 | This is a bit corny - but following Yankee, what can I say? | The Oil Drum | Oh All Right (or Friday Open Thread 2) (from a conference no less...) |  |
Friday Open Thread
Posted by Super G on April 21, 2006 - 2:29pm
As crude oil hits $75 a barrel...
[editor's note, by Yankee] Hey! Tomorrow's Earth Day! Do you have any plans to increase your own or others' awareness of the energy crisis? I hope to check out some of the events at Earth Day New York (especially the giant earth images).
“The aim of every political constitution is, or ought to be, first to obtain for rulers men who possess most wisdom to discern, and most virtue to pursue, the common good of the society; and in the next place, to take the most effectual precautions for keeping them virtuous whilst they continue to hold their public trust.”
—James Madison, FEDERALIST #57 (1787)
Contact
- Content: editors at theoildrum dot com
- Tech support: support at theoildrum dot com
License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.
Simmons: Imminent oil shortages possible
€5-a-litre petrol in the pipeline for motorists, warns expert
It was way back on August 23, 2005 that they made their $10,000 bet; Tierney swearing that crude would head down while Simmons warned that Twilight was near for the Desert. Whose your sooth sayer now Tierney? Inquiring non-economists want to know.
Tierney's probably not worried. Yet.
Who is in charge of new open threads?
(Not a comment to you, just near the top....190 comments is to many!!)
Those guys aren't smelling spring today, they're smelling toast.
Some survey data from MSNBC. Results below based on 77,416 responses.
21% respondents report it costs more that $50 to fill their tank.
76% have not changed driving habits due increased prices.
64% Of those who have changed habits now stay home more often.
31% will change habits when price reaches $3.25.
76% say they will not change driving habits. They have to drive.
I think that pretty much says it all. I have to drive too, because I'm required to have a personal vehicle for work (which they reimburse me at 45 cents/mile). I brought up gas prices with my manager this morning and he has no idea whether our company will adjust the reimbursement...all he said is, "they usually update it in summer." So in the meantime, we're all getting poorer.
I will not yet change my driving my habits until I move closer to work. I already combine trips to use less fuel. Hopefully, I'll live a litre away or less, and have the option of that evil Pace bus.
I would sooner move closer than use the bus as the alternative. (I have possible areas mapped out)
In a push come to shove, I'd rather use a motorcycle or God/Allah/Buddha Forbid, a bicycle, enabled by living closer to work than use that bus.
Compared to even pre-peak Europe, $3/gal is cheap. I'm getting a laugh, surely for now. For those peak-ignorant types: Get Over It! You ain't seen ANYTHING yet!
I will if the opportunity crops up, carpool, though this creates sub-optimal cases. (some people dawdle at the end of the day while I scramble to my car)
One thing's for sure. Peak Oil promises to be a ride of a lifetime, the economic equivalent to a C-130 with upholstered seats like a Pace Bus on a flight through Hurricane Katrina's eyewall! Buckle up! Just for fun, you won't see the evils of Pace buses at the <href>www.pacebus.com</href> website.
I do have errends, bank trip, etc but I can walk 'em, it will do me good.
Unlike most drivers, I'm aware of energy use as I weekly keep track of fuel consumption and all but calibrated the gas gauge onboard my car. That way, I know how much money to put down to ensure it tops off when I get my weekly load of gas. I took a day off and this morning, I loaded onboard 5.0? gallons of gas but drove 144.5 miles for the previous week. 28.9mpg. I live .6 of a gallon away, yet I have coworkers who live 4 gallons away. Guess who's the real fool? The bloke with the 4 gallon commuting mission!
Once I park my car on a Friday, I don't have to touch it until the Monday morning mission to work. That's the way it should be. And all walking-inaccessible shopping done enroute on an afternoon commute. Why waste gas? Given the copious energy use of cars, it could be thought as a road-only aircraft. If you had to pay for that jet fuel, would you waste it? Of course not!. Why more people don't seem to care about fuel use as they drive is hard to fathom, unless they are a Jeff Skilling. (or some airline pays for a pilot's fuel use as he "drives")
I don't know your commute's mission profile, but I know that gas prices if high enough will force you to change behaviour.
You may:
- take the bus
- carpool if possible
- use a motorcycle, scooter or even a bicycle
- LOSE YOUR JOB
If that's not enough reason to be aware of fuel consumption, I don't know what is. Yes, your car is your (road-only) aircraft.I'm pretty sincere yeah, but I suppose I'm lucky -- I work from home. I own a bicycle, but live in the burbs and need to use the car to get anything done. I'd max out about CAD$8 a litre which would have me spending probably about $400/month on gas, (right now its $50-100 with $1.00/liter) before moving to the city (Toronto) where public transit is pretty good.
If I lose my job, I'll find a new one, or do whatever I need to do. I'll find a way. I'll survive. And when my luck runs out ... life will catch up with me.
If the S is going to HTF (and I believe it will) then I just want it to hurry up and do so. Cascading systems failure.
Ain't that something? You guys are all stressing out about depression, nuclear war etc. etc. And MATT SIMMONS says we don't even need to worry about a recession!
Discuss.
There're also a bunch of conflicting (at least at face value) reports saying that a) people can't afford these prices and are pawning items off to fuel their tanks, and b) it hasn't changed demand levels one bit for the past week.
BTW, "PO Debunked" is one of the sites I check almost on a daily basis. Good job on it :)
We have lost most of our office assistants, have online payroll and benefits (fewer HR personnel), and office supplies are non-existent. My analytical team has gone from eight people three years ago down to three people this year and we are supporting more products and groups than three years ago.
I know this not unique to my company.
I quoted those lines in a previous thread.
And went on to explain why I think Simmons is an optimist...
So, the rich will effectively imprison themselves until a dieoff ensues to near-completion. It in their interests that a dieoff occurs as completely as possible. To foil that strategy, whether intentional or not, is to ensure there are people thriving without them so as they emerge, they can be taken out with said crossbows. If you are a cynic, this is a perfectly good reason to get the word out as a case of "if nothing else".
Already well-off people live in gated communities - prison camps. It's a gilded prison, but a prison all the same. As time goes by, they will want bunkers. THEN they will effectively imprison themselves. I wouldn't be surprised if Bush and Co. has a bunker system with Osama bin Laden as the housekeeper. (OK, a conspiracy theory) If more than some strategic-design minimum number of people survive, the bunker people will be held to account due to the intervening legends. They will end up toast. I wouldn't want to be 80 years old and emerge from an old coal mine only to have that red dot on my chest abd >thoomp!< that arrow makes it Game Over. Especially after 35 years underground. Yeecchh.
We might have found a possible upper range for a critical gas price. A postal worker bailing out despite a 1/2 gal commute could be an upper end. Vast demand destruction will occur WAY beforehand. People who work for the postal service make comparatively good wages, so a price like $10/gal could be about that critical price that screws over so many people that the economy sputters into a depression, as in "I can't come to work becuse the gas costs too much".
If that "expert" is right about $20/gal gas by 2010, we are in for one rough ride. A ride that'll make a Cessna in the middle of Katrina look smooth.
I want to ride my bicycle, I want to ride my biiiiike!
Honestly, the humble bike is the most effecient transpo of anything. Easy to do 50 miles a day, a person can ride all day at 10MPH which means in 10 hours they can do a "century" or 100 miles.
Look for bikes to get really big if this gets that bad.
