“Next, Baker says that ‘if we spend enough in other areas, it is possible to offset sharp reductions in the sectors of the economy that are heavy users of fossil fuels.’ This argument is central to the standard vision of the Green New Deal (i.e., massive public investment in clean energy, which will generate millions of well-paid jobs and increase GDP growth). Again, there are two problems with this.
(1) Even if we do manage to switch the entire energy system over to renewables, that might help us with emissions but it doesn’t help us with resource use. If we keep growing GDP, resource use will keep going up– even if the economy is powered by clean energy. And let’s not kid ourselves: to the extent that resource use is driving mass species extinction, this is an existential threat that we have to take seriously.
(2) …Baker has not made a positive argument for growth. He just for some reason assumes that we must have it, but he never says why. This is odd, because as he himself points out, the problem is not that we don’t have enough income; the problem is that it’s all locked up at the top…
In fact, the political obsession with GDP growth is an obstacle to the progressive agenda that Baker espouses. Think of all the regressive things that politicians and corporations do in the name of growth: weakening labour standards, slashing environmental protections, liberalizing markets, deregulating banks, cutting social spending…
…let’s not pretend that capital’s need for constant expansion is going to only make better products. When capital has bumped up against limits to profit-growth in the past, it has found fixes in things like structural adjustment programs, wars, restrictive patent laws, nefarious debt instruments, privatization, and by enclosing commons like water and seeds. Harvey has described this as ‘accumulation by dispossession’. Why would it be any different this time?
If growth must happen, and if all new value must be immaterial, then capital may well seek to enclose immaterial commons that are presently abundant and free (not just water and seeds but knowledge, songs, green spaces… maybe even parenting, physical touch… perhaps even the air) and then sell it back to us for money.
The point here is that closing off the usual go-to fix (extraction from nature) will generate pressure for other fixes. That is the violent side of growth. It’s just silly to pretend that these other fixes will somehow magically not be harmful. And it begs the question: given these risks, why must we continue to insist on GDP growth, when we know we don’t actually need it? Why not release our civilization, our planet, indeed our imaginations from this pressure?”
Comment:
“As a scientist/engineer I think it is silly to say we will increase GDP without increased use of energy and raw materials. As for products getting ‘better’. What will drive that? Over my lifetime… most products have gotten worse. Made cheaper, with shorter lifetime. Reliability engineers do testing to predict the expected life of products and calculate the resultant expected warranty costs, reducing cost of production as much as possible without increasing warranty costs enough to result in higher overall cost to the company, and making lifetime just enough to maintain customer trust. Hard to see what is going to drive companies to make ‘better’ products since that generally increases costs making them less competitive. Unregulated capitalism is a race to the bottom.
Most of the folks pushing this rubbish seem to have little to no background in the sciences and live in fantasy lands like classic economics theory with its grossly simplifying assumptions.” ~ Tom W
“Energy and ecology seem to become more intertwined as we go along, though that may well be a trompe oeil, trick of the eye. Still, if you see and read what people have to say about things like the big COP24 event in Katowice last week, it’s obvious that the 2nd law of Thermodynamics is a hard one to internalize. Because that law seems to say that the use of energy, period, produces waste, while all these mostly well-meaning folk are merely focusing on shifting between energy sources.
There is surprisingly little attention for not using energy in the first place, which the 2nd Law appears to stipulate is the only way to stop the rot. And it’s entirely feasible to build homes that use 70-80% less power to heat and cool, or to design a transport system in a city that saves that much energy.
But the ‘leaders’, politicians and business people, prefer to address solar panels and wind turbines that allow for the amount of energy used to fall only moderately, which when combined with the economic growth that nobody questions, will lead to the use of ever more energy [and land/species’ habitat and other resources].
…I’m not so much talking about climate change, since the earth is a system so complex we should really be very cautious about deriving any conclusions about it from simplified models, but the species extinction reported in 2018 is another, and more immediately convincing, story…”
“Home energy storage systems might save you money, but under current policies, they would also often increase carbon emissions [at the very least]. That is the conclusion reached by a team of researchers at the University of California San Diego in a study published recently in the journal Environmental Science & Technology…”
“Tesla has repeatedly claimed in publications, articles and tweets from Elon Musk that its Reno, Nevada Gigafactory will be powered 100% by renewables. Specifics on exactly how Tesla plans to do this are sparse, but the data that are available suggest that Tesla’s 70MW rooftop solar array won’t come close to supplying the Gigafactory’s needs and that the other options that Tesla is now or has been considering (more solar, possibly wind, battery storage) will not bridge the gap. As a result the Gigafactory will probably end up obtaining most of its electricity from the Nevada grid, 75% of which is presently generated by fossil fuels.”
Got an EV? Do you like to promote them? Think they’re better than ICE’s? Do you feel you’re making a difference, such as for wildlife, while FF burning still goes up?
“This documentary shows the human and environmental cost of mining these materials in Chile and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. In Chile lithium is extracted from salt lakes known as salares. These lagoons are home to Andean flamingos, which live exclusively in the wetlands of the high Andes. Large-scale lithium extraction is destroying their habitat. The birds are now threatened with extinction. Mining this ultra-light metal also uses an enormous amount of water. Sinking groundwater tables are making farming on the shores of the salt lakes impossible for indigenous communities.
About two thirds of the world’s cobalt is extracted in the politically unstable DRC, both by large international companies and in what are called artisanal mines. And in those small-scale mines conditions are especially dire – with child labor commonplace in many of them.”
Nice post. Sums up many aspects of a point I keep repeatedly trying to make to people… Renewables will not save industrial society. They are a red herring to the only viable option. Deindustrialize, simplify, localize, detechnologize, and degrow. Renewables at this point are doing far more harm then good. Without their “promise” that we aren’t in deep sh*t, maybe we would have woken up to the fact that industrial civilization is toast, and begun to reorganize.
Yes we are in deep shit and we do need a different civilizational paradigm if humanity and most life on the planet is to have a chance.
We could could certainly agree that renewables in and of themselves are not going to save the planet but no one with more than two functioning synapses ever believed that they would.
However to categorically state the renewables are doing more harm than good is truly an idiotic statment!
Renewables are most definitely not the underlying cause of human over population, ecological overshoot, consumerism social injustice, unequal wealth and resources, distribution, etc.. etc..
Do you have anything intellingent to say about how exactly we might transition to a more sustainsble and humane civilization without renewables?!
You do realize we have almost 8 billion humans on the planet, right!?
And, it was fifty years ago Apollo astronaut William Anders captured his iconic images of our home, revealing just how fragile Earth is — in the depths of space.
When there were only 3.54 billion people.
Season’s greetings
NAOM
Doesn’t look like we are going to hit 83 million new ones this year. Just not trying hard enough anymore.
New Rule by old farts: Build a Wall around every vagina.
I don’t see what all the fuss is about overpopulation. Humans are doing a lot to make sure that doesn’t happen for very long. in fact they are doing a lot to bring the Earth back to a more normal climate condition. That should do it.
Darn, I forgot, another day where I don’t use my car. I just walk over to my friend’s house. I am getting so forgetful in not doing my part for the climate.
Maybe I should go out and buy a powerful AWD SUV and drive every day from now on. Something to think about. Probably need an app for that.
Bahhh Humbug
Enjoy the Happy Motoring/Flying Paradise while it lasts, lots of fun to be had.
Xmas sarc
The population has more than tripled sense I’ve been alive.
Maybe they are hoping for a green future like a human version of Elysia Chlorotica?
Phytoderm anyone?
Well, thanks for starting the conversation by calling me an idiot.
No, I don’t have an idea how we will transition without renewables. You, of course, have no idea how we will transition with renewables. They do not do what their advocates claim.
Rather than replacing the fossil fuel system, renewables act additively. They cannot operate on their own, and depend utterly on fossil fuel infrastructure in every stage of their creation and deployment. They are merely “fossil fuel extenders”, nothing more. Thus, they act to prolong the planetary devastation and civilizational growth that is threatening every ecosystem on this planet.
Do I have a solution? Of course not. Nature, on the other hand, does: most of the 8 billion will die. Simple as that. Renewables do not change that picture one iota. They in fact prolong growth, making that number of dead more likely closer to 10 billion. And that will be 10 billion less prepared, since many of them were depending on renewables. Were many of the current 7.6 billion to begin relocalizing, many of them would stand a much stronger fighting chance. Renewables are a red herring, a way to distract the masses from the depths of our plight. That’s it.
So you do not believe renewables will stave off collapse? I am wondering how many of the regulars who post on this blog really do believe renewables will somehow save civilization as we know it?
While this is my first time really posting, I am a long time regular. I do not in any way believe that renewables have any chance of saving us. I am also curious what the other answers will be.
” am wondering how many of the regulars who post on this blog really do believe renewables will somehow save civilization as we know it?”
Not I.
It will be different than we know it.
Smaller. Beyond that I am not sure of the details.
But whoever is around will be very thankful for the energy they get from renewables.
Nice to have heating, or cooling, or locomotion.
Not many who have studied history would expect things to remain as they are, it has never happened in the past and is unlikely to be the case in the future.
I expect the future will be different than the past, do any of you look back on the World as it was when you were 15 and se a World that looks the same today? For anyone over the age of 30, I would expect they answer would be in the negative.
Does anybody believe that peak in fossil fuel output will require no change in the World’s energy infrastructure?
Perhaps those that believe renewables cannot cut it believe either that only Nuclear energy is the answer or that the World will collapse.
Certainly in a collapse scenario, the less nuclear energy (light water reactor type) the better.
The real question is what approach minimizes damage to the planet going forward.
Maximizing renewable energy and electric transport buildout while also maximizing energy efficiency, use of passive solar and heat pumps, and building insolation, while minimizing rates of population growth through better education and access to health care and modern birth control, while also guaranteeing equal rights for women worldwide might be a step in the correct direction.
…and even if such actions don’t prevent a collapse (they won’t) they are good practice for what may make the post-collapse world a little less savage.
I think things are quite a bit more complicated and complex than false-dichotomous/black-and-white choices, say, between nuclear and so-called renewables (or collapse).
There is change and then there are constants.
“real question is what approach minimizes damage to the planet going forward.”
A lot less people is probably the best approach. Famine secondary to combined impacts peak oil and climate change will be the catalyst. History teaches us about human nature. Google images for Russian famine or einsatzgruppen if you’d like to see what perceptions of objective scarcity does to folks.
McManus, have you tried the stone age life? I trained in and practiced primitive survival systems. It works fairly well in a viable and abundant ecosystem with proper population distributions, a condition which is currently absent . So good luck with that.
I recommend a biological civilization, however we don’t have the ability quite yet to pull that one off. To be against technology that will greatly reduce the harm to the environment is stupid at this point, unless one wants the total destruction of ecosystems. The road to a long term viable way of life for humans takes many steps and those who are trying to stop the progress toward that are even more criminal than the current fossil fuel/domination of nature promoters.
My point, and the point clearly illustrated in Caelan’s post, is that despite claims to the contrary, renewables act to further our destruction of the environment. This will not magically change as we extend their deployment. They are just as destructive as fossil fuels, in other ways. And they cannot be created or maintained without fossil fuels, making them ultimately pointless.
The best we can hope for is a soft landing. We should stop delaying it, because every day we delay makes the situation worse. Renewables are part of that delay.
“renewables act to further our destruction of the environment”
Compared to what. No renewable energy, then fossil energy continues to extremes, which causes extreme destruction of the marine and land based ecologies. Are you living on a planet where pollution and CO2 have no effect????
I say PV and wind power reduces the destruction to the environment.
First, I don’t read Caelan’s posts!
As for: “despite claims to the contrary, renewables act to further our destruction of the environment.”
I have to agree with GF, compared to what?! That is basically a simplistic cop out statement with zero basis in any fact. Prove it with data. let’s see the facts! Not with some pulled out of your ass bullshit!
There is no doubt we have an unsustainable civilization but it is not in any way shape or form made any worse by using renewables!
Unless you are saying that any attempt to continue civilization is flat out a bad thing. If so, stop using your computer or smart phone to post on this or any other forum. Are you gathering mushrooms and berries in the forest to eat? Do you live in a cave, do you have running water, electricity, etc, etc…
Fred and Gone Fishing,
The destruction of our environment is caused by the scale of our global industrial civilization. It is an extractive civilization that destroys the environment in the pursuit of non-renewable resources.
So, my points:
1. Renewables do not replace fossil fuels, they add to the fossil fuel energy mix.
2. The production of renewables is an extension of the extractive civilization. We extract and destroy in order to get the materials to build them.
3. Renewables cannot be constructed without fossil fuels. This fact will not change. Therefore, they extend the fossil fuel system.
4. Renewables act to allow the continued growth of the destructive civilization. Without them, the civilization would begin to shrink sooner, thus reducing the ultimate destruction total.
5. Renewables allow people to ignore the coming problems of depletion, thus giving people a way to pretend that the future is not in fact coming. Without their “promise”, it’s possible some people may have begun taking action. Instead, every intelligent individual is counting on renewables to save us. Pure folly, since they cannot.
Every discussion around renewables reveals the true desire of those who advocate them. Commonly heard are ideas about how we can use them to power our cars, or heat our single family homes, etc. Never questioned is the existence of the car in the first place, or the possibility of moving back towards communal dwellings more exposed to the vagaries of nature which humans dealt with for many many thousands of years. Renewables are ALWAYS seen as a way to continue our current civilization, when that civilization is itself the cause of the destruction, and must be ended before the destruction will end. A wholly different civilization may not be destructive. This one unequivocally is, and renewables add to and continue that destruction. They are not a hope, they are a distraction and a lie.
” Renewables cannot be constructed without fossil fuels. This fact will not change. Therefore, they extend the fossil fuel system.”
It’s true that renewable infrastructure is currently dependent on fossil fuel but there is ample reason to believe that we will be able to harness enough wind and solar energy within the foreseeable future to manufacture renewable energy infrastructure enough to get by with less and less fossil fuel from one decade to the next.
Whether we WILL turn this corner is impossible to say, because there are so many variables to consider.
As a practical matter, it takes an idiot to even consider the idea that naked apes will give up industrial civilization voluntarily.
We won’t give it up even with a gun held to our collective head.Talking about giving up fossil fuels now or anytime without renewable energy enough to shoulder the load is a complete waste of time, except as an academic exercise.
Both the wind and solar industries are now well past the point where the energy produced far exceeds the fossil energy input necessary to construct wind and solar farms.
Furthermore , almost all of the material used in these industries can and will be recycled.
We already know how to use fossil fuels three or for times as efficiently as we do at present.This obviously means that we can eventually get by just fine with one quarter as much energy per capita as we use today.We can produce this much renewable energy, if we put our minds and backs into the job.
It should be obvious to anybody paying attention that the prudent thing to do,in respect to renewables is to keep the pedal to the metal.(trucker ‘s slang for continuous all out effort)
We may have already mucked up the global environment to the point hard global level crash is inevitable. A lot of smart people think so.
I was once of that mind myself, but in recent years I have come to believe that piecemeal regional level collapse is about as likely, with some of the better positioned and more powerful countries likely to pull thru skinnied down but still basically functional.
Micro mini electric cars are all we really need to get to work or fetch a six pack.Given time, housing will again be located within walking distance of jobs, as was once the case a century ago.
There’s no real reason truly essential equipment such as farm tractors and ambulances can’t be built well enough to last half a century at least……
and the metals and plastics in them recycled into new equipment when the half century is up.
As a matter of actual fact, I’m personally running some equipment built as far back as the sixties, getting the same work done as neighbors with new equipment , for a very minor percentage of their total costs.
Anybody building a new house in the so called Sun Belt can buy enough solar panels and insulation, etc, today, to just about wipe out his electric bill PLUS enough additional juice to drive an electric car thirty of forty miles round trip to work anytime the sun cooperates….for the price of one nice new car.
Everybody in Africa could die of war, starvation and or plague without this having any serious effect on the USA in terms of Yankees having grid juice and well stocked grocery stores.
Now if India or China were to be so afflicted, well now …we Yankees might find ourselves involved in hot war with either or both countries…both of them well armed including nukes.
Farmers in the industrial world are quite accustomed to dealing with disaster at the local and regional level, without the general public even noticing.Twice at least I have seen my neighbors sell their cows for immediate slaughter because they had no feed due to drought , and could not afford to pay for feed shipped long distances. Four times at least over my lifetime my family lost over ninety percent of our fruit crop to bad weather.
Shit happens.
If a drought equivalent to the Dust Bowl hits a poor African country the population may the halved, or even quartered.Such countries are unable to conduct much in the way of offensive war,even against their equally impoverished neighbors.The local people will slaughter each other wholesale….and when things settle down after a year, or four or five years, the survivors will have land enough to feed themselves.
There’s no doubt in my mind that if China were to be so afflicted, and could not buy food enough on the open market, well……the Chinese leadership would imo go to war, to the extent necessary, to feed the country.
I’m not saying things can’t get this bad even here in the USA, but this country is big enough and has surplus land enough, etc, and government is strong enough, that we Yankees aren’t likely to starve unless the climate goes totally nuts.
We appear to have enough of any and all TRULY essential resources to not only survive but also to maintain a functional industrial economy for most of a century at least IF we adopt a war time economic plan , with critical materials tightly rationed for the duration.
That ought to be long enough to figure out how to live on a truly sustainable basis.
Whether we will adopt such an economic program is anybody’s guess.
I suggest that we each and every one of us pray to the sky daddy or mommy or rock or snake or mountain of our choice that we do so.
If we are fortunate enough that we get a sufficient number of Pearl Harbor Wake Up Events, in the form of super storms , super droughts, resource wars, etc, etc, we might just adopt such an economic plan before it’s too late.
Howdy OFM’
Well said.
Although I’d give a different perspective on one point that you made- “That ought to be long enough to figure out how to live on a truly sustainable basis.
Whether we will adopt such an economic program is anybody’s guess.
I suggest that we each and every one of us pray to the sky daddy or mommy or rock or snake or mountain of our choice that we do so.”
Florida is an example of a state that currently gets lets than 1% of electricity from solar. They have a great solar resource, and some money. So its about choices they make and policies they enact, rather than any physical limitation. They could and should be a solar powerhouse.
This won’t get done with prayer. It will get done by activism of its citizens. Activism at the level of personal choice, at the level of education, activism at work, and at the ballot box. Electing state officials who are champions of the issue.
Prayer is purely optional, and not an ingredient on the list of transition elements required. IMHO
Hi Hickory,
That remark was intended as humor, but as a matter of fact, there are many people who take both their religion and the environment seriously.
It’s my impression that people who worship mountains, snakes, bears, rocks, etc, are generally in favor of preserving the natural world.
They are at least potential allies, in the fight to preserve the environment.
It’s unfortunate that we have so many here in the USA that worship money and power, but their time is growing short.
I know quite a few of this sort very well indeed.
They are mostly old and scared, and ready to join hands with anybody who offers them assurances that they will be ok, that the country will not go to hell, as they see things.
They’re dying off fast.
In ten or twenty years they will mostly be gone. Their kids, grandkids, and great grandkids are scattered like leaves in the wind, and not very many of their descendants take their religion very seriously.
The church is no longer the glue that holds their world together.Food stamps and social workers have taken the place of the church as the safety net.
Niko McManus.
Re: Your points:
Your points are mostly a gish gallop of half truths, outright falsehoods, myths, and contain multiple logically flawed arguments! While they have been addressed to some degree by OFM, to properly address each of them would require multiple dissertations.
Let me address just a few of the blatant ones in your last paragraph.
Every discussion around renewables reveals the true desire of those who advocate them.
Really now?! Even the discussions on this blog alone reveal a multitude of rather nuanced opinions on this topic. The expression herding cats comes to mind! However the consensus seems to be, given the science behind the consequences of anthropogenic CO2 emissions that we need to end all burning of fossil fuels.
The argument that anyone who advocates using renewables in some fashion to achieve this end is doing more more harm than good, is simply ridiculous!
Never questioned is the existence of the car in the first place,
Of course it is! Again the discussion is nuanced it revolves around topics of disruption and paradigm change. Of moving to models of transport where car ownership is supplanted by fleets of on demand service providers or subscription models. It involves discussion about better public transport with individual transportation being needed only in the last mile, especially in urban environments.
These are vehicles that travel at low rates of speed are self driving and particularly suited for benefiting from the high efficiencies of electric motors, and batteries. They can potentially be incorporated into smart microgrids and power homes and businesses when needed.
There are huge potential savings of resources when such vehicles are designed from the ground up to be for all practical purposes 100% recyclable. Iron, aluminum, copper and lithium are not used up and can be used again and again! Not to mention the obvious advantage of not emitting CO2 by burning fuel.
Renewables are ALWAYS seen as a way to continue our current civilization, when that civilization is itself the cause of the destruction, and must be ended before the destruction will end
Again you show no capacity for nuance and resort to a simplistic black and white statements incorporating absolutes. You seem stuck on absolutes constantly using words like ‘Every’, ‘Always’,’ Never’, etc… to describe those who advocate the use of renewables.
Even those just on this blog who discuss these topics have a much more nuanced view of the world than you seem to be willing to give them credit for.
So to close my comment I will just reiterate my point, which is: Claiming that advocating for renewables does more harm than good is just a profoundly flawed and illogical statement to make.
McManus, your “facts” are not facts at all. Your assertions have no basis other than to continue fossil fuel/nuclear civilization which is a sure dead end for the planet. Anyone who thinks that extraction will just end is blowing smoke in their empty skulls. There are vast stores of carbon to be burned and smaller stores of nuclear fuel to be mined and placed on the surface for all to enjoy. Only a matter of some tech advances to allow that access.
Gone fishing,
At some point the extraction stops (or at minimum is reduced) because the price of that the product can be sold for is less than the cost to extract the product.
Fossil fuels are not extracted because it is a fun thing to do, it is done to make money. When the cost of alternatives to fossil fuel become less expensive than fossil fuel, extraction ceases, first the more expensive sources and gradually fewer and fewer sources of fossil fuels will be able to compete as the World switches to less expensive alternatives, as demand for fossil fuels falls below supply available the price of fossil fuels starts to fall and the industry scales down costs are driven up, leading to lower supply.
Probably won’t fall to zero, just as there may still be a few buggy whips produced, but output will be pretty low by 2050 to 2060 as the energy transition continues apace.
“1. Renewables do not replace fossil fuels, they add to the fossil fuel energy mix.
2. The production of renewables is an extension of the extractive civilization. We extract and destroy in order to get the materials to build them.
3. Renewables cannot be constructed without fossil fuels. This fact will not change. Therefore, they extend the fossil fuel system.”
All these statements are nonsense/uneducated personal opinion sold as fact.
Renewables are an excellent idea, but in the short term conservation is clearly a better idea. The idea that the solution to our problems is to build more energy generation capacity comes from over a century of living with a profitable energy industry. The industry per se seems to make economic sense.
Renewables are bursting that bubble not so much be replacing the existing industry as by killing it. There is very little profit in renewables. The days of oil fatcats in golden Rolls Royces will soon be over. There will be no solar fatcats, thanks to the smooth distribution of solar radiation. So the of strategy of building more and more generation will have fewer backers with less political clout.
In addition, renewables create problems because they have no output “when the sun doesn’t blow and the wind doesn’t shine”. One solution to that is batteries. Batteries are more expensive than renewables. Another solution is conservation. Conservation may be more expensive than renewables in the long run, as we move to a more efficient economy, but in the short run it is cheaper. And in the long run, conservation competes with batteries.
Much, maybe most of new generation capacity being added is renewables. But it has low capacity factor, meaning less energy will be generated. On the other hand, it often has high output, trashing the business plans of any fuel based competitor. There is no way to make money fighting this, so the traditional energy industry is doomed without government handouts. But conservation and batteries save the day. The problem of energy generation is more or less solved. The question for the 21st century is how to store and transport energy, and the solution is mostly not to waste it.
I totally agree, reduction in energy and material use is mandatory. Luckily just using PV and wind reduces energy and material use dramatically as it reduces waste and does not use oxidation for power. Simple things like insulation improvements and system changes also reduce energy demand.
We have one more thing going for us, nature will force lower demand as we continue to trash the planet. So we may need fewer cars and renewables than we think.
Conservation is indeed THE key, in the short and medium term, meaning over the next decade or two, allowing the renewables industries to grow up, and technology to provide us with things that work as well while using way less materials and energy.
The problem with conservation is that it isn’t sexy, it doesn’t make the hormones flow. There’s obviously tons and tons of money to be made by people who can SELL conservation to their customers, and of course the customer saves more than he spends, generally a lot more.
But the selling and the saving involved are dispersed all thru the economy. You save a little each year on heating and air conditioning, a little buy buying a smaller car, etc.
So the typical customer is way more interested in a high status car than he is in saving a few hundred bucks on gasoline. He’s more interested in a giant flat screen TV and a couple of hundred channels than he is in saving fifty or a hundred bucks a month on his electricity bill.
So….. as I see it, electric cars aren’t going to displace ICE cars until the near term costs of owning one are only a little more, or the same, as the cost of owning an otherwise similar car with an ICE under the hood. Mr. Driver is mostly interested in that old monthly payment, and diverting as much as it of possible to other indulgences, such as a new top of the line phone or a couple of weeks at the beach.
Government action,mandates, are almost a necessity in order for conservation to take a really big bite out of energy and materials uses, so long as times are prosperous.
But suppose an oil supply crisis hits and lasts a few months………. Your old raggedy assed Nissan Leaf will fetch you three times what you paid for it, and any new electric car you can find on a dealer lot will be marked up way beyond list price. (Dealers know how to do that by adding such things as an extra layer of undercoating, selling service contracts etc.)
Pray to the deity of your personal choice for Pearl Harbor Wake Up Events.
In terms of the overall health and welfare of the planet, and all the living things on it, an oil supply crisis lasting a year or longer would truly be a gift from the gods.
The question is not whether there’s such a crisis in the cards….It’s almost dead sure, given that oil is a depleting resource, and that it will likely deplete faster than the world economy can switch away from oil to renewable electricity and electrically driven mobile machinery.
The question is whether the supply crisis hits soon enough that we are still possessed of sufficient one time gift of nature resources to successfully manage it.
Just from an economic standpoint, driving that 35 mpg Corolla or Camry type versus a big SUV can save more than $200,000 over a lifetime of driving. Basically one uses several years of working to get the bigger types.
As an unapologetic advocate of rapid implementation of renewable energy, I’ll certainly take a bite!
I have been somewhere between somewhat depressed and severely depressed over the past few weeks as the silly season approaches and the celebrations surrounding the winter solstice in the northern hemisphere kick into high gear. (for any devout Christians that may stumble upon this post, that is what the festivities at this time of the year have been about for thousands of years and the early Roman Catholic church just co-opted them for it’s own devices. Get over it!). In my neck of the woods that means lots of “Christmas treats” and corporate awards ceremonies and prize givings etc. “Good” employers also give their employees a “Christmas bonus” as part of their December pay packet. Conservatives should not worry since the accountants were probably instructed to work that into the total compensation package such that it really isn’t a bonus but, rather sort of deferred earnings.
There is also a crazy rush to spruce up stuff “for Christmas”, not to mention the decorations and Christmas trees and lights. Lots of painting and in some cases new furniture and/or appliances. The government even has a “Christmas work” program where unemployed folks are given work to cut vegetation on road verges in rural areas of refresh the paint on curb walls in urban areas. The net result of a this is that money in circulation is at it’s peak, so much so that at least one local newspaper reported recently that the central bank was indicating record amounts in circulation.
At the same time there is an unemployed young woman that I have written about in this forum as having four kids. She was the recipient of a tiny house from the local branch of Food for the Poor, out of a set of 39 financed by the efforts of a “Walworth couple from Grand Junction, Colorado”. Well, she now has five kids, the latest being about a month old. This is despite the fact that, the father of the latest child is unemployed, the father of her oldest two is deceased and she does not have the money to feed her previous four much less send them to school. Her fifteen year old son has dropped out of school as a result and her extended family is trying hard to keep her other three (girls) in school despite most of the family not having permanent jobs. The only one with a more or less permanent (minimum wage) job is one of the young woman’s brothers and guess what? His new girlfriend is pregnant!
There are are far more of these stories than I care to detail but, my basic point is that the awareness of a problem among the general population is severely lacking in my neck of the woods and no doubt in most other places all over the world. The attitude towards the having of children is very much “go forth and multiply” and I feel that I am pretty isolated in my view that having children is not a casual matter but, in fact deadly serious! I fear that many of these children, a couple of which I have grown quite fond of, are being condemned to a miserable future, through no fault of their own but, instead, their unaware parents. The thing is, I see very little if anything being done to raise awareness among the people who are most vulnerable, that having children is going to require resources that neither they, their government or the planet will likely be able to provide.
In light of this widespread apparent belief in an abundance of resources and the possibility of continuing to take advantage of said resources, how is the message of de-growth going to propagate? My predilection for renewable energy is party based on an observation most advocates of renewable energy must surely have made. That is that each renewable energy asset can only harvest energy at the rate it is capable of given the availability of the resource, be it wind, solar, hydro, biomass, landfill gas, geothermal or whatever else. There is no windfall or mother lode of millions of years of stored solar energy to fall back on. Renewable energy is a “real time” system and if one starts to depend on it, one tends to get an appreciation of the value of energy.
Hence, I do not see renewable energy as a red herring but, for the same reason pointed out by the posts from Niko McManus and Caelan MacIntyre, a mechanism of getting the general populace to come to an awareness of the folly of the doctrine of never ending economic growth and the dependence on finite fossil energy sources to drive that growth. With renewable energy, the energy you have available, is the essentially the energy you can harvest in real time! Outside of hydroelectric dams I am not aware of any means of storing more than a couple days of harvested renewable energy based on the rate at which modern civilisation is using fossil energy. So, a civilisation making the transition to renewable energy should at the same time, experience an increasing awareness that profligate use and waste of energy is unsustainable. Hopefully that would translate to an awareness that increasing use of all other kinds of finite resources is a dead end and maybe, just maybe, that population growth should probably be drastically reined in.
How else is it proposed to spread the message of de-growth?
Merry Christmas, peace on Earth and goodwill to men! To hell with all other creatures! /sarc
That is probably the best argument for renewables I have ever heard. Your argument boils down to “use renewables as a teaching tool to educate the populace about finite resources, and then as we go down the other side of the resource throughput graph, there may be an awakening of consciousness”.
My argument boils down to “renewables allow us to continue using too much for longer, and don’t ultimately accomplish anything, other than delaying that awakening of consciousness”.
Without renewables, the lessons you hope to teach (conservation) would necessarily be learned SOONER, as the coming resource crunch would force the issue. How does maintaining more for longer possibly aid in dispersing this message?
Regardless, I generally think all paths are ultimately futile, as convincing the populace of ANY of this, even the coming decline of fossil fuel resources (which should be a simple point of fact) seems impossible. The “silly season”, as you aptly put it, fills me with dread. The profligate consumption on display highlights the deep problems with our culture, problems that I do not at all think the public at large is even capable of admitting, much less solving.
At this point we debate details of the hole in the side of the Titanic.
And. Merry Christmas to you! I’ve spent countless hours reading your posts on this forum. I thank you for your effort.
In response I’d like to offer an observation. “The deep problems with our culture” you allude to are being driven with a large dose of help from “think tanks” funded by the likes of Charles Koch along with conservative media outlets such as those run by News Corp. These sources are desperately trying to maintain the status quo where to quote 15 year old Swede Greta Thunberg, “Our civilisation is being sacrificed for the opportunity of a very small number of people to continue making enormous amounts of money”. So the battle for the minds of the public at large is being fought by promoting the ultra right wing ideology of Charles Koch et al and demonizing any notions of collective actions that might benefit the majority at the expense of the few.
The problem with this situation is that the few are insanely wealthy with Charles Koch for example, having an estimated net worth of $44.6 billion today, down from $60 billion in June 2018 according to forbes.com. Charles Koch in particular, has demonstrated a willingness to use his wealth to further his extreme right wing political agenda through his funding of various think tanks, at least a couple of which should be familiar to long time readers of this web site. He is also a major contributor to the GOP’s election campaigns and virtually has the man I consider the second most powerful individual in Washington, behind Donald Trump, Mitch McConnell in his pocket.
Many of Trumps cabinet picks and Supreme Court Justice Bret Kavanaugh are highly favored or were groomed by mechanisms set up by Koch and the current US administration can be viewed as implementing a Koch agenda with the exception of Trumps immigration and trade policies. The budget, rollbacks of all types of regulation, climate change denial, focus on fossil energy exploitation and scaling back of incentives for renewable energy and EVs are all part of the Koch agenda.
Many of the ideas being put forward in this forum, such as de-growth and re-localization, fly in the face of the Koch/News Corp agenda as can be seen from the general, happy, BAU tone of most media. IMO the “awakening of consciousness” you allude to is being deliberately stymied by the Koch agenda. Got to keep the sheeple blissfully ignorant and happy to mindlessly continue consuming their product, so that the 0.1% can continue scraping in more wealth for themselves. To hell with the health of the biosphere.
So how do things change? What can be done to turn the tide? Their supply of oxygen (money) has to be cut off. As long as the world continues to gobble up oil and coal like there is no tomorrow, the Kochs and their ilk will continue to make boatloads of money, enabling them to continue to exert undue influence over governments all over the globe. The fact is that, under the current energy and transportation paradigm there is no hope of cutting of the supply of oxygen to the current set of oligarchs. Renewable energy and EVs offer the chance of breaking that stranglehold and cutting off the oxygen supply of the Kochs and their ilk.
To quote Charles Koch himself:
“For business to survive over a long period, it needs to be contributing to society and people’s well-being. Otherwise, who’s going to want it?”
“So how do things change? What can be done to turn the tide? Their supply of oxygen (money) has to be cut off. ”
Indeed. One step in that direction is a strict estate tax.
Maybe something like 90% over 10 mill., to start.
International tax on financial assets.
Just out of curiosity with the last quote.
How do you explain investment bankers and the crooks on wall street. What service do they provide society?
That is a question best posed to the person I quoted. I haven’t a clue!
‘How do you explain investment bankers and the crooks on wall street. What service do they provide society?’
They’re the oligarchs
Hi Niko, I’m inclined to agree.
But of course we have a system that is seriously out of whack and out of touch with reality, as per its fundamental code/legal framework, modus operandi and spinoff/assorted corruptions, while it continues on with its murderous rampage. And it’s that very system that, along with its ideological indoctrinates/prisoners, apparently wants to produce so-called renewables, and at this late stage of the game no less, while it nevertheless continues murdering, using fossil fuels.
That writ and WRT GoneFishing’s ‘compared to what?’, well, so-called renewable energy is of course a subset of the system and fossil fuel use, so I’m unsure what kind of comparison is being sought or what an insinuation might be behind the question, or if the question is meant to mislead, but in any case, it is also, and perhaps more importantly, if not crucially, not so much about questionable energy comparisons, as about the kind of system that produces and utilizes resources like energy.
IOW perhaps, there seems a major problem with the expectation of a particular system producing a desired outcome and maybe it’s somewhat related to the notion of ‘doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result’.
Caelan,
I think you’ve got it 100% correct. Nuff said.
It is the civilizational system itself that is the problem. Renewables, as a facet and extension of that system, cannot possibly be the solution. It could of course be deeper – I believe Ron is of the opinion that our genetic code itself is flawed, programmed for growth, as are the codes of all other species. This may be correct, as every human civilization seems doomed for eventual collapse.
Niko- “This may be correct, as every human civilization seems doomed for eventual collapse.”
So very true.
In the meantime, lets put out some PV into the bright sunshine.
And perhaps stop strip mining.
Once we get that done, we can talk about some more aspects.
Maximum power principle:
Here is a synopsis of the behavioral loop described above:
Step 1. Individuals and groups evolved a bias to maximize fitness by maximizing power, which requires over-reproduction and/or over-consumption of natural resources (overshoot), whenever systemic constraints allow it. Differential power generation and accumulation result in a hierarchical group structure.
Step 2. Energy is always limited, and overshoot eventually leads to decreasing power available to some members of the group, with lower-ranking members suffering first.
Step 3. Diminishing power availability creates divisive subgroups within the original group. Low-rank members will form subgroups and coalitions to demand a greater share of power from higher-ranking individuals, who will resist by forming their own coalitions to maintain power.
Step 4. Violent social strife eventually occurs among subgroups who demand a greater share of the remaining power.
Step 5. The weakest subgroups (high or low rank) are either forced to disperse to a new territory, are killed, enslaved, or imprisoned.
Ah yes, Jay Hanson… I wonder what he’s up to these days.
I have a home-made grape cider brewing at home which may be ready by midnight. I checked it earlier today, and it was bubbling quite vigorously: Yeast seem to especially like grape juice, maybe in large part due to the extra sweetness and sourness. It might explain the grape as apparently the preferred fruit for wines.
If I was to avoid charging it (transfering the cider to an airtight bottle and letting the yeast continue for a short time to produce carbon dioxide as another waste produce that naturally carbonates the juice) and then refrigerating it, thereby killing much of the yeast and/or at least slowing its activity down sufficiently enough not to explode the bottle, and just let them continue on with their partying, untransferred, in the open bottle, they’d probably kill themselves all on their own with their overproduction of waste and overconsumption of finite resources.
Posting this from Unfiltered Brewing‘s internet, over their ‘Daytimer’ beer.
2018 was first year experimenting with cider; 2019 may be the hard-stuff/ethanol year, with distillation.
^ All likely good to know in the context of decline/collapse, so, recommended.
Interesting talk by a guy whose name few people would recognize. Marc Tarpenning, Tesla’s co-founder. He is no longer with Tesla but he tells a bit of the story about Tesla’s early days and the motivation behind the company’s vision. Well worth listening to! If it wasn’t for him Elon might still only be building spaceships… 😉
Certainly shows that the big squeeze on coal has come, primarily, from gas.
Season’s greetings.
NAOM
Sure why not substitute the dirtiest global warmer with the fastest global warming fuel?
I just see it as an intermediate step down, get off the no 1 of coal asap while renewables are being built up. Next move gas to a fill in supply before finally eliminating it as storage takes over.
NAOM
Don’t bother replying as I am at internet cafe with phone line down.
That is a very useful presentation.
You can easily pick out bizarre trends.
For example, Massachusetts now gets 7% of its electricity from solar,
whereas Florida gets less than 1%!
“Despite its nickname, the Sunshine State generates very little power through solar energy and has no renewable energy requirements.”
Get to work Fred.
It’s illegal to buy, sell or trade electricity in the Sunshine Wasted State. Florida imports ~99% of it’s energy.
Her is something to titillate the imagination and make one wonder how new evidence does or does not get integrated into scientific endeavors.
“Is the house of history built on foundations of sand?” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZyfE3IvDWR8
I think the mainstream reject his ideas due to the fact that it will screw up the notion of linear advancement of civilization.
There is probably corruption in every human institution, in one form or another.
I think his ideas are intriguing and should be given more attention.
I wonder how much early civilization is buried under the water since sea levels rose quite a bit.
It’s a fascinating phenomenon–multiple extraterrestrial impacts happening recently and accounting for prehistoric temperature fluctuations that influenced the rise of civilization–but to jump from that to the conclusion that it verifies the myth of Plato’s Atlantis is just absurd. It reminds me of those who wish to link the filling of the Black Sea with Noah’s flood.
Some stories are just that–stories.
Oh my, Graham Hancock.
Start with Velikovskiy–or maybe Ignatius Donnely (Atlantis) unless you have the fortitude to tackle James Churchward and his books on the Lost Continent of Mu–move on to Von Daehniken, and come to harbor with Hancock. There is a population who cannot see the beauty and mystery of the world but who must find shiny mystery behind, seemingly, everything there is.
