Science: Fuck yeah (Oil 2.0)

[Lancer]

And solar cells simply might not be produced at all, even by the central government, if they don't give high enough energy yields.

This is actually what I'd expect. Solar panels on Earth aren't really worth it compared to nuclear fission. (Conversely, solar panels in space are the holy grail, but we regrettably aren't in space and that window appears to have already closed.)

The relative cost-effectiveness of solar power vs nuclear power isn't as important as the scale at which the technologies can be implemented. Individual households are unlikely to be able to set up a miniature uranium powerplant in their backyard. However they can install solar panels to suppliment the power they get off the grid. Likewise with most businesses.

That said, innovations in solar panel designs have already significantly reduced the cost of production. Remember Nanosolar? They're still massively backordered due to the scale of the demand for their product, but their method is sound.

[Surlethe]

Therefore, once fossil fuel production peaks, energy will no longer exist to go into developing alternatives?

Not without catastrophic repercussions for the economy.

Oh, good. I had thought that after the peak, we'd be, like, going extinct.

Unless you're going to put everyone into a job dealing with renewables, you're going to upset the growth economy we've had since industry started up.

Well, of course; I had thought that the end of a growth economy with the peaking of oil prices was a given. It makes sense that as oil production decreases, the economy contracts with it until alternatives start to come online.

But this is a moot point. There is no way in hell you are going to replace even a fraction of current global demand with renewables in any meaningful time-frame without bankrupting the whole OECD and more besides. All that energy going towards those projects is energy not going to heat homes, power cars or give people work for jobs they're already in now. There isn't even the manpower to make drilling for more oil anything but a lethargic process.

Well, naturally. But as demand for renewables rises, it only makes sense that the remaining energy is reallocated to the renewable projects. After all, that's how economies work.

[Admiral Valdemar]

Link? To a scientific report stating that we have absolutely removed more coal-energy from the ground that remains. Provide it immediately.

Already posted. See above.

Fun and enjoyment are in fact secondary to the survival of the species, yes, no matter what, though I can't convince you of that, so I wish you'd just get it over with and kill yourself.

Oh great, so we are no smarter than yeast. I forgot, everyone must strive to simply survive and not bother actually enjoying being alive.

Then do so, certainly. I'm not stopping you. I, on the other hand, intend to educate myself into the useful position of nuclear engineer, as I am doing right now, and contribute positively and meaningfully toward our future. You are welcome to go the fuck to Hell instead if you want to.

Yes, I also forgot we don't need disease ridding drugs or drought resistant plants in the future. I must certainly quit my un-beneficial profession, post haste.

Not if you want to spread continuous nihilistic ravings across this board which has POISONED THE ISSUE FOR SERIOUS DISCUSSION and made it a laughingstock!

I think you'll find that it is you who was quoted and subsequently mocked for suggesting breadlines in 21st century America by summer's end. I'm merely reporting facts, dear. If it's nihilistic to point out we've fucked ourselves, then you have nothing to fear from me, for I am a nihilist.

You've actually just proved my point for me. Since, you know, you could be working to change those opinions that people have, instead of screaming about doom. Or, since I'm apparently a Stalinist now, you could join one of my party cadres which are waiting all over the western world to spring up and institute a totalitarian police for our own good.

Let's see, I've talked to my friends and family about this issue for the last 18 months with no effect. I tried to start a peak oil awareness movement in the local parish of my home town and tried to get my MP to bring up the issue of tax credits for decentralised power and food generation to no avail (Brown's got his climate change mission set in stone, no matter how retardedly pitiful it is). My home is fully energy efficient from fluorescent and LED lamps to A rated white hardware. My car gets easy 40-50 MPG and never goes above 55 MPH on the motorway. I've not been abroad or on any real holiday trip since summer, 2002 and I've always recycled where County Council facilities allow.

That's about all I can reasonably do without becoming God-Emperor of Earth. I cannot afford to become energy independent, I've not land for a garden to grow my own food and I sure as shit cannot find a job that doesn't require using transport in one form or another, though for security purposes my workplace is in the middle of nowhere, but still seven minutes from me by car.

