Peak Oil, What Happens When We Run Out Of Oil?

[mixed]

Anyone who is going to have a extensive knowledge of the oil industry is going to be involved in it in some way be it for or against - critical evaluation of their views is what is required with the knowledge of where the speaker is coming from.

It's basically about continuing to make money from oil rather than the sustainability of oil addicted societies.

[mixed]

The renewables will play their (small) part too as well as their big brother Nuclear power. Don't forget that uranium is in an abundant supply and it produces a helluva lot more than renewables do. Nuclear waste is a down-side but deep-core sites and glass encasement are a way around this.

As a final solution, the boffins are predicting that by 2025 fusion power will be replacing oil and gas as a major energy source (subject to helium 3 availability).

Taking all this into account I don't think we'll be going back-to-basics but will have to be more conservative in our lifestyles than before (but not by that much).

I've heard that uranium will only last 20 years, but this figure is probably based on theories with strong growth in demand.

Lessening demand seems to be the key. Less consumption means a less economic growth, recession etc.

A degree of back to basics combined with new/renewable technologies will be an important part. Below is an example (as crazy as it seems):

[OlRedEyes]

Peak oil isn't really a problem IMHO. Alternative energy will be developed quite quickly if necessary. Major advances are already gaining momentum.

Global warming, world-wide recession/depression, religious fanaticism, mass migrations and the resultant strains as well as food/water will be the big issues of the 21st century.

Agree with a few things about what the problems will be but will there be a global recession depression - its not clear and many observers are saying the growth in the developing countries like India, China et all means things are different this time ie a USA recession will not have as much effect as it would have previously.

Mass migration will be an issue as those peoples who are missing out on the benefit of globalisation try to move to the regions that are doing very well ie the triad of N American, Europe and East Asia - it will certainly continue to be a highly contencious issue in Europe and America.

India, and especially China, are not (yet) really consumers, they are growing as manufacturers/suppliers (their fast-growing consumption is largely in raw materials) and therefore they're heavily dependent upon the US and EU economies for demand. If the consumers of this world go into recession, there will be little demand, and therefore little growth.

Mass migration as a result of climate change will totally overshadow the current migration trends caused largely by economic factors. Many millions of displaced people, in search of basics like food and water is a nightmare scenario.....

Edited January 15, 2008 by OlRedEyes

[meemiathai]

There are many ppl who believe we may have reached the peak of crude oil production. This combined with an ever increasing demand means a grim future awaits a world that is addicted to oil.

Alternative fuel options such as nuclear, solar, wind, bio-fuels etc. would only provide a tiny fraction of the of the energy supplied by oil.

What will be the impract on Thailand? Is the country better of because it's a warm climate with plenty of sun and a largely rural population that could revert back to traditional methods? Or is the country to poor to afford the expensive alternatives?

We are going to have a world war before that. So not really a thailand problem only.

[Sir Burr]

The oil won't run out. We will discover a more efficient way to power our civilization.

There is seven times all the oil in Saudi Arabia within the Canadian oil sands. The only reason why it hasn't been utilized before is the cost of extraction. This goes for hundreds of oil-fields all over the world. As long as the cost of extraction was more than the cost on the free-market, these oil-fields weren't counted. now that the price is up, a lot of these oil-fields will be exploited.

Whenever people talk about oil, they always seem to talk about power production ie. petrol and oil for power stations.

Oil is necessary for lubricants, plastics, chemicals, textiles, fertilizers and pharmaceuticals, just to name a few of it's uses.

For many of these things, there is no substitite.

Just remember, the Stone Age didn't end because they ran out of stones.

[rafval]

oil may or may not be running out, but India has a huge population and has just put out a very cheap car, and the chinese midle class are buying cars too, the demand for oil is going to keep rising so its certainly not going to get cheaper, and uranium is also a limited resource which is rising in cost too I believe

[gregb]

Just remember, the Stone Age didn't end because they ran out of stones.

It's comments like this that just make me sad on so many levels.

