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http://www.lifeaftertheoilcrash.net/
I only recently discovered this site, and to be honest, I think it's really scary.
Sorry if this is old news to some, but like I said, it's new to me.
Who knows if that's really the truth... but I find myself agreeing with a lot of what is being said on that site. Does anyone know anything else about the subject?
Hey, IC-where you been?
This type of thing is not rare, but not necessarily the product of the typical doom-sayers, either.
As a consequence, it is difficult to know, exactly, how much weight to give it, if any.
Best I can tell you is, keep your ears open for additional info; if it's a genuine concern, of earth-shaking magnitude, it won't stay quiet for long.
I am aware that the current atmosphere of price increases and OPEC's non-existant reasonings for cutting production have people up in arms, but, until OPEC starts justifying it's "strategy" or bows to market pressure, we can't know how to suss that, either.
So-
Stay tuned, I guess. ;)
Good Link IC. Good to see you posting. ;)
A quick google seems to lend credence to the validity of the article. Time to have a good read and do some deeper digging.
All in all, the story isn't suprising. There is only so much oil. The timing is the key point. Have we reached Hubbert's Oil Peak?
Very interesting.
:beerchug: omc
Vert interesting, and scary. may explain Bushes sinister motives behind the Iraq
war <_<
Yes-Quote:
Originally posted by billyfridge@10 March 2004 - 15:15
Vert interesting, and scary. may explain Bushes sinister motives behind the Iraq
war <_<
I'm sure of it. ;)
Apparently Ford are coming together with GM this month to produce an ulta-economical engine. It's a billion dollar project with the aim to ease the oil resources deficit. The proposed specs for the engine are: Capacity: 14 litres. Fuel economy: 3 gallons per mile.
<_<
Hasn't that been done already? :huh:Quote:
Originally posted by 4th gen@10 March 2004 - 15:29
Apparently Ford are coming together with GM this month to produce an ulta-economical engine. It's a billion dollar project with the aim to ease the oil resources deficit. The proposed specs for the engine are: Capacity: 14 litres. Fuel economy: 3 gallons per mile.
<_<
Must be 7 liters for Ford and 7 for G.M., huh?
I imagine we'll have to buy the gas. ;)
I found a column having to do with this topic; I'll try to find it on-line and link it tomorrow. ;)
I like this idea.
Nice site and interesting information.Quote:
Support the troops by informing people that our troops are dying primarily to support our oil based, consumer lifestyle. Slogans such "Save our troops by riding your bikes" or "Ride alone and you ride with Osama" could make it patriotic to conserve.
In the long run i think this could be a good thing because it will force us to live a more natural life. It would probaly be very tough to begin with but i think the end result could be good for this planet and for it's inhabitants.
I remember the last oil crisis in UK was good how ppl rallied round and helped each other. instead of four cars going to work it was one car and four ppl, each contributed towards petrol. at that time if u weren't a regular at a petrol/gas station
u dtdn't get any, when u did it was 4 gallons maximum.
thing is, we managed ;)
Here it is-
Charley Reese's column from 3/3/04:
Bad Times Coming
One of the things the Bush administration is ignoring is the coming catastrophe that is likely to impoverish the world and plunge it into global warfare.
It will be the end of civilization as we know it, and it will occur in this decade or the next. Not since the fall of the Roman Empire will human progress so forcefully and quickly reverse itself. I'm talking about the end of the oil age.
Several experts now agree that world oil production will peak soon and begin an unalterable decline. The price of oil will skyrocket, and as the supply dwindles, some of the nations that can't afford it will try to take it. Nation-states will be like starving hounds fighting over a few scraps.
Things we take for granted, like electricity, the family car and air transportation, will become unaffordable for the great mass of people. Petroleum permeates our economy, not only in the form of gasoline, diesel fuel and heating oil, but also in the myriad of petrochemicals that are made from it. Many of these are essential to large-scale agricultural production.
The impact of the loss of oil would be better understood if someone had not mislabeled the Industrial Revolution. It was instead a fossil-fuel revolution. Prior to that, in the course of human history, poverty had been the norm. The only sources of energy were human and animal muscle, wind and water. Oil and coal existed, of course, but no one knew how to convert them into energy that could do work. That's why for most of human history, slavery was universal.
Whatever work was to be done — agricultural or construction — had to be done by human muscle, assisted, if they were available, by animals. Water could be used to grind grain, and wind was the principle source of propulsion on the seas. Since the human population was small, slaves were considered simply as the spoils of war, a valuable commodity.
