Napoleon's Nightingale
DP Veteran
- Joined
- Aug 11, 2005
- Messages
- 1,670
- Reaction score
- 17
- Location
- Ohio
- Gender
- Male
- Political Leaning
- Undisclosed
And how are we going to build enough nuclear reactors in time? Building reactors takes energy.
Do you have a study that shows that this will be a viable option? Most of what I've read indicates it couldn't be.
Scalable? No, not remotely.
49 years? The only estimate I'm aware of that puts peak out that far is Michael Lynch's--and he's an economist, not a geologist.
Anyway, most of the news that's been coming out over the last couple of years is pretty bad. I'm not terribly optimistic, if you can't tell.
NN said:I guess construction workers won't be allowed to stand around doing nothing for hours on end on the job. You shouldn't be afraid of a little sweat and hard work. Building reactors does take energy...so what?
NN said:They are perfectly viable in Europe and have been since the 90s. The Tesla Roadster has also proven to be a VERY good option.
NN said:I don't understand how you can keep making such an argument considering the fact that solar/electric cars have been on the market for over a decade.
NN said:I said less than 49 years. Geologists are irrelevant in determining when the peak oil marker will be reached because, while they are useful in determining how many crude deposists are left and how many barrels of oil are contained therein, they don't keep track of oil consumption rates which is where economists come into the picture. I'd be happy to show you the math.
NN said:The news is quite different in Europe.
If we're already using all the oil we can possibly find just to keep the economy going, where are we going to find the extra oil necessary to build all those nuclear reactors?
So how many are actually on the road in Europe? Is the infrastructure (especially in terms of needed materials) present so that we could replace all the cars on the road now in a matter of a decade or two?
1) You say geologists are irrelevant and then claim that they're "useful" in determining how much oil is available. Seems a little odd...
2) I'd love to see the math.
It's somewhat different in Europe because they started preparing for the inevitable decades ago.
NN said:We aren't using all of the oil we can possibly find. There are plenty of deposits in the Gulf and Pacific that are still untapped.
NN said:The problem is that these cars aren't in high demand in the United States or elsewhere because people percieve oil fueled automobiles to be easier to run and maintain not to mention less expensive i.e. more convienient. If we could bring more attention to these vehicles then demand would go up.
NN said:Geologists are only relevant, in this context, in determining how much oil exists not in how many years we have left before reaching the peak oil marker because they don't keep track of consumption rates.
NN said:1. There are around 9 trillion barrels of oil which have yet to be tapped.
NN said:2. The United States currently consumes 7.3 billion barrels of oil per year with an annual increase in consumption on average of 1.4% per year.
NN said:It's not any different. The technology has been available here and has been on the market here for 6 years already. All that is neccessary is public awareness.
I'm not aware of any known field with a good P1 number that is intentionally shut in, unless it's in a politically volatile area (Nigeria, for instance), it's not economic to produce (some of those places you mention in the Pacific, for instance), or has been protected for environmental reasons.
Now, with regard to these cars--what materials do they use and can those materials be produced at a rate and in the volume necessary to make them scalable? Have they the capabilities necessary to replace the machines we currently run on petroleum?
That is extremely unlikely. Most everyone puts the usable untapped resource base at no more than 1.5 trillion barrels.
Got a source for that? I've not seen estimates lower than 8 bbls/year for some time. 7.3 bbls/year is 20 mbpd; I think we crossed that line in the late 90's but I'm going on memory here.
NN said:That doesn't change what I said.
NN said:The sun isn't going to die anytime in the near future and nuclear power is the perfect alternative for fossil fuels in generating electricity.
NN said:The Tesla Roadster is the PERFECT alternative to petroleum fueled vehicles.
NN said:Anyone who states that the usable untapped resource is that low must be severly limiting the study to a handful of territories.
NN said:EIA - Energy Information Sheets Index: Petroleum Products Consumption
It changes the subtext quite a bit. Your claim seemed to imply that there were lots and lots of untapped oil fields out there. I say there are very few.
Well, except that we don't have enough nuclear capacity right now. We need to build more reactors. And you haven't answered the question I've posed about that.
Production of lithium doesn't look poised to supply that kind of demand
Production capacity would need to expand a thousand fold in 2 or 3 decades, without the use of cheap energy, and similar supply constraints in needed materials elsewhere.
No, that's for every possible oil-yielding basin in the world. Other than the USGS y2000 survey, I'm not aware of a single geologist that has a significantly different estimate.
It appears that the EIA estimate is based on barrels of crude only, not including NGLs and other liquids. We're using about 8.3 bbls/year OE.
I like the exchange going on, but there is one thing I'd like to see addressed and that is what should we do about our way of life? I think a big part of the solution is the rebirth of our cities with more and more people living in an urban environment where cars are not necessary. New Urbanism can have a huge impact on the amount of oil and gas we use, but only if becomes widespread. And people aren't crazy about change, even if it's for the better.
There really is no reason why we would have to change our way of life just because we're enventually going to switch to alternative fuels. New Urbanism is so impractical that it borders on dangerous. If you're packing tens of millions of people into a single city in tight living conditions then you are just asking for trouble in many ways but, most importantly, healthwise.
