Lonestar wrote:I mean, as oil dries up (not "disappears suddenly") wouldn't we naturally be shifting away from such energy sources?
Didn't America run out of it's primary energy source(wood) during the late 19th century, and yet managed to smoothly transition to fossil fuels without any economic impact?
Here's a depiction of what historically happened:
I wouldn't count on a smooth transition with peak oil, with the potential for major economic depression. It would be vastly better to have switched away from fossil fuels before. But survival of industrial civilization will occur for the reasons described in my past post and the following replies to Admiral Valdemar:
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Quotes are rearranged from original chronological order when helpful in organization.
Admiral Valdemar wrote:Sikon wrote:Regarding the opening post, I could see being concerned about whether having children is ethical if they were doomed to starvation, but that isn't the case. There will not be collapse of modern industrial civilization, although temporary economic suffering for a number of years is likely.
[...]
Mechanized agriculture will continue, which consumes only 1.7% of the energy supply, and there will not be starvation (not in the U.S.):
[...]
After the initial years of economic trouble, there would be more production of alternative fuels.
You assume the economy survives the initial months of going over the peak. The US economy as it stands now is on shaky ground with many fearing a strike on Iran which is pushing oil prices to a record this year already. When it comes to the point that no more cheap oil exists globally, then those fears are compounded and it gets worse as drop-off continues.
[...]
What will happen is that demand will outstrip supply, which alone is enough to topple the largest economy in the world thanks to the way the US has been creating money over the years (which is strained by house prices, health-care and other issues without the need for PO, all of which can cause a '29 level depression by themselves).
You haven't defined what is your criteria for whether "the economy survives," e.g. 90+% of GDP, 50+% of GDP, or what. I said before that there can be major economic depression. But my idea of a situation making raising children unethical is like them being doomed to die of starvation, and that isn't the case here.
I can't tell exactly what you are arguing here when it comes to the quantitative degree of peak oil effects, aside from economic depression that I already suggested as likely in my last post, but my point in this thread is that the U.S. can and will survive without massive population die-off or going back to 19th century living ... also answering the thread title's question about the ethics of having children.
When world peak oil occurs, aside from potential indirect effects like wars, the trend is for the oil supply to decrease by a few percent in the first year, like the Hubbert curves in the graph in my previous post. That applies both to a local geographical area and to the total of various geographical areas. For example, here is a graph of historical U.S. domestic oil production (not including imports), which peaked back in 1970:
As illustrated, oil production declines, but, like the original rise in production, it takes a number of years to decline by tens of percent, buying time for alternatives.
Admiral Valdemar wrote:It will not be a gentle lowering in prices and supply, especially when in the '70s a 5% loss in supply caused a 400% increase in price which was only alleviated by the finding of the last elephant sized fields and the US buddying with non-OPEC suppliers, the UK also had just brought the North Sea facilities onstream which are now peaked.
There is potential for economic depression, and switching away in advance from fossil fuel dependence would be preferable. But I already said that before. The sudden artificial cut off to the U.S. of
most imported oil from Arab countries in the oil crisis three decades ago was economically damaging yet survivable.
The reduction in imported oil that the U.S. survived in part of the 1970s to the early 1980s was quite major, about 50% loss as shown here:
Even with domestic oil production, such resulted in about a 20% drop in total oil consumption as shown here, a drop that caused much economic harm but was survived:
In event of major disaster with world peak oil, indirect effects like wars and instability are possible. For example, the U.S. continuing to receive oil from various Middle Eastern countries is questionable in the possible event of that region turning into chaos. That may lead to a faster decline in oil supply than the usual Hubbert curve.
However, the U.S. presumably keeps oil flowing in from countries like Canada and Mexico, as well as remaining domestic production, while their production declines but at a moderate rate as suggested before, so the decline in the total U.S. oil supply is not utterly precipitous. In fact, Canada and Mexico are the two largest sources of oil imported into
the U.S.. After all, even in event of oil wars, they would tend to be fought elsewhere, with no country's military being foolish enough to try invading North America. Indeed, now oil imports from the Middle East do not amount to more than 18% of imported U.S.
oil, about 10% of total U.S. oil consumption.
