I Was Wrong About Peak Oil

42 Comments on "I Was Wrong About Peak Oil"

geopressure on Mon, 12th Dec 2016 2:17 pm 



We are not even close to peak oil production…

joe on Mon, 12th Dec 2016 2:29 pm 



Can’t wait for high prices again, will see return to tight oil and faster switch to renewable energy.

Jerome Purtzer on Mon, 12th Dec 2016 2:45 pm 



Ignorance is bliss. I picking up a lot of bliss from this blurb. Must be the Christmas bliss. It’s like P.T. Barnum said, you never go broke underestimating the intelligence of the American public. Let’s make America great again!

Cloggie on Mon, 12th Dec 2016 3:11 pm 



Couldn’t have said it better. “We” were not so much wrong about peak conventional oil, we were wrong about the implications of that event. We ignored technology and overlooked that there are ways to exploit lower grade fossil fuel, that is present in enormous quantities (fracking, UCG). Oh and we should leave them were they are, apart from those quantities we need to set up a 100% fossil fuel free economy.

Cloggie on Mon, 12th Dec 2016 3:39 pm 



In the long term we do not need fossil fuel for anything. In 20-30 years the transition will be complete, at least in Europe.

Tonight on the Dutch 8 o’clock news: the world’s second largest oil company Roday Dutch Shell won the bid for two large wind parks in the North Sea:

http://nos.nl/data/image/2016/12/12/339664/864×486.jpg
(Danish Dong 1&2, Shell 3&4)

Before 2023 all the yellow areas on the map will be covered with wind turbines –> 4500 MW in total. That’s enough to cover 5 of the 7.7 million Dutch households. But this is still only 3% of the total Dutch energy consumption (incl transport, industry and space heating). 10,000 new wind energy jobs will be created by 2020.

The best news is the price: merely 5.4 euro cent/kwh, excl 1.4 cent “connection costs”. Greenpeace calls the price drop (and the price) “spectacular”. Government investment was reduced from the expected 18 billion to merely 6 billion. The very good news is that wind energy under these conditions has become competitive with fossil fuel. The new wind parks will be the most cost effective in the world.

After 2023 the speed of implementation will be increased and large areas of the North Sea will be covered. 7 new wind parks will be build in the North sea of 1000 MW each.

The next step will be to write a tender to replace natural gas based space heating with geothermal energy for 25% of the Dutch households.

https://fd.nl/ondernemen/1179351/shell-gaat-tweede-grote-borssele-windpark-aanleggen

http://nos.nl/artikel/2148050-shell-bouwt-megawindpark-met-stroom-voor-1-miljoen-huishoudens.html

Plantagenet on Mon, 12th Dec 2016 4:06 pm 



In spite of the article’s claims, there has been no reduction in the demand for fossil fuels. More oil and NG are being used now then ever before.

Its wonderful that the EU is building out its wind potential. But oil use is growing rapidly in India and replacing the drop in demand seen in the USA and EU.

Cheers!

alain LE GARGASSON on Mon, 12th Dec 2016 4:07 pm 



The law of energy conservation demonstrates that we can not create or destroy energy. We must remember the chemist Lavoisier “nothing is created, nothing is lost, everything is transformed.” Man can only transform, he does not create an atom, ore or energy. We can only transform the primary energies present on our planet like geothermal energy, nuclear energy, the ocean (tides, currents and waves), the sun (light, heat) and associated with the atmosphere (wind, rain) The old biomass (fossils – coal, oil and gas), recent (our food and animals we consume, wood)) hydrogen and electricity (are not native and come from chemical, mechanical and / Or heat) No “new” energies. The energy characterizes the change of state of a system, then it is the unit of account of the modification of our environment. The world consumes 95 Mb / d or 12 million tons or 40 tankers of 300,000 t per day. Any technology will always need mineral resources and energy to be manufactured, transported, installed and maintained for at least 50 Years for nuclear energy, without oil in a few decades, I would like to know by what miracle, the heolic energy, thorium or others could function for centuries. Will cement, steel, insulation, lubricants fall from the sky? Similarly for Artificial Intelligence !!!
Today you need more and more metals and energy to extract the same amount of fossil fuels and more and more energy and metals to extract minerals with decreasing concentration. 4% of steel is used in the petroleum industry and 4% of the energy in cement processing (3.5 billion tons).
In agriculture, oil and gas are used to produce fertilizers, 180 million tons of fertilizers (N-P-K), and phytosanitary products that are essential to modern agriculture. Without them, yields collapse. Within 20 years we will pass the peak of phosphorus production which has no replacement. We also use diesel (100 to 150 liters per hectare per year to plant, process and harvest) for mechanization, forget the electric tractor. 1 truck out of 2 carry food, cold chain etc. Saying that we want a sustainable world, it is possible with 1 or 2 billion inhabitants, but it will be the return in 1800 before the industrial revolution.
Energy production in Germany 1st half 2014, page 5 and 6, the difference between installed capacity and energy production between base and intermittent renewables is very clear.
https://www.ise.fraunhofer.de/en/downloads-englisch/pdf-files-englisch/data-nivc-/electricity-production-from-solar-and-wind-in-germany-2014.pdf

