Interesting bit on fossil fuel reserves from today’s Straight Dope, with Cecil Adams. For your consideration:
Dear Cecil:
It’s not often that I stumble into anything on the Net that scares me, but this does. A large number of sites declare that we’re about to hit, or have hit, peak oil production and that our civilization is essentially on the clock and poised to implode in the next 40 to 60 years. Are these accurate assessments, or are they taking the worst-case scenario to extremes? –Scott Lumley, via e-mail
Cecil replies:
Sit down, Scott. What you’re describing isn’t the worst case; arguably it’s the best case. While it’s not clear when oil production will peak, or whether the peak is already past, no one doubts oil production is bound to decline–the only questions are how soon and how fast. Opinions vary (boy, do they), but my feeling is, 40 to 60 years? We should be so lucky.
Background: The concept most associated with looming oil shortages is that of the “Hubbert curve,” named after the late geophysicist M. King Hubbert. In a prescient 1956 paper, Hubbert drew on more than a century’s worth of data to suggest that fossil fuel production followed a characteristic bell-shaped curve, ramping up sharply in the early going, peaking once practical limits were reached, then declining. If you could accurately estimate fossil fuel reserves, Hubbert argued, you could predict when peak oil production would occur. Compiling such an estimate for U.S. oil reserves, Hubbert projected that U.S. oil production would peak between 1965 and 1970. In the event, it peaked in 1971.
Hubbert estimated world oil production would peak in 2000. It didn’t, but that hardly invalidates his theory. World oil-reserve estimates are inherently fuzzier than those for the U.S.; the oil shortages of the 1970s and resulting conservation may have briefly postponed the inevitable; and anyway it’s only 2006 now. Some think that, if we haven’t passed the peak already, we’re pretty damn close–and I mean by the end of this decade. Optimists say 2020 or later, but the exact date isn’t important. The point is, the extraordinary growth of the industrialized nations since 1900 has been disproportionately fueled by a nonrenewable resource that’s now roughly one-half to one-quarter gone and that will cease to be a commercially practical energy source within the lifetime of many already born.
You’re thinking: We stand at the abyss. Not necessarily. Fact is, the U.S. has been here before and we got through it OK. During the 19th century the chief U.S. fuel source was wood extracted from the country’s vast forests, which were logged off at a rate that takes one’s breath away even now. As early as the Civil War conservationists warned of a coming “timber famine.” The crisis never materialized. Total U.S. wood consumption peaked in 1907 and declined steadily thereafter, yet the economy hummed on. What replaced wood? Why, fossil fuels, mainly coal. (Coal, incidentally, remains relatively plentiful—Hubbert thought peak production might occur in 2150.)
But Cecil, you object, how is this thought supposed to be comforting? Today we don’t have any comparable alternative fuel waiting in the wings. Sure we do. What’s more, it was waiting in Hubbert’s day. The title of his 1956 paper was “Nuclear Energy and the Fossil Fuels.” His purpose in writing had been to point out that, in contrast to oil, the U.S. had sufficient reserves of fissionable fuels, chiefly uranium, to last hundreds and likely thousands of years.
We all know what happened to the nuclear-power industry. Yet Hubbert’s argument has lost none of its force: The uranium in little more than three square miles of Chattanooga shale contains as much energy as all the U.S. oil reserves known in his day. What’s more, his theory offers promise that the shift from oil to something else needn’t be the catastrophe some fear. The curve is, after all, a curve. Oil production won’t suddenly stop; it’ll drift downward as oil fields dry up. Once we’ve shifted from a buyer’s to a seller’s market, of course, the cost of petroleum will spike, making today’s gas prices look cheap. That won’t be pleasant; one recalls the sour 70s. But it will promote, in a way that no amount of hand-wringing up to this point has done, a search for less costly alternatives. Petroleum sources heretofore considered marginal or uneconomic, such as oil shale and oil sands, will look a lot better. But even they won’t last long. The pessimists think we’ve got a trillion barrels of oil left, the optimists three trillion. At present consumption rates, the world will burn through three trillion barrels in 105 years–70 years if consumption increases 50 percent as predicted. Mind, that’s the optimistic estimate. After that we’re left with wind, solar, coal, biofuels, and yes, nukes. To be sure, people fear nukes and will resist till the last. But they’ll come around when it becomes clear, as it will, that the alternative is to freeze in the dark.