In other words, in the first years of peak oil, the U.S. tends to suffer a supply loss of a number of percent, experiencing mostly a scenario like the Hubbert curves described before with decrease over years and over decades, rather than an unlimited instant drop. That can be survived, with economic harm as opposed to utter collapse, buying time for alternatives.
Admiral Valdemar wrote:Additionally, it's been shown during the crises of the '70s that the demand was inelastic and the market made no attempt whatsoever at replacing their oil with alternative sources which are still massively underfunded.
What has been the situation so far is that the amount spent on suitable production of alternative fuels has been very, very close to zero relative to the whole economy. Private companies haven't been much attracted to producing synthetic fuel when oil prices have been low enough that it appeared they would not compete, not provide enough of a financial return for many investors to risk their money. Even when prices rose during the 1973 oil crisis, investing in synthetic fuel production was financially risky since the price of competing fuel from oil could later drop again, making the plants be competitive too briefly to give a good return on investment (like capital costs). And that is what happened, like this one illustration, which is actually for non-conventional oil instead of synthetic fuel but a similar situation:
Article wrote:During the oil crisis of the 1970s, [some] people thought that oil supplies were peaking, expected oil prices to be around seventy dollars a barrel for some time to come, and invested huge amounts of money in refining oil shale — money that they lost. Because of the astronomical sums that were lost last time around there is considerable reluctance to invest in oil shale this time around. Investors are waiting to see if oil prices really will remain this high (in August 2006: US$75 a barrel).
[...]
In 2005, Royal Dutch Shell announced that its in-situ extraction technology could be competitive at prices over $30/bbl [$30 per barrel, below current oil price today in 2007 but above it until recently]
From here.
If that oil crisis had been clearly permanent, physical rather than a matter of politics, the situation would not be the same.
Let's look at the government (the U.S. government). Total federal spending is 2900 billion
dollars per year, about $30+ trillion per decade (aside from $20+ trillion more state & local government spending), but how much is spent in a manner preparing for peak oil?
A bit less than 1% of the total federal budget, the Department of Energy's annual budget is $23.6 billion
(2007). Of that, $9.868 billion is on nuclear weapons and other defense-related activities. Another $5.827 billion is environmental cleanup at various locations. If one continues looking through the
details in a similar manner, the main expenditures that appear very relevant in this context are the following:
.gov site wrote:The Budget provides $54 million in 2007 for the Nuclear Power 2010 (NP 2010) initiative to make it feasible to build new nuclear power plants in the United States for the first time in three decades.
[...]
If successful, this seven-year, $1.1 billion effort [~ $0.16 billion per year], 50 percent of which would be non-Federal funding [~ $0.079 billion annually], could result in a new nuclear power plant order by 2009, and a new nuclear power plant constructed by the private sector and in operation by 2014.
[...]
The Budget provides $32 million for research and development (R&D) to support Generation IV nuclear energy systems.
[...]
The Budget provides $250 million in 2007 for the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership (GNEP)
From here.
Adding up the above, the result is ~ $0.42 billion annually. That's about 0.01% of the total federal budget and about 1 part in 30000 of annual U.S. GDP.
There are some other potentially relevant expenditures like the Biofuels Initiative
project attempting to develop ethanol from cellulosic sources like relatively abundant and cheap agricultural waste rather than ethanol from relatively expensive corn, funded at about $0.09 billion to $0.15 billion annually, although it succeeding is uncertain. And one could go through the rest of the federal budget and those of state governments. Not everything really counts much in this context relative to expenditures, like the California Million Solar Roofs project that with current solar roofs results in vastly less electrical generation than such funds being spent supporting nuclear power, as described in another
thread.
Anyway, the overall picture is that current expenditures, particularly those spent efficiently, are utterly miniscule compared to what is possible if or when strong motivation develops from effects of world peak oil. Much of the public has an anti-nuclear bias, but, if they start getting desperate, start getting motivated from seeing shortages affecting them personally far more than their imaginary significant harm from nuclear reactors, then they may finally make a substantial amount of funding get devoted to nuclear power expansion.
And while that Nuclear Power 2010
Initiative with $54 million per year funding or one part in 240,000 of U.S. GDP of $13,000,000 million
($13 trillion) annually is hoped to result in a new nuclear power plant in 2009 to 2014, that's next to nothing compared to what would happen if extreme motivation from peak oil troubles led eventually to the literally thousands of times greater funding possible.
