World population is growing 20 million people every 3 months

[daletournier]

There are some serious difficulties in replacing oil, and once again this isnt even touching on the fact that the usd would lose its place at the head of the table. Can it be done? Probably yes, but not anytime soon and not without great pain.

https://www.peakprosperity.com/blog/...newables/65387

Sent from my vivo Y35 using Cruisers Sailing Forum mobile app

[Dockhead]

Originally Posted by daletournier

I just re read your post Dh, "oil will be as quaintly irrelevant as whale oil soon" Wow!! How so? Seriously, please explain how, I'm all for it but have know idea how this is going to happen, a resource that has shaped our current world that we are as much depend on as a junkie is to smack, not to me the financial implications.

Sent from my vivo Y35 using Cruisers Sailing Forum mobile app

See my previous post.

Oil is nothing but fossilized solar energy.

In the absence of technology to harvest and store solar energy ourselves -- because we haven't gotten there yet -- oil is a very convenient way to carry energy for transportation.

But it forces us to rely on geology for both the source of energy, and the way to store it. It's a kind of "bundling".

Separating source from storage allows concentration on each specific technological task separately. Production of energy is really not such a problem already -- there are lots of ways to do it, and a world-changing breakthrough in production of energy will be if we ever figure out nuclear fusion, which I think is inevitable and must happen in our lifetimes.

Transport of energy is not a big problem -- we have an excellent electric grid.

Storage is the big challenge and is the ONE thing which keeps oil viable as an energy source -- our batteries are still far inferior (about two orders of magnitude) to diesel fuel, jet fuel, or gasoline in terms of energy density. But there are presently tens of billions of dollars being invested every year in R&D on battery technology. Do you think we'll never figure it out? I wouldn't bet against it, personally.

[StuM]

Originally Posted by Dockhead

More precisely defining the problem: It's not that there's not enough of it; it's that it's used irrationally (it's generally not market priced), and whole communities are built up which depend on an endless supply of cheap water, which is increasingly unavailable.

The problem is that it's not in the right place

[Dockhead]

Originally Posted by daletournier

There are some serious difficulties in replacing oil, and once again this isnt even touching on the fact that the usd would lose its place at the head of the table. Can it be done? Probably yes, but not anytime soon and not without great pain.

https://www.peakprosperity.com/blog/...newables/65387

Sent from my vivo Y35 using Cruisers Sailing Forum mobile app

USD is losing its place at the head of the table with or without oil. We are living in an increasingly less unipolar world. There will be some pain associated with losing the world's free "float", but it won't be the end of the world. Other countries do quite well without any float, and with much higher levels of debt than what we have.

As to the challenges for replacing oil -- there is a range of views out there, and the source you cite is one of the more pessimistic. But even this source is talking about "when", not "if", we replace oil through technology, and he's talking about the next couple of years, not the next few decades, like I am.

In the short term, yes, we are dependent on oil. But technology has a way of progressing in unexpected leaps and bursts. The short term has a way of being over before you know it!

[daletournier]

Originally Posted by Dockhead

See my previous post.

Oil is nothing but fossilized solar energy.

In the absence of technology to harvest and store solar energy ourselves -- because we haven't gotten there yet -- oil is a very convenient way to carry energy for transportation.

But it forces us to rely on geology for both the source of energy, and the way to store it. It's a kind of "bundling".

Separating source from storage allows concentration on each specific technological task separately. Production of energy is really not such a problem already -- there are lots of ways to do it, and a world-changing breakthrough in production of energy will be if we ever figure out nuclear fusion, which I think is inevitable and must happen in our lifetimes.

Transport of energy is not a big problem -- we have an excellent electric grid.

Storage is the big challenge and is the ONE thing which keeps oil viable as an energy source -- our batteries are still far inferior (about two orders of magnitude) to diesel fuel, jet fuel, or gasoline in terms of energy density. But there are presently tens of billions of dollars being invested every year in R&D on battery technology. Do you think we'll never figure it out? I wouldn't bet against it, personally.

I think we will have to figure it out due to it being a limited resource but the disruption is on an incredibly huge scale,. I believe you are underestimating the extent its woven into our current world model and how interconnected oil, our environment and finances are. Currently I haven't seen any evidence to suggest an alternative energy source that comes close to replacing oils role. As mentioned in the podcast I posted above it will most likely be a combination of various energy sources but also a very large reduction in the energy we use. The way we live will have to change dramatically to fit around our new energy paradigm. Massive changes create massive disruption.

Sent from my vivo Y35 using Cruisers Sailing Forum mobile app

[Dockhead]

Originally Posted by daletournier

I think we will have to figure it out due to it being a limited resource but the disruption is on an incredibly huge scale,. I believe you are underestimating the extent its woven into our current world model and how interconnected oil, our environment and finances are. Currently I haven't seen any evidence to suggest an alternative energy source that comes close to replacing oils role. As mentioned in the podcast I posted above it will most likely be a combination of various energy sources but also a very large reduction in the energy we use. The way we live will have to change dramatically to fit around our new energy paradigm. Massive changes create massive disruption.