I once thought of making a lot of money by writing a book in this line; I figured a crystal skull on the cover, maybe a picture of a big impact, and a title that ended: …What the Scientists Won’t Tell You, would make me big bucks. Put it in the racks at every Safeway and it’d be a shoe-in.
I attended one of Hancock’s talks a couple of decades ago and I’ve looked into several of his books and I find that he either has no capacity for critical thought or he sets it aside because he can earn a lot more that way. In the talk he was maintaining that the Piri Reis map, I think it was, showed that mariners had discovered and mapped the coast of Antarctica back in the Fifteenth or Sixteenth Centuries. He showed a part of the map of the South Atlantic and had boxed a small stretch of the Antarctic coast that matches today’s coast. It wasn’t much of today’s coast and the rest of the map didn’t agree at all with today but that didn’t matter. The fact that the map showed Antarctica joined solidly to South America over a width equal to that of Patagonia didn’t matter either, the point was to look at this little stretch here…
A Honda Civic costs about €20,000 and weighs about 1,200 kg, or about €17 / kg. An iPhone costs about €700 and weight 0.132 kg, or about €5300/kg. So an iPhone is worth over 300 times as much as a Civic per kg. It’s also worth more than ten times as much as silver.
Along the same lines, gas weighs about 6 lbs a gallon. If your buggy gets 25 mpg, you burn 40 gallons to go 1000 miles, which weighs about 240 lbs. A Tesla Model 3 battery has a 100,000 mile guarantee and weighs about a half ton, but the gas you’d need would weigh about 24,000 lbs, or 12 tons.
But what about the fuel to charge the battery? Well, if you go solar you might put panels on your roof. And average US installation is 6 KW and weighs about 800 lbs (20 panels @ 40 lbs), or 133 lbs /KW. That lets you produce about 30 KWh a day (assuming 20% capacity) so you might need say a ton of solar panels (roughly 15 KW). I suppose you’d need home storage as well, so add another half ton.
All told two tons of solar and batteries could replace the 12 tons of gasoline, a six to one improvement. And of course it can all be recycled at the end of its lifetime, unlike gasoline.
EDIT: Not to mention the fact you don’t need an engine in your car.
Wouldn’t the solar panels produce a lot more than the 100,000 miles worth of power over their lifetime?
Each panel produces power for 50,000 miles over it’s thirty year lifetime, so 20 panels produce enough power to run a vehicle (vehicles) 1,000,000 miles in that time. Liquid fuel equivalent is 40,000 gallons. Note too that solar panels at 30 years are still producing power, probably 75% of original so why throw them away unless other failure has occurred. They don’t close off oil wells that are producing at 75% of initial output. We really don’t know how long they last when properly built.
Maybe they only need the glass replaced at 30 years.
Also the EV does not use the land, water and air as it’s toilet. Nor do the solar panels.
I was lowballing the potential benefits of renewables. In fact EVs can be almost free in terms of energy consumption because they can live on the scraps discarded by the current system.
My point was that there is no need to increase humanity’s footprint to raise GDP, and that the current GDP could be at least maintained with massive reduction of the footprint.
It’s really hubris to think that we can’t reduce the amount of energy we waste, like guys in the late 19th century claiming that manned flight is impossible. The fact is that the current level of technology is shit, and the level of awareness for making non-technical improvements is ludicrously low.
I think it is worth remembering that a 1.2 ton car burns 12 tons of fuel in just 100,000 miles, and that EVs essentially eliminate that part of the footprint.
Sorry in advance if this has been already posted.
This is a report done by Utah state university. Released July 2015.
It is called the true cost of wind.
I am specifically putting it out here for hardcore renewable advocates on this forum. At the least I’d recommend reading the executive summary.
Isn’t Strata a pro-fracking/pro nuclear publication?
Yep. The source is highly suspect. I know many reasons to doubt the efficacy of renewables. A few are included in that review. However, there are just as many reasons to doubt FF and nuclear power, and the posted review is obviously slanted.
Unfortunately, I’ve yet to find a solid compilation of ALL the reasons to doubt renewables all in one place. Energyskeptic.com has a fairly honest compilation of links, along with commentary, but I think the editor(Alice Friedman) is a bit too rabid in her takedowns here and there. Vaclav Smil gives many good reasons why wind and solar are bunk, he has free lectures available that don’t take too much time, and his books are superb. Charles Hall helps us understand the problem of dilute power more clearly. Richard Heinberg has great material exploring the potential and limitations of renewables. His lecture “Our Renewable Future” is a great overview of the real challenges facing renewables (he also has a book of the same name). Euan Mearns gives superb detailed analysis of various individual renewable projects, but his continued support of fossil fuels is baffling, considering his clear understanding that we are approaching the end of the FF age. There was the recent incident in which Jacobson and Deluchhi’s attempt at a 100% renewable energy system was destroyed by a large number of scientists and research groups, the work of which exposed many of the deep problems with renewable systems. Tom Murphy’s old blog Do The Math had a great many very, very good reasons to doubt renewables. Well worth a long and involved read.
All in all, though disparate, there’s plenty of work by honest individuals and groups describing the problems with renewables. In fact, nearly every individual I’ve just listed is a renewables PROPONENT (which should really tell you just how difficult their deployment really is). We don’t need to turn to pro-fracking publications for our information.
At the moment, I would be extremely wary of any “research” casting doubt on the “efficacy of renewables”. A tipping point has been breached with respect to the LCOE of solar PV (see the two minutes starting at 19 min. 29 sec. and the final eleven minutes before the question and answer section of the December 7 Tony Seba presentation to the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM)). Seba is predicting the financial collapse of the fossil fuel based electricity generating business in the early 2020s. As such Charles Koch and his ilk are ratcheting up their anti-renewables, anti EV campaigns. We can expect more and more shrill headlines about the “dangers of renewables” and the inablilty of renewables to effectively replace the status quo. A better approach is to try the approach of disruptive minds like Elon Musk, whose approach is to look at the challenges and find solutions to them one by one.
I am not saying renewable energy is a panacea but based on the amount of concern being shown by the fossil fuel industries at the moment, one is led to wonder if they are in fact a real existential threat to the fossil fuel industries. It is hard to imagine that the fossil fuel industries would be paying as much attention to then and making the effort to discredit them if that were not the case.
Island,
The people I’ve posted are nearly all renewable proponents. They have also all been active for many years. None of them are fossil fuel shills, with the possible exception of Euan Mearns.
Further, I don’t need to be wary of anything I read. I can read it, and judge it’s merits based on the data, calculations, and logic therein. I can research for myself any claims.
As far as the LCOE of solar goes, who cares? The sticking point for solar has never been the cost of the electricity. The solar resource is obviously extremely vast, and now we can access it cheaply. Great! Except it still won’t really work, but that’s not a point I feel like labouring right now. The reasons why are varied, complex, and make for long reading. It would be a waste of my time to try and rewrite everything that has already been discussed in great detail by those authors who I mentioned in my previous post.
Food for thought: If fossil fuel companies were scared of solar, why would they not simply use their vast resources to invest in renewables? Wouldn’t that make sense for an energy company to invest in a better form of energy? Unless you just think they are stupid, but I really don’t think they are. Greedy and shortsighted, yes, but stupid enough to ignore an opportunity to position themselves in future profitable energy markets? I doubt it.
As far as Elon Musk being a disruptive mind… He’s great at marketing himself, I’ll give him that. I don’t think there are many humans alive who could put Chinese batteries in very expensive cars and be titled a disruptive mind. What has he disrupted? He is in fact attempting to build the infrastructure to PREVENT disruption, and keep our civilization going exactly as it is. Fossil fuel depletion is disruptive. Elon Musk is anti-disruptive. Disruptive would be teaching the world that we need to organize for ourselves an entirely new way of life. Musk is instead telling the world that nothing at all must change except for the batteries we but in our expensive, wasteful, mobile blocks of embedded energy, which drive on our expensive, wasteful, fossil fuel constructed roads. Elon Musk tells us nothing must change while selling us lies of humans in space and on Mars. Disruptive would be using his amassed wealth to warn the world that we must begin consuming less. Instead he leans into that consumption, helping to reinforce consumption as the only way forward. “Want to save the world? Buy my cars.” He is one of many who turn good instincts of humans back on themselves for his own profits. Give me a break. “Disruptive”. Good joke.
Niko,
There are many points of view on this, my take is the widely distributed wind and solar can produce excess energy which can be used to produce some form of stored energy which can be used as a backup along with pumped hydro, hydro, a bit of natural gas or biofuel, batteries, vehicle to grid, and demand management through real time market electricity pricing and perhaps some nuclear power.
Fossil fuel output will peak and decline (2025 to 2035) and as this occurs fossil fuel will become more expensive than alternatives. Also note that nuclear is quite a bit more expensive than alternatives, especially when all costs (such as insurance) are included. Society can choose not to use nuclear power because it is viewed as too risky compared to alternative forms of energy.
Niko and Ron:
I’ve been watching the rapid implementation of a mostly non-fossil fuel society in Norway (where I spend about half my time). Naturally all this is possible because it’s paid for by exploiting North Sea oil/gas resources. I’d say this mainly amounts to BAU perhaps with a slightly lower long-term carbon footprint when you factor in the vast infrastructure costs such as hydroelectric dams, paved roads, hundreds of elaborate bridges and tunnels, car parking structures, etc.
Of course, Norwegians can afford to drive around in $100,000 EVs and pretend they are saving the world but that’s not what in happening. BTW those EVs are selling like hotcakes right now mostly because of very generous government subsidies. Norwegians aren’t idiots and often refer to the “energy transition” as Norway’s Paradox — the great transition being fueled and paid for by, you guessed it, OIL.
Of course, Norwegians can afford to drive around in $100,000 EVs and pretend they are saving the world but that’s not what in happening.
Yes that is obviously true! But that is not what is important. What is also happening is the development and implementation of renewables and EV technology in the form of mass transport such as electric buses and trains in large urban centers in developing nations. That is where the real disruptions that make the greatest impact on global CO2 emissions are happening. To keep using the rich as an example of why renewables are bad is truly counterproductive in my humble opinion.
Edit: And BTW, I don’t consider using oil to pay for a transition to renewables as an example of the worst thing it has ever been used for, just sayin!
And, to keep using the example of EVs (BAU by another name) as progress toward a non-ff world is truly counterproductive in my humble opinion, just sayin! 🙂
Not all EVs are $100,000.00 Teslas!
EVs include all kinds of vehicles from electric bikes to fleets of electric buses used by the poor in urban environments in the third world! EVs are not BAU!
Please don’t try to make EVs synonymous with Teslas!
EV’s, PV and wind turbines are not BAU, no matter how many of you try and redefine the terms. Reality is not changed by wordplay and redefining terms to meet one’s own agenda or personal views.
BAU means the continuance of the huge carbon oxidation flux to run the economic system. Defining major system changes such as renewable energy (PV, wind) and efficiency changes as BAU is ludicrous at best and purposeful sabotage at worst.
BAU is globally defined in terms of GHG emissions. In other words, systems that produce no GHG emissions are definitely not BAU.
The fact that some Norwegians still sell petroleum does not change the reduction in GHG by using EV’s, PV, wind turbines or efficiency anywhere on the planet.
BAU is globally defined in terms of GHG emissions. In other words, systems that produce no GHG emissions are definitely not BAU.
Couldn’t agree more!
Case in point: while at a dead stop generating zero emissions sitting in a 6 km Stähle (traffic jam) on the Autobahn just south of Stuttgart in my brother’s new Nissan Leaf we were surrounded by hundreds and hundreds of cars, trucks and buses with their engines idling producing 20 lbs of CO2 for each gallon of non renewable fuel burned. I guess we were the bad guys!
Sorry, but all the other vehicles were BAU!
Edit: And BTW, I don’t consider using oil to pay for a transition to renewables as an example of the worst thing it has ever been used for, just sayin!
But what if those fossil fuels are also required to maintain that infrastructure? What if there is no way for that infrastructure to become self-maintaining?
“Non-fossil fuel society: brought to you by the continued massive use of fossil fuels!”
Food for thought: If fossil fuel companies were scared of solar, why would they not simply use their vast resources to invest in renewables? Wouldn’t that make sense for an energy company to invest in a better form of energy? Unless you just think they are stupid, but I really don’t think they are. Greedy and shortsighted, yes, but stupid enough to ignore an opportunity to position themselves in future profitable energy markets? I doubt it.
Right! Why did Kodak, despite inventing the extremely disruptive technology of digital photography miss the boat on mass marketing it? Were they stupid? Or just so invested in the old ways of doing things that they just weren’t willing to take the plunge and accept that film was a truly dead end?!
As far as Elon Musk being a disruptive mind… He’s great at marketing himself, I’ll give him that. I don’t think there are many humans alive who could put Chinese batteries in very expensive cars and be titled a disruptive mind. What has he disrupted?
It was actually the original co-founders of Tesla Motors and not Elon, who understood the potential of the ‘Slow Moore’s Law’ of Li-ion battery tech’s advantage to disrupt the lead acid battery paradigm which was holding back the development of viable EVs!
And it was Japanese not Chinese technology! At least get your historical facts straight, even if you don’t grasp how massively disruptive this technology actually is. There is a reason every automotive manufacturer is currently heavily investing in EVs with Li-ion batteries.
BTW, it is highly doubtful that the BAU paradigm of individual car ownership is not also being disrupted by completely new and also disruptive technologies such as smartphone apps that allow joint ownership and ride sharing.
Case in point Ford Motor company currently has significant income from financing car sales to individuals. I’m willing to bet that in the future there will be big changes to that business model. Perhaps Ford can adapt maybe not. To argue that EVs are not disruptive to BAU is to ignore multiple interrelated aspects of the currently existing paradigm that are already changing everywhere.
Niko, I replied to a post of yours further up, elaborating on some of the logic for my support of renewables and the Koch funded campaign against them. That reply should partially explain why I think we should be wary of anything anti-EV or anti-renewable. Hint – it plays right into the Koch anti-EV, anti-renewable playbook and we don’t need to be supporting the agenda of climate change denying 0.1 percenters.
As far as disruption goes, if you have not watched a Tony Seba presentation, you might learn something new from watching one! Even if you have seen one or more before, I highly recommend the latest one (linked to in my post above) to put disruption in context. To quote Seba from the latest presentation, technology disruptions “create new products and services that do two things, one is they open up new markets that did not exist, that could not possibly exist before and two, they either destroy or radically transform existing industries”. It is in this context that I use the term disruption.
As far as the existing energy companies switching their focus to renewables goes, you really have to dabble in disruption more than a little, as Seba has, to understand why this is unlikely to happen. One reason is that renewable energy especially solar, is far more widely dispersed than the relatively few discreet pockets of fossil fuel resources. Far harder to corner sunshine, it’s everywhere!
To more closely examine the true cost of wind energy, this report will discuss in detail aspects of wind energy that are often overlooked, aspects which lead to dramatic underestimation of the true costs of producing electricity from wind. These include the cost of massive government subsidies and mandates to incentivize development and production of renewable energy. They also include the costs of building transmission lines to the often-remote locations where wind power is plentiful. As important but more difficult to quantify are the costs of reduced reliability. Wind energy distorts the market and drives more reliable energy sources out. Finally, the true cost of wind must also include opportunity costs paid by taxpayers, whose money could have been spent more productively than subsidizing the wind industry.
Oh fer crimminies sake! This report is blatant bullshit propaganda! Since you posted a report from 2015 I’m posting a report from the same year by the greenie weenies at the IMF which gives us the ‘TRUE’ cost of fossil fuel subsidies!
A new report from the International Monetary Fund says global use of fossil fuels costs taxpayers and consumers $5.3 trillion year. That’s trillion — with a T. …
…The IMF report calls this huge figure a “subsidy,” a term some economists take issue with. A subsidy typically refers to direct financial governmental support or specific policies, like tax breaks, that underwrite the production and consumption of a certain product — in this case fossil fuels such as oil, coal and gas.
But the IMF report looked at the overall benefits and harms of fossil fuel use, factors that economists typically put into a separate category called “externalities,” and classified these, too, as subsidies. These include such things as increased economic activity, damage to public health and the environment, and the amount of money unavailable for investment in other community goods due to hidden costs.
Before we can have an intelligent discussion about any ‘True Costs’ it would behove any participants in said discussion to at the very least have a comprehensive grasp of some of the basic concepts related to the planetary carbon cycle and how that cycle impacts and is impacted by our global civilization, how our societies use energy and resources, our political and economic agendas, the vested interests behind blatant misinformation campaigns and so forth!
So while I hardly expect the average lay person to wade through all 880 pages of the science contained in this most recent highly technical report:
‘The 2nd State of the Carbon Cycle Report (SOCCR2)’ released by the USGS, perhaps we can at least get on the same page, if those who wish to participate in an honest informed discussion om these topics, would at the very least take the time to read the Executive Summary of the report which is only a mere 32 pages long.
2010, Seriously?! That is from the caveman days!
Fossil fuel subsidies are multiple orders of magnitude greater at all levels!
Did you check out the IMF report?
Lol calm down sugar tits.
They aren’t when you compare them to power output used by civilization.
And removing the subsidies for petroleum or other ff would drive up the price for the consumer. Global economy would probably collapse.
Anyways my position at the moment is agreement with Niko. Fossil fuel conglomerate corporations would invest heavily in renewables if they saw a future in it and probably attempt to monopolise it, but they are not they rather still frack low EROI oil and gas. I doubt they are dumb as well (in terms of business). I can’t see at the moment how renewables will save anything.
And also i apologise for the Strata article, had no idea of their position in fracking and nuclear. I don’t reside in the U.S. However I think they still make a valid point regarding the true costs or true EROI of an energy producing technology or source. It is extremely difficult to calculate.
Lol calm down sugar tits.
ROFL!
And removing the subsidies for petroleum or other ff would drive up the price for the consumer. Global economy would probably collapse.
So what happens to the global economy when the reality of a fossil fuel dependency with no backup renewables available meets Peak Oil in one form or another. or is the purpose of this blog just entertainment?!
I have no idea what will happen but i assume it will collapse.
I honestly can’t see renewables doing anything to smooth the transition. But i am not nostradamus lol.
You think what we say on this blog makes any difference. Come on Fred! People in general have no clue about anything. All they care about is their own families, food, clothing, shelter, healthcare and entertainment. No one thinks about peak oil. None of my friends even know what it means, if you ask them hey do you know about peak oil? They will probably reply, is it something similar to canola oil?
I can see renewables working in rural set ups. I am planning to buy a farm soon, and I’ll definitely utilise solar and storage batteries.
Iron Mike- you are correct about renewables, if you don’t deploy them.
If you do, they help a hell of a lot.
In fact the biggest state in the USA in yr 2017 got 42% of its electricity from [wind, hydro, solar].
Check back in ten years. That number will be a much higher.
And yes. It will make a difference.
If the effort its taken seriously.
Thats a big if.
In places where people get to it, they will be thankful.
You think what we say on this blog makes any difference. Come on Fred!
My point is not that what we say here makes any difference or that the general public understands the implications of peak oil, but rather that peak oil is real and it will have consequences sooner or later.
As someone who lived with a very small solar PV system after a Florida hurricane, I can assure you that even a minuscule amount of intermittent electricity to power some lights, a fan and a cell phone is infinitely better than having no power at all.
Just ask my neighbor who couldn’t get fuel to power his Honda generator… He was in the dark ages with candles while I had LED lights and internet with communications capability.
Which would you prefer?
Fred, pay no attention to those scoffers and deniers, they spew some strange philosophy/opinion while back in the real world things are changing fast.
Global wind and solar crossed the 1 TW cumulative installation point last June. It doubled in four years!
That is a large amount of GHG’s avoided.
So much for no effect.
Since fossil fuels are so inefficient and things like EV’s are about 6 times more efficient than liquid fueled vehicles, we won’t need that 18 TW of primary energy to run the global energy system.
Why does everything you post seem to be from 2015? In any case what do you suppose that graph might look like in 2025 and beyond?
Since fossil fuels are so inefficient and things like EV’s are about 6 times more efficient than liquid fueled vehicles, we won’t need that 18 TW of primary energy to run the global energy system.
And that’s before we fully implement graphene ultracapicitor technology. Thank you Estonia. I have to put visiting this intriguing little country on my bucket list… 😉
Hi Mike,
Divide TWh/yr by 8760 to get the average power. Even worse though is most of that power is waste energy, does nothing but cause heat problems in the machinery, rivers, not to mention the pollution.
Now I am not going to reveal all of my energy discoveries but say we reduce the use of oil by 60% (most oil is used for transport). That will automatically reduce the use of both coal and natural gas by about 20% each. I am not talking about the waste problem, it’s the energy to produce and distribute fuels.
Now we are down to about half global fossil energy just by reducing oil by 60%.
How much renewable energy does that take? About 15% of the current oil energy if we do it poorly, ten percent if we get smart.
It’s easy to leverage against a low efficiency interdependent energy system with high efficiency systems.
So you see now that renewables plus EVs have a huge leverage factor over fossil fuels.
At the same time much of the pollution is removed.
Iron Mike,
You are familiar with the exponential function, I assume.
If we take the data from BP Statistical review of World energy using consumption of fossil fuels and consumption of wind and solar power from 1990 to 2017 (we only have data for wind and solar from those years) and take the natural log of fossil fuel and combined wind and solar for thos periods and fit a linear trend line to get the growth rate of each and then extend the linear trend for 15 years for each we get the chart below.
Note that fossil fuel output is likely to peak by 2027, so the fossil fuel curve is a bit optimistic as it assumes growth in output continues at the 1990-2017 rate.
Click on chart for larger view.
“The possibility that the renewable/EV thrust may peter out is quite real. Global wind power growth has gone near linear already from an early exponential start. Wind energy growth has fallen from 17 percent in 2015 to 10 percent in 2017. If the current rate holds it will be 10 years to a global doubling of wind power. It looks like the slowdown started in 2009. If the downward trend continues it could be several decades to a doubling… ” ~ GoneFishing
“Claire Fyson says that we must reduce fossil use 50% in 10 years to avoid 1.5 C.
Stefan Rahmstorf says we must reduce fossil use 100% in 20 years to avoid 2.0 C.
Hans Schellnhuber says runaway hothouse earth will be triggered between 1.5 and 2.0 C.
Once runaway hothouse climate change is started, it cannot be stopped or reversed.
BP says that fossil demand will increase 15% by 2030 and fossil emissions will go up 10% more.
In 2018 oil production hit 100 million barrels/day for the first time says the IEA.
By 2025 oil production will increase 1 million barrels/day every year, increasing oil demand by then with 7 million barrels/day more.
If energy demand does not increase over the next 10 years, the financial system will collapse.
If fossil emissions do not go down 50% in 10 years, earth will enter runaway hothouse mass extinction.
Runaway mass extinction will begin by 2030-2040.
Livestock and agriculture are responsible for 80% of species extinction.
Once started mass extinction cannot be stopped or reversed.”
I din’t have figures handy, but way back when nuclear power was just getting started,it was directly and indirectly subsidized to a far greater extent than wind and solar power have been during their early stages.
Can we all say Price Anderson Act together?
OFM, nuclear has always been too cheap to meter, why would it need any subsidies /sarc
Price Anderson act, for those unfamiliar, was in effect a huge subsidy for the nuclear industry in the form of liability coverage. Without it, the industry would have been dead in its tracks beginning in 1957.
“The Price-Anderson Nuclear Industries Indemnity Act (commonly called the Price-Anderson Act) is a United States federal law, first passed in 1957 and since renewed several times, which governs liability-related issues for all non-military nuclear facilities constructed in the United States before 2026. The main purpose of the Act is to partially compensate the nuclear industry against liability claims arising from nuclear incidents while still ensuring compensation coverage for the general public. The Act establishes a no fault insurance-type system in which the first approximately $12.6 billion…”
A second massive subsidy for the nuclear industry has been loan guarantees for construction. Beginning in late 1970’s, projects could not get funding since the risk of economic failure was too high for banks/utilities to pull it off.
Thus-
” loan guarantees under its Title XVII Loan Guarantee Program, which was originally authorized by the Energy Policy Act of 2005. The authority to distribute $18.5 billion for new reactors was first granted by the Appropriations Committee for fiscal year 2008, and extended indefinitely in the fiscal year 2009 appropriations process. However, industry requests far surpassed what was appropriated. DOE received 19 applications from 17 electric power companies requesting $122 billion in loan guarantees to cover new reactors projects.”
They would not exist without a huge taxpayer subsidy.
Private markets would never touch them.
I worked for General Atomic in the 1970s. We expected each year to get our promised $80 million from Uncle Sugar for what was called “Base Programs”, that was pure R&D money for advancing nuclear power. During that time we only managed to construct a single reactor and Uncle Sugar provided the enriched Uranium scott-free. I have no idea how much money went to the big guys; GE, Westinghouse, B&W etc. but you can bet it was a lot more besides funding the AEC which later became the NRC and some other federal letter group.
Iron Mike and Niko,
You guys have made comments about how renewable energy sources are faulty.
And while this has made a bunch of guys get their oatmeal coming up out their nose,
I think you are generally correct.
Where I disagree is what the implications are.
Even though faulty, renewables are the best game in town.
Best by by far, now that the price has come down, and no big breakthrough in some form of miraculous nuclear/chemistry/gravitron whatever has developed.
And since they are the best game in town, its time to roll them out like there is no tomorrow.
Past time really.
And sure perhaps there is no tomorrow.
But today we pretend there will be, just like yesterday we did.
Wishing a Merry Christmas to everyone at Peak Oil Barrel. And may you have prosperity into the New Year also!
Merry Christmas, to you.
And so everybody is included,
in these greetings.
Happy Holidays to All 😉
To Fred, GF, Islandboy, Dennis, Iron Mike, Hickory, OFM, Doug,
Lots of good discussion here. I would not have bothered posting if I wasn’t confident some interesting stuff would come out of it. This forum has a good way of making things interesting. I probably won’t be posting much for a while, I prefer to lurk in the shadows and glean what I can. So thanks for the good discussion and Happy Holidays everyone.
I believe that renewables can power A society, but they cannot power THIS one. Happy motoring, internet using, high flying, media consuming, meat eating, big house living society… That’s done. No way around it, renewables or no. It’s too consumptive. Every route to transitioning this society to renewables quickly runs into oppressive resource shortages, while continuing to allow growth to power ever more destruction. So, in the context of this society, renewables I think are destructive. They simply further the destructive ends of this civilization. I don’t see that changing. The destructive roots of our culture are too deep. Extraction is the only way we seem to know, as is clear when we consider that all of our solutions to the problems created by destructive extraction seem to be more extraction. If we could all (especially the richest) reduce our consumption by a whole lot, renewables would have a fighting chance. But I’ve only ever seen them discussed in the mainstream, and used in practice, as a way to further increase our consumption of resources and energy. They don’t displace, they add.
And I’m not sure renewables will be there for any remaining society, since as I’ve stated, and it seems most here agree with, they can’t be built or maintained without fossil fuels. We have to consider the global mining, refining, shipping networks that make renewables possible. All these activities require a fuel density that renewables have not yet shown themselves capable of supplying. I’m not at all convinced they ever will. So yes, we can drammatically decrease our use of fossil fuels, but at the end of the day renewables are still chained to them. And once that global network begins to fail, I think renewables fail too. Norway’s roads and bridges can’t be built without their oil. Until you solve that problem, I don’t see renewables working. Especially true when you consider carbon budgets – we don’t stay under 2C by using our carbon more slowly.
If renewables do stick around, and the planet’s population is reduced to 500 million or below (probably lower considering degraded carrying capacity) I assume those renewables (especially hydro) make their lives a whole lot easier for some time. Maybe they can learn to live in accordance with the boundaries of nature. That’s a society that maybe can be powered with renewables. A society, but certainly not this one.
If renewables were pushed as a pathway to a far reduced material standard of living in an effort to drastically and meaningfully reduce consumption in order to save ourselves and our ecosystems, then I would be for them.
Alas, they are not. They are a modern profit driven industry with all the destructive effects that entails. They are pushed as a cheaper way to live wastefully. If solar is used to power our current global mass consumerist society, then solar is bad, as it allows the continued existence of the problem, the existence of the civilization that is destroying the basis of human life on this planet.
Though it might not seem like it, I’m probably more in favor of renewables than against them. I just think the real challenges with them are seldom discussed, and that is to our detriment. Fred, GoneFishing, and Islandboy: do you at least admit that renewables cannot do the same things which can be done with fossil fuels? That they are more limited in their capabilities than fossil fuels? Because the problem I see is that there is no real discussion of the very real limitations of renewables. They are seen as a “plug and play” replacement for fossil fuels, which they are not. They act differently, and their use would require a very different society from the one we have. This is why the EV strategy is not convincing to me – it assumes renewables exist in our current societal context. If we want to have a real discussion of a renewable future, we have to at least agree on their limits. This is not something I see happening from hardly anyone who is attempting to lead a renewable transition.
Anyway, have a good year everyone!
Hey Niko,
Even if it is true that we need fossil fuel ( atleast for a few decades) to maintain some baseline industrial capacity, then all the more reason to get cracking on a massive Solar/Wind buildout- so that we can extend the usable life of the fossil reserves to supplement the other.
Better to fill the coming fossil shortfall with something, rather than nothing. Its pretty simple.
Better to fill the coming fossil shortfall with something, rather than nothing. Its pretty simple.
Not necessarily. If industrial society is screwed either way, with all the mass death and destruction that entails, it’s better to take the hit sooner, preserving more of the Earth that will support future non-industrial society. That’s been part of my point this whole time – furthering industrial society is destructive. If it’s also ultimately futile, it would be better to let civilization as we know it end sooner.
It seems part of the sentiment here is that renewables can’t save industrial civilization, but also that we should use as much of our resources as possible building out renewables. I don’t get this, it seems contradictory to me. Perhaps it is an unwillingness to consider that a different, low technology route might be better in the long run.
I think we would be far better served by rationing our remaining fossil fuels, and slowly beginning to consume less and less each year until we are back to some sort of an agrarian, low tech civilization.
The only way renewables make sense is if you somehow believe that we aren’t completely fucked. I believe we are, so it’s hard to justify continuing our current route and adding to it by building renewables. I see renewables as a way to extend our destruction longer than it would otherwise last. For a different society, I think renewables might make sense. For our society, renewables are just another facet of growth.
Niko,
As OFM said well, its not an all or none situation. Some places will do better than others. I’d rather be in a place where they are making a big effort to come up with some replacement for fossil. USA hasn’t taken the challenge seriously at all yet. Maybe 1%. Its a sorry ass effort.
Industrial civilization is likely to be a characteristic of human civilization for the duration. At its core, what does the term mean? It is simply production of goods within an economic system, and there are a lot of ways to go about that, both methods of production, and economic systems.
Mass production of goods is more efficient than artisanal production. Why would we revert to less efficient methods except for artisanal reasons?
Industrial civilization as we practice it will end, but humans will not stop practicing industrial production. We will transform our systems of production to be less reliant on fossil energy, and ultimately, be free of it. Will the transition be smooth? Unlikely. It may only occur when there is no other option, but future human energy systems will be, without question, sustainable.
It seems increasing clear that EV’s will provide the majority of personal human transportation in the near future. Electric cars will be part of that, but also very light, inexpensive EV’s such as scooters and bikes will become very prevalent, especially in areas of the world where passenger cars don’t already dominate.
The area of solar PV necessary to power an electric car for the average daily vehicle miles is not very large; about the size of a carport roof over the vehicle itself. The system cost is very cheap, especially when compared to gasoline costs over the life of the vehicle.
Three months ago I bought an used electric car for just $6,600. I’ve driven it nearly 3,000 miles since, and bought no gasoline, dripped no oil, contributed no direct emissions, and It saves me $2.50/day in fuel costs, net, after I cover the cost of my electricity. I also enjoy the hell out of driving it, which is something I haven’t been able to say about driving for a very long time. I hope to get 5 years out of it, and then buy another used EV with longer range. The selection of those should be quite good by then, and it will be interesting to see what the market looks like. I won’t willingly go back to a combustion car. EV’s are simply better within the scope of their capabilities.
All other arguments aside, can one seriously claim that if we woke up tomorrow and all passenger cars globally were electric, and 100% powered by solar, wind, and water, that there would be no net environmental benefit?
Would the environment be much better off without any cars at all? Sure, but the environment would be much better off with no humans at all. For the most part, we want our species to persist.
Take your magic 500 million number, and let’s imagine that is in fact the global human population of the future. Can one say with certainty that the environmental impact of those .5 gigahumans would be less without access to renewable power and its uses than with them? I personally don’t think that’s a certainty at all. Comfortable, quiet, net-zero houses w/ LED lighting, induction cooking, electric transport, satellite communication systems, permaculture, and no need to burn anything. Fantasy? Sure, but so is your 500 million.
It’s not the renewable power that is the problem.
The fun little video below illustrates very well why we won’t be going back to animal power until we’ve exhausted all other options:
The apparent paradox, Bob, is that the ostensible complexity required for ‘your’ (Whose, exactly? Elite-derived, manufactured-needs-mass-peddled?) ‘technology’ can run into problems over ‘democratic’ control and issues related to the detachment of those using technology to nature and general reality.
IOW, we are not simple creatures like ants or termites, as much as humans might try to hyperspecialize like they do. Hyperspecialization and hypercomplexity, human-style, as manifest in social and material technologies (‘governments’ and such things as electric cars) may create the very overcomplex conditions that go beyond certain levels of human’s abilities to control them and to human’s important attachments to nature and reality beyond the technologies– all of which may inevitably lead to various forms of decline and/or collapse.
I was having a bit of trouble understanding what the hell you were talking about Caelan, so using The Google, I translated your text from Caelanese to Spanish, from Spanish to Dutch, from Dutch to Italian, from Italian to German, from German to French, from French to Japanese, and from Japanese to English, et voilà:
Bob, an obvious paradox, means that “you” needs obvious complexity (this is exactly what comes from the elite and is being sold by the masses). “Technology” may create problems of “control and democracy problems”. In the context of separation of people who use technology for nature and general reality.
For two examples and explanations, the tenter talks about complexity, and I often referred to the iron law of the oligarchy regime.
As a recent example, we mention that excessive specialization can compromise our survival.
In other words, we are not just creatures like ants and termites, just like people trying Hiper’s specialization. As evidenced by social and material technologies (“government” and other elements of electric vehicles), super specialization and superhuman style is a very complex condition beyond a certain human capability Natural people who can control and provide important links. And reality beyond the technology that inevitably leads to various forms of deterioration and collapse.
But I still couldn’t quite parse it, so I tried the more tedious task of manual translation using a dictionary to decipher the big words, and shit-canning stuff that seemed gratuitous or superfluous, which means without apparent reason, cause, or justification and being more than is sufficient or required; excessive.
So, here we go:
The capable of being easily perceived or understood; plain or clear; obvious statement or proposition that seems self-contradictory or absurd but in reality expresses a possible truth, Bob, is that the apparent, evident, or conspicuous complexity required by technology can encounter democratic control problems and the detachment of the user from reality, and from a connection to nature.
Refer to these outside sources for comprehensible prose: LINKS.
Human attempts at seriously or obsessively concerned specialization, such as government, and electric cars, may exceed our ability to control them, detach us from nature, and reality, and are better left up to hymenoptera and isoptera.
So, it appears your point is that technology can disconnect us from nature, and detach us from reality, if those two things actually differ. Probably true.
Mm-yes I’ve done that funny back-and-forth translation-thing before, too…
Despite it, you appear to nevertheless understand at least part of my point, and maybe even more than you’ve let on.
At any rate, collective critical thinking and a leg up on some knowledge and wisdom, such as, and especially where, technology is concerned is crucial, such as if we want to survive and thrive on this planet.
And of course we are not on a peak oil/collapse blog for nothing– and for many negative results from what we call ‘technology’.
“Go back 150 years… beginnings of the industrial revolution… At that time, the mills were being formed around Boston. They were bringing in working people, what were called factory-girls– young women from farms. Irish workmen from Downtown Boston…
…their assumptions are what are relevant here- they just took for granted that wage labour was virtually the same as slavery. They had no influence from European radicalism– never heard of Marx, nothing of this– it’s just the ordinary assumptions of people who think reasonably about the world. Wage labour is illegitimate, it’s like slavery. This is right around the time of the civil war. Northern workers in the American Civil War fought under that banner; that wage slavery is like chattel slavery. In fact it was even the position of the Republican Party. It was a fairly mainstream position. You’ve even got editorials in the NY Times about it, believe it or not. And they also took for granted that the industrial system is totally illegitimate. It’s just a form of feudalism to which people are driven by essentially violence or starvation, and has to be overcome. Those who work in the mills should own them is taken for granted. The feudalistic industrial system was destroying their culture… These are understandings about the nature of freedom and domination that have been lost. So it’s not pure progress. How far they’ve been lost is an interesting question. My suspicion is that they’re right below the surface. And when the issues arise– right now– working people in the counterpart of the mills will recognize the relevance and accuracy of these, basically anarchist, positions…” ~ Noam Chomsky
Bob. You get the big award for being the first to understand/decifer anything in Caelanese.
Most people seem to have stopped trying long ago.
‘If you don’t say something simply, you must not want people to hear what you have to say’
“I don’t know if we are about to get a lot warmer (from CO2), or on the verge of a big cool down as the Holocene pleasant period comes to an end. Anyone who says they do either is just trying their best to make a prediction (guess), or has some big agenda…” ~ Hickory
Here’s a radical thought: Why not ask a climate scientist or, better yet, see what the consensus is of the scientific community?
Niko,
Despite what you think would be better, and I agree actually that less industrialization and a “better society” (form very unclear to me) would also be preferred.
My suggestion is that we incrementally improve the way we do things ( as generally has been done in the past).
Consider total fertility ratio. In 1965 it was approximately 5 children per woman on average worldwide, in 2005 this had been cut in half to about 2.5 births per woman Worldwide (average rate). If the rate were cut in half again by 2045 to 1.25 births per woman on average, population would rapidly decline by a factor of about 4 in 200 years. Many nations in East Asia are already under 1.5 for a Total Fertility ratio(TFR), Sub Saharan Africa is where the highest TFR is common (about 5 on average I believe). Better education, better access to modern birth control, and more equal rights for women would go a long way to reducing TFR to 2.5 in Sub Saharan Africa by 2050.
Also note that you claim that most here agree that renewables are dependent on fossil fuel and must remain so. I certainly do not agree, and it seems people who comment are split on what they believe.
Will fossil fuels be eliminated entirely? Probably not. But just as one might claim that out society is dependent on horses, because their are a few who still ride them, as fossil fuel depletes and is replaced by other sources of energy that are cleaner, more efficient and less expensive, society will become less and less dependent on the energy services provided by fossil fuel.
Also note that the change to a cleaner more efficient energy source that requires a lot less extraction and is far less wasteful will change society.
Nothing exists in a vacuum, and the idea that society is static and unchanging is also false, social structures and norms are constantly evolving and changing and this also influences human behavior, which is also not fixed.
Hi Niko,
Happy holidays to you and yours. I think the Georgian guidestones of 500 million population will be sustained with renewables as long as they don’t internationally trade with one another. The problem of trade in an all renewable civilization seems out of reach. Unless you use nuclear powered ships or something. Also flight would be a thing of the past too it seems.
Anyways I think the only way to settle this is to have a royal rumble match between us and GoneFishing and Fred, so start brushing up on your wrestling moves lol.
The problem of trade in an all renewable civilization seems out of reach. Unless you use nuclear powered ships or something
Why would flight be a thing of the past?! Don’t worry there are plenty of people working on electric planes. Don’t take my word for it, just Google electric airplanes.
Here’s one I like, this one is for short flights, it might cut into ground transport like taxis and ride sharing businesses. https://lilium.com/technology/
Man, and if nothing else you really need to take a cruise on a big sailboat!
