THE Jevons Paradox Thread (merged)

[thuja]

Aaron is right, only prices will force efficiency, check Europe, to reduce energy waste you need to start on national levels with promotion of trains, buses etc.. not on a personal level- it goes nowhere,

"Man's a party animal" is a classic, a lot said and explained in a short sentence

Aaron doesn't even believe in it on a national level- as it would simply stimulate other nations to take advantage of lowered prices.

No the question is not about whether conservation will stop Peak and Decline Oil from happening- that will happen no matter what...

Again- just to make clear- conserving will not let us use less oil. That aspect of Jevon's paradox is correct.

But...to take the next step...which Aaron does...and say...and therefore "voluntary conservation is pointless" is simply....

silly.

Again- conservation prior to geologically mandated conservation helps families and communities to prepare by shifting to alternative modes of managing life without oil.

And again...the reverse...profligate consumption...is clearly ridiculous. Sorry...

[thuja]

I have been called much worse than silly.

What's really silly is talking about becoming a better, more efficient consumer as if that was a noble, self less gesture.

Sure conservation means you save money... And so will I.

But it won't save 1 tiny bit energy.

Conservation may well be a useful survival skill on a personal level, but it won't impact global energy consumption.

Which is, of course, the whole point.

The only way we could really "conserve" is if all nations voluntarily agreed to use less oil than is being produced and then agreeing not to use remaining reserves. The likelihood of that happening is....zero.

That means we will use what is left...thats ok by me because geologically mandated decline rates will be occuring within a few years.

Those decline rates are better than any mandates a global governmental body would suggest.....2-4 % a year until its gone...

Because we will be achieving those nice decline rates in short order, best to get a jump on things and start conserving now- put that extra cash into efficiency, passive solar heating and lighting, garden tools, etc...

Yes conservation matters and is simply and obviously not...."pointless".

[kokoda]

Unfortunately economies either grow or shrink ... they never simply stay at the same level.

If money is not spent then the part of the economy that depends on that spending will wither ... which in turn effects other parts of the economy.

The entire financial system is dependant on continual growth. Growth means consumerism and consumerism means more energy.

I really can't think of a alternative, low energy model for an economic system that will allow for continual growth or even stay at a steady state.

[HEADER_RACK]

I have to agree with Thuja.
If you are conserving for the sole purpose of learning to live without it, for when it does run out. Then conservation has served it's purpose in the teaching.
If your conserving for the sole purpose of trying to make it go a little further,last a little longer. Then your efforts are about as useful as goose shit on a pump handle.

[JoeW]

I really can't think of a alternative, low energy model for an economic system that will allow for continual growth or even stay at a steady state.

I'm not about to let your lack of imagination destroy my hopes. Instead of "low energy", let's think "smart energy". For starters, millions of people in the US driving 20+ miles to work each day is not smart. Telecommuting (working where you live) and living where you work are the key.

To address the other point... for every part of the economy affected adversely, another economic opportunity emerges. If people don't travel as much (for example), how will they spend their vacations? There is an opportunity there. Just like if people aren't buying as many large vehicles as they were, maybe there is an opportunity to sell smaller ones, bicycles, scooters, motorcycles, whatever.

I understand that the market for incandescent light bulbs will be completely destroyed due to their prohibition in 2014. Oh no! It's going to be a recession because the people making light bulbs won't buy cars and the people making cars then can't buy houses and the people building houses can't buy light bulbs!!!!!

Let us all prepare for the worst, hope for the best, and be smart. This is peakoil.com and people who discover the truth are going to find this site and read what we have been saying all this time. Must we give them a "we're all fucked"message over and over again?

[LoneSnark]

If money is not spent then the part of the economy that depends on that spending will wither ... which in turn effects other parts of the economy.

Not true. If you cashed your paycheck every month and burned it society would not be made worse off because your loss is everyone elses gain. You are made directly worse off because by burning your money you are unable to consume the goods and services being produced in the economy. However, those goods and services still were produced, all that changed what the quantity of money, which means all prices in the economy will fall slightly so that all the purchasing power you lost was regained collectively by everyone else.

[The_Virginian]

The first poster (as pointed out by esteemed others) is mistaken...

"The explanation is that in our modern economy, saving energy makes people save money, which they either spend or invest...Spending the money will use energy"

This is not Jevon's "paradox" at all...

For example one could spend a huge amount on SOLAR CELLS and a battery bank to run the homestead...and thus USE LESS energy...

Money is not energy Per say...most people use it to by things that take energy to make...but that is not what it is... (Petro-dollar analogy excluded).

If you want to conserve energy, then do it for the sake of saving a few dollars...why not?

But every scrap of energy you save with a Mercury emitting compact florescent bulb...is in turn used by countries like CHINA to make goods for the whole world...

