What will happen when Oil starts to run out ?

[wd40]

What happens if the oil doesn't run out?!

If as much oil as is needed keeps on being discovered (eg even tiny Israel has recently discovered its own massive Leviathan Field) and demand keeps increasing, can one expect in 2112 after another 100 years of burning oil that there will be any really demonstrable effects on

a) oxygen, CO2 and the weather?

b) on human health?


Or nothing of note at all?


There was a fear that even they hadn't been able to fix the recent Gulf BP leak, it could have eventually destroyed the oceans and become an ELE?

Is there any way that oil, or anything to do with it, cause an ELE?

[Van Rijn]

What happens if the oil doesn't run out?!

Well, that's one of the points I've been trying to make: If you're hoping that peak oil will force alternatives soon, don't be surprised if that doesn't happen. One of the key reasons I'd like to see a lot more nuclear power is to reduce CO2 and other pollution, and it's one of the currently feasible options for that. Keep fossil fuels for transportation, at least for now, since that's harder to replace in a practical way. Though cars can be made more efficient - but don't be surprised if we have a repeat of the '80s, where at first we were looking at all sorts of alternatives. Then as the prices dropped, people wanted bigger cars again, interest in alternatives faded, etc.

[NEOWatcher]

a) oxygen, CO2 and the weather?

It already has. As long as we take more carbon that has been sequestered and release it faster than we can sequester ourselves, it's going to continue.

There was a fear that even they hadn't been able to fix the recent Gulf BP leak, it could have eventually destroyed the oceans and become an ELE?
Is there any way that oil, or anything to do with it, cause an ELE?

What's ELE stand for?

[swampyankee]

There never will be a point where there is only "few years of supply remaining." There will be a point when other energy sources consistently become the more economic option, but there will still be a lot of oil available.

To be clearer, then: when even the most pigheaded dolt recognizes that the time it takes to replace an petroleum-dependent infrastructure is much longer than the oil needed to operate it is going to be available at a price which permits the infrastructure to be economically operated.

[noncryptic]

Is there any way that oil, or anything to do with it, cause an ELE?

I doubt it.
Much worse things than large oil leaks have happened to Earth's eco system, and although species can go extinct, so far the ecosystem has survived.

To be clearer, then: when even the most pigheaded dolt recognizes that the time it takes to replace an petroleum-dependent infrastructure is much longer than the oil needed to operate it is going to be available at a price which permits the infrastructure to be economically operated.

Indeed.
While in principal we still have the opportunity to bootstrap ourselves into alternatives: use fossil fuels now to start creating non-fossil fuel depended alternatives, when that's online the energy it supplies can be used to build more of it.

That scenario will probably not without pain to the less wealthy (although less so if it would have been started decades ago); primarily developing nations, where demand destruction that the west now benefits from is already taking place. Which is why i think peak oil and GW should not be viewed in a US-centric or more generally a western-centric way, and which is one reason why i think we're on the peak: it's predicable effects are being felt - just not generally by westerners (like most of us here).

But gambling on a recovery of production of fossil fuels (back to avg ~3% increase per year), or waiting until it's obvious we need to switch to something else, is likely to be more painful. If not because it's not going to materialize then because of accelerated GW.

[publiusr]

Now, could a power company use some of its electricity to break down CO2, use the oxygen to burn hotter, and gas deposit pure carbon vapors into products?

[aquitaine]

Now, could a power company use some of its electricity to break down CO2, use the oxygen to burn hotter, and gas deposit pure carbon vapors into products?

Thermodynamics fail. Doing so would use virtually all the electricity that process generated in the first place, probably even more.

EDIT:

While in principal we still have the opportunity to bootstrap ourselves into alternatives: use fossil fuels now to start creating non-fossil fuel depended alternatives, when that's online the energy it supplies can be used to build more of it.

There's a very real and serious danger when governments swoop in, picking and choosing technological winners and losers. Namely collosal sums of wasted time and money.

[swampyankee]

There's a very real and serious danger when governments swoop in, picking and choosing technological winners and losers. Namely collosal sums of wasted time and money.

Many businesses, especially publicly held businesses, are run by people for whom the infinite future is their next multi-million dollar bonus check. Bluntly, they make Louis XV, with his famous dictum, après moi, le déluge, look concerned with what happens after their reign.

In other words, relying on the free market is not likely to result in a solution that doesn't involve a lot of dead bodies from the social and economic disruption.