As I've said to my local gas station guy, this isn't a gas crisis, because I'm old enough to remember a gas crisis. When I see bicycles all over, mopeds advertised on local and national TV, and kids (like us) growing up knowing how to siphon gas, then I'll call it a gas crisis.
Good thing I'm not a Canada goose. Give me a stomachful of greasy fries and I could pull a Steve Fossett - and still gain weight. As far as bicycle use, the main deterrent in my case is my own being easy to startle. Burning half a calorie is perfectly cool, and I'd like to do it. But that easy-startle deterrent is there. That'll take some SEVERE gas prices to overcome. More than enough to cause world economic catastrophe. That deterrent really sucks for me. The same anxiety problem exists if I attempt to swim, something I can't do.
Get an old bike and work with a master mechanic.
In regard to punctures, I've had only one during the last 5,000 miles of riding, because some of my tires have the kevlar inserts, and with the others I squirt goop into the inner tubes that self-seals around thorns, nails, slivers of glass, etc. Before I aggressively attacked the puncture problem (about thirty years ago) I might get four flats in a month--especially in the sping time, when the snow and ice melted to leave all sorts of sharp nasty things on road shoulders and bike trails.
A sturdy bike need not be expensive. As a college student I had an old Raleigh 3-speed that I rode rain or shine for many years, up and down steep hills in Berkeley--bought it used for $20 and sold it after four or five years for $15, and except for the usual tires and chain and brake pads, I don't recall replacing anything on the bike, except for a spoke or two. Especially if you live in England, I don't think you can do better than an old Raleigh, but there are other fine old English bikes too.
Now that I am old and wise, I am partial to fat tires and massive and heavy and extremely strong steel frames, and with fat tires at relatively low pressures you can go through mud, sand, gravel, slush, and over forest floors--pretty much anywhere a mountain bike can go, except you have to walk it up steep hills because of no exceptionally low gears.
The main problem with bikes these days is that they're being built/designed either for "weekend dawdlers" or high performance racers/mountain bikers. The former don't mind it being crap because they can always get another one and they're not doing much mileage anyway, the latter prefer lightweight over reliability.
(note sarcasm)
Gee, I can hardly wait to see what oil prices do when the first hurricane forms in the Atlantic with all the other geo-political events going on. Here is the list of 2006 names with some editorial freelancing:
Hurricane Alberto VO5 lather, rinse, and repeat-just getting started w/CAT 1 thru 5s
Hurricane Beryl of no oil
Hurricane Chris[t] $5.00/gal of gasoline ! Holy Crap!
Hurricane Debby Devastation
Hurricane Ernesto Yergin will still be ernestly saying $35/bbl
Hurricane Florence Nightingale: Cat 5 into Houston at 2am
Hurricane Gordon 's Gin-Gimme a drink cause I cannot get gas
Hurricane Helene ?
Hurricane Isaac Asimov--this baby's a sci-fi classic!
Hurricane Joyce a Rolls-Royce of a hurricane-high dollar damage all the way!
Hurricane Kirk Captain, Captain, she can't take anymore!
Hurricane Leslie Yes, less and less platforms lie above sea-level
Hurricane Michael All boats ashore, cause this is the biggie!
Hurricane Nadine No, the nadir of FEMA response to helping people
Hurricane Oscar This one is must see TV!
Hurricane Patty Right thru Miami!
Hurricane Rafael A true masterpiece of destruction!
Hurricane Sandy Beaches left in downtown Boston
Hurricane Tony ?
Hurricane Valerie ?
Hurricane William Tell-a big arrow straight thru Long Island
Maybe some other poster can think of something for Tony, Valerie,and Helene. My guess is a big hit in the GoM again is good for instant $5/bbl.
Bob Shaw in Phx,AZ Are Humans Smarter than Yeast?
Good point.
Murphy's Law predicts that the Hurricanes will hit at the worst possible moment and not until then. ;-(
You would give yourself a cultural heart attack and get nothing for it.
You can buy oil, steel, concrete in exchange for all kinds of export goods, you are still an industrialized country even if you no longer are the largest general manufacturing country. This will be regulated by market forces, there will be very little money for importing plastic crap and you will have to wear your clothes longer before buying the latest fashion.
It is an ill wind that blows no good.
Better hardship now than shipwreck later.
I suggest an alternative explanation - FED hinted that it is almost done with interest rates increases and the investors returned to hard assests like gold, silver, oil. Like I said all those hot paper over there has to go somewhere and the recent drop of the USD confirms where the wind is blowing to.
Yes it takes quite a while until the paper holders start getting it, and this time fuels even more the "inflation potential" ahead. This time though the FED will probably try to be the first to draw the guns and shoot the interest rates to the sky (and probably leaving me without a job). IMO the trigger factor this time was that our government is more and more apparantly taking a completely out-of control course. A thing we witnessed yesterday... what kind of idiot must you be to insult the leader of the country that can ruined your economy in 5 minutes?
- Strengthen the dollar, reducing the relative price of crude;
- Slam the economy, reducing demand for oil(though maybe not much -- Stuart's analysis shocked me).
Global demand would continue to be an issue, and if consumption in other countries does accelerate you'd see that ol' Jevon's Paradox in action.With current CPI/PPI and unemployment levels, it'd be difficult to justify this action in economic theory and impossible to justify it politically. I've got a lot of faith in Helicopter Ben. Don't hold your breath, especially with the latest minutes and the soothing sounds of Yellen.
The US$ is still holding up well, in its 88% to 92% range which its been for the last 6+ months, and almost exactly where it was 2 years ago, so that is not a cause of the high oil price in US$. That could change soon, it is at the bottom of its range and must bounce back up soon (inside a couple of weeks) or it will drop noticeably.
Now is a very interesting time market wise. Commodity prices and stocks can't both continue to increase at current rates, one or t'other must break down significantly. I can even imagine both dropping before commodities resume their upward climb, but what happens in the short term (next 3 months) is anyone's guess. What happens to the US$ may be a significant determinant or consequence. I expect stocks and US$ to correct down by 20% and 10% respectively before 2006 is out.
Any links to this information?
I've had a radical solution in my head for a few years now: a 'depletable commodities' currency for all basic non-renewable resource commodities (oil, gas, coal, metals, etc) independent of any state or national currency. It would probably have to be administered by the UN and some other global finance institutions, could levy a small tax on transactions which could make funding the UN possible without the current country contributions. Of course, this idea will be impossible while the US benefits from the reserve status of the US$. But that free lunch will be unwinding soon ;)
The above is my impression of the technocracy idea. The whole "work ethic" bit would have to change. In exchange for increasing wealth, we all settle for sustainability but innovation makes for more free time, not more toys to never have time for. You work to live, not live to work. What a concept! It would be much like a techno-Sweden. Type-A aggressives would hate it, but long weekends to drink during would appeal to many. The Type-A idiots can always slowly assemble a spaceship to drive off to their death. Let them. Even if there's water on the moon, they will use it up in short order. Meanwhile, we live within our means, with some technology and lots of time to drink up and have fun.
What is called "economic freedom" even sans Peak Oil is a spun-up-like-a-turbo way of saying Social Darwinism. Survival of the fittest and all that crap. It barely works even with chronic growth, but wait. With the oil peak, an awful lot of people will wake up. Look at Bush approval ratings. It's falling like Space Shuttle Columbia did. As it stands, our economic model with Peak Oil is going to look like the not-so-reality game show Survivor, but writ very large.
The remarks helped send the dollar lower against major currencies and caused Wall Street analysts to wonder whether central banks will increasingly diversify their holdings out of dollars.
here's a quick link to a Google News search, the first page has some interesting results.
