Posted on 03/04/2008 11:53:59 AM PST by shoptalk
Many energy analysts view the ongoing waltz of crude prices with the mystical $100 mark -- notwithstanding the dollar's anemia -- as another sign of the beginning of the end for the oil era. "[A]t the furthest out, it will be a crisis in 2008 to 2012," declares Matthew Simmons, the most vocal voice among the "neo-peak-oil" club. Tempering this pessimism only slightly is the viewpoint gaining ground among many industry leaders, who argue that daily production by 2030 of 100 million barrels will be difficult.
In fact, we are nowhere close to reaching a peak in global oil supplies.
Given a set of assumptions, forecasting the peak-oil-point - defined as the onset of global production decline - is a relatively trivial problem. Four primary factors will pinpoint its exact timing. The trivial becomes far more complex because the four factors - resources in place (how many barrels initially underground), recovery efficiency (what percentage is ultimately recoverable), rate of consumption, and state of depletion at peak (how empty is the global tank when decline kicks in) - are inherently uncertain.
(Excerpt) Read more at online.wsj.com ...
You are correct.
You read it here on FR:
http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=59991
I have posted about the concept of recycling atmospheric CO2 many times before, and I do believe that it will be the ultimate long-term soource of transportation fuel.
The facts of life - regarding energy for transportation.
Today we obtain more than 95% of our transportation fuel from oil, and will continue to do so as long as it makes economic sense. Locating, extracting, transporting, refining, and distributing absorb about 12% of the energy content of the crude oil entering the system, leaving 88% for end-user consumption.
Nearly 3/4 of our crude oil becomes transportation fuel, with most of the rest going to industrial uses. 60% of that 3/4 becomes gasoline for light duty vehicles, with an efficiency of about 20%. 25% is diesel for trains, trucks, and other freight movement, with about 40% efficiency. And 12% becomes aircraft fuel, with about 25% efficiency.
Light liquid hydrocarbons are the transportation fuel of choice, and will remain so indefinitely because, when burned in an oxygen atmosphere, they provide the greatest energy density available that is relatively safe and easy to handle.
When the cost of crude oil rises to the point that alternate sources are economically competitive, we will STILL be using light liquid hydrocarbons as our primary transportation “fuel”. However, instead of refining it from the heavier hydrocarbons in crude oil, we will synthesize it from other sources of carbon, hydrogen, and the energy to assemble them. In other words, it will become a SECONDARY fuel - an energy VECTOR rather than a primary source.
Hydrogen as fuel is a sick joke - a boondoggle to pacify the peasants (including Congress) while they go about their real business of selling us products we want to buy. The best way to store, transport, distribute, and consume hydrogen for energy is in the same form we use today - a mixture of light liquid hydrocarbons that we call GASOLINE. A 1-gallon tank could contain 0.568 pounds of liquid hydrogen (H2) - but at a CRITICAL temperature of -400F and a pressure of about 190 PSI. Warm it up by ONE degree and you might as well juggle hand grenades.
But fill that tank with 5.625 pounds of gasoline - exactly 1 full gallon - and you will have 0.888 pounds of hydrogen in there, at atmospheric pressure and comfortable temperatures! That is 56% MORE hydrogen in the same space, in a light, unpressurized container, that ALSO includes the energy available from burning the 5.1 pounds of carbon sharing that space. And if all you wanted was the hydrogen, it could be extracted WITHOUT additional energy. Hydrogen works for the space shuttle, where cost is no object but weight (mass, really) is critical. But even there they get it off the ground with kerosene.
Almost everything else must be converted to electricity for productive use - an inefficient process, although sometimes the waste heat can be harnessed for low-level productive purposes, such as water purification and space heating. But with minor exceptions, electricity cannot be used for transportation because extension cords just are impractical for cars, boats, and airplanes.
Two major exceptions:
Train locomotives, which are powered by electric motors. Subway trains and trolleys pick up electricity along their route from 3rd rails or overhead wires. But for unpowered rail routes, diesel-electric locomotives generate the electricity on-board with diesel generators.
And electric battery power, which is used in older submarines, and more recently, hybrid cars and trucks.
I don’t know the economics of electrifying the railroads. If it works, it would reduce our total oil consumption by about 5% by shifting it to the electric grid. But it certainly would be expensive, and take a while to accomplish.
