I recently finished David Goodstein's Out of Gas: The End of the Age of Oil. It made for a few more sleepless nights as a whole, to say the least. It was more technical than other pieces I've read on peak oil, with most of the book being devoted to the technical aspects of engines (more than I wanted to know) with the first and last parts of the book looking at first Hubbert's peak, then ending with alternative sources of energy.
For those out of the loop, Hubbert's peak was developed by a geophysicist M. King Hubbert, working for Shell Oil, in the 1950's when it seemed that America's oil boom would never end, with frequent discoveries in Texas, etc. He correctly predicted peak oil for the continental U.S. (Alaska excluded), in which new discoveries peaked in the 1950's and peak production was reached in the early 1970's, declining perpetually afterward. His model has been used in countries and, more importantly, for the entire world. We know, of course, that oil is a finite resource; no matter what you think about drilling or the need to drill further, any thinking person realizes that there is only so much oil in the entire world. When we use it up, it's gone and cannot be replaced. According to many estimates, we have used up roughly half the oil that has been estimated to exist, and some think that we have already hit the point of peak oil discoveries worldwide. If the last point is true, then the actual peak in oil production is only a few decades away, at which point it will decrease rapidly. This is occurring in a world where demand is only increasing as well, not only in the United States but especially in the emerging Asian economies of China and India.
An increasing demand curve will meet, at some point, a decreasing production curve. This is a recipe for disaster. Given that U.S. oil production (again, with the limited exception of Alaska) has been in decline since the 1970's, the thought that we will somehow be exempt from the global paroxysms that will accompany peak oil, or the idea that we're still sitting on enough oil to keep our way of life in motion, is delusional at best. Because our own oil production has been in decline for roughly forty years, thus our heavy dependence on foreign imports of oil, I expect that we will be among the first victims of Hubbert's peak. We may delay this day of reckoning, for a time, given that our two biggest sources of oil are Canada and Mexico, but this grace period will be brief at best, and still marked with rapidly rising prices for everything we purchase.
Think carefully about what it means when we run out of oil, when imports stop because everyone else is experiencing the same problem and wants to hang on as long as they can. Everything we do is based on oil; the food we eat, the clothes we wear, the computer at which I am sitting and the electricity that's powering it. What happens when the flow of world oil production falls to a trickle, or stops completely? Empty shelves at the grocery store, gas stations shuttered, rippling power outages (because while most of our power plants run on coal, we use oil to mine and transport it) if not total blackout. And that's just the beginning.
Estimates of when peak will occur vary, as opinions as to whether the problems occur at the peak or when every last drop is gone (Hubbert and his followers believed the problems start at the peak; I agree), anywhere from those who say that peak has already occurred and will not be apparent until a few years hence as production drops, to those who claim we have forty, seventy or even a hundred years left (those are the ones who believe it won't be bad until we've extracted all the oil we possibly can). Regardless, it's only a matter of when, not if, this will occur. I have little confidence that alternative fuels and sources of energy, even in combination, will suffice to stave off a very dire new, oil-free, world. Wind turbines, solar panels, biofuels, coal, even nuclear power plants, all use oil in their production, and even if they were sufficient, the United States isn't exactly running to embrace them. Even Goodstein isn't confident in alternative fuels; at the end of the book he reviews them in turn, concluding that either nuclear power plants or, better still, some as yet undeveloped or undiscovered technology like nuclear fusion, will present itself as a solution. If all you are left with is the hope that something will be developed to replace oil and keep us in motion, then the line between civilization and a second dark age is thin indeed.
After reading this and also James Howard Kunstler's The Long Emergency (a better, if even less optimistic, treatment of peak oil in combination with the rising threat of antibiotic resistance in bacteria and climate change), my view of humanity's future, especially in the oil-addicted U.S., is grim indeed. Just this past week, we've seen oil prices skyrocket in response to the crisis in oil-producing Libya (an interruption in production rather than running out, but a reminder how vulnerable we are nonetheless), and a WikiLeaks document claiming that the Saudis have overestimated their remaining reserves by forty percent; we move closer and closer to the peak, and few seem to take note, choosing to mouth empty platitudes about a mythic "hydrogen economy" and the need for increased domestic drilling.