Observe even a potential economic downturn and depression affecting U.S. GDP by a number of percent doesn't change the overall picture of the number of orders of magnitude difference. If the U.S. coming out of the Great Depression and some other nations couldn't devote vastly, vastly more than a few millionths of economic output to a new project when really motivated, the Allies wouldn't have won WWII. Current funding for nuclear expansion that is mere millionths of U.S. GDP does not represent what is really possible.
Admiral Valdemar wrote:The problem is China, for instance, is not building CCS plants, and bar China, no one is ramping up coal powerplants unless they already have to. Why would they? Oil is a far superior product and is why the US and UK do not even bother with coal relatively.
I showed how coal power plants dominate the U.S. and world electricity supply in past threads, like part of my recent posts
here and
here, which included verifiable references a click of the mouse away as usual.
Let's add a graphical illustration of generation from oil power plants today versus the amount from other sources:
The 2006 figures are from
here.
Why is coal so much more of electricity generation than oil? Coal is multiple times cheaper per unit of energy, as illustrated by the following:
Since 1976, however, coal has been the least expensive fossil fuel used to generate electricity. In 1999, on a dollars-per-million-Btu basis, natural gas was the most expensive fossil fuel ($2.59) [*], petroleum was second ($2.56), and coal was least expensive ($1.22).
From here.
[*] Natural gas is a significant portion of electricity generation today despite its expense compared to coal for reasons including past economics and the financial suitability of small relatively efficient low-capital-cost natural gas generators for applications like
load following power plants.
Actually, with the major rise in oil prices for now compared to 1999, oil would be even much worse compared to coal for electricity generation today. Some oil-fueled electrical generation exists for reasons such as it being easier to have a small generator work with diesel fuel, but that isn't much at <= 3% of the total. Oil's dominance in fueling transportation is a different situation, of course.
Coal liquidification producing synthetic gasoline and diesel fuel isn't nearly as cheap as the cost of raw coal, but it still isn't astronomically expensive, rather costing
on the order of $35 per barrel. Investors have historically been discouraged from implementing such for multiple reasons, such as oil only recently much exceeding that price, having for a while been around $20 per barrel, aside from the too-short price spike:
Oil has recently started being in the $60 to $70 per barrel price range. Once oil not only gets up to ~ $100+ barrel but also appear certain to permanently stay that expensive, then major investors may conclude alternative fuel plants costing years to build will be able to operate competitively long enough afterwards to pay back capital expenses. Or, if the economic situation with oil eventually becomes really extreme, actions of the government may become what matters most.
Incidentally, coal mining today involves 74000 workers in terms of "all employees engaged in production, preparation, processing, development, maintenance, repair shop, or yard work at mining operations, including office workers [excluding preparation plants with less than 5,000 employee hours per year]"
(from here). That's less than 1/1000th of the U.S. workforce, so there is the potential to mine much more coal per year if more resources ended up being diverted to it.
One might object that the preceding figure doesn't represent indirect manpower costs, but those are captured in the price of coal: The 1039 million short tons of coal consumed for electric power (more than 90% of total coal use)
in 2005 cost the electric utilities $30.91 per delivered ton on average, corresponding to $32 billion per year. Again, that is limited, about 1/400th of U.S. GDP
today of $13 trillion. Again, even an economic depression doesn't change the general picture, the order-of-magnitude situation, that a lot more coal could be mined per year if necessary for still a small portion of the total economy.
Admiral Valdemar wrote:All of which is great, until you remember that Germany had horrible energy shortages, hence Operation Blau and the failure of such campaigns which led to the Sixth Army being stranded outside Stalingrad. If this is an ideal situation to you, especially given Nazi Germany is nowhere near 21st century Earth, then by all means believe the growth economy will not stagnate.