Columbusite said:I like the exchange going on, but there is one thing I'd like to see addressed and that is what should we do about our way of life? I think a big part of the solution is the rebirth of our cities with more and more people living in an urban environment where cars are not necessary. New Urbanism can have a huge impact on the amount of oil and gas we use, but only if becomes widespread. And people aren't crazy about change, even if it's for the better.
NN said:You shifted the goal posts to exclude all fields which aren't immediatley available for extraction due to one reason or another.
NN said:There are PLENTY of untapped oil fields out there. It's just a matter of eliminating the reasons why they are still untapped.
NN said:There was nothing really to answer.
NN said:Thats because that large of a demand doesn't exist at the moment. The production rate will increase along with the demand.
NN said:Kinda like the production capacity of fossil fuels during the Industrial Revolution?
NN said:You keep assuming, for reasons unknown to me, that it is impossible to use "cheap energy" to extract the materials needed for alternative fuels but you still haven't explained why it isn't possible to use petroleum for those purposes while the alternative fuels are being phased in.
NN said:Convention oil reserves are in the 2-3 trillion barrel range but you can't ignore "unconventional" oil reserves if your'e going to be intellectually honest.
NN said:Natural gas is irrelevant in this context. We're talking about petroleum fueled vehicles and power.
So, tell me, where are the fields that are going to make up that shortfall?
How are we going to get the cheap energy necessary to build enough nuclear reactors when we are using all the oil we can find (less a little) just to keep the economy going?
Until then, it appears that production is not likely to exceed 100,000 tons per year, even in the face of rapidly increasing demand.
Production of fossil fuels did no such thing during the Industrial revolution. Production increased about a hundred-fold over a century and a half. And that was balls-to-the-wall exploration and production. People have fought wars, had revolutions, risked and lost billions, etc. in the petroleum game. People have died to produce as much oil as we did.
As that happens, we need to continue an economy that runs on oil, and have enough left over to switch to alternative fuels.
The largest Oil Shale deposits:
1. Morocco - 12.3 billion metric tons
2. Thailand - 18.7 billion metric tons
3. Sweden - 50 billion metric tons
4. Israel - 15.4 billion metric tons
5. Jordan - 40 billion metric tons
6. United States - 3.3 trillion metric tons
(A total of 2.6 trillion barrels worldwide are extractable)
The largest Oil Sand deposits:
1. Canada - 175 billion barrels
2. United States - 32 billion barrels
3. Venezuela - 236 billion barrels
Nations which can increase their petroleum output:
1. Bolivia
2. Brazil
3. Algeria
4. Angola
5. Chad
6. Nigeria
7. Iran
8. Iraq
9. Kuwait
10. UAE
11. Azerbaijan
12. Kazakhstan
13. Russia
Again, it's not as if there isn't enough oil to build the reactors. In anycase, it's a matter of priorities. The United States has one of the lowest fuel efficiency requirements in the world. We could start by making our nation more fuel efficient.
The Journal Of Fusion Energy estimated in 2005 that there are enough land based Lithium deposits to last us between 300-500 years so I don't see the problelm.
No one ever said that the switch would be easy but the doom and gloom scenario you and certain scientists are painting is simply unrealistic.
Yeah if you're going to do it at the last minute.
NN said:The largest Oil Shale deposits:
1. Morocco - 12.3 billion metric tons
2. Thailand - 18.7 billion metric tons
3. Sweden - 50 billion metric tons
4. Israel - 15.4 billion metric tons
5. Jordan - 40 billion metric tons
6. United States - 3.3 trillion metric tons
(A total of 2.6 trillion barrels worldwide are extractable)
NN said:The largest Oil Sand deposits:
1. Canada - 175 billion barrels
2. United States - 32 billion barrels
3. Venezuela - 236 billion barrels
NN said:1. Bolivia
2. Brazil
3. Algeria
4. Angola
5. Chad
6. Nigeria
7. Iran
8. Iraq
9. Kuwait
10. UAE
11. Azerbaijan
12. Kazakhstan
13. Russia
NN said:Again, it's not as if there isn't enough oil to build the reactors. In anycase, it's a matter of priorities. The United States has one of the lowest fuel efficiency requirements in the world. We could start by making our nation more fuel efficient.
NN said:The Journal Of Fusion Energy estimated in 2005 that there are enough land based Lithium deposits to last us between 300-500 years so I don't see the problelm.
NN said:No one ever said that the switch would be easy but the doom and gloom scenario you and certain scientists are painting is simply unrealistic.
NN said:Yeah if you're going to do it at the last minute.
Unfortunately, tar sands are a joke. Hydrogen is a joke. Tar sands have to be heavily processed and even then they're unusable until some chemicals/elements are added. You basically use more energy to produce it than you get out of it. And then hydrogen, well just look at what that article says we're going to need; natural gas. Natural gas is dwindling and we want to rely on a resource that is becoming much rarer as the days go by?
Unfortunately, tar sands are a joke. Hydrogen is a joke. Tar sands have to be heavily processed and even then they're unusable until some chemicals/elements are added. You basically use more energy to produce it than you get out of it. And then hydrogen, well just look at what that article says we're going to need; natural gas. Natural gas is dwindling and we want to rely on a resource that is becoming much rarer as the days go by?
We use cookies and similar technologies for the following purposes:
Do you accept cookies and these technologies?
We use cookies and similar technologies for the following purposes:
Do you accept cookies and these technologies?