Peak Oil

Overview Alternative Sources of Energy

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Overview

Civilization as we know it is coming to an end soon. This is not the wacky proclamation of a doomsday cult, apocalypse bible prophecy sect, or conspiracy theory society. Rather, it is the scientific conclusion of the best paid, most widely-respected geologists, physicists, and investment bankers in the world. These are rational, professional, conservative individuals who are absolutely terrified by a phenomenon known as global "Peak Oil."

– Life After the Oil Crash by Matt Savinar.

The dominant economic theory in the U.S. for the past 60 years holds that the pursuit of self-interest is the engine of economic growth which will ultimately benefit all of society. There are clear benefits from the creative dynamism that is released in free markets. But this “greed is good” economic theory, which is maintained with nearly religious fervor, has tended to create extremes of wealth and poverty, along with unsustainable environmental destruction. It is not clear if it can or will evolve into a sustainable and fair system.

– Peak America – Is Our Time Up? by Pat Murphy, November 2005.

Our analysis of the discovery and production of oil fields around the world suggests that within the next decade, the supply of conventional oil will be unable to keep up with demand. This conclusion contradicts the picture one gets from oil industry reports, which boasted of 1,020 billion barrels of oil (Gbo) in "Proved" reserves at the start of 1998. Dividing that figure by the current production rate of about 23.6 Gbo a year might suggest that crude oil could remain plentiful and cheap for 43 more years – probably longer, because official charts show reserves growing.

Unfortunately, this appraisal makes three critical errors. First, it relies on distorted estimates of reserves. A second mistake is to pretend that production will remain constant. Third and most important, conventional wisdom erroneously assumes that the last bucket of oil can be pumped from the ground just as quickly as the barrels of oil gushing from wells today. In fact, the rate at which any well – or any country – can produce oil always rises to a maximum and then, when about half the oil is gone, begins falling gradually back to zero.

From an economic perspective, when the world runs completely out of oil is thus not directly relevant: what matters is when production begins to taper off. Beyond that point, prices will rise unless demand declines commensurately.

Using several different techniques to estimate the current reserves of conventional oil and the amount still left to be discovered, we conclude that the decline will begin before 2010.

– The End of Cheap Oil by Colin J. Campbell and Jean H. Laherrère, March 1998.

In 1940 the average farm in the United States produced 2.3 calories of food energy for every calorie of fossil energy it used. By 1974 (the last year in which anyone looked closely at this issue), that ratio was 1:1. And this understates the problem, because at the same time that there is more oil in our food there is less oil in our oil. A couple of generations ago we spent a lot less energy drilling, pumping, and distributing than we do now. In the 1940s we got about 100 barrels of oil back for every barrel of oil we spent getting it. Today each barrel invested in the process returns only ten, a calculation that no doubt fails to include the fuel burned by the Hummers and Blackhawks we use to maintain access to the oil in Iraq.

– The Oil We Eat by Richard Manning, February 2004.

Alternative Energy Sources

Ethanol

At a time when ethanol-gasoline mixtures (gasohol) are touted as the American answer to fossil fuel shortages by corn producers, food processors and some lawmakers, Cornell's David Pimentel takes a longer range view. "Abusing our precious croplands to grow corn for an energy-inefficient process that yields low-grade automobile fuel amounts to unsustainable, subsidized food burning," said the Cornell professor in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences.

– CU scientist terms corn-based ethanol 'subsidized food burning' by Roger Segelken, 23 August 2001.

Nuclear

The reality is that nuclear is a tried, tested and failed technology. There is nothing to stop private investors from building nuclear reactors today, but not a single private consortium has done so anywhere in the world without lashings of taxpayers' largesse since the accidents at Chernobyl and Three Mile Island. […]

Investors have taken a shrewd view of the risk, and have decided not to build. The operating and running costs of nuclear power are far from attractive and these costs do not include the unknown future costs of decommissioning reactors and storing waste that remains radioactive for thousands of years.

Nor are the potential costs of accidents included: there are still 200,000 radioactive British sheep because of soil contaminated by Chernobyl. The latest estimate of the clean-up costs of retiring our [the UK's] existing reactors has soared to £70bn, and will not stop there. There is still no long-term solution to nuclear waste. And nuclear reactors are uninsurable. Why write another blank cheque?

– Tried, tested and failed by Chris Huhne, 20 June 2006.

Hydrogen

There are a number of problems with hydrogen fuel cells. Many of these are engineering problems which could probably be worked out in time. But there is one basic flaw which will never be overcome. Free hydrogen is not an energy source; it is rather an energy carrier. Free hydrogen does not exist on this planet, so to derive free hydrogen we must break the hydrogen bond in molecules. Basic chemistry tells us that it requires more energy to break a hydrogen bond than to form one. This is due to the Second Law of Thermodynamics, and there is no getting around it. We are working on catalysts which will help to lower the energy necessary to generate free hydrogen, but there will always be an energy loss, and the catalysts themselves will become terribly expensive if manufactured on a scale to match current transportation energy requirements.

– The Myth of the Hydrogen Economy by Dale Pfeiffer, 03 January 2006.