Peak Everything

Richard Heinberg's new book.

Telling it like it is, almost

Chevron's ad campaign, The Power of Human Energy.

a closer look at biofuels

The National Geographic October 2007 article, Green Dreams, takes an in-depth look at biofuels, especially ethanol.

ignoring the obvious

In his memoir, or at least from this Newsweek excerpt, Alan Greenspan projects into the future, with no mention of peak oil. Similarly with the upcoming CNN series, Planet in Peril. (CNN did at least once reprise its documentary, We Were Warned, now with added label Out of Gas; see transcription and classroom guide.) Can no one see the forest for the trees?

energy players

Fareed Zakaria continues his series of interviews. Here's one with Chris Somerville. Zakaria asks:

Are biofuels going to get us out of the energy trap?

What trap, Mr. Zakaria doesn't explain.

Earlier Mr. Zakaria interviewed Lovins on efficiency, Raymond on oil and Hefner on natural gas. Of Raymond, Zakaria asks:

Do you think the world is running out of oil?

Raymond's answer:

As the study says, the world is not running out of the resource. The problem we're getting into is the question, can we develop it in a timely way, given the constraints we have on the political front, the economic front, and just the time it takes to get things done?

Mr. Zakaria in an earlier piece wonders:

I don't know if the world is running out of oil, a subject of heated debate.

See my earlier posts on Raymond and on Lovins, here and here.

The World without Us

Alan Weisman's book is reviewed in July's Scientific American as well as in Newsweek . The latter refers to a Voluntary Human Extinction Movement, established 1996. Slate comments on the subject here.

Regarding how we might get there, in the Newsweek 7/30/07 issue, Jonathan Alter writes thusly about Norman Borlaug:

In only a few years, his ideas—which go far beyond seed varieties—had spread around the world and disproved Malthusian doomsday scenarios like Paul Ehrlich's 1968 best seller "The Population Bomb."

One Curtis Palmer comments on Alter's piece:

Dr. Borlaug labored to provide a food supply for the supply of people. He has to his credit an amazing achievement. The problem however, has never been the supply of food, it is the supply of people, and that remains to be addressed. If we don't adddress it in the near term it will correct itself, but that will likely be brutal. Even Dr. Borlaug believes that with little land left available to be put into food production that mass starvation will not be prevented through his work, just delayed (and magnified due to population increase). Inceases in crop yield may still be possible to compensate for further population growth but eventually we will reach the end of this particular Malthusian rope.

The Malthusian catastrophe looms large. See Albert Bartlett's letter to Physics Today and the DieOff site.

The History Channel has produced an extensive series based Weisman's book, Life After People.

local considerations

in the California desert. Per the Riverside County Press Enterprise, green efforts. See also the work of Berkeley professor Tad Patzek on ethanol and energy.

Black (oil) Humour

from down under
and satire from the not-so-frozen north (belongs in Ripley's)

Chevron Human Energy TV Campaign

Now showing on a tv near you and on Chevron's website, from the manhole commercial:

Some say that by 2020 we’ll have used up half the world’s oil. Some say we already have. Making the other half last longer will take innovation, conservation…and collaboration. Will you join us?

When exactly is (or was) the peak? Does it much matter? Chevron says "it's clear, the era of cheap oil is over." What exactly happens when oil demand outstrips supply? Do we understand what we all face with shortages?

Earth Day 2007

Sundance Channel aired the documentary, A Crude Awakening: The Oil Crash. A wider audience may have thus been introduced to this frightening subject, but as one narrator commented, I'm paraphrasing, we are somehow unable to come to terms with it. It's available on Netflix (and as of July 08, on Netflix Instant & Roku).

Update: The film was released theatrically in the UK on November 9, 2007; BBC referred to that release in its coverage of record oil prices. Also from the UK, in Masterpiece Theater's, The Amazing Mrs. Pritchard, one theme is global warming and the Kyoto Protocol.

Leading up to Earth Day, Newsweek covered the environment in this April issue but, as usual for the general media, conflates peak oil with global warming, and skirts the implications for both.