None of this matters, though. Because the people in power aren't doing anything, and no amount of screaming will change that unless you've got some actual clout. As I have repeatedly said, this whole issue is really a non-issue if you had started planning for it thirty years ago. Now, it's too late. It's like saying you'll save up for your retirement by putting money into your pension at sixty-five. Sorry, that isn't going to cut it. If that's depressing, if it makes you feel angry and want to hurt somebody, then get in the queue. I don't see subsistence living in some autocratic hellhole as particularly better than living in Mad Max land.

[Admiral Valdemar]

Forget solar. It doesn't scale up too well for what we need. Which is why, instead, I always propose we go with the idea of powering streets and homesteads with the pod based nuke reactors I linked to in another thread which eludes me. I know Toshiba have similar, albeit, larger designs on the market.

[The Duchess of Zeon]

Already posted. See above.

The only ones I can distinctly recall are broken links Ossus complained about.

What's interesting is this report here. Figure #1 seems to indicate that (as a ballpark average) we've extracted about 65,000 million short tons of coal from the ground from 1890 to 2005. Our current proved reserves are 246,000 million metric tons, 111,338 million of which are bituminous and anthracite. You lose.

Next time, try better than posting a few random links to try and disagree with official government figures. Even assuming the majority of those 111,338 million tons of high-grade coal are bituminous, I know for a fact that at least a third of the coal yanked out of the ground before now was low-grade, and even if the other 2/3rds were anthracite, you're still not getting nearly to the energy removed that could remotely equal the energy still in the ground. There simply isn't that much of a difference.

Incidentally the entire world has 909 million tons of proven reserves. There is certainly more.

Oh great, so we are no smarter than yeast. I forgot, everyone must strive to simply survive and not bother actually enjoying being alive.

If that's what it comes to, YES, you fucking little man-child. Survival comes FIRST.

Yes, I also forgot we don't need disease ridding drugs or drought resistant plants in the future. I must certainly quit my un-beneficial profession, post haste.

Don't hide your moral bankruptcy behind the work you do.

I think you'll find that it is you who was quoted and subsequently mocked for suggesting breadlines in 21st century America by summer's end. I'm merely reporting facts, dear. If it's nihilistic to point out we've fucked ourselves, then you have nothing to fear from me, for I am a nihilist.

I say things like that for the sole reason that I'm trying to reassure people and put the future in terms they can understand, instead of your apocalyptic ravings. You really do come off, you fool, as convinced that humanity is going to die out. So I come around and correct that by explaining to people what the experience will be like in human terms and what they can do about it. Do you really have any idea about how you sound when you make these posts? A gleeful lunatic, dancing every time the world tilts closer to total extermination.

Let's see, I've talked to my friends and family about this issue for the last 18 months with no effect. I tried to start a peak oil awareness movement in the local parish of my home town and tried to get my MP to bring up the issue of tax credits for decentralised power and food generation to no avail (Brown's got his climate change mission set in stone, no matter how retardedly pitiful it is). My home is fully energy efficient from fluorescent and LED lamps to A rated white hardware. My car gets easy 40-50 MPG and never goes above 55 MPH on the motorway. I've not been abroad or on any real holiday trip since summer, 2002 and I've always recycled where County Council facilities allow.

That's about all I can reasonably do without becoming God-Emperor of Earth. I cannot afford to become energy independent, I've not land for a garden to grow my own food and I sure as shit cannot find a job that doesn't require using transport in one form or another, though for security purposes my workplace is in the middle of nowhere, but still seven minutes from me by car.

None of this matters, though. Because the people in power aren't doing anything, and no amount of screaming will change that unless you've got some actual clout. As I have repeatedly said, this whole issue is really a non-issue if you had started planning for it thirty years ago. Now, it's too late. It's like saying you'll save up for your retirement by putting money into your pension at sixty-five. Sorry, that isn't going to cut it. If that's depressing, if it makes you feel angry and want to hurt somebody, then get in the queue. I don't see subsistence living in some autocratic hellhole as particularly better than living in Mad Max land.

