oil and energy in the short run

[bob g]

i know we are all painfully aware of the cost of fuel, to power the car, and to fuel the home fires this winter, consider the following

i was listening to the financial talking heads today, and having followed the discussion on "peak oil" something else was added to the mixing bowl today that i guess i didn't realize fully the extent of until today.

they were discussing china today with its 1.6 billion people as opposed to our .29 billion people here in the states, kind of boggles the mind. while i knew they had us outnumbered all along what i didnt recognize was the impending demand that country has and will have in the very near future.

it is projected that within the next 10 years there will be an additional 200 million people with automobiles in china!

while i am not sure how many we have on the road today, i think it is a safe estimate that we likely don't have much more than that today, and likely not that many on the road on any given day.

china has been working hard to get contracts for oil from russia, the ukrain, a 70 billion dollar deal with Iran, and are working on Venezula for more.

it surely seems to me the impact will be severe, and will be much sooner than later.

i remember what it was like in sw kansas in 1985 when the oil fields collapsed and literally 50% of the homes in the town of 16,000 were for sale, no jobs , no nothing.

while this was a regional and severe problem then, consider what much higher fuel prices will bring to bear on a national scope.

i am glad i don't own an suv, or a huge and inefficient home with a fat mortgage. i can only see some real earth shaking realignment, and those that are stuck on the wrong side of the correction are going to be quite uncomfortable.

if all comes to pass as bad as it seems it must i suspect this board will grow by a factor of 10 if not by 1000 between here and there.

that is if they can afford or get enough power to log on.

all of this, and then consider the global impact, forget any accords reguarding global warming, does anyone think that china is going to care much about emmisions and there impacts.

well at least the dirty americans, will be the least of the problem!

i think everyone should take a good look around and inform those that are in the rut and haven't taken a look outside the furrow long enough to see where this thing is heading.

those that are off grid, and provide for themselves should fare far better than those that are not.

considering that so much of our economy depends so heavily on oil, food production, delivery systems etc, will take some pretty large upward ticks.

has anyone noticed the increases in costs of goods that have to be transported because of the latest round of fuel cost increases, or is it just a regional thing here in the seattle area.

food prices are markedly up, steel prices are up substantially, fuel surcharges are the norm now for delivery.

so much of our public goes on living like there is no tomorrow, heavily in debt, living paycheck to paycheck, maxed out on credit cards, suv payments, college expences, and refinanced homes to get equity out to pay down debt, or worse to buy more stuff.

it will end, and it will certainly be ugly.

any thoughts

bob g

[thunderhead]

Your analysis seems to be about right.  My brother works for a leading-edge oil prospecting outfit, and he's always said that there's plenty of oil for current demand, but not at current prices.  In the future the oil will be more expensive as extraction gets harder.  

Sell the Chinese lots of SUVs, and watch this future get much, much sooner.

That is why I am so interested in electric vehicles.

[finnsawyer]

Don't forget that our war with Japan came about because of their need for raw materials.  Also, I don't think alternate energy as it exists today will provide the energy needs of all the people in this country.  Actually, we've got one ace in the hole, good old dirty coal.

[JW]

Neat conversation guys,

 I have also heard that we have reached the "midpoint or peak" of oil production, some guy recently published a book on this, cant remember the title. Most likely the electricity grid will be the last energy sector to be affected by oil shortages. The transportation sector will be hardest hit and most likely first. I keep hearing about natural gas and propane reserves being pretty substantial. Perhaps this will be the transition energy source as oil prices rise above that of CNG. If China centered on propane or cng for motive transportation, they could have the suv's and not worry to much about smog. I must say I really do like the electric car angle to all this. To bad with all the hype in the 1980's the electric car market evaporated. Most have in-city driving needs without much range needed. Besides if one worked the electric car scheme from the standpoint of RE based technologys for recharging, then the utility grid would not be overloaded. But theres no way, the instant switch of energy infrostructure thats desired, is going to materialize. Its going to be a slow agonizing process. Just my opinion. Also we should be considering conserving what oil is avalible for trucking and commercial fleets. If the prices rise to sharply on oil this will effect the economy in some negative ways. so right now, were 30 years ahead of the game.

JW

[skravlinge]

Yes, the oil will never be cheap, still it is a lot in the ground, but it will cost more and  more to take it up. The North See oil was not detected around 1974. It was the oilprice made it possibe to start use it. I think we have to find ways around it. A car can be built to use less, a car do not need to go on petrol.

In Europe you can by a small car with two-cylinders diesel. and just 50 cc motor, it takes easy two persons in 50 km/h and run 40 kilometers on a litre.

(You do not need license, pay no tax on the car.)

As its diesel biodiesel will do. Heavy transport can use alcohol, In Sweden its already 10% alcohol in the fuel, and very few knows about it. We have started to build plants which make alcohol of wood (Ethyl) and many think it will be realistic to use much more, then oil will be pricy. In Europe the  as well as in  America the farmers produce a surplus, and they would for sure be happy to find a market in producing energy corps.