Even simpler and less convenient

From this British site:

Everyday in the news, we hear of the threat of climate change. There are international conferences, television documentaries, books galore.

(and an Academy Award and a possible Nobel Peace Prize)

But there is a danger whose consequences will be far more destructive and which will hit us much sooner. It is a danger that will effect everybody, rich or poor, wherever they live in the world. It will require enormous financial and scientific strides to defeat, strides which the world’s governments show few signs of taking. It is a danger which, quite feasibly, could lead to the end of our industrial civilisation. It is the danger of peak oil.

From another British site, here's an overview of the subject.

Oil on the Brain

NPR : Lisa Margonelli, Concerned with 'Oil on the Brain'

See also NPR's collection, Paying at the Pump.

Verboten

In this Newsweek column, George Will contends with Mr. Bush's global warming comment in his SOTU speech . All well and good, except for these paragraphs:

It could cost tens of trillions (in expenditures and foregone economic growth, here and in less-favored parts of the planet) to try to fine-tune the planet's temperature. We cannot know if these trillions would purchase benefits commensurate with the benefits that would have come from social wealth that was not produced.

and

Another reason (for his fascination with new fuels), he says, is U.S. imports of oil from unstable nations.

One of our greatest pundits, Mr. Will, by focusing on the 'foreign' aspect, doesn't recognize the essential role oil itself plays in our economy. He fails to ask the question: what happens when demand exceeds the supply? Can the economy (and social well-being) be sustained, nevermind expand?

Mr. Will correctly questions the assumptions regarding ethanol. He's generous when he says:

Ethanol produces just slightly more energy than it takes to manufacture it

Back to the SOTU, Mr. Bush suggests:

Let us build on the work we've done and reduce gasoline usage in the United States by 20 percent in the next 10 years.

Is there the option not to, willy-nilly.
Peak Oil Cassandra I

Betting the farm

President Bush had more to say about energy in SOTU 2007 compared to last but without the catch phrase, America is addicted to oil.

Extending hope and opportunity depends on a stable supply of energy that keeps America's economy running and America's environment clean. For too long our nation has been dependent on foreign oil. And this dependence leaves us more vulnerable to hostile regimes, and to terrorists -- who could cause huge disruptions of oil shipments, and raise the price of oil, and do great harm to our economy.

It's in our vital interest to diversify America's energy supply -- the way forward is through technology. We must continue changing the way America generates electric power, by even greater use of clean coal technology, solar and wind energy, and clean, safe nuclear power. (Applause.) We need to press on with battery research for plug-in and hybrid vehicles, and expand the use of clean diesel vehicles and biodiesel fuel. (Applause.) We must continue investing in new methods of producing ethanol -- (applause) -- using everything from wood chips to grasses, to agricultural wastes.

We made a lot of progress, thanks to good policies here in Washington and the strong response of the market. And now even more dramatic advances are within reach. Tonight, I ask Congress to join me in pursuing a great goal. Let us build on the work we've done and reduce gasoline usage in the United States by 20 percent in the next 10 years. (Applause.) When we do that we will have cut our total imports by the equivalent of three-quarters of all the oil we now import from the Middle East.

To reach this goal, we must increase the supply of alternative fuels, by setting a mandatory fuels standard to require 35 billion gallons of renewable and alternative fuels in 2017 -- and that is nearly five times the current target. (Applause.) At the same time, we need to reform and modernize fuel economy standards for cars the way we did for light trucks -- and conserve up to 8.5 billion more gallons of gasoline by 2017.

Achieving these ambitious goals will dramatically reduce our dependence on foreign oil, but it's not going to eliminate it. And so as we continue to diversify our fuel supply, we must step up domestic oil production in environmentally sensitive ways. (Applause.) And to further protect America against severe disruptions to our oil supply, I ask Congress to double the current capacity of the Strategic Petroleum Reserve. (Applause.)

America is on the verge of technological breakthroughs that will enable us to live our lives less dependent on oil. And these technologies will help us be better stewards of the environment, and they will help us to confront the serious challenge of global climate change. (Applause.)