The modern-day U.S. economy has a relative advantage compared to WWII Germany's economy for multiple reasons including not starting, fighting, and eventually losing a war against most of the civilized world at the same time as the conversion away from oil. WWII Germany had about $0.4 trillion annual GDP
converted to 1990 dollars or $0.6 trillion annual GDP in
today's dollars, largely blown on the war, compared to the 20 times greater
figure for the U.S. today. But my point is not that economic growth couldn't stagnate. Economic output could potentially stagnate and somewhat decline for a time, though such a depression would be no more forever permanent than the 1970s oil crisis or the Great Depression, albeit in worse-case scenarios potentially lasting longer. Recovery and then growth once more would tend to occur eventually after even the public finally realized the value of nuclear power conversion. Before then, industrial civilization survives with a combination of cut-backs in non-critical oil usage and alternative fuels as described later, as possible when the oil supply doesn't drop precipitiously overnight, rather mostly follows Hubbert curves.
Admiral Valdemar wrote:It is incredibly dirty and the FDA openly opposes such coal gasification given the environmental risks. So now you're basically adding to global warming and forcing people to work with highly toxic products that get into the local environment too.
Coal liquidation is dirty and not my preferred method, but realistically it tends to happen. If or when the average American gets seriously inconvenienced, they care more about maintaining a modern lifestyle than the environmental side-effects of coal liquidation. What Germany accomplished during a few years in WWII with their building production infrastructure for primarily synthetic fuels has not been forgotten, and they had about 5% of the U.S. economic output today as described before, plus inferior technology.
If instead talking about what would be preferable, here's a random illustration, an arbitrary example: With
total U.S. GDP over a 40-year period being ~ $520 trillion neglecting economic growth and change, devoting 0.5% of that would be $2.6 trillion. If measures were taken to obtain economics like
those of the Maine Yankee power plant of 920 MW capacity that was built in four years between 1968 and 1972 for
a cost of $231 million, which is $1.14 billion
converted to today's dollars, the preceding $2600 billion would correspond to 2280 nuclear power plants of 920 MW capacity each or the equivalent. (Eventually historical nuclear power economics were not quite as great as plants like the Maine Yankee, but such was due to avoidable factors as discussed in
an older thread).
That would be a generation capacity of ~ 2,100,000 megawatts, not bad for construction with the fraction of one percent of GDP over the decades. At a typical nuclear power plant capacity factor above 90%, that would be 0.9+ * (2100000 megawatts) * (24 hours/day) * (365 days/year) = 16,500,000+ megawatt-hours a year. Total U.S. electricity generation today is a quarter as much: 4,055,000 megawatt-hours a year
(2006). That much clean energy running off uranium in seawater that can last for eons would help solve a lot of troubles.
The preceding with even X thousandths of GDP instead would be the equivalent of about X * 110 nuclear power plants of 0.9 gigawatts each constructed per decade. The current nuclear power plant expansion rate of 0 new plants ordered since 1973 corresponds to not 1/1000th of U.S. GDP being spent on such nuclear power expansion.
But I don't focus on expecting nuclear power expansion on the preceding level since a requirement in making standard predictions is to account for real-world sociopolitical factors against doing anything like the preceding. For that reason, I predict funds devoted to nuclear power expansion to much exceed the current few millionths of GDP only after the public and the government become desperate enough to significantly change the status quo. Even then, realistically, the probable initial government focus is on fuels from coal more than nuclear energy, albeit hopefully with the public learning enough from the peak oil experience to eventually switch away from all fossil fuels before coal supplies later much decline (in the more distant future after a number of decades of elevated consumption).
Admiral Valdemar wrote:There are means to counter the decrease in supply, but they are nowhere near being implemented because they are not economically viable, at least on such a scale, to be brought onstream.
In many cases, they tend to not be economically viable in terms of competing with oil at the prices described before. The situation changes if prices rise enough, or if the government allocates enough funds.
In the long-term, nuclear energy has the potential for much reduced energy cost that I have discussed
elsewhere. Extreme motivation would make the public more willing to implement it to some degree since most have a moderate anti-nuclear bias rather than an utterly absolute one.
Admiral Valdemar wrote:I won't even go into bio-fuels, which are a big white elephant and hydrogen, as stated, is not an energy source.
[...]
Too many people mare looking at bio-fuels, for instance, which even if they had the facilities to supply the whole of the US, means the US has now lost all of its corn and similar crops to the fuel, plastic and related industries. Again, the meagre returns on invested energy with regards to cellulose based alternatives means there is a huge energy deficit still (16% of the populace can drive and use plastic since a tonne of corn is around 450 litres of bio-fuel).