I don't make this statement lightly, but I feel that people should begin to learn how to do useful things like raise a garden and save from seed in order to replant the following year. Even if you don't accept peak oil and think that I've fallen off the wagon on this one, there are plenty of reasons to grow at least some of your own food, better nutrition to say the least. The day is approaching when such knowledge may mean the difference between survival and some very hard times, to put it diplomatically. I expect to see that day in my lifetime, and if not in my lifetime then in the lifetime of the next generation. As Kunstler said in the introduction to his own book, America is "still sleepwalking into the future. We have walked out of our burning house and we are now headed off the edge of a cliff."
The clock is ticking, and we are nowhere near ready. The view from Hubbert's peak is grim indeed.
For those out of the loop, Hubbert's peak was developed by a geophysicist M. King Hubbert, working for Shell Oil, in the 1950's when it seemed that America's oil boom would never end, with frequent discoveries in Texas, etc. He correctly predicted peak oil for the continental U.S. (Alaska excluded), in which new discoveries peaked in the 1950's and peak production was reached in the early 1970's, declining perpetually afterward. His model has been used in countries and, more importantly, for the entire world. We know, of course, that oil is a finite resource; no matter what you think about drilling or the need to drill further, any thinking person realizes that there is only so much oil in the entire world. When we use it up, it's gone and cannot be replaced. According to many estimates, we have used up roughly half the oil that has been estimated to exist, and some think that we have already hit the point of peak oil discoveries worldwide. If the last point is true, then the actual peak in oil production is only a few decades away, at which point it will decrease rapidly. This is occurring in a world where demand is only increasing as well, not only in the United States but especially in the emerging Asian economies of China and India.
An increasing demand curve will meet, at some point, a decreasing production curve. This is a recipe for disaster. Given that U.S. oil production (again, with the limited exception of Alaska) has been in decline since the 1970's, the thought that we will somehow be exempt from the global paroxysms that will accompany peak oil, or the idea that we're still sitting on enough oil to keep our way of life in motion, is delusional at best. Because our own oil production has been in decline for roughly forty years, thus our heavy dependence on foreign imports of oil, I expect that we will be among the first victims of Hubbert's peak. We may delay this day of reckoning, for a time, given that our two biggest sources of oil are Canada and Mexico, but this grace period will be brief at best, and still marked with rapidly rising prices for everything we purchase.
Think carefully about what it means when we run out of oil, when imports stop because everyone else is experiencing the same problem and wants to hang on as long as they can. Everything we do is based on oil; the food we eat, the clothes we wear, the computer at which I am sitting and the electricity that's powering it. What happens when the flow of world oil production falls to a trickle, or stops completely? Empty shelves at the grocery store, gas stations shuttered, rippling power outages (because while most of our power plants run on coal, we use oil to mine and transport it) if not total blackout. And that's just the beginning.
Estimates of when peak will occur vary, as opinions as to whether the problems occur at the peak or when every last drop is gone (Hubbert and his followers believed the problems start at the peak; I agree), anywhere from those who say that peak has already occurred and will not be apparent until a few years hence as production drops, to those who claim we have forty, seventy or even a hundred years left (those are the ones who believe it won't be bad until we've extracted all the oil we possibly can). Regardless, it's only a matter of when, not if, this will occur. I have little confidence that alternative fuels and sources of energy, even in combination, will suffice to stave off a very dire new, oil-free, world. Wind turbines, solar panels, biofuels, coal, even nuclear power plants, all use oil in their production, and even if they were sufficient, the United States isn't exactly running to embrace them. Even Goodstein isn't confident in alternative fuels; at the end of the book he reviews them in turn, concluding that either nuclear power plants or, better still, some as yet undeveloped or undiscovered technology like nuclear fusion, will present itself as a solution. If all you are left with is the hope that something will be developed to replace oil and keep us in motion, then the line between civilization and a second dark age is thin indeed.
