Petroleum and the future of civilization

[ribozyme]

Oh please…

You see, the solution it seems for many means maintaining our current way of life at all costs. The solution is fine as long as I can keep my Hummer, shop at WalMart and consume cheap **** from China.

Technology is merely a tool, not an answer.

Does the thought of losing your car, cel phone, internet connection, and NASCAR scare you?

NASCAR doesn’t scare me, but it scares me that the Singularity will never happen unless humanity solves this.

The actual gambit is much higher than cellular phones, Internet, transportation, personal computers. Like I said, humanity will never witness the Singularity. That makes me dyspeptic.

 

[Mr.Bee]

NASCAR doesn’t scare me, but it scares me that the Singularity will never happen unless humanity solves this.

Well, yeah. It is up to humanity to solve it. And we have many wonderful things at our disposal to help solve these dilemmas. but we rely on our technology alone to provide the answers.

And… the solutions and outcomes don’t need to be scary and horrible.

 

[Doug50]

Oh please…

You see, the solution it seems for many means maintaining our current way of life at all costs. The solution is fine as long as I can keep my Hummer, shop at WalMart and consume cheap **** from China.

Technology is merely a tool, not an answer.

Does the thought of losing your car, cel phone, internet connection, and NASCAR scare you?

Not me. I actually like living simpler but the thought of my kids/grandkids living an Amish lifestyle is almost funny…talk about culture shock

I see a rebirth of small town communities where you actually buy your stuff from the local market, and that includes things like chickens and eggs comming from the local farmers.

And you’re right about technology. Technology has been a net user of energy. The higher the tech societies have become the more energy those society have required.

Economic growth…you can’t grow your economy if you can’t grow your enegy supply to feed it. The law of substitution only holds if there is something to substitute for that is more cost effiicient - wood to coal, coal to oil, and oil to what. A problem the US faces is that our economy must grow at an annualized 2% growth rate just to service our debt. At a 2% rate that means our economic wealth (our GDP) would double in 35 years. Where’s the energy going to come from to feed this growth when oil, natural gas, and even coal supplies are going to be strained?

 

[Al_Masetti]

For being the most technologically advanced society to ever have existed, we have done an outstanding job of having dropped the ball with respect to nuclear-powered electrical power.

We have let some environmental extremists allow France to take the lead with building nukes, for goodness sake.

Drilling more oil and gas wells may not solve the WHOLE problem, but it can solve a lot of the problem … make a dent in it. But more environmental extremists have precluded that. To the extent that CHINA, for goodness sake, is drilling off the Florida coast … where our folks won’t let us drill.

We can do a lot in terms of food preservation by using irradiation. But the average person’s knowledge of chemistry and physics is so weak, they don’t understand how it works and are prey to fear mongers.

Not so sure the government does such a hot job running a space program. And the military procurement bureaucracy is going to get us all killed with their foot-dragging, bean-counting, 9-5 mentality.

Yeah it is funny and I agree with him…but that’s not what we’re talking about here.

American is the most technologically advanced society to ever have existed. Yet it hasn’t solved its future’s energy delima. At one time the US was a creditor nation. Then domestic oil peaked in 1970 and from that time forward we became a debtor nation. I was courious if you’d read my links. Apparently you do not. Read the Richard Smalley link where he gives an opinion as to how we’ll have to deal with the energy problem in the 21st century.

As far as the government goes there are some things that governments do better than private industry…like running a military or a space organization.

 

[Ridgerunner]

I have read a good number of the posts, but, gee, there sure are a lot of them. So if this is redundant, please ignore it.

My grandmother had a railroad pass because my grandfather worked for the railroad. She patronized the local stores, but when she wanted special things, she rode on a train to St. Louis, over 250 miles away for one day of shopping, and thought nothing of it. She got on the train in the early morning, arrived in St. Louis in late morning, much more quickly than one could drive it now. The train station was in downtown St. Louis. The stores were all in large buildings to which you could easily walk. They started not a block away. She would shop, then go back and get on the train and be home in the evening. The passenger cars were spacious and far more comfortable than planes are now. There was a dining car and a club car. She could sleep if she wanted. Nowadays, that shopping trip would knock a person cold no matter how they did it, because there is no passenger service anymore. There were so many passenger trains, you could get on one to go wherever you wanted several times a day. You didn’t need the train to go 400 mph. You would get where you wanted to go at 100mph faster than you can get there now by either automobile or plane, if the waits and scheduling of the latter are taken into account.