The President’s recent alternative energy initiative, for all its talk of wind and solar power, has always been—in my opinion—about reopening the door to nuclear energy on a large scale by, in essence, forcing the hand of conservationalists and environmentalists who realize, though they are loathe to admit it, that wind and solar power (at least as we are able to harnvest those energies now) are simply not the answer for a world becoming increasingly more reliant on power.
Adams is right to note that other technologies—along with hybrid sources that increase the mileage we get from fossil fuels—will create the bridge we need to make the changeover; and in fact, should we be able to limit the use of fossil-fuels to powering things like automobiles, supplies could last for what would seem an eternity.
Is the President being disingenuous, then, when he talks of Ethanol and wind power and clean-burning coal? I don’t think so; rather, he is willing to give proponents of those technologies the chance to make good on their optimism. But in doing so, he is also showing us that the need to begin the transition to a strong and vastly improved nuclear energy program IS our energy future—and this is the case, and MUST BE the case, no matter how many times the networks chose to run clips from Chernobyl or show The China Syndrome.
Well, I’ve been nuclear-powered for the past several years, and it’s changed my life! I’d recommend it to anyone.
I’m holding out for a home-hydrogen fuel cell stack myself. Either that or some of that turkey-guts diesel.
Although a good joke would be finding out abiogenic oil is real.
Indeed. The worst nuclear accident in history, caused by poor training and poor design, resulted in how many deaths?
28 people died within four months from radiation or thermal burns,
19 have subsequently died,
and there have been around nine deaths from thyroid cancer apparently due to the accident. Total: 56.
How may people died yesterday in Iraq? 132. How many Americans died in fatal motor vehicle accidents in 1994? 42,636.
There’s some interesting developments in genetic engineering of algae going on:
http://forums.biodieselnow.com/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=11411
Algal oil has a vast, vast potential. But I think they’re at least ten years away from being truly viable. We still need to do a lot of research.
It seems when talking about oil people forget all about the power of the market and the ingenuity of smart people who are motivated by demand and profit.
I’m not worried. After all, we’re a world that took about no time at all to ramp up an entire industry based on selling people fuzzy cameras and stupid ring tones for their cell phones.
The greatest consumption would seem to be for fuels and synthesis. Nuclear, wind, solar are only alternatives for energy. Small drop in the bucket when you also put an emerging China in the mix as far as fuels.
What has been fun to watch is the free market starting to kick into gear (no pun, blah, blah, blah). Hybrids are not at their full potential, and will pave the way (sorry) for newer technologies and products.
Either that or we just hook up Glenn Reynolds. I think he must run on nanite juice or something.
TW: I miss my 1980 4-door Chevette Hatchback.
I miss my 1980 4-door Chevette Hatchback.
no doubt it was loaded on a container to south america with my 1973 Vega
Hmmm.
1. The future is in pebble-bed nuclear reactors.
2. We can make synthetic oil by converting waste carbon found in garbage.
3. There is a hypothesis that oil isn’t the result of dinosaurs being compressed and heated over the course of centuries. That in fact oil is being created within the Earth’s crust on a continual basis wherever and whenever there is both high pressure, heat and available sources of carbon.
If this is the case, then I would think a simpler means of producing oil would be to take organic or carbon-heavy waste and chuck it into a hole several miles deep where both heat and high pressure are available in large quantities.