After reading this and also James Howard Kunstler's The Long Emergency (a better, if even less optimistic, treatment of peak oil in combination with the rising threat of antibiotic resistance in bacteria and climate change), my view of humanity's future, especially in the oil-addicted U.S., is grim indeed. Just this past week, we've seen oil prices skyrocket in response to the crisis in oil-producing Libya (an interruption in production rather than running out, but a reminder how vulnerable we are nonetheless), and a WikiLeaks document claiming that the Saudis have overestimated their remaining reserves by forty percent; we move closer and closer to the peak, and few seem to take note, choosing to mouth empty platitudes about a mythic "hydrogen economy" and the need for increased domestic drilling.
I don't make this statement lightly, but I feel that people should begin to learn how to do useful things like raise a garden and save from seed in order to replant the following year. Even if you don't accept peak oil and think that I've fallen off the wagon on this one, there are plenty of reasons to grow at least some of your own food, better nutrition to say the least. The day is approaching when such knowledge may mean the difference between survival and some very hard times, to put it diplomatically. I expect to see that day in my lifetime, and if not in my lifetime then in the lifetime of the next generation. As Kunstler said in the introduction to his own book, America is "still sleepwalking into the future. We have walked out of our burning house and we are now headed off the edge of a cliff."
The clock is ticking, and we are nowhere near ready. The view from Hubbert's peak is grim indeed.
I'm not even going to argue about the timing of Hubbert's peak; I think it's coming soon enough in our (you and I kind of "our”) lifetimes. Being a pre-industrial historically-minded individual, I rather find that I am constantly aware of the immense demands that each of us put on natural resources, not just oil. It is my opinion that not only can this behavior not continue in perpetuity, but it must be consciously curved by us so that we may make a smoother -- and certainly less violent, by gum -- transition to a more simplistic, "eco-friendly" existence, or face a jacked up wake up call.
ReplyDeleteIt has become routine for many of us to make every day commutes that just a few generations ago would not have been considered lightly. Just the other day, I sat down at a magic light-box (much like the one I'm using now) and ordered a set of books from California, a few thousand miles away. Miraculously, they appeared at my door a week later! Can you imagine what that would have meant in 1811 or even 1911 A.D. /C.E.? It really is asking a lot and is demonstrable of the kind of behavior that would likely fall by the proverbial "wayside" in an -- as it appears now – future oil-free world.
On the bright side, I believe in human ingenuity and inventiveness and trust in our ability to find an alternative, if lesser, means to accomplish many of the same tasks that we have been used to undertaking. I believe it was last month that I read an article about a battery-operated car which uses a cumbersome mast and wind turbine to recharge itself that, with the aid of some human operators, just made a transcontinental voyage across Australia. As it stands, this technology “sucks” by today’s standards, but we are always advancing, however slowly. This is just one example of the things which we might look forward to seeing in regular production in time to combat the looming oil shortage crises. I realize that much oil was likely used in the production of this vehicle, but that can change as the market demands that substitutes for oil be introduced into the equation, and they will soon enough.
In the meantime, I shall continue to hone my skill in everything from husbandry to knitting [cough] and prepare for the worst as I deem fitting to changing circumstances. When push comes to shove, as they say, I believe that the strong shall overcome the weak, no matter how good and necessary their Pinot Noir Pepper planting skills are ;-) Take notice, I’ll be coming for some peppers in exchange for “protection” and the combination of our libraries should this somehow happen sooner rather than latter.
Isn't this all moot since it'll all be over in 2012 anyway? Seriously though, with transportation being the majority of oil consumption and the current administration purporting to being eco-friendly, why are there not more work-at-home (or other reasonable) initiatives -nay, mandates, coming from our supposed leaders (either side here)?
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