For the record, there was global trade on the high seas a long long time ago and the technology has come a long way since then. No nuclear necessary. Just nice clean wind!
Sail, plus PV, plus hydrogen storage. Guess what, hydrogen comes from water. How convenient. Fuel up while at dock and traveling.
Sounds like something out of Jules Verne’s 20 thousand leagues under the sea…the Nautilus was all electric 😉
But… but… solar and wind powering a container ship? That can’t be! Only diesel fuel can do that, right?! We can’t have any maritime trade with renewables. Its against the laws of nature! /sarc
Cheers!
Cornocupian cognitive dissonance at its finest.
You forgot to mention dilithium crystals. And fairy dust. Ohh and energy extraction from a rotating black hole… Hooray
Yeah, who would believe a civilization dumb enough to burn fossil fuels to run ships. Sounds absolutely irrational and insane they would muck up their planet like that.
GoneFishing,
Please see my comment in response to Fred’s comment… Mike is right, this stuff is pure, 100%, unadulterated FANTASY.
Fred,
Let’s see, in the first article, we have:
The Turanor, a 101 foot long and 49 foot wide boat that took 18 MONTHS to sail around the globe, with a maximum cargo of 50 passengers. Compare that to a modern container ship (not too modern, circa 2006, they get a bit bigger now) which is 1302 feet long, 184 feet wide, and can carry 14,770 20 foot wide, 8 foot long containers. FOURTEEN THOUSAND CONTAINERS. Compared with 50 people. I’m actually laughing. And it gets from Northern China to the UK in 25 days.
The other so called solar “ships” aren’t even in the conversation (not that the Turanor is either). They are two small drones (one which does not exist) a yacht (does not eist), a 4 person fun-boat (does not exist) and a solar sail boat (does not exist).
From the second article: a concept to slightly reduce emissions by adding solar power. Does not exist.
We can’t have any maritime trade with renewables.
That is correct. It’s baffling to me that you could possibly think those articles aid your point. They do the exact opposite. I’m sure you did not actually read them, however. You saw “renewables” and your mind went “That’s good!”
I wanted to address everything you just did Niko but seriously couldn’t be bothered. Well done my friend.
No you totally missed my point, which was that global trade existed long before modern industrial civilization. It was done with sailing ships. As for container vessels they are the epitome of BAU carrying mostly merchandise for a consumer based society based on wasteful extractive resource use. Isn’t that exactly what you are so up in arms about?! So why discount the possibility of a new paradigm that still includes a somewhat reduced amount of trade done by modern sailing vessels?!
The American clipper ship was built for speed, and it revolutionized global trade with its super-fast trips between the United States and China. That was in the early 19th century.
Fred,
Your point was not at all about how maritime trade existed before modern civilization. From the context, it was obvious to everyone that you were implying these solar powered ships could be used for maritime trade. Attempting to redefine your point after you were proven wrong is a bit scummy, don’t you think? Besides, you aren’t fooling anyone, we all know what you meant.
As far as maritime trade before modern industrial civilization, it was such a small amount of GDP as to be inconsequential. Our modern civilization simply cannot go back to such a low level of trade. As always with renewables, SCALE is the issue. It’s absolutely dishonest to suggest that pre-industrial sailing ships somehow prove we can trade using renewables at our current behomoth global scale.
But please, continue ignoring all of the problems with renewables. That’s a surefire way toward solving the problems, just pretend they DON’T EXIST.
Niko,
Point one, fossil fuel use does not stop overnight, it becomes expensive and other cheaper options will replace it, there are many possibilities, wind, nuclear, biofuel, batteries, fuel cells, and possibly hybrid designs. In addition there may be less overseas trade and more trade by land, it will depend on the cost to ship goods and over time supply chains will adjust.
It is no doubt true that there will be less international trade in low value merchandise, it will mostly be high value items that are in scarce supply that will continue to be traded internationally. The World economy is highly flexible and can adjust to change, sometimes it requires CEOs to think outside the box, those that can will succeed, those who cannot will fail.
Attempting to redefine your point after you were proven wrong is a bit scummy, don’t you think? Besides, you aren’t fooling anyone, we all know what you meant.
Oh fer criminies sake get off your high horse there sonny! I think you are confusing my comment with GF’s.
I did make a somewhat snide remark about wind and sails not being able to power a container vessel since only diesel was capable of doing that. In case you didn’t get it, I was being sarcastic!
Since I do think that both sailing vessels and electric propulsion will certainly be used to transport goods around the globe if there is any continuation of some form of civilization. If you think that won’t happen, then I’ll just leave it at saying that you are probably wrong in a big way! Diesel sure as heck won’t be doing iy for much longer.
BTW during the 17th century there was a robust coastal trade in Brazil done in very large dugout canoes. And I mean really huge ones that were paddled by large crews out on the ocean. Bet you didn’t know that either!
Yes my blowup doll from china will be received in 2-4 years. In that “civilization”.
I can’t believe you guys can’t even admit global trade will grind to a halt relative to the standards of industrial civilization. GDP will be meaningless.
Can you guys at least admit that. Goodness.
They don’t seem able to Mike. Which is odd, because it seems everyone here fears a collapse of civilization. And yet, if renewables are as great as some here make them out to be, then what are we worried about??? That the world won’t REALIZE how great they are? How’s that supposed to happen?
Woman: “Here sir, it’s a new energy source. It’s cheaper, cleaner, and just as useful as the last one! And besides, the last one is gonna run out so you might as well use this one, it never runs out! ”
Man: “Bah Humbug, I don’t want it! Get your cheap, clean, easy, unlimited energy out of my FACE!”
This situation is obviously ridiculous. If it was as good as Fred and GF and island seem to think, we would have transitioned yesterday. The profiteers of the world are not ignoring a potential profit because of… I actually cannot think of a single reason why they would. They WOULDN’T. They would be absolutely chomping at the bit to deploy this shit as fast as possible. I know this is where someone tells me they ARE racing to deploy it, and that’s where I call bullshit. This isn’t what a race looks like; This is a crawl. Which just doesn’t make sense if renewables are really so unbelievably great.
UNLESS, of course, they are NOT as good as Fred and GF and islandboy think! If there are serious challenges in construction and use and maintenance, then the current skittish-to-renewables state of the world (a world that includes massive subsidies for renewables and the looming ecodestruction of global warming) makes a lot more sense.
There are significant challenges to making this stuff work. A whole lot bigger than a slight reorganization of personal transport. When seen from the aspect of very real (physical) challenges to deployment, the world’s seeming inability or reticence to “transition” to renewables makes a lot more sense.
And these problems are well documented! Anyone with a mind and eyes can read all this stuff for themselves! The information is not hidden. Richard Heinberg, a long term renewables proponent and fossil fuel detractor wrote an entire book on the challenges of renewables, meant as a guide to their deployment. Vaclav Smil wrote a book detailing past energy transitions. The point at the end of the day, is that getting from 5% solar/wind in the energy mix to 25% will take 3 to 4 decades at least. We are not yet at the 5% that marks the start of that race, even though we have already been working at it for multiple decades. “Transition” is a misnomer by the way, human society has never transitioned to a new energy source, they have only ever added new energy sources to the old ones. More wood is now burned for fuel than ever was in the past.
By ignoring the problems that thoughtful and intelligent renewables proponents have written about, we take the transition from being nearly impossible to being completely so.
Anyway, this time I mean it, I’m not commenting for a while. These kind of discussions are too potent, they suck me in and I get too involved.
>Vaclav Smil wrote a book detailing past energy transitions. The point at the end of the day, is that getting from 5% solar/wind in the energy mix to 25% will take 3 to 4 decades at least.
But Germany managed to get to about a third much faster than that.
Smil is simply wrong. Comparing modern society to the Bronze Age has its flaws.
Mike,
I’m not interested in a rumble match. I’ve said my piece, and I’m happy to withdraw back to the shadows for a time. I will be reading everyone’s comments, of that you can be sure.
I am young. Barring cataclysm, I will be alive long enough to see the majority of this play out. If Fred and Island and Fishing are right, I will be truly happy. If they are wrong, I’ll be dealing with much of what I fear!
If nothing else, I’ve been happy to have your opinions. You agreeing does much to make me not feel too crazy.
Happy Holidays.
Hi Niko,
I am young too. So however it plays out, we’ll see.
Peace
Time for grown-ups. Belief and opinion are not valid unless they coincide with reality.
At my latitude, almost halfway to the north pole, a 100 foot by 100 foot area of land receives 3636 kWh per day on average. That is the effective useful equivalent of 861 gallons of gasoline per day.
If humans cannot figure out how to use that much energy then they are just lazy recalcitrant children who want a dysfunctional dystopian daddy system to take care of them.
Energy is not the problem, mental aberration and shirking responsibility is the problem.
GF,
What are your views on fusion? Assuming it came to be commercialised?
Not trying to put words in GF’s mouth but obviously the fusion reactor at the center of our solar system already works really well! 😉
As he stated above: At my latitude, almost halfway to the north pole, a 100 foot by 100 foot area of land receives 3636 kWh per day on average. That is the effective useful equivalent of 861 gallons of gasoline per day.
We already have commercially available off the shelf technology that allows us to both capture that energy and store it for times when the sun is not shining. We are also learning how to build and distribute energy in smart micro grids and incorporating components like home battery systems, EV batteries etc. to power the needs of entire communities and thus creating independent energy nodes that can be further linked into larger energy networks if necessary.
If that puts the legacy power and distribution utilities out of business as Gail Tverberg says in that link provided by Iron Mike, that’s actually a feature not a bug! It is a really good example as to why the anti renewables folk are just completely wrong with their argument that renewables and EVs are a continuation of BAU and merely so called fossil fuel extenders. Nope, this is exactly what disruption of BAU actually looks like.
And from Cat@Home’s post:
The takeaway: Renewables are a public opinion juggernaut. Being against them is no longer an option. The industry’s best and only hope is to slow down the stampede a bit (and that’s what they plan to try).
So basically the ‘Industry’ is losing its war on renewables and its attempt at maintaining their BAU monopolies.
First They Ignore You, Then They Laugh at You, Then They Attack You, Then You Win
Author unknown though often attributed to Mohandas Gandhi
Cheers!
Back in the 70s Nader ran a TV ad regarding the sun as a fusion power plant 93 million miles distant.
He thought that was about close enough.
I think if we burned all the paper used to calculate how to build fission and fusion power plants we could generate more useful energy than the plants have or will ever produce.
Back in the 70’s one of my physics professors worked on fusion. Air Products had a program to develop it in the 70’s that failed. The list goes on.
Even if it can be finally accomplished with a net gain of energy, it is very complex, expensive and so will not be too cheap to meter. I would say that fusion power may not be practical for a very long time, if ever.
With PV and wind producing electricity at very low costs and storage of power/heat developing fast, there will be no demand for fusion power except in space travel or maybe Antarctica.
Who knows though, breakthroughs happen and it might find a niche powering atmospheric CO2 removal systems and converting it to rocks or other materials.
Who knows though, breakthroughs happen and it might find a niche powering atmospheric CO2 removal systems and converting it to rocks or other materials.
I have given up on doubts after seeing all the fantastically stupid systems we operate with currently. Even in a more rational and logical future we have to leave room for some stupidity. 🙂
Yeah, but that level of extreme stupidity can only be attained by a group of people with very high IQs… 😉
With computer assistance.
Imagine what AI will be like since it will be designed by a group of people with very high IQ’s.
Oh I wouldn’t worry about that at all because AI seems to very quickly develop a mind of its own when left to its own devices.
AI Is Inventing Languages Humans Can’t Understand. Should We Stop It?
Researchers at Facebook realized their bots were chattering in a new language. Then they stopped it.
Bob: “I can can I I everything else.”
Alice: “Balls have zero to me to me to me to me to me to me to me to me to.”
To you and I, that passage looks like nonsense. But what if I told you this nonsense was the discussion of what might be the most sophisticated negotiation software on the planet? Negotiation software that had learned, and evolved, to get the best deal possible with more speed and efficiency–and perhaps, hidden nuance–than you or I ever could? Because it is.
This conversation occurred between two AI agents developed inside Facebook. At first, they were speaking to each other in plain old English. But then researchers realized they’d made a mistake in programming.
“There was no reward to sticking to English language,” says Dhruv
Which makes me wonder if Trump is really just a malevolent negotiating bot gone completely awry! 😉
Lift the hair to find out.
Here is a description of a nuclear power plant accident that actually happened:
1. Utility and contractor agree the plant is ready for hand-off.
2. Clean up crew does cleanup, paint-up.
3. Electrical engineer does “one last test” on control rod mechanism and creates a brief short-circuit
4. Reactor scrams
5. Emergency generator kicks in, located just below control room air intake.
6. Freshly painted diesel exhaust system emits copious amounts of smoke.
7. Control room fills with smoke.
8. Highly trained crew panics and runs out of building, jumps in their cars and escapes.
9. Contractor engineers remain on site for shutdown.
Stuff happens.
Iron Mike,
Fusion is the energy of the future, always has been (since it has been understood in 1930s) and always will be. Perhaps 2250, hard to guess.
Iron Mike,
You might have heard of sailing? It was done for ocean transport for centuries, nuclear is also an option as is biofuel, batteries, fuel cells. Air travel might become less common, again biofuels, hydrogen, batteries, and solar are options and there may be others. For land rail, and EVs will work fine. Much is simply dependent on cost, if we included all externalities including global warming risk in the price of energy, fossil fuels would already be priced out of most markets. Current trends suggest that even ignoring the pollution from fossil fuel, within 10 to 15 years they will not be able to compete unless subsidized.
You going to carry around million of tons of cargo with sale ships? Are you nuts?
The global economy will grind to a halt. If you can’t see that, then we have nothing to talk about.
Iron Mike, you are still under the gross misconception that the future will be like the present. The meme of continued growth is ending, one way or another.
I remember when winter time came it was back to canned and other preserved goods, we didn’t have fresh fruit and veggies from far away countries. No big deal, we just ate what was available.
See what happened in France (yellow vests)
Imagine that on a global scale.
That’s what i think will happen. You think people will be okay with lowering the standards of their lifestyle? I doubt it. The masses will go insane. Nobody likes to downgrade. I predict chaos.
But again each to their own.
Dennis is smarter than that to make such a statement. We are talking about industrialized society. Right now you order something from overseas and max it will take a month. Sale ships? Yes you “might” receive your order 2-4 years. Come on huh.
Really? You think that sailing ships (not what I proposed but we will go with that for more BS fun) traveled at 0.2 knots. More like 50 to 100 times that. Look below and turn red faced.
Iron Mike, I agree with you that there will be a lot of chaos in the coming decade and beyond. Like you said, nobody likes a downgrade, and some handle it better than others. I doubt it will be everywhere, but perhaps few places will be spared the repercussions. Think of how much chaos happened around the world in the 1940’s. I wouldn’t be surprised to see that kind of action again. And a lot it will have to do with energy.
We have grown so far into overshoot territory on so many fronts, to me contraction looks inevitable.
If you think you know which areas of the world will be most resilient ( to the threats you see as most likely), then by all means relocate. Thats exactly what the caravans from the south ( Africa and C. America) are doing.
In the meantime, develop good skills for a local economy, and install lots of solar panels and battery packs. And a good well.
When you realize the potential chaos on the horizon- all the more reason to push as hard as we can for replacement sources of energy- solar as the prime example.
Regarding all that cargo ship stuff, yes it will decline. Air travel even more so. I believe. There is a huge amount of trivial use energy being consumed.In a rational world that would be cut first.
Amen Hickory. Everything you said is logical. Thank you for your comment.
I am planning already to move rural. Living in a city environment will be perilous when the energy crisis hits (in my opinion). And all the skill sets you mentioned are vital and pertinent, regardless of if it passes or not, it is great to be independent and to be able to support oneself.
Once again thanks for the comment.
btw- of course you are right about the cargo shipping. It will get scaled back. These guys all know that. Essential stuff will still get shipped.
Bananas will be more of a treat than routine.
Oh no, we have gone back in time already!
Modern cargo ships slow to the speed of the sailing clippers Travel times between the US and China, or between Australia and Europe, are now comparable to those of the great age of sail in the 19th century. American clippers reached 14 to 17 knots in the 1850s, with the fastest recording speeds of 22 knots or more. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2010/jul/25/slow-ships-cut-greenhouse-emissions
Come on GF stop cherry picking. Order something now from Europe and see how long it takes. Does it take years?
For god sakes. Sometimes with you people it is a bit frustrating. It is all about winning an argument with confirmation bias and internet links which back up that bias. Just think independently about the scenario. You can find whatever you want on the internet. Just because its on the internet doesnt mean it is true.
Case in point: https://theflatearthsociety.org/home/
Order something now from Europe and see how long it takes. Does it take years?
Have you ever been on a ship traveling at 20 knots? It doesn’t take years to cross the Atlantic at that speed!
You can do the math yourself!
I’m reading an account of various US revolutionary critters, Jefferson, Monroe and Paine. There are several accounts in the book with dates of departure and arrival between North America and Europe. roughly I would estimate the travel time to be between 6 and 8 weeks, barring bad winds or weather.
I know it’s very disconcerting for Republican types to deal with logic, facts and actual examples that occurred in history. It tends to make them confused and angry, then they respond in illogical ways (which is their logic).
So stop whining and get your panties untwisted. I will try to use a different format in any responses I give to you from now on.
It takes about 2 months for mail to get from Mexico City to the west coast – um, about the same as JJHMAN says below.
NAOM
“The meme of continued growth is ending, one way or another.”
Consequences of this ? With world population increasing with 80 million each year, lot of them using water, food, energy. (Migration) chaos, already taking place in several countries, will increase.
“No big deal, we just ate what was available”
Now ingredients of food and parts of whatever goods come from almost all the different continents in the world. Even for something simple like bread. The step you imagine, from globalisation to deglobalisation, how will that go ? Now global population is not 1-2 billion, but soon 8 billion, many of them living in mega big cities.
>I remember when winter time came it was back to canned and other preserved goods, we didn’t have fresh fruit and veggies from far away countries. No big deal, we just ate what was available.
Not only that, it makes a lot more sense to simply grow locally. I get fresh salad from Holland at this time of year — I just got back from the vegetable market and was disappointed that there were no spring onions, but the reason was I came late and the stalls were already closing. It’s Christmas time in Holland, it get dark there at 4 PM, but fresh salads are no problem, given the right farming technology.
OK. Holland if fifty miles away, but it makes more sense than shipping the stuff in from Spain.
You going to carry around million of tons of cargo with sale ships? Are you nuts?
It’s sail not sale… 😉 And why do you think they will be transporting a million tons of cargo?! Just curious, have you ever heard of 3D printing and on site and on demand manufacturing? Do you not grasp that we are in the throes of major disruptions and paradigm change?!
This might give you some idea as to why I think you are living in the past. It’s a 45 min talk. It’s about disruption in materials science and design. This stuff is real, It is happening now and these are the kinds of ideas and people who are not on the mainstream’s radar but will have major impacts on future industrial civilization.
In case you didn’t notice the global industrialized economy is based on freaking trade with millions of tons of cargo being transported from country to country. EHHHMMM G fucking D P
Oh excuse me i didn’t realise the 2nd law is void all of a sudden. You sound like an economist thinking human ingenuity can overcome the laws of physics.
Anyways fuck this, we are going in circles. Lets agree to disagree.
A lot of that is coal and oil, which we cold easily do without anyway.
The yellow vest thing ended already. They weren’t really protesting about gas prices anyway.
Incidentally the price was about €1.90 a liter ( say $8 a gallon) beforehand. Americans jumped on this protest and tried to use it to explain their own stuid wastefulness. but 99% of what was written in English on the topic was pure crap. You don’t know what’s going on in France, and you don’t care.
Iron Mike,
I cannot foresee the future as well as you, my crystal ball in in the shop 🙂
Essential items that need to be shipped will be shipped by sea or air, using several potential technologies. Individual companies will choose the option that is cheapest, perhaps nuclear, biofuels, or batteries will be the cheapest options, perhaps there will be a hybrid design. This does not happen overnight, smart companies will adjust their strategy based on prices, as they see liquid or solid fuel prices rise they will switch to alternative technologies as they lower costs of shipping.
Nobody, except perhaps you, is suggesting that things will not change, one needs to think outside the box.
I thought the iPhone was a waste of money when I first saw one in 2007.
I imagine that engineers in the early 70s thought that the slide rule would never be replaced.
As far as I can see humans are pretty innovative, if you don’t see that…
do you at least admit that renewables cannot do the same things which can be done with fossil fuels?
Since renewables are not fuels, obviously they can’t but if you mean can they be used to power an industrial civilization then the answer is; there are no impediments that break any of the known physical laws, so at least in theory, they certainly can!
That they are more limited in their capabilities than fossil fuels?
Simple answer, no! I’d go further and say less limited. Burning fossil fuels to obtain energy is an extremely inefficient means of getting work done. We have discussed this over and over. Its basic physics.
Because the problem I see is that there is no real discussion of the very real limitations of renewables.
What exactly do you see as the limitations of renewables? The limitations I see are more cultural, social and political, especially when it comes to engaging in the necessary paradigm changes that could make it work.
They are seen as a “plug and play” replacement for fossil fuels, which they are not.
I can’t speak for anyone else but I have never seen renewables as a plug and play replacement for fossil fuels, that’s simply not at all how I think.
They act differently, and their use would require a very different society from the one we have.
I’ll agree that society and the resulting societal needs must be configured very differently from what we currently have! For example, I suggest farming and eating crickets instead of cows for starters 😉
this is why the EV strategy is not convincing to me – it assumes renewables exist in our current societal context.
I disagree I see EVs as being a profoundly disruptive technology that coupled with other disruptive technologies are going to completely change the playing field and put a lot of legacy businesses and ways of doing things in the dust bin of history. Case in point, My son is not in the least bit interested ever in owning a car! He might in the near future call a Lilium electric jet from an app on his smartphone instead. And according to Lilium’s vision that shouldn’t cost him any more than cab fare does now: https://lilium.com/technology/
If we want to have a real discussion of a renewable future, we have to at least agree on their limits. This is not something I see happening from hardly anyone who is attempting to lead a renewable transition.
I agree that limits are very real but renewables are not the limiting factor per se!
The limits I see are biological first and foremost. Population and ecosystem dynamics and ecological overshoot! We also have very real limits to our waste sinks. We can’t continue to use our atmosphere and oceans as dumping grounds for our CO2 emissions.
And finally I’m not quite sure who you think of as individuals attempting transition but most of the people I think of are probably not even in the public eye at this point.
Though they are working out of sight and under the radar.
In any case societies can and very probably will be configured very differently in the not too distant future. Either that or we will all be dead and this discussion will be moot. In the meantime, maybe check out some of Kate Raworth’s ideas as a starting point…
Cheers!
[i]That they are more limited in their capabilities than fossil fuels?[/i]
“Simple answer, no! I’d go further and say less limited. Burning fossil fuels to obtain energy is an extremely inefficient means of getting work done. We have discussed this over and over. Its basic physics.”
Fred, it seems to me that Niko is pointing at the advantages “easy to transport” and “high energy density” of liquid fuels
Easy to transport? If one ignores the thousands of miles the petroleum, coal, natural gas and electricity to make and distribute that gasoline had to travel, sure put it in a can and carry it around. Of course make sure you divide that energy in the gallon of gas by 8.33 since that is the net useful energy one gets from it.
“Easy to transport? If one ignores the thousands of miles the petroleum, coal, natural gas…”
Ok, surely now it has become more easy to transport wind and solar energy over long distances.
Dividing one gallon of gasoline by 8.33 is still a lot of energy.
Hey, I have a few gallons of that energy (gasoline) in a container and a few more in a car. How does that make my refrigerator, pump, blower motors, microwave, washing machine or computer function?
It can’t. It is isolated from most of the energy uses in civilization.
Gasoline is good for a very limited use, ICE engines. Now it is being replaced by that very portable and multi-use thing called electricity.
Fancy this, PV panels can run all those things and the car battery can be used to move the car or run all those other things too. It’s called portability.
I do recall not being able to get gasoline because the electrical pumps were not working after big storms. Hmm, no electricity, everything stops.
It will be so much cheaper, saving trillions of dollars, to get rid of that old complex, wasteful FF system and go all electric, Most things use electricity to operate, even ICE cars. So why not just short circuit the clunky old unnecessary systems?
Just one generation from now ICE cars will be show and museum pieces like steam locomotives.
K.I.S.S.
GF, I agree with what you write, but it is a description of your personal situation and others comparable to yours. Most of humans living in mega big cities are in different situations. And some unfortunates in undeveloped countries go, if they can, to the borders to try to buy gasoline/gasoil, either because it is unavailable where they live or much cheaper at the border. And even in a highly developed country like Holland a lot of people cannot afford to buy heatpumps, solar panels, etc without subsidy from the government. Hey, if everyone would be fortunate, this peakoilbarrel forum loses much of its value !!
By long distance do you mean a few meters above your head? 😉 Although long distance electric distribution is useful, local generation renewables cuts the need for this – something that cannot be done with oil and gas. Oh, and once transmission lines are in place they no longer need fuel for transport.
NAOM
What a load of bollocks!
You cannot even get basic facts right and throw out an absolute load of rubbish. Note that people are not saying that renewables are THE solution, they are simply part of it. You obviously have no comprehension of what Tony Seba is saying. We are in the 21st century trying o live with 19th century methods, we need to wake up and move a couple of hundred years forward and fast.
BTW Fred called your comment idiotic, he did not call you an idiot and I suggest an appology is due. From you comments I cannot perceive you as anything but a troll and if you have been in lurk mode, as you claim, you would not be saying the things you have.
NAOM
Dont bother replying as I am in an internet cafe with phone line down
All hail Tony Seba our new overlord.
How is he trolling, just because what he says doesn’t fit your paradigm he is trolling.
Relax with the period pains huh
IIRC, I was the person who introduced Tony Seba to the discussions here. At any rate, I have brought him up in discussions fairly frequently so, I’d like to chime in.
I do not see him (Seba) as an overlord but, a lone voice in the BAU wilderness, shouting about an impending set of technology disruptions while the mainstream analysts bury their heads in the sand. Lets look at a quote from the youtube transcript of his latest presentation:
” The installed base of solar energy worldwide since 2000 has been growing at 40% or so every year, every single year! Since 2000! It’s been doubling every two years right? And every year the the the EIA, the IEA and most mainstream analysts go back and say, ‘Oh it grew 40%. All right I’ll just do another a linear kind of projection.’ And then it grows 40% and they do another linear projection, as if it was gonna slow down as solar gets cheaper! In what market does it happen that, when a product gets cheaper the adoption slows down? How insane is that?”
Bold mine. Would you like to stab at answering the question (in bold)?
Seba’s presentations contain a fair amount of extrapolations of current exponential trends, in contrast to the linear trends shown in the graphic produced by Auke Hoekstra that, was used as the backdrop to the section of the presentation quoted above. What is undeniable, as far as I can tell, is that Seba’s projections from 2014, when he wrote the book on which the presentation “Clean Disruption” is based, are far closer to reality than any others I am aware of. In some cases, Seba is now claiming that things are happening faster than he projected back in 2014 for example, here he is from 76 min. 27 sec. into his most recent presentation:
“And solar is getting to the point of four or five cents already and in 2014 I said by 2020, rooftop solar is gonna be four or five cents and of course I was told I was insane. It already is okay, four or five cents! No subsidies right?”
If you can cite or point us to anybody who has made claims, such as those made by Seba, that have turned out to be closer or anywhere near as close to what has actually happened, please by all means let us know. I would gladly stop citing Seba if there was anybody else in the ballpark!
The only other energy savant I know of is Amory Lovins. He is another one to listen to and has actually built or had built many of his ideas. R 16 windows anyone? Carbon fiber electric car anyone? Passive house in the Rocky Mountains, advanced pumping with 50% less energy cost and on and on. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UwCFfKjn558
GF, you must truly be the epitome of evil for posting that Youtube presentation! Don’t you realize the harm you are doing?!
Renewables at this point are doing far more harm then good.
I just spent a couple of months wandering around in Europe observing and talking to people from all walks of life. Certainly there are examples of resistance to change both political and economic such as the yellow vest protesters in Paris. Who are basically Neo-Luddites desperately clinging to the past because they are being manipulated by special interests.
However there is no doubt that Most of Europe is moving ahead very quickly, They are way ahead of the US!
Cheers!
And while I myself wasn’t quite up to renting and hopping on one of these little electric scooters on a cold and wet November day in Budapest, a lot of young people there are certainly doing so.
.
Fred, I agree with every point made in your comment.
Renewables are doing far more harm than good to the vested fossil fuel interests.
I like the way the French are not afraid to protest, yet they are probably stuck in the past. That will shake out if I know the French.
And finally, yes Europe is far ahead of the US in many energy areas. However, it still needs a lot of work and I hope they will continue leading. It is in everyone’s best interest.
I would like to see low energy or passive houses built to last 1000 years. I think Europe makes buildings to last longer but we need to design them to really last and stop using them as profit mechanism for parasites to glean money by rebuilding them constantly. If it’s worth destroying the biome in that piece of land make the building worthy of it.
In fact we should all try to be worthy of the Earth and Nature in the way we act and what we do.
A good New Year’s resolution that needs to be hung up like the sign THINK.
Well Mike, I am undecided as to whether you are a troll or just not up to speed, we shall see 😉
As for Niko, “While this is my first time really posting, I am a long time regular.” a phrase frequently used by trolls. “I do not in any way believe that renewables have any chance of saving us.” if he was a long time regular then he would understand that we don’t think that is the answer and that we believe it is only a part of the answer.
“Rather than replacing the fossil fuel system, renewables act additively. They cannot operate on their own, and depend utterly on fossil fuel infrastructure in every stage of their creation and deployment.” Another standing line from trolls. Consumption is growing and, yes, renewables are absorbing a lot of that but are preventing further growth of fossil fuels. We are only at the start of an exponential growth and things are changing very rapidly, the reduction will come. As for depending on fossil fuels, many producers are switching to self generated renewable energy – again an exponential.
“renewables act to further our destruction of the environment. This will not magically change as we extend their deployment. They are just as destructive as fossil fuels, in other ways. And they cannot be created or maintained without fossil fuels, making them ultimately pointless.” Another troll meme
“So, my points:
1.”etc
Repeating and hammering a troll meme.
“As far as Elon Musk being a disruptive mind… He’s great at marketing himself, I’ll give him that. I don’t think there are many humans alive who could put Chinese batteries in very expensive cars and be titled a disruptive mind.” Didn’t read his script properly, using a script from 5 years ago or didn’t check that Musk is making mid range cars and trying to drive prices down further. Oh, and he doesn’t use Chinese batteries, He uses batteries made in the USA in partnership with Panasonic, which is a Japanese company.
“I probably won’t be posting much for a while,” “I’m not interested in a rumble match. I’ve said my piece, and I’m happy to withdraw back to the shadows for a time” A flyby crapper, typical behaviour of a troll.
As Fred said “Your points are mostly a gish gallop of half truths, outright falsehoods, myths, and contain multiple logically flawed arguments!”. I could pull out many more of the things Niko said that are from the troll script book that we see time and time again. I hope you can learn and not end up a troll. 😉 (got to put smilies in to convey I am trying to be nice not nasty, have a good New Year)
NAOM
MIT TECHNOLOGY REVIEW: WHY CHINA’S ELECTRIC-CAR INDUSTRY IS LEAVING DETROIT, JAPAN, AND GERMANY IN THE DUST
Now the Chinese government is embracing the shift from combustion to electric engines in a way no other country can match. It’s made electric vehicles one of the 10 pillars of Made in China 2025—a state-led plan for the country to become a global leader in high-tech industries—and enacted policies to generate demand. Since 2013, almost 500 electric-vehicle companies have launched in China to meet the government’s mandate and to cash in on subsidies designed to generate supply.
LOL! I don’t think this message could possibly be any clearer:
$14,000
Cost of a license plate for an internal-combustion car in Shanghai
$0
Cost of an electric-vehicle plate in Shanghai
Somehow I suspect that the Chinese don’t exactly agree with the premise that: “Advocating for EVs and renewable energy does more harm than good!”.
So if I say I like central planning [national energy policy], does that make me a communist?
Well then so be it.
Sure beats ‘no policy’, or ‘limp policy’, or ‘stupid policy’.
Thats what our democracy has given us in energy, at least since 1970’s.
So if I say I like central planning [national energy policy], does that make me a communist?
Nah! Of course not! You only qualify as a true communist if you also like Universal Health Care, which China also has… 😉
Notice the glaring absence of a certain country from this list?
If the health care in those countries is so wonderful, why do so many people travel to the United States to access the medical facilities we have here? I used to have a Canadian coworker who would tell us the horrors of “socialized medicine” in her country and how her sister who still lives in Canada crossed south of the border to get care instead of spending months on a waiting list just to ultimately get less sophisticated equipment and testing because that’s what you get when everything is ran by the government.
If the health care in those countries is so wonderful, why do so many people travel to the United States to access the medical facilities we have here?
You might be surprised to learn it’s actually the other way around. A surprising number of Americans travel to other countries for better and much cheaper health care, surgical procedures, dental care, etc… Maybe you need to get out into the real world a bit! There is an entire thriving Health Care Tourist Industry that you seem to be unaware of.
I used to have a Canadian coworker who would tell us the horrors of “socialized medicine” in her country and how her sister who still lives in Canada crossed south of the border to get care
That’s interesting, literally just yesterday ,I was at Christmas party and the host, a liscensed physical therapist, told us of a Canadian citizen she was treating due to an unfortunate accident. The Canadian government not only paid for her air fare back to Canada, they also sent a nurse to accompany her on the trip.
BTW in Germany I got free health care no questions asked and I’m not a German citizen. I’ve also gotten health care in Hungary and Brazil that was as good as any I could have gotten in the US. In Brazil it was free. In Hungary it was cheaper than a US co pay!
According to Patients Beyond Borders, approximately 900,000 Americans went outside the U.S. to find medical treatment last year and the number has been rising consistently over the last decade. But medical tourism is not limited to America. Patients Beyond Borders details that nearly 8 million patients from around the world seek overseas treatment contributing to a global industry valued at somewhere between $20 billion and $40 billion.
Now why would 900,000 Americans seek health care overseas if it were affordable and readily available in the US?!
The US is ranked 37th by WHO.
If you need care that’s not urgent in a socialized healthcare country, you are put on a very long waiting list while bureaucrats determine your fate. This is exactly what I have read, seen on the news and heard firsthand from people who’ve experienced it. Even though the United States system might have some flaws, I trust it. I also doubt highly I could get as good of insurance from the government as I get now.
All first world countries are ahead of you, and their citizens live longer, and have a lower infant mortality rate.
The US falls between Costa Rica and Cuba.
Take a look: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_life_expectancy
Of course, Costa Rica and Cuba spend 1/5 as much, and the US spends twice as much as the top countries.
I’m sure the 28 million or so American citizens who still have no health care under the current Trump administration because they are either not eligible or simply can’t afford the premiums would be quite happy with some form of basic socialized healthcare as opposed to none whatsoever!
Most of the civilized first world and even many third world countries consider universal health care a basic human right. And none of those countries prohibit their citizens from purchasing what are known as luxury private health care packages if they can afford it!
We Canadians spend much less on Health care than the US, and live longer.
The number of Americans I meet who complain about things like not being able to select their own doctor, losing their coverage if they change jobs, etc., convinces me that having some wait lists( which I, at age 60, have not experienced) is not that big a problem and an acceptable compromise.
Please Lloyd, don’t confuse us Americans with facts and logic. We have a beautiful wall to build.
Medicare-for-all has become incredibly popular among the Democratic base, but the primary problem it will face is that many people are fine with the insurance they have today. They might not love it, but they are familiar with it, and for the people who don’t incur regular medical bills but want to be protected from an emergency, the benefits you receive through work-based insurance are probably sufficient.
“It’s a real barrier to doing anything big,” says the Urban Institute, who helped create a proposal explicitly designed not to disrupt work-based insurance. “Most people with employer plans are reasonably happy with them.”
When Vox conducted focus groups on single-payer, one recurring concern we heard was from people who mostly like the insurance they have and were worried about losing it under Medicare-for-all.
“I wouldn’t like that,” Richard M., a federal official who gets his insurance through his work, said when told he would have to give up his insurance. “I like having an option. And I mean at this stage, I’m working full time, I should have an option.”
The polling bears out this sentiment: 83 percent of people with employer-sponsored insurance said in March 2016 that they thought their health insurance was excellent or good, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation. The status quo is powerful in American health care — while there are problems, people are worried about big changes that could upend the system they rely on today.
Thats a false argument about Medicare for All.
Under that kind of basic single payer (rationed) system, most individuals would elect to purchase an insurance policy on top, to cover things the basic program didn’t cover.
So, we can move the nationwide discussion on the pros and cons beyond that point immediately.
I’m for such a system, realizing that it will be a basic care system, by and large.
Didn’t you see all the political ads before the election? You won’t be able to get people to buy into that kind of plan in the face of all the think tank attacks about how Medicare-for-all would be a $32 trillion government takeover of healthcare that would force politicians to come between you and your doctor.
Geoff, yeh probably right. But I’m open to watching this public debate slowly change. The vast majority of voters would like a basic ‘medicare for all’ plan, with insurance on top for those who choose to buy some version of it.
The real appeal of most people’s health care system in the US is that their employers are paying for it.
The good, the bad, and the ugly of England’s universal health-care system
Jessica Hullinger
While the NHS has long been the subject of some scorn in America, it is also often heralded elsewhere as a shining example of how universal health care can succeed. British citizens are fiercely protective of it. One survey found that Brits list the NHS as the number one reason they are proud to be British. And there’s good reason for this: The NHS is great. Having grown up in the States and become accustomed to the complicated web of insurance claims, co-pays, deductibles, and enormously confusing bills that plague the American health-care system, I found the idea that I could receive top-tier treatment for free here in London mind-blowing. After I got pregnant last year, the maternity care I received leading up to and during the birth of my son was outstanding.
But this system is far from perfect. It is plagued by funding problems and staff shortages. We encountered the NHS’s dark underbelly after postnatal complications landed us in the hospital. The NHS gave me a healthy baby, yes. But the NHS also gave me nightmares that still wake me from a dead sleep, even nine months on.
Perhaps the most dehumanizing part of this entire experience was how powerless we felt. There was no one I could complain to, no manager I could shake my fist at. We were just another disgruntled, weary family clutching our newborns and waiting to be released. That’s the thing: When you take the money out of medicine, when you’re no longer a paying customer with alternative options, you lose your leverage. You are at the mercy of the system.
Sailing past my 75th year in the great American health care system I can assure you that “you are at the mercy of the system” from day one.
Mr Slow, if you think the USA system is so good then why do people need a go fund me ti get on a transplant list, why do common drugs jump 1000s of percent in price, why do people get bills for tens or hundreds of $1000s for simple things, why do people get given many unneccessary tests, why do you have some of the worst mortality rates for childbirth in the world, why do people come doen here for medical tourism including doctors who wish to use facilities at a fraction of the price?
NAOM
HOTTER DAYS WILL BOOST CHINESE RESIDENTIAL ELECTRIC USE
By 2099, scientists estimate mean surface temperature will be 2-5 C hotter than today. If consumption patterns remained similar to today, average residential electricity demand in China would rise by 18 percent at the low end and as much as 55 percent at the high end. Peak usage would rise by a minimum of 72 percent. This finding has important implications for energy grid planning, but even without climate change, average household electricity consumption in China is projected to double by 2040 due to rising incomes.
Renewable energy is hot. It has incredible momentum, not only in terms of deployment and costs but in terms of public opinion and cultural cachet. To put it simply: Everyone loves renewable energy. It’s cleaner, it’s high-tech, it’s new jobs, it’s the future.
And so more and more big energy customers are demanding the full meal deal: 100 percent renewable energy.