4. I think corn based ethanol is not likely to succeed but cellulose based ethanol might be. It’s worth a shot.
The main problems with wind and solar power is that it is intermittent, and doesn’t produce power on demand. Power companies produce only the amount of power that is at any particular moment being used on the grid. There’s no practical way to save the excess. At best, wind and solar would be a supplement to the main supply of energy. Otherwise, you can forget about watching TV on a windless night.
A quantum leap in battery technology would save the world. Current batteries just do not store that much energy. Which is why electric cars have 20 of them and need to be plugged in after going around the block. But an industrial strength battery, once invented, could allow everything to be run on whatever clean or renewable energy source you want. That’s one of the big problems since so much oil is used for cars. Nuclear power would be great for the grid, but it only runs cars if it fills up the batteries (Mr. Fusion powers the flux capacitor, the Delorean runs on gas, always has). Airplanes would probably be a tougher nut to crack.
I think we will become an alcohol economy for transportation, nuclear for fixed.
We need a liquid fuel for transport, and alcohol from biomass is probably the only economical source.
Oh, and it’s vastly amusing to me that after decades of having the nation’s highest electricity rates here in ComEd land because we’re the Midwest home of nuclear power, we are suddenly one of the cheapest for that same reason.
Possibly, TallDave. Though I think that we underestimate the abundance of fossil fuels (advances in harvesting will create additional means of location and extraction)—and I think the importance of getting us new grid power (along with advances in hybrid-run autos) will prevent us from having to change the automotive industry (retrofitting gas stations, etc) until the time when we’re all flying around with jet packs powered by bacon bits.
Which, I was told in elementary school we’d be doing by now, incidentally.
Fucking lying socialists.
One of my major concerns about nuclear power has always been what to do with the waste. It sounds like France is also still wrestling with that issue. I think a lot of minds would change about using nuclear power if someone could come up with a viable method of disposing (or reusing) the waste – other than burying it in the earth or shooting it off into space.
And I would agree that – unless we’re all going to run on some sort of battery power – the need for a liquid alternative still exists.
The thing people always seem to forget about the Hubbert Curve is that it applies only to single oilfields (or sets of homogenous oilfields in proximity).
It does not describe the oil production of a nation, a region, or the world; those are described by the aggregate curves of all their fields (including new fields and new production brought into use by new methods, higher prices, or exploration).
The steep-right bell curve that frightens so many people is nothing like what actual worldwide oil reserves or production look like.
I’d have to agree. Having had my own backyard plutonium-fueled reactor for several years, I’ve never been happier. Well, except during the occasional SCRAM, of course. It’s so annoying when the explosive charges blow, and those damper rods go flying in like little neutron-sucking rockets.
Scares the crap out of the cat, lemme tell ya.
I think you’re partially right. Nobody in their right minds thinks dubya is going to talk about conservation or efficiency. What you’re missing is that he’s also probably open to following the modern GOP populism of corporate welfare. Its not just that he wants to give a to the enviros to prove their technology feasable. Its also about subdizing the current energy complex’s attempts to make this proof.
Well I envision some genius developing some little chip that enables a motor (or motors) to extract static electricity from the atmosphere and power any thing, anywhere. Maybe not in my lifetime, but relatively soon as it relates to the energy clock.
Two of my favorite companies working on this:
http://www.greenfuelonline.com/
Green Fuel Technologies. Accelerated algae growth in a closed-loop system feeding off the flue gasses from powerplants. They have several demonstration systems undergoing testing right now. I think these guys could expand very quickly if necessary.
http://www.iogen.ca/
Canadian company pioneering cellulose ethanol.
I’m told, by people who know the oilfield, that there are HUGE deposits of “heavy oil” in western Texas, eastern New Mexico and maybe a little in Oklahoma. The problem is that it’s so thick that it won’t pump. They talk like it’s got the consistancy of road tar on a hot day. If oil prices get much higher though it would seem to me that R & D money will start tricklling into technologies that use heat and pressure to make this stuff flow to the wellhead and pump.