All of these things that you believe can save may in fact be possible. It is possible to get energy from the sun, gravity or nuclear. (The only 3 fundamental forces available to us, from which all other sources are derived.) There are lots of ways to tap it, and any that give a positive return on investment (energy that is, not money) could in theory be used to power a society in some sense.

Fossil fuels are so nice because a process ran over millions of years to tap into the solar energy stream, and then used gravitational energy to form a very useful product requiring minimal extraction and processing to be used.

Here are the facts: fossil fuels are peaking, and no other substitute way of tapping these energy streams gives the same EROEI (energy returned on energy invested.) That doesn't mean nothing else could work, but it does mean that we will need to do one of the following or both:

A ) Invest massively in new mechanisms to tap these streams. The investment will be collossally larger than the original investment in the oil infrastructure, because of the lower EROEI. This isn't being done currently, and the scope of which is so large as to be incomprehensible to any of us. The oil infrastructure took a century to build. 80+ million barrels per day of oil? Not replacing that with any substitute in any short order. Use your brain. Do the math. This needed to start decades ago to be a viable strategy. A small 2% decline per year is a HUGE amount of energy. Substitutes are currently such a small stream that they need to grow by several orders of magnitude to keep up with depletion. It's too late now. Substitution will fall behind.

B ) Adjust your life to accept the new realities of declining energy. This means low energy lifestyles. No personal cars. Start walking. Maybe a train now and then for large scale transport. This could be a viable option, but people who make statements like the above often quoted, ridiculous stone statement aren't even trying. Business as usual won't work, no matter much you want to stick your head in the sand and believe it will. Reference point A above. Energy availability is going down despite the almost fanatical belief in technology by some members of the population.

If 100% of the people on the globe accepted the realities of A and/or B, then I could believe that there was hope for a mitigating solution. But when I see how few people even take this crisis seriously, I realize that the current civilization will crash just as hundreds have before it.

I'm not sure what will be around for my grandchildren, but I know what it won't be. What it won't be is a technologically advanced world of 9 billion people living off solar panels driving hydrogen cars. That is nothing more than a pipe dream shared by those who don't want to think.

The future is war and disease, eventually killing billions of people until equilibrium is reestablished with nature. What new civilization rises up from this is anyone's guess. Sad reality, but ultimately the truth.

[Gary A]

There are many Chicken Littles out there. The sky is NOT falling. In the first place we will never run out of oil but it will become too expensive. Future cars and trucks will be running on hydrogen fuel cells. Breeder reactors will be common so large amounts of uranium will no longer be needed. Google hydrogen and you will find that water contains two parts hydrogen and one part oxygen. To separate the two requires electricity and electrodes commonly made from graphite. The beauty of that is sea water is more conductive than fresh water so there is no need for fresh water. There will be huge hydrogen producing plants along the coasts and they will be using clean nuclear power to produce all the vehicle fuel the world needs. If the price of oil remains high there is a very good chance that many of you will see this happen in your lifetime.

Unfortunately OPEC will eventually lower oil prices to make the new processes too expensive and many projects will likely be stopped and forgotten. Governments around the world will have to tax fossil fuel to fund and encourage new alternative fuels and to foil OPEC's master plan. The US is especially guilty because politicians don't have the guts to do what must be done.

Dirty coal is still the cheapest energy available and many countries will continue to use it and won't worry about damage to the earth and future generations.

[PeaceBlondie]

Remember the story of the boy who too often called "Wolf!" when there was no wolf. Then the wolf came, and nobody believed him.

[pampal]

And while everyone has got their eye on oil, the real issue is water.

I agree with you that water is a major issue and the water wars will occur in our lifetime. But couldn't the seemingly endless supply of water (in the oceans) be utilized by building desalination plants. If I remember correctly, 

you are in the KSA and they supply the majority of their potable water by desalination.

Edited January 15, 2008 by pampal

[Gary A]

Remember the story of the boy who too often called "Wolf!" when there was no wolf. Then the wolf came, and nobody believed him.