Then die, like I said. Because that's what the future is going to be, and I am quite prepared to find my happiness in an "autocratic hellhole". Life went on even in the bleakest days of WW2 or Stalin's terror in the USSR, or in the Russian Civil War before it. What kind of human would I be if I curled up and died at the slightest onset of hard times? But you, you are not human. You have no ability to survive hardship, and for that I do pity you. Enjoy your PS3 while it lasts. The real people have a future to build, one painful step at a time.

[Hawkwings]

Forget solar. It doesn't scale up too well for what we need. Which is why, instead, I always propose we go with the idea of powering streets and homesteads with the pod based nuke reactors I linked to in another thread which eludes me. I know Toshiba have similar, albeit, larger designs on the market.

Toshiba 4S

This similar to what you're looking for?

[Kanastrous]

Don't hide your moral bankruptcy behind the work you do.

When I saw that, all I could think was my moral bankruptcy is essential to the work I do...

/micro threadjack

[Admiral Valdemar]

The only ones I can distinctly recall are broken links Ossus complained about.

What's interesting is this report here. Figure #1 seems to indicate that (as a ballpark average) we've extracted about 65,000 million short tons of coal from the ground from 1890 to 2005. Our current proved reserves are 246,000 million metric tons, 111,338 million of which are bituminous and anthracite. You lose.

Next time, try better than posting a few random links to try and disagree with official government figures. Even assuming the majority of those 111,338 million tons of high-grade coal are bituminous, I know for a fact that at least a third of the coal yanked out of the ground before now was low-grade, and even if the other 2/3rds were anthracite, you're still not getting nearly to the energy removed that could remotely equal the energy still in the ground. There simply isn't that much of a difference.

Incidentally the entire world has 909 million tons of proven reserves. There is certainly more.

Ah yes, the 2006 report that trumps the 2007 one. Look harder. I have already gone over this.

And again, all of this is totally moot anyway, because the bigger threat is moving to coal in the first place, not moving to it and having it run out, but having it out of the ground. You want to avoid an Apocalypse by slamming the pedal and gunning for another one? Have at it.

If that's what it comes to, YES, you fucking little man-child. Survival comes FIRST.

Then I weep for you. Yours is a sad life.

Don't hide your moral bankruptcy behind the work you do.

A morally bankrupt philanthropist. How novel. Sorry to disappoint you in my not only giving a shit, but actually delivering to society as well.

I say things like that for the sole reason that I'm trying to reassure people and put the future in terms they can understand, instead of your apocalyptic ravings. You really do come off, you fool, as convinced that humanity is going to die out. So I come around and correct that by explaining to people what the experience will be like in human terms and what they can do about it. Do you really have any idea about how you sound when you make these posts? A gleeful lunatic, dancing every time the world tilts closer to total extermination.

Physician, heal thyself.

Then die, like I said. Because that's what the future is going to be, and I am quite prepared to find my happiness in an "autocratic hellhole". Life went on even in the bleakest days of WW2 or Stalin's terror in the USSR, or in the Russian Civil War before it. What kind of human would I be if I curled up and died at the slightest onset of hard times? But you, you are not human. You have no ability to survive hardship, and for that I do pity you. Enjoy your PS3 while it lasts. The real people have a future to build, one painful step at a time.

First of all, nothing in history compares to this situation, so citing WWII or a petty civil war is meaningless. Secondly, even in those times people lived for something. They didn't have this bullshit "We must survive for the sake of surviving" mentality you so happily go on about like life even means anything without meaning. Maybe to you and your utterly devoid of fun life that's pleasant, but to most normal people, we kind of like to have something to believe in and make our time on this planet something other than a battle to secure the next meal and not die in our sleep. If this is your ideal world, go and move to the Sudan. Have a blast building your neo-classical empire, Your Highness.