Sent from my vivo Y35 using Cruisers Sailing Forum mobile app

I generally agree with this.

We are all speculating, as no one can predict with certainty the speed of technological innovation.

I definitely agree that it is most likely that there will be a combination of a lot of different solutions, involved with progress in energy production and storage.

But I do think that electric cars have emerged as the fairly clear next step, and it won't take that much development in one specific technology -- batteries -- to kill oil as a transport fuel. That is so close that it's already somewhat less speculative. Yes, big changes cause big disruptions, agreed. But we've seen horses phased out by motor transport, not that long ago, and the world did not end because of it. Disruption is an inevitable part of progress.


I admit that I have a political interest in seeing the end of oil -- I've seen how it has destroyed Russia, setting Russia back a hundred years, and how it has devastated the Middle East. The sooner the Saudis go back to herding goats, the better for the world!

[daletournier]

Actually the US is the greatest debtor nation in history, although relative to gdp theIr not leading the pack. We are talking about the largest economy in history that has dominated the monetary system for close to 100 years that gets a large part of its power and advantage from the petro dollar, I wouldn't be dismissing it so lightly.

As stated earlier yes that article does state that we have to find alternative, that's obvious because its going to runnout but it also states that most likely changing the way we live and using considerable less energy is a large part of the solution as we don't have an adequate replacement.

More negative article? Why because it dosent fit your narative? Data has been getting brought up regarding population growth through out this discussion, there's also plenty of data out there to support the energy predictment we are in and the fact theres no easy replacement or answer to the problem.

Anyway your entitled to your views although I disagree with many of them. I'll leave it there.



Sent from my vivo Y35 using Cruisers Sailing Forum mobile app

[a64pilot]

Assume you have a zero weight battery that will store unlimited amounts of electrical energy, and discharge it at any rate you like, the "holy grail" battery. Oh, its very inexpensive and made entirely from recyclables
The only way your going to replace oil with this battery is with a very great many, very large Nuclear power plants. If Solar were viable, then where is it?
Something is going to have to charge these batteries, and there is no where near enough electrical supply now to do it.
We could have easily been oil free for transportation for the last 50 yrs or so, just by using Hydrogen, we are not simply because there is no where near enough electrical generation to make it possible.

People dislike oil, but are terrified of Nuclear, besides there is just way too much money to be made in oil

[valhalla360]

Originally Posted by boatman61

[FONT="Comic Sans MS"][SIZE="3"]
Poor people in India did/do not breed every year for a work force of 9-11 kids.. they did/do it because there was a chance 1 or 2 might live long enough to start work.. and the women don't have a choice..
Been watching some twat on Sky blathering on about the 'Universal Wage'.. another con like the Minimum Wage.. designed to take more control away from the majority and place it in the hands of the minority.. who you can lay odds of a Trillion to 1 will not be subject to it.

That's exactly why they had a kid every other year. It's just that until recent times a large percentage would die before adulthood, so population didn't increase.

We can agree Universal Wage or Minimum Wage is a joke that will do nothing to help people out.

[valhalla360]

Originally Posted by a64pilot

Assume you have a zero weight battery that will store unlimited amounts of electrical energy, and discharge it at any rate you like, the "holy grail" battery. Oh, its very inexpensive and made entirely from recyclables
The only way your going to replace oil with this battery is with a very great many, very large Nuclear power plants. If Solar were viable, then where is it?
Something is going to have to charge these batteries, and there is no where near enough electrical supply now to do it.
We could have easily been oil free for transportation for the last 50 yrs or so, just by using Hydrogen, we are not simply because there is no where near enough electrical generation to make it possible.

People dislike oil, but are terrified of Nuclear, besides there is just way too much money to be made in oil

Actually, your "Holy Grail" battery would be a game changer. It might not solve 100% of the problem but probably 90-95% of the problem.

The biggest thing holding back solar/wind is they are intermittent and often unpredictable. Probably worst is their peak output rarely matches peak demand (early evening around 5-6pm). As a result, they can never be stand alone power supplies and that's why you are seeing utilities react by building "peaker" plants that can quickly ramp up when wind or solar drop off. Much of this is driven by govt regulations that push solar/wind.

With your battery, you wouldn't need these "peaker" plants and suddenly solar/wind become drastically cheaper in reality.

Even for traditional plants like coal, there are advantages. You can set your coal fired plants to run at peak efficiency and leave them there. During low periods, the excess production goes into batteries and during peaks the batteries feed back in (very like a hybrid car).

Actually for large parts of the day, the grid is under utilized.Late night there are typically several hours where supply exceeds demand by 50% or more.

Put that energy into your batteries to power cars, trucking, heavy machinery, etc...

Of course, none of this happens because the "holy grail" of batteries does not exist and is unlikely to ever exist. Instead it's an economic supply & demand problem. As oil prices go up and solar/battery costs come down, you will see the selection shift. A clear example of this is boats (hey we haven't talked much about those on this thread). It's really hard to keep a moving boat connected to the grid, so supplying the house energy needs via a generator becomes expensive, especially if you only need small amounts. In that case a solar/battery system makes economic sense.