Less oil, less transportation, declining society.

“who believes that growth can be infinite in a finite world is either a madman or an economist. “Kenneth Boulding (1910-1993), president of the American Economic Association.
A French engineer

rockman on Mon, 12th Dec 2016 4:32 pm 



“…the time when the world would start running out of fossil fuels, defined as Peak Oil.” Incorrect…a point oddly made in the next sentence.

“…after which production is expected to enter terminal decline causing energy prices to skyrocket.” A childish view of the dynamics. The price of fossil fuels has always been dominated by economic vitality much more so then production rates.

“…looked forward to a future in which renewable energy would be able to offset these high energy prices.” Given we might be at or at least close to global PO lower oil prices are not providing much incentives for developing alternatives.

“…horizontal drilling and fracking allowed drilling companies to pump oil and natural gas out of hard to reach areas.” No, it didn’t: the technology used to develop the shale plays existed more then a decade earlier. What didn’t exist were oil prices 3 to 4 times higher then when the tech was available.

“…the supply of oil (and its substitute natural gas) went up, with a commensurate reduction in oil and gas prices.” No, just the opposite: production went up as a result of increasing prices. And oil production is now decreasing as a result of lower prices.

“…the availability of less expensive alternative forms of energy (particularly wind and solar)..have reduced demand for fossil fuels. Both oil and NG consumption are near or at their highest level since the beginning of the fossil fuel age. And global coal consumption, the consumption of which since 2000 increased at a higher % rate then oil/NG, is just a few years past from its historic high.

“…Peak Oil, and the increasing irrelevance of this concept as wind, solar…”. About 98% of the 80+ MILLION light motor vehicles purchased in the world this year burn fossil fuels. And today there are more then 1.2 BILLION ICE’s in the world currently burning fossil fuels. IOW less the 1% of the light vehicles on the road today utilize an alternative energy source.

But other then that a very insightful bit of scholarship. LOL.

penury on Mon, 12th Dec 2016 5:38 pm 



“Peak Oil” you are not wrong in thinking that there will be a “Peak Oil” just forgot that timing might be wrong. Like Malthus you are probably correct in expecting peak just wrong in how soon it gets here, Keep the faith, it is definitely coming soon to a world close to you.

Davy on Mon, 12th Dec 2016 6:12 pm 



If we see the big picture rather little is well anywhere and with anything. Don’t you think the dynamics of the phenomenon of peak oil is playing its part? It is the approach that matters not the event itself. If you are intellectually lazy you will always default to your emotions when confronted with a topic without clear definition or results. Peak Oil is one of those topics little understood by all sides. The reason for this is just how integrated oil and the economy are making an analysis of one without the other problematic. It is clear we can’t figure out the economy so maybe the same can be said of Peak Oil dynamics. Yea Rock, that is your term.

sunweb on Mon, 12th Dec 2016 6:30 pm 



I expect Clogged to give his usual cordial response.
Solar and wind energy collecting devices and their auxiliary equipment have an industrial history. They are an extension of the fossil fuel supply system and the global industrial infrastructure. It is important to understand the industrial infrastructure and the environmental results for the components of the solar energy collecting devices so we don’t designate them with false labels such as green, renewable or sustainable. http://sunweber.blogspot.com/2015/04/solar-devices-industrial-infrastructure.html
This is a challenge to ‘business as usual’. If we teach people that these solar devices are the future of energy without teaching the whole system, we mislead, misinform and create false hopes and beliefs. They are not made with magic wands.
How will we use this electric energy? This must be one of the mantras for survival now and tomorrow. Imagine beginning at an earth resource –the mine, the well – and the subsequent flow of these materials. This creates a tremendous picture in motion of “energy” and resources flowing around the world.