The Sierra Club notes that so far in the US, more than 80 cities, five counties, and two states have committed to 100 percent renewables. Six cities have already hit the target.
The group RE100 tracks 152 private companies across the globe that have committed to 100 percent renewables, including Google, Ikea, Apple, Facebook, Microsoft, Coca-Cola, Nike, GM, and, uh, Lego.
The timing of all these targets (and thus their stringency) varies, everywhere from 2020 to 2050, but cumulatively, they are beginning to add up.
The rapid spread and evident popularity of the 100 percent target has created an alarming situation for power utilities…In short, their customers are stampeding in a direction that terrifies them.
The industry’s dilemma is brought home by a recent bit of market research and polling done on behalf of the Edison Electric Institute, a trade group for utilities. It was distributed at a recent meeting of EEI board members and executives and shared with me.
The takeaway: Renewables are a public opinion juggernaut. Being against them is no longer an option. The industry’s best and only hope is to slow down the stampede a bit (and that’s what they plan to try).
She has been saying the same thing for at least 15 years. She is wrong and even she knows it. The problem is that she has stuck with that position for so long that she cannot abandon it without losing all credibility with her fan base.
This lame, unsupported, categorical dismissal makes one want to rush right over and read the article.
From the article:
“While intermittent wind and solar may sound sustainable, the way that they are added to the electric grid tends to push the overall electrical system toward collapse. “
Isn’t the surplus of electricity stored in batteries ?
Suyog, I think part of her audience share her opinion:
“I recently gave a talk to a group of IEEE electricity researchers (primarily engineers) about the current energy situation and how welcoming it is for new technologies. They wanted to understand what the electricity situation really is. They are very aware that intermittent renewables, including wind and solar, present many challenges. “
To repeat my question in another way: Is storing the surplus of electricity in batteries not the ‘easy’ solution ? As the engineers welcome new technologies apparently it is not, but why not ? ‘Too many’ batteries needed ?
She has been beating this drum since the days of the Peak Oil web site which was the predecessor to this one. There have been repeated warnings that grids will collapse at 10%, then 20%, then 30% but we have seen repeated examples of grids running on 40% – 100% renewables. Her story doesn’t hold water.
NAOM
NAOM, I understand, but what kind of new technologies are those engineers waiting for ?
“I recently gave a talk to a group of IEEE electricity researchers (primarily engineers) about the current energy situation and how welcoming it is for new technologies.”
Why are they waiting? Why don’t they get on with finding them? Unfortunately the IEEE is not exactly a groundbreaking organisation, they are more conservative and concerned building up the rules after much debate, followers not leaders. It is the entrepreneurs who are driving things forward and developing the technologies. If we wait for the IEEE it will be way too late, one has to ask ‘Why haven’t they been solving these issues instead of waiting?’.
NAOM
Why renewables don’t need a breakthrough in energy storage or even need baseload coal and natural gas.
GF, nice. So nobody needs the kind of lectures that Gail gives anymore. The IEEE members must be deaf and blind, so to speak
I think they are trying to integrate older systems with the newer renewable systems, which leads to many mismatched solutions. One set of solutions uses lots of energy storage to filter the mismatch.
Better to think of a completely renewable system and search for solutions that minimize storage using time of use and non-battery storage systems or an already existing battery system (EV).
We didn’t fit engines to horses (hybrid), we got rid of the horses completely and dealt with the other problems separate from the original system.
NOAM, can you corroborate your points please?
AFAIK, there are different kinds of grids, grid ages and grid setups and what may work now (in what contexts?) may not necessarily work later.
Also, some people hereon seem to be at odds with one another WRT off-grid versus on-grid and the kinds of issues (including freedoms) they may and may not entail.
CLIMATE CHANGE: HUGE COSTS OF WARMING IMPACTS IN 2018
Extreme weather events linked to climate change cost thousands of lives and caused huge damage throughout the world in 2018, say Christian Aid. The charity’s report identified ten events that cost more than $1bn each, with four costing more than $7bn each. According to the report the most financially costly disasters linked to rising temperatures were Hurricanes Florence and Michael, with costs said to be around $17bn for the former, and $15bn for the latter.
2019 MAY BE THE WARMEST YEAR ON RECORD AS A RESULT OF AN EL NIÑO EVENT EXACERBATED BY GLOBAL WARMING
Climate scientists warn that 2019 may be the warmest year on record largely as the result of a possible El Niño event exacerbated by man-made global warming. There is a 90 percent chance that El Niño will form and continue through the Northern Hemisphere winter of 2018-19 and a 60 percent chance that it will continue into the spring of 2019, according to the Climate Prediction Center at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).
Exponential growth? Well, perhaps with some exceptions then?
“GM delivered 3,949 Bolt EVs during the last three months versus 6,710 units during the same period last year. That’s a 41.1% decrease in sales in the U.S., the biggest market for GM’s flagship all-electric vehicle.”
Meanwhile, in commie Norway with its despicable state sponsored medicare system,
PLUG-IN EV SALES IN NORWAY UP 48% IN OCTOBER [2017], OVERALL MARKET SHARE AT 43%
If we check the best selling vehicle ranks after 10 months in Norway (straight ICE and plug-ins), the data shows some interesting findings:
1. Volkswagen Golf – 10,383 total (including 7,794 or 75% plug-ins – 5,699 e-Golf and 2,085 Golf GTE)
2. BMW i3 – 4,166
3. Volkswagen Passat – 3,349 total (including 2,859 or 72% plug-in GTE)
4. Toyota Rav4 – 3,824 total
5. Toyota Yaris – 3,543 total
6. Mitsubishi Outlander – 3,335 total (including 3,150 or 94.5% plug-in)
7. Nissan LEAF – 3,180 total
8. Toyota C-HR – 3,118 total
9. Skoda Octavia – 2,928 total
10. Toyota Auris –2,858 total
The Tesla Model X – sits #11 with 2,824 registrations, and has so far outpaced the Model S – which finds itself in 12th with 2,185 registrations. The Renault ZOE sits 17th with 1,898 deliveries.
I’m glad Norway is deploying lots of EV/hybrid cars. Helping the rest of the world get experience with cold weather effects on batteries and charging.
Since the Tesla model X and the model S are basically the same drive train and battery pack that would bring the combined sales and registrations of Teslas to 5,009. Putting Tesla into 2nd place beating out the BMW i3
And now for a bridge too short. That means natural gas plants built today could be rendered uncompetitive well before their rated lifespan. They could become “stranded assets,” saddling utility ratepayers and investors with the costs of premature decommissioning.
Meanwhile, gas’s environmental reputation has suffered from a series of reports, most recently a study in Science, showing that gas’s lifecycle methane emissions are much higher than previously estimated and could seriously dent gas’s climate advantage over coal.
Park this truck in a warehouse covered with PV panels, and make delivers to your hearts content.
This kind of thing will be commonplace in the coming decade.
The only oil you need is for lubrication, not burning.
Australia’s vast continent is sizzling through extreme heatwave conditions this week, with temperatures reaching record highs and emergency services on high alert for bushfires. The mercury is up to 16 degree Celsius (29 degrees Fahrenheit) higher than usual for this time of the year for southern Australia, with numerous towns setting new December records, the Bureau of Meteorology said Friday.
The town of Marble Bar in the nation’s north-west, thought to be the country’s hottest on average, broke its record for all-time highest temperature on Thursday, reaching 49.3C. That’s 120.74 degrees Fahrenheit.
THE CHANGING NATURE OF CANADA’S FOREST SUPPLY AS FIRES, BUGS, AND CLIMATE BITE
Mills in the heart of Canada’s timber industry have fallen quieter this winter as wildfires and infestations made worse by climate change have made vast tracts of once valuable forest into barren stands of dead trees. After seeing record high softwood lumber prices earlier this year, Canada’s forestry industry is facing an uncertain future due to falling demand from a cooling U.S. housing market, increasingly frequent and intense forest fires and the continuing damage from pests such as the mountain pine beetle.
When I saw that story headlined, I immediately googled both Adelaide and Sydney temperatures for the 10 day outlook.
This had become a de facto method for correlating high electricity prices on the AEMO site, especially late afternoon South Australia on low wind days.
Should you check out these 2 cities temperatures, you will find remarkably mild temperature ranges with Sydney topping out in the low 80s Farenheit.
Looks hot to me.
Two days ago on the news: part of Australia 50 degrees Celsius
Edit: see post above by Doug
Another tweet!
Donald J. Trump
✔
@realDonaldTrump
We will be forced to close the Southern Border entirely if the Obstructionist Democrats do not give us the money to finish the Wall & also change the ridiculous immigration laws that our Country is saddled with. Hard to believe there was a Congress & President who would approve!
69.8K
7:16 AM – Dec 28, 2018
Why ‘Nation’ Is the Word of the Year
Virulent nationalism proves the U.S. was founded on a myth
Douglas Rushkoff
Instead of depending on some a-historical mythology — from Bible stories to Make America Great Again — the power of a nation state should come from its citizens’ conscious and active choice to live within a unifying ethical framework. It’s an ongoing negotiation between a cluster of human colonies. Not a set of boundaries, but a moving target. Open source.
The experiment fails, however, when we conceive of our nation as something forged in the past — some blood-and-soil claim to authentic origins or divine rights — rather than an approach to the future. The backwards-looking nation builds walls to protect its boundaries, defines its citizens with ever-more precision, and protects the profits of its chartered corporations even at the expense of the climate, economy, and the well-being of its people. Nationalism is an ideology that depends on forgetting that the nation is a social construction, subordinating people and places to the imaginary framework.
As nation states disconnect from the needs of people, it has fallen to the real human colonies — the cities — to serve as true representatives of the people’s will.
“It all comes down to wealth and power – the few who have more and more of it (Wall St. investors, top CEOs, billionaires, and monopolists), and the many who have less and less. Trump isn’t the cause of this. He’s the consequence.” — Robert Reich
Trump isn’t the cause of this. He’s the consequence.”
Right, but that isn’t what worries me! It’s his stupid supporters…
Think of all the business opportunities kids: EVs, new coal plants to feed them, the list goes on….
INDIA’S POPULATION: BECOMING NUMBER ONE
“India is poised to overtake China as the world’s most populous country by 2024…India will likely hold that rank throughout the 21st century. Its population is 1.34 billion, nearly a fourfold increase since independence 70 years ago. China’s population, at 1.41 billion, roughly doubled over the same period. The pace of India’s population growth, now at 15 million per year, is the world’s largest. The two nations alone have more than a billion people, and their population gap is projected to widen to 500 million by 2100. By comparison, the third and fourth most populous countries in 2100, Nigeria and the United States, are projected to have populations of nearly 800 million and 450 million, respectively.”
From what I have heard discussed elsewhere, India’s Green Revolution, is not working as well as advertised. To bring poor but successful farmers into a capitalistic system paying for seed, fertilizer and machinery does not always work very well.
It is often a debt trap, a water trap and a soil destroyer.
If you add India + Bangladesh + Pakistan [1,354, 201, 166]
population is now 1.72 B.
That is more than all of Europe, N Amer, and S Amer combined 1.53B.
Space Time Ripples and Einstein’s Legacy
Published on Jun 29, 2016
Headline news was made earlier this year when the detection of gravitational waves, caused by the collision of two black holes, was confirmed by the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory (LIGO). And earlier this month, another ripple was detected! The observed ripples in the fabric of space-time validate a key prediction in Albert Einstein’s theory of general relativity. One hundred years old, the theory continues to astonish scientists with how correct it is. LIGO’s discovery signals a new era of astronomy and a new way of understanding the warped side of the universe.
Listening to that panel of physicists is just so much more fun than discussing the evils of promoting renewables, tks!
Yep, there are many more fun things to do than playing with the trolls and BSer’s. Lots of related videos with the same speakers and similar topics. These of course can lead to actual scientific papers and articles.
The analogy is the human condition, signals (communication) can propagate very quickly but actual human action or response can be very slow.
BTW the Amory Lovins video I put up earlier is probably one of the most information rich seminars I have ever heard. He covers large areas in a sentence or two.
Energy has never been the problem, the problem is in the head (or lack of using it).
Have a great New Year and spread the word.
The analogy is the human condition, signals (communication) can propagate very quickly but actual human action or response can be very slow.
Not to mention all the human resistors that slow down and diminish the quality of the signal flow… Time to redesign the circuits!
Happy New Year!
Life-blood of Tesla batteries hits supply limits in Andean mine
Yep, politics hits a lithium mine. Good excuse to push other technologies for batteries, which is happening now.
First commercialization of lithium ion batteries came in the early 1990’s by the Japanese.
It still has not been replaced, and has been quite a while.
I would not hold your breath on a upgrade (10% of market share).
Don’t worry, your precious lithium might still be used for some applications.
Now we use aluminum or carbon in car bodies and even have computers and lasers. Planes fly now too. Changes and advances are always being made, especially when their is money involved. Oh, I forgot to mention diesel powered locomotives took over from steam powered ones.
A short list of the possible candidates.
Future batteries, coming soon: Charge in seconds, last months and power over the air
“In this compelling and cogently argued book, Tom Wessels demonstrates how our current path toward progress, based on continual economic expansion and inefficient use of resources, runs absolutely contrary to three foundational scientific laws that govern all complex natural systems…
These laws, scientifically proven to sustain life in its myriad forms, have been cast aside since the eighteenth century, first by Western economists, political pragmatists, and governments attracted by the idea of unlimited growth, and more recently by a global economy dominated by large corporations, in which consolidation and oversimplification create large-scale inefficiencies in both material and energy usage.”
Wessels makes scientific theory readily accessible by offering examples of how the laws of sustainability function in the complex systems we can observe in the natural world around us. He shows how systems such as forests can be templates for developing sustainable economic practices that will allow true progress. Demonstrating that all environmental problems have their source in a disregard for the laws of sustainability that is based on the myth of progress, he concludes with an impassioned argument for cultural change.”
Batteries are indeed the big bottleneck to the EV future. We shall see.
Yeah, might happen but not because there is not enough resource. Politics, the last ditch resort to slow the process.
“There’s little risk of lithium supplies running low in any absolute sense; the next decade will probably see less than one percent of the world’s lithium reserves depleted. The real danger is that lithium won’t be recovered and made available quickly enough to meet the rising demand.” https://blog.energybrainpool.com/en/is-there-enough-lithium-to-feed-the-need-for-batteries/
Good reason to bring on other battery or storage systems.
I agree–
When somethings gets 10% of market, I think we can talk.
According to Freedoniagroup
“World hybrid and electric vehicle (H/EV) sales will more than double through 2018, reaching 25.6 million units and accounting for nearly one-quarter of all new motor vehicles sold. ”
Studies predicting 40 million e-bikes to be sold in 2023. That market is rising fast, especially in Asia. Who needs four wheels when two will do the job?
Cars (4 wheelers) might go the other way, as they become autonomous and go into urban service fleets, the numbers could actually fall by 2030. Should be a fun time to watch what happens as the dinosaurs fade away and the electro eaters roll on.
Those are charged electrical transport.
Need to get on the same page.
Balderdash.
Bingo!
I have been waiting.
“we shall see”
Meanwhile life blood of all ICE powered vehicles could hit supply limits on the entire planet.
How an oil glut could swiftly turn to an oil shortage
Oil industry analysts and executives fear a looming global supply crunch is on the horizon, even as Texas and other parts of the nation keep churning out more oil than ever.
U.S. oil prices could spike from about $70 a barrel now to levels not seen since mid-2014 when oil hovered above $100, analysts say. That would be great for Houston’s oil-rich economy, but only until skyrocketing gasoline prices and supply disruptions spawned a global economic slowdown.
“It’s even more worrisome in a time like this when you have significant geopolitical risks coming from different spots in the world.” said Jamie Webster, senior director at Boston Consulting Group’s Center for Energy Impact in Washington.
Oh, and not to mention that all the ecological impacts of extracting, distributing and burning fossil fuels are multiple orders of magnitude more harmful than building out and using renewables!
Many oil-producing countries are on the decline, while others are pumping out almost as much as they possibly can. There’s little remaining margin to boost production if supplies dwindle.
That’s the gist of your link Fred. And no one is prepared for it. Trucks and SUVs are selling like hot cakes. Trump has eliminated milage requirments for new vehicles.
Again, when everyone was expecting peak oil, it didn’t happen. It will happen when no one is expecting it.
Again, when everyone was expecting peak oil, it didn’t happen. It will happen when no one is expecting it.
Amen 😉
I third it.
My lips are sealed.
Our storage system for fresh water is going away.
80% of mountain glaciers in Alberta, B.C. and Yukon will disappear within 50 years: report “We don’t have detailed measurements everywhere but where we have measurements the rates can be 25 to 70 per cent [of melt] in the last six to seven decades.”
The rates of melting are similar to what is seen in the European Alps and the Andes, he said.
The 2017–18 North American cold wave was an extreme weather event in North America in which record low temperatures gripped much of the Central, Eastern United States, and parts of Central and Eastern Canada. Starting in late December as a result of the southward shift of the polar vortex, extremely cold conditions froze the eastern United States in the last few days of 2017 as well as into the new year. Following a brief respite in mid-January, cold temperatures swung back into the eastern U.S. shortly afterwards. The cold wave finally dissolved by around January 19, as near-average temperatures returned.
Awwhh, that was nothing compared to past weather events. Have had much worse winters here in the eastern US in recent history. Also much worse ones even further back.
125 years ago, deadly ‘Children’s Blizzard’ blasted Minnesota
“The storm happened at the tail-end of a six-year run of extreme weather called the “Little Ice Age.” Climate historian and retired state policy analyst Thomas St. Martin of Woodbury wrote in an abstract that a series of phenomena, including the eruption of the Indonesian volcano Krakatoa in August, 1883, created an atmospheric shield against solar radiation that plunged the globe into the deep freeze from 1882 to 1888. In the long gaze of history, the powerful blizzard of Jan. 12, 1888 was a final exclamation point. ” https://www.minnpost.com/minnesota-history/2013/01/125-years-ago-deadly-children-s-blizzard-blasted-minnesota/
In fact cold waves are quite common, US had over 20 in the last 70 years.
I remember the cold wave of 77. Had lots of fun in the snow that year.
“Cold wave of January 1977. Greatest nationwide coldwave of 20th century. Core of the cold air extended from New Hampshire to Florida and west to Iowa and Missouri. Ohio was at the very center of the cold air mass where every weather station there recorded its coldest month on record. Cincinnati recorded its lowest known temperature of -25F dating back to 1820. The South Carolina state record temperature of -20F was recorded during this cold wave near Long Creek. The windchill in Minneapolis was -78F on January 28th, possibility the lowest ever recorded there. Snow fell in Miami and Homestead Florida, the farthest south snow was ever recorded in America. President Jimmy Carter walked in his inauguration parade in temperatures below freezing on January 20th. The Buffalo, NY was hit with its worst blizzard ever during the last week of January where near hurricane force winds created whiteout conditions for three days. Temperatures in Buffalo were around 0F, windchills recorded of -60F, and the blizzard paralyzed the city with snow drifts of up to 30 feet.[29]”
And how does it compare to the current extreme heat wave in Australia?!
Australian town records temperature of 49.3 Celsius as country sizzles in record-breaking heatwave
Good news, everyone! Trumps’ EPA is well on the way to erasing all those pesky onerous environmental regulations!
Yes, let’s degrade our environment more…kind of funny how some folks who are anti-vaxers who rail about thimerosal in vaccines supposedly causing autism are A-OK with coal plants and other industries spewing mercury and other heavy metals and other toxins into the air and water. So, let ideology trump rationality, you betcha. So many people are so stupid.
The art of luxury, built on science.
With Mercedes-Benz EQ, the electric future is here. Through expert engineering and cutting-edge technology, the next wave of Mercedes-Benz vehicles will usher in a new era of luxury driving.
Fred
You cannot buy that now you numpty. In your rush to show other people up you make yourself look very silly.
Mercedes, search of electric vehicle comes up with nothing.
I guess our individual definitions of ‘Nothing’ may need some tweaking…
In any case Mercedes is most definitely entering the EV market, probably sooner rather than later in 2019.
Cheers!
Fred
I was saying that sales are low because there are so few vehicles for sale.
and Mercedes do NOT sell and electric car as yet in the UK.
Sorry that is too difficult for you to understand
Cheers
“I was saying that sales are low because there are so few vehicles for sale.“
Hugo, so few different vehicles for sale I guess you claim. But there is more. Take a country like Holland, where politicians want that from 2030 on only EV’s are sold. All ‘renewable measures’ only with the goal of CO2 emission reduction, so at least is said (what if climate change wouldn’t exist).
A few weeks ago the news showed interviews with buyers of a new car. The conclusion is that most of who bought a CE car had considered buying an EV, but they wanted to wait still. Motives: afraid/uncomfortable for/with the change in combination with the (in their eyes) uncertainties of range and battery lifespan.
It will take a few more years for EV’s to “take off” seriously, and maybe only happening in combination with high oilprices.
I was with a group of modern human beings, watching some football yesterday.
3 of 4 came in electric or hybrid electric vehicles.
Things will change, slow at first, and then fast.
Unless they are plug-in hybrid electric, they only use petrol or diesel, so are a total waste of time. Even plug-in are only good if people charge them up every day.
In 2018 global consumption of oil went up by 1,400,000 barrels per day. Obviously electric cars are having little impact at the moment.
My point is sales are so low because there are so few electric models,
Click on All cars and try and find it. There is a Hybrid joke, powered only by petrol, how does that help with global warming or the coming peak of oil production?
“Even plug-in are only good if people charge them up every day.”
I went more than 12 months without putting gasoline in my Chevy Volt. I don’t see a problem with charging the car every day. Depending on how I drive and outside temperature it will go between 50 and 70 miles between charges.
The car is so damned smart it amazes me. When I bought it I had the utility switch my service to “Time of use” rates. I then programmed the car to only charge at the lowest rates (between 9PM and 7AM). I’m saving between 7 and 10 cents/mile compared to a car getting 30 miles/gallon.
‘Smart car’ is practically an oxymoron.
With Brexit coming up I doubt people have much confidence in buying things like cars and are especially risk adverse to new ideas such as EVs. Sales overall suddenly dropped after several years of growth. A second point to note is that the sales of PHEVs, in the UK, were mostly to fleets however the users failed to charge them and just topped up the fuel. I believe the government knows that there has to be a switch in emphasis but they are too bogged down in Brexit to worry about anything else. A further factor is the car industries fears over Brexit and their having to plan for shutdowns, if they see a possible need to move production to the continent they are not going to go for a big push to electric until they know the situation.
Fred, Hickory, esteemed Hugo was looking at the UK market which is lagging behind the USA which is why EVs are so obscure on UK manufacturers’ web sites compared with the USA.
NAOM
notanoilman
If we had never joined the stupid union we could have kept the £18,000,000,000 per year we give to Brussels’s politicians. Then perhaps we could have used part of that money to subsidize the shift to electric cars.
Only time will tell how things will shake out but so far Brexit is not looking too smart! Its looking more and more like a poorly thought out and totally unnecessary self inflicted economic wound that may cost the UK much more in the long run than its current economic obligations vis a vis the EU. The expression ‘penny wise and pound foolish’, comes to mind
I think the Scots have a term for the people who voted for Brexit: ‘bampots’!
Fred
If Europe is so great why did you leave?
If Europe is so great why does it need £18,000,000,000 of UK money each year?
Ice Ages are tough, but they also can be life abundant since the geology and soil structures get changed and deserts are reduced.
Do we even have a concept of what we are in the process of doing by heading toward a warm planet? Not only a possible major extinction event but probably changing the future soil and surface geology of the planet for the next millions of years by leaving the Ice Age.
GoneFishing,
I can’t get enough sound to listen to the lecture but thanks for bringing these talks to my attention.
There are backwater flood deposits in the city of Wenatchee just as there are all the way NE to past Grand Coulee Dam and SE almost to Wallula Gap where the floodwaters joined the Columbia River as it approached where the Washington/Oregon border is now. In some parts of the Columbia Plateau floods left material that can be farmed and in many others they formed what’s called scabland where all material that had overlain the basalts below flood level was removed.
In some parts of the Columbia Plateau floods left material that can be farmed and in many others they formed what’s called scabland where all material that had overlain the basalts below flood level was removed.
The big question is ‘will part of the production be sidelined for cricket bats?’.
NAOM
‘will part of the production be sidelined for cricket bats?’
This guy is a Pallid Bat and among the things he likes to eat are Jerusalem Crickets… So I guess he could be called a ‘Cricket Bat’ 😉
.
Grooooooooooaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaan!
Scale, Numbers, Forethought and Lock-Ins
“No, I don’t have an idea how we will transition without renewables.” ~ Niko McManus
Niko, actually you do seem to have an idea how to transition without so-called renewables, and you already wrote it hereon WRT your comment regarding relocalizing, degrowing, simplifying, and so forth– resilience.
I also seem to recall you mentioning scale, perhaps in another context, but it nevertheless applies to ‘renewable’ and related manufacture and buildout (etc.– cradle-to-grave)– scale and numbers (etc.).
Part of the point here is that, while ‘renewables’ may work in some sort of limited fashion now, they are of course in the current context of the crony-capitalist plutarchy (or corporatocracy if you will), which is still chugging along on apparently roughly 85% fossil fuels as its primary and very mobile energy. When things like technoindustrial-produced renewables are numbered and scaled-up, new and often unforeseen (perhaps especially by those who might advocate for them in a handwavey kind of way) problems arise, manifested in a myriad of ways…
U-shaped cost curves; market saturations; haves and have nots (and other issues behind renewable allocation); recycling (or improper or lack thereof); resource limits; transportation infrastructure; new forms of pollution and wealth inequity (think of child-labor issues with cobalt mining in Africa or lithium mining impacts in South America for examples); mass-production industries’ capacities or incapacities to adapt, such as to intermittency and/or dramatic changes in the so-called economy in general; and so on.
By now, it seems quite obvious that not everyone on the planet is going to be basking in the pseudo-glory and pseudo-wealth of this ‘technoindustrial’ crony-capitalist plutarchy ‘set of living arrangments’ (unless if by pushing the planet past certain limits), but who and how many question that for this supposed renewable transition? Not many.
We have the likes of GoneFishing or Fred Magyar mentioning how not every EV has to be a car, but so what, if billions of people get indoctrinated by adverstising and marketing (and assorted propaganda, brainwashing and coercion) that they ‘need’ batteries, such as for their digital devices, cars, scooters, electric bikes, homes (heating, lighting, appliances, etc.) and so on. That’s an issue in part of scale and numbers and that can and probably will bump up against social and natural planetary constraints, just like our modus operandi is already doing.
Not many people seem to think or talk about these kinds of things in their blinkered navigations though reality and that’s why we can get, down the road, into the kinds predicaments, the kinds of rock-and-hard-places that what some, such as David Korowizc, for example, would call, ‘lock-in’.
And guess what? Fossil fuel, general mass production industry and industrial agro (or the Green Revolution) are just such lock-ins.
And now we have AGW, species extinctions, and soil despoilments, etc., and the ‘need’ for collapse/peak oil blogs like these.
Lock-ins can, or maybe always do, leave us extra vulnerable– non-resilient.
“Niko, actually you do seem to have an idea how to transition without so-called renewables, and you already wrote it hereon WRT your comment regarding relocalizing, degrowing, simplifying, and so forth– resilience.”
Caelan, I was trying to say (not very well) that there is no way to painlessly transition, AKA transition in such a way that the majority of the current population stays alive. Resilience is the right way to go, but we cannot fool ourselves into thinking resilience is a solution for all of humanity. Resilience gives those that remain a better chance, and helps more remain after TSHTF, while reducing our total negative impact on the biosphere. Resilience does not feed 8 billion. This relates to what you’ve said about lock-in regarding industrial agriculture and scale. We now need that sort of industrial agriculture, and the scale it enables, in order to feed everyone currently alive. Relocalizing, degrowing, etc are not a solution to this problem so much as an admittance of the problem’s intractability, and a taking of the best route forward after accepting the inevitable.
As you know, I believe you are correct about renewables. They are clearly an extension of the same system that created the fossil fueled destruction we see every day. And I think this is an important point, though rarely touched on: fossil fuels could have been a great boon to humanity. If after their discovery we had used them sparingly, for critical applications, at rates the waste of which the biosphere could absorb and neutralize, for the ease and betterment of those humans already living, they would never have become the evil they are today. The Earth’s natural carbon dioxide sinks are quite impressive, we could have burned carbon at a fairly high rate WRT the size of pre-industrial society without stressing those systems much at all. Had we at the time of their discovery decided not to grow without reason, and instead increase everyone’s standard of living by reasonable and equitable amounts, we could have supported such a society, in balance with the Earth’s carbon sinks, for a very long time. Perhaps even long enough for that society to develop a renewable infrastructure sustained by very small amounts of fossil fuels, well below previous levels.
But we did not – instead, we grew like a cancer in every way possible. And this is the point. If it was indeed possible to use fossil fuels in a wiser, Earth-system sustainable way, then it makes no difference if the same is possible for our current renewables. We did not choose to do so in the past with fossil fuels, so why would we choose to now with renewables? Does anyone here actually believe humanity has drastically changed its cultural awareness of the limitations of the biosphere since that time? We on this forum perhaps come from a group of less than 1 million people on Earth that are seriously discussing and studying this question.
So it seems clear that renewables, in so far as they are deployed, will be used to further the destruction of the biosphere, just as fossil fuels were used before them.
The Earth’s natural carbon dioxide sinks are quite impressive, we could have burned carbon at a fairly high rate WRT the size of pre-industrial society without stressing those systems much at all. Had we at the time of their discovery decided not to grow without reason, and instead increase everyone’s standard of living by reasonable and equitable amounts, we could have supported such a society, in balance with the Earth’s carbon sinks, for a very long time.
Sheesh! Let me guess, you really haven’t the faintest clue about the true meaning behind the query: ‘Are humans smarter than yeast’?!
And with regards: ‘ So it seems clear that renewables, in so far as they are deployed, will be used to further the destruction of the biosphere, just as fossil fuels were used before them.
‘Prediction is very difficult, especially about the future’
Niels Bohr
You know Fred, sometimes your comments to those who have thoughts and opinions that differ from yours shows little appreciation for the effort they make in communicating such. I happen to greatly appreciate Niko expressing his thoughts and views. And I agree with much of his assessment. Each time I go to a large city (heck, even the small one I live 10 miles from) it is obvious that ‘progress’ has a LONG way to go before we can declare anything to be resilient, renewable or sustainable. Nobody wants to believe that there is not a solution. And who among us, as educated as we are about the current state of affairs, believes it is possible for humanity to align itself such that all the solutions could have a fighting chance at creating a society that lives in harmony with the rest of life? Pretty sure that if that ever does happen, it’ll be long after I’m gone… and many others too. Development continues. Hard to hold all the opposing actions one sees all around. Yesterday at the grocery store I saw a Nissan Leaf. Cool. Two days prior on my 1.5 hr drive in my ICE to my sister’s I see prime farmland up for sale with houses and apartments building up all around it. Hummm, any land being put into farming? Nope, all I see is land succumbing to development. I see massive pipe projects that carry water from areas that have it to areas that don’t because people want to live where there isn’t enough water. And developers need that piped water in order to be profitable building the old way. Implementing the new way is a constant uphill battle. Thousands of new rooftops everyday. No solar. No water catchment. Billions of dollars for military, for destruction, for control through fear. 7+billion people have to be controlled somehow. More people require more control. Reducing the population without disease, war or famine will, IMHO, require just as much control, if not more. It would help greatly if humans actually got along with one another. Sigh.
I happen to greatly appreciate Niko expressing his thoughts and views. And I agree with much of his assessment.
I have no problem with Niko or anyone else expressing their views!
However, if you agree with this statement:
The Earth’s natural carbon dioxide sinks are quite impressive, we could have burned carbon at a fairly high rate WRT the size of pre-industrial society without stressing those systems much at all. Had we at the time of their discovery decided not to grow without reason, and instead increase everyone’s standard of living by reasonable and equitable amounts, we could have supported such a society, in balance with the Earth’s carbon sinks, for a very long time.
Then you don’t have a clue either! Why?! because it assumes that humans had a priori knowledge of the consequences of burning fossil fuels, (they didn’t) that humans are rational operators, (they aren’t) that humans would go against their natural biological programming (not likely) and last but not least, that humans are actually smarter than yeast, (there is nothing to indicate that might be the case).
Just because someone puts a lot of time and effort into explaining why the earth is flat does not mean we should accept their views as being valid!
The Third Set of Footprints
Niko, not too long ago on this forum, I posted a comment, with references, about how we may be able to feed ~8 billion and live well (that the issue may be more ‘sociopolitical’), but not in the current (‘footprint/sociopolitical’) context. I would even suggest that a relatively-painless transition is (or at least was) possible.
Some time ago before that (~2016?), I mentioned hereon the idea of having at least two different sets of footprints; one, our natural footprint, and one, our technological one…
To update that; for a third set, maybe there could be an intelligent/wise capacity (emergent property?) to react effectively to our current situation so that the third set are small enough to accommodate what– and to be kind of metaphoric– the dinosaurs couldn’t, but the birds (that are apparently related to the dinosaurs) could.
IOW, we may have the capacity to not only grow our footprints through technology, but also shrink them under our natural, non-technological size, though knowledge, wisdom, etc., and living in harmony with nature.
If it’s too late to do so, it may not be too late for at least some of us, maybe the wiser and/or just plain lucky, to shrink our third footprint small enough to get through the future bottleneck(s), such as of our making…
That may preclude the ‘tribes’ that cling too tightly to their two other sets of footprint and, for example, fail to let go of their notions of renewable energy, (via the crony-capitalist plutarchy) and associated ‘detritus’.
By the way (and this is not necessarily meant for you, Niko)…
There is no point to solar panels, batteries and what they may power on a dead and dying planet!
Niko, not too long ago on this forum, I posted a comment, with references, about how we may be able to feed ~8 billion and live well (that the issue may be more ‘sociopolitical’), but not in the current (‘footprint/sociopolitical’) context. I would even suggest that a relatively-painless transition is (or at least was) possible.
My optimistic side wants to agree, but my pessimistic side keeps bringing up the lessons of human history. I don’t know. It seems ludicrous to think we can support so many without extra energy inputs. Then again, I have heard a lot of very impressive things regarding organic farming advancements. Maybe if everyone became once again focused on making food, and doing it in a sustainable, restorative way… But then again, considering how much of the biomass of the planet humans have displaced, how could we all exist and also restore that biomass? Like I said, I don’t know. I’d be interested to see some of your references.
IOW, we may have the capacity to not only grow our footprints through technology, but also shrink them under our natural, non-technological size, though knowledge, wisdom, etc., and living in harmony with nature.
This I agree with. I do not know if we can shrink them a sufficient amount. I just don’t know.
However, I DO know that you will deeply enjoy this podcast, if you have not already heard about it. I assure you that it is right up your alley and you will like it very much.
If December will bring at least 272,000, total sales in 2018 will be 2 million
November 2018 was another great month for plug-in electric car sales around the world. A new all-time record was set the third time in a row, and we are waiting for the fourth in December.
EV Sales Blog estimates that, in total, some 237,553 plug-in electric cars were sold last month (up 73%). More than two-thirds (67%) of sales are BEVs.
See more our sales reports for November 2018 here.
The tally for 11 months of 2018 is 1,728,629 at an average of 2% market share. We are almost certain that more than a quarter million people will start driving electric (purely electric or partially electric) in December.
Reading through the comments, I almost felt I was a peakoilbarrel.com. Weird! Were it not for the fact that Peak Oil was not on anyone’s radar and no one mentioned the possibility of oil supply problem over the next decade or so, I would have been fooled!
Weird! Were it not for the fact that Peak Oil was not on anyone’s radar and no one mentioned the possibility of oil supply problem over the next decade or so, I would have been fooled!
Well there was this comment from someone named Mike 😉
It is still surprising that it is only 2% of global sales, but at some point this has got to start impacting global oil demand.
I think a reasonable estimate of average annual gasoline savings-per EV is probably 500 gallons~10 barrels of oil. I guess this works out to only 20 million barrels for all 2019 EV sales and something like 40-50 million for all EVs. No idea how this works out in the grand scheme of things, but maybe in the early 2020s we will start to see the freak-out over shrinking oil revenue.
Cheers! and Happy New Year!
LOL! Funny how you zoomed in the comment that most had me thinking I could be at peakoilbarre!
Why the wink? Do you know this “Mike”?
No but we have a couple of Mikes here so it just makes it seem even more like peakoilbarrel!
Thanks, Dennis, you too and thanks for your efforts in this site’s regard.
This open topic is getting old, but maybe it’s not dead yet, lol.
I’m looking for any serious articles about possible ways the owners of sufficient coal and gas fired generating capacity will be paid to keep their infrastructure up and ready to run, for as many years as necessary, on short notice ( minutes to days) as wind and solar farms take an ever bigger bite out of their market.
For starters, it seems perfectly obvious to me that it’s going to take two or three decades, at least, to build out sufficient renewable capacity, storage capacity, HVDC transmission lines, etc, to carry the load without coal and gas.
It looks at first glance as if there are only two, maybe three, viable options.
One is to allow the owners to charge whatever the market will bear to provide the necessary backup on the spot market. I don’t think that will fly politically, over the long term. I believe Joe and Suzy Sixpack will have a major, major hissy fit the first time they get a bill twice the usual size because the wind and sun fail to cooperate – and there WILL be times when both wind and solar generation are way down for a week, maybe even two weeks. It’s fine to talk about running entirely on renewable juice, EVENTUALLY, but that’s not what I’m talking about. I’m talking about the two decades or more the transition will take.
If I’m right on this point, then backup fossil fuel capacity will have to be subsidized. Tax money will have to be provided out of general revenue, or else by way of a tax levied on the wind and solar power industries.
I’m expecting to have a lot of fun out of the hard core conservative element that doesn’t believe in subsidies when they eventually reverse themselves, as they inevitably must, so as to keep their lights on.
Any links to relevant articles by professional economists, engineers, environmentalists, etc, will be greatly appreciated, and thanks in advance.
OFM,
Not specifically about coal and gas generators (nuclear is mentioned), but this article looks at baseload capacity in low carbon generation in GB.
Thanks Micheal for this great link. Anybody interested in the down in the dirt details concerning the transition to renewable electricity will find it very useful indeed.
Hickel Response on Degrowth
2018 Chaos, 2019 Mayhem
Switching to a home battery won’t help save the world from climate change
Powering the Tesla Gigafactory
Got an EV? Do you like to promote them? Think they’re better than ICE’s? Do you feel you’re making a difference, such as for wildlife, while FF burning still goes up?
Animals Hit By Cars
The true cost of electric cars
Nice post. Sums up many aspects of a point I keep repeatedly trying to make to people… Renewables will not save industrial society. They are a red herring to the only viable option. Deindustrialize, simplify, localize, detechnologize, and degrow. Renewables at this point are doing far more harm then good. Without their “promise” that we aren’t in deep sh*t, maybe we would have woken up to the fact that industrial civilization is toast, and begun to reorganize.
Yes we are in deep shit and we do need a different civilizational paradigm if humanity and most life on the planet is to have a chance.
We could could certainly agree that renewables in and of themselves are not going to save the planet but no one with more than two functioning synapses ever believed that they would.
However to categorically state the renewables are doing more harm than good is truly an idiotic statment!
Renewables are most definitely not the underlying cause of human over population, ecological overshoot, consumerism social injustice, unequal wealth and resources, distribution, etc.. etc..
Do you have anything intellingent to say about how exactly we might transition to a more sustainsble and humane civilization without renewables?!
You do realize we have almost 8 billion humans on the planet, right!?
And, it was fifty years ago Apollo astronaut William Anders captured his iconic images of our home, revealing just how fragile Earth is — in the depths of space.