It's fine creating the pretence you have adequate supplies of oil, but as the pain of debt-laden OECD economies becomes unbearable, you have to fend off accusations of hoarding and gouging.
I'm sure this is why the Saudi's claim of 1.5/2.0 mbd of spare capacity is now being brushed under the carpet.
Any thoughts?
I also agree it suggests current price increases are not fully explicable by speculation and risk premium. The current price levels surprise me a little, they are a tad higher than I expected in the absence of significant disruption. Could be that peak oil is beginning to percolate into market consciousness. I fancy that my prediction of average WTI next month price of $70 for 2006 is looking good and might even end up being on the low side.
Thanks... I'm on my way home ($CAD1.13/L) here today. Expect it to be $1.25 by the end of next week.
I've hardened my view in the last month. I see significant support at $65, unlikely the price will drop below that in the rest of 2006. I expect $100 to be seriously challenged.
$50 oil won't happen again until / unless a major recession happens. Note that a little over a year ago $50 oil had never been seen.
Yes, it should not be beyond the wit of US man to invent an anerobic pressurised and cooking process that converts our organic remains (and our pets, garden and food waste) into oil. What could be more touching and reverential than driving to work or the local Walmart on grandma Agnes' oil?
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1611689/posts
If it can take turkey no reason it can't take people.
Subkommander Dred
Here's something fun. If you are a liposuction surgeon, you have an opportunity. Make sure your Hummer takes diesel. When you suck out the fat from patients, what you do is collect it and make it into biodiesel - or in this case lipodiesel. Buy a house in Skokie and drive that lipodiesel fuelled Hummer and burn lipodiesel in the winter for home heat in Skokie. Becuse it'll smell like burning bodies, Jewish neighbours will HATE you for reminding them of the Holocaust! HINT: The Germans regulated oven temperatures by feeding it a mix of starved and fat Jews whereby starved Jews would be endothermic on cremation while fat ones would be exothermic.
Sorry, but you've been beat to the punch - by 60 years!
Oups, I should perhaps stop trying to be a constructive hobby politician. One of the bad things with it is that everyting faulty is my fault since I am a politician and previous generations of politicians have promised to fix everything for everybody and they did not deliver. Shame on me for that!
Wait, we need lugumbashi to come back and post again about how right Yergin and the fools over at 'The Economist' are. $35 oil any day now, just keep waiting. What a joke.
I think because Iran and Nigeria will be a big concern in 2012.
Demand destruction was supposed to happen at 30. 40. 60. You've seen the graphs HO did earlier. I was in Greece a few months ago, and the much less fortunate people there with much higher gas prices -- diesel there, mostly -- would sooner go broke than lose the status.
Maybe you can explain something to me here. Why would crude oil futures be consitently in contango (out months priced higher than the nearest month) but the futures market for unleaded gasoline be exactly the opposite? What is the trading rationale? Are the traders of these two commodities the same people, or is it a situation where one group rarely interacts with the other group (which seems highly unlikely)?
It seems like a situation ripe for some clever arbitrage.
There's a collective belief that current gasoline shortages are not related entirely to crude shortages, and are instead due to a lack of EtOH and refinery downtime. Also, in later months, less of the crude goes towards gas and more towards heating oil and other distillates.
If you think that's wrong, then you could absolutely short CL and go long the UH. Personally, I'm more than happy right now making pure directional bets...
However, I suggest US e&p's ard and pxp as being potentially more profitable and liquid.
This may be the beginning of a trend. There is excess capacity in Canada. The problem has always been getting it to market.
RR
Nice catch on this but weren't you one of the ones just a few days ago saying the absolute bottleneck is refinery capacity?
Why send oil south if there is no spare refining capacity?
Clearly crude is scarce in Texas, not refining capacity, or else the oil would flow the other way.
At this point I am not listening very much to what people are saying about what is scarce or why prices are high. I am watching what they are doing to determine what is scarce.
So far all actions reinforce a crude scarcity, at least of crude able to be refined, which to me is the same thing.
The other side of the coin is that this Canadian crude has historically been very cheap. So, refining capacity could be bottlenecked, but it may still make economic sense to push Canadian crude down to the gulf and buy it instead of something else.
RR
If the price of crude is going to continue to climb, wouldn't it make sense to buy more than you can refine now and just tank it someplace?
I read that Exxon had part of their pipeline (that is now bringing Canadian oil to the gulf) shut down since '02, since gulf oil production had dropped off. It used to feed midwest refineries. Can't recall right this second which of the half dozen or so articles I read that in, but it may be common knowledge to y'all.
RR
I asked my fellow sysadmins on campus what they were doing to reduce the energy used by all the PCs/Macs they manage.
Out of over 50 people, 1 replied saying that he always kept his machine on to receive updates.
sigh
I've been reminding people to keep their PCs off if they are not using them. I've also tried to prevent people using screensavers when they can just sleep their screens when idle. I've even started using load-dependent processor speed controls like Intel SpeedStep on desktop PCs. I think the next thing is to start enforcing suspend after idle...
I do sleep the hard drive etc. But any feelings of guilt are mitigated by driving past the baseball stadium that has all its lights on while it's still light out.
My company is installing solar panels on the office roofs so soon I can add a couple more machines without guilt!
I'm thinking the kids and I might take a bike ride. There is a city Earth Day celebration and it's always fun to ride past all the people that have to park their trucks a half a mile away (almost no parking at the park where it is held and few streets to park on)
Will be participating in a Earth Day fest in Ithaca, NY if anyone is local to there. Stop by and say hi.
Otherwise here's a good post that I found on what to do on Earth Day, if you are not participating in a clean up event.
Link HERE (last paragraph).
If we assume that TPTB are not just floating along at the whim of the market, and they have carefully planned the way in which peak oil will unfold then we would:
- Expect the markets to be manipulated and controlled. We find evidence for this when we normalize the markets to a Major Currency Dollar Index (MCDI) and plot the 100 day moving averages of oil and gold. They are uncannily straight, pointing to algorithmic price control steering to a preset course.
- Expect them to have an exit strategy when all else fails. The BIS have short positions of $1.5 trillion in oil, and the major bullion banks, (Sachs, Morgan, etc) are short more gold than can be produced in ten years. How are they going to cover this without sending the markets even higher and by implication making the dollar even more shaky?
If you think bigger and badder, (like Mike does), then you have to at least consider an international agreement between suppliers and consumers that fixes the price of oil and gold for (say) 10 years. This will immediately render all the long positions in the market worthless. Mr Chavez in recent weeks mentioned fixed $50.00 oil prices. What if that was something that has already been floated?Can it work?
I think those of us that dabble in the markets should think about this possibility for at least a few seconds before dismissing it. You can wake up Monday morning with this a reality in place.
The Chinese have, in effect, had price controls on their currency for a number of years now. This would not have worked without them buying lots of US debt and bringing the market into rough balance with the peg.
Uncle Hugo would only be selling oil at $50 to left leaning friends, methinks; the rapacious capitalists would get any leftovers at the market price.
There were some possible signs of the Fed money press aiding their friends who got a mite short on the oil markets in the first week of September 2005, I'm not aware of any recent rumours of such action... yet.
