by Starman » Wed Jun 08, 2005 7:17 pm
What's the overall context and its potential to offest Peak Oil disruptions?<br><br>We're talking a five-percent shortfall between supply and demand that could cause the global economy to crash, with serious social disruptions and long-term dislocations.<br><br>Note too, this is a tentative plan, contingent on a lot of considerations, but aided in part by the growing (yet still tiny) public awareness, esp. among big Banks, financial Execs, social-planners, and citizen groups that Peak Oil is NOT just a lark, but something very real and portentious. Note too, the big energy cartels have positioned themselves for taking a dominant position in developing alternative energy systems -- they're among the only ones with enough economic and political clout to pull-off the enormous investments required. Tragically, these efforts are most likely to be too little, too late to avert tremendous upsets -- many of which we've already been seeing but remain oblivious to their link to the trend of declining oil production, typically seen in the scramble for resource supplies in contested third-world nations, esp. in Africa where 15 nations are currently involved in conflicts or dangerously-tense power-plays, where factions are used to 'blame' fighting resulting from resource exploitation. Much of the past 20 years of global strife, low-intensity conflicts,out-and-out wars, economic reorganization and privatization resulting from ruinous and coercive IMF/World Bank policies, millions of economic and political and environmental refugees, increasing debt-peonage, politically-facilitated disease pandemics, alarming child-mortality rates, increasing militarization of social, political and economic policies (as authentic 'democracy' and social justice institutions are subverted), 3rd-world inadequate medical-care to address common and readily-treated illnesses, 24,000 daily deaths from starvation (linked to agribusiness control of food production and loss of small-farm, local control of production resources) and related malnutrition and hunger -- all are closely linked to direct or secondary consequences of Peak Oil -- ie., we've been SEEING the crisis of Peak Oil unfolding before our eyes, and yet collectively are unable to either recognize what's happening or significantly address these issue via our political system (which tends to avoid upsetting the status-quo or materially changing the way things are -- thus, mass-media encourages public complacency and ignores controversial disclosures esp. that criticize the economic/political elites whose lack of vision, foresight and will (or particular self-interest involvement) have greatly caused or helped exacerbate the impending crisis. Thus, the disinformation and fabricated case for war (as well as inordinate 'National Security' secrecy)also helps shield those powerful cartels from being held accountable for not acting in a timely manner to address the Peak Oil issue.<br><br>But more to the point of this post re: wind farms as a viable alternative energy option:<br><br><!--EZCODE AUTOLINK START--><a href="http://www.lifeaftertheoilcrash.net/SecondPage.html">www.lifeaftertheoilcrash....dPage.html</a><!--EZCODE AUTOLINK END--><br>--excerpt--<br>III. Energy Intermittency:<br><br>In addition to suffering from poor energy-density and being largely inappropriate for transportation, solar and wind also suffer from energy intermittency. Unlike oil and gas, which can be used at anytime of the day or night, solar and wind are dependent on weather conditions. This may not be that big of a deal if you simply want to power your household appliances or a small scale, decentralized economy, but if you want to run an industrial economy that relies on airports, airplanes, 18-wheel trucks, millions of miles of highways, huge skyscrapers, 24/7 availability of fuel, etc., an intermittent source of energy will not suffice.<br><br>The energy produced from solar, wind, and other green alternatives can be stored in batteries, but battery technology is woefully inadequate for the scale of our problem. <br><br>IV. Percentage of Total Energy Supply:<br><br>Finally, most people new to this issue drastically overestimate the amount of energy we will be able to realistically derive from these sources inside of the next 5-25 years. <br><br>In 2003, the US consumed 98 quadrillion BTU's of energy. A whopping .171 quadrillion came from solar and wind combined. Do the math (.171/9<!--EZCODE EMOTICON START 8) --><img src=http://www.ezboard.com/images/emoticons/glasses.gif ALT="8)"><!--EZCODE EMOTICON END--> and you will see that a total of less then one-sixth of one percent of our energy appetite was satisfied with solar and wind combined. Thus, just to derive a paltry 2-3 percent of our current energy needs from solar and wind, we would need to double the percentage of our energy supply derived from solar/wind, then double it again, then double it again, and then double it yet again.<br><br>Unfortunately, the odds of us upscaling our use of solar and wind to the point where they provide even just 2-3 percent of our total energy supply are about the same as the odds of Michael Moore and Dick Cheney teaming up to win a 5K relay race. Despite jaw-dropping levels of growth in these industries, coupled with practically miraculous drops in price per kilowatt hour (95% drop in two decades), along with increased interest from the public in alternative energies, the percentage of our total energy supply derived from solar and wind is projected to grow by only 10 percent per year. <br><br>Since we are starting with only one-sixth of one percent of our energy coming from solar and wind, a growth rate of 10 percent per year isn't going to do much to soften a national economic meltdown. Twenty-five years from now, we will be lucky if solar and wind account for one percent of our total energy supply.<br><br>While other alternative energy sources, such as wave and geothermal power, are fantastic sources of energy in and of themselves, they are incapable of replacing more than a fraction of our petroleum usage for the same reasons as solar and wind: they are nowhere near as energy dense as petroleum and they are inappropriate as transportation fuels. In addition, they are also limited by geography - wave power is only technically viable in coastal locations. Only a handful of nations, such as Iceland, have access to enough geothermal power to make up for much of their petroleum consumption.<br><br>This is by no means reason not to invest in these alternatives. We simply have to be realistic about what they can and can't do. On a household or village scale, they are certainly worthy investments. But to hope/expect they are going to power more than a small fraction of our forty-five trillion dollar per year (and growing) global industrial economy is woefully unrealistic.<br><br>On a related note, even if solar, wind, and other green alternatives could replace oil, we still wouldn't escape the evil clutches of so called "Big Oil." The biggest maker of solar panels is British Petroleum with Shell not too far behind. Similarly, the second biggest maker of wind turbines is General Electric, who obtained their wind turbine business from that stalwart of corporate social responsibility, Enron. As these examples illustrate, the notion that "Big Oil is scared of the immerging renewable energy market!" is silly. "Big Oil" already owns the renewable energy market.<br><br>******************<br>Food for thought;<br>Starman <p></p><i></i>