It's actually pretty simple as far as fossil oil. Just Google oils sands and shale oil and you will find PROVEN reserves that are many times higher than all the oil that has ever been pumped out of mother earth since we started using oil. No wolf there.

[pampal]

Natural Gas is the future and the world's proven supply of GAS is large enough to satisfy demand for the next couple of hundred years. The majority of the gas supplies are in Russia, Iran and Qatar.

Nuclear energy is OK for producing electricity, but the technology doesn't lend it self well to other applications, like powering you car.

Gas can instantly replace gasoline/petrol and there is enough of it to last a long, long time.

[pampal]

Remember the story of the boy who too often called "Wolf!" when there was no wolf. Then the wolf came, and nobody believed him.

It's actually pretty simple as far as fossil oil. Just Google oils sands and shale oil and you will find PROVEN reserves that are many times higher than all the oil that has ever been pumped out of mother earth since we started using oil. No wolf there.

There are vast proven reserves of oil and shales. But they do not come without a heavy price and I don't mean just economically. The process of mining the stone and washing (steam and/or chemical)and extracting the oil ,creates a heck of mess. The cleaned stones also have to be moved to another pit.

Today's refineries also have to be modified to handle the extra heavy crude oil(plastic like consistency). The environmental price of this technology is pretty large.

[Gary A]

Natural Gas is the future and the world's proven supply of GAS is large enough to satisfy demand for the next couple of hundred years. The majority of the gas supplies are in Russia, Iran and Qatar.

Nuclear energy is OK for producing electricity, but the technology doesn't lend it self well to other applications, like powering you car.

Gas can instantly replace gasoline/petrol and there is enough of it to last a long, long time.

Interesting you should mention natural gas. I have stock in a VERY small oil company called Credo Petroleum. I took this from their annual report;

Proved reserves reached a record 20.5 billion cubic feet equivalent (Bcfe), or 11 percent more than the year before. Natural gas reserves increased 6 percent while oil reserves increased 40 percent. Credo has posted record reserves for 14 consecutive years.

[micksterbs]

Some interesting points on here with not too much name-calling, thank God.

Has anyone else read "The End of Oil" by Paul Roberts? I did a couple of years ago and found it very illuminating. He writes it in as near a "neutral" position as you could, IMO. What I find depressing is that so many people just seem to be burying their heads in the sand. A blind faith in technology akin to believing, hoping, praying that Superman is going to make it all go away and we can just carry on as before.

I do agree with a previous poster that many overlook the fact that we rely on oil for a lot more than merely its use as a fuel. Without oil as a lubricant the world would, literally, grind to a halt. Then there's plastics. Just walk into any supermarket and strip away all the plastic in your imagination. Doesn't leave much. Ok, we all managed before plastics, granted. But then a lot more food was grown locally and eaten when still fresh. Can you imagine how the really big cities are going to cope just feeding themselves every day?

We may not be around to see the crunch but I think a fair few of us will see a sizeable amount of civil disobedience in the next 25-30 years. It's selfish, I know, but I'm glad I shan't see it. Having said that, I would love to think that the human race will adapt to this huge challenge which is big enough without global warming. Wouldn't you love to have a little peek into the future sometimes? Just for a while...

[Naam]

We may not be around to see the crunch but I think a fair few of us will see a sizeable amount of civil disobedience in the next 25-30 years. It's selfish, I know, but I'm glad I shan't see it.

welcome to the club!

[Naam]

here's a picture worth a thousand words...

isn't this Tony Blair receiving a blessing from the Pope?

[Naam]

Nuclear energy can be produced with no more radioactive side effects than already exists in our environment ("background radiation"). This would require fusion...

but we are technically decades (if not centuries) away to master that technology. a dozen countries have 'banded' together and are financing a research plant which is presently under construction in southern France. for me personally extremely interesting but my chances are very low to live long enough and see positive results.