Thursday's action in the COMEX silver and gold pits may have been a sign of such things to come:
http://www.financialsense.com/fsu/editorials/steer/2006/0420.html
The result was a major pull back in silver (14%) and a significant one in gold (2%). Interesting to note that both recovered today (Friday 21st April), gold making up almost all its Thursday loss, silver half its, copper and zinc surged violently to new highs. Gold is up 5.9% in the last week. This article is a good summary of the action:
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000082&sid=asAYtq6lO6wQ&refer=canada
The gold and silver markets are very much smaller and more susceptible to manipulation than oil markets, and their manipulation by TPTB has been routine for years. However, it is quite possible that control is breaking down if today's action is anything to go by.
Will Iran tighten the reins on the global petro supply?
Actually, iraq was quite bombastic, and seemingly always ready to pick a fight - indeed, it invaded two countries, something never done in modern times by iran and generally reserved for superpowers, eg USSR and US. And, iraq also had friends in high places, including germany, france, russia and china. Little good it did her.
The real questions are, a) does gb think attacking iran will increase or decrease his popularity? which is not as dumb as it sounds - ask the democrats if we should or should not help israel against their enemy iran, and watch them tie themselves into knots, and b) does gb think it is his duty to the country to stop Iran's (charter axis of evil member) nuclear program, regardless of what it does to his popularity?
Say, find out where the US gets the most spare parts from for the high tech weapons like ships and airplances and tanks, and then nuke those cities in a premptive attack.
Say, the largest three hundred cities.
Just as a warning, mind you. Not a serious attack that would make us shoot back. Just a warning.
Remember back to the 1880s, when Herman Goering's father was governor of what is now Namibia? He decided to simply kill 85% of the Herero population to stop them trying to keep their land. The Herero were helpless against cavalry with rifles.
The Hereros didn't have nuclear weapons, because if they did Lake Berlin would still glow on moonless nights.
You want to be that Iran doesn't have nukes already, bought instead of made? Do you really feel lucky?
PhilRelig,
your and Lieber & Press attempts to bring about a fierce controversy on nuclear affairs are caused by a simple fact: five years ago the Russian side cancelled almost all the American capabilities to know the actual state of the Russian nuclear arms by turning down the proposal of deep American inspections within the framework of the Russian-American nuclear treaties. The US's inspectors can not get beyond the pale of official headquarters and some well-known industrial sites.
Since then the American side undertakes various attempts to infiltrate. For example, a few years ago the idea of miserable state of security of the Russian nuclear stockpiles was in fashion. The English language MSM reeked with articles about terrorists getting old Russian nukes. Less known is the fact that in the same time the Americans requested an entrée to the numbers of active nukes and the places of storage. They had gotten nothing.
Today the US side tempts another tactics. By asserting its nuclear supremacy the Americans try to bring about the meaty discussion to discover the actual state of strategic arms of Russia and China. And my feelings are they again will get nothing, except maybe some traitors.
As for a first -strike capability: as they say in Russian prisons "Why do you cover your head with your hands, if your asshole is loose?"
Two months ago I wrote in response to some stupid war plan:
Imagine. You wake up in the morning, switch on a TV set and see a news report:
There was a nuclear explosion in New York. Almost all the city is destroyed. No one has taken a charge for the explosion. Foreign governments deny their implication.
Do you think this is impossible?
Think again.
There are eight known countries which have got nuclear bombs. And maybe from ten to fifteen which have got know-how and fissile materials. Imagine. Some country has smuggled a few bombs and mined the big cities of its adversary. Just in case if the missiles wouldn't hit the targets.
Do you think this is impossible?
Think again.
Andrei.
From Moscow with sinless smile.
You add to smekhovo's comments the further point that the U.S. doesn't even really KNOW just how much Russian military improvements have progressed since then - but boy, they sure would like to! Overall, then, both Russian military upgrades since 2000, and U.S. ignorance about them, completely undermine the viability of Lieber and Press's claims about U.S. nuclear primacy.
You and Smekhovo almost have me convinced. My only remaining question would be this: Does the U.S. not perhaps have the capability of learning a lot about just what these Russian military improvements are via advanced remote sensing techniques and the like? My memory on whether Lieber and Press address this point is dim; perhaps they mentioned it in passing....
Aside from that, I would like at some point in the future to solicit reactions from the TOD community about the two other articles regarding U.S. military supremacy that I posted about during that lengthy subthread. (For the present, though, due to general Nuclear-Primacy-Fatigue, I will simply include a link immmediately following this post that takes you to the point in Wednesday's thread where I posted about those other articles, in case anyone cares to take a look....)
I have no idea; just asking. Any experts on the subject out there care to share their classified knowledge on the subject with TOD readers? [You wouldn't be denounced for treason by me, no matter what country you're from!]
I'm thinking either something is up like it's a psyop or the CIA dispatched "The Fab 5" to metrosexualize his ass.
Best,
Matt
(Note: The Fab 5 are those gay dudes from that tv show.)
LOLL-Laughing out loud and long
As I noted elsewhere, IMO there is no real difference between tactical and strategic nuclear weapons. Hersh asserts that there is operational planning going on for a nuclear strike on Iran.
While a nuclear weapon going off in the States is always a possibility, IMO a nuclear strike on Iran will make a nuclear attack (terrorist or otherwise) in the States virtually a 100% probability.
Ret. Lt. General Newbold, IMO, has effectively suggested that senior officers may refuse to carry out orders from Bush/Cheney/Rumsfeld. For Sixties Era leftists, it must be ironic that the only thing that may be standing between us and World War III are the uniformed officers in the Pentagon.
As reported in INTERNATIONAL SECURITY (Winter 1997/98, VOL. 22, NO. 3) in an article entitled "The Utility of Force in a World of Scarcity," by John Orme:
By the late 1990s, observers were speaking of a "Revolution in Military Affairs," that is, an epochal shift in the military techniques, organization, and strategy employed by the United States relative to the Cold War Period. As summarized by Orme,
The technological bases of the ongoing revolution are
(1) the dramatic improvements in the accuracy and range of weaponry (i.e., the development of "smart weapons"),
(2) the acuity of reconnaissance and surveillance (i.e., spy satellites and other reconnaissance aircraft),
(3) the ease of deception (i.e., stealth technology),
(4) the ease of suppressing enemy defenses (again, "stealth technology and the development of "cruise missiles), and
(5) the effectiveness of command and control (which the "computer revolution" has unleashed).
This technology, when implemented effectively - and, again, only one nation possesses the means and "know how" of doing this - has the effect of reducing to impotence the military establishments of the other nations of the earth. From a military standpoint, then - and given the collapse of the Soviet Union and the development of RMA technology in the United States military - the U.S. has no equal left to challenge its hegemony. What military forces the rest of the world possesses (and that includes Western Europe, Japan, China and the new Russian Federation) are non-RMA forces. Their navies are minuscule in comparison to the U.S. navy, while their air forces are hardly worth a yawn. Moreover, these nations possess very limited nuclear capability, and the once formidable capability of the Russian Federation has fallen into irretrievable disrepair. None of these nations has even the remotest possibility [either alone or in combination with each other] of building a RMA military machine with any chance of competing with the Americans - and none of them has the capacity to "project" power the way the United States can. No other nation on earth can put 540,000 men onto a battlefield thousands of miles from its home country like the U.S. did in the Gulf War, support that army in the field logistically, and when the time comes, win decisively on the battlefield the way the Americans can.
That is quite an impressive argument you have made about US military superiority. Perhaps you might want to tell that to the Iraqi resistance.
Subkommander Dred
Lest I be misunderstood, I am NOT advocating this; quite the contrary, I find it morally abhorrent. But I would not put it past the U.S. elite to decide to embark upon this if and when they deem it necessary to do so. Moreover, as a general matter, it is precisely this sort of ruthlessness that would give U.S. military superiority (to the extent that it exists - still a matter of dispute, I admit) its REAL power. What use is raw power, after all, if you are morally hamstrung from employing it to the full?
