Unfortunately, recommendations need to be practical.
It takes many decades to come up with “high-speed intercity electric rail” and “intra-city light rail” and “locally grown food” and all the rest. [Northern New Jersey will NOT be growing large quantities of food in the near future … unless perhaps they start with “Soylent Green”!]
The geography of the United States is radically different from the geography of Europe or Japan. Distances in the U.S. are much longer. And, at least along the East coast, there are a lot of rivers and hills that create sharp curves, river crossings and steep grades … all of which cause slower speeds. Currently, AMTRAK’s rail capacity is about filled up. So extra trackage would be be needed; that would require extensive condemnation of private property, not to mention YEARS of environmental impact statements.
Yeah, yeah, MAGLEV magnetic levitation ]. Maglev can get us “trains” that can travel at 300 mph or more. But the curves and accelerations and decelerations would be harsh (to say the least), not to mention the problems associated with acquisition of the right-of-way, etc, etc, etc. It’s not much more than an amusement park ride at this point. You’re not going to be able to mix slow freights and fast passenger service on the same set of “tracks” [yeah, yeah, guideways].
If the situation is so dire that the “crossover” point for “peak oil” would occur within five years, then there is almost nothing that can be done within that time frame.
It DOES, however, create an obligation on the part of the popularizers of the notion of “peak oil” to examine and re-examine their data. Consider that all of the previous advocates of “peak oil” were just plain wrong. We need to examine WHY all of those forecasters were wrong. Where did they err? What happened?!!!
In each case, the existing reserves turned out to be much more plentiful than the forecasters had estimated. NOT ONLY, were the existing reserves plentiful and not scarce, but also many commercial and industrial processors converted to petrochemical applications instead of away from petrochemicals. The costs of petrochemicals became cheaper rather than more expensive than the alternatives.
In addition, new oil supplies were discovered, to the extent that enough reserves were calculated to exist that needs for the foreseeable future could be accommodated.
Now, we have new oil discoveries near Brazil and near Mexico. Seems like new discoveries are happening on a weekly basis.
And that’s just oil. Natural gas seems to be abundant. As is coal. Nuke is enjoying a resurgence.
Yes, the low-hanging fruit has been picked, so that the newer discoveries cost more to access. Whoopee-do. That’s normal. As costs increase, existing fields will be the recipients of more sophisticated management … and who knows … maybe some of those third world dictatorships will loosen up a little and give up some aspects of the command economy.
Meanwhile, folks are ordering whole fleets of the Super Jumbo Airbus A-380 aircraft (seating about twice the number of passengers as a Boeng 747 [depending on configuration). Obviously, those folks … many of which are located in Middle East oil countries … think that they can get all the oil they want over the next 50 or 100 years.
drpmjhess;2999221 said:
Doug50, what does being “up on the issue” mean for Mitt Romney? I hate to be cynical, but what can any politician do who really understands the predicament? You can’t just tell people to abandon their McMansions and move closer to electric rail lines. You can’t expect them willingly to trade in their SUVs for hybrid vehicles. Of course, you can exercise leadership in pushing for high-speed intercity electric rail, and for intra-city light rail. And you can educate people about the the need for smaller families, for buying locally-grown food, for telecommuting from home offices, and for taking more local less oil-intensive vacations. I hope the next president takes such leadership.
Happy Thanksgiving,
Petrus
