Liam, the carbon in soils thing has me really excited.

Imagine if there was no CO2 issue burning cheap coal, because global CO2 emissions were being CONSTRUCTIVELY USED (not sequestered) to completely reinvent agriculture? (BTW — I hate coal for many reasons, not just CO2 emissions. But imagine if Global warming just went away).

Tim Flannery recently attended the worlds first International Agrichar Initiative. Not only does agrichar produce FUEL from agricultural waste (avoiding the normal "Fuel or food" problem with most biofuel crops), but it also returns charcoal to the soil which completely revolutionizes farming. Farmers are getting double or triple yields with less fertilizer, because fungi grows around the charcoal, dies, and leaves organics and nitrogen back in the soil. (We still need to watch Phosphorus and Potassium, and might need to think about how to recycle our sewerage not just for water, but for fertilizer.)

This is all new science which must be evaluated by further tests, but has the soil Phd's all excited. Check out the claims.

"Lietaer said that a land mass the size of France using this system could lock up all the carbon the world needs to."
http://transitionculture.org/?p=192

Or this...

"Claims for biochar's capacity to capture carbon sound almost audacious. Johannes Lehmann, soil scientist and author of Amazonian Dark Earths: Origin, Properties, Management, believes that a strategy combining biochar with biofuels could ultimately offset 9.5 billion tons of carbon per year-an amount equal to the total current fossil fuel emissions!"
http://www.worldchanging.com/archives/004815.html

Or the Truthout.org article that calls Agrichar the "Birth of a new wedge"
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/050307R.shtml

It's brand spanking new science, even though the ancient Amazonians used charcoal to fertilize their soils. And 7000 years later, we are still digging up their soil for potting mix.

We need Agrichar or "Terra Preta" to be evaluated and discussed at more forums, especially agricultural forums where they will probably be panicking about peak oil after Thursday. Agrichar might just create enough fuel and fertilizer to replace oil in the farming sector, if we are lucky. I hope so, for my kids sake.

Three points;
First: If you haven't got the fortitude to use your real name and hide behind some nickname that provides anonymity fine, however, your words will always lack authenciticity and easily label you as one subservent to your political masters; your job function is to create doubt, muddy the waters and spread misinformation; rather than be part of the solution, you are the problem.

Second: I’m a born and bred Queenslander and sick of the immigrants from other States that have brought their polluting ways and greed to a once great State. [Beattie included]

Third: in the early 70’s the Americans (the then biggest oil producing nation) oil production crashed, they had to get it elsewhere; in an atypical Aussie fashion, we took about 10 years to twig to the possibility that this could happen to us, we set up a National Energy Conservation Program (1979) ‘to create public awareness to conserve liquid fuel/s’; we were about 20% reliant on imported fuel.
Progressively, the various federal governments’ corporate masters convinced them of the money to be made and we sold off our fuels and now we are about 80% reliant on imports.

In inclosing, the population in Queensland in April 1861 was about 37,000, today its over 4 million .… so what you might say, well that represents a growth of 13,000% and we’re running out of water … what State of Ignorance do you live in if you believe there is unlimited resources to service the needs of a species that is in plague proportion

I am please to share with you that my company in conjunction with an American company has perfected coal to liquid fuels technology with our pyrolysis/gasification system.

We built our pilot plant late 2005 and then proceeded to trial various coals and develop our own catalyst ( patent pending) with a result being a diesel fuel (ECO FUEL) which includes:

1. Low sulphur and virtually no aromatics. In a properly tuned engine this leads to lower particle exhaust emissions
2. The absence of sulphur means that oxidation catalysts and particulate traps will operate at maximum efficiency
3. The existing diesel infrastructure can be used, unchanged
4. Can be used in existing diesel engines

Our system does not produce any of the less desirable co-products from a refinery, and produces a pure CO2 stream that provides an option for the capture and storage of CO2.

Our NOx and CO more than complies with EPA emission regulations.