I'd love to carry on with your plan of not making these threads a laughing stock by attacking me over my purchasing of a games console, but I have better things to do. I believe there's some mildew on the shower curtain to remove.

[Sarevok]

Firstly I have to thank both Valdemar and Duchess for posting enlightning threads on this issue. Long before rest of the world started waking up I had at least some idea about the current food and fuel crisis. Thank you for that.

However with all due respect Duchess what exactly is your personal survival plan here ? Speaking as a noob there is nothing individuals like Valdemar can do to offset current situation.

[CaptainZoidberg]

First of all, nothing in history compares to this situation, so citing WWII or a petty civil war is meaningless.

So how bad do you think it's really going to get before we can switch over entirely to nuclear? Of course, people will have to give up luxuries, and will have to think about where they drive.

I'd love to carry on with your plan of not making these threads a laughing stock by attacking me over my purchasing of a games console, but I have better things to do. I believe there's some mildew on the shower curtain to remove.

I'm not sure how else one could prepare for the future with that money. I mean, you could buy a solar panel, but it's not like $1000 of solar panel would make a huge difference.

[Master of Ossus]

Firstly I have to thank both Valdemar and Duchess for posting enlightning threads on this issue. Long before rest of the world started waking up I had at least some idea about the current food and fuel crisis. Thank you for that.

However with all due respect Duchess what exactly is your personal survival plan here ? Speaking as a noob there is nothing individuals like Valdemar can do to offset current situation.

Modesty aside, someone with 7000 posts and an account registered 6 years ago is not a noob.

Also, I agree with you. The world will not end because a board member buys a PlayStation, and frankly it's unrealistic to get other people to drop all enjoyment out of their lives because of the threat of future economic disruption.

[Sarevok]

Well assuming the future plays out as Valdermar's and Duchess's hypotheticals the following happens. Totalitarian governments become more prevalent in even democratic parts of the world. Speaking as a third world dweller energy efficiency and food growing is least of your worries when there is an oppressive government in power. So even if someone contributes 0.0000......01 % to world energy crisis ultimately they get picked up by paramilitary thugs who confiscate their personal survival fortress. Realistically the cutthroat politician and local strongman type with shady connections and hired guns dominate the world in absence of fair and balanced justice. Unless someone has all the required traits of an Afgan warlord or Lebanese politician I don't see how any amount of technical know how will save oneself if world political and social situation deteriorates.

[The Duchess of Zeon]

Ah yes, the 2006 report that trumps the 2007 one. Look harder. I have already gone over this.

The historical figures are not about to be revised dramatically upward, which is really what this was about.

And again, all of this is totally moot anyway, because the bigger threat is moving to coal in the first place, not moving to it and having it run out, but having it out of the ground. You want to avoid an Apocalypse by slamming the pedal and gunning for another one? Have at it.

Fuck you I don't! We just need the energy to build the environmentally neutral power production facilities IN THE FIRST PLACE. Do you have a better idea of how to get that energy than a combination of extreme rationing and using our existing resources? Because certainly we will try to prevent global warming by minimizing the amount of coal we use, which will mean that luxuries will have to be eliminated and people will need to subsist at a level of bare survival. Then, we will use as much coal as is necessary--and not more--for the purpose of building nuclear, hydroelectric, and other renewable sources, and constructing alternate transportation modes (we can easily electrify the railroads, for starters, that haul most coal anyway, thereby removing the major transportation issue you whine about) to sustain the new, carbon-neutral industrial society.

Then I weep for you. Yours is a sad life.

Enjoy dying. I shall provide a legacy for myself--you will slip away and be forgotten.

A morally bankrupt philanthropist. How novel. Sorry to disappoint you in my not only giving a shit, but actually delivering to society as well.

And yet you are unprepared to suffer for the sake of the future?

Physician, heal thyself.

You're the one encouraging us all to sit down and play games until we die.

First of all, nothing in history compares to this situation, so citing WWII or a petty civil war is meaningless.

You really know nothing of the scale of the total civilizational collapse in Russia in 1919, do you?