Her house, like all houses at the time, was on a fairly small lot, and all of the houses were pretty close together. Families typically had one car and people were so close to business and industrial areas they could easily walk. Little grocery stores were scattered all over the residential areas. My grandparents (over) heated their home with coal, and their petroleum consumption was very small compared to mine. Interestingly, except for central air, their basic home machinery wasn’t terribly different from mine.

A big part of the difference was that railroad passenger service was there and inexpensive, and towns and cities were built for that, and for low automobile use. What people don’t realize is that railroad passenger service was ALWAYS subsidized. The railroads did it because they were required by the government to do it. Railroad rights of way and huge tracts of land were given to them by the government; every alternate section all along the right of way. Their freight rates were regulated, but the cost of passenger traffic was built into them.

Automobile traffic is also heavily subsidized. Government builds and maintains the highways; gives tax breaks to the oil companies. The extreme distances utility lines have to go even in cities is dictated by the wide spacing automobile traffic allows for.

Government greatly affects energy use. And it does it in many, many ways. For myself, I don’t think it has done us too many favors.

 

[Doug50]

Ridgerunner, I hear you and I think that’s were we are headed again. I live in a small town. When I was a kid the population was about 1200. Yet we had 3 grocery stores (now 1), 4 auto dealers (now 1), clothing and shoe store (now 0), etc.

I remember my aunt, who sewed a lot, using a foot pumped sewing machine. She’d walk to the bus station to go to the next town for medical or other shopping. And the thing is most people did just as her.

The problem I see with going back to this lifestyle is we have now built, and zoned for, suburban cities that can’t survive a demished gas supply to fuel the needed cars suburbia requires. And add to that the increased population the US now has that it didn’t have in the 1930-50’s.

 

[ribozyme]

For being the most technologically advanced society to ever have existed, we have done an outstanding job of having dropped the ball with respect to nuclear-powered electrical power.

We have let some environmental extremists allow France to take the lead with building nukes, for goodness sake.
.

Shame how that regressive culture with universal health care and 35 hour work weeks uses nuclear power profusely. I wonder how their meddling bureaucracy would allow that. There’s always someone to blame; if it is not the progressives, it is enviromental extremists.

I actually support nuclear power; I think it kills less people than using fossil fuels.

 

[Ridgerunner]

Ridgerunner, I hear you and I think that’s were we are headed again. I live in a small town. When I was a kid the population was about 1200. Yet we had 3 grocery stores (now 1), 4 auto dealers (now 1), clothing and shoe store (now 0), etc.

I remember my aunt, who sewed a lot, using a foot pumped sewing machine. She’d walk to the bus station to go to the next town for medical or other shopping. And the thing is most people did just as her.

The problem I see with going back to this lifestyle is we have now built, and zoned for, suburban cities that can’t survive a demished gas supply to fuel the needed cars suburbia requires. And add to that the increased population the US now has that it didn’t have in the 1930-50’s.

I’m afraid you’re right about the way suburbia is built. Still, the cars don’t have to be BMW 740s to get around at 35 mph. That’s what you need on the interestates to keep from being swept off the road or beaten to pieces, not in suburbia.

The passenger trains were once so frequent and varied that my father used to take one to visit his grandmother in a town not more than five miles away. On the other hand, there were more than one a day that would take you straight through to St. Louis.

Not far from here, in a grouping of fair-sized towns, they once had electric streetcars that connected to other towns 10-30 miles distant from each other.

Notwithstanding the way suburbia is set up, I think mass transit could still work for distant travel, with low-consumption vehicles for local transit.