The invention of the steam engine, followed by the internal combustion engine, the diesel engine and the electric motor, allowed mankind to use fossil-fuel energy to do the work of civilization. At first the main fossil fuel was coal, until cheaper oil put it into a secondary position. Now our civilization is dependent on oil, and so is development. The big net importers of oil today are the United States, China and Japan. As other countries try to develop, they will need cheap oil, and so even as supply peaks and then dwindles, demand is constantly increasing. That spells skyrocketing prices, conflict and poverty.
For a more academic discussion, you might read the new book "Out of Gas: The End of the Age of Oil " by California physicist David Goodstein. Others in the petroleum industry are also forecasting the same thing.
President Bush, instead of trying to increase the profits of his corporate oil buddies by opening up new areas for exploitation (which won't amount to a drop in the bucket), should be mobilizing the nation to face the coming crisis. Uninformed talk about hydrogen won't do it. Goodstein points out that it takes the energy of seven gallons of gasoline to produce enough hydrogen to do the work of one gallon of gasoline.
What is needed is the equivalent of a new Manhattan Project, the extraordinary government effort to develop the atomic bomb. The best brains in America need to be mobilized to prepare the country for that soon-to-come day when the world demand for oil exceeds the world supply. Unless we can find alternatives — cheap, mass-produced alternatives — Americans face a catastrophic decline in their standard of living, not to mention a dangerous world in chaos and conflict.
If you think I paint too grim a picture, imagine what your household budget will be like when the price of oil has climbed to a $100 a barrel. It is an unfortunate truth of history that nations sometimes face extraordinary challenges just when their political leaders are poorly equipped by nature and nurture to deal with them.
Yep it looks bleak, the situation is more serious than that with no oil there will be no plastic, the world can potentionaly sustain whithout the need of oil as a fuel, but it cannot whithout oil for plastic, which will raise recycling demands, which should have already been done.
I worry for my kids...
Like the US in Iraq? There is a lot to be said for pre-emptive action!Quote:
Originally posted by j2k4@11 March 2004 - 16:28
The price of oil will skyrocket, and as the supply dwindles, some of the nations that can't afford it will try to take it.
Like the US in Iraq? There is a lot to be said for pre-emptive action![/b][/quote]Quote:
Originally posted by Alex H+11 March 2004 - 22:56--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td>QUOTE (Alex H @ 11 March 2004 - 22:56)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteBegin-j2k4@11 March 2004 - 16:28
The price of oil will skyrocket, and as the supply dwindles, some of the nations that can't afford it will try to take it.
How short-sighted of me to have failed to mention that. <_<
Yes, our strategy has been caught out.
Be nice to us and we might share with you, Alex.
Our only hope is for the burgeoning scientific community in Haiti or some other third-world country to discover an alternative to oil. ;)
worried for your kids :o ??? i'm worried for myself :( . crap, with this kind of news, i'll never be able to become a pilot :angry: :( :( :( :( . damit to hell, piss, son of a bitch, damit damit damit, hell, fuck, shit, son of a..it's good to swear sometimes <_<Quote:
Originally posted by sara5564@11 March 2004 - 15:34
I worry for my kids...
Thats right...let it all out...you will feel better :lol:
lol :lol: but i really am worried about the future :(Quote:
Originally posted by sara5564@21 March 2004 - 14:39
Thats right...let it all out...you will feel better :lol:
A worrying article, but I would cast doubt on some of it, particularly the page on alternatives.
For example:
Hydro-Electric power currently supplies 2.3% of global energy supply. It is not a sufficient replacement for fossil fuels for the following reasons:
1. It is unsuitable for aircrafts and the present 800 million existing vehicles.
But is can be used to generate hydrogen. Hydrogen powered engines are already being developed. Part of the problem is that they are being promoted as clean engines, and environmental groups point out that this just moves the point of production of emissions from the vehicle to the power station. This argument ignores the fact that current large power stations are far more efficient than the internal combustion engine, and that energy from renewable sources does not cause this polution.
Other forms of hydro-electric power such as tidal power can produce massive amounts of power. In the UK the Severn Barrage, if fully implemented could supply 12GW of power, 10% of the country's electricity needs, and that is just one scheme.
Solar power currently supplies .006% of global energy supply. As a replacement for fossil fuels, it suffers from several deficiencies:
1. Energy from solar power varies constantly with weather or day/night.
This is nonsense. On a commercial scale energy production from one solar generator may go down due to a little local cloud, but at the same time production at other sites would rise because of the dispersion of local cloud. Energy arriving from the sun is unremarkably constant. And the day/night argument is nonsense too. Again, if used to create hydrogen production could stop overnight. Just like plants stop photosynthesis at night.
