307 comments on DrumBeat: September 7, 2006
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307 comments on DrumBeat: September 7, 2006
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Perhaps, but that wasn't the claim. The claim was that any increase in efficiency would be self-defeating, since JP would make that translate into an increase in consumption, and that's simply not true.
While it's certainly the case that per-capita consumption didn't drop as much as per-mile consumption did (15% vs. 40% = 100%-100%/1.70), that's much what you'd expect based on a supply/demand analysis; i.e., more efficiency = lower per-mile cost = more miles = lower decrease in total cost than in cost-per-mile.
Jevon's Paradox is simply noting that sometimes (relatively rarely) the demand for extra miles at the new per-mile price is so much higher than at the old price that the total cost actually increases. That's not really all that surprising in light of modern supply/demand thought, though.
It's also worth noting that Jevon's Paradox is much less likely to apply to a mature market, rather than an emerging one, since the scope for increased consumption is so much lower. If fuel efficiency went up by 100% in the US, it's unlikely that people would increase their miles driven by over 100% in response; most people just don't have that many extra miles they want to drive, so the "mile demand" is largely saturated, regardless of efficiency. (Of course, we'd probably see SUVs come back into vogue to some extent, so we'd see the same kind of smaller-but-positive improvement that we saw from the CAFE standards.)
Your distinction is academic. The fact remains demand increases for gasoline every year, as does the domestic (and global) demand for crude. Our industrial economies require increased energy inputs for growth, otherwise financial markets wither. If efficiency cannot gain inversely proportionate to global crude oil depletion then there is trouble. IMHO there is simply no way efficiency can make the required advances to replace the most energy dense and useful liquid that we've discovered and consume is massive amounts. We have built our infrastructure around the highly inefficient internal combustion engine.
As of now, until the Dow drops dead or some other climatic event (no pun intended!) in whatever bizarre form--I was just stating that JP must hold true in a world of unequal humans, where billions are in poverty and billions of others in industrialized countries with computers, cars and credit cards. There is a natural tendency for the global system to encompass all humans in the "good" modern life of industrial societies. Energy = affluence. Hence, here in the US waste equals profit. There are masses eager to participate in the consumer cult culture we have created here in the West. If we conserve, that will be displaced by someone else, that is the fact. The Chinese have trade surpluses that they are siphoning off into development of highways and sprawling cities--a rising middle class is now displacing the old status quo of bicycles. In Shanghai, now most major roads don't even allow bikes. Not that I'm any Critical Mass proselytizer for bicycles--I prefer the subway. And as long as oil use and demand are rising--which is a necessity in order to ensure growth, then JP will hold true with a vengeance regardless of those who tout "efficiency" and "alternative energy" as saviors. More will be included in the easy-motoring economy, which will just further propagate demand. The financial system is built around these fundamentals, no-growth is not a viable option under present conditions...and if it rears its ugly head soon (like I and many others here at TOD believe it will) then people must know that "efficiency" and "alternative" fuels alone will not support the same kind of system that we had become accustomed to.
When will people realize there is no viable alternative for crude oil? Especially at the present global population level. We are going to have to make other arrangements, as JHK puts it.
All potentially true, and all completely unrelated to Jevon's Paradox.
While you're right that it'll be almost impossible for efficiency gains to keep up with exponential demand growth in the face of falling production, that has nothing to do with Jevon's Paradox, and invoking it only obscures the very valid point you're trying to make.
Jevon's Paradox is not a general indictment of energy dependency; it's a very narrow observation, and simply doesn't describe most of the problems we're facing. When it comes to Peak Oil, Jevon's Paradox probably doesn't apply at all.
Thanks for thoughtful treatment of Jevon's Paradox. It helps that I happen to agree with you and think that invoking JP in discussion is often just a substitute for "Tsk, Tsk.."
The fact that I'm converting my travel to mostly a human electric hybrid (tandem bike) makes the rhetorical taming of JP even nicer. I feel good!
Cheers,
Roy in Silicon Valley
Historical evidence suggests that's not true.
Per-capita energy consumption in the US hasn't changed over the last 25 years (http://www.eia.doe.gov/pub/international/iealf/tablee1c.xls), so the US uses only 60% as much energy per (chained-2000) dollar of GDP as it did in 1980 (http://www.eia.doe.gov/pub/international/iealf/tablee1p.xls).
i.e., the US has seen roughly 65% per-capita GDP growth with zero growth in per-capita energy use.