We are currently preparing our engineering drawings for the first of 5 commercialized plants with each plant processing 25 tons of coal per hour. Our trials have shown that 25 tons of coal per hour will give us a yield of 12,000 plus litres of diesel per hour.

We are currently trialing brown coal on behalf of a Victorian company wherein initial tests have shown excellent results. It is to be noted our process does not require the moisture to be removed nor the coal to be dried.

A formal press conference will be held later this month announcing our success.

Eclipse Now is getting all hysterical again and calling anybody who disagrees with his pet subject DUMB (with emphasis). I find it best to ignore him as he blathers for pages on peak "anything", citing psuedo scientific references.

ChrisC at lease admits that peak coal isn't going to happen anytime soon.

Eclipse Now and Liam are getting "really excited" together about making some charcoal to solve the world's problems. They talk of "spanking" science and the "Birth of a new wedgie". Eclipse Now also brings out that old chestnut "I hope so, for my kids sake" *sniff*, an emotional plea that ends many of his posts.

daniel boon are you (back from the dead) or are you related to Sir Joh? Sounds like you bought his book on rhetoric.

big bear your company's process sounds very interesting, I look forward to reading about it.

This whole concept of "peak anything" is mired in moronic simplicity. For it implies some sort of catastrophic decline when there is every indication that technology will replace a resource long before the resource runs out. It is particularly stupid when we are talking about a resource like coal that is so large that it could last a century or two. Given the rate of technological advance in just the last 30 years, can anyone seriously suggest that there will not be a cheaper alternative to coal by year 2100?

Humans reach maturity sometime between 20 and 25 but do we all hit the panic button because we have passed "peak human"? Should we drive the kids to angst ridden torpor because they are rapidly approaching "peak human".

Both peak oil and peak coal are nothing more than the point at which reserves begin to be reduced through use. And the important issue is not whether the volume of new discovery is lower than the volume of resource use but, rather, how large is the gap between the two and how long will existing and projected new resources last. Clearly, if resource use is 105% of resource discovery, and current stocks will cover 75 years of use, then the actual use can be maintained for a lot longer than that.

A very good example of this interaction of resource discovery, technological change and resource use was the supply of whale oil for household lighting. The use of gas and electicity kicked in long before the supply of whales ran out even though the industry had long since passed the point of "peak whale".

I just can't wait for "peak moron", the point at which the supply of new morons drops below the stock of existing ones.

Alzo, you must have missed the bit where we asked for actual arguments with data and logic, specifically dealing with the problem of exponential growth. No, you are back to sarcasm and trusting in the "prophets" who are telling you what you want to hear. You don't seem to comprehend that exponential growth in consumption halves and quarters your quoted "reserves" very quickly.

You reveal how closed you are to new paradigms and information even when I am positive about something like the Agrichar solution. Instead of carefully reserving judgment until you have sought further information, you jump right in, boots and all. You seems to know better than a multi discipline scientist like Tim Flannery, or the many soil scientists at the International Agrichar Initiative. Tell me Alzo, where did you obtain your soil Phd? ;-) Are you aware that this discussion has just hit the Scientific American?
http://tinyurl.com/yryfrr

Perseus, you once again demonstrate just how desperately you need to watch ABC's "Crude" Thursday night. Do you have any idea of the projected rates of decline?

The market panics when we lose just 200 thousand barrels due to trouble in Nigeria. Imagine what will happen to the price of oil when we lose 2 MILLION barrels of daily production capacity each and every year? Persy, I'll fill you in on some of the details. There’s be an international bidding war. Some airlines and trucking companies will bankrupt immediately, and very soon fuel rationing begins under the Liquid Fuels emergency act, recession turns into depression, and there’s a serious threat to our very food supply.

But don't worry, there's HEAPS of coal you say, pulling statistics out of thin air. Yet the SMH documents how NSW could RUN OUT of coal in 35 years — let alone when NSW coal might “Peak”. Can I suggest you try reading these reports before you get stuck into them? That way you might just camouflage your currently blatant denial. Persy, try to remember that the best lies contain a little truth. ;-)