Nightshade

I posted this here as the topic will affect how we travel.........

This is a VERY sobering read. Many points about what is happening today
is cleared up by this opinion.


https://www.commondreams.org/views04/0301-12.htm

lyeinyoureye

No offense towards the OP, but that article is complete drivel. It completely ignores the primary/economic basis for our oil use, profit. I wouldn't be surprised if doomerism regarding the peak in crude was being flamed by oil companies so there won't be as much resistence to securing foreign oil supplies to pad the profits of western oil companies using the West's military, primarily the US'. If people feel we have no alternatives, they aren't as critical of our actions regardin this product overseas.

tsl

Not at all. It simply uses the euphemism, "greed".

krazygluon

energy (and the availability of high density energy storage in the form of oil) is the one thing. doesn't matter squat where you get that energy, just that you've got it. Industrial civilization was doing a decent job with coal-fired railways 50 years before oil was ever discovered. (not that I'm saying to go back to coal for everything...that would be ludicrous)

I second the notion that the greed problem needs to be changed, and the energy problem.

lyeinyoureye

In comparing our use of oil to a monkey's greed, I suppose the point is that we won't stop using it because we're greedy, but it neglects to mention that we aren't presented with other options that are just as functional so that the minority can maximize profits. Besides, with lines like this...
How can anyone take this seriously?

okpik

lyeinyoureye

what determines when an oil company will no longer pursue extracting oil from a reservoir?

the world is using 85 million bpd per day, thats 3570 million gallons, unless the alternatives can provide that kind of energy, no, modern industry such as we know cannot exist in its current scale and form, thats a no brainer

best guesses ive seen, we might if we work super hard and quit quibling over stupid things and work together as nations on the problem alternatives might cover 15-30% of the energy we use these days, I havent seen any real good guesses at how much conservation can be done to help out, and its probably the most effective way, just use less, but my feeling is there will be a sizable gap, meaning we will be using less whether we like it or not

bragi

I don't dispute the details of the article, but think its conclusions are a bit too pessimistic. Yes, running out of oil will suck; we've all read the dire predicitions. But human beings, even the current generation of Americans, tend to be pretty inventive when push comes to shove, and I'm pretty sure that most people, when forced to choose between their SUV and continued civilized existence, will reluctantly choose the latter. Whether or not we'll be able to save democracy in the process is another question, though... (Too bad we're currently cursed with such corrupt and incompetent leaders. Where's John Adams when you need him?)

What's this have to do with bikes? I dunno...

Roody

I take it seriously because it's self-evident. Can you seriously believe that our civilization can survive without vast amounts of energy? Or do you suffer from the delusion that there is some source for this energy other than oil? No, for clearly, we need energy to make profits, and we have no source of it other than fossil fuel.

As for the monkey--it's a form if inattention blindness, like when the cager is so busy looking for other cars that he crashes into the cyclist: "I just didn't see him until he was right in front of me and then it was too late to stop." We fail to see the real dangers facing our society because we look only at the oil-fed profits that we want so badly.

lyeinyoureye

@okpik
Offhand I'd say profit is the limiting factor in terms of extraction. As for energy, you can isolate the usage of oil in order to estimate how much of whatever it'd require to replacement. The first place to look is personal transportation, and in the U.S. we use something like ~400 million gallons of gasoline a day. Assuming each gallon of gasoline contains 82kwh/gal of gasoline we would need ~33 billion kwh of energy to replace gasoline usage per day, and ~12 trillion kwh/year. This seems to be problematic because we only make ~4 trillion kwh/year... But, and it's a big but, gasoline cars are built to be inefficient.

