Peak Oil: What are the Facts?

[cienaños]

Forgive me if there is a thread on this already. A cursory search led me to none.

So I finally watched the documentary "Collapse" recently and I gotta say I was floored. Going off the limited knowledge I have, my understanding is that the fossil fuel OIL will run out at some point within or around a hundred years. In the doc, Ruppert makes it sound like it'll happen a lot sooner. He also pretty much dismantles all of the alternative fuel ideas. Convincingly.

What are the facts?

 

[MRC_Hans]

(Some of) the facts are that:

- Oil supplies are indeed limited, but there are still large deposits that remain unexploited, because they are not cost-effective to exploit with the current price level.

- Alternative sources are picking up and, put together, and augmented by energy savings, have the potential to entirely supplant fossil fuel.

- Oil can, at the cost of increaded emissions, be replaced by products derived from coal. The supply of coal is also limited, but vastly greater than that of oil.

- The 'peak oil' scenario implies that both the supply of, and demand for, oil are both inflexible, but they are not.

- We may well be heading for grave trouble, but hardly total disaster.

Hans

 

[drkitten]

Forgive me if there is a thread on this already. A cursory search led me to none.

So I finally watched the documentary "Collapse" recently and I gotta say I was floored. Going off the limited knowledge I have, my understanding is that the fossil fuel OIL will run out at some point within or around a hundred years. In the doc, Ruppert makes it sound like it'll happen a lot sooner. He also pretty much dismantles all of the alternative fuel ideas. Convincingly.

The idea that oil will run out within the next hundred years is unsupported either by theory or by evidence. Theory states that the resource exploitation curve is symmetric, which is to say that it will take us just as long to work down from the peak as it did to work up to the peak. If you take the first oil well (the Drake well, 1859) as the start of the oil industry and use 1999 as the peak, we'd expect to see "the end of oil" in about 2139.

As Hans pointed out, the problem is economic, not technical. We have more oil than we can exploit at current price levels. We have more alternative energy forms than we can exploit at current price levels. As oil rises in price, this will obviously change.

In particular, uranium in seawater is almost commercially viable to harvest; it would be commercially viable if the price of energy doubled. There's enough oceanic uranium to power the world (allowing for an extension of current growth rates in aggregate demand) for something like another 40,000 years.

So you can probably expect some nasty transitions over the next century as people figure out how to make electric cars work, but once the transportation industry switches to electric, the demand for oil will drop dramatically, and we're back to yet another "new paradigm."

 

[dudalb]

The idea that oil will run out within the next hundred years is unsupported either by theory or by evidence. Theory states that the resource exploitation curve is symmetric, which is to say that it will take us just as long to work down from the peak as it did to work up to the peak. If you take the first oil well (the Drake well, 1859) as the start of the oil industry and use 1999 as the peak, we'd expect to see "the end of oil" in about 2139.

As Hans pointed out, the problem is economic, not technical. We have more oil than we can exploit at current price levels. We have more alternative energy forms than we can exploit at current price levels. As oil rises in price, this will obviously change.

In particular, uranium in seawater is almost commercially viable to harvest; it would be commercially viable if the price of energy doubled. There's enough oceanic uranium to power the world (allowing for an extension of current growth rates in aggregate demand) for something like another 40,000 years.

So you can probably expect some nasty transitions over the next century as people figure out how to make electric cars work, but once the transportation industry switches to electric, the demand for oil will drop dramatically, and we're back to yet another "new paradigm."

So in Fifty years the skies will not be empty as aviation becomes a thing of the past, as some of the Peak Oil advocates predict?
Of course I notice that a lot of the Peak Oil advocates seem to be Major League LUddites who hate modern society and dream of a returning to a simpler pre industrial age.....

 

[Sword_Of_Truth]

Forgive me if there is a thread on this already. A cursory search led me to none.

So I finally watched the documentary "Collapse" recently and I gotta say I was floored. Going off the limited knowledge I have, my understanding is that the fossil fuel OIL will run out at some point within or around a hundred years. In the doc, Ruppert...

BZZZZZTTT!!! 9/11 truther alert.

9/11 truthers are the most spectacularly scientifically ignorant people in the world. Going off documentaries by anti-semites, racists, terrorist sympathizers and borderline sex offenders like Michael C. Ruppert isn't the best way to reach a logical conclusion.

 

[rjh01]

The way I see it the problem is to do with the price of oil. This will go up and down with more ups than downs. It will be a matter of what people will pay. How much are you willing to pay for the petrol (gas) for your car? Does your electricity company produce electricity by burning oil? If so that would go up too.

There are alternatives to oil. However they must be developed. This takes time. They also could be more expensive than the current price of oil. If the price of oil went down then the investors could lose their money. So it is very risky for investors to invest in alternatives. Worse until they are developed the world risks going into another recession as the price of oil goes up and all the money goes to a few companies and countries that have the oil.