I don’t think greater population is a deterrent. I think the opposite is true. I know it’s politically incorrect to say it, but I think this country as a whole is underpopulated, which is one of the reasons distant travel is so pervasive. Mine is not all that unpopulated a state, and we have two large cities. Still, depending on where I go, I can drive for two hours or more in this state and not see more than 50 houses the whole way. I can drive into two neighboring states and, depending on where I go, see even fewer. In the northern part of the state, a super-rich farming area, you can go through town after town that’s all but abandoned; mile after mile after mile of nothing but cornfields. I can drive across the southern part, from the west where I live, through mile after mile of nothing but forest, then into delta country where it’s almost nothing but cottonfields as far as the eye can see. Yet, in my immediate part of the state and in a piece of another one, which is considered “rural”, there are a million people within an oval-shaped area about 50 miles by 75 miles as the crow flies. Strange to tell, it doesn’t seem at all overcrowded, because businesses and industries are well dispersed and lots of people live in the countryside. And the environment is very clean. Agriculturally, we’re in the worst part of the state, but what we do have is jobs. I realize jobs can’t be produced by wishing it. But from the sheer standpoint of “room”, I truly believe this country could handle a population at least as large as Europe’s. And, the shorter the distance is to jobs, the less fuel you need to get to them. In a place like this, if you had good, reliable, comfortable mass transit, you could save a lot of fuel. But it would require subsidizing, just as highways do.

 

[Mr.Bee]

Not me. I actually like living simpler but the thought of my kids/grandkids living an Amish lifestyle is almost funny…talk about culture shock

Economic growth…you can’t grow your economy if you can’t grow your enegy supply to feed it. The law of substitution only holds if there is something to substitute for that is more cost effiicient - wood to coal, coal to oil, and oil to what. A problem the US faces is that our economy must grow at an annualized 2% growth rate just to service our debt. At a 2% rate that means our economic wealth (our GDP) would double in 35 years. Where’s the energy going to come from to feed this growth when oil, natural gas, and even coal supplies are going to be strained?

Ah yes, I too have fantasies about being Amish. Ever had Shoofly Pie and coffee for breakfast? Oh man… that’s living! Except though, for the fact that they get up really early in the morning, I’ve never been a morning person. But if worse came to worse I’d guess I would suck it up and give up the beauty sleep.

But seriously, your comment about economic growth struck a chord, and herein lies the problem. It’s all about the economy, money trumps everything else…
But we cannot serve two masters. If we want sustainable living conditions, we’re going to have to scale back… a lot!

But I hear too many people out there that deny this and find this solution ridiculous and unreasonable because it threatens their lucrative values and freedom we all have taken for granted. The mentality of certain generations can’t come to terms with the fact that we have been wasteful and need to stop.

I’m afraid to say that we can’t have lifestyles based on reasonable demands on our resources, and keep all of our stuff at the same time.

Now, I’m not saying that we should all adopt an Amish lifestyle (although that might be the only solution?) But for it all to work everybody is going to need to scale back and strike a balance, and it’s going to hurt, both physically and in our bank accounts.

But that’s crazy talk and nobody wants to hear it.

 

[ribozyme]

Ah yes, I too have fantasies about being Amish. Ever had Shoofly Pie and coffee for breakfast? Oh man… that’s living! Except though, for the fact that they get up really early in the morning, I’ve never been a morning person. But if worse came to worse I’d guess I would suck it up and give up the beauty sleep.

I’m afraid to say that we can’t have lifestyles based on reasonable demands on our resources, and keep all of our stuff at the same time.

Now, I’m not saying that we should all adopt an Amish lifestyle (although that might be the only solution?) But for it all to work everybody is going to need to scale back and strike a balance, and it’s going to hurt, both physically and in our bank accounts.

But that’s crazy talk and nobody wants to hear it.

It really scares me. I do not want to live out my life with an Amish lifestyle. When technological innovation stops, humanity is doomed. We would either destroy ourselves, engage in tribal warfare, or live in poverty. The Singularity would be rendered impossible if our civilization runs out fuel. Humanity would have no hope… I do not know what I would do if we run out of fuel… suicide? Perhaps, as I would have no hope for the Singularity to save us. Life would seem to be bereft of any possible meaning if the Singularity is deemed an impossible goal rendering it extremely pointless.

Why did I post in this thread:

I’m afraid you’re right. I have friends and family very much like Al. They believe technology will save us from this future. These friends simply say: “They’ll come up with something to replace oil. They have too.” Or “the market will solve the problem of oil depetion.” I don’t know who they are (these techno-messiahs) or what silver bullet the market will load into the energy gun to target the problem.

I thought you said “AI” not “Al”. I’ll try to desist.