When there were only 3.54 billion people.
Season’s greetings
NAOM
Doesn’t look like we are going to hit 83 million new ones this year. Just not trying hard enough anymore.
New Rule by old farts: Build a Wall around every vagina.
I don’t see what all the fuss is about overpopulation. Humans are doing a lot to make sure that doesn’t happen for very long. in fact they are doing a lot to bring the Earth back to a more normal climate condition. That should do it.
Darn, I forgot, another day where I don’t use my car. I just walk over to my friend’s house. I am getting so forgetful in not doing my part for the climate.
Maybe I should go out and buy a powerful AWD SUV and drive every day from now on. Something to think about. Probably need an app for that.
Bahhh Humbug
Enjoy the Happy Motoring/Flying Paradise while it lasts, lots of fun to be had.
Xmas sarc
The population has more than tripled sense I’ve been alive.
Maybe they are hoping for a green future like a human version of Elysia Chlorotica?
Phytoderm anyone?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elysia_chlorotica
Well, thanks for starting the conversation by calling me an idiot.
No, I don’t have an idea how we will transition without renewables. You, of course, have no idea how we will transition with renewables. They do not do what their advocates claim.
Rather than replacing the fossil fuel system, renewables act additively. They cannot operate on their own, and depend utterly on fossil fuel infrastructure in every stage of their creation and deployment. They are merely “fossil fuel extenders”, nothing more. Thus, they act to prolong the planetary devastation and civilizational growth that is threatening every ecosystem on this planet.
Do I have a solution? Of course not. Nature, on the other hand, does: most of the 8 billion will die. Simple as that. Renewables do not change that picture one iota. They in fact prolong growth, making that number of dead more likely closer to 10 billion. And that will be 10 billion less prepared, since many of them were depending on renewables. Were many of the current 7.6 billion to begin relocalizing, many of them would stand a much stronger fighting chance. Renewables are a red herring, a way to distract the masses from the depths of our plight. That’s it.
So you do not believe renewables will stave off collapse? I am wondering how many of the regulars who post on this blog really do believe renewables will somehow save civilization as we know it?
While this is my first time really posting, I am a long time regular. I do not in any way believe that renewables have any chance of saving us. I am also curious what the other answers will be.
” am wondering how many of the regulars who post on this blog really do believe renewables will somehow save civilization as we know it?”
Not I.
It will be different than we know it.
Smaller. Beyond that I am not sure of the details.
But whoever is around will be very thankful for the energy they get from renewables.
Nice to have heating, or cooling, or locomotion.
Not many who have studied history would expect things to remain as they are, it has never happened in the past and is unlikely to be the case in the future.
I expect the future will be different than the past, do any of you look back on the World as it was when you were 15 and se a World that looks the same today? For anyone over the age of 30, I would expect they answer would be in the negative.
Does anybody believe that peak in fossil fuel output will require no change in the World’s energy infrastructure?
Perhaps those that believe renewables cannot cut it believe either that only Nuclear energy is the answer or that the World will collapse.
Certainly in a collapse scenario, the less nuclear energy (light water reactor type) the better.
The real question is what approach minimizes damage to the planet going forward.
Maximizing renewable energy and electric transport buildout while also maximizing energy efficiency, use of passive solar and heat pumps, and building insolation, while minimizing rates of population growth through better education and access to health care and modern birth control, while also guaranteeing equal rights for women worldwide might be a step in the correct direction.
…and even if such actions don’t prevent a collapse (they won’t) they are good practice for what may make the post-collapse world a little less savage.
I think things are quite a bit more complicated and complex than false-dichotomous/black-and-white choices, say, between nuclear and so-called renewables (or collapse).
There is change and then there are constants.
“real question is what approach minimizes damage to the planet going forward.”
A lot less people is probably the best approach. Famine secondary to combined impacts peak oil and climate change will be the catalyst. History teaches us about human nature. Google images for Russian famine or einsatzgruppen if you’d like to see what perceptions of objective scarcity does to folks.
See here.
McManus, have you tried the stone age life? I trained in and practiced primitive survival systems. It works fairly well in a viable and abundant ecosystem with proper population distributions, a condition which is currently absent . So good luck with that.
I recommend a biological civilization, however we don’t have the ability quite yet to pull that one off. To be against technology that will greatly reduce the harm to the environment is stupid at this point, unless one wants the total destruction of ecosystems. The road to a long term viable way of life for humans takes many steps and those who are trying to stop the progress toward that are even more criminal than the current fossil fuel/domination of nature promoters.
My point, and the point clearly illustrated in Caelan’s post, is that despite claims to the contrary, renewables act to further our destruction of the environment. This will not magically change as we extend their deployment. They are just as destructive as fossil fuels, in other ways. And they cannot be created or maintained without fossil fuels, making them ultimately pointless.
The best we can hope for is a soft landing. We should stop delaying it, because every day we delay makes the situation worse. Renewables are part of that delay.
“renewables act to further our destruction of the environment”
Compared to what. No renewable energy, then fossil energy continues to extremes, which causes extreme destruction of the marine and land based ecologies. Are you living on a planet where pollution and CO2 have no effect????
I say PV and wind power reduces the destruction to the environment.
First, I don’t read Caelan’s posts!
As for: “despite claims to the contrary, renewables act to further our destruction of the environment.”
I have to agree with GF, compared to what?! That is basically a simplistic cop out statement with zero basis in any fact. Prove it with data. let’s see the facts! Not with some pulled out of your ass bullshit!
There is no doubt we have an unsustainable civilization but it is not in any way shape or form made any worse by using renewables!
Unless you are saying that any attempt to continue civilization is flat out a bad thing. If so, stop using your computer or smart phone to post on this or any other forum. Are you gathering mushrooms and berries in the forest to eat? Do you live in a cave, do you have running water, electricity, etc, etc…
Fred and Gone Fishing,
The destruction of our environment is caused by the scale of our global industrial civilization. It is an extractive civilization that destroys the environment in the pursuit of non-renewable resources.
So, my points:
1. Renewables do not replace fossil fuels, they add to the fossil fuel energy mix.
2. The production of renewables is an extension of the extractive civilization. We extract and destroy in order to get the materials to build them.
3. Renewables cannot be constructed without fossil fuels. This fact will not change. Therefore, they extend the fossil fuel system.
4. Renewables act to allow the continued growth of the destructive civilization. Without them, the civilization would begin to shrink sooner, thus reducing the ultimate destruction total.
5. Renewables allow people to ignore the coming problems of depletion, thus giving people a way to pretend that the future is not in fact coming. Without their “promise”, it’s possible some people may have begun taking action. Instead, every intelligent individual is counting on renewables to save us. Pure folly, since they cannot.
Every discussion around renewables reveals the true desire of those who advocate them. Commonly heard are ideas about how we can use them to power our cars, or heat our single family homes, etc. Never questioned is the existence of the car in the first place, or the possibility of moving back towards communal dwellings more exposed to the vagaries of nature which humans dealt with for many many thousands of years. Renewables are ALWAYS seen as a way to continue our current civilization, when that civilization is itself the cause of the destruction, and must be ended before the destruction will end. A wholly different civilization may not be destructive. This one unequivocally is, and renewables add to and continue that destruction. They are not a hope, they are a distraction and a lie.
” Renewables cannot be constructed without fossil fuels. This fact will not change. Therefore, they extend the fossil fuel system.”
It’s true that renewable infrastructure is currently dependent on fossil fuel but there is ample reason to believe that we will be able to harness enough wind and solar energy within the foreseeable future to manufacture renewable energy infrastructure enough to get by with less and less fossil fuel from one decade to the next.
Whether we WILL turn this corner is impossible to say, because there are so many variables to consider.
As a practical matter, it takes an idiot to even consider the idea that naked apes will give up industrial civilization voluntarily.
We won’t give it up even with a gun held to our collective head.Talking about giving up fossil fuels now or anytime without renewable energy enough to shoulder the load is a complete waste of time, except as an academic exercise.
Both the wind and solar industries are now well past the point where the energy produced far exceeds the fossil energy input necessary to construct wind and solar farms.
Furthermore , almost all of the material used in these industries can and will be recycled.
We already know how to use fossil fuels three or for times as efficiently as we do at present.This obviously means that we can eventually get by just fine with one quarter as much energy per capita as we use today.We can produce this much renewable energy, if we put our minds and backs into the job.
It should be obvious to anybody paying attention that the prudent thing to do,in respect to renewables is to keep the pedal to the metal.(trucker ‘s slang for continuous all out effort)
We may have already mucked up the global environment to the point hard global level crash is inevitable. A lot of smart people think so.
I was once of that mind myself, but in recent years I have come to believe that piecemeal regional level collapse is about as likely, with some of the better positioned and more powerful countries likely to pull thru skinnied down but still basically functional.
Micro mini electric cars are all we really need to get to work or fetch a six pack.Given time, housing will again be located within walking distance of jobs, as was once the case a century ago.
There’s no real reason truly essential equipment such as farm tractors and ambulances can’t be built well enough to last half a century at least……
and the metals and plastics in them recycled into new equipment when the half century is up.
As a matter of actual fact, I’m personally running some equipment built as far back as the sixties, getting the same work done as neighbors with new equipment , for a very minor percentage of their total costs.
Anybody building a new house in the so called Sun Belt can buy enough solar panels and insulation, etc, today, to just about wipe out his electric bill PLUS enough additional juice to drive an electric car thirty of forty miles round trip to work anytime the sun cooperates….for the price of one nice new car.
Everybody in Africa could die of war, starvation and or plague without this having any serious effect on the USA in terms of Yankees having grid juice and well stocked grocery stores.
Now if India or China were to be so afflicted, well now …we Yankees might find ourselves involved in hot war with either or both countries…both of them well armed including nukes.
Farmers in the industrial world are quite accustomed to dealing with disaster at the local and regional level, without the general public even noticing.Twice at least I have seen my neighbors sell their cows for immediate slaughter because they had no feed due to drought , and could not afford to pay for feed shipped long distances. Four times at least over my lifetime my family lost over ninety percent of our fruit crop to bad weather.
Shit happens.
If a drought equivalent to the Dust Bowl hits a poor African country the population may the halved, or even quartered.Such countries are unable to conduct much in the way of offensive war,even against their equally impoverished neighbors.The local people will slaughter each other wholesale….and when things settle down after a year, or four or five years, the survivors will have land enough to feed themselves.
There’s no doubt in my mind that if China were to be so afflicted, and could not buy food enough on the open market, well……the Chinese leadership would imo go to war, to the extent necessary, to feed the country.
I’m not saying things can’t get this bad even here in the USA, but this country is big enough and has surplus land enough, etc, and government is strong enough, that we Yankees aren’t likely to starve unless the climate goes totally nuts.
We appear to have enough of any and all TRULY essential resources to not only survive but also to maintain a functional industrial economy for most of a century at least IF we adopt a war time economic plan , with critical materials tightly rationed for the duration.
That ought to be long enough to figure out how to live on a truly sustainable basis.
Whether we will adopt such an economic program is anybody’s guess.
I suggest that we each and every one of us pray to the sky daddy or mommy or rock or snake or mountain of our choice that we do so.
If we are fortunate enough that we get a sufficient number of Pearl Harbor Wake Up Events, in the form of super storms , super droughts, resource wars, etc, etc, we might just adopt such an economic plan before it’s too late.
Howdy OFM’
Well said.
Although I’d give a different perspective on one point that you made- “That ought to be long enough to figure out how to live on a truly sustainable basis.
Whether we will adopt such an economic program is anybody’s guess.
I suggest that we each and every one of us pray to the sky daddy or mommy or rock or snake or mountain of our choice that we do so.”
Florida is an example of a state that currently gets lets than 1% of electricity from solar. They have a great solar resource, and some money. So its about choices they make and policies they enact, rather than any physical limitation. They could and should be a solar powerhouse.
This won’t get done with prayer. It will get done by activism of its citizens. Activism at the level of personal choice, at the level of education, activism at work, and at the ballot box. Electing state officials who are champions of the issue.
Prayer is purely optional, and not an ingredient on the list of transition elements required. IMHO
Hi Hickory,
That remark was intended as humor, but as a matter of fact, there are many people who take both their religion and the environment seriously.
It’s my impression that people who worship mountains, snakes, bears, rocks, etc, are generally in favor of preserving the natural world.
They are at least potential allies, in the fight to preserve the environment.
It’s unfortunate that we have so many here in the USA that worship money and power, but their time is growing short.
I know quite a few of this sort very well indeed.
They are mostly old and scared, and ready to join hands with anybody who offers them assurances that they will be ok, that the country will not go to hell, as they see things.
They’re dying off fast.
In ten or twenty years they will mostly be gone. Their kids, grandkids, and great grandkids are scattered like leaves in the wind, and not very many of their descendants take their religion very seriously.
The church is no longer the glue that holds their world together.Food stamps and social workers have taken the place of the church as the safety net.
Niko McManus.
Re: Your points:
Your points are mostly a gish gallop of half truths, outright falsehoods, myths, and contain multiple logically flawed arguments! While they have been addressed to some degree by OFM, to properly address each of them would require multiple dissertations.
Let me address just a few of the blatant ones in your last paragraph.
Every discussion around renewables reveals the true desire of those who advocate them.
Really now?! Even the discussions on this blog alone reveal a multitude of rather nuanced opinions on this topic. The expression herding cats comes to mind! However the consensus seems to be, given the science behind the consequences of anthropogenic CO2 emissions that we need to end all burning of fossil fuels.
The argument that anyone who advocates using renewables in some fashion to achieve this end is doing more more harm than good, is simply ridiculous!
Never questioned is the existence of the car in the first place,
Of course it is! Again the discussion is nuanced it revolves around topics of disruption and paradigm change. Of moving to models of transport where car ownership is supplanted by fleets of on demand service providers or subscription models. It involves discussion about better public transport with individual transportation being needed only in the last mile, especially in urban environments.
These are vehicles that travel at low rates of speed are self driving and particularly suited for benefiting from the high efficiencies of electric motors, and batteries. They can potentially be incorporated into smart microgrids and power homes and businesses when needed.
There are huge potential savings of resources when such vehicles are designed from the ground up to be for all practical purposes 100% recyclable. Iron, aluminum, copper and lithium are not used up and can be used again and again! Not to mention the obvious advantage of not emitting CO2 by burning fuel.
Renewables are ALWAYS seen as a way to continue our current civilization, when that civilization is itself the cause of the destruction, and must be ended before the destruction will end
Again you show no capacity for nuance and resort to a simplistic black and white statements incorporating absolutes. You seem stuck on absolutes constantly using words like ‘Every’, ‘Always’,’ Never’, etc… to describe those who advocate the use of renewables.
Even those just on this blog who discuss these topics have a much more nuanced view of the world than you seem to be willing to give them credit for.
So to close my comment I will just reiterate my point, which is: Claiming that advocating for renewables does more harm than good is just a profoundly flawed and illogical statement to make.
McManus, your “facts” are not facts at all. Your assertions have no basis other than to continue fossil fuel/nuclear civilization which is a sure dead end for the planet. Anyone who thinks that extraction will just end is blowing smoke in their empty skulls. There are vast stores of carbon to be burned and smaller stores of nuclear fuel to be mined and placed on the surface for all to enjoy. Only a matter of some tech advances to allow that access.
Gone fishing,
At some point the extraction stops (or at minimum is reduced) because the price of that the product can be sold for is less than the cost to extract the product.
Fossil fuels are not extracted because it is a fun thing to do, it is done to make money. When the cost of alternatives to fossil fuel become less expensive than fossil fuel, extraction ceases, first the more expensive sources and gradually fewer and fewer sources of fossil fuels will be able to compete as the World switches to less expensive alternatives, as demand for fossil fuels falls below supply available the price of fossil fuels starts to fall and the industry scales down costs are driven up, leading to lower supply.
Probably won’t fall to zero, just as there may still be a few buggy whips produced, but output will be pretty low by 2050 to 2060 as the energy transition continues apace.
“1. Renewables do not replace fossil fuels, they add to the fossil fuel energy mix.
2. The production of renewables is an extension of the extractive civilization. We extract and destroy in order to get the materials to build them.
3. Renewables cannot be constructed without fossil fuels. This fact will not change. Therefore, they extend the fossil fuel system.”
All these statements are nonsense/uneducated personal opinion sold as fact.
Renewables are an excellent idea, but in the short term conservation is clearly a better idea. The idea that the solution to our problems is to build more energy generation capacity comes from over a century of living with a profitable energy industry. The industry per se seems to make economic sense.
Renewables are bursting that bubble not so much be replacing the existing industry as by killing it. There is very little profit in renewables. The days of oil fatcats in golden Rolls Royces will soon be over. There will be no solar fatcats, thanks to the smooth distribution of solar radiation. So the of strategy of building more and more generation will have fewer backers with less political clout.
In addition, renewables create problems because they have no output “when the sun doesn’t blow and the wind doesn’t shine”. One solution to that is batteries. Batteries are more expensive than renewables. Another solution is conservation. Conservation may be more expensive than renewables in the long run, as we move to a more efficient economy, but in the short run it is cheaper. And in the long run, conservation competes with batteries.
Much, maybe most of new generation capacity being added is renewables. But it has low capacity factor, meaning less energy will be generated. On the other hand, it often has high output, trashing the business plans of any fuel based competitor. There is no way to make money fighting this, so the traditional energy industry is doomed without government handouts. But conservation and batteries save the day. The problem of energy generation is more or less solved. The question for the 21st century is how to store and transport energy, and the solution is mostly not to waste it.
I totally agree, reduction in energy and material use is mandatory. Luckily just using PV and wind reduces energy and material use dramatically as it reduces waste and does not use oxidation for power. Simple things like insulation improvements and system changes also reduce energy demand.
We have one more thing going for us, nature will force lower demand as we continue to trash the planet. So we may need fewer cars and renewables than we think.
Conservation is indeed THE key, in the short and medium term, meaning over the next decade or two, allowing the renewables industries to grow up, and technology to provide us with things that work as well while using way less materials and energy.
The problem with conservation is that it isn’t sexy, it doesn’t make the hormones flow. There’s obviously tons and tons of money to be made by people who can SELL conservation to their customers, and of course the customer saves more than he spends, generally a lot more.
But the selling and the saving involved are dispersed all thru the economy. You save a little each year on heating and air conditioning, a little buy buying a smaller car, etc.
So the typical customer is way more interested in a high status car than he is in saving a few hundred bucks on gasoline. He’s more interested in a giant flat screen TV and a couple of hundred channels than he is in saving fifty or a hundred bucks a month on his electricity bill.
So….. as I see it, electric cars aren’t going to displace ICE cars until the near term costs of owning one are only a little more, or the same, as the cost of owning an otherwise similar car with an ICE under the hood. Mr. Driver is mostly interested in that old monthly payment, and diverting as much as it of possible to other indulgences, such as a new top of the line phone or a couple of weeks at the beach.
Government action,mandates, are almost a necessity in order for conservation to take a really big bite out of energy and materials uses, so long as times are prosperous.
But suppose an oil supply crisis hits and lasts a few months………. Your old raggedy assed Nissan Leaf will fetch you three times what you paid for it, and any new electric car you can find on a dealer lot will be marked up way beyond list price. (Dealers know how to do that by adding such things as an extra layer of undercoating, selling service contracts etc.)
Pray to the deity of your personal choice for Pearl Harbor Wake Up Events.
In terms of the overall health and welfare of the planet, and all the living things on it, an oil supply crisis lasting a year or longer would truly be a gift from the gods.
The question is not whether there’s such a crisis in the cards….It’s almost dead sure, given that oil is a depleting resource, and that it will likely deplete faster than the world economy can switch away from oil to renewable electricity and electrically driven mobile machinery.
The question is whether the supply crisis hits soon enough that we are still possessed of sufficient one time gift of nature resources to successfully manage it.
Just from an economic standpoint, driving that 35 mpg Corolla or Camry type versus a big SUV can save more than $200,000 over a lifetime of driving. Basically one uses several years of working to get the bigger types.
As an unapologetic advocate of rapid implementation of renewable energy, I’ll certainly take a bite!
I have been somewhere between somewhat depressed and severely depressed over the past few weeks as the silly season approaches and the celebrations surrounding the winter solstice in the northern hemisphere kick into high gear. (for any devout Christians that may stumble upon this post, that is what the festivities at this time of the year have been about for thousands of years and the early Roman Catholic church just co-opted them for it’s own devices. Get over it!). In my neck of the woods that means lots of “Christmas treats” and corporate awards ceremonies and prize givings etc. “Good” employers also give their employees a “Christmas bonus” as part of their December pay packet. Conservatives should not worry since the accountants were probably instructed to work that into the total compensation package such that it really isn’t a bonus but, rather sort of deferred earnings.
There is also a crazy rush to spruce up stuff “for Christmas”, not to mention the decorations and Christmas trees and lights. Lots of painting and in some cases new furniture and/or appliances. The government even has a “Christmas work” program where unemployed folks are given work to cut vegetation on road verges in rural areas of refresh the paint on curb walls in urban areas. The net result of a this is that money in circulation is at it’s peak, so much so that at least one local newspaper reported recently that the central bank was indicating record amounts in circulation.
At the same time there is an unemployed young woman that I have written about in this forum as having four kids. She was the recipient of a tiny house from the local branch of Food for the Poor, out of a set of 39 financed by the efforts of a “Walworth couple from Grand Junction, Colorado”. Well, she now has five kids, the latest being about a month old. This is despite the fact that, the father of the latest child is unemployed, the father of her oldest two is deceased and she does not have the money to feed her previous four much less send them to school. Her fifteen year old son has dropped out of school as a result and her extended family is trying hard to keep her other three (girls) in school despite most of the family not having permanent jobs. The only one with a more or less permanent (minimum wage) job is one of the young woman’s brothers and guess what? His new girlfriend is pregnant!
There are are far more of these stories than I care to detail but, my basic point is that the awareness of a problem among the general population is severely lacking in my neck of the woods and no doubt in most other places all over the world. The attitude towards the having of children is very much “go forth and multiply” and I feel that I am pretty isolated in my view that having children is not a casual matter but, in fact deadly serious! I fear that many of these children, a couple of which I have grown quite fond of, are being condemned to a miserable future, through no fault of their own but, instead, their unaware parents. The thing is, I see very little if anything being done to raise awareness among the people who are most vulnerable, that having children is going to require resources that neither they, their government or the planet will likely be able to provide.
In light of this widespread apparent belief in an abundance of resources and the possibility of continuing to take advantage of said resources, how is the message of de-growth going to propagate? My predilection for renewable energy is party based on an observation most advocates of renewable energy must surely have made. That is that each renewable energy asset can only harvest energy at the rate it is capable of given the availability of the resource, be it wind, solar, hydro, biomass, landfill gas, geothermal or whatever else. There is no windfall or mother lode of millions of years of stored solar energy to fall back on. Renewable energy is a “real time” system and if one starts to depend on it, one tends to get an appreciation of the value of energy.
Hence, I do not see renewable energy as a red herring but, for the same reason pointed out by the posts from Niko McManus and Caelan MacIntyre, a mechanism of getting the general populace to come to an awareness of the folly of the doctrine of never ending economic growth and the dependence on finite fossil energy sources to drive that growth. With renewable energy, the energy you have available, is the essentially the energy you can harvest in real time! Outside of hydroelectric dams I am not aware of any means of storing more than a couple days of harvested renewable energy based on the rate at which modern civilisation is using fossil energy. So, a civilisation making the transition to renewable energy should at the same time, experience an increasing awareness that profligate use and waste of energy is unsustainable. Hopefully that would translate to an awareness that increasing use of all other kinds of finite resources is a dead end and maybe, just maybe, that population growth should probably be drastically reined in.
How else is it proposed to spread the message of de-growth?
Merry Christmas, peace on Earth and goodwill to men! To hell with all other creatures! /sarc
That is probably the best argument for renewables I have ever heard. Your argument boils down to “use renewables as a teaching tool to educate the populace about finite resources, and then as we go down the other side of the resource throughput graph, there may be an awakening of consciousness”.
My argument boils down to “renewables allow us to continue using too much for longer, and don’t ultimately accomplish anything, other than delaying that awakening of consciousness”.
Without renewables, the lessons you hope to teach (conservation) would necessarily be learned SOONER, as the coming resource crunch would force the issue. How does maintaining more for longer possibly aid in dispersing this message?
Regardless, I generally think all paths are ultimately futile, as convincing the populace of ANY of this, even the coming decline of fossil fuel resources (which should be a simple point of fact) seems impossible. The “silly season”, as you aptly put it, fills me with dread. The profligate consumption on display highlights the deep problems with our culture, problems that I do not at all think the public at large is even capable of admitting, much less solving.
At this point we debate details of the hole in the side of the Titanic.
And. Merry Christmas to you! I’ve spent countless hours reading your posts on this forum. I thank you for your effort.
In response I’d like to offer an observation. “The deep problems with our culture” you allude to are being driven with a large dose of help from “think tanks” funded by the likes of Charles Koch along with conservative media outlets such as those run by News Corp. These sources are desperately trying to maintain the status quo where to quote 15 year old Swede Greta Thunberg, “Our civilisation is being sacrificed for the opportunity of a very small number of people to continue making enormous amounts of money”. So the battle for the minds of the public at large is being fought by promoting the ultra right wing ideology of Charles Koch et al and demonizing any notions of collective actions that might benefit the majority at the expense of the few.
The problem with this situation is that the few are insanely wealthy with Charles Koch for example, having an estimated net worth of $44.6 billion today, down from $60 billion in June 2018 according to forbes.com. Charles Koch in particular, has demonstrated a willingness to use his wealth to further his extreme right wing political agenda through his funding of various think tanks, at least a couple of which should be familiar to long time readers of this web site. He is also a major contributor to the GOP’s election campaigns and virtually has the man I consider the second most powerful individual in Washington, behind Donald Trump, Mitch McConnell in his pocket.
Many of Trumps cabinet picks and Supreme Court Justice Bret Kavanaugh are highly favored or were groomed by mechanisms set up by Koch and the current US administration can be viewed as implementing a Koch agenda with the exception of Trumps immigration and trade policies. The budget, rollbacks of all types of regulation, climate change denial, focus on fossil energy exploitation and scaling back of incentives for renewable energy and EVs are all part of the Koch agenda.
Many of the ideas being put forward in this forum, such as de-growth and re-localization, fly in the face of the Koch/News Corp agenda as can be seen from the general, happy, BAU tone of most media. IMO the “awakening of consciousness” you allude to is being deliberately stymied by the Koch agenda. Got to keep the sheeple blissfully ignorant and happy to mindlessly continue consuming their product, so that the 0.1% can continue scraping in more wealth for themselves. To hell with the health of the biosphere.
So how do things change? What can be done to turn the tide? Their supply of oxygen (money) has to be cut off. As long as the world continues to gobble up oil and coal like there is no tomorrow, the Kochs and their ilk will continue to make boatloads of money, enabling them to continue to exert undue influence over governments all over the globe. The fact is that, under the current energy and transportation paradigm there is no hope of cutting of the supply of oxygen to the current set of oligarchs. Renewable energy and EVs offer the chance of breaking that stranglehold and cutting off the oxygen supply of the Kochs and their ilk.
To quote Charles Koch himself:
“For business to survive over a long period, it needs to be contributing to society and people’s well-being. Otherwise, who’s going to want it?”
“So how do things change? What can be done to turn the tide? Their supply of oxygen (money) has to be cut off. ”
Indeed. One step in that direction is a strict estate tax.
Maybe something like 90% over 10 mill., to start.
International tax on financial assets.
Just out of curiosity with the last quote.
How do you explain investment bankers and the crooks on wall street. What service do they provide society?
That is a question best posed to the person I quoted. I haven’t a clue!
‘How do you explain investment bankers and the crooks on wall street. What service do they provide society?’
They’re the oligarchs
Hi Niko, I’m inclined to agree.
But of course we have a system that is seriously out of whack and out of touch with reality, as per its fundamental code/legal framework, modus operandi and spinoff/assorted corruptions, while it continues on with its murderous rampage. And it’s that very system that, along with its ideological indoctrinates/prisoners, apparently wants to produce so-called renewables, and at this late stage of the game no less, while it nevertheless continues murdering, using fossil fuels.
That writ and WRT GoneFishing’s ‘compared to what?’, well, so-called renewable energy is of course a subset of the system and fossil fuel use, so I’m unsure what kind of comparison is being sought or what an insinuation might be behind the question, or if the question is meant to mislead, but in any case, it is also, and perhaps more importantly, if not crucially, not so much about questionable energy comparisons, as about the kind of system that produces and utilizes resources like energy.
IOW perhaps, there seems a major problem with the expectation of a particular system producing a desired outcome and maybe it’s somewhat related to the notion of ‘doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result’.
Caelan,
I think you’ve got it 100% correct. Nuff said.
It is the civilizational system itself that is the problem. Renewables, as a facet and extension of that system, cannot possibly be the solution. It could of course be deeper – I believe Ron is of the opinion that our genetic code itself is flawed, programmed for growth, as are the codes of all other species. This may be correct, as every human civilization seems doomed for eventual collapse.
Niko- “This may be correct, as every human civilization seems doomed for eventual collapse.”
So very true.
In the meantime, lets put out some PV into the bright sunshine.
And perhaps stop strip mining.
Once we get that done, we can talk about some more aspects.
Maximum power principle:
Here is a synopsis of the behavioral loop described above:
Step 1. Individuals and groups evolved a bias to maximize fitness by maximizing power, which requires over-reproduction and/or over-consumption of natural resources (overshoot), whenever systemic constraints allow it. Differential power generation and accumulation result in a hierarchical group structure.
Step 2. Energy is always limited, and overshoot eventually leads to decreasing power available to some members of the group, with lower-ranking members suffering first.
Step 3. Diminishing power availability creates divisive subgroups within the original group. Low-rank members will form subgroups and coalitions to demand a greater share of power from higher-ranking individuals, who will resist by forming their own coalitions to maintain power.
Step 4. Violent social strife eventually occurs among subgroups who demand a greater share of the remaining power.
Step 5. The weakest subgroups (high or low rank) are either forced to disperse to a new territory, are killed, enslaved, or imprisoned.
Step 6. Go back to step 1.
http://www.dieoff.org
Ah yes, Jay Hanson… I wonder what he’s up to these days.
I have a home-made grape cider brewing at home which may be ready by midnight. I checked it earlier today, and it was bubbling quite vigorously: Yeast seem to especially like grape juice, maybe in large part due to the extra sweetness and sourness. It might explain the grape as apparently the preferred fruit for wines.
If I was to avoid charging it (transfering the cider to an airtight bottle and letting the yeast continue for a short time to produce carbon dioxide as another waste produce that naturally carbonates the juice) and then refrigerating it, thereby killing much of the yeast and/or at least slowing its activity down sufficiently enough not to explode the bottle, and just let them continue on with their partying, untransferred, in the open bottle, they’d probably kill themselves all on their own with their overproduction of waste and overconsumption of finite resources.
Posting this from Unfiltered Brewing‘s internet, over their ‘Daytimer’ beer.
2018 was first year experimenting with cider; 2019 may be the hard-stuff/ethanol year, with distillation.
^ All likely good to know in the context of decline/collapse, so, recommended.
Interesting talk by a guy whose name few people would recognize. Marc Tarpenning, Tesla’s co-founder. He is no longer with Tesla but he tells a bit of the story about Tesla’s early days and the motivation behind the company’s vision. Well worth listening to! If it wasn’t for him Elon might still only be building spaceships… 😉
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UOt9KF2fsdw
A very in depth article on the early days of Tesla and some of the soap opera that spun around Musk, by Business Insider.
https://www.businessinsider.com/tesla-the-origin-story-2014-10
Graphics depicting how the U.S. and each state generates electricity from 2001 through 2017:
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/12/24/climate/how-electricity-generation-changed-in-your-state.html?smtyp=cur&smid=tw-nytimes
Certainly shows that the big squeeze on coal has come, primarily, from gas.
Season’s greetings.
NAOM
Sure why not substitute the dirtiest global warmer with the fastest global warming fuel?
I just see it as an intermediate step down, get off the no 1 of coal asap while renewables are being built up. Next move gas to a fill in supply before finally eliminating it as storage takes over.
NAOM
Don’t bother replying as I am at internet cafe with phone line down.
That is a very useful presentation.
You can easily pick out bizarre trends.
For example, Massachusetts now gets 7% of its electricity from solar,
whereas Florida gets less than 1%!
“Despite its nickname, the Sunshine State generates very little power through solar energy and has no renewable energy requirements.”
Get to work Fred.
It’s illegal to buy, sell or trade electricity in the Sunshine Wasted State. Florida imports ~99% of it’s energy.
Her is something to titillate the imagination and make one wonder how new evidence does or does not get integrated into scientific endeavors.
“Is the house of history built on foundations of sand?”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZyfE3IvDWR8
I think the mainstream reject his ideas due to the fact that it will screw up the notion of linear advancement of civilization.
There is probably corruption in every human institution, in one form or another.
I think his ideas are intriguing and should be given more attention.
I wonder how much early civilization is buried under the water since sea levels rose quite a bit.
It’s a fascinating phenomenon–multiple extraterrestrial impacts happening recently and accounting for prehistoric temperature fluctuations that influenced the rise of civilization–but to jump from that to the conclusion that it verifies the myth of Plato’s Atlantis is just absurd. It reminds me of those who wish to link the filling of the Black Sea with Noah’s flood.
Some stories are just that–stories.
Oh my, Graham Hancock.
Start with Velikovskiy–or maybe Ignatius Donnely (Atlantis) unless you have the fortitude to tackle James Churchward and his books on the Lost Continent of Mu–move on to Von Daehniken, and come to harbor with Hancock. There is a population who cannot see the beauty and mystery of the world but who must find shiny mystery behind, seemingly, everything there is.
I once thought of making a lot of money by writing a book in this line; I figured a crystal skull on the cover, maybe a picture of a big impact, and a title that ended: …What the Scientists Won’t Tell You, would make me big bucks. Put it in the racks at every Safeway and it’d be a shoe-in.
I attended one of Hancock’s talks a couple of decades ago and I’ve looked into several of his books and I find that he either has no capacity for critical thought or he sets it aside because he can earn a lot more that way. In the talk he was maintaining that the Piri Reis map, I think it was, showed that mariners had discovered and mapped the coast of Antarctica back in the Fifteenth or Sixteenth Centuries. He showed a part of the map of the South Atlantic and had boxed a small stretch of the Antarctic coast that matches today’s coast. It wasn’t much of today’s coast and the rest of the map didn’t agree at all with today but that didn’t matter. The fact that the map showed Antarctica joined solidly to South America over a width equal to that of Patagonia didn’t matter either, the point was to look at this little stretch here…
A Honda Civic costs about €20,000 and weighs about 1,200 kg, or about €17 / kg. An iPhone costs about €700 and weight 0.132 kg, or about €5300/kg. So an iPhone is worth over 300 times as much as a Civic per kg. It’s also worth more than ten times as much as silver.
Along the same lines, gas weighs about 6 lbs a gallon. If your buggy gets 25 mpg, you burn 40 gallons to go 1000 miles, which weighs about 240 lbs. A Tesla Model 3 battery has a 100,000 mile guarantee and weighs about a half ton, but the gas you’d need would weigh about 24,000 lbs, or 12 tons.
But what about the fuel to charge the battery? Well, if you go solar you might put panels on your roof. And average US installation is 6 KW and weighs about 800 lbs (20 panels @ 40 lbs), or 133 lbs /KW. That lets you produce about 30 KWh a day (assuming 20% capacity) so you might need say a ton of solar panels (roughly 15 KW). I suppose you’d need home storage as well, so add another half ton.
All told two tons of solar and batteries could replace the 12 tons of gasoline, a six to one improvement. And of course it can all be recycled at the end of its lifetime, unlike gasoline.
EDIT: Not to mention the fact you don’t need an engine in your car.
Wouldn’t the solar panels produce a lot more than the 100,000 miles worth of power over their lifetime?
Each panel produces power for 50,000 miles over it’s thirty year lifetime, so 20 panels produce enough power to run a vehicle (vehicles) 1,000,000 miles in that time. Liquid fuel equivalent is 40,000 gallons. Note too that solar panels at 30 years are still producing power, probably 75% of original so why throw them away unless other failure has occurred. They don’t close off oil wells that are producing at 75% of initial output. We really don’t know how long they last when properly built.
Maybe they only need the glass replaced at 30 years.
Also the EV does not use the land, water and air as it’s toilet. Nor do the solar panels.
https://www.sunrun.com/go-solar-center/solar-articles/how-long-do-solar-panels-really-last
I was lowballing the potential benefits of renewables. In fact EVs can be almost free in terms of energy consumption because they can live on the scraps discarded by the current system.
My point was that there is no need to increase humanity’s footprint to raise GDP, and that the current GDP could be at least maintained with massive reduction of the footprint.
It’s really hubris to think that we can’t reduce the amount of energy we waste, like guys in the late 19th century claiming that manned flight is impossible. The fact is that the current level of technology is shit, and the level of awareness for making non-technical improvements is ludicrously low.
I think it is worth remembering that a 1.2 ton car burns 12 tons of fuel in just 100,000 miles, and that EVs essentially eliminate that part of the footprint.
Sorry in advance if this has been already posted.
This is a report done by Utah state university. Released July 2015.
It is called the true cost of wind.
I am specifically putting it out here for hardcore renewable advocates on this forum. At the least I’d recommend reading the executive summary.
https://www.strata.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/Full-Report-True-Cost-of-Wind1.pdf
Isn’t Strata a pro-fracking/pro nuclear publication?
Yep. The source is highly suspect. I know many reasons to doubt the efficacy of renewables. A few are included in that review. However, there are just as many reasons to doubt FF and nuclear power, and the posted review is obviously slanted.
Unfortunately, I’ve yet to find a solid compilation of ALL the reasons to doubt renewables all in one place. Energyskeptic.com has a fairly honest compilation of links, along with commentary, but I think the editor(Alice Friedman) is a bit too rabid in her takedowns here and there. Vaclav Smil gives many good reasons why wind and solar are bunk, he has free lectures available that don’t take too much time, and his books are superb. Charles Hall helps us understand the problem of dilute power more clearly. Richard Heinberg has great material exploring the potential and limitations of renewables. His lecture “Our Renewable Future” is a great overview of the real challenges facing renewables (he also has a book of the same name). Euan Mearns gives superb detailed analysis of various individual renewable projects, but his continued support of fossil fuels is baffling, considering his clear understanding that we are approaching the end of the FF age. There was the recent incident in which Jacobson and Deluchhi’s attempt at a 100% renewable energy system was destroyed by a large number of scientists and research groups, the work of which exposed many of the deep problems with renewable systems. Tom Murphy’s old blog Do The Math had a great many very, very good reasons to doubt renewables. Well worth a long and involved read.
All in all, though disparate, there’s plenty of work by honest individuals and groups describing the problems with renewables. In fact, nearly every individual I’ve just listed is a renewables PROPONENT (which should really tell you just how difficult their deployment really is). We don’t need to turn to pro-fracking publications for our information.
At the moment, I would be extremely wary of any “research” casting doubt on the “efficacy of renewables”. A tipping point has been breached with respect to the LCOE of solar PV (see the two minutes starting at 19 min. 29 sec. and the final eleven minutes before the question and answer section of the December 7 Tony Seba presentation to the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM)). Seba is predicting the financial collapse of the fossil fuel based electricity generating business in the early 2020s. As such Charles Koch and his ilk are ratcheting up their anti-renewables, anti EV campaigns. We can expect more and more shrill headlines about the “dangers of renewables” and the inablilty of renewables to effectively replace the status quo. A better approach is to try the approach of disruptive minds like Elon Musk, whose approach is to look at the challenges and find solutions to them one by one.
