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Tar Sand Eco Impact Pt.1(merged)

Irradiated Oil

Unread postby Colorado-Valley » Tue 07 Jun 2005, 01:28:39

Irradiated Oil
by Stirling Newberry

(Stirling wrote this over at BOP News, and it seems feasible, although we may not like the kind of world it would create. What do you guys think?)


To drive a machine requires energy, the economic history of the West has seen three major shifts in the energy basis over the last five centuries. The first was the wind and water revolution, where technological improvements allowed the increasingly efficient harnessing of waterwheels and sails. The great leaps forward began with the creation of the mathematical physics of Newton, and the fluid mechanics of Borda, which made it possible to design improved hulls and water wheels. This would drive connecting more complex machines to water power, and open greater trade through faster ships. The force of fluid, not steam, drove early textile mills in England and America. It was the clipper ship and not the steam engine that crossed the Pacific in the early "China Trade."

This is why by 1820, Europeans faced an energy crisis. There were 60,000 water wheels in France, and almost every inch of head was being exploited already, and so, enormous prizes were offered for better designs. One winner was the undershot wheel of Poncelets, who, like Newton and Borda, was also an accomplished mathematician, as well as being a practical engineer. Another was Fourneyron, who developed the earliest turbine. In the United States the election of 1824 hinged on the completion of the "American System," which required the use of canals and internal trade to replace external trade lost by high tariffs. In 1828, Andrew Jackson chased John Quincy Adams from office, ending the project, and turning, instead, to a system of "every man for himself" competition.

In the end, it would be steam that would wash away many of the late water innovations, because their expense would have been very high for the cost of introducing them. By 1825, the water/wave economy was near its final stages, and the wins available for improvements were simply not worth the cost.

Coal would form the basis of this new economy, and railroads would be the means by which high-speed transportation occured. Coal would, in its turn, be replaced by petroleum, and the huge engines of the steam age be replaced by the compact engines of the combustion age.

In 1820 steam power was not yet ready for prime time, and dramatically expanding water power was too expensive. The result in the US was that the public took a third option: just do without, and let people fight over the limited allocation of access to opportunity. By electing Jackson, and by beginning an era of "free banking," the United States entered a holding pattern which would only gradually crumble as the cost of steam came down. The dam would finally break when American committed itself to a transcontinental railroad system.

By the 1970s, the petroleum age was reaching the same kind of crisis point that the wind and water age reached in the 1820s and 1830s. It was possible, through technological cleverness, to extend the old energy age a while longer. And this is precisely what the right wing has settled upon as its next scam to run on the public. I say scam because it will not work. I say next because the last 15 years have been devoted to one attempt after another to convince the public that the problem of the ending of the petroleum era would take care of itself.

The first was that there was no problem at all: that both global warming and any limits to petroleum production were myths. The weight of evidence has piled up so that now only the most reactionary and vicious of individuals seek to deny global warming, while the limits to petroleum production have been back handedly admitted by the right wing.

However, they are not going to use the phrase "peak oil" if they can avoid it. Instead the approved Newspeak is "quality of energy problem." What they mean is that while we are reaching the end of the easy-to-package forms of hydrocarbon - natural gas and light or intermediate petroleum - there are still large quantities of harder-to-package hydrocarbons out there. Their plan is to "boil the frog" - provide a series of intermediate steps that will allow the packaging of progressively worse sources of petrochemicals in order to leave the public with a constant series of false choices: what will seem like a way to "fix" the problem, with the implied promise that this repair will be the last. But it will be like an old car: each repair will lead to another, more expensive, repair.

The "upgrade path" of the petroleum economy is to gradually be able to package worse and worse sources of energy. The first step is what we hear when the Saudis state that "more refinery capacity is needed." The implication to the American public is that they are pumping plenty of oil, but that it is a lack of refinery capacity. That oil is piling up some place.

The reality is different: what they mean is that processing lower grades of petroleum into gasoline is going to be a necessity. This step - of refining lower quality fuels - is something the US has done before. In the 1960s and 1970s, as the quality of domestic US oil production went down, we put additives in gasoline to increase its power: lead, for example. The reason "unleaded" gasoline was expensive is not that lead is naturally found in petroleum and then removed, it is that it can be made with lower quality crude oil. The additive that we want to add now is hydrogen. The "hydrogen economy" isn't about fuel cells, it is about adding hydrogen to petroleum. This will allow the use of lower grades of petroleum.

The second phase is to extract kerogene, so called "shale oil," and tar sands. The road here is to pressure steam into the hydrocarbon-bearing rock, forcing out the mixture. This then needs to be synthesized into petroleum. There are large reserves of this kind of very low-quality hydrocarbon, but even generous extraction rates show that it too will run out relatively quickly.