I'm not sure if you know about Tesla's new electric roadster but if you don't, check it out. In any event, it uses a 50kwh battery pack to go ~250 miles during the EPA combined cycle. Since there are 82kwh per gallon of gas, and the roadster has a 50kwh battery pack, it uses the energy equivalent of .61 gallons of gas to go ~250 miles, so the EPA rating in miles per gallon is ~400mpg. In other words, a well built, not terribly aerodynamic electric supercar is ~16 times as efficient as the average gasoline car. Since EVs are so efficient, we're down to ~2 trillion kwh/year, about half of total production. Still a big amount. But, and here's a but that isn't quite as big, if the Tesla roadster is an electric supercar and gets 110wh/km or ~400mpg equivalent, everyday commuter cars will probably be more efficient than this.

The econoboxes will probably be something like vw's 1L concept car, and return the equivalent of something like ~1000mpg, with the average sedan getting something like 600mpg equivalent. If we all switched to econoboxes, on the surface we'd need an approximate doubling of nuclear capacity. Assuming we use the current transportation ratios of econoboxes/sedans/sports cars, maybe 1.5-2 times our current nuclear capacity would suffice. But, and I bet you're getting tired of these buts, we waste a lot of electricity during off peak generation, enough to power quite a few electric cars.

Check out the CA system status. The difference in available and used is pretty big, and illustrates how much capacity is available off peak, especially at night, when most EVs would be in the garage charging. We wouldn't need nearly as much as I just mentioned, I've seen estimates that we wouldn't need any additional generation capacity at all due to the huge difference in peak and off peak generation.

Now, something I haven't mentioned is the cost of these cars, which seems to be high. Enough batteries to take you ~250 miles will cost ~$6-15,000. We can't add $15,000 to the cost of every car. But, we know that every car doesn't go 250 miles per day, the average car goes ~30-35 miles per day, and would only need ~$700-2000 worth of batteries on average, for most use. As for extended range, the addition of a small gasoline or diesel genset allows much more range at some fixed speed with fuel consumption of ~50-120mpg depending on genset type and driving speed. All told, reverse hybrids (small gasoline engine/bigger battery pack/plug-in) would cost the owners something like a tenth of what gasoline cars cost to operate, and we'd recoupe the extra purchase cost in a few years. The electric motor would never break down, the batteries would only get cheaper/better (they last over 100k miles now) with mass production, and the genset would probably cost under a grand to replace. This car would be cheap to drive, and cheap to own. No or fewer oil changes, tune ups, or problems with the emissions system. Because they're modular they lend themselves to cheaper ungrades, instead of replacing the entire car. They are bad for oil companies, auto dealers, the auto service industry, and potentially the electricity industry because with a EV, solar panels or a wind mill start looking pretty nice...

The only crisis we have has to do with the fossil fuel industry saturating the transportation and power generation markets. They were there first and they are going to stay there for as long as possible so they can sell as much possible, to hell with the consequences. If we pay more, that's better for them, and why should they care if ~3 million people per year die from fossil fuel pollution? With the kind of cash they're making, they can live where they want.

@roody
A mole of urnanium has ~10,000 times more energy than a mole of fossil fuel. Electric vehicles are more efficient than fossil fuel vehicles. We have vast amounts of energy with or without fossil fuels. A nuclear baseload with distributed renewables can provide much more energy than we get from fossil fuels, in a much safer manner. We are not looking at oil fed profits, those who own oil are. They're not going to let it get to the point where civilization disintigrates, but they will squeeze us for as much as they can. God bless facism.

If anyone needs clarification, hit me up.

bragi

Your numbers look accurate at a glance, but I have a couple of questions about the nuclear power option (which, I agree, is preferable to making electricity with fossil fuels):

1. Would we have enough nuclear fuel on hand to produce that much extra capacity? I mean, without resorting to breeder reactors, of which we have none right now?

2. What do we do with the waste, esp. if we do, in fact, resort to breeder reactors, which are pretty darn "dirty"?

3. Who's going to pay for the extra nuclear plants? Building, maintaining and decommisioning nuclear plants is several times more expensive than other ways of boiling water.