Bio-fuel concepts vary in practicality, like corn (food) -> ethanol having its issues, but even the better ones tend to be practical more as only a good supplement to other techniques rather than the dominant solution. However, some supplementation can be helpful in this context of mitigating peak oil as discussed later.
The popular hydrogen fuel-cell vehicle concept corresponds to a situation of replacing 200+ million automobiles, as well as almost maximum infrastructure change, like the huge existing distribution system for liquid gasoline and diesel fuel being incompatible with hydrogen gas. There is a reason hydrogen-fueled fuel-cell vehicles have existed for years yet never even had the slight level of sales of electric cars, mainly being built as prototypes not even attempted to be sold: They remain extremely expensive. While the basic nominal economics of replacing vehicles is $5+ trillion if $25,000+ for the average vehicle, already not particularly good, hydrogen fuel-cell vehicles of today so far remain one to two orders of magnitude more expensive. (That's without hydrogen generation expense, which would be proportionally small with nuclear power yet tend to be very expensive with some popular concepts). Admittedly, perhaps there could be extraordinary change in cost in the future, as some predict and hope. But it is undesirable to count on it too much when there are perfectly workable alternatives that could be implemented immediately rather than waiting indefinitely.
Presumably the idea of some of its proponents is that the expense of vehicle conversion doesn't count as much through occurring naturally over a long period of time. But it isn't as good if the goal was switching away from fossil fuel dependence for minimum trouble, in minimum time, and at minimum expense. The expense makes conversion of the total national vehicle fleet primarily to hydrogen fuel-cell vehicles unlikely to happen in the next two or three decades, if ever. Not even the vast popularity of the idea is likely to overcome its economics in the near-term.
For perspective compared to the preceding, if not for the sociopolitical factors preventing such, proper usage of nuclear power to replace non-electrical energy usage by synthesizing gasoline, diesel fuel, and plastics with zero net CO2 emissions would be on the order of $1.6 trillion
extra in power plant capital costs for the equivalent of current consumption, not a huge amount compared to $130+ trillion GDP per decade, simultaneously added to by other expenses but also countered by eliminating existing importation and extraction costs. That avoids the vast expense of changing vehicles and avoids most infrastructure change to allow it to be implemented much more cheaply, helping conversion be faster. However, judging from the approximately zero popularity in public discourse for proposing anything much like the preceding, it doesn't tend to actually be implemented in the near-term foreseeable future. So, let's get into what likely happens if peak oil is devastating.
Admiral Valdemar wrote:Alternatives exist, but they are simply not going to meet demand, which is the whole basis for PO, not that we won't have energy. The world's oil shale and tar sand productions may reach 4 mbd by 2030, if we're lucky.
The equivalent of four million barrels a day or less of
non-conventional oil equivalents could be the case in 2030 if the current proportionally miniscule level of funding continued, but motivation is low today precisely because there aren't undisputed major peak oil effects yet.
Indeed, given that production cost for non-conventional or synthetic fuel tends to be the equivalent of no more than ~ $30 to ~ $80 per barrel for some likely
techniques, production not going above 4 million barrels a day even after many years would be implicitly assuming the world would devote only the correspondingly tiny fraction of ~ 0.1% of its
economic output to the purpose. And a scenario of economic downturn doesn't change the general order of magnitude here. But this is getting off-topic to the degree that my focus is on the U.S. here rather than the world in general. It takes long enough to discuss some of the details with the U.S. alone.
Admiral Valdemar wrote:And you're not building these coal gasification plants, wind turbines, nuke plants or converting cars to hybrids without using oil already. If oil is at a premium, good luck trying to siphon that resource into these areas without depriving the rest of society of a great deal.
How might things go in the U.S. if peak oil effects become major enough?
In that case, a major degree of energy conservation and rationing would likely be implemented by the government. While that's no permanent solution by itself with the oil running out sooner or later at any likely consumption rate, plus or minus a moderate number of years, such may tend to occur at the same time as there finally being enough public motivation to start switching the energy source, so it can buy time during the important first years of peak oil.
Transportation is obviously a concern with a decrease in the oil supply.