What you are suggesting with regard to Iraq is perfectly plausible. Iraq has dratically reduced medical care, reduced availability of clean water, essentially no remaining sewage treatment, an abundance of depleted uranium and they are dependent on imported food. The UN administered oil-for-food ration system is currently being officially phased out and also simply evaporating. Could they be starved to submission? Of course. Probably the American public would never know. Or care. Clearly no one in Bushworld cares if Iraqis live or die, or what the rest of the world thinks.
Iraq is also depopulating by emigration.
Is there a conscious plan to depopulate Iraq? Who knows?
Read some history. Colonial wars particularly are rife with de facto and purposeful depopulation/extermination.
Iraq is a textbook classic perfect and complete colonial war and very large scale loss of population is assumed
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2006/apr2006/pipe-a11.shtml
It's morally repugnant and sickening, but there you have it.
For all our military prowess (and I agree, a country that spends close to half a trillion dollars a year on the Department of War is going to have a formidable military), for some strange reason the word 'Dunkirk' keeps coming to mind when I think of our guys in Iraq. Is it just me, or does the prospect of lengthy (and perhaps untenable) supply lines along with the very technical/ power intensive basis of that military might be our main weakness? This does not even to begin to take account of the lack of strategic planning, the refusal to admit past mistakes or even the blatant lies and stupidity of those who advocated for this war in the first place.
Subkommander Dred
As far as the logistical feasibility of securing their ultimate objectives in Iraq is concerned, I admit that I am sketchy on the details. What I am speculatively envisioning is the horrific scenario where Iraq has been sufficiently depopulated so as to make it feasible to hermetically seal the oil production and transportation areas of Iraq from harm by "retail terrorist" antagonists. How realistic this is I truly don't know.
But in a more general sense, it is also worth mentioning in this connection that the oil fields and associated infrastructure in the entire Middle East is very heavily concentrated in quite a small geographical area within and near the Persian Gulf itself. Moreover, it tends to be far away from major population centers, particularly in Saudi Arabia. As for Iran, it is a large country, but the vast majority of its oil fields and associated infrastructure is in its southwest region - and abuts against the southern border of Iraq. All of which raises an interesting question: How realistic is it to envision a broadened view of a depopulated Middle East, with the U.S. able to hermetically seal virtually all of that vast area of oil and gas reserves against "retail terrorist" attacks?
Relax. You have convinced me that you are the greatest fan of the AMERICAN MILITARY MACHINE.
"(1) the dramatic improvements in the accuracy and range of weaponry (i.e., the development of "smart weapons")"
If so, why did the American diplomacy strive to prevent procurement of Russian-made GPS jammers on the eve of the war in Iraq?
"(3) the ease of deception (i.e., stealth technology)"
You have to tell about those technologies to the Serbians who had brought down F-117 with the old Soviet-made C-125 anti-aircraft missile.
As for the carriers, their battle life in the real nuclear exchange would be 60 minutes.
What would the GPS jammers have done for the Iraqis?
The last line in your email seems to indicate your opinion that the Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD) paradigm essentially still prevails today - i.e., that the U.S. and Russia are essentially in a state of nuclear parity. Do you have any publicly available (or even classified - be my guest!) data to offer about current Russian ICBM, strategic bombing, and nuclear-based warhead capabilities? Do you have any hard data about Russian early warning, radar, etc. capabilities? So far, all the argumentation on this angle of the question has been an argument from silence: The Americans don't really know what the Russians have, but it COULD be a lot.
Do the RUSSIANS know what the Russians have?
1)the new intercontinental quasi-ballistic() missile with 6 maneuverable hyper-sonic() nuclear warheads capable to penetrate the anti-ballistic missile defense.
2)restoration of the Soviet global navigation system GLONASS, an analog of the US's GPS
3)new generation of nuclear submarines - smaller and quieter.
4)resumption of production of super-sonic bombers and heavy transport aircrafts.
(
)Quasi-ballistic means that the missile can deviate from a ballistic trajectory if necessary.(**)maneuverable hyper-sonic means that the warhead is capable to fly like a cruise missile on hyper-sonic speed.
I should like to tell more but I am not a military expert. I am sure you could find all those news on special military sites, at least in-Russian.
Several 'howevers', however. While the US has by far superior capability to 'project' its military force worldwide it takes much less expenditure locally to resist them. One might ask why a 'peaceful' nation wishes this force projection capability, too. For all the advantages of high tech military it also has greater vulnerabilities. US military hardware is very expensive, how high would you wish military spend as % of GDP to rise in response to consumption / destruction of the hardware / consumables, 10%, 20%? Now begin to limit resources (energy, metals): foreign wars vs. domestic consumption of critical resources?
Most other countries concentrate their military spend on their own defence, acheivable much more cost-effectively. The US is the only country that biases its spend towards offensive projection capabilities.
As for U.S. military vulnerabilities: I grant as an integral part of my argument that the U.S. is ill-equipped to deal with
- Insurgencies such as those in Iraq; and
- "Retail" (as opposed to state-sponsored) terrorism
As far as 1 is concerned, one can always exterminate the insurgency-producing population as a last resort. There were some in the U.S. during Vietnam whom essentially advocated this solution then (e.g.: musings about bombing the Red River dikes, about using nuclear weapons, etc.). If this was taken seriously then, WITH the Soviet and Chinese threat of the time being much greater than now, then what makes it beyond the realm of the possibility that the US would do so NOW? I have been saying since 2002 that the inner logic of U.S. involvement in Iraq is tending inexorably towards precisely this dismal end.I read through (scanned truthfully) your thread and all I can say is "who the hell knows?" Nothing would surprise me one way or the other these days. It's the type of thing though I'd need to invest at least a couple of days reading the various articles to even have a remotely intelligent opinion on.
Best,
Matt
At the same time, I would say there are some things that are more worth seriously researching than others, and I would say that the exact degree of U.S. nuclear primacy/military supremacy (or at least some reasonably reliable ball-park notion thereof) would be one of the things at the top. Don't you agree?
- Certain figures in the U.S. power structure seriously contemplated what would have amounted to mass-extermination of at least a partial sort during Vietnam: Nuclear weapons and bombing the red river dikes were explicitly contemplated among other things - despite the fact that the Soviets and Chinese posed a much more serious deterrent then than they do now (although this latter claim is being heavily assailed, I admit).
- How much of a tender spot in their hearts do you think Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, etc., actually have for the poor struggling masses in today's Iraq? Not much, if any, I'd wager - though I'm open to counter-evidence. (In this connection, it's worth recalling Madeleine Albright's infamous remark to Leslie Stahl on 60 MINUTES in 1996 that the sanctions-caused death of 500,000 Iraqis was "worth it." What does that tell you about the willingness of the elites to engage in mass-extermination under the requisite circumstances?)
I had some other thoughts, but I'll have to reread your message again; in the meantime, I'll just post this....But I think you have to look at all this from the point of view of the elites in particular, not the American population in general. Consider George Bush's ranch in Crawford, which is apparently outfitted with every sort of the most advanced alternative energy gadget and widget so as to enable a lavish lifestyle even in the event of a complete loss of access to the electricity grid. What does this example imply if not a willingness on the part of the elites to tolerate great increases in "retail terrorist"-type blowback, since they have the wherewithal to live in great comfort amid the carnage anyhow?
http://www.theoildrum.com/story/2006/4/21/142950/541#205
It would appear that perhaps the extermination card is already being played, and its unfolding won't be noted for a long time precisely because much of the violence is of a passive rather than an active sort.
