The National Forum   Donate   Your Account   On Line Opinion   Forum   Blogs   Polling   About   
The Forum - On Line Opinion's article discussion area



Syndicate
RSS/XML


RSS 2.0

Main Articles General

Sign In      Register

The Forum > Article Comments > Power for the people > Comments

Power for the people : Comments

By Ian Lowe, published 11/7/2006

Our energy use is equivalent to having forty human slaves working for us in shifts.

  1. Pages:
  2. Page 1
  3. 2
  4. 3
  5. 4
  6. 5
  7. 6
  8. All
Well expressed Ian and timely, following 4 Corners last night, which gave an excellent and extremely ominous overview of this subject.

This peak oil scenario is likely to be devastating to us in Australia (and around the world) in the very short term. If prices rise to $2 this year and $5 by 2010, or anything like that, basic economics at all levels from families to the whole nation are going to start failing.

Mass unemployment, chronic inflation, gross inequality and massive civil strife could easily result.

The single most important thing in Australian politics right now has got to be peak oil. We are so fundamentally dependent on liquid fossil fuels that this issue really does have the power to tear our society apart and destroy life as we know it.

I have long thought that our society (and the world) will reach thecrunch point in about 2012, after which the vast majority of us (that survive) will be living a third-world more or less subsistence type of life. This prediction is looking better all the time
Posted by Ludwig, Tuesday, 11 July 2006 9:49:15 AM
Find out more about this user Recommend this comment for deletion Return to top of page Return to Forum Main Page Copy comment URL to clipboard
I certainly think that we have reached "peak petrol and diesel", which must come before peak oil, because we are talking about embodied energy.

Mind you, I don't discount oil companies ripping everyone off in the process, but that may turn out to be the paranoia of profiteers.

We think that we may have used the "easy half" of the world's endowment of oil. In the best mining tradition, we have leaned towards the better grades of oil, as that is where the greatest energy profit may be had. But even the better quality oil deposits tend to yield their lighter fractions first, leaving the heavier, energy-lean residues to be scavenged later.

We know that the more abundant poorer grades of oil contain less energy and more dross (tar sand is an extreme example). We know that they require more energy to be consumed in extraction and processing, to produce the gasoline and diesel we need. So dwindling oil quality must have a "double whammy" effect on the availability of the desired article. By slow degrees, MORE energy must be sacrificed to liberate ever LESS contained energy.

No matter that we have enjoyed a plenitude of easy gasoline and diesel, that wonderful resource was never more than the "spare" energy left over after extraction and processing.

It follows that as oil quality decreases, the supply of oil and the scale of refining must increase for a steady amount of fuel produced. Yet oil suppliers and refineries are facing this reality during a period of increasing fuel demand.

Now add the tyrannies of distance and depth to reach unexploited oil deposits.

Add the costly capital investment, relative to the yield of smaller oil deposits.

Then to make things really confusing, realise that it is oil energy which sets the value of money, not the other way around.

That's the killer. Unless we see economics for what it really is - just another aspirational cult - we are doomed to collapse in ignorance. We are ALL members of Hillsong and we all live on Easter Island.
Posted by Chris Shaw, Carisbrook 3464, Tuesday, 11 July 2006 10:17:35 AM
Find out more about this user Recommend this comment for deletion Return to top of page Return to Forum Main Page Copy comment URL to clipboard
All these economic illiterates, fresh from predicting the imminent collapse of ecological systems, now have a dapple at predicting the imminent collapse of the economic system.
Answer? None of the above.

Lowe has had zero credibility since well before he tried to imply that a million hectares of clearing permits was equal to a million hectares of actual clearing, of actual old growth forest.

With anything Lowe says, just halve it, halve it again, and halve it once more and you may be somewhere near the truth.

And as for $5 petrol, most will buy a scooter while the SUV drivers will drop the kids at school with a designer quad bike until a better solution presents itself. Trains, tractors and interstate B-Doubles will switch to steam and the Lowes of this world will look for some new scenario to scare the kids with.

And the innovative ape will prevail.
Posted by Perseus, Tuesday, 11 July 2006 10:50:00 AM
Find out more about this user Recommend this comment for deletion Return to top of page Return to Forum Main Page Copy comment URL to clipboard
Perseus, makes some very good points indeed.

The economic pressure of increased fuel price will (almost certainly is) lead to an increase in oil exploration, improved technologies for extracting oil including from Shale oil, and greater investment in refining capacity. My understanding of the oil industry is that periods of shortage are followed by periods of oil glut.

If this means extracting oil from so-called environmental icons such as The Gear Barrier Reef, NIngaloo Reef or Antarctica and so on, then so beit. Oil in my view is more important, by orders of magnitude, to civilisation then “sloppy” romanticism and Rousseau like fantasy.

Michael Chrichton in his thriller “State of Fear” makes it clear that doomsday scenarios are great for fund raising. Professor Lowe as ACF president can not be indifferent to the importance of fund raising for his organization.
Posted by anti-green, Tuesday, 11 July 2006 11:35:55 AM
Find out more about this user Recommend this comment for deletion Return to top of page Return to Forum Main Page Copy comment URL to clipboard
Well, at least we wicked, wicked Australians don’t need to employ 40 slaves each; although, of course, we have put all of those people out of work.

The two words, “experts disagree” in this article are the ones we should be mindful of. Professor Lowe is obviously one of these experts.

Why should we believe him and not one of the many other experts who suggest that what he says is baloney?
Posted by Leigh, Tuesday, 11 July 2006 11:35:59 AM
Find out more about this user Recommend this comment for deletion Return to top of page Return to Forum Main Page Copy comment URL to clipboard
As unpalatable as it may be, there are presently no renewable energy options which can fill the gap that declining fossil fuels will leave. The one that comes closest, in theory, is probably solar energy, but as yet much more technological progress needs to be made to improve the cost and durability of solar technologies.

For all the doom and gloom reasons Mr Lowe refers to, people will eventually have to realise that our medium term future lies with nuclear energy, imperfect as it is. The sooner we accept that, the smoother will be the transition.
Posted by Kalin, Tuesday, 11 July 2006 11:38:17 AM
Find out more about this user Recommend this comment for deletion Return to top of page Return to Forum Main Page Copy comment URL to clipboard
  1. Pages:
  2. Page 1
  3. 2
  4. 3
  5. 4
  6. 5
  7. 6
  8. All

About Us :: Search :: Discuss :: Feedback :: Legals :: Privacy