[Ara Pacis]

There's a very real and serious danger when governments swoop in, picking and choosing technological winners and losers. Namely collosal sums of wasted time and money.

How is that any different from the past? Subsidies in low price land leases, dry-well tax breaks, pipelines, building road networks as opposed to rail networks, etc did the same.

[danscope]

Hi Swamp, Well said indeed. We have to be aware of those whose vision seldom extends beyond the next quarter.

[korjik]

Many businesses, especially publicly held businesses, are run by people for whom the infinite future is their next multi-million dollar bonus check. Bluntly, they make Louis XV, with his famous dictum, après moi, le déluge, look concerned with what happens after their reign.

In other words, relying on the free market is not likely to result in a solution that doesn't involve a lot of dead bodies from the social and economic disruption.

As opposed to the government? Like say maybe the 15th French king named Louis? I would say that the free market, while uncaring, beats out Stalin, Mao, the Khmer Rouge, or any one of dozens of repressive governments across the world and through history.

[aquitaine]

Many businesses, especially publicly held businesses, are run by people for whom the infinite future is their next multi-million dollar bonus check. Bluntly, they make Louis XV, with his famous dictum, après moi, le déluge, look concerned with what happens after their reign.

In other words, relying on the free market is not likely to result in a solution that doesn't involve a lot of dead bodies from the social and economic disruption.

I think you're massively underestimating the technologically disruptive effects that startups have on their respective industries. If your theory were true then we'd still be shackled to IBM mainframes and DEC minicomputers, but that is not the case.

[antoniseb]

As opposed to the government? ...

Let's avoid the politics. This is obviously a topic that can't be completely discussed without getting into politics, but that tells me we should just not discuss this topic rather than relax the rules. No points given, just a request.

[TooMany]

There's a very real and serious danger when governments swoop in, picking and choosing technological winners and losers. Namely collosal sums of wasted time and money.

These are apolitical facts in response to the above remark.

The "colossal sums" that the government "wastes" by supporting new technologies and research are trivial in comparison to each of these: the amount of money it spends on the wars, on Pentagon gadgets that are never used, on the man-in-space program, on subsidies for ethanol, on tax intensives for the oil industry, on tax breaks for the wealthiest 2% and on the future costs to mitigate the environmental damage done by fossil fuels and by mining them. The last costs are not paid for by these industries but by future generations.

Government funded civilian technology and research are a trivial part of the overall Federal budget.

[Swift]

These are apolitical facts in response to the above remark.

The "colossal sums" that the government "wastes" by supporting new technologies and research are trivial in comparison to each of these: the amount of money it spends on the wars, on Pentagon gadgets that are never used, on the man-in-space program, on subsidies for ethanol, on tax intensives for the oil industry, on tax breaks for the wealthiest 2% and on the future costs to mitigate the environmental damage done by fossil fuels and by mining them. The last costs are not paid for by these industries but by future generations.

Government funded civilian technology and research are a trivial part of the overall Federal budget.

You might have kept it apolitical if you simply stuck to the numbers. But as soon as you put in editorial comments like "waste" and "never used", and as soon as you start hinting at prioritizing, you are into politics.

antoniseb already warned once about this. This is a second warning, to everyone. Keep this discussion strictly technical, or more infractions will be given and the thread will be closed.

[whimsyfree]

Let's avoid the politics. This is obviously a topic that can't be completely discussed without getting into politics, but that tells me we should just not discuss this topic rather than relax the rules. No points given, just a request.

So saying relying on the free market instead of government leads to mass deaths is OK but contradicting that leads to an infraction?

This is evidence of a policy against certain political opinions rather than one against political discussion.

[swampyankee]

I think you're massively underestimating the technologically disruptive effects that startups have on their respective industries. If your theory were true then we'd still be shackled to IBM mainframes and DEC minicomputers, but that is not the case.

I'm not sure how the replacement of mainframes and minis is comparable to the disruption that will be caused by petroleum shortages. Mainframes were not suddenly replaced; they were replaced slowly, over a period of several decades as various flavors of PCs developed: the first personal computer came onto the market in 1971 or 1972; major corporations were still using mainframes as their data backbones as late as 2008 (and probably still are: DB2 on z/OS is not dead). In other words, there was no disruption for the customers of computing machinery; the disruptions were with the manufacturers of mainframes and minis. So, yes, DEC, Wang, Pyramid, Convex, Data General, etc are gone and IBM is barely more than a provider of IT services, but there was no disruption at the companies that used computers.