[Dockhead]

Originally Posted by a64pilot

Assume you have a zero weight battery that will store unlimited amounts of electrical energy, and discharge it at any rate you like, the "holy grail" battery. Oh, its very inexpensive and made entirely from recyclables
The only way your going to replace oil with this battery is with a very great many, very large Nuclear power plants. If Solar were viable, then where is it?
Something is going to have to charge these batteries, and there is no where near enough electrical supply now to do it.
We could have easily been oil free for transportation for the last 50 yrs or so, just by using Hydrogen, we are not simply because there is no where near enough electrical generation to make it possible.

People dislike oil, but are terrified of Nuclear, besides there is just way too much money to be made in oil

The bottleneck is in storage, not generation.

The U.S. consumes about 4 000 terawatt/hours of electrical power per year, out of a system which is being operated at about 70% of capacity.

The U.S. consumes about 143 billion gallons of gasoline a year, equivalent to about 1 000 terawatt/hours of electrical power (assuming the gas is burned in car engines with about 20% efficiency).

So theoretically, we could replace all the gasoline consumed with electrical power without increasing generating capacity at all. That may actually be practically realistic -- because electric cars would be charged largely at night when there is more than average spare capacity in the system. But in any case, one large nuclear power plant can produce more than 30 terawatt/hours of power a year, so it is not at all an impossible expansion of capacity, to phase out gasoline powered cars over a reasonable period of time.

The problem is storage, not generation. However much money there is to be made in oil, the same can be made in other technologies, and more so -- if they are more efficient.

[weavis]

Originally Posted by Dockhead

Actually, Iraqi's oil is all state owned, so there are no "oil companies there" at all, in the sense of companies who own reserves. Service agreements were granted by auctions won by a wide variety of the world's oil companies. U.S. companies are not the leaders there (the biggest agreements are with BP and with China; the Russians and Malaysians also have large interests).

The invasion of Iraq -- the most idiotic geopolitical event of my lifetime -- was NOT by any means a world war. Nor did it have any long term effect on world oil markets. In the context of apocalyptic world problems we are discussing here, it is a backside pimple.

The rest of the world disagrees...

Baghdad, Iraq - While the US military has formally ended its occupation of Iraq, some of the largest western oil companies, ExxonMobil, BP and Shell, remain.

On November 27, 38 months after Royal Dutch Shell announced its pursuit of a massive gas deal in southern Iraq, the oil giant had its contract signed for a $17bn flared gas deal.

Three days later, the US-based energy firm Emerson submitted a bid for a contract to operate at Iraq's giant Zubair oil field, which reportedly holds some eight million barrels of oil.

Earlier this year, Emerson was awarded a contract to provide crude oil metering systems and other technology for a new oil terminal in Basra, currently under construction in the Persian Gulf, and the company is installing control systems in the power stations in Hilla and Kerbala.

Iraq's supergiant Rumaila oil field is already being developed by BP, and the other supergiant reserve, Majnoon oil field, is being developed by Royal Dutch Shell. Both fields are in southern Iraq.

According to the US Energy Information Administration (EIA), Iraq's oil reserves of 112 billion barrels ranks second in the world, only behind Saudi Arabia. The EIA also estimates that up to 90 per cent of the country remains unexplored, due to decades of US-led wars and economic sanctions.

"Prior to the 2003 invasion and occupation of Iraq, US and other western oil companies were all but completely shut out of Iraq's oil market," oil industry analyst Antonia Juhasz told Al Jazeera. "But thanks to the invasion and occupation, the companies are now back inside Iraq and producing oil there for the first time since being forced out of the country in 1973."

"The last thing the US cares about in the Middle East is democracy. It is about oil, full stop."

[brownoarsman]

I find it very funny that a bunch of cruisers, many of whom sustain themselves solely on solar/wind generation and lead-acid battery storage, are arguing that the technology is not there yet ....

More about the needed sacrifices and behavioral changes to fit your usage to the current technology until something better comes around, innit?

Of course, industrial use is a totally different ball game than residential.

[valhalla360]

Originally Posted by brownoarsman

I find it very funny that a bunch of cruisers, many of whom sustain themselves solely on solar/wind generation and lead-acid battery storage, are arguing that the technology is not there yet ....

More about the needed sacrifices and behavioral changes to fit your usage to the current technology until something better comes around, innit?

Of course, industrial use is a totally different ball game than residential.

Sorry but the vast majority of energy consumption on your average cruising boat comes from either fossil fuel or grid based electric.

It's only for very specific low power needs that it's viable.

Go read some threads on electric propulsion and you will see how we are no where close on energy storage for propulsion.

[brownoarsman]

Originally Posted by valhalla360

Sorry but the vast majority of energy consumption on your average cruising boat comes from either fossil fuel or grid based electric.

It's only for very specific low power needs that it's viable.

Go read some threads on electric propulsion and you will see how we are no where close on energy storage for propulsion.

That's true, nowhere close for propulsion. But then again, most land-houses don't move.

Edit: rereading the last few posts the conversation was about replacing gas in autos, not more efficiently supplying energy to households (though the two will go hand-in-hand to save on building a64's nuclear plants). So, I'm off base, carry on!