out of 'em. And if Peak Oil makes that happen quicker, BRING IT ON, they say.
That's the primary difference, here, between yourself and ourselves - you think that companies will "see a need and fill it", as regards the supply of energy.
To which I reply: has the collapse of Enron, Worldcom, HIH (in Australia), One Tel (in Australia), and above all Arthur Anderson (who, coincidentally, was the accounting firm to ALL of the above) - has all this passed you by?
Surely you do not imagine that "oh these were just minor abberations - one-offs?" Jtmorgan, they were and ARE most definitely not.
General Motors, for example, singularly FAILED to use the high level of technical expertise they had developed from the 1920's onwards for their locomotive building division (Electromotive Division - EMD, now sold off in a desperate bid to generate cash-flow) to develop - ahead of their overseas competitors- the hybrid vehicle.
GENERAL MOTORS ALREADY HAD THE EXPERTISE, the equipment, the know-how, the personel, the factories and the production lines to make super-efficient diesel-electric vehicles of all sizes & functions, as they were already DOING so for railways...and they sat on their hands.
HECK diesel electric LOCOMOTIVES get rolled out of the plant daily - all that would be needed to have happened (notice PAST TENSE) to make DIESEL ELECTRIC "hybrid road vehicles" was to ask the EMD engineers to re-scale one of their designs, quite easy to do. General Motors would have captured the "hybrid" market & the mythical hydrogen Fuel Cell market (fuel cells require electric motors) and they'd be roaring along, now, with a great turn over.
General Motors didn't do so and they WON'T. Why not?
Well, in a desperate bid to generate cash-flow, General Motors sold the division off to their competitors...whom, I am SURE will not be allowed to make Road Vehicles of ANY nature under the terms of sale.
This and this ALONE should convince you that the twerps at the top of the the average corporation would find it difficult to stop being so damn SELF-interested and start to be interested in running the company properly.
But I'm certain you can find other examples of sheer management "incompetence" that always magically turns out to be highly profitable for the executives who always hide behind the idea of "incompetence", when it's actually blatant corruption.
I certainly can think of other examples: Ever heard of Wackenhut?
It was the HOTTEST property in the 1990's - hotels without doorknobs (prisons).
If you have ever read "The Best Democracy Money Can Buy", then you'll know why Wackenhut ended up under investigation for the wide-spread sexual abuse of prisoners and why they managed to have many deaths among prisoners and guards.
And you'll know why they ended up under investigation for various fraudulent practices (much like Haliburton is under investigation for over-charging the US army), and eventually the company went broke, but NOT until after it had set up (and been kicked out of) various "Illegal Immigrant Detention Centres" in Australia that have specialised in deporting Australian Citizens. Illegally . The media (in Australia) have been UNUSUALLY quiet about all that.
And just HOW did Wackenhut's shareholders benefit from what the company was doing?
Answer: They lost MILLIONS.
If you HAVEN'T read "The Best Democracy Money Can Buy" (it's by an American, Greg Palast), please do so.
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('jtmorgan', 'I') think because I don't predict the decline of the current dominator culture with peak oil, you're assuming I want to keep it around. It's actually the exact opposite - it needs to go, but I think everyone who's hoping that peak oil will make it happen in one decisive inferno is kidding themselves, and perhaps doing less to change the culture than they could be.
I quite acknowledge what you';re saying, and agree with the last sentence totally - as I keep asking "Do people really beleive that Post Peak Oil Everyone and Everything will be all goodness, niceness and happiness?" I posit that such a Post Peak Oil Society will most DEFINITELY not be very nice, no matter how it turns out.
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('jtmorgan', 'G')lobal cultural and economic activity is not as black and white, as instantly decisive, as many on this board would like to believe.
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'T')hus your inability to understand what Peak Oil is all about.
What is peak oil all about? It's about reaching the peak production rate of oil in the ground, what's going to happen, and what as individuals we can and should do.