The third phase will be packaging hydrogen and coal as petroleum. If one crushes coal, and heats it in the presence of hydrogen, the coal, which is carbon, combines with the hydrogen to produce hydrocarbons: namely, petroleum. The result of this is a low-quality petroleum, which can then be fed into the refinery system developed in the first phase, and sold to the public as gasoline. This phase runs out rather quickly as well. While we have "plenty of coal" we don't have plenty of coal if coal is to supplant petroleum. And certainly not if the affluent living standard is to be extended to the 2.5 billion people in China and India. In an irony, given the nature of the technology, this is called "clean coal."

Which is why the right wing is pushing fuel-cell technology: it is a pretty face to what is an ugly extractive reality. And that ugly extractive reality gets even uglier when one realizes that there is one crucial technology to all of these phases: so-called "heat process" nuclear power. A nuclear reactor of any kind produces neutrons and heat. Some of the neutrons split the next round of atoms, or in fusion enrich the hydrogen into tritum - but they produce no useful power directly. Instead the heat is captured by some means, and then made to do work. If electricity is the target, then heat is used to create steam, and the steam drives a turbine.

The only reason that one needs a "heat process" reactor is if one wants to package the energy in some form other than electricity. And all of the steps listed above need huge sources of heat. The heat can be used first to hydrogenate low-quality petroleum, then to extract nonconventional petroleum, and finally to hydrogenate coal.

In short, the proposal that Bush, Cheney, the oil companies and the Saudis are pushing is a system of irradiated oil.

The disadvantages of this system are numerous. First, each step is enormously expensive, and reduces the life-cycle output of the energy system at each step of the way. That is, we put more and more energy in for the energy we get out.

Second, through most of the life cycle of the irradiated petroleum oil, internal combustion, which produces huge amounts of carbon dioxide for the amount of energy we can get from it, is the means by which people use the energy which is packaged. In fact, "clean coal" is about adding carbon to hydrogen. Third, it is centralized. Individual people cannot produce these fuels, nor access them. One is stuck with the current top-down economy, where if you want energy, you buy it from the oil companies. A top-down energy system means a top-down economy. And a top-down economy means that there must be a large military to protect the sources of whatever it is supplies the key resources.

But the worst part about it is that after all that investment, after all that cost, this system runs out in a century or so no matter what. Given 30 years between generations, your great grandchildren - people you may well meet - will be faced with same problem we are being faced with right this very instant.
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Re: Irradiated Oil

Unread postby JohnDenver » Tue 07 Jun 2005, 04:56:36

Colorado-Valley wrote:In short, the proposal that Bush, Cheney, the oil companies and the Saudis are pushing is a system of irradiated oil.


Yep, "nuke the tarsands", as I like to say. They'll probably nuke the oil and gas fields too.
You can't blame Bush, Cheney, the oil companies or the Saudis for irradiated oil. They are simply responding to the so-called "needs" of their first world customers. If the public didn't want the oil, they wouldn't have to go to such extremes to produce it.

Why not boycott gasoline? "Oh, please... that's preposterous. We need our cars." Okay, but if you need your car, and your car needs gasoline, then Bush and Cheney need to get the oil. They're blameless, lily white. They're just following orders from the public. They don't want to pull a Jimmy Carter and piss off the electorate.

But the worst part about it is that after all that investment, after all that cost, this system runs out in a century or so no matter what. Given 30 years between generations, your great grandchildren - people you may well meet - will be faced with same problem we are being faced with right this very instant.


Yes, that's true. But 100 years is a long delay. A lot of time for energy R&D, and redoing infrastructure.
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Unread postby JohnDenver » Tue 07 Jun 2005, 08:36:09

I have previously calculated the cost per MMbtu of various types of energy:

Coal (Powder River Basin) = $0.45/MMbtu
Coal (Central Appalachia) = $2.60/MMbtu
Natural gas = $6.97/MMbtu
Oil = $9.14/MMbtu

Let's calculate the cost of uranium process heat. Since the heat is not converted to electricity, there is minimal loss.

Energy in 1 pound of uranium-235= 3.7 x 10^13 joules
Cost of 1 pound of commercial uranium (enriched 3-5%)= about $30

Assuming 3% enrichment, the energy in 1 pound of commercial uranium is:
(0.03)(3.7 x 10^13 joules) = 1.1 x 10^12 joules = 1.1 x 10^9 btu

So, price per MMbtu is = $30/1100 MMbtu = $0.03/MMbtu.