2. Not practical for transportation needs. While a handful of small, experimental, solar powered vehicles have been built, solar power is unsuited for planes, boats, cars, tanks, etc. . .
See above re hydrogen.
Wind
Wind power accounts for .07% of global energy supply. As a replacement for fossil fuels, its problems are:...
See above re solar power.
Hydrogen
Hydrogen accounts for 0.01% of global energy. It is not a true replacement for fossil fuels for the following reasons:
1. Hydrogen is currently manufactured from methane gas. It takes more energy to create it than the hydrogen actually provides. It is therefore an energy “carrier” not a source.
Hydrogen could easily be produced by electrolysis. The writer seems to have forgotten that he's already said that natural gas will run out, so it could not be used as a source in any case. He probably does not realise that methane is the main constituent of natural gas.
In any case, the argument that it takes more energy to produce something than it provides is poor: if we only get half a watt of useful energy from hydrogen, but have used 1 watt of otherwise wasted energy to produce it we have gained half a watt. The key is to use energy which we cannot otherwise utilise.
2. Liquid hydrogen occupies four to eleven times the bulk of equivalent gasoline or diesel.
So what? And which one is it? Liquid hydrogen occupies a known volume just like gasoline or diesel, it doesn't vary by 275% of it's volume. Again, the writer doesn't know his facts.
3. Existing vehicles and aircraft and existing distribution systems are not suited to it.
As stated earlier, development of hydrogen engines is will under way. I've seen (on tv) prototypes being driven around which were far more efficient than any vehicles we have at present (another blow for the inefficient production argument), performance was better too.
"Hydrogen Fuel Cells" should be called "Hydrogen Fool Cells." The "Hydrogen Economy" is a complete and utter hoax. Dr. Jorg Wing, a representative of the auto giant Daimler/Chrysler made this clear at the Paris Peak Oil Conference when he explained that his company did not view hydrogen as a viable alternative to petroleum-based engines.
Translation: we haven't done as much research as other companies and are going to be left behind.
I could go on, but I think I've destroyed enough of that piece already to show just how worthless it really is.
The point is that if we follow his arguments we won't do anything about the problem. He seems to be saying that we can't use anything other than oil so we should stop looking. Fossil fuels produce carbon dioxide. If we took steps to reduce CO2 emmisions by, say, 20% by 2015 we would already be well on the way towards meeting some of the deficit in energy requirements predicted. Funny, I seem to hear a little voice saying "Kyoto, Kyoto". Can't for the life of me think what it means.
Certainly there are going to be problems. We need to be looking at alternative solutions now, not bleating about how poor they are. The sooner we get some of those solutions in place the longer the existing oil will last, and the better the chance we have of finding other solutions before it is too late.
Exactly so-Quote:
Originally posted by lynx@22 March 2004 - 09:50
We need to be looking at alternative solutions now, not bleating about how poor they are. The sooner we get some of those solutions in place the longer the existing oil will last, and the better the chance we have of finding other solutions before it is too late.
As an aside, pure capitalist entrepeneurial spirit would dictate that a great deal of this R&D is/has been taking place already, but the situation must be allowed to ripen to the proper degree of desperation before the secrets are divulged, yes?
I wonder what the status of such goings-on might be? :huh:
interesting (i'm not too smart so i'll take your word for it ;) ). but all this will end with something big, do you think the greedy oil companies and conglomorates of earth will let this "new" technology, a new source of fuel, replace the oil that easily? lest we forget, most countries economy heavily relies on oil, thus WAR is enivatible. like i said, this is all going to end in one big finale before the people of earth (or more likely the people in charge of earth) accept this new fuel source. either that or we just kill all the leaders of the oil companies, it's all good :) . oh one last thing, is cold fission (fussion? sorry, don't remember which one) really possible? and if so, why don't the leaders of the free world gather up the most brilliant minds and just set them to work with unlimited resources at their desposal and let them do their thing and find the secrets of make "free energy". if we start now we'll atleast be finished by the end of the century (before things really really get worst). if we start 2020 or 2030, then we're really gonna be screwed. (sorry, i have know prior knowledge of cold fission [fussion?]).Quote:
Originally posted by lynx@22 March 2004 - 07:50
A worrying article, but I would cast doubt on some of it, particularly the page on alternatives.
For example:
Hydro-Electric power currently supplies 2.3% of global energy supply. It is not a sufficient replacement for fossil fuels for the following reasons:
1. It is unsuitable for aircrafts and the present 800 million existing vehicles.
But is can be used to generate hydrogen. Hydrogen powered engines are already being developed. Part of the problem is that they are being promoted as clean engines, and environmental groups point out that this just moves the point of production of emissions from the vehicle to the power station. This argument ignores the fact that current large power stations are far more efficient than the internal combustion engine, and that energy from renewable sources does not cause this polution.
