Peak Oil News and Message Boards

Expatriot wrote:

PrestonSturges wrote: I'm lily white going back to the 1700s, so it doesn't worry me, but don't make any assumptions about what side I'll be on.

I love it. You're lily white and you think that you'll have a choice. Let me know how that goes for you.

PrestonSturges wrote:

Expatriot wrote:

PrestonSturges wrote: I'm lily white going back to the 1700s, so it doesn't worry me, but don't make any assumptions about what side I'll be on.

I love it. You're lily white and you think that you'll have a choice. Let me know how that goes for you.

Judging by New Orleans, it was whites that went on a rampage in a grid down situation and started shooting black people randomly based on their elaborate fantasy scenarios. A number of them have plead guilty.

PrestonSturges wrote:I'm lily white going back to the 1700s, so it doesn't worry me, but don't make any assumptions about what side I'll be on.

Expatriot wrote:

PrestonSturges wrote:

Expatriot wrote:

PrestonSturges wrote: I'm lily white going back to the 1700s, so it doesn't worry me, but don't make any assumptions about what side I'll be on.

I love it. You're lily white and you think that you'll have a choice. Let me know how that goes for you.

Judging by New Orleans, it was whites that went on a rampage in a grid down situation and started shooting black people randomly based on their elaborate fantasy scenarios. A number of them have plead guilty.

Oh believe me, I'm not taking sides. I'm merely pointing out that even Eminem isn't going to be welcome on the black side when the lines form.

Yes, solar is a miniscule part of the energy budget, but history shows market shares can shift rapidly.


The first solar cells could only convert 4 percent to 11 percent of the sunlight that struck them into electricity -- and those early prototypes cost hundreds of dollars each.

Now, scientists have come up with solar cells that can convert more than 40 percent of the light that hits them into power and use the leftover power to heat water for your home. Solar modules in 1980 cost $21.80 a watt. Now, the cheapest solar modules cost less than 75 cents to make. By contrast, oil has risen from $11 a barrel to over $100 in that same period and even oil companies agree that new deposits are more expensive and more difficult to find than ever before.

Sun power is also relatively untapped. The world’s annual energy diet is equivalent to the amount of energy in three cubic miles of oil. Three cubic miles of oil would cover the island of Manhattan 450 feet deep in crude, or fill 9,000 sports arenas, says Malhotra.

The sunlight that strikes the earth every year contains as much energy as 22,000 cubic miles of oil. A tiny fraction of that light could provide more than enough energy for all the biofuel crops and solar panels we’d ever need.

Put it another way: if you could bottle the next hour of sunlight, you’d have enough energy for the entire globe for the next 14 months.

The International Energy Agency recently issued its annual progress report [PDF] on clean energy. Here’s the five-cent version:
The transition to a low-carbon energy sector is affordable and represents tremendous business opportunities, but investor confidence remains low due to policy frameworks that do not provide certainty and address key barriers to technology deployment. Private sector financing will only reach the levels required if governments create and maintain supportive business environments for low-carbon energy technologies. [my emphasis]

Progress is inadequate — relative to the goal of limiting global temperature rise to 2 degrees C — on virtually every low-carbon technology except onshore wind and solar (click for a larger version of this chart):

What will it cost to turn this around and hit the 2 degrees C target? A good chunk in the short term and negative dollars in the long term:
Globally, the near-term additional investment cost of achieving these objectives would amount to USD 5 trillion by 2020, but USD 4 trillion will be saved through lower fossil fuel use over this period. The net costs over the next decade are therefore estimated at over USD 1 trillion. More impressively, by 2050, energy and emissions savings increase significantly as CO2 emissions peak, and begin to decline from 2015. In this timeframe, benefits of fuel savings are also expected to surpass additional investment requirements for decarbonising the energy sector. [my emphasis]

Here are the IEA’s big recommendations:

1.Level the playing field for clean energy technologies by pricing energy appropriately and addressing energy systems holistically (this latter is a particular challenge).

2.Unlock the potential of energy efficiency by tightening standards and enlisting the help of energy providers (utilities).

3.Accelerate energy innovation and public RD&D.

Revi wrote:It's always some other country that leapfrogs over the old tech and creates a new way of doing things. The British had coal working for them until we discovered oil and took over the world.

Revi wrote:The next century will be about green technology, but it won't be us who builds it, and it won't be us who reaps the rewards either.

pstarr wrote:There won't be an energy transition in the USA because we built out our auto-centric dispersed suburban nest 60 years ago. There is no going back. Other places in the world are more suited to an expensive-petroleum regime.

pstarr wrote:Chinese workers for instance bike to work, live in a single room without exorbitant heating/cooling demands, and buy food in neighborhood markets grown right outside the city. We will never compete.

Plantagenet wrote:You don't know China. The days of Mao suits and millions of people riding identical bikes to work in cities in China are long gone----you just don't see many bikes anymore in Chinese cities---there are busy streets in modern cities filled with cars, motorcycles, taxis, buses---but the bicycles are virtually gone.

The transition to a low-carbon energy sector is affordable and represents tremendous business opportunities, but investor confidence remains low due to policy frameworks that do not provide certainty and address key barriers to technology deployment.

The DB Climate Change Advisors has released its latest Global Climate Change Policy Tracker report [PDF], its fourth. The report has quite a bit of interesting info in it. Most important, from a global perspective, is that “the best case global outlook” based on potential current targets still leaves us is with “a 5.8Gt ‘gap’ compared to a 450ppm stabilization pathway.” And even 450ppm is way to high according to top climate scientists.


In an email from someone at DB, a couple of the key takeaway points they saw were:

China, Germany, Brazil and many of the Nordic countries have strong policy regimes in place to meet their mandates, whilst the rest of the EU and other emerging economies’ policy regimes remain mixed.

The US and Italy in particular remain challenged in meeting their clean energy mandates. However, in terms of emissions, an aggressive coal to gas switch can have a valuable effect in the US.

I primarily agree. However, in light of recent research on natural gas, I think more emphasis needs to be placed on growing out the US’ truly clean energy economy.

Overall, though, the message of this report is quite similar to the IEA’s recent annual report — yes, we’re moving forward, but we’re still moving way too slowly.

Graeme wrote:The US and Italy in particular remain challenged in meeting their clean energy mandates. However, in terms of emissions, an aggressive coal to gas switch can have a valuable effect in the US.