4. Wouldn't it be saner to give up on the idea of a personal car for everyone, and settle for a more modest increase in generating capacity that relies on cheaper, cleaner energy technologies? Civilization did pretty well for millenia without cars of any kind, and I don't see why we can't imagine life without them now.

Roody

I would like clarification of three points, please:

pedex

for number 1, assuming no use of fossil fuels for transportation AND using electric cars AND no drop in current usage of cars, about 8-900 in the US alone----this isnt going to happen

for number 2, who knows, another issue along with this is what happens when you try to do this WHILE fossil fuel supplies decline, hard to build huge capital projects when costs increase exponentially at the same time

for number 3, bad, violent, and different, deserts in places they shouldnt be, no ice where there should be, cold where it is normally temperate---and much more stormy

im all for electric transportation, but it makes much more sense to do electrified rail and rip up the existing exurbs and suburbs which are essentially worthless, not all to be certain, but lets face it, exurbs and suburbs 20-30 miles from downtown and far away from what makes a city functional is ludicrous

it isnt just oil/natural gas issues we face, but also many commonly taken for granted commodities, we are systemically screwed all the way around

Bike_UK

We (the UK) appear to have pretty much decided to go down the nuclear route for a large percentage of our future energy needs. The one question that I have not heard an answer to is what are we going to use when the top-grade uranium is gone? From what i have read, within a couple of decades it will cost more energy in the extraction process of lower quality nuclear material than we will get back from the power stations!


But aren't they faced with this choice now, with many still choosing the latter?

lyeinyoureye

@bragi
1) We may not need any additional capacity, but assuming we do, we should have plenty of fuel from military and civilian sources. Currently the military has 174 tons of HEU that is slated for disposal. Most of it will be converted to LUE for use in reactors, so assuming we use ~150 tons of HEU for nuclear fuel, which equates to ~4,000 tons of LEU, this should be enought to power a nuclear program twice as large as the one we have right now for a couple decades, give or take. It seems we also may be reprocessing spent fuel to extract uranium for use, as opposed to the current cycle we use where we send it through a reactor once and stick it in big barrels someplace. This allows us to extend the usefulness of nuclear fuel, while reducing the volume of the waste by something like 95% and further increases fuel availability. We are having trouble with nuclear waste storage because most of our nuclear waste isn't actually waste, but it still takes up space, reprocessing helps in this respect as well.

2) Like I mentioned before, reprocessing reduces the volume of waste by leaps and bounds, the downside being we're left with small amounts of highly radioactive waste. To address this waste, some of which can be radioactive for large time intervals, seperation and transmutation is being looked into by most countries with large enough nuclear programs. This will not eliminate nuclear waste disposal, but it results in nuclear waste that can be interred underground and will only be radioactive for a few hundred years, instead of thousands.

3) Nuclear power competes economically with fossil fuels without including the external costs into the picture, once these are taken into account, the only electricity source that's cheaper than nuclear is wind power in select locations. Wind power is statistically more dangerous to human life than nuclear power, but it's also much cheaper in terms of initial capital. As for the specific cost, the AP1000 is expected to cost ~$2.2-2.7 billion per pair, with a pair generating ~2200mw. We generate ~100,000mw from nuclear power today, if we spent ~$300 billion on nuclear power instead of the Iraq war, we would have ~265000mw in new capacity, and could eliminate all coal electricity generation. Nuclear power, like electric cars, and distributed renewable power, is only expensive to the corporations operating it. It's cheap for the consumer. Unlike fossil fuels, which are going to peak in a few years, or a few decades, nuclear fuel has no foreseeable peak, which means there is nothing to drive prices up and maximize profits.

4) Ehh, that's more a matter of personal opinion than anything else. We have the resources to do what we want to do, be it localize around cities, continue to spread out, or somthing in the middle. Pick the one that suits you best.

@Roody
1) About $450 billion, give or take. The details are above in No. 3.