Other forms of hydro-electric power such as tidal power can produce massive amounts of power. In the UK the Severn Barrage, if fully implemented could supply 12GW of power, 10% of the country's electricity needs, and that is just one scheme.
Solar power currently supplies .006% of global energy supply. As a replacement for fossil fuels, it suffers from several deficiencies:
1. Energy from solar power varies constantly with weather or day/night.
This is nonsense. On a commercial scale energy production from one solar generator may go down due to a little local cloud, but at the same time production at other sites would rise because of the dispersion of local cloud. Energy arriving from the sun is unremarkably constant. And the day/night argument is nonsense too. Again, if used to create hydrogen production could stop overnight. Just like plants stop photosynthesis at night.
2. Not practical for transportation needs. While a handful of small, experimental, solar powered vehicles have been built, solar power is unsuited for planes, boats, cars, tanks, etc. . .
See above re hydrogen.
Wind
Wind power accounts for .07% of global energy supply. As a replacement for fossil fuels, its problems are:...
See above re solar power.
Hydrogen
Hydrogen accounts for 0.01% of global energy. It is not a true replacement for fossil fuels for the following reasons:
1. Hydrogen is currently manufactured from methane gas. It takes more energy to create it than the hydrogen actually provides. It is therefore an energy “carrier” not a source.
Hydrogen could easily be produced by electrolysis. The writer seems to have forgotten that he's already said that natural gas will run out, so it could not be used as a source in any case. He probably does not realise that methane is the main constituent of natural gas.
In any case, the argument that it takes more energy to produce something than it provides is poor: if we only get half a watt of useful energy from hydrogen, but have used 1 watt of otherwise wasted energy to produce it we have gained half a watt. The key is to use energy which we cannot otherwise utilise.
2. Liquid hydrogen occupies four to eleven times the bulk of equivalent gasoline or diesel.
So what? And which one is it? Liquid hydrogen occupies a known volume just like gasoline or diesel, it doesn't vary by 275% of it's volume. Again, the writer doesn't know his facts.
3. Existing vehicles and aircraft and existing distribution systems are not suited to it.
As stated earlier, development of hydrogen engines is will under way. I've seen (on tv) prototypes being driven around which were far more efficient than any vehicles we have at present (another blow for the inefficient production argument), performance was better too.
"Hydrogen Fuel Cells" should be called "Hydrogen Fool Cells." The "Hydrogen Economy" is a complete and utter hoax. Dr. Jorg Wing, a representative of the auto giant Daimler/Chrysler made this clear at the Paris Peak Oil Conference when he explained that his company did not view hydrogen as a viable alternative to petroleum-based engines.
Translation: we haven't done as much research as other companies and are going to be left behind.
I could go on, but I think I've destroyed enough of that piece already to show just how worthless it really is.
The point is that if we follow his arguments we won't do anything about the problem. He seems to be saying that we can't use anything other than oil so we should stop looking. Fossil fuels produce carbon dioxide. If we took steps to reduce CO2 emmisions by, say, 20% by 2015 we would already be well on the way towards meeting some of the deficit in energy requirements predicted. Funny, I seem to hear a little voice saying "Kyoto, Kyoto". Can't for the life of me think what it means.
Certainly there are going to be problems. We need to be looking at alternative solutions now, not bleating about how poor they are. The sooner we get some of those solutions in place the longer the existing oil will last, and the better the chance we have of finding other solutions before it is too late.
P.S. i have very bad spelling, damn street talk <_<
I would like to know how solar-generated electricity would be feasible in a country that doesn't get sun for half the year. It's not enough to be able to see the sun, there has to be some power behind it.
:ninja:
I agree that some of the possible solutions will not be feasible everywhere.Quote:
Originally posted by MagicNakor@23 March 2004 - 04:30
I would like to know how solar-generated electricity would be feasible in a country that doesn't get sun for half the year. It's not enough to be able to see the sun, there has to be some power behind it.
:ninja:
Tidal power is not going to be much of an option in the middle of a desert, but there might be an little more solar power than is actually needed. Perhaps there could be an export system for electric power, in much the same way as there currently is for oil.
One big advantage too - no poluting oil spills - does electricity float on water? :D
Yes, but it kills everything in it.
:ninja:
Therein might lie another salvation: Diversification-
Competition from the many energy resources would (could, should) perpetuate fair pricing, availability of options, etc.
Nah-never happen.
Governments would be involved.
Sure sounds good, though.