Secondly, even in those times people lived for something. They didn't have this bullshit "We must survive for the sake of surviving" mentality you so happily go on about like life even means anything without meaning. Maybe to you and your utterly devoid of fun life that's pleasant, but to most normal people, we kind of like to have something to believe in and make our time on this planet something other than a battle to secure the next meal and not die in our sleep. If this is your ideal world, go and move to the Sudan. Have a blast building your neo-classical empire, Your Highness.

They will have a future to look forward to, for them and their children. Do you really think that isn't enough to motivate most people? It was what motivated most people for all of human history. Oh, but you're an oh-so-hip non-breeder, so you have no future through children. Well, good.

The more of you there are, the better--we can just recycle you for spare parts and fertilizer when the crunch comes, and reduce the energy needs of our civilization. I mean, that's what you always trumpet, right? We need to "draw down" with no proposals made for how to allow future progress and just accept our world becoming a medieval shithole, right? Well, I don't plan on accepting that, so if you really don't care about anything, good, but leave the energy for the rest of us to use to fix things, hmm?

[MKSheppard]

You know, I hate to bring this up, but according to Valdemar's previous proclaimations on this board in the past, shouldn't we all be dead from various strains of super Bird Flu?

[The Duchess of Zeon]

I mean, it's rather been obvious ever since the thread about sterilizing his girlfriend that he's just a hip, 20-something nihilist who has discovered that the world, the future, and all of existence is pointless, and it's time to party it up for the next three decades and then die. He'll probably be embarrassed by his attitudes within a decade.

As Mike put it in that thread:

Wow. Another person barely out of school who thinks he knows how the rest of his life will look, and how he will feel about his life in twenty years Rolling Eyes

Don't worry, I know. You will tell me that the two of you are WAAAY more mature than most people your age.

And then Valdemar comes back with the exact whiny-20-something routine that Mike predicted:

Well, hey, judge me as being just like everyone else with super older person wisdom. I can't change your viewpoint, but I'm telling you that I have no intention all the same. If you can't accept that, that's your problem, not mine. I've highlighted the reasons why multiple times in the past and nothing's changing that.

And that's really just what he is. A kid barely out of school who thinks that his nihilistic, pleasure-seeking life with no plan for children and no plan for any sort of future is the Best Thing Ever.

Now, I may well be attacked for making an ad hominem--except that I'm not. Both Valdemar and I agree perfectly on the facts, except for some minor details about worldwide coal consumption which actually don't matter in the long run for my proposals (because burning Oil Shale provides a backup which makes my expectations possible even if he is completely correct about the coal figures). What I'm really doing here is providing evidence for a different argument entirely--that Valdemar consistently refuses to accept or encourage any kind of solution to Peak Oil because he wants the world to end, as it justifies his own immature 20-something lifestyle.

[Stark]

Well assuming the future plays out as Valdermar's and Duchess's hypotheticals the following happens. Totalitarian governments become more prevalent in even democratic parts of the world. Speaking as a third world dweller energy efficiency and food growing is least of your worries when there is an oppressive government in power. So even if someone contributes 0.0000......01 % to world energy crisis ultimately they get picked up by paramilitary thugs who confiscate their personal survival fortress. Realistically the cutthroat politician and local strongman type with shady connections and hired guns dominate the world in absence of fair and balanced justice. Unless someone has all the required traits of an Afgan warlord or Lebanese politician I don't see how any amount of technical know how will save oneself if world political and social situation deteriorates.

This is what I find personally amusing about much of this paranoia; that if society DOES collapse, all your preparations are just going to make you a target for either Mad Max mobs or organised paramilitary organisations. It might make you feel better now, and it's better than sticking your head in the sand, but the whole point of chaos is that there IS no security. I mean, when society collapses, who wants to be the guy with the 20,000L tanker in his back yard? Not me.

But then, people probably imagine they WILL become a regional warlord, and that's even MORE hilarious.

[Kanastrous]

I have no aspirations in the direction of Regional Warlord, although I might manage employment as a mid- to upper-level henchman.