2) My crystal ball is a bit hazy...
Social and political opposition isn't something I'd wager on considering we could vaporize ourselves in a nuclear war at any time, or we could instantaneous transform into a large telepathic human conciousness and live in a utopia forever. Who knows? In terms of construction time, "The AP1000 has a site construction schedule of 36 months from first concrete to fuel loading." Last time we were worried about PO (70s) we built quite a few reactors very quickly, then stopped once it became apparent there was still money to be made off of oil.

3) Crystal ball again. There are various estimates that take into account different levels of GHG production, but the problem with comparing climate to weather is that we don't know what exactly will happen locally. So far we've seen hotter summers and cooler winters with a relatively small increase in climate temperature, who knows what we'll see in the future. The best time to stop GHG emissions is now.

@pedex
Where are you getting the 8-900 nuclear power plant number? An electric sports car that wipes the floor with every other comparable gasoline powered sports car only uses ~110wh/mile, so assuming we travel ~2,000 billion miles per year in the US, that's only ~220 billion kwh per year, or about 6% of current generation which is ~4 trillion kwh per year, so we'd need 30-40 new reactors. Looking at it from a household POV, 110hw/mile going ~30 miles per day would only require ~3.3kwh per day, or ~100kwh per month, which seems to be about 10% of the average American's electric bill. The only way that 8-900 figure would hold true is if everyone drove electric double decker H3s always going 80mph (not literally). As for the rest, can I borrow your crystal ball, mine seems to be malfunctioning?

jeff-o

My kids are going to be growing up in a much different world than I did, that's for sure. Hopefully it won't be too severe.

Start invesing in alternative energy companies now...

pedex

from the eia website:
2002 numbers:
transportation fuel consumed=167,730 million gallons fuel=13,753,860 million kw/hrs
average vehicle mileage=17 mpg
******************
projected 2006 electric consumption=3677 billion kw/hrs from eia website
***************************
so to convert to pure electric and assuming no drops in consumption your looking at about 20k billion kw/hrs per year, no changes in efficiency assumed, more later
************************************
eia website shows 1 barrel of oil=584kw/h or about 13.9kw/h per gallon


+++++++++++++++++++++
I will be back to add to this, gotta go do more runs

lyeinyoureye

Np, add more as you can. The only problem with your projection is that electric cars are much more efficient than gasoline cars. If you want to look at EVs, it's best to start with the most inefficient, and go on from there. The Tesla roadster gets ~400mpg equivalent (EPA cycle), and it's a sports car. We're talking ~400-1000mpg equivalent for a range of EVs, so assuming we all drive the equivalent of a gas guzzling Bugatti, BMW, or Chevy sports car, then these EVs roadsters are ~25 times more efficient than gasoline vehicles on a mpg basis, and will consume 25 times less energy. When looking at your ~13.7 trillion kwh/year requirement, it's valid if we assume all EVs are as efficient as the average gasoline powered car, but EVs designed as EVs are at a minimum, 25 times more efficient. So we're talking ~.5 trillion kwh/year, maybe 15% of current production, if everyone had an EV that's faster than a 2006 vette, much less assuming a similar distribution of vehicle types.

Artkansas 

Oil History

Actually, oil was known by the ancient greeks and employed as weapon. The Chinese were mining for it by 347. In the 8th century, the streets of Baghdad were paved with tar and Persians used oil for medicine and lighting.

atman

lyeinyoureye has the right of it: the efficiencies of the newer electric cars are pretty mindboggling when you first look into the subject. Some of the billions the US government has poured into nanotechnology research has actually paid off, in the form of a new battery technology from MIT being licensed by A123 systems which will double capacity over existing lithium ions while eliminating dangers from charge overload, oh, and extending the service life to be comparable with lead-acid, plus it charges much faster than any existing battery. Not bad!

Of course, I'm mostly happy about this because it means a longer-range Stokemonkey. But it will also lead to all sorts of usable electric vehicles. Also, love that someone took on the nuclear option, but the truth is that the united states has loads and loads of coal, more than enough to power electric vehicles until we all roast. Time to start investing in some other generating options, sure, but I don't know about nukes, necessarily.