There are multiple questions that a realistic assessment of the future of these devices requires. Each of these questions, asks about the future of “renewable” devices.

First and foremost:
What do we need the energy for?
Not, why or what do we want this electricity for.
This must be one of the mantras for survival now and tomorrow.

When it comes time to replace these devices:
Where will the energy and resources come from?

To replace components of these systems:
Where will the energy and resources come from?

As we need to manufacture the tools and toys we want the electricity for:
Where will the energy and resources come from?

Will we sequester/store the energy to provide for these future needs?
How will we do that?

OR

Will dedicated devices be built simply to facilitate replacement?

Who will manage these dedicated devices?

What will stop society from using this sequestered energy?

Will the need to protect this sequestered energy create an even more constrained and draconian social environment?

How will this electricity be equally shared globally compared to the present unequal energy availability?

How will we mine and transport all these raw resources:
the basic material for fabrication, the actual devices, the various auxiliary equipment, the tools and the toys?

Big Time Doomer on Mon, 12th Dec 2016 7:29 pm 



I’m not so much concerned with Peak Oil as I am with Peak Cannibalism.

makati1 on Mon, 12th Dec 2016 7:40 pm 



sunweb, you are correct, of course. Few, if any ‘renewables’ proponents think past the end product. Total systems is foreign to them, or suppressed because they do see the impossibility of their dreams and chose to ignore them.

Most of our ‘stuff’, especially techie stuff, takes thousands of humans and much energy at, maybe hundreds of steps, to become reality and, eventually, junk on the rubbish heap of waste. This will end with the end of global finances and trade. Materials/parts will stop flowing around the world.

I just learned that even chickens raised in the U$ are slaughtered, frozen, and sent to China to be processed, and returned to the U$ grocery shelves. Something as simple as chicken can become much more expensive, or not available when energy is no longer cheap enough to do that. That is, unless American wages are about $5 per day. lol

Newfie on Mon, 12th Dec 2016 10:21 pm 



@ Jerome: “… like P.T. Barnum said, you never go broke underestimating the intelligence of the American public.” H. L. Mencken said that.

tita on Tue, 13th Dec 2016 12:59 am 



“I was a believer in Peak Oil”. Good for you, but peak oil is not a dogma/belief/theory. It’s a fact that at some point, we’ll produce and consume less oil. The belief is what is gonna happen at this point, and the author’s belief hasn’t change as he’s eager to see a shift to renewables. Some others point to a doomerish position of economic collapse, others to a degrowth of society. We have some hints from history that in any case, we’ll have economic challenges the nearest we get to peak oil.

Another fact against beliefs is that we haven’t shift away from fossil fuels as they still provide the 2/3 of our energy needs.

Cloggie on Tue, 13th Dec 2016 4:30 am 



“I was a believer in Peak Oil”. Good for you, but peak oil is not a dogma/belief/theory.

I was a believer too. For many here collapse is a dogma; stronger: it is a “way of life”, a religion, a superstition, a way to feel superior over others. Throughout history there have been groups of True Believers professing that the end was neigh. The adherents are usually not the most successful in life.

Solar and wind energy collecting devices and their auxiliary equipment have an industrial history. They are an extension of the fossil fuel supply system and the global industrial infrastructure.

You’re a one-trick pony sunweb. Always the same crusted opinion. Perhaps with 84 it is time to retire and pickup fishing or ballroom-dancing.

Yes the entire economic system needs to be “refactored” for electricity rather than combustion engines, but that can be done. It is important to understand the enormous significance of the equation:

1 kwh = 1 kwh

In other words it doesn’t matter were a kwh comes from, fossil or renewable; in both cases it is still worth a single man day of very hard physical labor.