Petroleum is a commodity for which there is no short-term alternative (in my world view, short-term is up to about five years), especially in the transportation sector, and for which there is no current economic incentive to develop one: petroleum prices are low, and are expected to remain low for at least the next year or so, making it very difficult to make a business case to fund development of alternatives.

[aquitaine]

I'm not sure how the replacement of mainframes and minis is comparable to the disruption that will be caused by petroleum shortages. Mainframes were not suddenly replaced; they were replaced slowly, over a period of several decades as various flavors of PCs developed: the first personal computer came onto the market in 1971 or 1972; major corporations were still using mainframes as their data backbones as late as 2008 (and probably still are: DB2 on z/OS is not dead). In other words, there was no disruption for the customers of computing machinery; the disruptions were with the manufacturers of mainframes and minis. So, yes, DEC, Wang, Pyramid, Convex, Data General, etc are gone and IBM is barely more than a provider of IT services, but there was no disruption at the companies that used computers.

Mainframes last. So, since my example is appearently unconvincing let's look at a real world example: Germany. The government government picked its winners, wind and solar, and its loser, nuclear. The results are that after spending collosal sums they now have to import huge quantities of electricity because their winners happen to be extremely unreliable. Add to that dramatic increases in electricity rates. So the common citizen not only has their tax money thrown at this, they pay for it through the meter as well.

But wait, there's more. In addition to all of the above, Germany is now building a huge quantity of coal fired and gas fired powerplants. So basically the citizenry and industry loses because they are facing much higher rates and the environment loses because now they are having to use significantly more fossil fuels. The only winners I'm seeing are a few companies that make wind turbines and solar panels. This doesn't sound like a system likely to succeed.

The problem ultimately stems from how governments make decisions about things like this. Beyond the obvious political influences, they also make assumptions about the market, the technology involved, and future development of that technology that are not neccessarily true. Compounding this problem, when it turns out they are wrong, they can "stay the course" in a way that a private company never could, making it that much harder to change.

Petroleum is a commodity for which there is no short-term alternative (in my world view, short-term is up to about five years), especially in the transportation sector, and for which there is no current economic incentive to develop one: petroleum prices are low, and are expected to remain low for at least the next year or so, making it very difficult to make a business case to fund development of alternatives.

Actually right now petroleum prices are not low, the problem is they have been low until just a few years ago. In the late 1990's oil got as low as $8 a barrel. From there it was a long climb upwards over many years. Realistically we're about a decade away from a battery system that is competitive with an internal combustion engine. While there's nothing wrong with government funded R&D, as long as its done equally among competing technologies, where it really gets sticky is when they fund production, as is the case with Germany.

[Robert Tulip]

Petroleum is a commodity for which there is no short-term alternative (in my world view, short-term is up to about five years), especially in the transportation sector, and for which there is no current economic incentive to develop one: petroleum prices are low, and are expected to remain low for at least the next year or so, making it very difficult to make a business case to fund development of alternatives.

Liquid fuel consumption produces more than one third of world CO2 emissions, according to the World Bank. The externalities include ocean acidification and global warming. This ought to be an economic incentive to stop burning up the planet like there is no tomorrow. The business case should factor in the economic and security risks of extreme climate change.

[swampyankee]

Liquid fuel consumption produces more than one third of world CO2 emissions, according to the World Bank. The externalities include ocean acidification and global warming. This ought to be an economic incentive to stop burning up the planet like there is no tomorrow. The business case should factor in the economic and security risks of extreme climate change.

Many people -- especially people who run businesses -- have been and continue to be adamantly opposed to having to pay for use or even destruction of commons, including the traditional greens that form the center of many New England towns: these were created as common pasture land, and abuse of the privilege led to such damage that their use as pasture land was banned.