Here's one: how about a 500 million dollar prize to the first consortium to produce a better Tokamak reactor than has been produced so far, with a billion even to go to the first group to produce positive power outputs? The X prize worked, for an easier goal but for an order of magnitude less money.

pedex

Tesla roadster hasnt been mass produced and likely wont be, and on top of that gasoline to electric conversion numbers are very very optimistic and also DO NOT include what happens with temperature nor do your claimed efficiency gains deal with the upstream energy supply and infrastructure needed to deal with the increased load needed. Also, your also neglecting the issue of what happens when you have to start dealing with the absolutely massive amount of batteries involved here. There are logistical constraints and matters of practicality.

Now, I will be back here in awhile and we can take a better look at this with some real numbers based on the energy needed to move the vehicle independent of BS and made up numbers and get a better look at what we can expect. It isnt too hard to determine how much power it takes to move a vehicle based on its mass and average numbers that gas vehicles use now, it will give a better gasoline to electric conversion factor.........for exampe you claimed 82, while the eia is saying 33.x, thats more than a twofold difference !! I used the 82 number in the fuel used to electricity needed calculation, and its way way wrong.

pedex

Until you take a hard look at the system as a whole yes. Much of the inefficiency of electric cars is hidden by the sins hidng behind the upstream energy supply which these electric cars rely on. As far as coal goes, bzzzzzzzzzzt, not likely, not if we intend to replace IC engines with electric.

lyeinyoureye

1) The roadster uses a sealed, regulated, battery "box", as would any large manufacturer.

2) We're talking about supply and capacity, not upstream efficiency or infrastructure. If you'd like to talk about those things, bring some numbers.

3) Have you read my previous posts? We don't need 50kwh of batteries per car, we only need a small fraction of that for everyday use, with small gasoline or diesel gensets in the back for longer trips. This reduces gasoline demand immensely, with little strain on the grid. Take a look at this graph showing the disparity between electricity used, and electricity available, especially during the wee hours of the morning.



Assuming we use the EPA's 82kwh/gallon number, we'll need ~15% of that total capacity, which will be used during off peak hours. If we use the ~33kwh/gallon number, we'll use ~37% of that capacity. If you notice the disparity between electricity available, and electricity used, you'll probably notice it's around 50%, meaning a 15% or 37% increase in consumption during off peak generation can be picked up easily.

Assuming we use 33kwh/gallon instead of 82kwh/gallon, ~15% versus ~37% can still be accounted for easily with off peak generation, or additional baseload generation if you'd like.

The EPA mentions both here.

Why don't you put your money where your mouth is and drop some figures on us? I bet you'll find that efficient electric vehicles with small IC engines for long range travel are way ahead of straight IC vehicles in terms of efficiency and emissions controls. Gasoline vehicles are deliberately inefficient to encourage consumption because once we split the atom, they went the way of the dinosaurs that power them. The only reason we still use them is the groups that sell fossil fuels weild enough influence to insure we continue to use their product, so all those "profits" they own in the ground don't get left there... and end up worthless to them.

atman

er, I dunno pedex. There's really rather a lot of it, coal that is. As for the 'sins' of the electrical grid, nice thing about a battery powered anything is that it doesn't care where the juice comes from.

But, I'm sure you're right about everything you turn your steely gaze on, pedex. You have that insistent quality about you, which I associate with the consistently correct.

lyeinyoureye

Same goes for usable nuclear fuel, but someone that insistent must be correct. Physics be damned.

Platy

I read lye's EPA link. We can get to the bottom of this. PEF is the petroleum-equivalent fuel factor.

Am I interpreting the EPA link correctly by saying 82,049 watt-hours of electricity into the battery of an electric car gives you the same number of miles out as one gallon of petroleum based fuel into the tank of an internal combustion car of the same weight?