That is, unless American wages are about $5 per day. lol

You have a subtle sense of humor, Bill. I wonder how bad US society must have treated you for you to display this kind of glee. You have zero sense of identity and hence loyalty, in other words the perfect commie.

Cloggie on Tue, 13th Dec 2016 5:03 am 



Back to the North Sea transition:

The low price of offshore wind energy becomes understandable if you realize how cheap steel is. Once you have equipment like this…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JV9PykR5bHo&t=120s

…you can merrily ram a single monopile into the sea bed in less than 24 hours; in other words, you don’t have to worry about building roads, buying out land owners. The entire sea belongs to a government. So in 100 days or three months you construct a 100 wind turbine = 500 MW wind park. And then you set up another wind park, for years on end.

Raw steel costs almost nothing ($300 per ton):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CfYhGFR3uWo

Weight monopile: 300 – 550 ton. Length monopile: 50 – 72 m.

Once you have achieved true economy of scale, prices will plummet further, sidelining fossil fuel. Sorry Rockman.lol

So, no need to search for oil in the Arctic. Just line up and patiently wait for your turn to order a brand new wind park from Shell O.. Wind.

#LoveTheSoundOfCashRegistersRinging

In the coming years the Netherlands are going to become one huge construction site, with every street opened to bury pipelines for geothermal and/or industrial hot waste water pipelines and the 50 year existing natural gas pipes removed. The business opportunities are endless. Huge European companies like Shell are probably going to take the lead in the global energy transition effort, not unlike Anglo oil majors took the lead 100 years ago in turning the world into one giant oil operation.

Alain LE GARGASSON on Tue, 13th Dec 2016 5:42 am 



@Cloggie
Peak oil is an Rolle’s theorem consequence. Your reasoning violates the principles of thermodynamics and orders of magnitude. It is “Magic Technology”, 98% of transportation is done with fossil energies, you change everything in how much time and infrastructure? Will you have lithium for the batteries? Aircrafts and electric boats? In the fields, tractor and electric harvester too? Phosphorus passes its peak production in about twenty years, as important as nitrates in NPK fertilizers.What do you eat ?

Davy on Tue, 13th Dec 2016 5:53 am 



Let’s not generalize and lump sum everyone who address collapse as a possibility. Many of us are just looking for answers and open to anything but pain and suffering. Many of us see denial and obstructionism because of a status quo social narrative heading for a disaster. We are trying to be human and offer some reason in the contrary to a status quo that has no desire to face the possibility of collapse. Let’s also reflect on the techno optimism way of life, religion, and superstition with blind belief in progress and technology. Techno optimism is also part of the problem we see with extremism. Yes, collapse is and has been an extremism throughout the ages. Techno-optimism is in charge now throughout the world and it is clearly failing and failing because of its own extremism.

“1kw-1kw, In other words it doesn’t matter were a kwh comes from”

Yes, it does matter and it is why your 1kw-1kw simplicity is not working in the world today. It is called economics and scale. It also involves attitude and lifestyles. It also involves paying a price for the poor decisions that got us here. We are not going to extend and pretend our way out of this trap then break out in transcendence to a shiny new world of alternatives with complexity because 1kw-1kw. There may be a theoretical place where civilization would be flexible enough with 1kw-1kw to do another existential transition but that is likely long gone for ours. Regionally and locally it is possible for a time but not in the macro. I would go so far as to say we are not even close as a global civilization.

What is wrong with life is so much more than energy and energy will not decouple from this dangerous reality nor will it solve these problems. We better get energy right and many techno optimist points about energy are important. If we don’t get our energy future right we are in trouble sooner and with more consequences. We are not getting out of this without losing some skin and that is an inconvenient point you techno-optimist don’t want to hear. Some sort of population decline is ahead and not an easy one. Where techno optimist are wrong is claiming they have a final solution when they don’t and likely won’t. All they have is a temporary solution and IMA an important one. Technology and efficiency is important but it is also dangerous if mistaken for “the” solution.