All of the environmental regulations have been written because of abuse of the commons, and many of them may have been avoided had the commons been considered a finite commodity that had to be paid for if -- big if -- the people who were most abusive were charged appropriately. A current example is highway funding: a number most civil engineers will accept is that 80% of the wear and tear on the interstate highways is due to heavy truck traffic (this is overall for the US, so it smears the cost of weather damage out nationally; this is imo, appropriate for a federal program). Despite this, the federal diesel road tax (24.4¢/gallon) raises only about $14 billion/year, vs $24 billion for gasoline (virtually all heavy trucks in the US have diesel engines; very few cars do). I have not been able to find how much revenue is generated by the excise and road use tax that must be paid on heavy truck purchase and operation. These taxes don't appear to be deductible (taxes are a business expense; many business expenses are deductible). Obviously, raising diesel taxes enough to cover that 80% figure would drive trucking companies to use alternatives, the easiest being gasoline, so the difference has to be made up someplace else or it has to be accepted that the heavy trucks are not paying their fair share (this is called an indirect subsidy). Personally, I think the federal taxes for gasoline and diesel should be raised radically -- at least doubled -- because a) we've got a deficit b) we should discourage burning fossil fuels, and transport is the biggest user of fossil fuels and c) we have to import fuel, which is bad for US balance of trade (I'd also be willing to accept high import tariffs on petroleum, with a higher tax rate on refined products)

Method

1,405,060 kilobarrels/year of diesel with < 15ppm sulfur (this is legal for road use, but some probably has other uses) times 42000 gallons/kilobarrel * $0.0244 tax/gallon

3,188,709 kilobarrels/year of gasoline (this will include gasoline used for purposes other than road fuel) * 42000 gallons/kilobarrel * $0.0184 tax/gallon





Sources:

Consumption: http://www.eia.gov/dnav/pet/pet_cons...nus_mbbl_a.htm

Tax rates: http://www.gaspricewatch.com/web_gas_taxes.php

[HenrikOlsen]

A current example is highway funding: a number most civil engineers will accept is that 80% of the wear and tear on the interstate highways is due to heavy truck traffic (this is overall for the US, so it smears the cost of weather damage out nationally; this is imo, appropriate for a federal program). Despite this, the federal diesel road tax (24.4¢/gallon) raises only about $14 billion/year, vs $24 billion for gasoline (virtually all heavy trucks in the US have diesel engines; very few cars do). I have not been able to find how much revenue is generated by the excise and road use tax that must be paid on heavy truck purchase and operation. These taxes don't appear to be deductible (taxes are a business expense; many business expenses are deductible).

In Denmark vehicles are in different tax brackets depending on weight, with heavier vehicles paying more, plus diesels pay more in the same bracket. I expect the latter is because diesels are expected to drive more per year (it's a flat rate weight tax paid per vehicle per year).

Recently, for private cars (not vans even if privately owned) this changed to a mileage tax, a sliding scale which basically gives tax breaks for cars with good mileage to the point were a diesel doing better than 32.1 km/L would cost about $30/year in tax (that's better that the Smart TwoFour diesel can do, so that's an easy thing for them to say, that one will cost about $150/year with "normal" cars at $400+/year).

[TooMany]

In Denmark vehicles are in different tax brackets depending on weight, with heavier vehicles paying more, plus diesels pay more in the same bracket. I expect the latter is because diesels are expected to drive more per year (it's a flat rate weight tax paid per vehicle per year).

Recently, for private cars (not vans even if privately owned) this changed to a mileage tax, a sliding scale which basically gives tax breaks for cars with good mileage to the point were a diesel doing better than 32.1 km/L would cost about $30/year in tax (that's better that the Smart TwoFour diesel can do, so that's an easy thing for them to say, that one will cost about $150/year with "normal" cars at $400+/year).

Do the taxes on fuel generally exceed this tax? I guess this must be an extra incentive beyond what you get for better mileage alone?

[HenrikOlsen]

Do the taxes on fuel generally exceed this tax? I guess this must be an extra incentive beyond what you get for better mileage alone?

Seeing that we pay about $7.5 per gallon for petrol and a bit less for diesel, fuel taxes definitely exceed this for most people. It's an extra incentive to buy smaller cars, except for the weight based tax which is supposedly more a tax to offset the extra road wear.
I laugh with scorn at claims that petrol prices are low:-D.

[Ara Pacis]

I hope the discussion of taxes doesn't cross over into politics here.

I recently saw a proposal I haven't seen before. It's called Fee & Dividend. The petroleum is taxed (the fee) at the point of production or import. This has the effect if raising prices on the end-user, who will rationally try to reduce demand. Then, at regular intervals, everyone receives an equal dividend payment.

[Robert Tulip]

Here is a chart I put together from World Development Indicators data showing Annual World CO2 Emissions since 1960.

You can see the uptick in coal over the last decade, as the main cause of the acceleration of the rate of increase. If economic growth means continued emission growth under business as usual, then James Hansen's thesis of global risks makes good sense.

Annual World CO2 Emissions Since 1960.gif