I hear ya ggoede1, indeed we do have a bright and good future to look forward to.

 

Hi Ggoede1:

___When supply meets demand; prices have to rise until a new balance is achieved. There are tens of alternatives but they are not ready right now all the while Supply is flattening while Demand is still increasing …

___It does not matter what someone thinks is possibly available, it matters what is actually available and on that score, we are in trouble …

___Good Luck

___Wayne R. Gerdes
___Waynegerdes@earthlink.net

 

Hi ggoede1, Very interesting post and links. It has led me on a fun hour of google research. Thanks!

"Gas hydrates" are a solid mixture of methane gas and water which occur in ocean depths or under Arctic permafrost. They are a potential source of natural gas. Estimates for significant production of gas are about 2025. The size of these deposits are enormous, but most are likely very hard to exploit. This is not entirely good news, because methane is also a green house gas, trapping heat more powerfully than CO2. There are several scenarios where global warming can lead to a runaway methane global warming (positive feedback).

http://www.rense.com/general63/refil.htm
Interesting link: it says that old, very deeply buried oil may be replenishing some depleted oil reservoirs. The research is interesting, but I doubt that this will be economically useful. [Fast refilling in geological time might help our descendants in a few million years.]

I'm not sure what will happen with oil. I suspect that something like the peak oil idea will be happening in the next decade. Though, I have to admit that people much more knowledgeable than me are on both sides of the issue. In any event, I think cheap oil won't be seen again. I remember when Persian Gulf crude was $1.25 a barrel on the east coast (except the government required us to buy from Texas for $3 +. a barrel).

--Walter

 

The article has posted on the NYTimes website here
(you might have to register or use BugMeNot.com )

Here's the tease on the Sunday Magazine's front page:
"The Breaking Point by Peter Maass
The United States and China are counting on the Saudis to satisfy our growing thirst for oil. The Saudis say they can supply all our needs. Critics say that that is becoming impossible. They just might turn out to be right."

I have not read it yet.

Fred

 

My money is on the following sequence of events...

Cars turn to hybrid tech. Even fuel cell vehicle or electrics can benefit from regenerative braking.

Batteries improve vastly. Full recharge in minutes at 'pumps' capable of high current. 300-400 ranges become attainable. Also, all those gas powered items for the yard can go electric. Those lithium batteries have a high charge density.

http://www.evworld.com/view.cfm?sect...ue&newsid=8033
http://www.greencarcongress.com/2005...arsquos_f.html

Fuel cells, while expensive now, get economical. However, if batteries can be quickly recharged I don't know if it is economical to go to the trouble to separate hydrogen from a happy marriage with oxygen.

Hydrates can be used. I think the idea my friend and I came up with was to heat the hydrate with microwaves and use a hood to collect the heated gas. The methane would be piped to the surface then to shore.

Through mat'l science we see lighting become cheaper. LEDs or similar things using a tenth of the energy become wide spread. Fewer MWs needed. Also, using carbon nantubes or similar tech solar power becomes cheap enough to use at home. Couple this to battery tech and your roof shingles/panels fully recharge the house batteries in hours (remember, new lithium are fast charge) and the remainder can be sold to a utility.

http://www.physorg.com/news5890.html

There are other things as well such as a mix of wind, biogas, wave motion and other things. I am a big proponent on the cleverness of humans. It may be that oil replenishes and if true at some point we just stop using it because it is dirty to handle.

My bet is that in fewer than 10 years we see what would be regular size cars on the road with fast charge batteries. Between that and this carbon nanotube thread/fabric we can expect a jump in things.

Of course, that is just my opinion and I could be wrong.

 

New technology is great... BUT who is going to buy this stuff? No new technology is cheap to begin with, it usually takes at least 10 years to work the price down to consumer levels. People are already cutting back on spending money on other things like entertainment and food so that they can keep pumping the gas into their car so they can get to work to make the money they use to pump that gas into their car. When gas increases in price even more as the world oil production peaks people are going to have even less money to invest into things like solar or other new efficient technologies that come along.

I have confidence that we'll be able to continue living in relative comfort, but things are going to change in a big way. The peak oil shock will hit us hard because we aren't doing anything about it until it arrives, and even then it seems we're doing far too little. Food production relies so heavily on oil, it's not even funny. Hopefully that will force us to reconsider transporting food products thousands of miles and instead encourage local, sustainable (organic) farming practices and less energy intensive food processing, but again we should be starting now, before the peak arrives and screws up our ability to make the necessary changes in agriculture.

Unfortunately industry is so slow to react that they will find themselves going bankrupt, as has happened in the past. Government can affect the industry and consumers in a positive way, and in some respects they are doing a little bit here and there, but they could be doing a lot more, such as raising the CAFE standards, which most people DO support. Consumers can affect change too, but as we are mostly brainwashed by advertising and TV 'news' from the industry we're likely not well informed enough to make the correct decisions, and instead will keep on buying SUVs and whatever else they figure can make them lots of money regardless of the consequences.

Peak oil is not the end of the word, civilization, or whatever, it's just then end of an era. I welcome the new era, but I'm also prepared to expect a bit of turmoil as we move from oil into the variety of 'alternative' energy systems we will be involved with.

