163 comments on Updated World Oil Forecasts, including Saudi Arabia
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163 comments on Updated World Oil Forecasts, including Saudi Arabia
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It's funny that nobody pays attention to WT's point that the Golden Age of Trains in the United States dates from pre-1925, when there was almost no petroleum use at all!
Strictly speaking, of course it's Alan's point, but I think that it is critically important. Many electric systems were built in the late 19th to early 20th centuries, with little or no oil input. The car culture is so ingrained in the US that I think that people have trouble thinking of alternatives.
IMO, Alan will be giving the single most important presentation at the ASPO-USA meeting. How many times and in how many different ways do we need to hear that we are in trouble? What we need are plans to implement, in order to "make things not as bad as they would otherwise be."
"Many electric systems were built in the late 19th to early 20th centuries, with little or no oil input. "
And yet, they did a lot of manufacturing, and construction. This is not unique to trains: personal transportation is manufactured with the same techniques as trains, which suggests that PHEV's and EV's are also a perfectly viable path.
yes, trains can mitigate
and will be useful for just
hand cars if nothing else.
But the "bottleneck" will prevent usefulness of trains
at the beginning.
People will camp on train lines for ex.
Trains use diesel for ex. Just retrofitting
will be an awesome endeavor and coal will be at peak as well.
Pre 1925 they weren't also tasked with using the same resource base to support a population of 300 million Americans and a car-based infrastructure that had been built up over the previous century.
Pre-1925 we dug coal out by hand and hauled it to the surface with ponies.
Pre-1925, we picked cotton by hand.
Pre-1925, most families used kerosene light.
Pre-1925, most families did not have a radio or a car.
Pre-1925, per capita oil production was almost an order of magnitude less than today (even though we exported oil then and import it now).
We did *NOT have the same resource base in 1925, we had (effectively) *FAR* fewer resources per capita then than now.
I do not think you have any real comprehension of pre-1925 America.
Alan
What this? Is Alan becoming a realist?
In the 1920's 40% of the US population lived in poverty. And I mean poverty. By today's standard those that live in poverty lived similar lifestyles of the 1920's era middle class. Few people has access to basics that we take for granted (ie clean water, fresh foods, health-care, etc).
In the 1920's the unemployement rate ranged from the 25% to 35%. Just imagine today if 25% to 30% of the workforce was unemployment. Most People also worked much longer days (about 10 hours day + 5 hours on Saturdays), and they were happy to have a job. The work was far more grueling and the working conditions where dangerous (no worker safety regulations).