[stop4stuff]

interesting stuff...

google came up with a few answers about china's fuel demands..

this winter will be cold in Bejing for many ppl due to a shortfall in coal production... petrochemical usage is set to increase substantially (maybe as a result???)

see;

http://www.peakoil.com

The future of oil products as we know it is limited...

peak oil is set to happen soon...

2005, 2007, 2010...

odds neone???

paul

p.s. what will happen to plastics production when 'the-oil-runs-out'?

[TomW]

Paul;

p.s. what will happen to plastics production when 'the-oil-runs-out'?

Good point. You can also toss in drugs that are based on oil.

It just seems that burning up oil to get around is a bit like burning your furniture to keep warm because your too lazy to cut wood. Many things can be used for motive power but oil is so useful for other things it should not be consumed for heat and transportation.

Just the view from here.

T

[skravlinge]

World changes, and then its time for  people to find new ways. It were days people  had  worries of  the traffic in London could be limited due to too much horse$#|+, later they found you could spreed the $#|+ burning fuel instead.

Next step is to  drive around without  pollution like today. See something good in the development, and dont just worry. We will drive in the postoil world,  as we are not using  knives of stone anymore, and we can use plastic made of  for example corm.

[finnsawyer]

Sure adjustments will be made, but what agony will the world have to go through first?  What will happen if enough Chinese freeze this winter?  Will China pull an "Imperial Japan" and go after the raw materials it needs?  During World War Two Germany was after "Lebens Raum" and Japan after raw materials.  The U. S. can weather any energy crisis using it's own resources, such as coal, but maybe others can't.  And some of those "others" can potentially be very dangerous to our health.

[skravlinge]

Prediction thats a difficult task, especally about the future. We had crises before, history is full of them, so we will likely meet crisis again. Conflict of resources has been  before, and it were the countries  which were quite rich, which was  more in the game, its needs resources and economy  comparing to others to do that especially  GB did in the 19th  year hundred. I remember the 50-ies the cold war, a time you found it not unrealistic you will not see the next day. It was nuclear threat we were busy with.  Today that seems to be forgotten, but I think the nuclear  threat is still real as it is  in hands of more states, and maybe  organizations not  organizied as a state.

The countries now demanding more energy,  use a fraction (pro head)of what we in  North America and Europe do. It will not be easy to tell them they can not live as we do. Myself think economic development in countries like China  is not a threat, its  promising. Do you think China can  develop  in the figures they do today without changing the political system towards democracy.  Dictatorship and  wellfare dont stick to eachother for long time.  The proof is : Germany was splittet , the outcome was one rich and one poor, the same whith Korea and even China. Its still a billion people in China lives much poorer than in Hong-Kong and Taiwan. In North Korea is no food.  Two countries having bacic the same history and culture  then one getting democracy and the other not . Democratic states goes sometimes to war, but when saw you two democratic states going to make war  on  eachother. In case of pollution, its the western countries stands for the major part, we may be going slowly to do something about it, and nobody knows, we maybe are going to get the knowhow from Asia, things move faster then it is a demand for it, energy or  system to reduce emissions.

Spellchecker seems out of order!

[weldingrodd]

Bob

Very good observations!

Too bad we could not get our "quality professional politicians" to see the same "writing on the wall" we see.

China surely has compounded the the oil problems which have been looming for a long time, but the "rose colored glasses " "professional dept heads "see problems with would not let the administrations address the real problems...If Washington does not move fast(ha ha )we will be picking coal off the railroad tracks (buy railroad stock)They will be the only means of "mass transit" we will have left in US...Maybe our China made locomotive will run off something other than coal so I dont know what will be able to "scrounge" to burn in our 55 gallon barrel stoves...

Wont be able to go to scrap yard find anything ..The Chineese have cleaned them all up!!!

[JW]

Hi TomW,

 Uknow I agree with you on many points. Thinking about the Hydrogen economy, I often wonder if the trend that which we consume oil currently, will be any example of our stratigy with water in the same respect. What I mean is, electrolisis with pure water it probably best, since salt water will emit tons of clorine on the Oxy side. So theres another energy sink besides compression of gas and liquifaction(supercooling), as de-salination energy needs would accumulate cumulaive on the energy balence thats needed to produce usable hydrogen, regardless of the energy sources used to produce it. Nevertheless the balence is out of wack in this regard, since hydrogen is only an energy carrier and it takes more energy to produce a given quantity, then is released at an end use point, such as a fuel cell. Considering generally fuel cells are only 60% efficient, then 40% of the original hydrogen used is lost to heat, as in-efficiency. Even though water is in fact recovered as a result of the fuel cell process, 40% of the original Hydrogen consumed from electrolisis is lost thru heat of just the fuelcell process. This means water is infact being consumed irreversably if thru only the fuelcell, let alone liquifaction losses and distribution losses, and end use losses.