First, consider trucks transporting goods.
Statistics page wrote:In 2001, it took more than 23 million trucks (of all weight classes) to haul 8.8 billion tons of freight. [...]
Trucks need fuel to run, and it took nearly 47 billion gallons to power those trucks (all weight classes). Most heavy-duty trucks run on diesel fuel, which is why 69% of those 47 billion gallons was diesel, and 31% gasoline.
From here.
If a lot of those 47 billion gallons a year are a priority to be kept supplied, where can emergency savings be made?
Let's look at personal transportation:
The average household has 1.9 vehicles and travels 23100 vehicle-miles per year, with an additional 113 billion
gallons consumed by such personal use. If prices rise vastly and/or rationing occurs, huge drops in that consumption are possible. For example, the average person drives to and from work with a single person in the vehicle, yet it is possible to drop the gasoline consumption for his commute by several times if four or five people carpool in the same vehicle.
Instead of the preceding figures being 47 billion gallons + 113 billion gallons = 160 billion gallons, so much of the latter could be eliminated if the situation was sufficiently dire that even 100 billion gallons a year or 60% as much would be more than enough for critical transportation to keep operating. And, as previously discussed, the U.S. will not tend to suffer that much of a drop in oil supply during the first few years of peak oil. That gives time to get alternative fuel production going, as would happen if the critical necessity and importance of oil alternatives became blatantly obvious to the entire public and the government.
As another example, the technique of thermal depolymerization
currently costs $80/barrel. That is more than the regular oil competition today, and it is a figure that could vary with feedstock. Yet its potential in a peak oil scenario is significant, e.g. "converting all the U.S. agricultural waste into oil and gas would yield the energy equivalent of 4 billion barrels of oil annually [... and in 2001 ] the United States imported 4.2 billion barrels of oil"
(from here).
Cost for the main past plant was around $20 million for the 600-barrels-a-day
plant, proportionally like $91 billion capital cost per 1 billion barrels of annual capacity. For example, that would be capital costs like Y * 0.07% of the $13 trillion U.S. GDP for new construction per year in the case of ramping up to Y billion annual barrels of synthetic oil production with construction over a 10-year period. On the other hand, the
likely production cost of $80+ per barrel corresponds to Y * 0.6+% of GDP in production expense, so some of the other options look potentially less expensive, such as because it can be better to synthesize gasoline or gasoline-equivalent fuel than to make synthetic oil that doesn't become it 100%. But other can see the general idea.
Here's another example, for wood alcohol, able to be produced from wood, natural gas, coal, and/or other sources, where approximate price figures in today's
dollars have been added in brackets:
U.S. Forest Service wrote:METHANOL FROM WOOD WASTE: [...]
The yield of methanol from wood is about 38 percent, or about 100 gallons per ODT [oven-dry-ton] of wood. This yield is based on all process energy required coming from the wood waste. At a wood waste cost of $15/ODT [$57 per dry-ton], the selling price of methanol is estimated at $0.77/gal [$2.94 per gallon]; at $34/ODT [$130 per dry-ton], the selling price is $0.96 / gal [$3.77 per gallon]
[...] Any carbonaceous material such as coal, lignite, wood waste, agricultural residue, and garbage can be utilized for synthetic methanol production.
[...] The investment estimate requirement for a 50 million gpy methanol plant using wood waste totals $64.0 million (1975 dollars). [$245 million]
[...] Because of the simplicity of the conversion of natural gas to methanol, the investment costs for such a plant is about one-third that of a comparable wood waste facility.
[...]Conversion of coal to methanol, while considerably more efficient than
that of waste wood, involves more processing facilities because of the
greater amount of ash and sulfur (wood has no sulfur). Coal conversion
to syngas is more efficient because it has a higher carbon content and
less oxygen than wood.
[...]CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS
It is technically feasible but not economically attractive to produce
methanol from wood waste. [...]
From here.
I am just looking to illustrate one method rather than necessarily finding the cheapest method, so let's look at it:
In the case of the <= ~ $3.77/gallon of methanol economics described above, that is the equivalent of $6.80 per gallon of gasoline replaced or better (1.8 gallons methanol = 1 gallon gasoline).