Chomsky's noted, referencing Bernard Fall, that
And yet the Americans still lost. And this was in the days that rendering a third-world country "extinct" was more less acceptable behaviour. Even if the U.S. were to somehow pull it off politically (say, by "turning off" the Internet, so that news doesn't get out), it seems to me that the only way it could succeed militarily is by destroying the country so fully that it wouldn't be able to extract the oil. And then you've still got to deal with the economic consequences.
You said yesterday that U.S. elites don't care how many Americans are victimised by terrorism. I'd agree. But they'll damn sure care when systems -- pipelines, terminals, refineries, power plants, etc. -- are targeted (as has already begun in Iraq, Arabia, and Nigeria). Ever see that Frontline episode about how fragile our electricity grid is? And it may not even take terrorists to deliver a knockout blow -- just a few more well-placed hurricanes could do the trick.
Incidentally, earlier this week a retired general gave the opposite view to your authors' over at Asia Times.
- Fear of serious reprisals by the Soviets and/or the Chinese, and of the unforeseeable consequences for world incineration that this might involve;
- A certain lingering sense of humanity that prevented them from going quite that far. Even Kissinger (a.k.a. "kissMyAssInger"), whom I love to hate, is recorded somewhere of having said to Nixon something like "But we just can't do that!" when the latter was at one point musing about just nuking the goddamn place.
But 1), in my estimation, is essentially gone as a factor - or at least greatly reduced; and 2) will be increasing reduced to nothing as a consideration in direct proportion to how desperate the U.S becomes in coming years due to Peak Oil.If I were a U.S. planner, I would allocate resources like this: Save the conventional, aircraft-carrier stuff for weak, non-nuclear foes who don't stand a great chance of actually sinking a carrier, if any(such as Iran, Venezuela, Nigeria); and play the Nuclear Primacy card against the Russians and Chinese, against whom the conventional, aircraft-carrier card is insufficient.
I read a story on AVWEB about Boeing's Wichita plant is laying off 400 workers due to a cut back in military orders.
Could financial incentive's to enlist is not leaving enough for new airplanes?
The odds are probably 50/50 of something similar happening in the next 5 years. I will be slightly surprised if the next 10 years pass without a nuclear explosion being used in anger for the first time since August 1945.
Any other suggestions as to a des res when TSHTF ?
My relatively ordinary house in the midlands bought me a small farm over here, with enough left over to kit the place out with renewable energy infrastructure and survive with no income for long enough to get re-established career-wise. Canada doesn't exactly make it easy for foreign professionals or academics to get established here (as they place very little value on qualifications or experience gained elsewhere IMO), but expertise in energy helps (my partner and I are power system consultants these days).
:)
The container and nuke gets loaded onto a ship. The ship drives to San Diego and the nuke is offloaded. Now the fun part. Remember that photocell? Now, if the TSA inspects it, they will open it. The photocell catches light, and the nuke goes off. No more San Diego. The alternative is that it goes uninspected and ends up at the town with the WalMart hub warehouse. They open it and again, kaboom. No more WalMartville! This is a case where you WANT lax security!
Excerpts:
NEW YORK (Dow Jones) -- Complete Production Services Inc. traded well above its offering price Friday as the oil and gas exploration services firm tapped into the energy craze for its stock market debut.
Complete Energy Services (CPX) raised $624 million as the second richest IPO of 2006 by offering 26 million shares at $24 a share with underwriters Credit Suisse Securities, UBS Securities, Banc of America Securities and Jefferies & Company.
Complete Energy Services is majority-owned by Houston businessman L.E. Simmons, who is son of Zions Bancorporation (ZION) Chairman and CEO Harris H. Simmons.
Simmons moved to Houston with his brother Matt to set up an investment banking firm in 1974 to specialize in the oil field service industry, Simmons & Co., according to his biography.
(Full disclosure: I am not a shareholder, I have no interest in this company. The reason I post this is, the majority owner is Matt Simmons's brother. Just jumped off the page at me.)
If you subscribe to Barron's Online, check it out.
Oxygenating the fuel only increases the volume of fuel used. The EFI system will adjust to maintain a constant exhaust oxygen level.
If you indroduce more oxygen into the intake air stream, the system will compensate by increasing the amount of fuel. This does not have to mean that you'll use more fuel, as you would normally reduce the throttle opening because you'd be making more power that way.
However, if it is the fuel that is carrying the oxygen, then the control system will need to put in much more fuel, as each additional amount of fuel also brings more oxygen. Therefore you will use more fuel. It may not use more oil, but it uses more of the fuel you have to pay for.
AND IT ACOMPLISHES NOTHIG!
Even for a properly tuned open loop carburated car, it will only lean out the mixture, which can result in poor combustion, more pollution, and more fuel used.
Note that the process used to make MTBE from isobutylene can be modified to produce iso-octane instead, and I suspect that we may see a decrease in the price differential for premium grades in markets with reformulated gas requirements....
Conventional gasoline is allowed to have Reid Vapor Pressure (RVP) of 9 pounds per square inch (psi) during the summer months. Conventional gasoline blended with ethanol receives a 1-psi waiver from the RVP standard, since the addition of up to 10 volume percent ethanol raises RVP to 10 psi. This paper provides background on the 1-pound waiver and how its removal can affect gasoline volumes.
http://www.eia.doe.gov/oiaf/ethanol3.html
RR
Sooo... if oxygenates are no longer required and it makes the volatility porblem harder to solve (since Ethanol raises the RVP of lower volatility gas by more than that of higher volatility gas), is the only rationale for adding it these days the octane boost?
Rep Louise Slaughter (D-NY - Buffalo, I think) has posted a diary over at:
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2006/4/21/1592/53377#132
Unfortunately she is going on about price gouging. Same as Chuck Schumer - is there something in the water up there that all the Democrats are drinking?
People have already commented about peak oil (with links to this site), and how the things she is suggesting in these 2 bills are probably not going to be effective.
The good news is that it appears that she (or a staffer) is reading the comments, so there is some hope that we can bring some of our elected officials up to speed.
Our corrupt officials are aware of the situation and try to spin it to their advantage to get re-elected. Folks, get ready for our oil problems to be greatly exacerbated by politicians interfering with the free-market. Sure, you can buy gas for $2.50/gal... if you can find it.
Best,
Matt
I have some ideas about why this is the case but nothing really firm.
Best,
Matt
When it's from Bartlett, Rainwater, etc., they obviouls can't do that.
Best,
Matt
This may come as a surprise but due to how far past the point of no return we've gone, I'm glad the media-government aren't telling the peopel the truth. At this point there would just be mass panic if everybody thought the way even a peak oil moderate thinks.
Imagine, if you wil, Peak Oil Moderate Mike. He doesn't believe civilization as we know it is coming to an end but he does think when in for a major recession or depression and has thus pulled his money out of the market with the exception of energy stocks and has a lot in PMs. Sold his overpriced home to move into somethingn moderate and has decided not to buy a new car.
Well if most people did as he has done, the markets would plummet over night, gold would be $1,500 an ounce and that probably wouldn't serve anybody's interests.