I am not saying renewable energy is a panacea but based on the amount of concern being shown by the fossil fuel industries at the moment, one is led to wonder if they are in fact a real existential threat to the fossil fuel industries. It is hard to imagine that the fossil fuel industries would be paying as much attention to then and making the effort to discredit them if that were not the case.
Island,
The people I’ve posted are nearly all renewable proponents. They have also all been active for many years. None of them are fossil fuel shills, with the possible exception of Euan Mearns.
Further, I don’t need to be wary of anything I read. I can read it, and judge it’s merits based on the data, calculations, and logic therein. I can research for myself any claims.
As far as the LCOE of solar goes, who cares? The sticking point for solar has never been the cost of the electricity. The solar resource is obviously extremely vast, and now we can access it cheaply. Great! Except it still won’t really work, but that’s not a point I feel like labouring right now. The reasons why are varied, complex, and make for long reading. It would be a waste of my time to try and rewrite everything that has already been discussed in great detail by those authors who I mentioned in my previous post.
Food for thought: If fossil fuel companies were scared of solar, why would they not simply use their vast resources to invest in renewables? Wouldn’t that make sense for an energy company to invest in a better form of energy? Unless you just think they are stupid, but I really don’t think they are. Greedy and shortsighted, yes, but stupid enough to ignore an opportunity to position themselves in future profitable energy markets? I doubt it.
As far as Elon Musk being a disruptive mind… He’s great at marketing himself, I’ll give him that. I don’t think there are many humans alive who could put Chinese batteries in very expensive cars and be titled a disruptive mind. What has he disrupted? He is in fact attempting to build the infrastructure to PREVENT disruption, and keep our civilization going exactly as it is. Fossil fuel depletion is disruptive. Elon Musk is anti-disruptive. Disruptive would be teaching the world that we need to organize for ourselves an entirely new way of life. Musk is instead telling the world that nothing at all must change except for the batteries we but in our expensive, wasteful, mobile blocks of embedded energy, which drive on our expensive, wasteful, fossil fuel constructed roads. Elon Musk tells us nothing must change while selling us lies of humans in space and on Mars. Disruptive would be using his amassed wealth to warn the world that we must begin consuming less. Instead he leans into that consumption, helping to reinforce consumption as the only way forward. “Want to save the world? Buy my cars.” He is one of many who turn good instincts of humans back on themselves for his own profits. Give me a break. “Disruptive”. Good joke.
Niko,
There are many points of view on this, my take is the widely distributed wind and solar can produce excess energy which can be used to produce some form of stored energy which can be used as a backup along with pumped hydro, hydro, a bit of natural gas or biofuel, batteries, vehicle to grid, and demand management through real time market electricity pricing and perhaps some nuclear power.
Fossil fuel output will peak and decline (2025 to 2035) and as this occurs fossil fuel will become more expensive than alternatives. Also note that nuclear is quite a bit more expensive than alternatives, especially when all costs (such as insurance) are included. Society can choose not to use nuclear power because it is viewed as too risky compared to alternative forms of energy.
Niko and Ron:
I’ve been watching the rapid implementation of a mostly non-fossil fuel society in Norway (where I spend about half my time). Naturally all this is possible because it’s paid for by exploiting North Sea oil/gas resources. I’d say this mainly amounts to BAU perhaps with a slightly lower long-term carbon footprint when you factor in the vast infrastructure costs such as hydroelectric dams, paved roads, hundreds of elaborate bridges and tunnels, car parking structures, etc.
Of course, Norwegians can afford to drive around in $100,000 EVs and pretend they are saving the world but that’s not what in happening. BTW those EVs are selling like hotcakes right now mostly because of very generous government subsidies. Norwegians aren’t idiots and often refer to the “energy transition” as Norway’s Paradox — the great transition being fueled and paid for by, you guessed it, OIL.
Of course, Norwegians can afford to drive around in $100,000 EVs and pretend they are saving the world but that’s not what in happening.
Yes that is obviously true! But that is not what is important. What is also happening is the development and implementation of renewables and EV technology in the form of mass transport such as electric buses and trains in large urban centers in developing nations. That is where the real disruptions that make the greatest impact on global CO2 emissions are happening. To keep using the rich as an example of why renewables are bad is truly counterproductive in my humble opinion.
Edit: And BTW, I don’t consider using oil to pay for a transition to renewables as an example of the worst thing it has ever been used for, just sayin!
And, to keep using the example of EVs (BAU by another name) as progress toward a non-ff world is truly counterproductive in my humble opinion, just sayin! 🙂
Not all EVs are $100,000.00 Teslas!
EVs include all kinds of vehicles from electric bikes to fleets of electric buses used by the poor in urban environments in the third world! EVs are not BAU!
Please don’t try to make EVs synonymous with Teslas!
EV’s, PV and wind turbines are not BAU, no matter how many of you try and redefine the terms. Reality is not changed by wordplay and redefining terms to meet one’s own agenda or personal views.
BAU means the continuance of the huge carbon oxidation flux to run the economic system. Defining major system changes such as renewable energy (PV, wind) and efficiency changes as BAU is ludicrous at best and purposeful sabotage at worst.
BAU is globally defined in terms of GHG emissions. In other words, systems that produce no GHG emissions are definitely not BAU.
The fact that some Norwegians still sell petroleum does not change the reduction in GHG by using EV’s, PV, wind turbines or efficiency anywhere on the planet.
BAU is globally defined in terms of GHG emissions. In other words, systems that produce no GHG emissions are definitely not BAU.
Couldn’t agree more!
Case in point: while at a dead stop generating zero emissions sitting in a 6 km Stähle (traffic jam) on the Autobahn just south of Stuttgart in my brother’s new Nissan Leaf we were surrounded by hundreds and hundreds of cars, trucks and buses with their engines idling producing 20 lbs of CO2 for each gallon of non renewable fuel burned. I guess we were the bad guys!
Sorry, but all the other vehicles were BAU!
Edit: And BTW, I don’t consider using oil to pay for a transition to renewables as an example of the worst thing it has ever been used for, just sayin!
But what if those fossil fuels are also required to maintain that infrastructure? What if there is no way for that infrastructure to become self-maintaining?
“Non-fossil fuel society: brought to you by the continued massive use of fossil fuels!”
Food for thought: If fossil fuel companies were scared of solar, why would they not simply use their vast resources to invest in renewables? Wouldn’t that make sense for an energy company to invest in a better form of energy? Unless you just think they are stupid, but I really don’t think they are. Greedy and shortsighted, yes, but stupid enough to ignore an opportunity to position themselves in future profitable energy markets? I doubt it.
Right! Why did Kodak, despite inventing the extremely disruptive technology of digital photography miss the boat on mass marketing it? Were they stupid? Or just so invested in the old ways of doing things that they just weren’t willing to take the plunge and accept that film was a truly dead end?!
As far as Elon Musk being a disruptive mind… He’s great at marketing himself, I’ll give him that. I don’t think there are many humans alive who could put Chinese batteries in very expensive cars and be titled a disruptive mind. What has he disrupted?
It was actually the original co-founders of Tesla Motors and not Elon, who understood the potential of the ‘Slow Moore’s Law’ of Li-ion battery tech’s advantage to disrupt the lead acid battery paradigm which was holding back the development of viable EVs!
And it was Japanese not Chinese technology! At least get your historical facts straight, even if you don’t grasp how massively disruptive this technology actually is. There is a reason every automotive manufacturer is currently heavily investing in EVs with Li-ion batteries.
BTW, it is highly doubtful that the BAU paradigm of individual car ownership is not also being disrupted by completely new and also disruptive technologies such as smartphone apps that allow joint ownership and ride sharing.
Case in point Ford Motor company currently has significant income from financing car sales to individuals. I’m willing to bet that in the future there will be big changes to that business model. Perhaps Ford can adapt maybe not. To argue that EVs are not disruptive to BAU is to ignore multiple interrelated aspects of the currently existing paradigm that are already changing everywhere.
Niko, I replied to a post of yours further up, elaborating on some of the logic for my support of renewables and the Koch funded campaign against them. That reply should partially explain why I think we should be wary of anything anti-EV or anti-renewable. Hint – it plays right into the Koch anti-EV, anti-renewable playbook and we don’t need to be supporting the agenda of climate change denying 0.1 percenters.
As far as disruption goes, if you have not watched a Tony Seba presentation, you might learn something new from watching one! Even if you have seen one or more before, I highly recommend the latest one (linked to in my post above) to put disruption in context. To quote Seba from the latest presentation, technology disruptions “create new products and services that do two things, one is they open up new markets that did not exist, that could not possibly exist before and two, they either destroy or radically transform existing industries”. It is in this context that I use the term disruption.
As far as the existing energy companies switching their focus to renewables goes, you really have to dabble in disruption more than a little, as Seba has, to understand why this is unlikely to happen. One reason is that renewable energy especially solar, is far more widely dispersed than the relatively few discreet pockets of fossil fuel resources. Far harder to corner sunshine, it’s everywhere!
To more closely examine the true cost of wind energy, this report will discuss in detail aspects of wind energy that are often overlooked, aspects which lead to dramatic underestimation of the true costs of producing electricity from wind. These include the cost of massive government subsidies and mandates to incentivize development and production of renewable energy. They also include the costs of building transmission lines to the often-remote locations where wind power is plentiful. As important but more difficult to quantify are the costs of reduced reliability. Wind energy distorts the market and drives more reliable energy sources out. Finally, the true cost of wind must also include opportunity costs paid by taxpayers, whose money could have been spent more productively than subsidizing the wind industry.
Oh fer crimminies sake! This report is blatant bullshit propaganda! Since you posted a report from 2015 I’m posting a report from the same year by the greenie weenies at the IMF which gives us the ‘TRUE’ cost of fossil fuel subsidies!
So let’s get real, shall we?!
https://www.pri.org/stories/2015-06-07/imf-true-cost-fossil-fuels-53-trillion-year
A new report from the International Monetary Fund says global use of fossil fuels costs taxpayers and consumers $5.3 trillion year. That’s trillion — with a T. …
…The IMF report calls this huge figure a “subsidy,” a term some economists take issue with. A subsidy typically refers to direct financial governmental support or specific policies, like tax breaks, that underwrite the production and consumption of a certain product — in this case fossil fuels such as oil, coal and gas.
But the IMF report looked at the overall benefits and harms of fossil fuel use, factors that economists typically put into a separate category called “externalities,” and classified these, too, as subsidies. These include such things as increased economic activity, damage to public health and the environment, and the amount of money unavailable for investment in other community goods due to hidden costs.
Before we can have an intelligent discussion about any ‘True Costs’ it would behove any participants in said discussion to at the very least have a comprehensive grasp of some of the basic concepts related to the planetary carbon cycle and how that cycle impacts and is impacted by our global civilization, how our societies use energy and resources, our political and economic agendas, the vested interests behind blatant misinformation campaigns and so forth!
So while I hardly expect the average lay person to wade through all 880 pages of the science contained in this most recent highly technical report:
‘The 2nd State of the Carbon Cycle Report (SOCCR2)’ released by the USGS, perhaps we can at least get on the same page, if those who wish to participate in an honest informed discussion om these topics, would at the very least take the time to read the Executive Summary of the report which is only a mere 32 pages long.
https://carbon2018.globalchange.gov/downloads/SOCCR2_Executive_Summary.pdf
A bit outdated but still…
2010, Seriously?! That is from the caveman days!
Fossil fuel subsidies are multiple orders of magnitude greater at all levels!
Did you check out the IMF report?
Lol calm down sugar tits.
They aren’t when you compare them to power output used by civilization.
And removing the subsidies for petroleum or other ff would drive up the price for the consumer. Global economy would probably collapse.
Anyways my position at the moment is agreement with Niko. Fossil fuel conglomerate corporations would invest heavily in renewables if they saw a future in it and probably attempt to monopolise it, but they are not they rather still frack low EROI oil and gas. I doubt they are dumb as well (in terms of business). I can’t see at the moment how renewables will save anything.
And also i apologise for the Strata article, had no idea of their position in fracking and nuclear. I don’t reside in the U.S. However I think they still make a valid point regarding the true costs or true EROI of an energy producing technology or source. It is extremely difficult to calculate.
Lol calm down sugar tits.
ROFL!
And removing the subsidies for petroleum or other ff would drive up the price for the consumer. Global economy would probably collapse.
So what happens to the global economy when the reality of a fossil fuel dependency with no backup renewables available meets Peak Oil in one form or another. or is the purpose of this blog just entertainment?!
I have no idea what will happen but i assume it will collapse.
I honestly can’t see renewables doing anything to smooth the transition. But i am not nostradamus lol.
You think what we say on this blog makes any difference. Come on Fred! People in general have no clue about anything. All they care about is their own families, food, clothing, shelter, healthcare and entertainment. No one thinks about peak oil. None of my friends even know what it means, if you ask them hey do you know about peak oil? They will probably reply, is it something similar to canola oil?
I can see renewables working in rural set ups. I am planning to buy a farm soon, and I’ll definitely utilise solar and storage batteries.
Iron Mike- you are correct about renewables, if you don’t deploy them.
If you do, they help a hell of a lot.
In fact the biggest state in the USA in yr 2017 got 42% of its electricity from [wind, hydro, solar].
Check back in ten years. That number will be a much higher.
And yes. It will make a difference.
If the effort its taken seriously.
Thats a big if.
In places where people get to it, they will be thankful.
You think what we say on this blog makes any difference. Come on Fred!
My point is not that what we say here makes any difference or that the general public understands the implications of peak oil, but rather that peak oil is real and it will have consequences sooner or later.
As someone who lived with a very small solar PV system after a Florida hurricane, I can assure you that even a minuscule amount of intermittent electricity to power some lights, a fan and a cell phone is infinitely better than having no power at all.
Just ask my neighbor who couldn’t get fuel to power his Honda generator… He was in the dark ages with candles while I had LED lights and internet with communications capability.
Which would you prefer?
Fred, pay no attention to those scoffers and deniers, they spew some strange philosophy/opinion while back in the real world things are changing fast.
Global wind and solar crossed the 1 TW cumulative installation point last June. It doubled in four years!
That is a large amount of GHG’s avoided.
So much for no effect.
Since fossil fuels are so inefficient and things like EV’s are about 6 times more efficient than liquid fueled vehicles, we won’t need that 18 TW of primary energy to run the global energy system.
https://c1cleantechnicacom-wpengine.netdna-ssl.com/files/2018/08/BNEF-1000-TW-1.jpg
Meanwhile….
Why does everything you post seem to be from 2015? In any case what do you suppose that graph might look like in 2025 and beyond?
Since fossil fuels are so inefficient and things like EV’s are about 6 times more efficient than liquid fueled vehicles, we won’t need that 18 TW of primary energy to run the global energy system.
And that’s before we fully implement graphene ultracapicitor technology. Thank you Estonia. I have to put visiting this intriguing little country on my bucket list… 😉
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KQ2Eo6wl5r0
Skeleton Ultra Capacitors | Fully Charged
Hi Mike,
Divide TWh/yr by 8760 to get the average power. Even worse though is most of that power is waste energy, does nothing but cause heat problems in the machinery, rivers, not to mention the pollution.
Now I am not going to reveal all of my energy discoveries but say we reduce the use of oil by 60% (most oil is used for transport). That will automatically reduce the use of both coal and natural gas by about 20% each. I am not talking about the waste problem, it’s the energy to produce and distribute fuels.
Now we are down to about half global fossil energy just by reducing oil by 60%.
How much renewable energy does that take? About 15% of the current oil energy if we do it poorly, ten percent if we get smart.
It’s easy to leverage against a low efficiency interdependent energy system with high efficiency systems.
So you see now that renewables plus EVs have a huge leverage factor over fossil fuels.
At the same time much of the pollution is removed.
Iron Mike,
You are familiar with the exponential function, I assume.
If we take the data from BP Statistical review of World energy using consumption of fossil fuels and consumption of wind and solar power from 1990 to 2017 (we only have data for wind and solar from those years) and take the natural log of fossil fuel and combined wind and solar for thos periods and fit a linear trend line to get the growth rate of each and then extend the linear trend for 15 years for each we get the chart below.
Note that fossil fuel output is likely to peak by 2027, so the fossil fuel curve is a bit optimistic as it assumes growth in output continues at the 1990-2017 rate.
Click on chart for larger view.
“The possibility that the renewable/EV thrust may peter out is quite real. Global wind power growth has gone near linear already from an early exponential start. Wind energy growth has fallen from 17 percent in 2015 to 10 percent in 2017. If the current rate holds it will be 10 years to a global doubling of wind power. It looks like the slowdown started in 2009. If the downward trend continues it could be several decades to a doubling… ” ~ GoneFishing
——
Loki’s Revenge
“Claire Fyson says that we must reduce fossil use 50% in 10 years to avoid 1.5 C.
Stefan Rahmstorf says we must reduce fossil use 100% in 20 years to avoid 2.0 C.
Hans Schellnhuber says runaway hothouse earth will be triggered between 1.5 and 2.0 C.
Once runaway hothouse climate change is started, it cannot be stopped or reversed.
BP says that fossil demand will increase 15% by 2030 and fossil emissions will go up 10% more.
In 2018 oil production hit 100 million barrels/day for the first time says the IEA.
By 2025 oil production will increase 1 million barrels/day every year, increasing oil demand by then with 7 million barrels/day more.
If energy demand does not increase over the next 10 years, the financial system will collapse.
If fossil emissions do not go down 50% in 10 years, earth will enter runaway hothouse mass extinction.
Runaway mass extinction will begin by 2030-2040.
Livestock and agriculture are responsible for 80% of species extinction.
Once started mass extinction cannot be stopped or reversed.”
I din’t have figures handy, but way back when nuclear power was just getting started,it was directly and indirectly subsidized to a far greater extent than wind and solar power have been during their early stages.
Can we all say Price Anderson Act together?
OFM, nuclear has always been too cheap to meter, why would it need any subsidies /sarc
Price Anderson act, for those unfamiliar, was in effect a huge subsidy for the nuclear industry in the form of liability coverage. Without it, the industry would have been dead in its tracks beginning in 1957.
“The Price-Anderson Nuclear Industries Indemnity Act (commonly called the Price-Anderson Act) is a United States federal law, first passed in 1957 and since renewed several times, which governs liability-related issues for all non-military nuclear facilities constructed in the United States before 2026. The main purpose of the Act is to partially compensate the nuclear industry against liability claims arising from nuclear incidents while still ensuring compensation coverage for the general public. The Act establishes a no fault insurance-type system in which the first approximately $12.6 billion…”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Price%E2%80%93Anderson_Nuclear_Industries_Indemnity_Act
A second massive subsidy for the nuclear industry has been loan guarantees for construction. Beginning in late 1970’s, projects could not get funding since the risk of economic failure was too high for banks/utilities to pull it off.
Thus-
” loan guarantees under its Title XVII Loan Guarantee Program, which was originally authorized by the Energy Policy Act of 2005. The authority to distribute $18.5 billion for new reactors was first granted by the Appropriations Committee for fiscal year 2008, and extended indefinitely in the fiscal year 2009 appropriations process. However, industry requests far surpassed what was appropriated. DOE received 19 applications from 17 electric power companies requesting $122 billion in loan guarantees to cover new reactors projects.”
Read that last sentence. Not trivial folks.
https://www.taxpayer.net/energy-natural-resources/federal-loan-guarantees-for-nuclear-reactors-details-of-the-current-applica/
Lol holy shit.
They would not exist without a huge taxpayer subsidy.
Private markets would never touch them.
I worked for General Atomic in the 1970s. We expected each year to get our promised $80 million from Uncle Sugar for what was called “Base Programs”, that was pure R&D money for advancing nuclear power. During that time we only managed to construct a single reactor and Uncle Sugar provided the enriched Uranium scott-free. I have no idea how much money went to the big guys; GE, Westinghouse, B&W etc. but you can bet it was a lot more besides funding the AEC which later became the NRC and some other federal letter group.
Iron Mike and Niko,
You guys have made comments about how renewable energy sources are faulty.
And while this has made a bunch of guys get their oatmeal coming up out their nose,
I think you are generally correct.
Where I disagree is what the implications are.
Even though faulty, renewables are the best game in town.
Best by by far, now that the price has come down, and no big breakthrough in some form of miraculous nuclear/chemistry/gravitron whatever has developed.
And since they are the best game in town, its time to roll them out like there is no tomorrow.
Past time really.
And sure perhaps there is no tomorrow.
But today we pretend there will be, just like yesterday we did.
Wishing a Merry Christmas to everyone at Peak Oil Barrel. And may you have prosperity into the New Year also!
Merry Christmas, to you.
And so everybody is included,
in these greetings.
Happy Holidays to All 😉
To Fred, GF, Islandboy, Dennis, Iron Mike, Hickory, OFM, Doug,
Lots of good discussion here. I would not have bothered posting if I wasn’t confident some interesting stuff would come out of it. This forum has a good way of making things interesting. I probably won’t be posting much for a while, I prefer to lurk in the shadows and glean what I can. So thanks for the good discussion and Happy Holidays everyone.
I believe that renewables can power A society, but they cannot power THIS one. Happy motoring, internet using, high flying, media consuming, meat eating, big house living society… That’s done. No way around it, renewables or no. It’s too consumptive. Every route to transitioning this society to renewables quickly runs into oppressive resource shortages, while continuing to allow growth to power ever more destruction. So, in the context of this society, renewables I think are destructive. They simply further the destructive ends of this civilization. I don’t see that changing. The destructive roots of our culture are too deep. Extraction is the only way we seem to know, as is clear when we consider that all of our solutions to the problems created by destructive extraction seem to be more extraction. If we could all (especially the richest) reduce our consumption by a whole lot, renewables would have a fighting chance. But I’ve only ever seen them discussed in the mainstream, and used in practice, as a way to further increase our consumption of resources and energy. They don’t displace, they add.
And I’m not sure renewables will be there for any remaining society, since as I’ve stated, and it seems most here agree with, they can’t be built or maintained without fossil fuels. We have to consider the global mining, refining, shipping networks that make renewables possible. All these activities require a fuel density that renewables have not yet shown themselves capable of supplying. I’m not at all convinced they ever will. So yes, we can drammatically decrease our use of fossil fuels, but at the end of the day renewables are still chained to them. And once that global network begins to fail, I think renewables fail too. Norway’s roads and bridges can’t be built without their oil. Until you solve that problem, I don’t see renewables working. Especially true when you consider carbon budgets – we don’t stay under 2C by using our carbon more slowly.
If renewables do stick around, and the planet’s population is reduced to 500 million or below (probably lower considering degraded carrying capacity) I assume those renewables (especially hydro) make their lives a whole lot easier for some time. Maybe they can learn to live in accordance with the boundaries of nature. That’s a society that maybe can be powered with renewables. A society, but certainly not this one.
If renewables were pushed as a pathway to a far reduced material standard of living in an effort to drastically and meaningfully reduce consumption in order to save ourselves and our ecosystems, then I would be for them.
Alas, they are not. They are a modern profit driven industry with all the destructive effects that entails. They are pushed as a cheaper way to live wastefully. If solar is used to power our current global mass consumerist society, then solar is bad, as it allows the continued existence of the problem, the existence of the civilization that is destroying the basis of human life on this planet.
Though it might not seem like it, I’m probably more in favor of renewables than against them. I just think the real challenges with them are seldom discussed, and that is to our detriment. Fred, GoneFishing, and Islandboy: do you at least admit that renewables cannot do the same things which can be done with fossil fuels? That they are more limited in their capabilities than fossil fuels? Because the problem I see is that there is no real discussion of the very real limitations of renewables. They are seen as a “plug and play” replacement for fossil fuels, which they are not. They act differently, and their use would require a very different society from the one we have. This is why the EV strategy is not convincing to me – it assumes renewables exist in our current societal context. If we want to have a real discussion of a renewable future, we have to at least agree on their limits. This is not something I see happening from hardly anyone who is attempting to lead a renewable transition.
Anyway, have a good year everyone!
Hey Niko,
Even if it is true that we need fossil fuel ( atleast for a few decades) to maintain some baseline industrial capacity, then all the more reason to get cracking on a massive Solar/Wind buildout- so that we can extend the usable life of the fossil reserves to supplement the other.
Better to fill the coming fossil shortfall with something, rather than nothing. Its pretty simple.
Better to fill the coming fossil shortfall with something, rather than nothing. Its pretty simple.
Not necessarily. If industrial society is screwed either way, with all the mass death and destruction that entails, it’s better to take the hit sooner, preserving more of the Earth that will support future non-industrial society. That’s been part of my point this whole time – furthering industrial society is destructive. If it’s also ultimately futile, it would be better to let civilization as we know it end sooner.
It seems part of the sentiment here is that renewables can’t save industrial civilization, but also that we should use as much of our resources as possible building out renewables. I don’t get this, it seems contradictory to me. Perhaps it is an unwillingness to consider that a different, low technology route might be better in the long run.
I think we would be far better served by rationing our remaining fossil fuels, and slowly beginning to consume less and less each year until we are back to some sort of an agrarian, low tech civilization.
The only way renewables make sense is if you somehow believe that we aren’t completely fucked. I believe we are, so it’s hard to justify continuing our current route and adding to it by building renewables. I see renewables as a way to extend our destruction longer than it would otherwise last. For a different society, I think renewables might make sense. For our society, renewables are just another facet of growth.
Niko,
As OFM said well, its not an all or none situation. Some places will do better than others. I’d rather be in a place where they are making a big effort to come up with some replacement for fossil. USA hasn’t taken the challenge seriously at all yet. Maybe 1%. Its a sorry ass effort.
Industrial civilization is likely to be a characteristic of human civilization for the duration. At its core, what does the term mean? It is simply production of goods within an economic system, and there are a lot of ways to go about that, both methods of production, and economic systems.
Mass production of goods is more efficient than artisanal production. Why would we revert to less efficient methods except for artisanal reasons?
Industrial civilization as we practice it will end, but humans will not stop practicing industrial production. We will transform our systems of production to be less reliant on fossil energy, and ultimately, be free of it. Will the transition be smooth? Unlikely. It may only occur when there is no other option, but future human energy systems will be, without question, sustainable.
It seems increasing clear that EV’s will provide the majority of personal human transportation in the near future. Electric cars will be part of that, but also very light, inexpensive EV’s such as scooters and bikes will become very prevalent, especially in areas of the world where passenger cars don’t already dominate.
The area of solar PV necessary to power an electric car for the average daily vehicle miles is not very large; about the size of a carport roof over the vehicle itself. The system cost is very cheap, especially when compared to gasoline costs over the life of the vehicle.
Three months ago I bought an used electric car for just $6,600. I’ve driven it nearly 3,000 miles since, and bought no gasoline, dripped no oil, contributed no direct emissions, and It saves me $2.50/day in fuel costs, net, after I cover the cost of my electricity. I also enjoy the hell out of driving it, which is something I haven’t been able to say about driving for a very long time. I hope to get 5 years out of it, and then buy another used EV with longer range. The selection of those should be quite good by then, and it will be interesting to see what the market looks like. I won’t willingly go back to a combustion car. EV’s are simply better within the scope of their capabilities.
All other arguments aside, can one seriously claim that if we woke up tomorrow and all passenger cars globally were electric, and 100% powered by solar, wind, and water, that there would be no net environmental benefit?
Would the environment be much better off without any cars at all? Sure, but the environment would be much better off with no humans at all. For the most part, we want our species to persist.
Take your magic 500 million number, and let’s imagine that is in fact the global human population of the future. Can one say with certainty that the environmental impact of those .5 gigahumans would be less without access to renewable power and its uses than with them? I personally don’t think that’s a certainty at all. Comfortable, quiet, net-zero houses w/ LED lighting, induction cooking, electric transport, satellite communication systems, permaculture, and no need to burn anything. Fantasy? Sure, but so is your 500 million.
It’s not the renewable power that is the problem.
The fun little video below illustrates very well why we won’t be going back to animal power until we’ve exhausted all other options:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S4O5voOCqAQ
The apparent paradox, Bob, is that the ostensible complexity required for ‘your’ (Whose, exactly? Elite-derived, manufactured-needs-mass-peddled?) ‘technology’ can run into problems over ‘democratic’ control and issues related to the detachment of those using technology to nature and general reality.
For two examples or elaborations, Tainter talks about complexity and I’ve often mentioned the Iron Law of Oligarchy.
For another recent example, I mention quotes about how overspecialization can threaten our survival.
IOW, we are not simple creatures like ants or termites, as much as humans might try to hyperspecialize like they do. Hyperspecialization and hypercomplexity, human-style, as manifest in social and material technologies (‘governments’ and such things as electric cars) may create the very overcomplex conditions that go beyond certain levels of human’s abilities to control them and to human’s important attachments to nature and reality beyond the technologies– all of which may inevitably lead to various forms of decline and/or collapse.
I was having a bit of trouble understanding what the hell you were talking about Caelan, so using The Google, I translated your text from Caelanese to Spanish, from Spanish to Dutch, from Dutch to Italian, from Italian to German, from German to French, from French to Japanese, and from Japanese to English, et voilà:
But I still couldn’t quite parse it, so I tried the more tedious task of manual translation using a dictionary to decipher the big words, and shit-canning stuff that seemed gratuitous or superfluous, which means without apparent reason, cause, or justification and being more than is sufficient or required; excessive.
So, here we go:
So, it appears your point is that technology can disconnect us from nature, and detach us from reality, if those two things actually differ. Probably true.
Mm-yes I’ve done that funny back-and-forth translation-thing before, too…
Despite it, you appear to nevertheless understand at least part of my point, and maybe even more than you’ve let on.
At any rate, collective critical thinking and a leg up on some knowledge and wisdom, such as, and especially where, technology is concerned is crucial, such as if we want to survive and thrive on this planet.
And of course we are not on a peak oil/collapse blog for nothing– and for many negative results from what we call ‘technology’.
Bob. You get the big award for being the first to understand/decifer anything in Caelanese.
Most people seem to have stopped trying long ago.
‘If you don’t say something simply, you must not want people to hear what you have to say’
Here’s a radical thought: Why not ask a climate scientist or, better yet, see what the consensus is of the scientific community?
Niko,
Despite what you think would be better, and I agree actually that less industrialization and a “better society” (form very unclear to me) would also be preferred.
My suggestion is that we incrementally improve the way we do things ( as generally has been done in the past).
Consider total fertility ratio. In 1965 it was approximately 5 children per woman on average worldwide, in 2005 this had been cut in half to about 2.5 births per woman Worldwide (average rate). If the rate were cut in half again by 2045 to 1.25 births per woman on average, population would rapidly decline by a factor of about 4 in 200 years. Many nations in East Asia are already under 1.5 for a Total Fertility ratio(TFR), Sub Saharan Africa is where the highest TFR is common (about 5 on average I believe). Better education, better access to modern birth control, and more equal rights for women would go a long way to reducing TFR to 2.5 in Sub Saharan Africa by 2050.
Also note that you claim that most here agree that renewables are dependent on fossil fuel and must remain so. I certainly do not agree, and it seems people who comment are split on what they believe.
Will fossil fuels be eliminated entirely? Probably not. But just as one might claim that out society is dependent on horses, because their are a few who still ride them, as fossil fuel depletes and is replaced by other sources of energy that are cleaner, more efficient and less expensive, society will become less and less dependent on the energy services provided by fossil fuel.
Also note that the change to a cleaner more efficient energy source that requires a lot less extraction and is far less wasteful will change society.
Nothing exists in a vacuum, and the idea that society is static and unchanging is also false, social structures and norms are constantly evolving and changing and this also influences human behavior, which is also not fixed.
Hi Niko,
Happy holidays to you and yours. I think the Georgian guidestones of 500 million population will be sustained with renewables as long as they don’t internationally trade with one another. The problem of trade in an all renewable civilization seems out of reach. Unless you use nuclear powered ships or something. Also flight would be a thing of the past too it seems.
Anyways I think the only way to settle this is to have a royal rumble match between us and GoneFishing and Fred, so start brushing up on your wrestling moves lol.
The problem of trade in an all renewable civilization seems out of reach. Unless you use nuclear powered ships or something
Why would flight be a thing of the past?! Don’t worry there are plenty of people working on electric planes. Don’t take my word for it, just Google electric airplanes.
Here’s one I like, this one is for short flights, it might cut into ground transport like taxis and ride sharing businesses. https://lilium.com/technology/
Man, and if nothing else you really need to take a cruise on a big sailboat!
For the record, there was global trade on the high seas a long long time ago and the technology has come a long way since then. No nuclear necessary. Just nice clean wind!
Sail, plus PV, plus hydrogen storage. Guess what, hydrogen comes from water. How convenient. Fuel up while at dock and traveling.
Sounds like something out of Jules Verne’s 20 thousand leagues under the sea…the Nautilus was all electric 😉
https://www.engadget.com/2016/09/24/six-sun-powered-ships/
https://futurism.com/new-ship-rigid-solar-sails-harnesses-power-sun-wind-same-time
But… but… solar and wind powering a container ship? That can’t be! Only diesel fuel can do that, right?! We can’t have any maritime trade with renewables. Its against the laws of nature! /sarc
Cheers!
Cornocupian cognitive dissonance at its finest.
You forgot to mention dilithium crystals. And fairy dust. Ohh and energy extraction from a rotating black hole… Hooray
Yeah, who would believe a civilization dumb enough to burn fossil fuels to run ships. Sounds absolutely irrational and insane they would muck up their planet like that.
GoneFishing,
Please see my comment in response to Fred’s comment… Mike is right, this stuff is pure, 100%, unadulterated FANTASY.
Fred,
Let’s see, in the first article, we have:
The Turanor, a 101 foot long and 49 foot wide boat that took 18 MONTHS to sail around the globe, with a maximum cargo of 50 passengers. Compare that to a modern container ship (not too modern, circa 2006, they get a bit bigger now) which is 1302 feet long, 184 feet wide, and can carry 14,770 20 foot wide, 8 foot long containers. FOURTEEN THOUSAND CONTAINERS. Compared with 50 people. I’m actually laughing. And it gets from Northern China to the UK in 25 days.
The other so called solar “ships” aren’t even in the conversation (not that the Turanor is either). They are two small drones (one which does not exist) a yacht (does not eist), a 4 person fun-boat (does not exist) and a solar sail boat (does not exist).
From the second article: a concept to slightly reduce emissions by adding solar power. Does not exist.
We can’t have any maritime trade with renewables.
That is correct. It’s baffling to me that you could possibly think those articles aid your point. They do the exact opposite. I’m sure you did not actually read them, however. You saw “renewables” and your mind went “That’s good!”
I wanted to address everything you just did Niko but seriously couldn’t be bothered. Well done my friend.
No you totally missed my point, which was that global trade existed long before modern industrial civilization. It was done with sailing ships. As for container vessels they are the epitome of BAU carrying mostly merchandise for a consumer based society based on wasteful extractive resource use. Isn’t that exactly what you are so up in arms about?! So why discount the possibility of a new paradigm that still includes a somewhat reduced amount of trade done by modern sailing vessels?!
check this out:
https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/2018/08/news-clipper-ship-opium-trade-gold-rush/
The American clipper ship was built for speed, and it revolutionized global trade with its super-fast trips between the United States and China. That was in the early 19th century.
Fred,
Your point was not at all about how maritime trade existed before modern civilization. From the context, it was obvious to everyone that you were implying these solar powered ships could be used for maritime trade. Attempting to redefine your point after you were proven wrong is a bit scummy, don’t you think? Besides, you aren’t fooling anyone, we all know what you meant.
As far as maritime trade before modern industrial civilization, it was such a small amount of GDP as to be inconsequential. Our modern civilization simply cannot go back to such a low level of trade. As always with renewables, SCALE is the issue. It’s absolutely dishonest to suggest that pre-industrial sailing ships somehow prove we can trade using renewables at our current behomoth global scale.
But please, continue ignoring all of the problems with renewables. That’s a surefire way toward solving the problems, just pretend they DON’T EXIST.
Niko,
Point one, fossil fuel use does not stop overnight, it becomes expensive and other cheaper options will replace it, there are many possibilities, wind, nuclear, biofuel, batteries, fuel cells, and possibly hybrid designs. In addition there may be less overseas trade and more trade by land, it will depend on the cost to ship goods and over time supply chains will adjust.
It is no doubt true that there will be less international trade in low value merchandise, it will mostly be high value items that are in scarce supply that will continue to be traded internationally. The World economy is highly flexible and can adjust to change, sometimes it requires CEOs to think outside the box, those that can will succeed, those who cannot will fail.
Attempting to redefine your point after you were proven wrong is a bit scummy, don’t you think? Besides, you aren’t fooling anyone, we all know what you meant.
Oh fer criminies sake get off your high horse there sonny! I think you are confusing my comment with GF’s.
I did make a somewhat snide remark about wind and sails not being able to power a container vessel since only diesel was capable of doing that. In case you didn’t get it, I was being sarcastic!
Since I do think that both sailing vessels and electric propulsion will certainly be used to transport goods around the globe if there is any continuation of some form of civilization. If you think that won’t happen, then I’ll just leave it at saying that you are probably wrong in a big way! Diesel sure as heck won’t be doing iy for much longer.
BTW during the 17th century there was a robust coastal trade in Brazil done in very large dugout canoes. And I mean really huge ones that were paddled by large crews out on the ocean. Bet you didn’t know that either!
Yes my blowup doll from china will be received in 2-4 years. In that “civilization”.
I can’t believe you guys can’t even admit global trade will grind to a halt relative to the standards of industrial civilization. GDP will be meaningless.
Can you guys at least admit that. Goodness.
They don’t seem able to Mike. Which is odd, because it seems everyone here fears a collapse of civilization. And yet, if renewables are as great as some here make them out to be, then what are we worried about??? That the world won’t REALIZE how great they are? How’s that supposed to happen?
Woman: “Here sir, it’s a new energy source. It’s cheaper, cleaner, and just as useful as the last one! And besides, the last one is gonna run out so you might as well use this one, it never runs out! ”
Man: “Bah Humbug, I don’t want it! Get your cheap, clean, easy, unlimited energy out of my FACE!”
This situation is obviously ridiculous. If it was as good as Fred and GF and island seem to think, we would have transitioned yesterday. The profiteers of the world are not ignoring a potential profit because of… I actually cannot think of a single reason why they would. They WOULDN’T. They would be absolutely chomping at the bit to deploy this shit as fast as possible. I know this is where someone tells me they ARE racing to deploy it, and that’s where I call bullshit. This isn’t what a race looks like; This is a crawl. Which just doesn’t make sense if renewables are really so unbelievably great.
UNLESS, of course, they are NOT as good as Fred and GF and islandboy think! If there are serious challenges in construction and use and maintenance, then the current skittish-to-renewables state of the world (a world that includes massive subsidies for renewables and the looming ecodestruction of global warming) makes a lot more sense.
There are significant challenges to making this stuff work. A whole lot bigger than a slight reorganization of personal transport. When seen from the aspect of very real (physical) challenges to deployment, the world’s seeming inability or reticence to “transition” to renewables makes a lot more sense.
And these problems are well documented! Anyone with a mind and eyes can read all this stuff for themselves! The information is not hidden. Richard Heinberg, a long term renewables proponent and fossil fuel detractor wrote an entire book on the challenges of renewables, meant as a guide to their deployment. Vaclav Smil wrote a book detailing past energy transitions. The point at the end of the day, is that getting from 5% solar/wind in the energy mix to 25% will take 3 to 4 decades at least. We are not yet at the 5% that marks the start of that race, even though we have already been working at it for multiple decades. “Transition” is a misnomer by the way, human society has never transitioned to a new energy source, they have only ever added new energy sources to the old ones. More wood is now burned for fuel than ever was in the past.
By ignoring the problems that thoughtful and intelligent renewables proponents have written about, we take the transition from being nearly impossible to being completely so.