[MKSheppard]

I mean, when society collapses, who wants to be the guy with the 20,000L tanker in his back yard? Not me.

But then, people probably imagine they WILL become a regional warlord, and that's even MORE hilarious.

Shush Stark! Don't inject reality into their ideas of becoming a regional warlord; or surviving with a 20,000L tanker in their backyard!

It's why I feel that any preparations should be low key, just enough to let you and a small immediate circle survive the immediate Shit Hits the Fan scenario for a month or two.....and then you can hook up with other survivors.

[Stark]

I have no aspirations in the direction of Regional Warlord, although I might manage employment as a mid- to upper-level henchman.

Choosing your warlord may be the career-defining decision of the 2020s.

[CaptainChewbacca]

I have no aspirations in the direction of Regional Warlord, although I might manage employment as a mid- to upper-level henchman.

Choosing your warlord may be the career-defining decision of the 2020s.

I'm hoping I can land a job as 'Warlord's pet scientist'. Its a steady gig, nobody is shooting directly at you, and you usually get pretty descent food and supplies.

[The Duchess of Zeon]

Well assuming the future plays out as Valdermar's and Duchess's hypotheticals the following happens. Totalitarian governments become more prevalent in even democratic parts of the world. Speaking as a third world dweller energy efficiency and food growing is least of your worries when there is an oppressive government in power. So even if someone contributes 0.0000......01 % to world energy crisis ultimately they get picked up by paramilitary thugs who confiscate their personal survival fortress. Realistically the cutthroat politician and local strongman type with shady connections and hired guns dominate the world in absence of fair and balanced justice. Unless someone has all the required traits of an Afgan warlord or Lebanese politician I don't see how any amount of technical know how will save oneself if world political and social situation deteriorates.

My only plan is to complete dealing with medical issues and get a graduate-level education in nuclear engineering before everything goes to Hell. Society will still be organized enough that I'll be able to find plenty of work--I mean, I expect my combined household income (me and others) will come out to 400,000 USD a year equivalent within 12 years. So even if the standard of living has declined by a factor of eight in the next 12 years, which is ludicrous, I'd still be able to afford everything a middle class American can today. The whole world is not going to become like Afghanistan. The third world might.

Realistically, if you don't criticize the government, work hard on mitigation projects, and don't complain about having waiting lists for any sort of luxury item or living in a one-room apartment with a family of six, there will probably be no real severe consequences for your life if you're not impoverished. You might, even in the USA, starve to death if you're both impoverished and in a remote area where food is difficult to be shipped to. And that's probably true even in the worst case.

[Stark]

I'm hoping I can land a job as 'Warlord's pet scientist'. Its a steady gig, nobody is shooting directly at you, and you usually get pretty descent food and supplies.

Well I imagine it'll be old-school politics; you want a warlord whose yoke rests as lightly as possible, while still being brutal enough to defend their territory, and you want someone with lots of friends, but not the 'start a fight with someone else' type of friends.

[The Duchess of Zeon]

The worst case for people in the First World are basically those scenes in Dr. Zhivago of Soviet Petrograd/Leningrad during the Russian Civil War--lots of death from disease and starvation and so many people stealing wood for their fires that you have to shoot them to keep things under control, and large homes being converted into apartments for 20 or 30 people. But there will still be a fully organized government engaged in scientific and industrial development and mitigation. I have never said it could ever possibly get worse than that.

[Einhander Sn0m4n]

What I'm really doing here is providing evidence for a different argument entirely--that Valdemar consistently refuses to accept or encourage any kind of solution to Peak Oil because he wants the world to end, as it justifies his own immature 20-something lifestyle.

Finally, someone with the balls to actually say what we've all been thinking. Thanks Duchess, and again, I apologize for my post at the beginning of the thread.

[Admiral Valdemar]

Are you all through with the DR2 hijack, or do you want to go on with this little charade? I find it quite humorous all the same.

Ein, your contribution was nothing less than totally relevant and completely informative. Thanks for sharing.