Even if the retail price is 10 times that ($0.30), it would still be cheaper than any other form of energy. If the tar sands or oil shale are mined with uranium process heat, the operation could still break even if it takes 30 MMbtu of input energy to yield 1 MMbtu of synthetic oil (i.e. even if the EROEI of the tar sands is about 0.03).
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Unread postby dmtu » Tue 07 Jun 2005, 09:25:57

Interesting JD.

Do you have sources? Not so much because I doubt you, but because I want to do a little research of my own, and I would like to verify the numbers to my own experience. Particularly for the PRB.
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Unread postby Andy » Tue 07 Jun 2005, 09:36:18

We are forgetting something here. You can't simply just use nuclear heat to process the tar sands. You will need to make allowances to contain the radioactivity, direct the heat for the process, deal with the waste products etc. etc. In other words, there is a whole lot of infrastructure (much more than for other heating techniques) required. When those are considered, it no longer looks as attractive.
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Unread postby JohnDenver » Tue 07 Jun 2005, 09:44:34

dmtu wrote:Interesting JD.

Do you have sources? Not so much because I doubt you, but because I want to do a little research of my own, and I would like to verify the numbers to my own experience. Particularly for the PRB.


The earlier calculations and sources are here:
http://www.peakoil.com/fortopic8261-0.html

This is also a good source, which gives consumer prices per MMbtu for various types of energy, from 1970 to 2000:
http://www.eia.doe.gov/emeu/aer/txt/ptb0303.html
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Unread postby PhilBiker » Tue 07 Jun 2005, 10:45:51

We are forgetting something here. You can't simply just use nuclear heat to process the tar sands. You will need to make allowances to contain the radioactivity, direct the heat for the process, deal with the waste products etc. etc. In other words, there is a whole lot of infrastructure (much more than for other heating techniques) required. When those are considered, it no longer looks as attractive.
Actually it does, particularly since it's basically the only option there is. The infrastructure is no different than a nuclear electrical generating power plant, and Canada's in the forefront of making small efficient reactors that generate the minimum amount of waste (their CANDU model). Instead of (or in addition to) running a turbine, the steam generated is used to treat the tar sands.

There are other problems, such as water and general environmental degradation that are both more formidable than siting a nuclear reactor.

Also, to get back on the topic of the header... The oil won't be irradiated any more than the electricity coming from your socket is. If you want to talk about irradiated fossil fuels take a look at the Colorado projects by the DOE.
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Unread postby Colorado-Valley » Tue 07 Jun 2005, 11:32:43

Phil,

By "irradiating oil," I think Stirling is referring to a process that uses nuclear energy to keep the world dependent on the oil companies and a centralized, top-down, militaristic system. This is how they would keep the internal combustion engine (and urban sprawl) as the driver of the economy.

In other posts, he's outlined the alternative, which is an "electric economy" based a wide variety of energy sources and patterns of living that are much more democratic and decentralized.
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Unread postby JohnDenver » Tue 07 Jun 2005, 11:52:47

Colorado-Valley wrote:This is how they would keep the internal combustion engine (and urban sprawl) as the driver of the economy.


Yes, cunning strategies must be employed to force the internal combustion engine down the throat of the car-hating masses. :lol:

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Unread postby pongle » Tue 07 Jun 2005, 12:11:21

PhilBiker wrote:
Also, to get back on the topic of the header... The oil won't be irradiated any more than the electricity coming from your socket is. If you want to talk about irradiated fossil fuels take a look at the Colorado projects by the DOE.


Indeed. I found the heading to be very confusing. I dont mind puns or wordplay, but please..

[edit] In all fairness, i must add that the content of the post was interesting and had new ideas. kudos for that.
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Re: Irradiated Oil

Unread postby 0mar » Tue 07 Jun 2005, 12:56:20

JohnDenver wrote:
Colorado-Valley wrote:In short, the proposal that Bush, Cheney, the oil companies and the Saudis are pushing is a system of irradiated oil.


Yep, "nuke the tarsands", as I like to say. They'll probably nuke the oil and gas fields too.
You can't blame Bush, Cheney, the oil companies or the Saudis for irradiated oil. They are simply responding to the so-called "needs" of their first world customers. If the public didn't want the oil, they wouldn't have to go to such extremes to produce it.

Why not boycott gasoline? "Oh, please... that's preposterous. We need our cars." Okay, but if you need your car, and your car needs gasoline, then Bush and Cheney need to get the oil. They're blameless, lily white. They're just following orders from the public. They don't want to pull a Jimmy Carter and piss off the electorate.

But the worst part about it is that after all that investment, after all that cost, this system runs out in a century or so no matter what. Given 30 years between generations, your great grandchildren - people you may well meet - will be faced with same problem we are being faced with right this very instant.


