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Is "Peak Oil" really that bad?

General discussions of the systemic, societal and civilisational effects of depletion.
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Re: Is "Peak Oil" really that bad?

Unread postby Lighthouse » Wed 28 Nov 2007, 19:28:44

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('steam_cannon', '[')b]Riots begin again in Paris suburbs (Monday, November 26 2007)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7112497.stm
http://www.peakoil.com/fortopic34331.html

As free energy wains so does industry and jobs, prices rise, then riots come. It's not that bad, if you like fire...
Image


Excuse me? The riots are reported to have begun shortly after two teens, from a now largely Muslim immigrant area of the northern Paris suburb Villiers-le-Bel, ran through a red light and into a police car with their motorbike. The teens, who were not wearing helmets, died from their encounter with the car. Apparently, this was just the trigger needed for the other “youth” immigrants to renew riots in France!

What has this to do with peak oil?

PS: Its really funny how everything is now peak oil related.

Joe: "My wife does not sleep with me anymore"

Jim: "Yep, As free energy wains so does industry and jobs, prices rise, your wife will lock you out of the bedroom more often"
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Re: Is "Peak Oil" really that bad?

Unread postby Lighthouse » Wed 28 Nov 2007, 19:34:45

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('MonteQuest', 'F')ossil fuels.

And just because we are feeding 6.7 billion does not mean we haven't exceeded the ability of the earth to tolerate such numbers...


Sorry, but we are carrying the load of 6.6 billion right now and still are able - in the US alone - to waste nearly 100 billion pounds of fresh vegetables, fruits, milk, and grain products by retailers, restaurants, and consumers. Now add the food wasted in Europe, Australia, rich parts of Asia etc.

Please explain how we can waste all of that, and say, yep we have reached the carrying capacity of this planet, worse we have overshot a lot.
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Re: Is "Peak Oil" really that bad?

Unread postby steam_cannon » Wed 28 Nov 2007, 20:23:26

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Lighthouse', 'S')orry, but we are carrying the load of 6.6 billion right now and still are able - in the US alone - to waste nearly 100 billion pounds, including fresh vegetables, fruits, milk, and grain products by retailers, restaurants, and consumers. Now add the food wasted in Europe, Australia, rich parts of Asia etc. and add it up.

Please explain how we can waste all of that, and say, yep we have reached the carrying capacity of this planet, worse we have overshot a lot.
Wasting food only starts to matter when it gets expensive because farms can't keep up with demand. And it looks like we've reached the point where population is using more then farms can produce, even with plentiful petrochemical inputs boosting production.

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('energybulletin', '
')World Grain Stocks Fall to 57 Days of Consumption: Grain Prices Starting to Rise (2006)

ImageImage

This year’s world grain harvest is projected to fall short of consumption by 61 million tons, marking the sixth time in the last seven years that production has failed to satisfy demand. As a result of these shortfalls, world carryover stocks at the end of this crop year are projected to drop to 57 days of consumption, the shortest buffer since the 56-day-low in 1972 that triggered a doubling of grain prices.

http://www.energybulletin.net/17261.html
Presently with our good weather and good times, world grain production is falling behind and drawing down stored grain to make up for demand. The market has not been able to respond to shortages for several years in a row. And probably, the market isn't responding because it can't respond.

100 billion pounds or waste = 45359237000 kilograms
61 million short tons below demand = 55338269140 kilograms

shortage - waste
55338269140 - 45359237000 = 9979032140 kilograms
9979032140 kilograms = 22 billion pounds

Even if we subtracted the waste you mentioned, we are still running 22 billion pounds short. So it's likely stuff like that will start showing up as higher food costs to consumers. And of course if the short falls gets large enough famine comes next. Whatever happens, all indicators are pointing towards food production being more difficult.

At a minimum this suggests food prices will be going up. But how high? Well that depends on a number of factors, like how bad we've messed up our climate.