I will call it techno-hubris and it will end badly because it will make poor investments of scarce resources in an unrealistic future. Instead of building out we need to practice reductionism with the understanding we will attempt a managed response to dangerous decline. This decline is the result of overshoot of population and consumption of that population. This type of overshoot is a powerful and dangerous kind that is a trap. We can’t manage our way out of this but we can do fire drills for when it becomes a dangerous daily reality. Techno optimist are not so much in denial of limits and diminishing returns it is more a psychological blind spot and a failure with scaling and timing. It revolves around a shallow understanding of our existential traps and the belief energy will solve it. Energy is just part of the problem. Techno optimist want to believe the economy is more or less a constant with gyrations. If you can’t harness a healthy economy we are not going to transition. Every metric of the economy is negative to disastrous. Techno optimist discount and dismiss the consequences of peak conventional oil again because of technology.

We must change and that change will be destructive. Techno-solutions are solutions but within limits. There are more important things we can and should do then more of the same just green mentality of the techno-optimist. There are too many variables like the economy and climate change that techno optimist choose to make a constant value in their equation. This social narrative of perpetual progress just with alternatives is a lie of negligence and it perpetuates a dangerous denial that we can have our cake and eat it. It is just more of the extend and pretend mentality of more with less that is a disguised form of more with more. On a finite planet that ends poorly for species. They go into overshoot and then a bottleneck or worse extinction.

Cloggie on Tue, 13th Dec 2016 9:03 am 



Peak oil is an Rolle’s theorem consequence.

Translation Rolle: What goes up must come down. Your point?

Fossil is indeed on the way out. But not because we run out of fossil, but because it stinks and is soon more expensive than renewable. Likewise the stone age didn’t end because we ran out of stones.

Your reasoning violates the principles of thermodynamics and orders of magnitude. It is “Magic Technology”

Look, I believe you have a book about thermodynamics on your shelf, but I am not so sure that you actually read it. So if you want to brag with your supposed knowledge of thermodynamics, then you have to go into detail and explain to me what all these hundreds of thousands of engineers and construction workers, who as we speak work on setting up a renewable energy base, are overlooking. I think they are not overlooking anything and that instead you have been drinking too much Merlot again.

98% of transportation is done with fossil energies, you change everything in how much time and infrastructure?

Even that Napoleon of yours began his career by filling diapers. But that didn’t mean he continued to do that for the rest of his life. Likewise with transport. And we have all the time of the world to set up that new renewable energy base since we are not going to run out of fossil fuel any time soon (think centuries). Under the North Sea alone there is 10-30 times more coal than the total amount of fossil fuel humanity has cumulatively burned in history and can be harvested efficiently using tried UCG methods.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2593032/Coal-fuel-UK-centuries-Vast-deposits-totalling-23trillion-tonnes-North-Sea.html

Will you have lithium for the batteries? Aircrafts and electric boats?

Lithium isn’t particularly necessary for anything.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/jeffmcmahon/2016/12/05/argonne-selects-two-next-generation-batteries-to-succeed-lithium-ion

And you seriously worry about air-crafts?

In the fields, tractor and electric harvester too? Phosphorus passes its peak production in about twenty years, as important as nitrates in NPK fertilizers.What do you eat ?

For some mysterious reason the lush tropical rain forests don’t need to be treated by humans with phosphor.

Niche applications like tractors can perhaps be powered by batteries, CO2 neutral bio-fuel, or gasified coal.

Alain LE GARGASSON on Tue, 13th Dec 2016 6:11 pm 



@Cloggie
The production of a stock begins and ends at zero and passes through a maximum or peak, a demonstration derived from Rolle’s theorem.

A 5 MW wind turbine is 1000t of concrete, 250t of steel, 600kg of copper and many petroleum derivatives (plastics, resins, for electrical circuits as well as blades (50t of fiberglass or coated carbon in resin), lubricants, alternator with permanent magnets with neodimio … etc …). Photovoltaic plate with galium, indium, selenium, cadmium or tellurium. It’s very easy to produce when you have oil, but can you assure that you are able to produce a wind turbine or a photovoltaic plate, to have all the elements and to be able to transport and to assemble them without oil. The First Principle of Thermodynamics says that you can not create or destroy energy, so we need to find the 80% energy of global consumption to be the equivalent of 95 million barrels of oil a day to continue living like today, with what, where and how?

Cloggie on Tue, 13th Dec 2016 6:46 pm 



For a turbine at see, you don’t need 1000 ton concrete.

Steel and copper can be recycled ad infinitum.

For niche products like plastic you can always use bio-fuel.