As to dudalb's point about aircraft. No I do not see that there will be no aircraft in the future. Just that a plane ticket be much more expensive in real terms. So there would be fewer of them.

 

[Sword_Of_Truth]

As to dudalb's point about aircraft. No I do not see that there will be no aircraft in the future. Just that a plane ticket be much more expensive in real terms. So there would be fewer of them.

Oh there will be aircraft in the future. They're just too damn useful for there not to be.

While petroleum is unlikely to ever be toppled as aviations ideal fuel source, there's no requirement for it to be natural petroleum. There are multiple processes that have been developed that strip carbon from CO₂ from the air and hydrogen from water and use them to create synthetic hydrocarbons which can then be upgraded into artificial gasoline and kerosene. All they really need is a large enough energy source to run the process.

Since the carbon for these fuels would come from the air itself, they would effectively have no carbon footprint to their use (if one uses nuclear power to run the system).

 

[drkitten]

So in Fifty years the skies will not be empty as aviation becomes a thing of the past, as some of the Peak Oil advocates predict?

Almost certainly not, but unless we can find an affordable substitute for aviation gas, they may be a lot emptier as people switch use high-speed electric rail and teleconferencing.

 

[MRC_Hans]

Almost certainly not, but unless we can find an affordable substitute for aviation gas, they may be a lot emptier as people switch use high-speed electric rail and teleconferencing.

Not to mention new aviation technology. Electrical and solar powered planes have flown. New types of lighter than air craft have been built. Currently, they are completely useless for any practical purpose, but so is every newborn child.

Hans

 

[Eddie Dane]

I was caught up in the Peak Oil doom "logic" big-time in 2005.

I read everything I could find on the subject, but only looked in the Peak Oil echo chamber of doom.

It triggered a serious depression in me and really expected industrialised civilization to contract. The implications being starvation, contracting populations, much lower living standards, a return to high infant-mortality rates, war over remaining resources etc.

I had just become a parent and even regretted having a child at this unfortunate pivotal time in history.

In short: I was in crisis.

Thanks to a good friend, the blog Peak Oil Debunked and this forum I have a much broader view of the subject. And I can be positive about the future again.

The PO doom-sphere works much like the Truther echo-chamber. It is ideologically driven and the writers and Youtube "film makers" make sure that they keep the data-set limited. As in: anything that disproves their theory is not in their book/film.

PO is a serious problem, but these days I actually think that fossil-fuel depletion will lead to better future with much cleaner technologies.

Even the most rabid eco-weeny will drop his opposition to nuclear after eating raw food in the dark for a while. In fact, probably a long time before that situation will actually develop.

ETA:
For your reading pleasure: http://peakoildebunked.blogspot.com/

 

[Eddie Dane]

Oh, I have my eye on a beauty of a car.

Usually I buy very fuel efficient cars, but this time I'm in love with a 2,7 litre diesel monster. ( a limo, not an SUV, you barbarian)

Might just go for it.

 

[jargon buster]

If I live another 50 years I will be lucky, so as long as things last until then I couldnt care less what happens after Im gone.
And quite frankly neither should anyone else.
Im not prepared to sit at home scared of using recources to try and make sure it lasts another 300 years, lifes for living, not walking around in hemp sack cloths instead of clothes.

Why do people bleat on about "Oh what about the children and their futures", the next generations will find a way to survive and its patronising for others to assume they wont.

 

[timhau]

Oh, I have my eye on a beauty of a car.

Usually I buy very fuel efficient cars, but this time I'm in love with a 2,7 litre diesel monster.

Well, modern diesels are pretty fuel-efficient. Even the big ones with a lot of oomph.

(says he and glances out the office window into the parking lot, where his Toyota Yaris 1.4D sits, gathering snow)

 

[A'isha]

Forgive me if there is a thread on this already. A cursory search led me to none.

So I finally watched the documentary "Collapse" recently and I gotta say I was floored. Going off the limited knowledge I have, my understanding is that the fossil fuel OIL will run out at some point within or around a hundred years. In the doc, Ruppert makes it sound like it'll happen a lot sooner. He also pretty much dismantles all of the alternative fuel ideas. Convincingly.

Ruppert is also a crackpot who thought that hurricanes Katrina and Rita back in 2005 meant "the United States is finished; not only as a superpower, but possibly even as a single, unified nation" and FEMA would have trouble trying to "preserve even a functioning part of America’s governing and economic infrastructure."

And in 2008, he predicted "by the end of next summer, as the corn comes in, this nation will be sensing that it is in the grips of something ten times worse than the Great Depression... Shock and Awe. By then you can forget about ethanol. People will be screaming for food."

And that in early January 2009, he thought that Obama, right after his inauguration, was going to "tell people that the collapse of industrialized civilization is coming," complete with multiple 700-point-per-day drops in the Dow, "50-75 new Executive Orders [that] will be announced within 72 hours of the inauguration," and that as a result he had "concluded that it may be just a matter of weeks before we start seeing major disruptions in everyday life."