Warmer Earth may slash farm yields
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16042134/

Image
America’s Breadbasket Moves to Canada (2006 Article)
http://thelede.blogs.nytimes.com/2006/1 ... to-canada/

The oil we eat
For every 1 calories on your dinner plate 10 calories of oil was burnt.
http://www.ofbyandfor.org/node/view/285

Fertilizer Prices Soar
"The cost of anhydrous ammonia has nearly doubled, due to the skyrocketing price of natural gas, which is used to manufacture the popular nitrogen fertilizer."
http://nationalhogfarmer.com/mag/farmin ... lue_rises/

---------------------------------------------------------------------------

Demand is already outstripping production and as we run out of cheap petrochemicals, farm production will slip even further meaning the gap between supply and demand will grow. Ultimately, if a population won't be able to produce enough food for itself in the future, that population is in overshoot. Like a man falling out of an airplane without a parachute. He hasn't hit the ground yet, but it's coming.

I'll rephrase what you're saying in context of this analogy...
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'S')orry, but we have 6.6 billion people falling to the earth right now and they still haven't hit the ground, so there is no need to worry...
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Re: Is "Peak Oil" really that bad?

Unread postby Heineken » Wed 28 Nov 2007, 23:22:46

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Lighthouse', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Heineken', 'L')ighthouse, carrying capacity is not the same thing as population. They differ in a critical way that is the crux of this entire discussion.


I disagree. The carrying capacity of the planet is in direct relation with the lifestyle of the population. And it is only periphery related to peak oil.

Keep in mind that we live on a planet where resources are on the one hand wasted in way that's unbelievable. If you share this resources in a fair way our carrying capacity would be much higher. Unfortunately most of the rich countries have a "non negotiable way of life".

If all of us live like the average American the planet could carry just 1,2 billion. On the other end of the scale is Africa. If all of us live like the average African the planet could carry at least 12 billion.


And is that your goal? To live like the average African?

Maybe if we lived like the "Soylent Green" masses, we could make it to 20 billion?

Does quality matter, or is quantity the important goal? Maximum people, living any which way?

"The dignity of man is not realized in a packed and dirty room." (I quote myself from elsewhere on the Internet.) To say nothing of the natural world.

One of the many problems with your analysis is that it faces backwards, not forwards. The current population (including Africa's) is in place because of all the wonderful benefits fossil fuels brought us in the many decades leading to now. Medicines, fertilizers, cheap 'n' easy food, roads and transportation, nimble and fantastically powerful machinery, cheap building materials . . . on and on AND ON; see link for fractional list:

http://www.anwr.org/features/oiluses.htm

For many of these things, there simply are no affordable, abundant substitutes without oil, NG, and coal.

As fossil fuels decline, the benefits wink out or become unaffordable for more and more people. Lifespans shorten. The population falls, especially as it rams into the eroded carrying capacity and global warming (itself a direct byproduct of the oil age).

The healthy natural conditions that sustained the preindustrial civilization are now diseased or deceased. There was always another pristine natural frontier to exploit; no longer. When the fuel that drives the industrial civilization becomes constrained, the impact of the eroded resource base comes fully into play. Like a face from behind a mask. That's what MonteQuest means when he refers to the "phantom" carrying capacity. It's not really there at all.
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Re: Is "Peak Oil" really that bad?

Unread postby steam_cannon » Wed 28 Nov 2007, 23:41:18

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Lighthouse', 'P')S: Its really funny how everything is now peak oil related.

Poor Joe: "My wife does not sleep with me anymore"

Sharp Jim: "Yep, As free energy wains so does industry and jobs, prices rise, your wife will lock you out of the bedroom more often"
This comment may have been intended to incite argument, but I like it anyway, it's very creative! :lol:

And I could see that happening...

The Natural Gas Fertiliser plant closes and Joe loses his job, his vapid TV-trance wife thinks he's just a loser...