Even world per-capita energy consumption is only up 10% in the last 25 years (http://www.eia.doe.gov/pub/international/iealf/tablee1c.xls), despite much faster growth in real per-capita GDP, so it's not as if the increased energy efficiency in the US has (primarily) come at the expense of vastly greater energy use elsewhere.
Of course, that's not to say Peak Oil doesn't represent a serious problem; obviously, it does. But the number and scope of problems it does threaten should be identified and examined as clearly as possible, and, fortunately, it is not the case that economic growth requires energy consumption growth.
" But the number and scope of problems it does threaten should be identified and examined as clearly as possible, and, fortunately, it is not the case that economic growth requires energy consumption growth." (my stress)
Again, excuse me, but I believe your historical evidence is just another semantic to make a very grim situation look somewhat palatable. I think the evidence is to the contrary, namely, that economic growth, in the modern financial sense, is predicated on increased energy consumption. Everything that enables our economies to "grow" is based on having more available energy.
Also, I cannot concieve of a situation where decreased energy consumption could lead to a growth based economy, in the fashion that we have been accustomed to.
What matters is absolute growth not per capita.
Of course, you're only talking about the US--the most wasteful society on earth, not that hard for us to cut some of our totally wasteful energy expenditures and recycle that through "efficiency"... Of course, global energy consumption per capita had to be rising over the last 150 years since the discovery of crude oil--and as you cite, over the last 25 years with 10% increase per capita. Maybe you could find statistical anomalies within that graph and point them out.
You also fail to realize that through energy arbitrage, so to speak, our economy's energy consumption has been displaced and "globalized". Now factories in China and the rest of the newly industrialized world use tons of energy that is not officially "counted" by your US DOE data.
Also, during the last 25 years efficiency has rapidly developed, but is starting to hit a wall.
One can only make the internal combustion engine so efficient before it must be replaced with something new (costly,/long-timeline) or with another fuel (unlikely/grain based ethanol is a swindle).
My point about JP is still simply what it initially was... That even with increased efficiency you still need absolute gains annually (with required population growth) in order for financial markets to function properly. The system just doesn't work otherwise, no matter how hard one can close their eyes and imagine that everything is gonna be A-OK in a no energy growth global economy.
We'll see, time will tell.
Based on what evidence do you believe that?
Yes, it's surprising (at least to me) and a little counter-intuitive that per-capita GDP has gone up so much despite per-capita energy consumption going up so little (or not at all), but that is the fact of the matter. Accordingly, our theories should be based on what we observe, not on what we believe.
It happened in the US from 1979 through 1983.
Obviously, that's not saying it will happen, but that does suggest that it can happen, so it might be an option worth looking at.
(Keep in mind also that you're pushing a bit of a false dichotomy; I was just talking about lack of growth, rather than outright decline.)
Absolutely. There are two reasons I've been talking about per-capita consumption:
First, my point was really pretty simple: economic growth without growth in energy consumption is possible - at least theoretically - since historical evidence shows us that a group (e.g., 100M Americans) can have large growth in GDP while having no growth in energy consumption.
Second, demographic trends suggest that this may be achievable in practice. The West - the world's major energy consumer - has a rapidly-falling population growth rate, and will reach no population growth in the medium term. What that means is that the challenge of maintaining no overall growth in energy consumption is relatively modest for the West as a whole - about a 0.5% decrease in per-capita consumption per year - and it will get easier as time progresses, since the growth rate will get lower (all other things being equal, which of course they won't be).
I haven't been arguing that it will happen, should happen, or even necessarily can happen; what I've been arguing is that evidence does not support the claim that it can not happen, so more investigation is needed.
No, I addressed that explicitly, as the above quote shows.
Interesting. What is your evidence for this?
That it "makes sense" does not mean that it's true.
What is your evidence for this?
The system did work otherwise, from (for example) 1979 to 1983 in the US. Stock markets even kept going up (although the S&P500 had a crash in 1981/82, it was still higher even at the trough).
In some ways, that illustrates my overall point: there are variety of "common wisdom" claims that people assert, and those claims typically make quite a lot of sense, but those claims may well be false.
Without evidence - hard, factual evidence - to support a claim, it's very difficult to tell what's true and what's urban myth.
So I'm trying to provide some historical and quantifiable evidence regarding some of these claims, and - having no personal preference for whether these claims turn out to be true or not - I'm pushing the conclusions that the data support. That is my overall point.