Off topic:

Anybody who believes exponential growth can go on forever in a finite world is either a madman or an economist. - Kenneth Boulding

Did I inspire you to post this? Did Ray Kurzweil inspire you to post this?

If anyone wants to be comforted you could read the material from this website:

futurepundit.com/

Has various entries about how solar and nuclear will solve this problem.

 

[ribozyme]

It really scares me. I do not want to live out my life with an Amish lifestyle. When technological innovation stops, humanity is doomed. We would either destroy ourselves, engage in tribal warfare, or live in poverty. The Singularity would be rendered impossible if our civilization runs out fuel. Humanity would have no hope… I do not know what I would do if we run out of fuel… suicide? Perhaps, as I would have no hope for the Singularity to save us. Life would seem to be bereft of any possible meaning if the Singularity is deemed an impossible goal rendering it extremely pointless.

Why did I post in this thread:

I thought you said “AI” not “Al”. I’ll try to desist.

Off topic:

Anybody who believes exponential growth can go on forever in a finite world is either a madman or an economist. - Kenneth Boulding

Did I inspire you to post this? Did Ray Kurzweil inspire you to post this?

 

[Doug50]

I’m afraid you’re right about the way suburbia is built. Still, the cars don’t have to be BMW 740s to get around at 35 mph. That’s what you need on the interestates to keep from being swept off the road or beaten to pieces, not in suburbia.

The passenger trains were once so frequent and varied that my father used to take one to visit his grandmother in a town not more than five miles away. On the other hand, there were more than one a day that would take you straight through to St. Louis.

We use to have a train run trough and service this town but in the early 1970’s the train tracks were pulled up. Now trees are all grown up where the tracks used to be. I can invision that ne day well wish that service was back. In Texas we have a governer who has grand plans to build the Texas Trans Corridor

http://www.bcsmpo.org/TransTexasCorridor.gif


Said Perry, “Some might ask, ‘Is this too big?’ I say nothing is too big for Texas when our economic security, our environment and our quality of life is at stake.”
The Trans Texas Corridor would proactively tackle a number of state problems, the governor contended. Among those problems: NAFTA-fueled increases in truck traffic, air pollution, rural economic development, transportation of hazardous materials and population growth over the next few decades that could push Texas’s tally from today’s 21 million residents to 50 million. “We need a transportation system that meets the needs of tomorrow, not one that struggles to keep up with the needs of yesterday,” said Perry.

Begs a question, If global oil production is peaking now to be followed by global declines, what are the needs for tomorrow? Who’s going to be driving these roadways? Expanding the railways make sense, at least those could be driven by an electric system.

The problem with suburbia is population density per square foot. To use an extreem example 5 thousand sailor can live on the USS Ronald Reagan. The ship takes up an area of 4 acears. If you look at new ski resort developments the developers have to plan for the effecient use of every square foot of land to max their profits, so the population desity is less then a super carrier but more dense than suburia KEYSTONE VILLAGE or River Run Village. Even with the cold temps notice people are walking, no cars. Yet a typical town having zone codes to reasonable mimic a higher end ski resort is do able. In fact that is very much how the Old World towns/villages of Europe were traditionally built. Just like this ski resorts the shop were on the bottom floors while a lot of the living was on the upper.

In most cities, however, zoning developments that encourage walking like these are illigal. The problem with low density suburbia is that mass transit isn’t viable while the skii resort model is.

 

[Ridgerunner]

We use to have a train run trough and service this town but in the early 1970’s the train tracks were pulled up. Now trees are all grown up where the tracks used to be. I can invision that ne day well wish that service was back. In Texas we have a governer who has grand plans to build the Texas Trans Corridor

http://www.bcsmpo.org/TransTexasCorridor.gif
http://www.siteselection.com/ssinsider/images/sf020218a.jpg

Said Perry, “Some might ask, ‘Is this too big?’ I say nothing is too big for Texas when our economic security, our environment and our quality of life is at stake.”
The Trans Texas Corridor would proactively tackle a number of state problems, the governor contended. Among those problems: NAFTA-fueled increases in truck traffic, air pollution, rural economic development, transportation of hazardous materials and population growth over the next few decades that could push Texas’s tally from today’s 21 million residents to 50 million. “We need a transportation system that meets the needs of tomorrow, not one that struggles to keep up with the needs of yesterday,” said Perry.