Poor Joe: "My wife does not sleep with me anymore"

Sharp Jim: "Yep, As free energy wains so does industry and jobs, prices rise, your wife will lock you out of the bedroom more often"

Seriously though, does anybody think the great depression was a boon for peoples sex lives? You might as well say, gee its really funny how everything is now great depression related. In 1929 the great depression had a big influence. In our time it's overpopulation leading peak oil and climate change.

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 's')uburban area... residents... have complained that the government had not lived up to promises it made, after last year's nationwide rampage, to improve living conditions and employment opportunities...
http://tinyurl.com/265dqh
The explosive tension in France has to do with it's jobless suburban residents. Whose problems are due to a lack of industry relating to energy... Call it a peak oil problem, call it a problem due to overpopulation and scarce resources... Call it racial tension in response to joblessness... Whatever you want to call it, it's real and we are likely to see the same. We've lost industry, suburbia is losing it's home values and getting ever more entrenched in debt... Eventually the hens are going to come home to roost for us too.

However...
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Lighthouse', 'E')xcuse me? The riots are...
No, there's no excuse for you're lack of depth.
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Re: Is "Peak Oil" really that bad?

Unread postby Lighthouse » Wed 28 Nov 2007, 23:42:23

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Heineken', 'A')nd is that your goal? To live like the average African?

Maybe if we lived like the "Soylent Green" masses, we could make it to 20 billion?


No I just wanted to demonstrate the range of the scale of carrying capacity related to lifestyle issues.

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Heineken', 'D')oes quality matter, or is quantity the important goal? Maximum people, living any which way...{and so on}


Ok I see. You are saying in other words half of the worlds population has to die in order to maintain your western lifestyle.

@steam_cannon

Yes grain production is declining. All we have to do to compensate is eat less meat. Between 1950 and 1994, global meat production increased nearly fourfold, rising faster than the human population. During this period, production rates jumped from 18 kg/person to 35.4 kg/person (Brown and Kane 1994; FAO 1997). The combined weight of the world’s 15 billion farm animals now surpasses that of the human population by more than a factor of 1.5.

In many countries, the affluent are eating the most meat, often at the expense of poorer people who depend on grain supplies increasingly diverted to feed livestock. In China, grain consumption by livestock has increased by a factor of five since 1978 (Gardner 1996).

Any discussion of overpopulation should surely include domesticated animals that, like people, depend on food, water, shelter, and mechanisms for heating, cooling, and transport. The many farm animals are straining resources and causing environmental harm as a result of their voracious appetites for feed crops and grazing.

At Toronto’s 1992 Royal Agricultural Winter Fair, Agriculture Canada displayed two contrasting statistics: “it takes four football fields of land (about 1.6 hectares) to feed each Canadian” and “one apple tree produces enough fruit to make 320 pies.” Think about it — a couple of apple trees and a few rows of wheat on a mere fraction of a hectare could produce enough food for one person!
Last edited by Lighthouse on Wed 28 Nov 2007, 23:44:21, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Is "Peak Oil" really that bad?

Unread postby steam_cannon » Wed 28 Nov 2007, 23:43:30

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Heineken', 'T')he dignity of man is not realized in a packed and dirty room.
Beautiful words Heineken.
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Re: Is "Peak Oil" really that bad?

Unread postby Lighthouse » Wed 28 Nov 2007, 23:49:27

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('steam_cannon', '.').. The explosive tension in France has to do with it's jobless suburban residents. Whose problems are due to a lack of industry relating to energy... Call it a peak oil problem, call it a problem due to overpopulation and scarce resources... Call it racial tension in response to joblessness... Whatever you want to call it, it's real and we are likely to see the same. We've lost industry, suburbia is losing it's home values and getting ever more entrenched in debt... Eventually the hens are going to come home to roost for us too.

However...
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Lighthouse', 'E')xcuse me? The riots are...
No, there's no excuse for you're lack of depth.




Besides quoting totally out of context, are you seriously claiming the riots in France are caused by Peak Oil and not because two hoons on a motorbike killed themselves by running over a red light into a police car?