He's also a 9/11 Truther, who thinks that Dick Cheney and Wall Street collaborated with the perpetrators of the attacks, and even wrote a huge book about it.

What are the facts?

Oil on Earth is finite. We will reach a point where we can no longer extract large quantities from the crust.

Everything else is speculation.

 

[gnome]

If I live another 50 years I will be lucky, so as long as things last until then I couldnt care less what happens after Im gone.
And quite frankly neither should anyone else.
Im not prepared to sit at home scared of using recources to try and make sure it lasts another 300 years, lifes for living, not walking around in hemp sack cloths instead of clothes.

Why do people bleat on about "Oh what about the children and their futures", the next generations will find a way to survive and its patronising for others to assume they wont.

There is another side to this--the distinction between preservation and conservation, for one thing. The ideal philosophy is not necessarily to use as few resources as possible. However, there's a place for avoiding waste, which could be defined as excess use of resources without proportional utility--bad habits that don't really make us better off or more comfortable, or at least not very much compared to the cost in resources. In addition, using technology to increase efficiency enriches both ourselves and future generations.

I get where you're coming from, but too often I hear it used as an argument against reasonable conservation, developing efficiency, and paying attention to sustainability of critical resources. It is when that attention is out of balance that a problem results.

 

[Kookwatcher]

The idea that oil will run out within the next hundred years is unsupported either by theory or by evidence. Theory states that the resource exploitation curve is symmetric, which is to say that it will take us just as long to work down from the peak as it did to work up to the peak. If you take the first oil well (the Drake well, 1859) as the start of the oil industry and use 1999 as the peak, we'd expect to see "the end of oil" in about 2139.

Assuming that's true, every millimetre of that descending curve will mean economic pain.

As Hans pointed out, the problem is economic, not technical. We have more oil than we can exploit at current price levels. We have more alternative energy forms than we can exploit at current price levels. As oil rises in price, this will obviously change.

But when you talk about cost, don't just think of monetary cost but energy cost as well. If you're burning more energy to extract the fuel than you get from the fuel itself - because it's less accessible, or lower grade and more difficult to process - then you will have no incentive to extract it.

I used to be incredibly gloomy and depressed about peak oil, just like Eddie Dane above and in the same time frame. I'm more optimistic now - I don't by any means think we're headed for a new dark age, but it's going to be rough because even now I don't see us retooling fast enough.

Best case scenario is we'll see scant economic growth over the next few decades and we'll have to get used to the idea that we can't just grow our way into future prosperity. I do hope I'm wrong. But in hindsight it does look like fuel prices were the pin that popped the mortgage and derivatives bubble (something would have popped it eventually of course) by applying the brakes to growth. I just can't see high fuel price not being a drag on the global economy.

Someone cheer me up.

 

[Nosi]

Forgive me if there is a thread on this already. A cursory search led me to none.

So I finally watched the documentary "Collapse" recently and I gotta say I was floored. Going off the limited knowledge I have, my understanding is that the fossil fuel OIL will run out at some point within or around a hundred years. In the doc, Ruppert makes it sound like it'll happen a lot sooner. He also pretty much dismantles all of the alternative fuel ideas. Convincingly.

What are the facts?

I am more worried about the world's fresh water supplies. Admittedly, Earth cycles water, but getting supplies into drinkable condition takes effort and regional supplies can and are stretched to breaking point. Note crowded western states Las Vagas, California, Arizona among others in the US, then China and Mexico.

 

[jargon buster]

I am more worried about the world's fresh water supplies. Admittedly, Earth cycles water, but getting supplies into drinkable condition takes effort and regional supplies can and are stretched to breaking point.

move to the UK it has loads of water, my back garden is like a paddy field at the moment.

 

[drkitten]

If I live another 50 years I will be lucky, so as long as things last until then I couldnt care less what happens after Im gone.

That seems unnecessarily selfish.

Why do people bleat on about "Oh what about the children and their futures",

Because they love their children. Even the childless ones typically have neices or children of friends that they recognize will have needs.

the next generations will find a way to survive and its patronising for others to assume they wont.

Most people think that "find a way to survive" is a rather low bar to set; while you may be happy with the idea that your grandchildren will be killing game (or the tribe next door) with a flint hatchet and eating it raw, but I'd rather like for my young relatives to have a life at least as nice as the one I have.

Especially since it's not that big a hardship. Despite the claims of peak oil, building renewable infrastructure isn't that hard; as I pointed out, there's thousands of years of uranium available if we just build the damn power plants. And designing electrical planes is a fun challenge for those of an engineering bent.

 

[drkitten]

Someone cheer me up.

There's 40,000 years worth of uranium in the ocean, uranium that with today's technology can supply energy at the equivalent of about $7-$10/gallon. And, of course, technology only improves....

So there's quite a hard limit of how bad that economic pain can get.