What, no mention of Julian Simon? His writings are the intellectual basis for Cecil Adams’ discussion of how we’ll make the switch from oil to other fuel sources.
Which will be in a much more sound, much more economically feasible manner than government-mandated “conservation” or “efficiency.” How’d those federally-mandated low-flow toilets help with water conservation, by the way?
“One of my major concerns about nuclear power has always been what to do with the waste.”
Oh, I’ve got ideas for where to put it, lemme tells ya.
I attended a seminar that discussed this. They solved the problem in mountain terrain by using the available energy to pump water to an elevated resevoir. The water is then released at a constant rate to a lower resevoir. There was something like a net loss of 15% of the original power. It was pretty interesting stuff.
You mean the one I have to flush three times to get anything through?
Explosive charges, mojo?! Who the hell designed your plant? Mine uses good ol’ gravity to scram… never change the classic method if it works…
Farmer Joe: Replace your toilet. The technology’s vastly improved since Dave Barry was making toilet jokes in the early ‘90s.
The big problem with the early low-flos was that the industry didn’t redesign the toilets to handle the reduced water use. They’re much better at swallowing your Trump-sized Nixons.
Natesnake:
The purpose behind “stored hydo” is to use base (lowest cost plant in the system) power to pump water to an elevated resevoir, overnight when demand is lowest, then release the “stored hydro” resevoir during peak daytime demand, so as to replace expensive peaking units with the low-cost base power used to create the “stored hydro” energy. This is simply a time-of-day usage issue.
Since solar is only available during daylight–peak demand hours–its role in stored hydro is useless.
Wind, due to its intermittance, requires the ability to coordinate the control of load dispatch at the margin, i.e. a system integration issue, or a switching issue. Time, experience, and some eqipment innovation, will satisfy that issue.
Energy storage is mostly a solution to the problem of mobility away from the grid, i.e. electric cars, cell phones, and other “portable” devices.
Storage, as a problem, in the case of wind occurs when it is used as a sole, or stand-alone, source of energy–off the grid. This, IMO, is not a critical concern. Continued improvements in battery technology will likely address the issue.
Remember “mobile” phones 20 years ago? Bricks.
Then why is the other prong of the antinuclear people’s strategy an absolute, one-hundred-percent prohibition on doing anything whatever with the waste? It’s going to have to be transported. It’s going to have to be processed. And having huge crowds of people massing to shout “Anathema!” with one voice, and burn the heretics and witches, whenever anything like that is suggested is not a good way to build the capability. If you won’t even let us bury it in the f*ing ground—ANATHEMA! ANATHEMA!—what’s the chances of reprocessing it?
North America has quite a bit of uranium. It has even more thorium. A properly managed nuclear fuel cycle uses energy, otherwise wasted, in the first-pass systems to convert non-fissile elements into fissionable ones, the so-called “breeder” concept. Fuel for the second pass is extracted not by expensive atomic-mass separation but by cheap chemicals. A cycle like that is what the inventors had in mind when they were talking about “too cheap to meter”. But if you can’t even transport the “waste” because of superstitious ignoramuses it won’t work.
Regards,
Ric
Of course this all might be a little like standing in New York in 1900 and observing that if the population of the city increased tenfold in the next hundred years then the horse population would also increase and what the fuck are you going to do with all that shit!
We can see the early signs of new technologies including some that may so totally change things that even Glenn Reynolds will be inpressed, but there is so much angst being spent, (revelled in), on this and Climate Change that pointing this out is considered churlish.
(Ofcourse if the Islamofascists succeed in taking us back to the seventh century we might be wondering what to do with all the camel, (and goat), shit.
Kevin B
normal So what are you implying, Turing!
Ireallymustdigoutthatbitofplainchocolatedigestivefromunderneathmyspacebar
This one was just installed a couple of years ago. But I agree, it does need to be replaced. I just wish I could stick the SOB who installed it for me with the bill for the replacement.