We are not going to run out of fossil fuel for centuries, please read the DailyMail link above. Combine that with UCG…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lOBXsmKdlcA

…and you will conclude with me that fossil fuel depletion is a non-issue for centuries to come.

The limiting factor in the usage of fossil is not fuel depletion, it is climate/environment.

The First Principle of Thermodynamics says that you can not create or destroy energy, so we need to find the 80% energy of global consumption to be the equivalent of 95 million barrels of oil a day to continue living like today, with what, where and how?

This sentence makes no sense; maybe you want to rephrase it.

First of all we don’t need to fully replace present day oil consumption for 100% with sun and wind and geothermal. Take Holland. In a couple of years, all newly built homes need to be energy neutral. Space heating is the largest chunk in private energy consumption (in Holland roughly 75%, 25% electricity). You can put solar panels on many roofs (I have 6 on mine and in the first year generated 1500 kwh and consumed 1600 kwh, so almost parity).

SA on Tue, 13th Dec 2016 11:57 pm 



“In the long term we do not need fossil fuel for anything.”

Yeah, right. All those wind farms mined and manufactured and maintained themselves without fossil fuels.

You are high on hopium. Addicted apparently.

You are in good company – among the brain dead morons that inflict this planet.

SA on Wed, 14th Dec 2016 12:06 am 



“…and you will conclude with me that fossil fuel depletion is a non-issue for centuries to come.”

Holy shit are you stupid. The LIMITING factor is limited resources and cost of extraction (none which is performed by non-fossil fuel energy you nitwit).

And your “bio-fuel” nonsense reveals your disconnect from reality. Are you going to press all that rape-seed oil by hand? No? Then by what means? Build those processing plants from wood?

You understand nothing but your own hubris.

Cloggie on Wed, 14th Dec 2016 5:22 am 



SA says Yeah, right. All those wind farms mined and manufactured and maintained themselves without fossil fuels.

Stormtrooper, like so many others here, simply doesn’t understand that 1 kwh = 1 kwh.

Stormtrooper opines that if a kwh doesn’t doesn smell like oil, it is not a kwh.

Stormtrooper is a kwh racist.

The LIMITING factor is limited resources and cost of extraction (none which is performed by non-fossil fuel energy you nitwit).

There are no limited fossil fuel resources, there is enough for centuries to come (not that we should use them), but there is so much that we can defeat and defeatists (like you, sunny) who in their ignorance claim that there are not enough resources to set up a new renewable energy base. For the umptiest time:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2593032/Coal-fuel-UK-centuries-Vast-deposits-totalling-23trillion-tonnes-North-Sea.html

And your “bio-fuel” nonsense reveals your disconnect from reality. Are you going to press all that rape-seed oil by hand? No? Then by what means? Build those processing plants from wood?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aOzWgyB1FSk

Portrait of a small scale biodiesel producer, exactly the kind of Americans I actually like. Requires $20k investment to buy a press to produce fuel from sunflower crop. Production price: $1.70 a gallon. This guy is able to run his entire operation on his own bio fuel and still is able to sell enough surplus bio fuel to make a living.

Alain LE GARGASSON on Wed, 14th Dec 2016 5:36 am 



@Cloggie
Recycling to infinity is not possible for several reasons:
· We always have a fire loss, example: case of recycling of beer cans, of the amount recovered only 95% is again available.
· There are thousands of metal alloys of steel with noble metals niobium, vanadium, tungsten etc, only two classifications in recycling, carbon steel and stainless steel. After melted they do not return in original use, they serve in construction as medium steel.
· Automotive industry, average of 10 years of life, in recycling, liquid emptying and melting in electric furnace, blending up to 10 alloys of steel, copper of the electric circuit, aluminum of the engine crankcase and burning of plastics.
· Dispersion use, metallic oxides used as dye in paints (walls, printed matter, plastics, cosmetics, fireworks … etc). The most emblematic case is titanium oxide, white universal colorant (paints, resins, cosmetics, toothpaste …) 95% finish in the dumps, rivers and seas. Nano technology precludes recycling like the silver used in socks to prevent chewing. Cell phone with more than 40 different elements of mendeleiev table (nano elements).
· Natural wear: Today for example, on the streets the asphalt contains a greater concentration in platine or palladium than some mines, due the exhaust wear of the automobiles and copper and zinc of the tires.
· There is no substitute for copper as an electric conductor, nickel for stainless steels, tin for welding, tungsten for cutting metal parts, silver or platinum for chemical and electronic industry, phosphorus for agriculture … etc
Agriculture: totally dispersive, diesel of 100 to 150 l per cultivated ha, limestone in the correction of the sun, fertilizers (NPK -nitrogen, potassium, phosphorus), phytosanitary products (herbicides, fungicides, insecticides …) that will end in rivers and In the sea, as well as land due to erosion, between 1 and 4 tonnes per tonne of production.
· Renewable energy, wind turbine 5 MW with a base of 1000t steel and concrete, 250t steel mast, 3 blades of 50t of fiberglass, carbon fiber and plastic resin, motor with permanent magnets, steel alloy with neodymium . Photovoltaic panel, with gallium, indium, selenium, cadmium or tellurium. Today not recyclable.
· Everything that rotates needs lubricant. 50 million tons / year.