Just look at how the USA, when we ran out short of Petroleum, shifted manufacture to CHINA (etc.) to make up for the increased cost(s) by decreasing labor costs and environmental regulations...

(Filthy someone else's backyard, and pay in paper for labor and human suffering.....He He ... the gig was good for a while...let's be honest.)

[dub_scratch]

Jevon's Paradox is often cited to reduce the effectiveness of conservation.

People have to put the Jevon's paradox in context for different conservation strategies. There is a big difference in conservation by means of curtailment of energy services and conservation by means of incremental improvements in energy services (aka machinery).

If oil started declining tomorrow and we respond by ending economic & population growth, eliminate long distance trucking and ending car driving, the overall reduction in the dependency on energy services would give the smooth transition post oil scenario that you cite. The remaining fossil fuels could be used for retooling civilization away from long term unsustainable systems.

Conversely, if all conservation strategies were made through efficiency, then the Jevon's paradox will rule and the end of oil would be chaotic. Efficiency can be like a source of energy in that it it gives us more energy to use elsewhere. But efficiency gains will run out just like the oil-- smacking us right up against the limits imposed my nature. For example, more efficient cars would just mean that we remain car dependent until we burn every last bit of oil and coal. Then everything comes crashing down because we won't have any resources left as we find that we have spent every last energy nickel on our "sustainable" cars.

Conservation thru powerdown is the only way while conservation thru better gizmos is a trap.

[master_rb]

master_rb wrote:
Aaron is right, only prices will force efficiency, check Europe, to reduce energy waste you need to start on national levels with promotion of trains, buses etc.. not on a personal level- it goes nowhere,

"Man's a party animal" is a classic, a lot said and explained in a short sentence

Aaron doesn't even believe in it on a national level- as it would simply stimulate other nations to take advantage of lowered prices.

No the question is not about whether conservation will stop Peak and Decline Oil from happening- that will happen no matter what...

Again- just to make clear- conserving will not let us use less oil. That aspect of Jevon's paradox is correct.

But...to take the next step...which Aaron does...and say...and therefore "voluntary conservation is pointless" is simply....

silly.

yes, you're correct but what I mean is to build infrastructure so a country is ready when the oil runs low and can handle it somehow and not have bunch of people stuck with SUV's and no trains or any other means of transportation, this can be only done on national level and not personal

if the goverment doesn't get involved then single persons can't do a thing

[tsakach]

For example one could spend a huge amount on SOLAR CELLS and a battery bank to run the homestead...and thus USE LESS energy...

If a million off-grid energy users replaced their light bulbs to save energy, what would be the resulting effect in terms of Jevon's Paradox?

[kokoda]

In the real world most businesses grow by borrowing money against future earnings. This means that those earnings had better grow at a faster rate than the interest being charged on that loan, or that business won't be keeping its doors open for very long.

Take that concept and expand it to a national level and you can then understand why continual growth is needed for an economy to stay healthy. Growth is only possible through the consumption of massive amounts of energy. There is really no way to work your way around that problem.

A steady state economy simply can't work.

[kokoda]

For example one could spend a huge amount on SOLAR CELLS and a battery bank to run the homestead...and thus USE LESS energy...

If a million off-grid energy users replaced their light bulbs to save energy, what would be the resulting effect in terms of Jevon's Paradox?

Well to start with people would be spending a fortune on solar panels and batteries ... both of which consume energy to make of course.

With any money saved they could probably afford to buy that brand new SUV that they have been hankering for.

[tsakach]

The following quotes are from a report produced by the UK Energy Research Centre’s Technology and Policy Assessment (TPA) function. The report argues that rebound effects vary widely between different technologies, sectors and income groups so that general statements about the size of such effects can be misleading. The assessment was overseen by a panel of experts and is extremely wide ranging, reviewing more than 500 studies and reports from around the world.

One interpretation of the Khazzoom-Brookes postulate is that all economically justified energy efficiency improvements will increase energy consumption above where it would be without those improvements. The main conclusion from the review is that such evidence does not exist. The theoretical and empirical evidence cited in favour of the postulate is suggestive rather than definitive, only indirectly relevant to the rebound effect and flawed in a number of respects.

The K-B postulate seems less likely to hold for dedicated energy efficiency technologies such as improved thermal insulation, particularly when these are used by consumers or when they play a subsidiary role in economic production. These technologies have smaller effects on productivity and economic growth, with the result that economy-wide energy consumption may be reduced.

[url=http://www.ukerc.ac.uk/MediaCentre/UKERCPressReleases/Releases2007/0710ReboundEffects.aspx]
The Rebound Effect: an assessment of the evidence for economy-wide energy savings from improved energy efficiency[/url]

[patience]

Great thoughts, gg3 and Aaron! Newbie here, albeit with a long awareness of the problems. My engineer attitude wants to reduce it all to practice. Let's see if I can summarize a general position here.