The White House expands on this theme with this web site.

We need a Manhattan project. What we're getting is smoke and mirrors.



An MSNBC editor John Schoen, whose articles I've reviewed before, comments on Mr. Bush's speech and its implications. He speaks of subsidies to the ethanol industry, as well as the following two items:

Higher prices for the natural gas — needed to generate heat to brew ethanol — has also gone up.

and

The administration is relying on another “safety value” — a technology to produce ethanol from the cellulose in corn stalks and other plants like switchgrass that can be produced more cheaply than corn. So far, this so-called “cellulosic” process is much more expensive than corn-based ethanol. Major research breakthroughs will be required to make it economically competitive.

The first point hints that much in the way of fossil fuels is needed for ethanol production. Heat for fermentation is only one of the energy inputs. See my earlier posts about EROEI, energy returned on energy invested.

The second point reflects a contradiction between claim and fact. Remember, Mr Bush claimed:

America is on the verge of technological breakthroughs

but Mr. Schoen points out that a process (from switchgrass cellulose) that is supposed to be cheaper (read: requiring fewer energy inputs) than corn, turns out to be "much more expensive".

An MSNBC blogger, Alan Boyle, explores the SOTU energy implications here from a more scientific viewpoint.

Worthy of note is the new Congress' 100 hours legislation on energy:

We will energize America by achieving energy independence, and we will begin by rolling back the multi-billion dollar subsidies for Big Oil.
H.R. 6, "Creating Long-Term Energy Alternatives for the Nation Act." passed 264-163, Jan. 18th, 2007

What if

Here's a terrifying dramatization (just shown again) on Discovery Science, What If: The Oil Runs Out.

Slowly a consensus has emerged. Oil, the lifeblood of modern societies, is going to peak then decline irreversibly. Oil will be used for decades to come, but the era of surplus, conventional oil is ending, and we are not prepared.

Mathew Simmons' first words are:

If we have a shortage, it's a lights out event.

Also narrating are: Paul Domjan , Neil McMahon, an analyst at Sanford Bernstein, and Andrew Curry of the Henley Centre Consultancy. Get the bittorent here.

Blending drama and documentary, the IF series returns with a film investigating a scenario many experts fear will come true.

When the cheap oil we depend on starts to run out, we may not be able to take anything for granted any more.

Drama
It is 2016 and the world is in crisis.

Global supplies of oil cannot keep up with soaring demand and the price of petrol is going through the roof.

The oil companies are in a desperate race to find any remaining oil reserves but what happens if there is no more out there?

Combining expert interviews with a fictional story line, the drama-documentary examines how our lives will change as the price of fuel starts to spiral out of control.

The film interweaves the story of Jess, an exploration geologist working for an international oil company, with the impact of the fuel crisis on her parents back home in Minneapolis.

Instability in the Middle East has caused an "oil shock" and the price of crude is rising day by day.

At the start of the film it is around $85 (£45) a barrel - in spring 2006 it is about $65 (£34) - but by the end of the drama the price has climbed to $160 (£85).

As the story unfolds, expert interviewees - including Paul Domjan, Former Energy Security Adviser at the US Dept of Defence, oil analyst Matt Simmons and the legendary former Saudi Arabian Minister of Oil, Sheikh Yamani - explain how the crisis will have an effect on every part of our lives.

We will not just be paying a lot more - £2.35 per litre or $5.88 per US gallon - to fill up our cars, we will be charged much higher prices for food, heating and light.

Long distance travel will become increasingly expensive and we will even think carefully before using the car for what we used to regard as routine trips to the shops.

Recession

As the economy goes into recession, Jess's parents find their world collapsing around them.

Also on Discovery, Clean Fuels.

From Newsweek: The New Coal Car. The article makes the claim:

With the world's largest coal reserves, the United States has enough coal to power the country for another century at least.