Alain LE GARGASSON on Wed, 14th Dec 2016 5:53 am 



correction
limestone in the correction of the agricultural land

Davy on Wed, 14th Dec 2016 6:29 am 



Clog, you are reasoning with madness and it shows just how far into the rabbit hole you have gone. I love this quotes from “Alice and Wonderland”. Clog, you remind me of Alice:

“But I don’t want to go among mad people,” Alice remarked.
“Oh, you can’t help that,” said the Cat: “we’re all mad here. I’m mad. You’re mad.”
“How do you know I’m mad?” said Alice.
“You must be,” said the Cat, “or you wouldn’t have come here.”
― Lewis Carroll, Alice in Wonderland

Cloggie on Wed, 14th Dec 2016 6:30 am 



Quick response:

– who needs beer cans? Go to the cafe and have your beer from the tap, like throughout the centuries
– you have to admit that recycling has really become big of the last few decades and there is no end in sight. You cannot destroy atoms other than in a nuclear chain reaction
– the car will be retreating. In a few years we will be having driverless cars, which eliminates the need for private car ownership, resulting in a far smaller car fleet, delivering the same transport effort (fewer cars, but on the road all the time, rather than your average 2% of the time, a tremendous waste)
– electromotors don’t need lubrication and go on for decades without maintenance. The combustion engine will disappear from Europe in 2 decades.
– My parents used the same Bakelite fixed line phone with rotating dial for over 50 years. Why do we need a new cell phone every 2-3 years?

Europe, (who else?) is leading the global recycling effort, with Germany (who else?) leading the pack with 65% recycling:

https://www.statista.com/chart/4470/the-countries-winning-the-recycling-race/

There is no end in sight yet of that effort.

Look, I am not predicting a continuation of BAU, let alone advocating it. Growth like we have seen over the 200 years (ever more kwh, tons of steel and cement and oil) will come to a halt. Food production will be mostly local (many here, including me, grow their own food). The average number of miles traveled per capita will eventually decrease. The focus should and will be on energy conservation. I was taught at university around 1980 that the developed world could easily digest 50% less energy input if energy conservation measures were put in place, without much loss of comfort.

Cloggie on Wed, 14th Dec 2016 6:35 am 



Clog, you are reasoning with madness

Show me the madness; produce a quote and tell me where I am wrong and not with vague abstractions but down to earth.

Davy on Wed, 14th Dec 2016 6:44 am 



LOL, Clog, that is the nature of madness and why you are lost in your own creationism. Madness cannot be explained it is lived and we are living it. You have created an elaborate system of denial and delusion that is a reflection of society in your case techno optimism and cultural progress. The madness is where we are and it is us.

oracle on Wed, 14th Dec 2016 9:16 am 



This “energy show” guy is naive, and his facts are not quite right. He makes it sound like horizontal drilling and fracking suddenly unleashed a permanent cornucopia of petroleum. He does not mention that imprudent investment is largely responsible for the recent spike in unconventional oil. He would benefit from reading comments by some of the knowledgeable posters here (among whom I do not consider myself), and talking less.

sunweb on Wed, 14th Dec 2016 9:41 am 



Clogged – you sir are the ” one-trick pony . . .. Always the same crusted opinion.” I see you as at least one part of that pony.
You always insult and never address the questions about replacements of auxiliary equipment, at the end of device life, of sequestering or dedicated.
I only do this to poke the end of the pony because you are predictable.
Davy – has more insight and truth in his little finger than you do in all your frightening, self-serving techno-arrogance.