Begs a question, If global oil production is peaking now to be followed by global declines, what are the needs for tomorrow? Who’s going to be driving these roadways? Expanding the railways make sense, at least those could be driven by an electric system.

The problem with suburbia is population density per square foot. To use an extreem example 5 thousand sailor can live on the USS Ronald Reagan. The ship takes up an area of 4 acears. If you look at new ski resort developments the developers have to plan for the effecient use of every square foot of land to max their profits, so the population desity is less then a super carrier but more dense than suburia KEYSTONE VILLAGE or River Run Village. Even with the cold temps notice people are walking, no cars. Yet a typical town having zone codes to reasonable mimic a higher end ski resort is do able. In fact that is very much how the Old World towns/villages of Europe were traditionally built. Just like this ski resorts the shop were on the bottom floors while a lot of the living was on the upper.

In most cities, however, zoning developments that encourage walking like these are illigal. The problem with low density suburbia is that mass transit isn’t viable while the skii resort model is.

Your pictures are interesting. I had to think, though, that if the plan results in extremely efficient transport of both freight and passengers, the artist put too many vehicles on the highway.

 

[Doug50]

Your pictures are interesting. I had to think, though, that if the plan results in extremely efficient transport of both freight and passengers, the artist put too many vehicles on the highway.

and think of it this way: if the TTC goes delevopment the strip of land needed is estimated to be 1/4 mile wide.

 

[Mr.Bee]

It really scares me. I do not want to live out my life with an Amish lifestyle. When technological innovation stops, humanity is doomed. We would either destroy ourselves, engage in tribal warfare, or live in poverty. The Singularity would be rendered impossible if our civilization runs out fuel. Humanity would have no hope… I do not know what I would do if we run out of fuel… suicide? Perhaps, as I would have no hope for the Singularity to save us. Life would seem to be bereft of any possible meaning if the Singularity is deemed an impossible goal rendering it extremely pointless.

Why did I post in this thread: .

Wow… I would lighten up my tech-savvy friend, I think hopefully things won’t get that bad.

But you do prove a point about a prevailing attitude that need to change if humanity is going to survive. I think technology is a wonderful thing, science is a gift from God.

But lets say for instance: your Dad give you a set of tools for Christmas, and you are thrilled with the gift and have big plans to make and fix things with these tools, but forgetting to thank the person who gave them to you. The beloved tool box becomes the center of attention and one begins to worship the gift, not the one who provided it.

A stupid example but the only one I could come up with.

But I see too many people out there worshipping their beloved technology, with cell phones glued to their ears and driving fancy cars to further their self-centered existance. I’m afraid that this attitude conjures the belief that food comes from McDonalds, or if you’re an eco-minded organic consumer, it comes from Whole Foods all neatly displayed. But in reality it comes from people like the Amish, or it will in a few years.

Technology is telling us to control population to reduce the carbon footprint. God is telling us to have more family run farms.

We can keep our technology, but lets not let it rule our lives

 

[Ridgerunner]

But I see too many people out there worshipping their beloved technology, with cell phones glued to their ears and driving fancy cars to further their self-centered existance. I’m afraid that this attitude conjures the belief that food comes from McDonalds, or if you’re an eco-minded organic consumer, it comes from Whole Foods all neatly displayed. But in reality it comes from people like the Amish, or it will in a few years.

Technology is telling us to control population to reduce the carbon footprint. God is telling us to have more family run farms.

We can keep our technology, but lets not let it rule our lives

There are Amish and Amish. Some are just as commercial as we “English”, as they call the rest of us. What I think people consider the “Amish” way is horse-drawn, hand-made kind of production. That way of farming once absorbed the work of most of the families in the U.S., and their surplus was so limited that food was much more expensive, relatively speaking, than now. It’s picturesque, but it’s very inefficient.

It was the era in which, as the poem goes “Oh God! That bread should be so dear and flesh and blood so cheap!”

What level of population is technology telling us is optimal, and based on what? Before the turn of the century, population could have been said to have been optimal, given the resources and methods of the time. The vast number of horses it took to keep transportation and farming going consumed nearly half of all agricultural production. The pollution from manure was absolutely staggering. The percentage of land under cultivation then was greater than now.