 By the way,   I have heard any plastic that can be made from oil can be made fron corn. Often bio-mass can replace the complex organic materials that oil produces for us now. But conservation is alway censible. Thinking about this, it remindes me that sponges and other rare marine oganisms living in the Worlds Oceans, exist because of a delicate balence of water volume, thermodynamically and salination wise this is an important nursery of life and potental cancer curing drugs extracts, that could be derived from sea life. Let alone preventing drought in protected rain forest areas. We can live without oil, but can we live without water? Just an opinion, directed at generallity.

JW

[rotornuts]

Hey Tom, you just coined my new favorite quote.

[rotornuts]

You don't honestly wonder why there's no change, there's toooo much money to be made. That's why we're here this is "otherpower". We know this change will come only from people like us. God knows there's millions of us out there. BTW, how many people know that Henry Ford built electric cars with Thomas Edison before he set out on his own to build them to run on kerosene. What would the world be if he had stuck with electricity (or would he have ever made it). How much oil do we have left is a moot question! All nonrenewable's will come to an end period, so why wait till it happens?

[JW]

Just thinking about using hydrogen as fuel. It seems to me Fusion reactors make much more energy from a given quantity of hydrogen than any fuelcell ever will. Let alone the millions of fuelcells being proposed for such use. It seems we have abandon support for Fusion reactors that wont produce nuclear waste. Alot of work has been put into the science of fusing two hydrogen atoms into a helium atom. Once these fusion reactors are put on-line, they will make a good long term solution for energy for future generations. Then it goes back to electric cars. But better battery technology is still needed.

JW

[finnsawyer]

Whether China is moving to democracy is debatable.  That may be wishful thinking.  What is not, is that their own oil production is falling.  Also, look at the problems they have producing coal.  Over 160 miners died in a coal mine explosion and they were 5 MILES from the mine entrance.  The riches of Siberia must look real attractive to the Chinese, not to mention Southeast Asia.  History is replete with nations doing things and starting wars that others were convinced they'd never do.  You speak of rich nations competing for resources.  Well, before world war two Japan was rich in technology and poor in resources, and that's exactly where China's heading.  The parallels are striking.  I could see the Chinese grabbing Taiwan and, if they get away with that then going after Siberia.  The whole thing would depend on whether they think their nuclear deterrent is credible.  Do we write off the West Coast to stop them?  Would the Russians do anything or just give in?

[skravlinge]

Japan face the same today, they have rich technology but not very much resources. The Japan of today is a democracy, In  the 40th ist was the opposite, so they  solve their problem today with trade. Moderen nations get their welth from  trading (domestic or export/import), and its far better  and less risky than war. I hope you are wrong regarding China. The Russians will sell whatever China want. Regarding Taiwan its  up to the rest of the world to try to avoid any threat against Taiwan. I think IF Mainland China succed in transform to a democracy,  Taiwan maybe would like to join a winning team. Its still a billion in China who lives  a preindustrial life. So it will take time before we see a modern China, and I think thats not possible without democracy.

[finnsawyer]

Well, any thing can happen.  Before World War Two the U. S. put an embargo on the export of scrap metals to Japan, which helped spark the war.  Recently the Chinese were importing so much scrap steel from the U. S. that there was some talk of limiting it due to the run up in prices and the effect on local steel producers.  When markets are denied to nations they do desperate things.

A country doesn't have to be democratic to be technologically advanced.  Take a hard look at Germany before WW2.  They had potential developements in place that would have greatly altered the outcome of the war.  Basically, Hilter wasn't interested until it was too late.  Hilter started the war and he lost it too, due to his attitudes.  He was also looking for raw materials, namely oil.

[finnsawyer]

You're a little confused here.  The hydrogen itself is not lost.  A fraction of the energy used to make the pure hydrogen is (the 40%).

Except for certain regions of the world, I don't think salt water will be needed.  An acre-inch of water is equal to 28,359 gallons of water.  Where I live we get 250 inces of snow (25 inches water equivalent) per year plus rain.  Lets say 30 inches of rain equivalent per year.  So, that's 850,770 gallons of water per acre.  I own 60 acres, so I'm entitled to process up to 51 million gallons of water per year into hydrogen.  The problem, of course, is that most of the water runs off.  And, since the water is returned back to the environment when the hydrogen is burned, it becomes a closed cycle.  The hydrogen used in California, for instance, may fall as snow in the mountains and be used again by Californians.

[skravlinge]

I did not say it was impossible to have a modern techology in a non-democratic state, I said it will not last. History sometimes looks like its repet itself, but a closer look show history is a process in ONE direction. Do not trust much in learning of the future from past. A lot of generals have got into the war after planning like the last, this have a cost.