Yes, that's true. But 100 years is a long delay. A lot of time for energy R&D, and redoing infrastructure.



Boycotting gasoline will never work without a significant portion of America participating. 20-30 million Americans boycotting gasoline for a year would work...
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Unread postby Caoimhan » Tue 07 Jun 2005, 15:10:49

An outright boycott won't happen. People won't give up driving cars. But when people start driving more and more diesel cars on bio-diesel, the oil companies and federal government WILL sit up and take notice.
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Unread postby ubercrap » Tue 07 Jun 2005, 17:30:27

Disregarding many of the other drawbacks, I, along with many others, have mentioned many, many times, the limitation with alternative oil sources seems to be the rate of production. If something can "mitigate" peak oil, this isn't it.
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Farewell Alberta "the land is dead"

Unread postby seldom_seen » Mon 10 Oct 2005, 02:29:02

In Canada's Wilderness, Measuring the Cost of Oil Profits

About 82,000 acres of forest and wetlands have been cleared or otherwise disturbed since development of oil sands began in earnest here in the late 1960's, and that is just the start. The pockets of oil sands in northern Alberta - which all together equal the size of Florida - are only beginning to be developed.

"There are no moose, no rabbits, no squirrels anymore," complained Howard Lacorde, 59, a Cree trapper whose trapline has been interrupted by a new oil sands project developed by Canadian Natural Resources. "The land is dead," he added, shaking in anger, as he walked through a construction site that was once his trapline.

The last great rape of nature is picking up steam. Full throttle to cliff and die-off!
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Re: Farewell Alberta "the land is dead"

Unread postby Antimatter » Mon 10 Oct 2005, 03:12:23

Earth first. We'll strip mine the other planets later. :-D

Only a relatively small area of the deposit is recoverable by mining, so it won't be too bad.
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Re: Farewell Alberta "the land is dead"

Unread postby skiwi » Mon 10 Oct 2005, 03:57:11

Fiordland is grand! It is very remote, extremely rugged, so much so that many inner areas of the Park remain virtually unexplored even today.
and we've still got our moose downunder

Moose DNA found in Fiordland

A series of DNA tests done on animal hairs found in Fiordland confirms that they come from a descendant of Canadian moose brought to New Zealand 95 years ago....
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Re: Farewell Alberta "the land is dead"

Unread postby Heineken » Mon 10 Oct 2005, 09:19:46

This just goes to show that money always speaks the same language, and that even a relatively advanced country like Canada is no better than the neocon empire to the south when it comes to $$$. Money will continue to trump environment until it's too late.
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Re: Farewell Alberta "the land is dead"

Unread postby seldom_seen » Mon 10 Oct 2005, 15:15:09

Canada is just like any third world country when it comes to pillaging their natural resources. There has been some fairly widespread and what I would call disastrous clear-cut logging here in Oregon and Washington. However, you ain't seen nothing until you've seen what British Columbia has done to their forests. Moonscape. Makes the Brazilians look like good stewards of the rainforest.

If they are advanced at anything it is condesencion towards their southern neighbors.
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Re: Farewell Alberta "the land is dead"

Unread postby seldom_seen » Mon 10 Oct 2005, 15:16:45

Antimatter wrote: Only a relatively small area of the deposit is recoverable by mining, so it won't be too bad.

right. just a little swath of land the size of Florida. nothing to see here...move along...
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Re: Farewell Alberta "the land is dead"

Unread postby fossilnut2 » Mon 10 Oct 2005, 16:36:54

"About 82,000 acres of forest and wetlands have been cleared or otherwise disturbed since development of oil sands began in earnest here in the late 1960's"


Let's expose another hysterical rambling: :razz:

82,000 acres. There's 640 acres to a sq mile. alberta is 250,000 sq miles in size. 82,000 is 128 sq miles. Or an area about 11 miles times 11 miles.... :lol:

There are ranches in Alberta and BC that are that size! 11 sq miles isn't much different in size from a city.

About 1/20000th of Alberta is taken up by the clearing of forests and wetlands for tarsands production..

I wonder if 'wherever' you live if 1/2000th of the area is developed? Developed how? There are no roads in your state? no houses? No shopping centers? No agriculture? For every mile you drive there are hundreds of undeveloped in between?....then again, you don't have roads :roll:

Yesterday we drove 50 kms West of our city and hiked in the middle of nowhere. Saw a balck bear...about 50 Mountain sheep...watched the rams headbutting. On the way home we had to drive slow because a mom Moose and her yearling were trotting down the middle of the road. I challenge anywhere in N. america to have as much wilderness as we do (except the Canadian north).

Peak Oil may be a valid concept but it's been hijacked by hysterics and lack of perspective.
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