In other words you claiming all social unrest in human history are caused by Peak Oil? And you are accusing me of lack of depth.

Thank you for clarifying that ...
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Re: Is "Peak Oil" really that bad?

Unread postby MonteQuest » Wed 28 Nov 2007, 23:59:47

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Lighthouse', ' ')If all of us live like the average African the planet could carry at least 12 billion.


Please cite a peer-reviewed study to support this claim.
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Re: Is "Peak Oil" really that bad?

Unread postby roccman » Thu 29 Nov 2007, 00:07:42

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('MonteQuest', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Lighthouse', ' ')If all of us live like the average African the planet could carry at least 12 billion.


Please cite a peer-reviewed study to support this claim.


ahhhhhhhhhhhhhh...

LH meet Monte...

Nice!!
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Re: Is "Peak Oil" really that bad?

Unread postby MonteQuest » Thu 29 Nov 2007, 00:10:19

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Lighthouse', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('MonteQuest', 'F')ossil fuels.

And just because we are feeding 6.7 billion does not mean we haven't exceeded the ability of the earth to tolerate such numbers...


Sorry, but we are carrying the load of 6.6 billion right now and still are able - in the US alone - to waste nearly 100 billion pounds of fresh vegetables, fruits, milk, and grain products by retailers, restaurants, and consumers. Now add the food wasted in Europe, Australia, rich parts of Asia etc.

Please explain how we can waste all of that, and say, yep we have reached the carrying capacity of this planet, worse we have overshot a lot.


Carrying capacity is not about how many people you can feed.

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Catton', 'W')hat is meant by an environment's carrying capacity for a given kind of creature living in a given way of life, is the maximum persistently feasible load. It's a load just short of what would begin damaging that environment's ability to support life of that kind.

The more there are of us and the larger our energy/resource consumption footprint, the harder it is for the environment to provide the three basic categories of services upon which all life is dependent: an environment from which we obtain energy to live, in which to carry on life's activities, and into which to discard our metabolic products.


We are not "carrying the load."

Look at global warming, top soil loss, loss of critical habitat, loss of biodiversity, air and water pollution, etc.
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Re: Is "Peak Oil" really that bad?

Unread postby steam_cannon » Thu 29 Nov 2007, 00:13:44

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Lighthouse', '[')u]Ok I see. You are saying in other words half of the worlds population has to die in order to maintain your western lifestyle.
In this context you're words look argumentative. How about you just be direct.

When I lived in Ukraine, people there did not live a western lifestyle. They did not eat much meat, they mostly used public transportation, most people had Dachas small farms of their own. Never the less, their population is still dying off due to a strangled economy. The breadbasket of Russia, now they suffer from increasing climate change problems like drought. There industry is getting choked off by competition with Europe for natural gas. And consequently their population is dwindling. Reduced carrying capacity means that as these wonderful free energy resources run down, even the most eco-friendly people will lose numbers.
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Re: Is "Peak Oil" really that bad?

Unread postby Lighthouse » Thu 29 Nov 2007, 01:15:29

Weekly food consumption

USA

Image

Chad

Image

Ok, I spent this morning doing some research on overpopulation.

I wanted to be a cornucopian! Now I'm on my way to become a doomer.

The rest of the day you can find me at the bar ...
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Re: Is "Peak Oil" really that bad?

Unread postby MonteQuest » Thu 29 Nov 2007, 01:52:35

Lighthouse,

You need to read Overshoot: The Ecological Basis for Revolutionary Change by William Catton.

You don't have a clue about what you are talking about.

Here are some links to some excerpts:

Dependence on Phantom Carrying Capacity

Industrialization: Prelude to Collapse

Especially read this one:

The Problem of Denial of Overshoot
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Re: Is "Peak Oil" really that bad?