I’d like to thank Bill for the term “Trump-sized Nixons” and my freshly wetted pants.
I think you’ve pretty much hit the nail on the head. Still, fair to to speculate a bit using existing technologies as a base.
It’s even worse than that, because we live on a rotating sphere.
Unless your solar cells are designed to track the sun (which means a big, bulky moving support mechanism) then the cells spend most of the time oblique to the sun, and so can only put out about 40% of their maximum rating. It’s usually a lot less than that, because we live on a wobbling spinning sphere, cells get dirty, and there’s these things called “clouds.”
Fuel cells are pretty much power storage. You still need a generator to produce the hydrogen.
Like Heinlein said, power storage is a key technology no matter how the power is originally developed. Unfortunately, chemical cells improve very slowly; lithium ion cells hit the market in 1991.
I think it’ll be a very important day when a fuel cell or capacitor storage device can finally store more energy than a gasoline engine and fuel tank of the same size.
Lots of comments:
1. Batteries are limited by chemistry. Nobody expects improvements of more than a few percent in the next decade. IF EVER.
2. Nice hearing talk about Breeder reactors. The 2 most important facts were missed. What is a breeder reactor’s waste like? 1. Only 300 years dangerous instead of thousands. We need them just to get rid of the waste we already have! 2. And get 10 to 15 times more power than the original uranium fuel. ( and this is 1960s news ) That 300 year time can be reduced by a strong neutron source of which we have several due to fusion research.
3. Cell phone batteries did not improve. Much. The electronics did. More efficiency Less oil, coal, nuclear…..
4. Algae coupled power plants face a severe limit.
Space. They use the sun to capture the CO2. Not practical in areas were it is needed most. Close to Urban areas.
5. Ethanol. All screwed up and every where to go.
Fact Brazil makes 8 times more ethanol per acre than the US does. Fact Brazil grows sugar cain as it’s feedstock. Fact The US uses High Fructose Corn syrup (Karo) to sweeten most things because it is cheaper than sugar from sugar cane or beets ( about 1/3 of US sugar is from beets).
So make ethanol out of High Fructose Corn Syrup, and then the corn grain, then get more by digesting the cellulose, then decompose the dregs to oil like the turkey guts.
6. Hybrid Smybred. Unless it gets 50 MPG its a waste of money. But where is then mandate to require all 18 wheelers and buses be Hybrid by 2010?
7. Capaciter electricty storage should be judged by weight. Not size. ( actually volume )
8. How about using that turkey guts digester to make gas from all your junk mail, lawn clipings, trash, the algae from your roof tanks….
Better repipe your house to get the most from your garbage disposer. And your new water saver toilet can make it’s own contribution.
9. Flouresenct Bulbs use 5 times less power than incandesent.
LED Bulbs use 10 times less power than flouresent.
Organic LED Bulbs use 10 times less power than LED bulbs.
10. Power Star standard writes should be taken out and shot. Most of them use 90% of thepower when turned off as when they are turned on. You are paying for it when you aren’t even useing it.
11. Central air. Ever hammer a nail it a board while holding it in the air with one hand? Set it down and you use less energy. Air is compressible.
Don’t use it to convey heat or air conditioning. Ducts should only be used for fresh air, or venting waste air. Most homes can use a $10 plastic dryer vent tube for both. (Ducts are a tremendous waste of space and money.)
12. Heat pumps. Ground loop heat pumps. 10 feet down it’s always 50 degrees. Just run a pump for your cooling. And a small compressor for all your heat.
13. Superconducting backbones. Collect solar power in the american deserts and ship it to to cities. This will cost less than Iraq cost us this year alone. Store excess power by collecting co2 and making methane and gasoline out of it.
It will take many solutions all used at once to supply our energy needs. Cities will have the worst of it. The crowding and population density eliminate some options, but do lead to economies of scale like the hybrid heating in center city Philadelphia. Never heard of it? They call it cogeneration.