Anyway, this time I mean it, I’m not commenting for a while. These kind of discussions are too potent, they suck me in and I get too involved.
>Vaclav Smil wrote a book detailing past energy transitions. The point at the end of the day, is that getting from 5% solar/wind in the energy mix to 25% will take 3 to 4 decades at least.
But Germany managed to get to about a third much faster than that.
Smil is simply wrong. Comparing modern society to the Bronze Age has its flaws.
Mike,
I’m not interested in a rumble match. I’ve said my piece, and I’m happy to withdraw back to the shadows for a time. I will be reading everyone’s comments, of that you can be sure.
I am young. Barring cataclysm, I will be alive long enough to see the majority of this play out. If Fred and Island and Fishing are right, I will be truly happy. If they are wrong, I’ll be dealing with much of what I fear!
If nothing else, I’ve been happy to have your opinions. You agreeing does much to make me not feel too crazy.
Happy Holidays.
Hi Niko,
I am young too. So however it plays out, we’ll see.
Peace
Time for grown-ups. Belief and opinion are not valid unless they coincide with reality.
At my latitude, almost halfway to the north pole, a 100 foot by 100 foot area of land receives 3636 kWh per day on average. That is the effective useful equivalent of 861 gallons of gasoline per day.
If humans cannot figure out how to use that much energy then they are just lazy recalcitrant children who want a dysfunctional dystopian daddy system to take care of them.
Energy is not the problem, mental aberration and shirking responsibility is the problem.
GF,
What are your views on fusion? Assuming it came to be commercialised?
Not trying to put words in GF’s mouth but obviously the fusion reactor at the center of our solar system already works really well! 😉
As he stated above:
At my latitude, almost halfway to the north pole, a 100 foot by 100 foot area of land receives 3636 kWh per day on average. That is the effective useful equivalent of 861 gallons of gasoline per day.
We already have commercially available off the shelf technology that allows us to both capture that energy and store it for times when the sun is not shining. We are also learning how to build and distribute energy in smart micro grids and incorporating components like home battery systems, EV batteries etc. to power the needs of entire communities and thus creating independent energy nodes that can be further linked into larger energy networks if necessary.
If that puts the legacy power and distribution utilities out of business as Gail Tverberg says in that link provided by Iron Mike, that’s actually a feature not a bug! It is a really good example as to why the anti renewables folk are just completely wrong with their argument that renewables and EVs are a continuation of BAU and merely so called fossil fuel extenders. Nope, this is exactly what disruption of BAU actually looks like.
And from Cat@Home’s post:
The takeaway: Renewables are a public opinion juggernaut. Being against them is no longer an option. The industry’s best and only hope is to slow down the stampede a bit (and that’s what they plan to try).
So basically the ‘Industry’ is losing its war on renewables and its attempt at maintaining their BAU monopolies.
First They Ignore You, Then They Laugh at You, Then They Attack You, Then You Win
Author unknown though often attributed to Mohandas Gandhi
Cheers!
Back in the 70s Nader ran a TV ad regarding the sun as a fusion power plant 93 million miles distant.
He thought that was about close enough.
I think if we burned all the paper used to calculate how to build fission and fusion power plants we could generate more useful energy than the plants have or will ever produce.
Back in the 70’s one of my physics professors worked on fusion. Air Products had a program to develop it in the 70’s that failed. The list goes on.
Even if it can be finally accomplished with a net gain of energy, it is very complex, expensive and so will not be too cheap to meter. I would say that fusion power may not be practical for a very long time, if ever.
With PV and wind producing electricity at very low costs and storage of power/heat developing fast, there will be no demand for fusion power except in space travel or maybe Antarctica.
Who knows though, breakthroughs happen and it might find a niche powering atmospheric CO2 removal systems and converting it to rocks or other materials.
Who knows though, breakthroughs happen and it might find a niche powering atmospheric CO2 removal systems and converting it to rocks or other materials.
I kinda have my doubts!
https://newatlas.com/wendelstein-7-x-nuclear-fusion-records/57394/
I’m betting on much more simple and sustainable solutions such as this:
https://www.ornl.gov/news/chemists-demonstrate-sustainable-approach-carbon-dioxide-capture-air
I have given up on doubts after seeing all the fantastically stupid systems we operate with currently. Even in a more rational and logical future we have to leave room for some stupidity. 🙂
Yeah, but that level of extreme stupidity can only be attained by a group of people with very high IQs… 😉
With computer assistance.
Imagine what AI will be like since it will be designed by a group of people with very high IQ’s.
Oh I wouldn’t worry about that at all because AI seems to very quickly develop a mind of its own when left to its own devices.
Maybe you remember this:
https://www.fastcompany.com/90132632/ai-is-inventing-its-own-perfect-languages-should-we-let-it
AI Is Inventing Languages Humans Can’t Understand. Should We Stop It?
Researchers at Facebook realized their bots were chattering in a new language. Then they stopped it.
Bob: “I can can I I everything else.”
Alice: “Balls have zero to me to me to me to me to me to me to me to me to.”
To you and I, that passage looks like nonsense. But what if I told you this nonsense was the discussion of what might be the most sophisticated negotiation software on the planet? Negotiation software that had learned, and evolved, to get the best deal possible with more speed and efficiency–and perhaps, hidden nuance–than you or I ever could? Because it is.
This conversation occurred between two AI agents developed inside Facebook. At first, they were speaking to each other in plain old English. But then researchers realized they’d made a mistake in programming.
“There was no reward to sticking to English language,” says Dhruv
Which makes me wonder if Trump is really just a malevolent negotiating bot gone completely awry! 😉
Lift the hair to find out.
Here is a description of a nuclear power plant accident that actually happened:
1. Utility and contractor agree the plant is ready for hand-off.
2. Clean up crew does cleanup, paint-up.
3. Electrical engineer does “one last test” on control rod mechanism and creates a brief short-circuit
4. Reactor scrams
5. Emergency generator kicks in, located just below control room air intake.
6. Freshly painted diesel exhaust system emits copious amounts of smoke.
7. Control room fills with smoke.
8. Highly trained crew panics and runs out of building, jumps in their cars and escapes.
9. Contractor engineers remain on site for shutdown.
Stuff happens.
Iron Mike,
Fusion is the energy of the future, always has been (since it has been understood in 1930s) and always will be. Perhaps 2250, hard to guess.
Iron Mike,
You might have heard of sailing? It was done for ocean transport for centuries, nuclear is also an option as is biofuel, batteries, fuel cells. Air travel might become less common, again biofuels, hydrogen, batteries, and solar are options and there may be others. For land rail, and EVs will work fine. Much is simply dependent on cost, if we included all externalities including global warming risk in the price of energy, fossil fuels would already be priced out of most markets. Current trends suggest that even ignoring the pollution from fossil fuel, within 10 to 15 years they will not be able to compete unless subsidized.
You going to carry around million of tons of cargo with sale ships? Are you nuts?
The global economy will grind to a halt. If you can’t see that, then we have nothing to talk about.
Iron Mike, you are still under the gross misconception that the future will be like the present. The meme of continued growth is ending, one way or another.
I remember when winter time came it was back to canned and other preserved goods, we didn’t have fresh fruit and veggies from far away countries. No big deal, we just ate what was available.
See what happened in France (yellow vests)
Imagine that on a global scale.
That’s what i think will happen. You think people will be okay with lowering the standards of their lifestyle? I doubt it. The masses will go insane. Nobody likes to downgrade. I predict chaos.
But again each to their own.
Dennis is smarter than that to make such a statement. We are talking about industrialized society. Right now you order something from overseas and max it will take a month. Sale ships? Yes you “might” receive your order 2-4 years. Come on huh.
Really? You think that sailing ships (not what I proposed but we will go with that for more BS fun) traveled at 0.2 knots. More like 50 to 100 times that. Look below and turn red faced.
Iron Mike, I agree with you that there will be a lot of chaos in the coming decade and beyond. Like you said, nobody likes a downgrade, and some handle it better than others. I doubt it will be everywhere, but perhaps few places will be spared the repercussions. Think of how much chaos happened around the world in the 1940’s. I wouldn’t be surprised to see that kind of action again. And a lot it will have to do with energy.
We have grown so far into overshoot territory on so many fronts, to me contraction looks inevitable.
If you think you know which areas of the world will be most resilient ( to the threats you see as most likely), then by all means relocate. Thats exactly what the caravans from the south ( Africa and C. America) are doing.
In the meantime, develop good skills for a local economy, and install lots of solar panels and battery packs. And a good well.
When you realize the potential chaos on the horizon- all the more reason to push as hard as we can for replacement sources of energy- solar as the prime example.
Regarding all that cargo ship stuff, yes it will decline. Air travel even more so. I believe. There is a huge amount of trivial use energy being consumed.In a rational world that would be cut first.
Amen Hickory. Everything you said is logical. Thank you for your comment.
I am planning already to move rural. Living in a city environment will be perilous when the energy crisis hits (in my opinion). And all the skill sets you mentioned are vital and pertinent, regardless of if it passes or not, it is great to be independent and to be able to support oneself.
Once again thanks for the comment.
btw- of course you are right about the cargo shipping. It will get scaled back. These guys all know that. Essential stuff will still get shipped.
Bananas will be more of a treat than routine.
Oh no, we have gone back in time already!
Modern cargo ships slow to the speed of the sailing clippers
Travel times between the US and China, or between Australia and Europe, are now comparable to those of the great age of sail in the 19th century. American clippers reached 14 to 17 knots in the 1850s, with the fastest recording speeds of 22 knots or more.
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2010/jul/25/slow-ships-cut-greenhouse-emissions
Come on GF stop cherry picking. Order something now from Europe and see how long it takes. Does it take years?
For god sakes. Sometimes with you people it is a bit frustrating. It is all about winning an argument with confirmation bias and internet links which back up that bias. Just think independently about the scenario. You can find whatever you want on the internet. Just because its on the internet doesnt mean it is true.
Case in point:
https://theflatearthsociety.org/home/
Order something now from Europe and see how long it takes. Does it take years?
Have you ever been on a ship traveling at 20 knots? It doesn’t take years to cross the Atlantic at that speed!
You can do the math yourself!
I’m reading an account of various US revolutionary critters, Jefferson, Monroe and Paine. There are several accounts in the book with dates of departure and arrival between North America and Europe. roughly I would estimate the travel time to be between 6 and 8 weeks, barring bad winds or weather.
I know it’s very disconcerting for Republican types to deal with logic, facts and actual examples that occurred in history. It tends to make them confused and angry, then they respond in illogical ways (which is their logic).
So stop whining and get your panties untwisted. I will try to use a different format in any responses I give to you from now on.
It takes about 2 months for mail to get from Mexico City to the west coast – um, about the same as JJHMAN says below.
NAOM
“The meme of continued growth is ending, one way or another.”
Consequences of this ? With world population increasing with 80 million each year, lot of them using water, food, energy. (Migration) chaos, already taking place in several countries, will increase.
“No big deal, we just ate what was available”
Now ingredients of food and parts of whatever goods come from almost all the different continents in the world. Even for something simple like bread. The step you imagine, from globalisation to deglobalisation, how will that go ? Now global population is not 1-2 billion, but soon 8 billion, many of them living in mega big cities.
>I remember when winter time came it was back to canned and other preserved goods, we didn’t have fresh fruit and veggies from far away countries. No big deal, we just ate what was available.
Not only that, it makes a lot more sense to simply grow locally. I get fresh salad from Holland at this time of year — I just got back from the vegetable market and was disappointed that there were no spring onions, but the reason was I came late and the stalls were already closing. It’s Christmas time in Holland, it get dark there at 4 PM, but fresh salads are no problem, given the right farming technology.
OK. Holland if fifty miles away, but it makes more sense than shipping the stuff in from Spain.
You going to carry around million of tons of cargo with sale ships? Are you nuts?
It’s sail not sale… 😉 And why do you think they will be transporting a million tons of cargo?! Just curious, have you ever heard of 3D printing and on site and on demand manufacturing? Do you not grasp that we are in the throes of major disruptions and paradigm change?!
This might give you some idea as to why I think you are living in the past. It’s a 45 min talk. It’s about disruption in materials science and design. This stuff is real, It is happening now and these are the kinds of ideas and people who are not on the mainstream’s radar but will have major impacts on future industrial civilization.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_wHT-FsCJjM
The Biggest Revolution in 3D Printing is Yet to Come
In case you didn’t notice the global industrialized economy is based on freaking trade with millions of tons of cargo being transported from country to country. EHHHMMM G fucking D P
Oh excuse me i didn’t realise the 2nd law is void all of a sudden. You sound like an economist thinking human ingenuity can overcome the laws of physics.
Anyways fuck this, we are going in circles. Lets agree to disagree.
A lot of that is coal and oil, which we cold easily do without anyway.
The yellow vest thing ended already. They weren’t really protesting about gas prices anyway.
Incidentally the price was about €1.90 a liter ( say $8 a gallon) beforehand. Americans jumped on this protest and tried to use it to explain their own stuid wastefulness. but 99% of what was written in English on the topic was pure crap. You don’t know what’s going on in France, and you don’t care.
Iron Mike,
I cannot foresee the future as well as you, my crystal ball in in the shop 🙂
Essential items that need to be shipped will be shipped by sea or air, using several potential technologies. Individual companies will choose the option that is cheapest, perhaps nuclear, biofuels, or batteries will be the cheapest options, perhaps there will be a hybrid design. This does not happen overnight, smart companies will adjust their strategy based on prices, as they see liquid or solid fuel prices rise they will switch to alternative technologies as they lower costs of shipping.
Nobody, except perhaps you, is suggesting that things will not change, one needs to think outside the box.
I thought the iPhone was a waste of money when I first saw one in 2007.
I imagine that engineers in the early 70s thought that the slide rule would never be replaced.
As far as I can see humans are pretty innovative, if you don’t see that…
do you at least admit that renewables cannot do the same things which can be done with fossil fuels?
Since renewables are not fuels, obviously they can’t but if you mean can they be used to power an industrial civilization then the answer is; there are no impediments that break any of the known physical laws, so at least in theory, they certainly can!
That they are more limited in their capabilities than fossil fuels?
Simple answer, no! I’d go further and say less limited. Burning fossil fuels to obtain energy is an extremely inefficient means of getting work done. We have discussed this over and over. Its basic physics.
Because the problem I see is that there is no real discussion of the very real limitations of renewables.
What exactly do you see as the limitations of renewables? The limitations I see are more cultural, social and political, especially when it comes to engaging in the necessary paradigm changes that could make it work.
They are seen as a “plug and play” replacement for fossil fuels, which they are not.
I can’t speak for anyone else but I have never seen renewables as a plug and play replacement for fossil fuels, that’s simply not at all how I think.
They act differently, and their use would require a very different society from the one we have.
I’ll agree that society and the resulting societal needs must be configured very differently from what we currently have! For example, I suggest farming and eating crickets instead of cows for starters 😉
this is why the EV strategy is not convincing to me – it assumes renewables exist in our current societal context.
I disagree I see EVs as being a profoundly disruptive technology that coupled with other disruptive technologies are going to completely change the playing field and put a lot of legacy businesses and ways of doing things in the dust bin of history. Case in point, My son is not in the least bit interested ever in owning a car! He might in the near future call a Lilium electric jet from an app on his smartphone instead. And according to Lilium’s vision that shouldn’t cost him any more than cab fare does now:
https://lilium.com/technology/
If we want to have a real discussion of a renewable future, we have to at least agree on their limits. This is not something I see happening from hardly anyone who is attempting to lead a renewable transition.
I agree that limits are very real but renewables are not the limiting factor per se!
The limits I see are biological first and foremost. Population and ecosystem dynamics and ecological overshoot! We also have very real limits to our waste sinks. We can’t continue to use our atmosphere and oceans as dumping grounds for our CO2 emissions.
And finally I’m not quite sure who you think of as individuals attempting transition but most of the people I think of are probably not even in the public eye at this point.
Though they are working out of sight and under the radar.
In any case societies can and very probably will be configured very differently in the not too distant future. Either that or we will all be dead and this discussion will be moot. In the meantime, maybe check out some of Kate Raworth’s ideas as a starting point…
Cheers!
[i]That they are more limited in their capabilities than fossil fuels?[/i]
“Simple answer, no! I’d go further and say less limited. Burning fossil fuels to obtain energy is an extremely inefficient means of getting work done. We have discussed this over and over. Its basic physics.”
Fred, it seems to me that Niko is pointing at the advantages “easy to transport” and “high energy density” of liquid fuels
Easy to transport? If one ignores the thousands of miles the petroleum, coal, natural gas and electricity to make and distribute that gasoline had to travel, sure put it in a can and carry it around. Of course make sure you divide that energy in the gallon of gas by 8.33 since that is the net useful energy one gets from it.
“Easy to transport? If one ignores the thousands of miles the petroleum, coal, natural gas…”
Ok, surely now it has become more easy to transport wind and solar energy over long distances.
Dividing one gallon of gasoline by 8.33 is still a lot of energy.
Hey, I have a few gallons of that energy (gasoline) in a container and a few more in a car. How does that make my refrigerator, pump, blower motors, microwave, washing machine or computer function?
It can’t. It is isolated from most of the energy uses in civilization.
Gasoline is good for a very limited use, ICE engines. Now it is being replaced by that very portable and multi-use thing called electricity.
Fancy this, PV panels can run all those things and the car battery can be used to move the car or run all those other things too. It’s called portability.
I do recall not being able to get gasoline because the electrical pumps were not working after big storms. Hmm, no electricity, everything stops.
It will be so much cheaper, saving trillions of dollars, to get rid of that old complex, wasteful FF system and go all electric, Most things use electricity to operate, even ICE cars. So why not just short circuit the clunky old unnecessary systems?
Just one generation from now ICE cars will be show and museum pieces like steam locomotives.
K.I.S.S.
GF, I agree with what you write, but it is a description of your personal situation and others comparable to yours. Most of humans living in mega big cities are in different situations. And some unfortunates in undeveloped countries go, if they can, to the borders to try to buy gasoline/gasoil, either because it is unavailable where they live or much cheaper at the border. And even in a highly developed country like Holland a lot of people cannot afford to buy heatpumps, solar panels, etc without subsidy from the government. Hey, if everyone would be fortunate, this peakoilbarrel forum loses much of its value !!
By long distance do you mean a few meters above your head? 😉 Although long distance electric distribution is useful, local generation renewables cuts the need for this – something that cannot be done with oil and gas. Oh, and once transmission lines are in place they no longer need fuel for transport.
NAOM
What a load of bollocks!
You cannot even get basic facts right and throw out an absolute load of rubbish. Note that people are not saying that renewables are THE solution, they are simply part of it. You obviously have no comprehension of what Tony Seba is saying. We are in the 21st century trying o live with 19th century methods, we need to wake up and move a couple of hundred years forward and fast.
BTW Fred called your comment idiotic, he did not call you an idiot and I suggest an appology is due. From you comments I cannot perceive you as anything but a troll and if you have been in lurk mode, as you claim, you would not be saying the things you have.
NAOM
Dont bother replying as I am in an internet cafe with phone line down
All hail Tony Seba our new overlord.
How is he trolling, just because what he says doesn’t fit your paradigm he is trolling.
Relax with the period pains huh
IIRC, I was the person who introduced Tony Seba to the discussions here. At any rate, I have brought him up in discussions fairly frequently so, I’d like to chime in.
I do not see him (Seba) as an overlord but, a lone voice in the BAU wilderness, shouting about an impending set of technology disruptions while the mainstream analysts bury their heads in the sand. Lets look at a quote from the youtube transcript of his latest presentation:
” The installed base of solar energy worldwide since 2000 has been growing at 40% or so every year, every single year! Since 2000! It’s been doubling every two years right? And every year the the the EIA, the IEA and most mainstream analysts go back and say, ‘Oh it grew 40%. All right I’ll just do another a linear kind of projection.’ And then it grows 40% and they do another linear projection, as if it was gonna slow down as solar gets cheaper! In what market does it happen that, when a product gets cheaper the adoption slows down? How insane is that?”
Bold mine. Would you like to stab at answering the question (in bold)?
Seba’s presentations contain a fair amount of extrapolations of current exponential trends, in contrast to the linear trends shown in the graphic produced by Auke Hoekstra that, was used as the backdrop to the section of the presentation quoted above. What is undeniable, as far as I can tell, is that Seba’s projections from 2014, when he wrote the book on which the presentation “Clean Disruption” is based, are far closer to reality than any others I am aware of. In some cases, Seba is now claiming that things are happening faster than he projected back in 2014 for example, here he is from 76 min. 27 sec. into his most recent presentation:
“And solar is getting to the point of four or five cents already and in 2014 I said by 2020, rooftop solar is gonna be four or five cents and of course I was told I was insane. It already is okay, four or five cents! No subsidies right?”
If you can cite or point us to anybody who has made claims, such as those made by Seba, that have turned out to be closer or anywhere near as close to what has actually happened, please by all means let us know. I would gladly stop citing Seba if there was anybody else in the ballpark!
The only other energy savant I know of is Amory Lovins. He is another one to listen to and has actually built or had built many of his ideas. R 16 windows anyone? Carbon fiber electric car anyone? Passive house in the Rocky Mountains, advanced pumping with 50% less energy cost and on and on.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UwCFfKjn558
GF, you must truly be the epitome of evil for posting that Youtube presentation! Don’t you realize the harm you are doing?!
Renewables at this point are doing far more harm then good.
I just spent a couple of months wandering around in Europe observing and talking to people from all walks of life. Certainly there are examples of resistance to change both political and economic such as the yellow vest protesters in Paris. Who are basically Neo-Luddites desperately clinging to the past because they are being manipulated by special interests.
However there is no doubt that Most of Europe is moving ahead very quickly, They are way ahead of the US!
Cheers!
And while I myself wasn’t quite up to renting and hopping on one of these little electric scooters on a cold and wet November day in Budapest, a lot of young people there are certainly doing so.
.
Fred, I agree with every point made in your comment.
Renewables are doing far more harm than good to the vested fossil fuel interests.
I like the way the French are not afraid to protest, yet they are probably stuck in the past. That will shake out if I know the French.
And finally, yes Europe is far ahead of the US in many energy areas. However, it still needs a lot of work and I hope they will continue leading. It is in everyone’s best interest.
I would like to see low energy or passive houses built to last 1000 years. I think Europe makes buildings to last longer but we need to design them to really last and stop using them as profit mechanism for parasites to glean money by rebuilding them constantly. If it’s worth destroying the biome in that piece of land make the building worthy of it.
In fact we should all try to be worthy of the Earth and Nature in the way we act and what we do.
A good New Year’s resolution that needs to be hung up like the sign THINK.
Well Mike, I am undecided as to whether you are a troll or just not up to speed, we shall see 😉
As for Niko, “While this is my first time really posting, I am a long time regular.” a phrase frequently used by trolls. “I do not in any way believe that renewables have any chance of saving us.” if he was a long time regular then he would understand that we don’t think that is the answer and that we believe it is only a part of the answer.
“Rather than replacing the fossil fuel system, renewables act additively. They cannot operate on their own, and depend utterly on fossil fuel infrastructure in every stage of their creation and deployment.” Another standing line from trolls. Consumption is growing and, yes, renewables are absorbing a lot of that but are preventing further growth of fossil fuels. We are only at the start of an exponential growth and things are changing very rapidly, the reduction will come. As for depending on fossil fuels, many producers are switching to self generated renewable energy – again an exponential.
“renewables act to further our destruction of the environment. This will not magically change as we extend their deployment. They are just as destructive as fossil fuels, in other ways. And they cannot be created or maintained without fossil fuels, making them ultimately pointless.” Another troll meme
“So, my points:
1.”etc
Repeating and hammering a troll meme.
“As far as Elon Musk being a disruptive mind… He’s great at marketing himself, I’ll give him that. I don’t think there are many humans alive who could put Chinese batteries in very expensive cars and be titled a disruptive mind.” Didn’t read his script properly, using a script from 5 years ago or didn’t check that Musk is making mid range cars and trying to drive prices down further. Oh, and he doesn’t use Chinese batteries, He uses batteries made in the USA in partnership with Panasonic, which is a Japanese company.
“I probably won’t be posting much for a while,” “I’m not interested in a rumble match. I’ve said my piece, and I’m happy to withdraw back to the shadows for a time” A flyby crapper, typical behaviour of a troll.
As Fred said “Your points are mostly a gish gallop of half truths, outright falsehoods, myths, and contain multiple logically flawed arguments!”. I could pull out many more of the things Niko said that are from the troll script book that we see time and time again. I hope you can learn and not end up a troll. 😉 (got to put smilies in to convey I am trying to be nice not nasty, have a good New Year)
NAOM
MIT TECHNOLOGY REVIEW: WHY CHINA’S ELECTRIC-CAR INDUSTRY IS LEAVING DETROIT, JAPAN, AND GERMANY IN THE DUST
Now the Chinese government is embracing the shift from combustion to electric engines in a way no other country can match. It’s made electric vehicles one of the 10 pillars of Made in China 2025—a state-led plan for the country to become a global leader in high-tech industries—and enacted policies to generate demand. Since 2013, almost 500 electric-vehicle companies have launched in China to meet the government’s mandate and to cash in on subsidies designed to generate supply.
https://www.technologyreview.com/s/612566/why-chinas-electric-car-industry-is-leaving-detroit-japan-and-germany-in-the-dust/?set=
LOL! I don’t think this message could possibly be any clearer:
$14,000
Cost of a license plate for an internal-combustion car in Shanghai
$0
Cost of an electric-vehicle plate in Shanghai
Somehow I suspect that the Chinese don’t exactly agree with the premise that: “Advocating for EVs and renewable energy does more harm than good!”.
So if I say I like central planning [national energy policy], does that make me a communist?
Well then so be it.
Sure beats ‘no policy’, or ‘limp policy’, or ‘stupid policy’.
Thats what our democracy has given us in energy, at least since 1970’s.
So if I say I like central planning [national energy policy], does that make me a communist?
Nah! Of course not! You only qualify as a true communist if you also like Universal Health Care, which China also has… 😉
Here’s a full list of countries that also have Universal Health Care!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_with_universal_health_care
Notice the glaring absence of a certain country from this list?
If the health care in those countries is so wonderful, why do so many people travel to the United States to access the medical facilities we have here? I used to have a Canadian coworker who would tell us the horrors of “socialized medicine” in her country and how her sister who still lives in Canada crossed south of the border to get care instead of spending months on a waiting list just to ultimately get less sophisticated equipment and testing because that’s what you get when everything is ran by the government.
If the health care in those countries is so wonderful, why do so many people travel to the United States to access the medical facilities we have here?
You might be surprised to learn it’s actually the other way around. A surprising number of Americans travel to other countries for better and much cheaper health care, surgical procedures, dental care, etc… Maybe you need to get out into the real world a bit! There is an entire thriving Health Care Tourist Industry that you seem to be unaware of.
I used to have a Canadian coworker who would tell us the horrors of “socialized medicine” in her country and how her sister who still lives in Canada crossed south of the border to get care
That’s interesting, literally just yesterday ,I was at Christmas party and the host, a liscensed physical therapist, told us of a Canadian citizen she was treating due to an unfortunate accident. The Canadian government not only paid for her air fare back to Canada, they also sent a nurse to accompany her on the trip.
BTW in Germany I got free health care no questions asked and I’m not a German citizen. I’ve also gotten health care in Hungary and Brazil that was as good as any I could have gotten in the US. In Brazil it was free. In Hungary it was cheaper than a US co pay!
https://www.clements.com/resources/articles/Top-5-Countries-for-Medical-Tourism
According to Patients Beyond Borders, approximately 900,000 Americans went outside the U.S. to find medical treatment last year and the number has been rising consistently over the last decade. But medical tourism is not limited to America. Patients Beyond Borders details that nearly 8 million patients from around the world seek overseas treatment contributing to a global industry valued at somewhere between $20 billion and $40 billion.
Now why would 900,000 Americans seek health care overseas if it were affordable and readily available in the US?!
The US is ranked 37th by WHO.
If you need care that’s not urgent in a socialized healthcare country, you are put on a very long waiting list while bureaucrats determine your fate. This is exactly what I have read, seen on the news and heard firsthand from people who’ve experienced it. Even though the United States system might have some flaws, I trust it. I also doubt highly I could get as good of insurance from the government as I get now.
All first world countries are ahead of you, and their citizens live longer, and have a lower infant mortality rate.
The US falls between Costa Rica and Cuba.
Take a look:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_life_expectancy
Of course, Costa Rica and Cuba spend 1/5 as much, and the US spends twice as much as the top countries.
I’m sure the 28 million or so American citizens who still have no health care under the current Trump administration because they are either not eligible or simply can’t afford the premiums would be quite happy with some form of basic socialized healthcare as opposed to none whatsoever!
Most of the civilized first world and even many third world countries consider universal health care a basic human right. And none of those countries prohibit their citizens from purchasing what are known as luxury private health care packages if they can afford it!
We Canadians spend much less on Health care than the US, and live longer.
The number of Americans I meet who complain about things like not being able to select their own doctor, losing their coverage if they change jobs, etc., convinces me that having some wait lists( which I, at age 60, have not experienced) is not that big a problem and an acceptable compromise.
Please Lloyd, don’t confuse us Americans with facts and logic. We have a beautiful wall to build.
The Medicare-for-all paradox
By Dylan Scott
https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2018/12/14/18117917/medicare-for-all-single-payer-pros-cons-work-health-insurance
Medicare-for-all has become incredibly popular among the Democratic base, but the primary problem it will face is that many people are fine with the insurance they have today. They might not love it, but they are familiar with it, and for the people who don’t incur regular medical bills but want to be protected from an emergency, the benefits you receive through work-based insurance are probably sufficient.
“It’s a real barrier to doing anything big,” says the Urban Institute, who helped create a proposal explicitly designed not to disrupt work-based insurance. “Most people with employer plans are reasonably happy with them.”
When Vox conducted focus groups on single-payer, one recurring concern we heard was from people who mostly like the insurance they have and were worried about losing it under Medicare-for-all.
“I wouldn’t like that,” Richard M., a federal official who gets his insurance through his work, said when told he would have to give up his insurance. “I like having an option. And I mean at this stage, I’m working full time, I should have an option.”
The polling bears out this sentiment: 83 percent of people with employer-sponsored insurance said in March 2016 that they thought their health insurance was excellent or good, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation. The status quo is powerful in American health care — while there are problems, people are worried about big changes that could upend the system they rely on today.
Thats a false argument about Medicare for All.
Under that kind of basic single payer (rationed) system, most individuals would elect to purchase an insurance policy on top, to cover things the basic program didn’t cover.
So, we can move the nationwide discussion on the pros and cons beyond that point immediately.
I’m for such a system, realizing that it will be a basic care system, by and large.
Didn’t you see all the political ads before the election? You won’t be able to get people to buy into that kind of plan in the face of all the think tank attacks about how Medicare-for-all would be a $32 trillion government takeover of healthcare that would force politicians to come between you and your doctor.
Geoff, yeh probably right. But I’m open to watching this public debate slowly change. The vast majority of voters would like a basic ‘medicare for all’ plan, with insurance on top for those who choose to buy some version of it.
The real appeal of most people’s health care system in the US is that their employers are paying for it.
The good, the bad, and the ugly of England’s universal health-care system
Jessica Hullinger
https://theweek.com/articles/789287/good-bad-ugly-englands-universal-healthcare-system
While the NHS has long been the subject of some scorn in America, it is also often heralded elsewhere as a shining example of how universal health care can succeed. British citizens are fiercely protective of it. One survey found that Brits list the NHS as the number one reason they are proud to be British. And there’s good reason for this: The NHS is great. Having grown up in the States and become accustomed to the complicated web of insurance claims, co-pays, deductibles, and enormously confusing bills that plague the American health-care system, I found the idea that I could receive top-tier treatment for free here in London mind-blowing. After I got pregnant last year, the maternity care I received leading up to and during the birth of my son was outstanding.
But this system is far from perfect. It is plagued by funding problems and staff shortages. We encountered the NHS’s dark underbelly after postnatal complications landed us in the hospital. The NHS gave me a healthy baby, yes. But the NHS also gave me nightmares that still wake me from a dead sleep, even nine months on.
Perhaps the most dehumanizing part of this entire experience was how powerless we felt. There was no one I could complain to, no manager I could shake my fist at. We were just another disgruntled, weary family clutching our newborns and waiting to be released. That’s the thing: When you take the money out of medicine, when you’re no longer a paying customer with alternative options, you lose your leverage. You are at the mercy of the system.
Sailing past my 75th year in the great American health care system I can assure you that “you are at the mercy of the system” from day one.
Mr Slow, if you think the USA system is so good then why do people need a go fund me ti get on a transplant list, why do common drugs jump 1000s of percent in price, why do people get bills for tens or hundreds of $1000s for simple things, why do people get given many unneccessary tests, why do you have some of the worst mortality rates for childbirth in the world, why do people come doen here for medical tourism including doctors who wish to use facilities at a fraction of the price?
NAOM
HOTTER DAYS WILL BOOST CHINESE RESIDENTIAL ELECTRIC USE
By 2099, scientists estimate mean surface temperature will be 2-5 C hotter than today. If consumption patterns remained similar to today, average residential electricity demand in China would rise by 18 percent at the low end and as much as 55 percent at the high end. Peak usage would rise by a minimum of 72 percent. This finding has important implications for energy grid planning, but even without climate change, average household electricity consumption in China is projected to double by 2040 due to rising incomes.
Read more at: https://phys.org/news/2018-12-hotter-days-boost-chinese-residential.html#jCp
Utilities have a problem: the public wants 100% renewable energy, and quick
By David Roberts
https://www.vox.com/energy-and-environment/2018/9/14/17853884/utilities-renewable-energy-100-percent-public-opinion
Renewable energy is hot. It has incredible momentum, not only in terms of deployment and costs but in terms of public opinion and cultural cachet. To put it simply: Everyone loves renewable energy. It’s cleaner, it’s high-tech, it’s new jobs, it’s the future.
And so more and more big energy customers are demanding the full meal deal: 100 percent renewable energy.
The Sierra Club notes that so far in the US, more than 80 cities, five counties, and two states have committed to 100 percent renewables. Six cities have already hit the target.
The group RE100 tracks 152 private companies across the globe that have committed to 100 percent renewables, including Google, Ikea, Apple, Facebook, Microsoft, Coca-Cola, Nike, GM, and, uh, Lego.
The timing of all these targets (and thus their stringency) varies, everywhere from 2020 to 2050, but cumulatively, they are beginning to add up.
The rapid spread and evident popularity of the 100 percent target has created an alarming situation for power utilities…In short, their customers are stampeding in a direction that terrifies them.
The industry’s dilemma is brought home by a recent bit of market research and polling done on behalf of the Edison Electric Institute, a trade group for utilities. It was distributed at a recent meeting of EEI board members and executives and shared with me.
The takeaway: Renewables are a public opinion juggernaut. Being against them is no longer an option. The industry’s best and only hope is to slow down the stampede a bit (and that’s what they plan to try).
In depth article on why electricity won’t save us from our oil problems. By Gail Tverberg
https://ourfiniteworld.com/2018/12/20/electricity-wont-save-us-from-our-oil-problems/
She has been saying the same thing for at least 15 years. She is wrong and even she knows it. The problem is that she has stuck with that position for so long that she cannot abandon it without losing all credibility with her fan base.
This lame, unsupported, categorical dismissal makes one want to rush right over and read the article.
From the article:
“While intermittent wind and solar may sound sustainable, the way that they are added to the electric grid tends to push the overall electrical system toward collapse. “
Isn’t the surplus of electricity stored in batteries ?
Suyog, I think part of her audience share her opinion:
“I recently gave a talk to a group of IEEE electricity researchers (primarily engineers) about the current energy situation and how welcoming it is for new technologies. They wanted to understand what the electricity situation really is. They are very aware that intermittent renewables, including wind and solar, present many challenges. “
To repeat my question in another way: Is storing the surplus of electricity in batteries not the ‘easy’ solution ? As the engineers welcome new technologies apparently it is not, but why not ? ‘Too many’ batteries needed ?
She has been beating this drum since the days of the Peak Oil web site which was the predecessor to this one. There have been repeated warnings that grids will collapse at 10%, then 20%, then 30% but we have seen repeated examples of grids running on 40% – 100% renewables. Her story doesn’t hold water.
NAOM
NAOM, I understand, but what kind of new technologies are those engineers waiting for ?
“I recently gave a talk to a group of IEEE electricity researchers (primarily engineers) about the current energy situation and how welcoming it is for new technologies.”
Why are they waiting? Why don’t they get on with finding them? Unfortunately the IEEE is not exactly a groundbreaking organisation, they are more conservative and concerned building up the rules after much debate, followers not leaders. It is the entrepreneurs who are driving things forward and developing the technologies. If we wait for the IEEE it will be way too late, one has to ask ‘Why haven’t they been solving these issues instead of waiting?’.
NAOM
Why renewables don’t need a breakthrough in energy storage or even need baseload coal and natural gas.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oo8iEL6SqgI&t=28s
GF, nice. So nobody needs the kind of lectures that Gail gives anymore. The IEEE members must be deaf and blind, so to speak
I think they are trying to integrate older systems with the newer renewable systems, which leads to many mismatched solutions. One set of solutions uses lots of energy storage to filter the mismatch.
Better to think of a completely renewable system and search for solutions that minimize storage using time of use and non-battery storage systems or an already existing battery system (EV).
We didn’t fit engines to horses (hybrid), we got rid of the horses completely and dealt with the other problems separate from the original system.
NOAM, can you corroborate your points please?
AFAIK, there are different kinds of grids, grid ages and grid setups and what may work now (in what contexts?) may not necessarily work later.
Also, some people hereon seem to be at odds with one another WRT off-grid versus on-grid and the kinds of issues (including freedoms) they may and may not entail.
CLIMATE CHANGE: HUGE COSTS OF WARMING IMPACTS IN 2018
Extreme weather events linked to climate change cost thousands of lives and caused huge damage throughout the world in 2018, say Christian Aid. The charity’s report identified ten events that cost more than $1bn each, with four costing more than $7bn each. According to the report the most financially costly disasters linked to rising temperatures were Hurricanes Florence and Michael, with costs said to be around $17bn for the former, and $15bn for the latter.
https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-46637102
2019 MAY BE THE WARMEST YEAR ON RECORD AS A RESULT OF AN EL NIÑO EVENT EXACERBATED BY GLOBAL WARMING
Climate scientists warn that 2019 may be the warmest year on record largely as the result of a possible El Niño event exacerbated by man-made global warming. There is a 90 percent chance that El Niño will form and continue through the Northern Hemisphere winter of 2018-19 and a 60 percent chance that it will continue into the spring of 2019, according to the Climate Prediction Center at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).
https://www.accuweather.com/en/weather-news/2019-may-be-the-warmest-year-on-record-as-a-result-of-an-el-nino-event-exacerbated-by-global-warming/70006943
Exponential growth? Well, perhaps with some exceptions then?