Unread postby Lighthouse » Thu 29 Nov 2007, 02:06:56

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('MonteQuest', 'L')ighthouse,

You need to read Overshoot: The Ecological Basis for Revolutionary Change by William Catton.

You don't have a clue about what you are talking about.

Here are some links to some excerpts:

Dependence on Phantom Carrying Capacity

Industrialization: Prelude to Collapse

Especially read this one:

The Problem of Denial of Overshoot


I admitted already that I was wrong.

Now leave me alone I will be totally drunk at least for the next three weeks ....
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Re: Is "Peak Oil" really that bad?

Unread postby OneStepAtATime » Thu 29 Nov 2007, 02:39:53

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Colorado-Valley', 'W')ell, I personally don't appreciate having to pay the extra $2,000 a year to the oil companies that depletion has cost me so far.

My feeling is that Exxon already has enough money.


8)


Sell your car. Save the loan payment, insurance and registration as well as what goes to Exxon.

Walk anywhere less than 3 miles. Take the bus or other mass transit otherwise.
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Re: Is "Peak Oil" really that bad?

Unread postby peripato » Thu 29 Nov 2007, 02:46:27

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Lighthouse', 'T')hanks for asking The last 5 years were the best of my life! I made more money than in the 40 years before.

All of us are drawn at some time by the temptations had by economic growth, which offers up the possibility of easy riches and sumptuous lifestyles'. We offer up the finite resources of the world in exchange for material things which are ultimately of a transitory physical and emotional nature. This is the trap that is leading us further into overshoot as more and more people are able to act upon the contagion of consumerism than ever before.

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'T')he last year or so I've tried to save the world through permaculture. Needless to say that it did not work out for the world ...

It takes time to get good at gardening, especially something as sophisticated as permaculture, which ultimately is about the establishment of a new (perma)nent agrarian culture, which was Bill Mollison’s original vision. We're talking generations, something that is not in keeping with our desire for immediate gratification and quick fixes.

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'F')or the traffic jams...

Too many cars or too many people?

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'O')k, I spent this morning doing some research on overpopulation.

I wanted to be a cornucopian! Now I'm on my way to become a doomer.

The rest of the day you can find me at the bar ...

Take it easy buddy. It takes a lot of courage to do what you did.
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Re: Is "Peak Oil" really that bad?

Unread postby steam_cannon » Thu 29 Nov 2007, 04:38:38

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('peripato', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Lighthouse', 'O')k, I spent this morning doing some research on overpopulation.

I wanted to be a cornucopian! Now I'm on my way to become a doomer.

The rest of the day you can find me at the bar ...

Take it easy buddy. It takes a lot of courage to do what you did.
It certainly does take courage to put ones ideas on the line. Also I'll add that it shows you have a great deal of mental flexibility, being able to see other points of view. And that you were seriously interested in an answer to the question "Is "Peak Oil" really that bad?".

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Lighthouse', 'N')ow leave me alone I will be totally drunk at least for the next three weeks ....
Well there's nothing wrong about taking a respite to put it all together...
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Re: Is "Peak Oil" really that bad?

Unread postby steam_cannon » Thu 29 Nov 2007, 04:56:56

By the way, that's a great photo shoot of food around the world...
I've seen it before, the funniest was on a Russian blog where they said the Americans should throw all that junk food away!
Image Image
http://www.fixingtheplanet.com/one-week ... our-planet
http://seventhreadsstudios.blogspot.com ... world.html

I think the picture of Chad is an interesting image because it is perhaps what many people here envision America turning into as food and energy disruptions mount. Also interesting is how high fuel prices are devastating the Third World with problems that will eventually be our problems.

Peak Oil Hits the Third World
http://www.energyandcapital.com/article ... rtages/490
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Re: Is "Peak Oil" really that bad?

Unread postby Lighthouse » Thu 29 Nov 2007, 06:34:36

Still sober. Busy reading.

One more question:

Lets assume for a moment there were no peak oil. Population overshoot would still become a massive problem?
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