To replace X% of the 100 billion gallons of fuel consumed annually described before costs $6.8 * X billion a year. Compared to U.S. GDP of $13000 billion a year, that would be about X * 0.052% of the total economy.
Economic depression could affect GDP, as could economic growth before peak oil have the opposite effect, but the basic idea is that it isn't utterly unaffordable.
In the case of the $245 million per 50-million-gallons-methanol-per-year plant described above, that is the equivalent of $8.8 * X billion capital cost to replace X% of the 100 billion gallons of fuel consumed annually. For example, for construction over a 10 year period, that is $0.88 * X billion new construction cost per year.
Such is X * 0.0068% of U.S. GDP, not too bad. The expectation is not 100% conversion to methanol fuel as compatibility with existing vehicles without excessively expensive modification is a goal. But the preceding is one of various methods that are options to help.
Biomass resources can be used to produce methanol. Estimates of biomass resources available for use in the production of alcohol fuels range from one million to 4.7 million dry tons per day one ton equaling 100 gallons of methanol when biomass is also used to fuel the processing plant. Biomass resources include crop residues, forage, grass, crops, wood resources, forest residues, short-rotation wood energy crops and the cellulosic components of municipal solid waste.
From here.
That corresponds to such a supply for potentially on the order of 0.1 billion to 0.5 billion gallons of methanol a day, e.g. ~ 37 billion to 180 billion gallons per year. It is not just like ethanol production in the U.S. today that uses up corn (food), since the preceding is largely wastes. Some aspects of methanol like its toxic nature are undesirable, including reasons ethanol is traditionally preferred as a goal, but one is just giving an illustration here about helping sustain modern civilization.
If supplementing biomass supplies is needed, production of methanol from coal is also possible, with, in fact, the first methanol document above showing methanol from coal as slightly less expensive than the $3.77/gallon-of-methanol figure illustrated previously, e.g. table 9 of
this and the usual dollar conversion.
Methanol has been seen as a possible large volume motor fuel substitute at various times during gasoline shortages. It was often used in the early part of the century to power automobiles before inexpensive gasoline was widely introduced. In the early 1920s, some viewed it as a source of fuel before new techniques were developed to discover and extract oil. The World War II era saw wide use of synthetically produced methanol as a motor fuel in Germany. Wartime fuel shortages throughout Europe prompted the use of the fumes produced by wood-burners as a source of fuel to power vehicles.
The use of methanol as a motor fuel received attention during the oil crises of the 1970s due to its availability and low cost. Problems occurred early in the development of gasoline-methanol blends. As a result of its low price some gasoline marketers over blended. Others used improper blending and handling techniques. This led to consumer and media problems and the eventual phase out of methanol blends. However, there is still a great deal of interest in using methanol as a neat fuel.
[...] Before modern production technologies were developed in the 1920s, methanol was obtained from wood as a co-product of charcoal production and, for this reason, was commonly known as wood alcohol.
[...] Methanol's energy density is about half that of gasoline, reducing the range a vehicle can travel on an equivalent tank of fuel. Current-technology vehicles using neat methanol at temperatures below 45 degrees Fahrenheit are difficult to start because of methanol's lower vapor pressure and single boiling point.
[...] 85 percent methanol solves the cold start difficulties because of its 15 percent-gasoline component. The availability of 85 percent methanol is limited, but growing through a network of dozens of gasoline stations in the key, high-population areas of California.
From here.
The above is just adding more on the methanol example.
There are also synthetic gasoline techniques like the coal liquidation discussed before.
What about oil usage in electricity generation? As shown
earlier in this post, it amounts to 3% of electricity generation, so that is no major concern.
Overall, oil usage is primarily in transportation. While manufacturing consumes some oil, it has even tended to decrease over time.
EIA wrote:The large majority of oil products purchased by manufacturers to produce heat and power are distillate and residual fuel oils.
[...]
Manufacturers have reduced their consumption of fuel oil as a fuel source between 1974 and 1994. As a proportion of total heat content (Btu) of purchased fuels and electricity, fuel oil reached a high of 16.5 percent in 1977 and decreased to a low of 4.5 percent in 1994.
From here.
