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Low Hanging Fruit

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General interest discussions, not necessarily related to depletion.
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Re: Low Hanging Fruit

Postby entropyfails » Sun 17 Apr 2005, 13:15:22

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('JohnDenver', '
')Here's another:
If the extraction of commodities becomes harder and harder by the year, then why do they keep getting cheaper and cheaper?


I'll take this specific point on JD and I think you'll agree it doesn't hold up as a refutation of this “Low Hanging Fruit” thing.

The price of the commodity will get cheaper and cheaper as long as the rate of supply grows faster than the demand in growth. Agreed?

We have peaked out on no other commodity but whale oil. Agreed?

Hence we should see commodity prices having a downward historic trend due to the ever increasing supply which out paces demand growth.

Prices will always go down on the upside of a peak. They jump up after the peak happens.
Image

Hence your price comparisons have no meaning because historic prices say nothing about the post-peak situation, excepting the whale oil situation, which lends itself towards high prices.

I don't see LDR as proving a peak must happen. Let us look at this “tree” metaphor that you like to use in this explanation of this theory. We'll roughly base the tree on EROEI and energy density and we'll use gravity to denote difficulty in harvesting as you have in your posts.
$this->bbcode_second_pass_code('', '
[Wood]
[Coal] [Fission]
|
[Wind] \
/ | |
[Oil] | [Natural Gas]
| | \
[Fusion] | [Solar]
|
|
')
Note that Oil sits lower than coal, it takes much less work to get oil out of the ground than to extract coal.

Fusion and fusion derived energy processes (ie solar) sit at the lowest possible spot in our tree by physical law. They also have the highest technical barrier.

If we don't get fusion or 99 % solar nanotech built panels, then we truly will have picked all the low hanging fruit and have to run back up to the higher fruit. If we do develop these technologies in time, then our civilization will continue until it destroys itself by killing the biodiversity it lives off of. We have a crisis either way.

I think the real argument goes, we won't have time to develop these technologies while we have to climb our way back up the energy tree. It doesn't prove anything, it rests as a theory with some evidence for it. Time will either prove or disprove it.

I think you had the tree upside down in your head an thus found a logic fault with the idea. It makes more sense when you look at it this way, don't you think?
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Postby nero » Sun 17 Apr 2005, 14:56:22

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'S')o why exactly is Low Fruit relevant? What does it really prove?



I personally think that the restricted LHF observation that given a choice people pick the low hanging fruit first is obvious. Surely we have no argument there. Attempting to compare the cost of picking fruit with two different levels of technology is going well beyond that simple observation. I don't believe that the "restricted LHF" is relevant to oil depletion other than to explain why oil companies cannot simply double their effort and find twice as much oil.

There is also a more controversial extended LLHF hypothesis that not only are we picking the low hanging fruit first but also the largest fruit first. In terms of oil this is Aaron's observation that we naturally tend to find the large reservoirs first because they are large and simple to find. There is very good evidence that in terms of oil this is quite true. I also believe this is applicable to scientific discovery. Does it apply to energy sources in general? I'm not so sure. I think that oil sands, oil shale are very large resources that we didn't pick first because they are not as "sweet" as other smaller resources. So then there is the comprehensive Low Large Ripe Hanging Fruit (LLRHF)hypothesis, but then we're getting silly :).
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Postby JohnDenver » Sun 17 Apr 2005, 23:23:56

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('nero', 'I') also believe this is applicable to scientific discovery.


nero, I wanted to talk a little more about this, but it's really hard to go further without agreeing (tentatively, at least) on what the terms "difficulty" and "pay-off" mean.

So how would you quantify it? I realize this is difficult, but even to a first approximation, what numbers would you use as a surrogate?

I agree that the restricted LFH is (or can be) quantitative. I would imagine that you can draw a graph of field size vs. discovery date which illustrates the principle nicely (at least on the later part of the curve).

But how do you do that for scientific progress? How do you measure "difficulty" and "pay-off" (or "significance")?
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Postby JohnDenver » Mon 18 Apr 2005, 11:41:38

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('nero', 'T')he problem I have with John's examples is that he equates monetary cost with difficulty.