Cloggie on Wed, 14th Dec 2016 9:44 am 



Sunweb – What is so frightening about wind turbines, solar panels and beer from the tap?

sunweb on Wed, 14th Dec 2016 10:07 am 



Clogged – check out this support ship for your wind energy capturing devices:
https://solarthermalmagazine.com/2014/04/13/offshore-wind-turbine-installation-support-vessel-siem-moxie-christened-in-hamburg/
Without fossil fuels????

Cloggie on Wed, 14th Dec 2016 11:56 am 



Without fossil fuels????

Yes!

You can run a blast furnace on electricity.

Wikipedia Blast Furnace: Variations of the blast furnace, such as the Swedish electric blast furnace, have been developed in countries which have no native coal resources.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electric_arc_furnace
Industrial arc furnaces range in size from small units of approximately one ton capacity (used in foundries for producing cast iron products) up to about 400 ton units used for secondary steelmaking.

You can weld on electricity:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arc_welding

But the real important point is that we will never run out of fossil fuel for niche applications. But “happy motoring” for billions or fossil based space heating for billions, that indeed will vanish.

I never heard you criticize this:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2593032/Coal-fuel-UK-centuries-Vast-deposits-totalling-23trillion-tonnes-North-Sea.html

If you spend 5 minutes of your time digesting the implications of these kind of finds and next watch a video on UCG, you will have to admit that we’ll have enough fossil fuel for centuries to come.

We obviously should not use these inventories for driving or heating.

But for many who have bought into the catastrophic collapse narrative, it is very difficult and costly in terms of social status to abandon old convictions (fear for “loss of face” after having broadcasted for years that industrial civilization is going to collapse).

P.S. Sunweb, I know you are a civilized person, so I am sorry if my earlier remarks sounded a little too harsh. But there are people around here (I am not going to mention names, but Friday and Anonymouse know exactly who I mean) who operate on extremely low social standards, who regularly need to be disciplined. I need to pay more attention who to target. My apologies.

GregT on Wed, 14th Dec 2016 12:30 pm 



“I never heard you criticize this:”

Most Fossil Fuels Must Stay in the Ground: New Study

REPORT / 08. JAN, 2015

“A study published this week in the journal Nature says that a third of all oil reserves, half of gas reserves and over 80% of current coal reserves would need to remain in the ground for the international community to reach its goal of staying below a maximum two degrees Celsius global average temperature rise.”

Even this study is too conservative Cloggie. The original agreed upon do not exceed temperature rise was 1 degree C, not 2, and the level of CO2 in the atmosphere was not to exceed 350ppm. We are now at 409ppm and rising.

GregT on Wed, 14th Dec 2016 12:31 pm 



Link here:
http://newsroom.unfccc.int/unfccc-newsroom/most-fossil-fuels-must-stay-in-the-ground-new-study/

Mark Ziegler on Wed, 14th Dec 2016 4:16 pm 



The most significant way to avoid peak oil would be to change to a comprehensive rail road system. Eliminate all cars and trucks and use trains. We will be lucky to ever achieve 10% energy supply through renewables. There are trains on the design table now that can go 350 mph. It will be far more efficient than automobiles.

Boat on Wed, 14th Dec 2016 9:00 pm 



greggiet,

That’s the first time you seem to admit there is plenty of FF in the ground. Just don’t use it. That is a much more realistic and believable assement. That is not normal for you. And Trump won. A weird ending of 2016. Lol

GregT on Wed, 14th Dec 2016 9:11 pm 



“That’s the first time you seem to admit there is plenty of FF in the ground.”

There’s a big difference between what you think that I ‘seem to admit’ Boat, and reality. I would expect nothing less from the likes of you. Not a fucking clue.

peakyeast on Thu, 15th Dec 2016 4:28 am 



peak cannibalism is something to look forward to – from then on things will get better and better.. Just remember dont eat citypeople more than once a week because of the heavymetal content.