The second graph near the top of this post showed that two-thirds of oil energy is used in transportation, which is more in the personal use of vehicles than critical trucking of freight shipments, as discussed earlier. Manufacturing uses a lot less oil.
Part of the argument in this post can be illustrated graphically. As discussed earlier, post-peak oil decline from oil-producing regions typically follows approximately a Hubbert curve, like this illustration for domestic oil production (not including imports):
Along with cuts in oil usage and alternative fuel production like that described previously, the finite rate of decline is likely to allow a switch away from oil, such as more coal usage and eventually funds devoted to nuclear power expansion reaching far more than the current few millionths of the ~ $13000000 million annual U.S. GDP (as illustrated before in this post). That overall order-of-magnitude picture still applies if the GDP was somewhat different after economic depression.
Such is meant to graphically suggest how the diversity of the U.S. energy supply realistically leads to most energy remaining available even into peak oil troubles.
My graphs are just approximate even for the pre-peak-oil period, as well as the obvious uncertainty of future prediction in the bottom graph. The historical data up to the "peak oil" dividing line in the "early 21st century" is actually just data valid up to
the year 1998, rather than whatever year peak oil starts. But the graphs are meant only as a very approximate, non-exact illustration. They show the general idea.
Admiral Valdemar wrote:As an aside, some of your numbers may be less than fruitful. The EIA, for instance, have admitted cooking their books before:
These adjustments to the estimates are based on non-technical considerations that support domestic supply growth to the levels necessary to meet projected demand levels. (EIA, Annual Energy Outlook 1998, p.17)
[...]
The cases where I used EIA data in my past post was for historical and current data, for which the Energy Information Administration has the official statistics published by the U.S. government.
Admiral Valdemar wrote:Then there's the fact that China is building a non CCS coal fired plant every two weeks and still cannot meet demand.
China's electrical generation, industrial output, and prosperity are all growing at a rate of tens of percent per decade, the exact figure more than that for any other large nation, but the U.S. is the focus here.
Admiral Valdemar wrote:The production of oil derivatives from coal gasification is doable, as Nazi Germany showed
Ok. We agree there.
Admiral Valdemar wrote:[However,] we should be starting this now, since the transition will not be as leisurely as some have forecast using previous energy crises.
Definitely advance preparation in terms of a switch away from fossil fuels would be much better, for both economic and environmental reasons. That has always been my position in past posts about dependence on fossil fuels, like one getting into some details
here.
Realistically, though, the default situation of little actually being done each decade is illustrated by the past three decades. However, sufficiently prolonged, permanent oil price rise may cause a bit more progress, and that seems to be starting now if the price trend of the past several years continues.
Admiral Valdemar wrote:Sikon wrote:[...]
It is perfectly ethical for people to have children now, if they will raise them well. Even with peak oil, most people born in industrialized countries today have a lot more to look forward to than the bulk of people throughout history.
Ignoring the ethnical question for a moment, no one said that oil would disappear, nor plastics, nor medicines nor such likes. What will happen is that demand will outstrip supply, which alone is enough to topple the largest economy in the world thanks to the way the US has been creating money over the years (which is strained by house prices, health-care and other issues without the need for PO, all of which can cause a '29 level depression by themselves).
My main point in this thread is that there will not be massive die-off and starvation in countries like the U.S., nor a return to 19th-century living, nor a situation where having children is unethical, as likely substantial temporary economic troubles do not equate to such.
EDIT: I just had to respond to a later quote:
Admiral Valdemar wrote:If you don't use breeder reactors, your uranium will run out within a few decades of supplying the demand gas does now and more (I'll have to look at the figures again; I'm sure they were overhyped much like oil at first). If you do use breeders, then you've now got a much more dangerous world with plutonium everywhere, unless you clamp down on "rogue" nations having nuclear, in which case, you're going to see them carry on using coal or the like and giving the finger to the AGW fearing masses. There is also doubt today about how the US can supply itself with uranium as is, that and to mine this stuff requires plenty of oil too
This is irritating. I see you really haven't read quite a number of threads in the past few months given how often the practicality of an almost unlimited supply of uranium from seawater if necessary has been repeatedly mentioned with reference(s) in posts by myself and several times by others too. An example getting into the details is
here, and, as can be seen, its information is verifiable with its online references.