Somebody earlier said Texas has a population of 21 million. Texas is about the same size as France, which has a population over 60 million. Texas’ population today is less than that of France during the height of the Roman Empire. And France is one of the least crowded countries in Western Europe.

Some thought needs to be given as well to the plummeting birth rates in the industrialized countries. Likely, population control in the U.S. is not even worth thinking about. If it becomes a problem in the next 20-30 years, the excess can always move to Europe, which will be emptying out rapidly by then. Well, and that much smaller European population won’t have nearly the need for fuel they have now, or the money with which to buy it.

 

[CalmDownWisWins]

It really scares me. I do not want to live out my life with an Amish lifestyle. When technological innovation stops, humanity is doomed. We would either destroy ourselves, engage in tribal warfare, or live in poverty. The Singularity would be rendered impossible if our civilization runs out fuel. Humanity would have no hope… I do not know what I would do if we run out of fuel… suicide? Perhaps, as I would have no hope for the Singularity to save us. Life would seem to be bereft of any possible meaning if the Singularity is deemed an impossible goal rendering it extremely pointless.

Your “anxiety” is precisely why there should be to you no God but God, and God is not “that which facilitates the singularity”.

You now have faith in mankind’s ability to generate what is necessary for the production of the singularity. This is your faith.

You now have hope that you will experience the singularity, as it would give you immortality. This is your hope.

You now do what you can do to help the coming of the singularity. This is your charity.

It is good that you realize the value of faith, hope and charity. It would be better if those virtues were in the service of the object for which they were created.

When the inevitable setback towards the creation of the singularity occurs, and yet another 3,000 years needs to elapse before the conditions are conducive to creating the singularity, what will be the object of your faith hope and charity?

Your religious capacity is large, as witnessed by your strong belief in such a thing as “the singularity”, and may you become a true champion of “gaining immortality for mankind”.

 

[Al_Masetti]

Here is an excellent paper.

Well worth the read.

ABIOGENIC OR BIOGENIC PETROLEUM* by S.S. Penner* Center for Energy Research
… of Research Needs for Shale-Oil Recovery by FERWG-III" by S. S. Penner, … Committee on Advanced Fossil Energy Technologies, S. S. Penner, Chairman, Energy …
ddponline.org/ppt/06penner.pdf

 

[Ridgerunner]

Al Masetti:

Very interesting read. I have often wondered about that, because it has been known for a long time that methane percolates up constantly from the interior of the earth. I have wondered, too, whether there is any real contradiction between the biogenic and abiogenic theories. I doubt those who hold the latter view would necessarily say there is.

If, say, subduction does carry large quantities of accumulated organic material under impermeable formations, and/or if, simply, such material is covered over and over again by sedimentation that becomes impermeable, then without question percolating methane would become an “ingredient”, as it were, of the petroleum “stew”. I have never seen anyone speculate on whether this percolation is perhaps a “necessary ingredient” in the formation of petroleum as we know it.

But I have never seen, and the article touches on it but doesn’t quite get into it, any kind of estimate as to the rate of accumulation of such percolation under impermeable covers.
Obviously, it has not “refilled” many containments that have gone dry.

It’s interesting too, to reflect on the fact that actual recovery of oil in petroleum deposits is very low. One assumes that, at a point, the oil-bearing strata eventually become something like oil shale; full of oil but not flowing sufficiently to make recovery worthwhile by conventional means.

If one considers that political choices have severely hampered exploration of even conventionally recoverable deposits (e.g., the coasts of Cal and Fla, and the desert hell that is ANWAR) it’s hard to be too optimistic in the short run about such things as recovery of oil from oil shale, plentiful as those supplies seem to be.

One suspects, however, that the pressures of economic necessity will eventually force political changes.

Thank you for citing this interesting article.

 

[edwest2]

The sky is falling. Nothing will save us.

All those billion dollar technocrats live on the same planet as the peasants. All of the renewables are coming online as investment dollars are redirected. Oil runs out as planned, new stuff appears as planned. The billionaires stay billionaires as planned.

Things will mesh together nicely as the days pass as if, oh, I don’t know, it was planned.

God bless,
Ed