The rational choice for consumers is to consume when it is cheap, which I have to do, or lose long term advantages of preparation.
The short term illogical consumer choice is to conserve. The long term based choice, in the face of dwindling resources, is to prepare for that time, as this group espouses. And living lightly on the earth NOW, is the moral choice.

Isn't that moral choice a dilemna, though, if we wrongly chose to NOT prepare? Thus, we logically arrive at the idea to maximize our preparations, particularly directed at living sustainably in the future. (A consumer attitude of course wouldn't do that.)

So, being aware of the long term, I (the world, infact) should exploit resources to the max NOW, toward a sustainable future.

This logic seems clear to me. So, I hire the guy with a backhoe to dig me a root cellar, terrace my garden area, etc. Most of my neighbors think I'm nuts, no matter that I argue coming depression. Consumers are what they are.

I tend to think gg3 has a valid point that the breakdown of Jevon will come sooner, rather than later. Tales from the 1930's would seem to bear that out, with a similiar crash on the way, and the rapid climate change he points out. I would add that, if the German Energy Watch Goup's report of Oct. '07 comes true, and oil production drops at their 7%/yr estimate, then Jevon's won't be with us for very long. The triangle of pressures from these events will each augment the others, and Jevon's will be no more.

[Aaron]

I tend to think gg3 has a valid point that the breakdown of Jevon will come sooner, rather than later. Tales from the 1930's would seem to bear that out, with a similiar crash on the way, and the rapid climate change he points out. I would add that, if the German Energy Watch Goup's report of Oct. '07 comes true, and oil production drops at their 7%/yr estimate, then Jevon's won't be with us for very long. The triangle of pressures from these events will each augment the others, and Jevon's will be no more.

Welcome to the board.

So you're basing this idea that Jevon will have little significance because of the consequences of GW & hydrocarbon depletion.

Isn't that kinda like saying, "Gee... if a whole bunch of people were gone, we would have plenty of everything to go 'round."

Anyway I don't think it matters.

To WHATEVER extent any valuable commodity is made more affordable, (than it would have been otherwise), it will get consumed to that same extent.

For the very obvious reason that people can afford more of this thing they want... if it's cheaper THAN IT WOULD HAVE BEEN OTHERWISE.

Ta Da

[patience]

Aaron, Not really what I was thinking. I agree with your logic, but I wasn't clear. I'm saying that I think demand destruction will negate Jevon's for the duration of, ironically, the depression brought about by high oil prices, and economic chaos in the financial world. Then, if climate change kicks us with a bad series of harvests, we could have Jevon's paradox held off until individual buying power makes oil affordable again. Even though oil prices would decline from demand destruction during a depression, if it's bad enough, consumption would stay down for a time. Is this possible?

Of course, in less dire circumstances, Jevon's comes back, right?

Maybe I'm just making a case for demand destruction for that period?

[mos6507]

Conservation and efficiency save my household $2250 per year. Every year we save that amount. It has emboldened me to buy a new fuel efficient vehicle. The money we saved has allowed us to put on solar hot water panels to capture sunlight that we didn't have access to before.

Right. It's not about how much you consume (i.e. spend). It's about how smartly you consume. You can blow the same amount of money in Vegas as you can on an eco-house. Some consumption is just almost instantly wasted and other consumption has a long-term tangible benefit.

[yesplease]

Bingo. Whatever consumption minimizes any need for further consumption while still facilitating the individual's objectives/desires is the best course of action IMO. Course, people are easily led, so instilling the desire to consume/participate in order to gain social leverage via money/power/religion/etc... has been a time honored tradition.

[FiniteQuantity]

Jevons Paradox or no Jevons Paradox - consumption will always increase until we stabilize population. Simple concept but hard for people to grasp because it involves something so sacred.

[Aaron]

Aaron, Not really what I was thinking. I agree with your logic, but I wasn't clear. I'm saying that I think demand destruction will negate Jevon's for the duration of, ironically, the depression brought about by high oil prices, and economic chaos in the financial world. Then, if climate change kicks us with a bad series of harvests, we could have Jevon's paradox held off until individual buying power makes oil affordable again. Even though oil prices would decline from demand destruction during a depression, if it's bad enough, consumption would stay down for a time. Is this possible?

Of course, in less dire circumstances, Jevon's comes back, right?

Maybe I'm just making a case for demand destruction for that period?

Jevon's is a relative judgement.

Of course demand destruction will impact how much is commonly available... Jevon just says that prices would be even higher without efficiency or conservation reductions.