Best,
Matt
Agreed. On a day like this, I just shake my head in wonder at how people (and my government) can ignore this stuff, even though I actually do know those things you mentioned--it would be a disaster to the growth-at-any-price crowd, and people will not willingly give up their rights to cheap energy, cheap goods, McMansions, etc. without something apocalyptic (debt? collapse of the dollar?) happening. (Hey wait,was that a thermonuclear device I just heard?) I think your idea of getting the Rainwater crowd involved is as good as anyone could come up with, given the cluelessness of the public and the mendacity of the leaders in this country. BTW, gold may get to $1500 without the any special enlightenment...just a few more doubts about the dollar as a reserve currency would do it, I think.
Best,
Matt
We really can't know. Gold could be at $1000 to $500 at the end of 2006, $750 would be a reasonable bet. Things should hang together for another 6 months but I wouldn't bet on too much longer, I expect signs of serious economic distress by this fall. When does TSHTF for real? About two years time is what I'm currently thinking but with contingency of being close to ready in 1 year. Time now for it to be the major determinant for your decisions.
Things could move very fast when they choose to. If they happen in stages and / or controllably we should have a fairly clear idea of how fast and how far they may go, but if it all happens shockingly fast then it's mostly guesswork. What constitutes 'appropriate positioning' is dependent on the speed and depth.
-----
It already is. Aside from my financial preps, I'm in the process of outsourcing my store (at LATOC) so I can move around a bit more. Right now I can't even go visit land for a few days or anything.
Best,
Matt
I wouldn't worry about the world ceasing consumption, etc. on a dime. Even if they know what they "should" do, it will be like going to the gym or changing your diet ... next week ... next month ...
The population will vary with the rate at which it actually does change.
What do the Republicans stand for? Is their military solution to the energy problem working any better?
The profiteering by the administration's big oil buddies only serves to convince people that PO is not real. It'll be a hell of a thing to convince them otherwise now.
Best,
Matt
voters won't understand their agenda, and
Democrats are afraid voters will understand
their agenda.
It is also, for a lot of people, the default outcome following the fall of socialism. The whole world (and not just Americans) went on a free market jag.
HR3964 - I don't know enough about US oil retailers' zone pricing to validly comment.
HR3722 - is wrong headed and displays a fundamental misunderstanding of the situation. If this is the way Dems are thinking then they are just stupidly ignorant.
If she and her staff seriously checkout stuff on PO at DK and here (mentioned several times in comments) they are in for a shocking weekend. Best she has an hour's chat with the Rt Hon (I think he deserves that title) Bartlett. Her website seems unaware of peak oil.
Oil Producers Scramble for Coverage
Insurance premiums for GOM offshore and onshore oil production and refinery facilities will go up 200% to 400% at their July 1 renewals. Capacity is very much restricted: in this instance--underwriters are able to assume the risk of loss for the values that are out there for a single event, but for more than one event the limits will be exhausted.
I guess for the major oil companies, self-insurance is an option, since they do have some spare cash sitting around. On the other hand the values involved at off-shore platforms and refinery facilities are enormous.
It does seem to be a bit of a large coincidence that the world hubbert peak and global warming starting to slam us seem to be coming down at the same time. And both much earlier than many people thought.
Oh, I forgot - it's just a theory, and we need to study it more before we think about acting!
According to this map Pensecola would appear as bright red, when the map shows
blue and 72F. Here at TOD we admire accurate data.
http://www.osdpd.noaa.gov/PSB/EPS/SST/data/gulfmex.cf.gif
http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/dsdt/cwtg/egof.html
He mentioned the web page a few days ago, and I took a bookmark of it. He is now wrong. As of Saturday 22nd April it is 85.1 F, i.e. above an average July temperature, not June. I use another web site for sea surface temperatures, but like yours it is large scale :-
http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/hurricane/atlsst_lastweek.html
April 2006 in the Midwest:
- Dandelions run amok (usually not until June).
- Lack of rain (usually not until July).
- June bugs on my porch (usually in June, hence the name).
- Several record highs already set for April.
This does not bode well for the summer.It ended with something Kunstler might say: that we could be in big trouble, because our houses are too far out, our cars are too big, and our corporate executives' salaries are too high.
This on Lou Dobbs Tonight, a supposedly business-oriented program...
Would it send a strong message that the people of the USA are 'in it altogether'? Or just create a panic?
What happened last time?
The bigger question is: would Americans accept 55MPH again? Though I am too young to remember what people were saying about it when 55MPH was implemented, I definately remember all my relatives grumbling about it during the 80s. But Americans are a good bit crazier and more selfish than they were back then, so this time around I don't think it can be passed before prices empty the roads.
Yes, the 55 MPH speed limit would reduce consumption. Maybe not a whole lot, but a bit. I can't speak to other vehicles, but my current ride (a BMW Dakar...a single cylinder 650cc bike and my only means of motor transport) functions most efficiently, fuel wise, at the range of 55 to 60 MPH (70 miles to the gallon). If you want to get someplace with the efficient use of fuel, decrease your speed. However, I get the impression that most folks don't care about efficiency, but speed. Alas, there is the rub. At present, I think re-instituting a 55 MPH speed limit, even given the current freak out of the populace over fuel prices, is a non-starter with the vast majority of my fellow citizens. Unfortunately, I think most of the folks in this country have a very strange sense of what 'Rights' they are guarenteed (to cheap gas, to drive as much as they want, as fast as they want, ect, ect...).
We truly live in very strange and frightening times.
Subkommander Dred
Maybe:
- A national limit of 55 mph would galvanise the the nation into addressing why there is a problem.
- Open up debate on the fuel efficiency issue
3)Get people to question the 'right' to drive gas guzzlers.4)Although I am no fan of GWB, were I an advisor and suggest this, this (contrarily) may up his ratings:
- Doing something / looking like a leader for a change.
- Recognising the problem
- Trying to ensure that all sections of society retains mobility, rather than rationing by price
- A by-blow would be a response to carbon emmissions.
If it were me, I would rather go on the telly and do this now, than go on later telling the people not to panic and stop shooting each other in gas lines.It would be a start. Super tankers turn slowly, but you have to start somewhere.
RR
I was qouted as saying we had two trillion barrels of oil left. I assume I must have been talking about crude + condensate + NGL's + GTL + Bitumen + CTL + The Kitchen Sink.
By the way, I have a question to entertain you folks with. I fear that Kunstler's prediction of a massive suburban devaluation due to the ramifications of peak oil is going to be right on the mark. It is just a matter of when. I am thinking of getting out by the spring of 2008.
Or will that already be too late?
That's maybe getting close to serious fuck-up time in other respects, best be prepared to move sooner but the odds are you would be lucky as late as spring 2008.
I'm not sure why you are planning to move two years' hence? Seems a long time horizon. Better to be ready to jump within a year and then delay should things stay stable.
I thought he came off as a kind of depressed Hunter S. Thompson figure, but without the drugs. What fun is that?
Oil and natural gas are peaking? Good.
Oil and natural gas are fundamental to our lives because they were always cheap and easy to use. As these resources become more expensive due to scarcity, we have an opportunity to use replacements. These replacements vary from country to country but here are the ones in the country I know best, the USA:
Biomass-based Plastics and Fibers
Natureworks LLC is already producing 126,000 tons of 100% corn-based plastic in Blair, Nebraska. Production started in 1997, before the price of oil started to spike and now it is even more profitable. The plastic can be molded into cups, plates, forks etc. and has the added benefit of degrading completely in compost in 45 days. Another division of the company turns the plastic into clothes, pillows, mattresses etc. ADM has partnered with Metabolix to develop PHA Natural Plastics and Dupont brought their Sorona product line to market.