[Naam]

"Cold fusion"; producing nuclear energy at room temp, seems to be the best alternative. No dangerous waste and no risk of a meltdown. I've read recently that some scientists (not sure which country) have actually done this

cold fusion is an ancient technology. it was already well known when i served on the Enterprise under Captain Picard. even Scotty and Captain Kirk considered cold fusion as a technology belonging to the steam age.

[Robski]

Remember the story of the boy who too often called "Wolf!" when there was no wolf. Then the wolf came, and nobody believed him.

And the moral of the story was, never tell the same lie twice.

I predict that Issan will benefit from the oil crisis as the rice whisky stills go into

overdrive to fill Thailands cars and bikes with it's own homegrown 'bio-fuel'.

I also predict an upsurge in drunk drivers.

You heard it here first.

Robstradamouski.

[Chloe82]

(North Sea is falling at something like 8% pa

Not so sure about 8% pa H, but it is certainly true that the North Sea peaked more than nine years ago so therefore we have (in the North Sea oil fields) reached the end of cheap oil extraction, the UK oil companies are now trying to extract as much oil as they can while it is still affordable to do so.

The loss to the UK government because of this has been in excess of 1billion GBP, we need now to look at the Arctic, the Barents Sea for exploration and development.

There is however, im convinced, a long way to go until we reach the year of global peak oil, though the ripple effect of Peak Oil grows as we type.

Chloe.

[waldpyk]

i still stand by my first post here (maiden speech)

although it was not appreciated and stopped by the moderater

[Chloe82]

I'm not sure how well foreigners in Thailand are going to do. We're going to head into – economically – choppy waters (think of the depression of the 1930s…only much worse) and foreigners are almost always the targets of resentment in times like that. If you're not established in a community, I wouldn't really fancy your chances.

If you believe what the websites you quoted are saying then one of them is predicting. (www.lifeaftertheoilcrash.net)

'Fascists will rise, feeding on the anger of the newly poor and whipping up support. These new rulers will find the tools of repression -- emergency laws, prison camps, a relaxed attitude toward torture'

"Once affluent cities with street cafés will have queues at soup kitchens and armies of beggars. The crime rate will soar. The earth has always been a dangerous place, but now it will become a tinderbox."

Chloe.

[Robski]

Could easily be the UK or the US already and has more to do with wealth distribution than oil supplies.

[Chloe82]

Alternative energy will be developed quite quickly if necessary.

How? There is no magic solution, the brains don't know what to do, you can't just presume that other people will deliver solutions, it might not work out like that.

Chloe.

[Chloe82]

Could easily be the UK or the US already and has more to do with wealth distribution than oil supplies.

If oil becomes to expensive for a country to buy then where would the wealth come from to be distributed?

Chloe.

[Robski]

Ah just print some more money, heck the US do it all the time.

Alternatively a tax on wheels for goalposts might ease the strain.

Edited January 15, 2008 by Robski

[Chloe82]

Ah just print some more money, heck the US do it all the time.

Yeh, that would work.

Chloe.

[pampal]

I have stock in a VERY small oil company called Credo Petroleum. I took this from their annual report;

Smart Man

[pampal]

Without oil as a lubricant the world would, literally, grind to a halt. Then there's plastics. Just walk into any supermarket and strip away all the plastic in your imagination. Doesn't leave much. Ok, we all managed before plastics, granted. But then a lot more food was grown locally and eaten when still fresh. Can you imagine how the really big cities are going to cope just feeding themselves every day?

Steam  engines were invented before oil based lubricants were available. Hemp based lubricants were used from the earliest days of engines until the 1940's, even in airplane engines. And except a few very specialized applications, hemp based lubricants can replace most lubricants used today.

Hemp and other organic fibers can be used in place of a number of different plastics.

They are more durable and more environmentally friendly.

Hemp was the world's number 1 fiber until the invention of nylon.

Hemp paper can be used to replace a number of different plastic packaging.

Edited January 15, 2008 by pampal