“GM delivered 3,949 Bolt EVs during the last three months versus 6,710 units during the same period last year. That’s a 41.1% decrease in sales in the U.S., the biggest market for GM’s flagship all-electric vehicle.”
https://electrek.co/2018/10/03/chevy-bolt-ev-sales-slumping-us/
Meanwhile, in commie Norway with its despicable state sponsored medicare system,
PLUG-IN EV SALES IN NORWAY UP 48% IN OCTOBER [2017], OVERALL MARKET SHARE AT 43%
If we check the best selling vehicle ranks after 10 months in Norway (straight ICE and plug-ins), the data shows some interesting findings:
1. Volkswagen Golf – 10,383 total (including 7,794 or 75% plug-ins – 5,699 e-Golf and 2,085 Golf GTE)
2. BMW i3 – 4,166
3. Volkswagen Passat – 3,349 total (including 2,859 or 72% plug-in GTE)
4. Toyota Rav4 – 3,824 total
5. Toyota Yaris – 3,543 total
6. Mitsubishi Outlander – 3,335 total (including 3,150 or 94.5% plug-in)
7. Nissan LEAF – 3,180 total
8. Toyota C-HR – 3,118 total
9. Skoda Octavia – 2,928 total
10. Toyota Auris –2,858 total
The Tesla Model X – sits #11 with 2,824 registrations, and has so far outpaced the Model S – which finds itself in 12th with 2,185 registrations. The Renault ZOE sits 17th with 1,898 deliveries.
https://insideevs.com/norway-ev-sales-october-2017/
I’m glad Norway is deploying lots of EV/hybrid cars. Helping the rest of the world get experience with cold weather effects on batteries and charging.
Since the Tesla model X and the model S are basically the same drive train and battery pack that would bring the combined sales and registrations of Teslas to 5,009. Putting Tesla into 2nd place beating out the BMW i3
I am still holding 2024 as the point where global fossil fuel energy levels off before falling and all new power is renewable.
https://www.windpowermonthly.com/article/1460160/renewables-fastest-growing-energy-source-2017
And now for a bridge too short.
That means natural gas plants built today could be rendered uncompetitive well before their rated lifespan. They could become “stranded assets,” saddling utility ratepayers and investors with the costs of premature decommissioning.
Meanwhile, gas’s environmental reputation has suffered from a series of reports, most recently a study in Science, showing that gas’s lifecycle methane emissions are much higher than previously estimated and could seriously dent gas’s climate advantage over coal.
https://www.vox.com/energy-and-environment/2018/7/13/17551878/natural-gas-markets-renewable-energy
Canada doing it’s best.
“Oil” by rail at new record amount.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hE0Ydnkl37E
Park this truck in a warehouse covered with PV panels, and make delivers to your hearts content.
This kind of thing will be commonplace in the coming decade.
The only oil you need is for lubrication, not burning.
https://electrek.co/2018/12/21/daimler-deliver-first-all-electric-freightliner-truck/
or this one-
https://www.caranddriver.com/news/a25299722/2021-rivian-r1t-electric-pickup-truck-photos-info/
or this one-
https://nikolamotor.com/motor
or this one-
https://workhorse.com/stepvans
or this one-
https://www.radpowerbikes.com/products/radwagon-electric-cargo-bike?variant=5032655749151
or…
Must be bloody hot work in all those coal mines?
AUSTRALIA SWELTERS IN RECORD-BREAKING HEATWAVE
Australia’s vast continent is sizzling through extreme heatwave conditions this week, with temperatures reaching record highs and emergency services on high alert for bushfires. The mercury is up to 16 degree Celsius (29 degrees Fahrenheit) higher than usual for this time of the year for southern Australia, with numerous towns setting new December records, the Bureau of Meteorology said Friday.
The town of Marble Bar in the nation’s north-west, thought to be the country’s hottest on average, broke its record for all-time highest temperature on Thursday, reaching 49.3C. That’s 120.74 degrees Fahrenheit.
Read more at: https://phys.org/news/2018-12-australia-swelters-record-breaking-heatwave.html#jCp
Closer to home,
THE CHANGING NATURE OF CANADA’S FOREST SUPPLY AS FIRES, BUGS, AND CLIMATE BITE
Mills in the heart of Canada’s timber industry have fallen quieter this winter as wildfires and infestations made worse by climate change have made vast tracts of once valuable forest into barren stands of dead trees. After seeing record high softwood lumber prices earlier this year, Canada’s forestry industry is facing an uncertain future due to falling demand from a cooling U.S. housing market, increasingly frequent and intense forest fires and the continuing damage from pests such as the mountain pine beetle.
https://ca.finance.yahoo.com/news/changing-nature-canada-apos-forest-150004737.html
Mr. Leighton
When I saw that story headlined, I immediately googled both Adelaide and Sydney temperatures for the 10 day outlook.
This had become a de facto method for correlating high electricity prices on the AEMO site, especially late afternoon South Australia on low wind days.
Should you check out these 2 cities temperatures, you will find remarkably mild temperature ranges with Sydney topping out in the low 80s Farenheit.
Looks hot to me.
Two days ago on the news: part of Australia 50 degrees Celsius
Edit: see post above by Doug
Another tweet!
Donald J. Trump
✔
@realDonaldTrump
We will be forced to close the Southern Border entirely if the Obstructionist Democrats do not give us the money to finish the Wall & also change the ridiculous immigration laws that our Country is saddled with. Hard to believe there was a Congress & President who would approve!
69.8K
7:16 AM – Dec 28, 2018
https://medium.com/wordsthatmatter/why-nation-is-the-word-of-the-year-f937cc35a547
Why ‘Nation’ Is the Word of the Year
Virulent nationalism proves the U.S. was founded on a myth
Douglas Rushkoff
Instead of depending on some a-historical mythology — from Bible stories to Make America Great Again — the power of a nation state should come from its citizens’ conscious and active choice to live within a unifying ethical framework. It’s an ongoing negotiation between a cluster of human colonies. Not a set of boundaries, but a moving target. Open source.
The experiment fails, however, when we conceive of our nation as something forged in the past — some blood-and-soil claim to authentic origins or divine rights — rather than an approach to the future. The backwards-looking nation builds walls to protect its boundaries, defines its citizens with ever-more precision, and protects the profits of its chartered corporations even at the expense of the climate, economy, and the well-being of its people. Nationalism is an ideology that depends on forgetting that the nation is a social construction, subordinating people and places to the imaginary framework.
As nation states disconnect from the needs of people, it has fallen to the real human colonies — the cities — to serve as true representatives of the people’s will.
“It all comes down to wealth and power – the few who have more and more of it (Wall St. investors, top CEOs, billionaires, and monopolists), and the many who have less and less. Trump isn’t the cause of this. He’s the consequence.” — Robert Reich
Trump isn’t the cause of this. He’s the consequence.”
Right, but that isn’t what worries me! It’s his stupid supporters…
Think of all the business opportunities kids: EVs, new coal plants to feed them, the list goes on….
INDIA’S POPULATION: BECOMING NUMBER ONE
“India is poised to overtake China as the world’s most populous country by 2024…India will likely hold that rank throughout the 21st century. Its population is 1.34 billion, nearly a fourfold increase since independence 70 years ago. China’s population, at 1.41 billion, roughly doubled over the same period. The pace of India’s population growth, now at 15 million per year, is the world’s largest. The two nations alone have more than a billion people, and their population gap is projected to widen to 500 million by 2100. By comparison, the third and fourth most populous countries in 2100, Nigeria and the United States, are projected to have populations of nearly 800 million and 450 million, respectively.”
https://yaleglobal.yale.edu/content/indias-population-becoming-number-one
Meanwhile India’s food import policies are making it economically difficult for farmers and increasing food dependence on external sources.
Rs 1,402,680,000,000 – India’s Agrarian Import Bill for 2015-16
https://thewire.in/agriculture/india-agrarian-import-bill-2015-2016-farmers
From what I have heard discussed elsewhere, India’s Green Revolution, is not working as well as advertised. To bring poor but successful farmers into a capitalistic system paying for seed, fertilizer and machinery does not always work very well.
It is often a debt trap, a water trap and a soil destroyer.
‘Green Revolution’ Trapping India’s Farmers In Debt
https://www.npr.org/2009/04/14/102944731/green-revolution-trapping-indias-farmers-in-debt
If you add India + Bangladesh + Pakistan [1,354, 201, 166]
population is now 1.72 B.
That is more than all of Europe, N Amer, and S Amer combined 1.53B.
Space Time Ripples and Einstein’s Legacy
Published on Jun 29, 2016
Headline news was made earlier this year when the detection of gravitational waves, caused by the collision of two black holes, was confirmed by the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory (LIGO). And earlier this month, another ripple was detected! The observed ripples in the fabric of space-time validate a key prediction in Albert Einstein’s theory of general relativity. One hundred years old, the theory continues to astonish scientists with how correct it is. LIGO’s discovery signals a new era of astronomy and a new way of understanding the warped side of the universe.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BTANC9OU5do&t=326s
Listening to that panel of physicists is just so much more fun than discussing the evils of promoting renewables, tks!
Yep, there are many more fun things to do than playing with the trolls and BSer’s. Lots of related videos with the same speakers and similar topics. These of course can lead to actual scientific papers and articles.
Here is something interesting, electrons mosey along. https://www.quora.com/What-is-the-speed-of-electric-current-If-I-switch-on-a-light-how-will-I-know-how-much-time-it-would-take-for-the-light-to-glow
The analogy is the human condition, signals (communication) can propagate very quickly but actual human action or response can be very slow.
BTW the Amory Lovins video I put up earlier is probably one of the most information rich seminars I have ever heard. He covers large areas in a sentence or two.
Energy has never been the problem, the problem is in the head (or lack of using it).
Have a great New Year and spread the word.
The analogy is the human condition, signals (communication) can propagate very quickly but actual human action or response can be very slow.
Not to mention all the human resistors that slow down and diminish the quality of the signal flow… Time to redesign the circuits!
Happy New Year!
Life-blood of Tesla batteries hits supply limits in Andean mine
http://www.mining.com/web/life-blood-tesla-batteries-hits-supply-limits-andean-mine/
Yep, politics hits a lithium mine. Good excuse to push other technologies for batteries, which is happening now.
First commercialization of lithium ion batteries came in the early 1990’s by the Japanese.
It still has not been replaced, and has been quite a while.
I would not hold your breath on a upgrade (10% of market share).
Don’t worry, your precious lithium might still be used for some applications.
Now we use aluminum or carbon in car bodies and even have computers and lasers. Planes fly now too. Changes and advances are always being made, especially when their is money involved. Oh, I forgot to mention diesel powered locomotives took over from steam powered ones.
A short list of the possible candidates.
Future batteries, coming soon: Charge in seconds, last months and power over the air
https://www.pocket-lint.com/gadgets/news/130380-future-batteries-coming-soon-charge-in-seconds-last-months-and-power-over-the-air
Then let them be made via the horse first, before the cart, and let the narrative ‘change and advance’ to reflect that.
The Myth of Progress…
Batteries are indeed the big bottleneck to the EV future. We shall see.
Yeah, might happen but not because there is not enough resource. Politics, the last ditch resort to slow the process.
“There’s little risk of lithium supplies running low in any absolute sense; the next decade will probably see less than one percent of the world’s lithium reserves depleted. The real danger is that lithium won’t be recovered and made available quickly enough to meet the rising demand.”
https://blog.energybrainpool.com/en/is-there-enough-lithium-to-feed-the-need-for-batteries/
Good reason to bring on other battery or storage systems.
I agree–
When somethings gets 10% of market, I think we can talk.
According to Freedoniagroup
“World hybrid and electric vehicle (H/EV) sales will more than double through 2018, reaching 25.6 million units and accounting for nearly one-quarter of all new motor vehicles sold. ”
Studies predicting 40 million e-bikes to be sold in 2023. That market is rising fast, especially in Asia. Who needs four wheels when two will do the job?
Cars (4 wheelers) might go the other way, as they become autonomous and go into urban service fleets, the numbers could actually fall by 2030. Should be a fun time to watch what happens as the dinosaurs fade away and the electro eaters roll on.
Those are charged electrical transport.
Need to get on the same page.
Balderdash.
Bingo!
I have been waiting.
“we shall see”
Meanwhile life blood of all ICE powered vehicles could hit supply limits on the entire planet.
https://www.houstonchronicle.com/business/article/How-an-oil-glut-could-swiftly-turn-to-an-oil-13092902.php
How an oil glut could swiftly turn to an oil shortage
Oil industry analysts and executives fear a looming global supply crunch is on the horizon, even as Texas and other parts of the nation keep churning out more oil than ever.
U.S. oil prices could spike from about $70 a barrel now to levels not seen since mid-2014 when oil hovered above $100, analysts say. That would be great for Houston’s oil-rich economy, but only until skyrocketing gasoline prices and supply disruptions spawned a global economic slowdown.
“It’s even more worrisome in a time like this when you have significant geopolitical risks coming from different spots in the world.” said Jamie Webster, senior director at Boston Consulting Group’s Center for Energy Impact in Washington.
Oh, and not to mention that all the ecological impacts of extracting, distributing and burning fossil fuels are multiple orders of magnitude more harmful than building out and using renewables!
Many oil-producing countries are on the decline, while others are pumping out almost as much as they possibly can. There’s little remaining margin to boost production if supplies dwindle.
That’s the gist of your link Fred. And no one is prepared for it. Trucks and SUVs are selling like hot cakes. Trump has eliminated milage requirments for new vehicles.
Again, when everyone was expecting peak oil, it didn’t happen. It will happen when no one is expecting it.
Again, when everyone was expecting peak oil, it didn’t happen. It will happen when no one is expecting it.
Amen 😉
I third it.
My lips are sealed.
Our storage system for fresh water is going away.
80% of mountain glaciers in Alberta, B.C. and Yukon will disappear within 50 years: report
“We don’t have detailed measurements everywhere but where we have measurements the rates can be 25 to 70 per cent [of melt] in the last six to seven decades.”
The rates of melting are similar to what is seen in the European Alps and the Andes, he said.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/western-glaciers-disappear-50-years-1.4959663
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/western-glaciers-disappear-50-years-1.4959663
We’re within the one year anniversary of the 2017-2018 North American Cold Wave. This event was so significant there is an entry in Wikipedia.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2017%E2%80%9318_North_American_cold_wave
The 2017–18 North American cold wave was an extreme weather event in North America in which record low temperatures gripped much of the Central, Eastern United States, and parts of Central and Eastern Canada. Starting in late December as a result of the southward shift of the polar vortex, extremely cold conditions froze the eastern United States in the last few days of 2017 as well as into the new year. Following a brief respite in mid-January, cold temperatures swung back into the eastern U.S. shortly afterwards. The cold wave finally dissolved by around January 19, as near-average temperatures returned.
Awwhh, that was nothing compared to past weather events. Have had much worse winters here in the eastern US in recent history. Also much worse ones even further back.
125 years ago, deadly ‘Children’s Blizzard’ blasted Minnesota
“The storm happened at the tail-end of a six-year run of extreme weather called the “Little Ice Age.” Climate historian and retired state policy analyst Thomas St. Martin of Woodbury wrote in an abstract that a series of phenomena, including the eruption of the Indonesian volcano Krakatoa in August, 1883, created an atmospheric shield against solar radiation that plunged the globe into the deep freeze from 1882 to 1888. In the long gaze of history, the powerful blizzard of Jan. 12, 1888 was a final exclamation point. ”
https://www.minnpost.com/minnesota-history/2013/01/125-years-ago-deadly-children-s-blizzard-blasted-minnesota/
The Winter of 48-49 in Wyoming
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xr7q4GPTG4M
Cold Wave of 1936
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1936_North_American_cold_wave
In fact cold waves are quite common, US had over 20 in the last 70 years.
I remember the cold wave of 77. Had lots of fun in the snow that year.
“Cold wave of January 1977. Greatest nationwide coldwave of 20th century. Core of the cold air extended from New Hampshire to Florida and west to Iowa and Missouri. Ohio was at the very center of the cold air mass where every weather station there recorded its coldest month on record. Cincinnati recorded its lowest known temperature of -25F dating back to 1820. The South Carolina state record temperature of -20F was recorded during this cold wave near Long Creek. The windchill in Minneapolis was -78F on January 28th, possibility the lowest ever recorded there. Snow fell in Miami and Homestead Florida, the farthest south snow was ever recorded in America. President Jimmy Carter walked in his inauguration parade in temperatures below freezing on January 20th. The Buffalo, NY was hit with its worst blizzard ever during the last week of January where near hurricane force winds created whiteout conditions for three days. Temperatures in Buffalo were around 0F, windchills recorded of -60F, and the blizzard paralyzed the city with snow drifts of up to 30 feet.[29]”
And how does it compare to the current extreme heat wave in Australia?!
https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=http://www.thejournal.ie/australia-heatwave-summer-2018-4415991-Dec2018/%3Famp%3D1&ved=2ahUKEwiYscKhu8PfAhUE1qwKHWgmDSEQFjABegQIDxAF&usg=AOvVaw3NeA3UtkrJIAysTIpVfFBr&cf=1
Australian town records temperature of 49.3 Celsius as country sizzles in record-breaking heatwave
Good news, everyone! Trumps’ EPA is well on the way to erasing all those pesky onerous environmental regulations!
Yes, let’s degrade our environment more…kind of funny how some folks who are anti-vaxers who rail about thimerosal in vaccines supposedly causing autism are A-OK with coal plants and other industries spewing mercury and other heavy metals and other toxins into the air and water. So, let ideology trump rationality, you betcha. So many people are so stupid.
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/28/climate/mercury-coal-pollution-regulations.html?fbclid=IwAR0FYCqy311NYfFshFhhg7YNgyKoMwCijw4ewAOCYa-P2tfXq0ejXm_ivPA
“Yes, let’s degrade our environment more”
Don’t need it. Apocalypse is nigh. /sarc
Yep, one way to guarantee another generation with reduced mental development and learning problems as well as emotional problems.
UK Electric car sales
https://www.nextgreencar.com/electric-cars/statistics/
UK sales of hybrid cars has increased by 20% over 2017, a reasonable increase but nothing like the increase that some people had hoped.
https://www.smmt.co.uk/2018/12/november-ev-registrations/
When we look at the numbers for cars that only use electricity, those numbers are still tiny. Being 13,940 out of 2,223,058 or 0.6% of cars sold.
November was a stronger month for pure electric vehicles, increasing to 0.8% of cars sold.
It is little wonder sales are so low, for many manufacturers you have to hunt for the electric car on their website.
https://www.peugeot.co.uk/new-cars/see-our-models/
1 model out of 24 and right down at the bottom
Mercedes, search of electric vehicle comes up with nothing.
https://stock.mercedes-benz.co.uk/search-results/a-class/1
Mercedes, search of electric vehicle comes up with nothing.
You didn’t try very hard, did ya?! 😉
https://www.mbusa.com/en/eq-electric-cars
The art of luxury, built on science.
With Mercedes-Benz EQ, the electric future is here. Through expert engineering and cutting-edge technology, the next wave of Mercedes-Benz vehicles will usher in a new era of luxury driving.
Fred
You cannot buy that now you numpty. In your rush to show other people up you make yourself look very silly.
Mercedes, search of electric vehicle comes up with nothing.
I guess our individual definitions of ‘Nothing’ may need some tweaking…
In any case Mercedes is most definitely entering the EV market, probably sooner rather than later in 2019.
Cheers!
Fred
I was saying that sales are low because there are so few vehicles for sale.
and Mercedes do NOT sell and electric car as yet in the UK.
Sorry that is too difficult for you to understand
Cheers
“I was saying that sales are low because there are so few vehicles for sale.“
Hugo, so few different vehicles for sale I guess you claim. But there is more. Take a country like Holland, where politicians want that from 2030 on only EV’s are sold. All ‘renewable measures’ only with the goal of CO2 emission reduction, so at least is said (what if climate change wouldn’t exist).
A few weeks ago the news showed interviews with buyers of a new car. The conclusion is that most of who bought a CE car had considered buying an EV, but they wanted to wait still. Motives: afraid/uncomfortable for/with the change in combination with the (in their eyes) uncertainties of range and battery lifespan.
It will take a few more years for EV’s to “take off” seriously, and maybe only happening in combination with high oilprices.
I was with a group of modern human beings, watching some football yesterday.
3 of 4 came in electric or hybrid electric vehicles.
Things will change, slow at first, and then fast.
Speaking of fast, how about 0-60mph in 3.2 seconds ( and oh yeh, can tow 11,000 lbs).
Made in the US of A
https://www.caranddriver.com/news/a25299722/2021-rivian-r1t-electric-pickup-truck-photos-info/
Hickory
Unless they are plug-in hybrid electric, they only use petrol or diesel, so are a total waste of time. Even plug-in are only good if people charge them up every day.
In 2018 global consumption of oil went up by 1,400,000 barrels per day. Obviously electric cars are having little impact at the moment.
My point is sales are so low because there are so few electric models,
https://www.ford.co.uk/
Click on All cars and try and find it. There is a Hybrid joke, powered only by petrol, how does that help with global warming or the coming peak of oil production?
“Even plug-in are only good if people charge them up every day.”
I went more than 12 months without putting gasoline in my Chevy Volt. I don’t see a problem with charging the car every day. Depending on how I drive and outside temperature it will go between 50 and 70 miles between charges.
The car is so damned smart it amazes me. When I bought it I had the utility switch my service to “Time of use” rates. I then programmed the car to only charge at the lowest rates (between 9PM and 7AM). I’m saving between 7 and 10 cents/mile compared to a car getting 30 miles/gallon.
‘Smart car’ is practically an oxymoron.
With Brexit coming up I doubt people have much confidence in buying things like cars and are especially risk adverse to new ideas such as EVs. Sales overall suddenly dropped after several years of growth. A second point to note is that the sales of PHEVs, in the UK, were mostly to fleets however the users failed to charge them and just topped up the fuel. I believe the government knows that there has to be a switch in emphasis but they are too bogged down in Brexit to worry about anything else. A further factor is the car industries fears over Brexit and their having to plan for shutdowns, if they see a possible need to move production to the continent they are not going to go for a big push to electric until they know the situation.
Fred, Hickory, esteemed Hugo was looking at the UK market which is lagging behind the USA which is why EVs are so obscure on UK manufacturers’ web sites compared with the USA.
NAOM
notanoilman
If we had never joined the stupid union we could have kept the £18,000,000,000 per year we give to Brussels’s politicians. Then perhaps we could have used part of that money to subsidize the shift to electric cars.
https://www.theguardian.com/money/2018/jul/02/norway-electric-cars-subsidies-fossil-fuel
Just like Norway is doing.
Just like Norway is doing.
While Norway is not an EU member it is fully integrated economically with the EU via the EEA and keeps open borders via the Schengen agreement.
https://www.regjeringen.no/en/aktuelt/statement_iiea/id2578433/
Only time will tell how things will shake out but so far Brexit is not looking too smart! Its looking more and more like a poorly thought out and totally unnecessary self inflicted economic wound that may cost the UK much more in the long run than its current economic obligations vis a vis the EU. The expression ‘penny wise and pound foolish’, comes to mind
I think the Scots have a term for the people who voted for Brexit: ‘bampots’!
Fred
If Europe is so great why did you leave?
If Europe is so great why does it need £18,000,000,000 of UK money each year?
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/12/business/italy-debt-crisis-eu-brussels.html
Italy is on the edge of a cliff.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/jul/03/greece-economy-collapse-close-food-medicine-shortage
How many bailouts did it take to stop Greece disintegrating?
https://www.cnbc.com/2017/09/21/heres-how-bad-economically-a-spain-catalonia-split-could-really-be.html
Catalans what an independent state, they want to get rid of Madrid politicians taking their money.
https://www.express.co.uk/news/world/1064718/France-riots-macron-protest-yellow-vests-paris-macron-news
The entire continent is on the brink of economic collapse?
If Europe is so great why did you leave?
The same reason I end up leaving Brazil every time I go there. Despite having been born in Brazil! My home, for better or for worse is in Florida.
The entire continent is on the brink of economic collapse?
So is the entire global economy including the UK!
Cheers!
From glacial floods to apple orchards.
Wenatchee Ice Age Floods: Downtown Geology Lecture Series
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Sbxn94vLWM
Ice Ages are tough, but they also can be life abundant since the geology and soil structures get changed and deserts are reduced.
Do we even have a concept of what we are in the process of doing by heading toward a warm planet? Not only a possible major extinction event but probably changing the future soil and surface geology of the planet for the next millions of years by leaving the Ice Age.
GoneFishing,
I can’t get enough sound to listen to the lecture but thanks for bringing these talks to my attention.
There are backwater flood deposits in the city of Wenatchee just as there are all the way NE to past Grand Coulee Dam and SE almost to Wallula Gap where the floodwaters joined the Columbia River as it approached where the Washington/Oregon border is now. In some parts of the Columbia Plateau floods left material that can be farmed and in many others they formed what’s called scabland where all material that had overlain the basalts below flood level was removed.
In some parts of the Columbia Plateau floods left material that can be farmed and in many others they formed what’s called scabland where all material that had overlain the basalts below flood level was removed.
Sounds like a great place to farm lichens! 😉
Deep deposits of the very rich soil backwashed upstream into the Williamette Valley. Excellent farmland there, in wide areas.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Missoula_Floods
It’s great to be able to stand in an area and conceptualize it through time. That area is on my short list of places to visit.
Dos por uno
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2018/dec/30/flood-defences-cumbria-how-willow-proved-to-be-a-natural-defender
The big question is ‘will part of the production be sidelined for cricket bats?’.
NAOM
‘will part of the production be sidelined for cricket bats?’
This guy is a Pallid Bat and among the things he likes to eat are Jerusalem Crickets… So I guess he could be called a ‘Cricket Bat’ 😉
.
Grooooooooooaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaan!
Scale, Numbers, Forethought and Lock-Ins
Niko, actually you do seem to have an idea how to transition without so-called renewables, and you already wrote it hereon WRT your comment regarding relocalizing, degrowing, simplifying, and so forth– resilience.
I also seem to recall you mentioning scale, perhaps in another context, but it nevertheless applies to ‘renewable’ and related manufacture and buildout (etc.– cradle-to-grave)– scale and numbers (etc.).
Part of the point here is that, while ‘renewables’ may work in some sort of limited fashion now, they are of course in the current context of the crony-capitalist plutarchy (or corporatocracy if you will), which is still chugging along on apparently roughly 85% fossil fuels as its primary and very mobile energy. When things like technoindustrial-produced renewables are numbered and scaled-up, new and often unforeseen (perhaps especially by those who might advocate for them in a handwavey kind of way) problems arise, manifested in a myriad of ways…
U-shaped cost curves; market saturations; haves and have nots (and other issues behind renewable allocation); recycling (or improper or lack thereof); resource limits; transportation infrastructure; new forms of pollution and wealth inequity (think of child-labor issues with cobalt mining in Africa or lithium mining impacts in South America for examples); mass-production industries’ capacities or incapacities to adapt, such as to intermittency and/or dramatic changes in the so-called economy in general; and so on.
By now, it seems quite obvious that not everyone on the planet is going to be basking in the pseudo-glory and pseudo-wealth of this ‘technoindustrial’ crony-capitalist plutarchy ‘set of living arrangments’ (unless if by pushing the planet past certain limits), but who and how many question that for this supposed renewable transition? Not many.
We have the likes of GoneFishing or Fred Magyar mentioning how not every EV has to be a car, but so what, if billions of people get indoctrinated by adverstising and marketing (and assorted propaganda, brainwashing and coercion) that they ‘need’ batteries, such as for their digital devices, cars, scooters, electric bikes, homes (heating, lighting, appliances, etc.) and so on. That’s an issue in part of scale and numbers and that can and probably will bump up against social and natural planetary constraints, just like our modus operandi is already doing.
Not many people seem to think or talk about these kinds of things in their blinkered navigations though reality and that’s why we can get, down the road, into the kinds predicaments, the kinds of rock-and-hard-places that what some, such as David Korowizc, for example, would call, ‘lock-in’.
And guess what? Fossil fuel, general mass production industry and industrial agro (or the Green Revolution) are just such lock-ins.
And now we have AGW, species extinctions, and soil despoilments, etc., and the ‘need’ for collapse/peak oil blogs like these.
Lock-ins can, or maybe always do, leave us extra vulnerable– non-resilient.
“Niko, actually you do seem to have an idea how to transition without so-called renewables, and you already wrote it hereon WRT your comment regarding relocalizing, degrowing, simplifying, and so forth– resilience.”
Caelan, I was trying to say (not very well) that there is no way to painlessly transition, AKA transition in such a way that the majority of the current population stays alive. Resilience is the right way to go, but we cannot fool ourselves into thinking resilience is a solution for all of humanity. Resilience gives those that remain a better chance, and helps more remain after TSHTF, while reducing our total negative impact on the biosphere. Resilience does not feed 8 billion. This relates to what you’ve said about lock-in regarding industrial agriculture and scale. We now need that sort of industrial agriculture, and the scale it enables, in order to feed everyone currently alive. Relocalizing, degrowing, etc are not a solution to this problem so much as an admittance of the problem’s intractability, and a taking of the best route forward after accepting the inevitable.
As you know, I believe you are correct about renewables. They are clearly an extension of the same system that created the fossil fueled destruction we see every day. And I think this is an important point, though rarely touched on: fossil fuels could have been a great boon to humanity. If after their discovery we had used them sparingly, for critical applications, at rates the waste of which the biosphere could absorb and neutralize, for the ease and betterment of those humans already living, they would never have become the evil they are today. The Earth’s natural carbon dioxide sinks are quite impressive, we could have burned carbon at a fairly high rate WRT the size of pre-industrial society without stressing those systems much at all. Had we at the time of their discovery decided not to grow without reason, and instead increase everyone’s standard of living by reasonable and equitable amounts, we could have supported such a society, in balance with the Earth’s carbon sinks, for a very long time. Perhaps even long enough for that society to develop a renewable infrastructure sustained by very small amounts of fossil fuels, well below previous levels.
But we did not – instead, we grew like a cancer in every way possible. And this is the point. If it was indeed possible to use fossil fuels in a wiser, Earth-system sustainable way, then it makes no difference if the same is possible for our current renewables. We did not choose to do so in the past with fossil fuels, so why would we choose to now with renewables? Does anyone here actually believe humanity has drastically changed its cultural awareness of the limitations of the biosphere since that time? We on this forum perhaps come from a group of less than 1 million people on Earth that are seriously discussing and studying this question.
So it seems clear that renewables, in so far as they are deployed, will be used to further the destruction of the biosphere, just as fossil fuels were used before them.
The Earth’s natural carbon dioxide sinks are quite impressive, we could have burned carbon at a fairly high rate WRT the size of pre-industrial society without stressing those systems much at all. Had we at the time of their discovery decided not to grow without reason, and instead increase everyone’s standard of living by reasonable and equitable amounts, we could have supported such a society, in balance with the Earth’s carbon sinks, for a very long time.
Sheesh! Let me guess, you really haven’t the faintest clue about the true meaning behind the query: ‘Are humans smarter than yeast’?!
And with regards:
‘ So it seems clear that renewables, in so far as they are deployed, will be used to further the destruction of the biosphere, just as fossil fuels were used before them.
‘Prediction is very difficult, especially about the future’
Niels Bohr
You know Fred, sometimes your comments to those who have thoughts and opinions that differ from yours shows little appreciation for the effort they make in communicating such. I happen to greatly appreciate Niko expressing his thoughts and views. And I agree with much of his assessment. Each time I go to a large city (heck, even the small one I live 10 miles from) it is obvious that ‘progress’ has a LONG way to go before we can declare anything to be resilient, renewable or sustainable. Nobody wants to believe that there is not a solution. And who among us, as educated as we are about the current state of affairs, believes it is possible for humanity to align itself such that all the solutions could have a fighting chance at creating a society that lives in harmony with the rest of life? Pretty sure that if that ever does happen, it’ll be long after I’m gone… and many others too. Development continues. Hard to hold all the opposing actions one sees all around. Yesterday at the grocery store I saw a Nissan Leaf. Cool. Two days prior on my 1.5 hr drive in my ICE to my sister’s I see prime farmland up for sale with houses and apartments building up all around it. Hummm, any land being put into farming? Nope, all I see is land succumbing to development. I see massive pipe projects that carry water from areas that have it to areas that don’t because people want to live where there isn’t enough water. And developers need that piped water in order to be profitable building the old way. Implementing the new way is a constant uphill battle. Thousands of new rooftops everyday. No solar. No water catchment. Billions of dollars for military, for destruction, for control through fear. 7+billion people have to be controlled somehow. More people require more control. Reducing the population without disease, war or famine will, IMHO, require just as much control, if not more. It would help greatly if humans actually got along with one another. Sigh.
I happen to greatly appreciate Niko expressing his thoughts and views. And I agree with much of his assessment.
I have no problem with Niko or anyone else expressing their views!
However, if you agree with this statement:
The Earth’s natural carbon dioxide sinks are quite impressive, we could have burned carbon at a fairly high rate WRT the size of pre-industrial society without stressing those systems much at all. Had we at the time of their discovery decided not to grow without reason, and instead increase everyone’s standard of living by reasonable and equitable amounts, we could have supported such a society, in balance with the Earth’s carbon sinks, for a very long time.
Then you don’t have a clue either! Why?! because it assumes that humans had a priori knowledge of the consequences of burning fossil fuels, (they didn’t) that humans are rational operators, (they aren’t) that humans would go against their natural biological programming (not likely) and last but not least, that humans are actually smarter than yeast, (there is nothing to indicate that might be the case).
Just because someone puts a lot of time and effort into explaining why the earth is flat does not mean we should accept their views as being valid!
The Third Set of Footprints
Niko, not too long ago on this forum, I posted a comment, with references, about how we may be able to feed ~8 billion and live well (that the issue may be more ‘sociopolitical’), but not in the current (‘footprint/sociopolitical’) context. I would even suggest that a relatively-painless transition is (or at least was) possible.
Some time ago before that (~2016?), I mentioned hereon the idea of having at least two different sets of footprints; one, our natural footprint, and one, our technological one…
To update that; for a third set, maybe there could be an intelligent/wise capacity (emergent property?) to react effectively to our current situation so that the third set are small enough to accommodate what– and to be kind of metaphoric– the dinosaurs couldn’t, but the birds (that are apparently related to the dinosaurs) could.
IOW, we may have the capacity to not only grow our footprints through technology, but also shrink them under our natural, non-technological size, though knowledge, wisdom, etc., and living in harmony with nature.
If it’s too late to do so, it may not be too late for at least some of us, maybe the wiser and/or just plain lucky, to shrink our third footprint small enough to get through the future bottleneck(s), such as of our making…
That may preclude the ‘tribes’ that cling too tightly to their two other sets of footprint and, for example, fail to let go of their notions of renewable energy, (via the crony-capitalist plutarchy) and associated ‘detritus’.
By the way (and this is not necessarily meant for you, Niko)…
There is no point to solar panels, batteries and what they may power on a dead and dying planet!
Niko, not too long ago on this forum, I posted a comment, with references, about how we may be able to feed ~8 billion and live well (that the issue may be more ‘sociopolitical’), but not in the current (‘footprint/sociopolitical’) context. I would even suggest that a relatively-painless transition is (or at least was) possible.
My optimistic side wants to agree, but my pessimistic side keeps bringing up the lessons of human history. I don’t know. It seems ludicrous to think we can support so many without extra energy inputs. Then again, I have heard a lot of very impressive things regarding organic farming advancements. Maybe if everyone became once again focused on making food, and doing it in a sustainable, restorative way… But then again, considering how much of the biomass of the planet humans have displaced, how could we all exist and also restore that biomass? Like I said, I don’t know. I’d be interested to see some of your references.
IOW, we may have the capacity to not only grow our footprints through technology, but also shrink them under our natural, non-technological size, though knowledge, wisdom, etc., and living in harmony with nature.
This I agree with. I do not know if we can shrink them a sufficient amount. I just don’t know.
However, I DO know that you will deeply enjoy this podcast, if you have not already heard about it. I assure you that it is right up your alley and you will like it very much.
https://ashesashes.org/
Cheers!
Global November Sales: New Record Of Over 237,000 Electric Cars
If December will bring at least 272,000, total sales in 2018 will be 2 million
November 2018 was another great month for plug-in electric car sales around the world. A new all-time record was set the third time in a row, and we are waiting for the fourth in December.
EV Sales Blog estimates that, in total, some 237,553 plug-in electric cars were sold last month (up 73%). More than two-thirds (67%) of sales are BEVs.
See more our sales reports for November 2018 here.
The tally for 11 months of 2018 is 1,728,629 at an average of 2% market share. We are almost certain that more than a quarter million people will start driving electric (purely electric or partially electric) in December.
Reading through the comments, I almost felt I was a peakoilbarrel.com. Weird! Were it not for the fact that Peak Oil was not on anyone’s radar and no one mentioned the possibility of oil supply problem over the next decade or so, I would have been fooled!
Weird! Were it not for the fact that Peak Oil was not on anyone’s radar and no one mentioned the possibility of oil supply problem over the next decade or so, I would have been fooled!
Well there was this comment from someone named Mike 😉
It is still surprising that it is only 2% of global sales, but at some point this has got to start impacting global oil demand.
I think a reasonable estimate of average annual gasoline savings-per EV is probably 500 gallons~10 barrels of oil. I guess this works out to only 20 million barrels for all 2019 EV sales and something like 40-50 million for all EVs. No idea how this works out in the grand scheme of things, but maybe in the early 2020s we will start to see the freak-out over shrinking oil revenue.
Cheers! and Happy New Year!
LOL! Funny how you zoomed in the comment that most had me thinking I could be at peakoilbarre!
Why the wink? Do you know this “Mike”?
No but we have a couple of Mikes here so it just makes it seem even more like peakoilbarrel!
Islandboy’s Electric Power Monthly is up
http://peakoilbarrel.com/eias-electric-power-monthly-december-2018-edition-with-data-for-october/
also a new Open Thread Petroleum Thread is up.
http://peakoilbarrel.com/open-thread-petroleum-december-31-2018/
Happy New Year everyone.
Thank you for participating in the discussion.
Thanks, Dennis, you too and thanks for your efforts in this site’s regard.
This open topic is getting old, but maybe it’s not dead yet, lol.
I’m looking for any serious articles about possible ways the owners of sufficient coal and gas fired generating capacity will be paid to keep their infrastructure up and ready to run, for as many years as necessary, on short notice ( minutes to days) as wind and solar farms take an ever bigger bite out of their market.
For starters, it seems perfectly obvious to me that it’s going to take two or three decades, at least, to build out sufficient renewable capacity, storage capacity, HVDC transmission lines, etc, to carry the load without coal and gas.
It looks at first glance as if there are only two, maybe three, viable options.
One is to allow the owners to charge whatever the market will bear to provide the necessary backup on the spot market. I don’t think that will fly politically, over the long term. I believe Joe and Suzy Sixpack will have a major, major hissy fit the first time they get a bill twice the usual size because the wind and sun fail to cooperate – and there WILL be times when both wind and solar generation are way down for a week, maybe even two weeks. It’s fine to talk about running entirely on renewable juice, EVENTUALLY, but that’s not what I’m talking about. I’m talking about the two decades or more the transition will take.
If I’m right on this point, then backup fossil fuel capacity will have to be subsidized. Tax money will have to be provided out of general revenue, or else by way of a tax levied on the wind and solar power industries.
I’m expecting to have a lot of fun out of the hard core conservative element that doesn’t believe in subsidies when they eventually reverse themselves, as they inevitably must, so as to keep their lights on.
Any links to relevant articles by professional economists, engineers, environmentalists, etc, will be greatly appreciated, and thanks in advance.
OFM,
Not specifically about coal and gas generators (nuclear is mentioned), but this article looks at baseload capacity in low carbon generation in GB.
https://www.ofgem.gov.uk/system/files/docs/2018/12/value_of_baseload_capacity_in_low-carbon_gb_electricity_system_2018.pdf
Thanks Micheal for this great link. Anybody interested in the down in the dirt details concerning the transition to renewable electricity will find it very useful indeed.
How did we get where we are today?
Here’s an article that throws a lot of light on our current political situation.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/2019/01/02/key-factor-rise-trumpism-that-we-continue-ignore/?utm_term=.11c99a414ad1
True comprehension of the present seems to require a substantial and nuanced understanding of the past.
There are more options than we usually come to mind when it comes to transportation.
http://www.bbc.com/future/gallery/20190103-the-rise-of-the-urban-cable-car