Vehicle Fuel
Ethanol works as a fuel mixed with gas in all car engines at a level of 10-20% and for some engines at a level of 85%. The only added equipment for the 85%-capable engine is a fuel sensor and different fuel lines and gaskets. These costs less than $200. Ethanol already displaces ~3% of gas in the US but this can easily double every few years. In the US, we don't have to displace 100% of our gas right away anyway. We are still one of the world's largest oil producers, we just need to match production declines. You say it is heavily subsidized? So are oil and gas, the difference is ethanol is getting cheaper to make and oil and gas are getting more expensive. You say that oil is necessary to make the corn to make the ethanol? Well why not use grass or willow that don't need fertilizer. Or make the fertilizer from coal.
Speaking of coal, in North America there is an estimated 300 years worth of coal to make diesel using the Fischer-Tropsch process. Obviously, if we depended solely on coal, it would get used up in less than 300 years, but we only need to mitigate decreasing oil production. Even without investing the huge amounts of R+D resources that the petroleum industry has done since 1859, 1 ton of coal can produce 1.5 barrels of diesel at a cost of less than $1/gallon.
Even better, the cabon dioxide byproduct can be sequestered like at the Great Plains Synfuels Plant in North Dakota
Electricity and Heat
Coal and nuclear already produce most electricity in the US so this is not a problem. Even so, it is interesting to see that solar is booming and wind produces electricity at less than 4 cents a kilowatt hour. If they receive the same R+D that coal and nuclear have received these may be significant additive sources of energy in the future.
Many Other Technologies and Ideas Ready for Implementation
Don't forget about using abandoned oil wells for geothermal energy.
We will also save electricity using solid state lighting that Cree and Color Kinetics already produce. Biodiesel is another commercially available automobile fuel gaining acceptance. Working from home, city living, mass transit, bicycles, mopeds, ethanol-fueled hybrid cars, rail transport and many other technologies and ideas that already exist will become more prevalent.
Is the peaking of oil and natural gas production a crisis or an opportunity?
In the days of steamships, sailboats and the horse and buggy, oil and the engines that burned them were considered alternative. Now these are dominant, but we are already transitioning to the technologies I described above. Mitigating oil and gas depletion will usher in a new era of investment, low unemployment, innovation, environmental stewardship and energy security.
Snark aside, don't you think we can save a lot more people from dieoff if we work on biointesive tribal food-raising through composting and other methods, rather than some corn to plastic alchemy? Plastic was a very bad idea in the first place and still is. We need to make food! That is what is going to be missing for billions of people very, very soon!!!
Best,
Matt
I disagree with your eloquently stated and superbly documented analysis of Jim Kunstler's work. And I might add that Richard Rainwater, who probably has a slightly greater net worth than either you or me and who has a superb, proven track record of making accurate predictions, disagrees with you also.
Re: Alternative Energy
The problem is the rate of production as we begin to lose two to four mbpd per year in conventional production. IMO, we are facing a long period of net energy supply contraction until the rate of growth of alternative energy production is equal to the rate of decline of conventional energy production.
Well, we're about to get a bunch of Empty Ford Factories to set up Renewable Mfg works in.. think they'd be convinced that panels are actually selling and they should keep those 40 plants and 30k employees on for some new work?
-----------
Either that or a worldwide war that will not end in our lifetimes, investment in all sorts of advanced killing tehchnologies, catastrophic weather events in oil-rich areas all while the polar ice caps melt. Mmmm. . . I supposse the jury's still out on which path we've chosen.
Anyways you got some very nice talking points you've got there. Very well done and professional. Your corporate trainer has taught you well. Tell me does he use bleach or a rolled up newspaper?
Best,
Matt
And nucular energy.
Technology is not the problem. We have had adequate technologies to make a successful transition away oil for at least the past forty years. Well then, what are the problems?
Yet both oil and natural gas are major inputs into the ethanol process. Almost every ethanol plant in the U.S. is heavily dependent upon natural gas. As it becomes more expensive, so does ethanol. Switch to coal, you say? That will take capital and time, and will mean ethanol loses its "green" distinction. I imagine there will be even more people coming out against ethanol when it helps accelerate global warming.
Ethanol already displaces ~3% of gas in the US but this can easily double every few years.
I checked the link, and didn't see the calculations. Can you reproduce them here? First of all, at 4 billion gallons a year, that is 1.85% of the energy value of our annual gasoline consumption. Furthermore, a tremendous amount of natural gas was consumed in the making of ethanol. As I showed in this essay:
http://i-r-squared.blogspot.com/2006/03/grain-derived-ethanol-emperors-new.html
It takes 6 gallons of ethanol to net the energy content in 1 gallon of gasoline because of all the energy lost in making it. Similar calculations have shown the same:
http://zfacts.com/p/60.html
So, in reality, 4 billion gallons of ethanol nets to about creation of the energy value of 0.5% of our annual gasoline consumption. Furthermore, if we used the entire ethanol crop for ethanol, it could displace about 6% of our nation's gasoline consumption:
http://ergosphere.blogspot.com/2005/07/money-grubbing-mendacity-of-ethanol.html
You say it is heavily subsidized? So are oil and gas, the difference is ethanol is getting cheaper to make and oil and gas are getting more expensive
If oil and gas are subsidized, then those subsidies benefit ethanol as well. Ethanol benefits from direct subsidies and corn subsidies also. I have calculated that ethanol is subsidized at the rate of $4.00 to displace 1 gallon of gasoline. The zfacts post above says it is over $7.87 when the corn subsidies are added in. No other alternative energy source comes close to this level of pork.
That's probably enough for now.
RR
When oil and gas wells are abandoned, they are plugged (pour concrete down them). So they cannot be used for geotehrmal purposes later. Any new abandonments will produce low temp hot wtaer. Good if you have a farmhouse near by in a colder climate, there are no groundwater issues, etc. Otherwise, useless.
In 2004, 94.5% of new powerplants in the US were natural gas fired. Been that way for a decade. Marginal source of elelctricity about everywhere in US is NG. It will take well over a decade to build enough coal fired plants to offset the current NG fired electricity plants, even with normal conservation steps.
VERY optimistic timeline has first new nuke in US (Anna Virginia owned by Dominion) in 2014 at earliest. Enough nukes to make a difference? 2020 is too early IMHO.
LEDs bulbs ? I have a couple of 1 watt ones (night lights, outdoor near my door, etc.) Compact fluorescents do better at about 3 watts (more light, $4 vs. $36/bulb).
I also use LEDs in my car (never burn out, less drag on alternator & battery > better fuel efficiency & lower repair bills).
See www.superbrightleds.com for house & auto (some new ones coming as well, a 3 watt red tail light LED)
Plants. All around us. They efficiently use the energy of the sun to grow food for us to eat, material for clothes and shelter, and just about everything we need.
Humans came up with a very bad misconception centuries back that our "technology" could improve upon nature. The reality is we are nature and everything we need is there.
Alternative fuels? Yep! Join and sing around the campfire in rejoice that they are all around us. Just remember that hooking wires up to them is the first step to destroying our humanity.
Though I guess another way to put it is, we're pretty close to an all-time high right about now.
Bob
I guess the suburbs are really dead, they just don't know it yet!
More than 200 students participated; given that this was the first such event, that's not bad.
Speakers included someone from the Dallas office of the EPA, a homebuilder who builds all the way up to "zero energy" homes and a company that does home energy usage audits.
I'll be doing my part by giving it sufficient play in my newspaper next week.