I just read the Tainter essay that abelardlindsay posted:
http://www.peakoil.com/fortopic6986.html

I couldn't help but notice that Tainter equates monetary cost with difficulty. I think you find Tainter convincing, so what's the difference?
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Postby nero » Mon 18 Apr 2005, 13:40:53

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('JohnDenver', 'I') couldn't help but notice that Tainter equates monetary cost with difficulty. I think you find Tainter convincing, so what's the difference?


I do have some problems with Tainter. His discussion of the decreasing returns on science and education is one where I think he overstretches his data. I agree with his hypothesis that science is subject to decreasing returns but I don't find his evidence at all conclusive. For instance, I don't think you can compare 1960 dollars with 1900 dollars. Using monetary costs to evaluate difficulty is fine if you are comparing the same money but when the level of technology changes what you are able to buy with the money changes and therefore the money is essentially different. There is no way a simple correction factor like the CPI takes this all into account.

So while I don't have any better metric to evalualte difficulty over time other than monetary cost I do recognize the limitation of that metric as well.

To my way of thinking "difficulty" cannot be compared over time without mixing in the change of technology and change in wealth of the different time periods. But that does not mean that there isn't an absolute level of "difficulty". We can still talk about "difficulty even if it isn't a measurable quantity just like we can talk about a "demand curve" although it also isn't quantifiable.

On "significance" I again would probably use money as the best indicator of the significance of a discovery. But of course some discoveries are not immediately economically valuable but lead to further discoveries that are. The discovery of DNA for example was not of immediate economic benefit but PCR certainly was a very valuable discovery. Since the value of a discovery and all future discoveries that result from that initial discovery is fundamentally unknowable it is impossible to place a value on it.

It feels like we are discussing angels dancing on a pin head doesn't it. I think you can only get a measurable quantity at the very large scale. For instance how much value does society as a whole receive from its scientific discovery, education and technological advance. This number might be quantifiable if you were able to subtract out all the other factors from the rate of increase in GDP per capita.
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Re: Low Hanging Fruit

Postby JoeW » Mon 18 Apr 2005, 14:28:17

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('JohnDenver', '
')Here's another:
If the extraction of commodities becomes harder and harder by the year, then why do they keep getting cheaper and cheaper?
Image


I think everyone can agree that technology has enabled mankind to strip the earth of resources at an ever-increasing pace. The peak oil theory is the bold concept that the trend of many hundreds of years is suddenly going to reverse!

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('JohnDenver', '
')Here's another from Gillett's nanotech paper (thanks Lorenzo!):
"The extraordinary decrease in the cost of computing over the last few decades has already had a significant effect: the cost of domestic [oil] production since 1984 has dropped from $14 to $4/bbl, largely through information technologies (Paul, 2001)."
http://www.foresight.org/impact/GillettWhitePaper.txt

Again, this argument cuts both ways. The trend is for the cost of oil production to get cheaper, but the peak oil theory suggests that the trend is about to reverse! You have accurately depicted the events leading up to now, but any suggestion that future performance is guaranteed by past results is bad advice. Everyone believes that the sun will come up tomorrow because it has come up every morning. But scientists know that it will come up tomorrow because of the physical relationship between the earth and the sun.
We are looking for more than the observation of past events. We are looking for the scientific proof that the future holds certain events. This means that peak-oil-doomsters shouldn't just state "We can't replace oil because we never have," because it is the same thing.
Peak oil theory is mathematically irrefutable. For any finite resource, if you produce some every year, it will eventually be exhausted. Looking back at the production curve (whatever shape it may be), initial production will be zero, final production will be zero, and one year (the peak year) will stand higher than the others.
If you believe that oil production will continue forever and ever in increasing fashion, then I believe you are mad.
If you believe that the oil production peak will likely be delayed by new technologies, or if you believe that it will be insignificant because mankind will find another means of mastering energy, then you may be correct. Only time will tell who is wise and who is a fool.
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