Battery technology has improved and is improving, but there are limits on the technology. It is a form of chemical energy storage, just like gasoline, except a lot heavier and less energy dense. And in terms of effieiency, charging a battery takes about 60% more energy that can be retrieved from it. Still, it provides useful intermediate storage that allows you to shift some consumption from transportation fuel to electricity from stationary sources, including available alternate sources and what will probably become the new primary source - nuclear.
Batteries have other limits, as well. Each has a maximum capacity, as well as maximum charge and discharge rates, and a maximum lifetime. The charge rate determines the minimum time required to recharge. It also sets the amount of electric power required from the grid to charge all of the batteries in use. Today’s local grid is not up to the task.
Using solar energy to process atmospheric CO2 to release oxygen and build carbon compounds is exactly what plants do - this would be just another version of it. I have read about growing algae for processing by thermal depolymerization as another approach.
Economics will determine the winner.
And you know this how?
"A man will not see what his paycheck prefers him not to see."
interesting. bookmark
That is correct. The airlifters had to land in daylight because of snafu and could no longer be ignored. If they had landed at night they might have got away with it. Russia was resupplying the Arabs. Nice Defcon 3 or so ended the entertainment.
The reason it is cheaper to get oil from abroad is political, not economic.
There is no reason to be impatient to get the world off of oil. The US alone contains enough oil to run the planet until the technology is obsolete. For the generations between now and then, oil does the job of supplying energy much more cheaply and with fewer trade-offs than anything else that is or will soon be available (other than hydro power, which is already fully exploited in the US).
I know that oil is biotic from the fact that all oil contains microorganisms which match up in the fossil record from strata in the sedimentary rock it was found.
Now, if you believe oil is abiotic you will need to find oil that does not contain any microorganisms and is found in or under an igneous rock formation.
So, until you can do that, abiotic oil is B.S. like UFO's and the Easter Bunny.
your thoughts?
Dead on! Count futures trading amongst the drivers.
Be sure not to burn up the fuel pump. Mercedes voids the warranty on their diesel engines if you use (Most all) biodiesel fuels. Not enough sulfur to help lube the pump.
Not from Vietnam, those were in use by the South Vietnamese. From US stocks in Germany and the US. Don't know that we sent any tanks, but we did send jammers for the SA-6 missile radars, which the Israelis did not have because they didn't know the Egyptians had SA-6s. All sorts of other stuff too of course, but mainly things you could stuff into a C-5 or C-141. Or Golda's 747. (I saw it at a stateside USAF base in early November of '73.)
An incredibly false choice that assumes we can only burn gasoline refined from petroleum in our cars and nothing else, ever.
In the real world, there comes an oil price point at which we will notice that we can float supertankers on the rivers of alternative fuels that have suddenly appeared.
Well, Dr. trumandogz, would you care to expound on the flaws in Dr. Gold's theory as presented in The Deep Hot Biosphere : The Myth of Fossil Fuels ?
If I'm going to pay attention to a single sentence opinion on this theory, I'll pick something like this one from the editorial reviews on the Amazon page:
Hans Bethe, Nobel Laureate: You have given many very good arguments, and I am convinced.
Read the book. It reports on holes drilled in the Canadian Shield and a similar formation in Norway or Sweden. Under all that igneous rock, they got oil.
And you will find microorganisms in and such oil.
How can it be abiotic if it contains microorganisms?
The general theory of the origin of the Earth is that it is a combination of a lot of the stuff we see in meteorites - and there's a lot of hydrocarbons in some. So, one thought question posed in the book is this: If you pile up an Earth-sized lump of the type of junk we see floating in space, how long will it take for the hydrocarbons to cook to the surface? The answer given is more time than it's been since the Earth was formed.
It's an interesting book, and worth the reading and discussion regardless which side you end up on.
As it stands today, no one has produced abiotic oil. When oil has been found in igneous rock it is not in sufficient quantities and can be traced to nearby sedimentary formations. Moreover, the microorganisms in that oil and any oil ever produced can be traced in the fossil record to correspond with the age of the formation the oil was extracted.
If someone were to drill a super deep well and extract oil that did not contain the markers of biotic oil, I would be delighted. Until then we need to deal with the reality that oil, no matter how much remains in the earth, will continue to increase in price.
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