What to do when fossil fuels run out.
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'A')ccording to Wikipedia, the most optimistic assessment of proven fossil fuel reserves is:
Coal: 417 years
Oil: 43 years
Natural gas: 167 years
This calculation assumes that reserves could be produced at a constant level for that number of years and that all of the proven reserves could be recovered, neither of which is likely to occur.
And then what?
For one thing, as Dr. Eric A. Davidson, President and Senior Scientist at Woods Hole Research Center puts it, “If we burn all known reserves of coal, oil, and natural gas, we will warm the earth by more than ten degrees Fahrenheit, creating a world unfit for civilization and the life support systems of the Earth upon which we depend. Our children and grandchildren will ask how we could have been so short-sighted and selfish.”
For another we will have accelerated the raising of sea levels by 69 feet, which will wipe out trillions of dollars worth of coastal infrastructure and will surrender sovereign territory to inundation without putting up a fight.
Actually we will have been active participants in the most monstrous act of sabotage ever perpetrated.
A team lead by Physicist Martin Hoffert estimates that by 2050 the world will need 30 terawatts of primary energy and that at least half of it will need to come from non-fossil sources.
Were it to come from fossil fuels, then global reserves would be depleted twice as fast as current projections and ten degrees Fahrenheit warming would be on us that much sooner.
By 2050 we would be out of oil, as will be the case 5 years later in any event with current consumption. And if we start converting coal and gas to liquid fuels their rates of decline will also increase.
The IEA has forecast it will take $8 trillion in investments in the oil industry over the next 25 years to maintain oil production at current levels.
Why would any diligent manager make such an investment; in an enterprise that will do at least as much damage again to the environment and will cease to be a going concern 18 years later?
So what are the renewable energy alternatives?
They are solar, wind, hydroelectricity, geothermal power, biomass, nuclear, tidal, wave power, ocean thermal energy conversion, space based solar power and salinity gradients.
In conclusion it is hard to see how Hoffert’s 15TW of renewable energy can be attained by 2050 or how the 14TW currently being produced from fossil fuels can be replaced in the absence of a large OTEC component, which seems self-evident considering the oceans are the largest hot as well as cold reservoirs on the planet.
In fact we can obtain over 80 percent of the total 2050 need from this one source and can continue to do so as long as the sun shines and the icecaps melt on a seasonal basis to replenish the ocean's cold, deep, heat sink, which OTEC would insure would continue to be the case.
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What to do when fossil fuels run out.
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Graeme - Fusion
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Re: What to do when fossil fuels run out.
by socrates1fan » Fri 14 Jun 2013, 22:38:15
It won't happen.
The system will collapse before the last bit of coal is mined or the last drop of oil is extracted.
The system will collapse before the last bit of coal is mined or the last drop of oil is extracted.
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Re: What to do when fossil fuels run out.
by Tanada » Sat 15 Jun 2013, 08:13:56
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('socrates1fan', 'I')t won't happen.
The system will collapse before the last bit of coal is mined or the last drop of oil is extracted.
The system will collapse before the last bit of coal is mined or the last drop of oil is extracted.
System collapse would have to be total to prevent local or possibly even regional levels of extraction from continuing. There are even now small scale mining operations where a family owned business mines a few tons a day for local consumption, it would take a truly total collapse to stop all of those kind of operations. Oil is different than coal in that the technology to retrieve it is much more difficult to maintain. Anyone can find picks and shovels in the left overs of civilization to mine with.
Certainly the pace of mining after a broad scale collapse would be very much lower, but it wouldn't stop entirely. Some of the salt mines in Europe and Asia are 1000 years old for example. As long as there is a demand for heating or cooking and the coal is easier to use than wood it will be.
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Alfred Tennyson', 'W')e are not now that strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are;
One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.
Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are;
One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.
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Re: What to do when fossil fuels run out.
by John_A » Sat 15 Jun 2013, 09:26:45
Fossil fuels running out is exactly what PO isn't about. Because. obviously, something else has to happen, doom and gloom, solar nirvana, whatever.
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Re: What to do when fossil fuels run out.
by ROCKMAN » Sat 15 Jun 2013, 10:58:58
John - So true. Obviously it's not a question of running out of ff's but what happens when total oil production capability drops X% of below current consumption levels. Each can pick their own X tipping point. Today consumption is moderated by price. And as we saw in 2008 a too high price sends the world into a decline with subsequent demand destruction.
But what happens if prices don't moderate consumption as they have and there's just a max oil rate available? IOW if there's monies to buy more oil than there's oil available to sell. I would offer a WAG that X need not be much more than 15% - 20% before severe global problems kick in. IOW we drop from 86 million bopd to 70 million bopd. That's a long way from "running out" of oil but still a potentially very disrupted world.
Which goes a long way IMHO to explain all the Chinese efforts to secure as much future oil production as possible. For instance it won't make any difference how much a US refiner is willing to pay for those 400,000 bopd going to the China/KSA Red Sea refinery...they won't get it. Now expand that to the unknown millions of bbls of oil China has their hooks in today and will gain in the next few years.
But what happens if prices don't moderate consumption as they have and there's just a max oil rate available? IOW if there's monies to buy more oil than there's oil available to sell. I would offer a WAG that X need not be much more than 15% - 20% before severe global problems kick in. IOW we drop from 86 million bopd to 70 million bopd. That's a long way from "running out" of oil but still a potentially very disrupted world.
Which goes a long way IMHO to explain all the Chinese efforts to secure as much future oil production as possible. For instance it won't make any difference how much a US refiner is willing to pay for those 400,000 bopd going to the China/KSA Red Sea refinery...they won't get it. Now expand that to the unknown millions of bbls of oil China has their hooks in today and will gain in the next few years.
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Re: What to do when fossil fuels run out.
by John_A » Sat 15 Jun 2013, 13:59:11
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('ROCKMAN', 'J')ohn - So true. Obviously it's not a question of running out of ff's but what happens when total oil production capability drops X% of below current consumption levels.
I would amend that idea slightly like this:
"but what happens when total oil production capability drops X% of below minimal demand levels."
Minimal demand being important because as you've noted, POD will cause substitution, thereby lowering demand as it works its wonders through the economy. With perhaps discretionary crude fuel usage in the US economy alone estimated at 50%, that is one heck of a wasteful amount to be wrung out of the system yet.
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Rockman', '
') Each can pick their own X tipping point. Today consumption is moderated by price. And as we saw in 2008 a too high price sends the world into a decline with subsequent demand destruction.
And that demand destruction is exactly why POD is such a wonderful idea. So supply drops...price spikes...and POD crushes demand, and some of that 50% of waste in at least the American economy gets squeezed that much harder. Which is why a resurgent, non-embargoed Iran is actually a BAD thing for world prices, lower prices at this point could harm the skyrocketing installation of other types of work enabling systems.Who needs EVs or their attendant infrastructure in the form of windmills and installed PV is gasoline is $1/gal?
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Rockman', '
')Which goes a long way IMHO to explain all the Chinese efforts to secure as much future oil production as possible. For instance it won't make any difference how much a US refiner is willing to pay for those 400,000 bopd going to the China/KSA Red Sea refinery...they won't get it. Now expand that to the unknown millions of bbls of oil China has their hooks in today and will gain in the next few years.
Let them gain. The economy with the ability to need less oil per unit of GDP has just been handed a HUGE competitive advantage, and I'm glad that will be the US rather than China.
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