 

I just turfed this up.

http://www.kvue.com/news/local/stori....8cc69c09.html

I tend towards the Optimist side of the scale. I'm pretty pro-creativity. Most of what I think I read in your posting was popular in the late 70s when my liberal teachers in school were trying to convince the students that the sky was falling and we all needed to put a brick in our toilets and ride bicycles. And I think bikes are cool. The world, surprisingly, turned out fine and things are actually better.

Large companies actually do a lot that looks green because it is economic. Wow, imagine it. Doing green things to make a profit. I currently work in the field of wet flue gas desulfurization. We allow a coal fired plant to burn ultra cheap coal and have low emmisions. The enviros love it and the coal fired power plants laugh all the way to the bank. Many other industrial facilities have cogens to allow them to make power from excess heat. Steam is used in a turbine and many plants generate a lot of their own power. Again, this is done for economic reasons but the enviros love it.

My point is that certain people continually say the sky is falling and at some point the argument is null. I think gas was $0.25 a gallon when I was born and it is like $2.50 where I live. There are no riots and my part of Colorado does not resemble a set from The Road Warrior.

As for new technology being expensive, yeah, you're right. Any new technology costs but that never prevented me from buying it. My first CD burner was a 1X at $450. All technology that 'has legs' gets cheaper. I am positive in 3 years Ford will make Escapes cheaper. Right now there is a shortage of batteries and other special items.

I hope I am wrong, but it sounds like you're a bit pessimistic. I am sort of looking for gas to get expensive. The higher prices will make other things suddenly look economic. I think hybrid tech was around for a long time. Since the 60s or 70s. It wasn't until gas hit a certain level that hybrids looked feasable.

Anyways, be of good cheer. I am sure things will work out well.

 

This has more to do with environmental regulation than anything else. Coal fired plants would be happier not having to spend money on technology to clean up their emissions. They are making changes because we (in the form of the government) have forced them to, thus opening up new markets for companies that design and manufacture the technology that can keep them in business. To say that corporations actually want to clean up their act is totally backwards from the logic employed in business. Either the consumer demands change and the corporation responds to that (very rare), or the consumer demands change and the government creates regulations to force the industry to clean up and take responsibility for it's externalities. Left to their own devices they will continue to pollute our environment because it's cheaper than taking responsibility for cleaning up.

That's why CAFE and the emissions regulations are so critical in this time of change. It's bad policy to ignore the factors that affect change the most, and are actually supported by the citizens. Unfortunately we have corporatism, so whatever they want, they get. Whenever we do manage to pass a law requiring them to shape up, it usually gets challenged to the point where it's virtually ineffective, such as the ZEV mandate. As soon as that vanished, so did all the efforts to bring EVs into the market, even though that's one of the best bets we have at this point. Now it's all about the pie-in-the-sky fuel cells some 15 to 20 years down the road. Not good enough, I say.

I'm optimistic, but I'm also into looking at the reality of the situation. Demand for oil is skyrocketing, and production is limited, thus peak oil is truly coming. When Saudi Arabia peaks, that's essentially the world peak. We have technology to avert this kind of trauma to the economy, but it's basically being ignored because of so many reasons. The Air powered vehicles in my signature are just one example of current low cost technology that can be put into the market right now, but it still takes money in the form of investments to get that happening. If we were smart we'd be getting that production happening now, but instead we're talking about fuel cells in 20 years! What a joke! We have misleaders in our government doing everything possible to increase oil consumption while trying to maintain a facade of environmentalism... Very frustrating, but that's what we've gotten ourselves into.

 

Well, I'd tend to agree that not all companies would voluntarily do some things. Cleaning the water, maybe not unless the EPA was there. But the WFGD and cogens they do and whatever incentives there are just lace their pockets with green cash. These two things would be done anyways as the tech puts money in their pockets.

For myself the only reason I bought my Ford Escape Hybrid, and I'm sure it was the wrong reason, is that Federal and State will get me over $7,000 bucks back, my old Wrangler got only 16 MPG and I needed the room. So, maybe I got a hybrid for the wrong reasons, namely, to save the green in my back pocket. I guess I'm no better than corporations, then.

My next project is a rammed earth house with solar power/water. Kinda wierd for a 'tree hugging Republican', eh?

Are these air cars available in the US? How about thos little Smart Cars from Daimler?

 

smart cars should be soon, Air Cars, no. The Air Cars could be, if someone wanted to spend the money on a manufacturing plant, but generally there's not much interest yet in the US. Mexico, Spain, France, the UK and a few other places are investing in plants. One of the benefits is that the technology is cheap to manufacture, cars are expected to cost around $8000, even though each facility will only produce ~2000 cars a year. Supposedly there are some people from around here who are interested in getting a licence (they went to the investor's meeting) so we'll see how that goes. They are also still in the development stage, finalizing the various manufacturing processes and improving the efficiency as well as developping other technology such a co-generation and large vehicles. It's a slow process without the buckets of money to spend as other already established manufacturers have available for R&D.