However, such claims are based on current usage levels, not the ones that would be required for complete replacement of oil usage.

grasping at straws

Over $100 million has been spent on Proposition 87 on California's ballot, a large sum. Bill Clinton and Al Gore have been featured in ads favoring the cause. One such ad states:

Imagine if we can stop being dependent on foreign oil. Brazil did it.
They made a simple change to their cars. Switched to ethanol, grown from their own crops.
If Brazil could do it, so could California.

Mr. Clinton promulgates similar themes with his Global Initiative, a recent meeting of which was critiqued thusly in TNR.

How true are the above claims? I've looked at them before, in Brazil and ethanol and ethanol, the panacea. Recently, Robert Rapier, at The Oil Drum, points out:

Brazil’s energy independence miracle was 10% ethanol and 90% domestic crude oil production.

This is astonishing and at such great odds with the basic pro-87 premise, especially when one considers that:

• Brazilian ethanol is also subsidized by government
• Enriching the well-connected
  
• Sugar cane grown in a tropical clime captures much more solar energy than anything in California and
  
• The environmental destruction is great
  

Tad Patzek of U.C. Berkeley also seriously doubts the pro-87 hype. Mr. Patzek took part in an ezine discussion about ethanol about which he comments:

My 1-hour working meeting with Mr. Khosla was *not* a debate. We both tried to establish points of mutual agreement and disagreement. While certainly there was agreement on several key issues, there was also significant, one might say fundamental, disagreement on biofuels. I find the biofuel focus of Proposition 87 to be inconsistent with the very survival of life diversity and key ecosystems on the Earth and, consequently, I do not favor Proposition 87.

Scientific American this year devotes its September special focus issue, as with part of last, to Energy's Future - Beyond Carbon. Again the emphasis is on global warming rather than fossil fuel depletion. Daniel M. Kammen (a Berkeley professor like Mr. Patzek) is author of the article, The Rise of Renewable Energy, in which he writes:

When all the inputs and outputs were correctly factored in, we found that ethanol has a positive net energy...

Mr. Patzek would strongly dispute that contention and others by Mr. Kammen.

Update (06-11-09): California Proposition 87 was defeated 55% to 45%. Also, from an analyst local to my area, Ethanol experiment goes off track.

Update (07-1-2): Scientific American publishes article Is Ethanol for the Long Haul?
summarized thus. The author, Matthew L. Wald, is a reporter for the N.Y. Times; puzzlingly, his scientific credentials are not listed in Sciam. Here's another article of his on the subject.

media

Tv
CBS: Greener Horizons
BBC: Fueling the Future, Education
PBS: EXTREME OIL

Press
NY Times: The Energy Challenge
Chicago Tribune: Oil:A Travelogue of Addiction

Radio
NPR: Paying at the Pump

Videos, etc
See my earlier post, Materials on energy

what elephant?

Banksy's L.A. living room

myopia writ large

One month does not a civilization make. What part of the word 'finite' do the pundits not understand? Here's more cornucopia from Newsweek. Mr. Maugeri writes:

Suddenly the alarmists who foresaw an imminent era of oil scarcity are silent

Not me.

As this bleak scenario gained acceptance, it became easy to assume that the price of oil would defy the laws of gravity and break the barrier of $100 per barrel.

Appealing to the laws of physics, now that's a first.

But a bit farther out, between roughly 2010 and 2012, there is a good chance that supply trends will overtake demand, raising spare production capacity to a range between 7 to 10 percent of demand.

Methinks we've heard that before. Higher prices lead to more investment lead to more oil, nevermind geology. Mr. Maugeri concludes with more gobbledygook:

..., contrary to all the scare scenarios, ... China's oil-consumption growth has the potential to ease substantially, while in most industrial countries consumption growth is approaching zero and may start to drop.

and

One thing is certain: if prices should drop significantly before the investments now underway reach the point of no return, they could come to a screeching halt, precipitating another price spike.

Newsweek also presents an article on Big Oil's malaise, two factors being:

the maturing of old reserves and more and more risky exploration projects

Left unspecified are which reserves have matured and how significant a role they play in the global oil picture. Could those include the venerable Saudi fields?

a tank of gas, a world of trouble

See the Chicago Tribune's investigative report, Oil: a Travelogue of Addiction .