Comments on: Potential Higher Prices for Oil Can Translate into More Sustainable Transportation… As Long as We Guide the Process

By: dennismarkatos

dennismarkatos — Mon, 30 Jul 2007 12:38:37 +0000

Thanks for the feedback, y’all-
Phillip, I agree that the shift to biofuels is occurring. It looks like you may be involved in it. The level of switch that will be needed to provide new fuel demand is immense (an acceleration from current rates).
Rod, what I am rooting for is cellulosic ethanol made from switchgrass and other perennials that don’t ruin topsoil and are less fertilizer intensive than corn/soy, etc. And our fuel needs can be reduced through plug-in hybrids that can connect to the electricity supply which I hope that we can make increasingly renewable in coming years via wind, solar, geothermal and other sources. Yes, there will be competition with agriculture that we have to weigh (and I agree that corn-based ethanol is not a mass solution as it is earmarked already to consume 27% of the 2007 US corn crop and offsets a small fraction of our gasoline demand. But I think it can be a bridge fuel to cellulosic – building trust with drivers and farmers before we move to waste products and let food crops feed people and animals rather than our inefficient traveling. I have read that some predict peak coal by 2025, and if that were the case that would help us fight climate change: but I’ve read very different versions that we have enough coal for centuries. I wouldn’t hold my breath for coal production to peak in less than 20 years with the increases in production of western coal in places like Wyoming.
David, I agree with your sentiment that we should focus on feeding people more than our cars – but one needs some transportation/mobility in society to ship food and goods. I think we can definitely help folks in the US live closer to where they work and bike/walk/mass transit more – but I also think that preservation of global transportation (not to preserve the current levels of joy-riding) is important as a means to getting clean water, food, wind turbines, and other amenities to the people that need them.
I think that we all agree that energy issues will be important in the 21st century, and that transitions will have to be made. I hope that they will be marked by a shift to more sustainable energy generation along with major efficiency (probably the largest and least expensive element of the solution, as Lovins calls them: negawatts). I do not mean to play down nor hype up the difficulties ahead and I have much to learn on these subjects. I hope that we get thinking about what we want our future to look like and work together to achieve our vision. Good luck to you in your efforts.
-Dennis

By: David Mathews

David Mathews — Sun, 29 Jul 2007 13:53:49 +0000

The biggest problem with “Peak Oil” is that it leads to the assumption that humankind’s primary problem in the 21st century (and beyond) is energy. If you solve the oil problem there are still at least a half-dozen other problems which threaten to destroy civilization and drive our species to the edge of extinction.

For example, the price of gasoline doesn’t mean much to those who are starving. Within a generation the Earth will host 9,000,000,000 humans but there aren’t any guarantees that the Earth can feed so many people. The food situation is already becoming dire with only 6.6 billion people inhabiting the planet: Food production is declining, food stocks are becoming depleted, and the price of food is skyrocketing.

Climate change appears like a pretty significant problem, too:

http://video.google.co.uk/videoplay?docid=-5550338253962849728

Humankind’s supply of fresh water is also at risk. Melting glaciers and shifting rainfall patterns are placing more than a billion humans in danger of perpetual water shortages. What does a world look like with more than a billion people lacking adequate water supplies?

These are just two of the problems which threaten humankind much more than Peak Oil. Don’t try to save the automobile. Save humankind instead.

By: Rod Campbell-Ross

Rod Campbell-Ross — Sun, 29 Jul 2007 13:45:14 +0000

I liked the first part of this essay, but when it got on to the substitutes, it unfortunately began to depart from the immutable laws of thermodynamics and the untested, but risky science of climate change.

There are no free lunches – cellulosic ethanol might be technically possible someday, but we will destroy the worlds top soil. There are no free energy lunches. The corn ethanol fiasco is deeply unsustainable; and anyway, if we devoted all of the worlds arable land to biofuels, we might replace a third. That is gross. Of course quite a lot would be needed in production, so the net would be much less. The other mooted solution, CTL, is too carbon intensive. It also gobbles up huge quantities of coal, for relatively little fuel. Has anybody told you about Peak Coal? 2025 I believe, not including wasting it on CTL.

Fusion is all we are left with; and that is 50 years away. What is more, it has been 50 years away for 50 years, so I am not going to hold my breath.

Our learned essay writer didn’t mention agriculture. The huge high input monoculture crops we live on are 100% oil and natural gas dependent. I don’t really care about whether we can keep the wheels of the worlds cars running. What I want to know is this: What are we going to eat?

By: Phillip T. Crenshaw

Phillip T. Crenshaw — Sat, 28 Jul 2007 17:27:52 +0000

Our world is involved in a source of fuel reallocation with scientific and technological developments opening the new sources. We develop and operate dirty material facilities (MRF) removing inorganics for remanufacture and organics remaining to be conveyed into compost manufacture or fuel of power plants. Now the organics may be used in new power plant fuel or ethanol manufacturing processes.
Dependence on oil will recede as small and large industrial/scientific organizations come together to apply the processes, both existing and new.
This is now occuring – not sometime in the future.

Phillip T. Crenshaw
BS, MBA, JD
Managing Director
Crenshaw Integrated Services
Industrial Facilitators
1555 Palm Beach Lakes Blvd., Suite 920
West Palm Beach, Florida 33401
Telephone: 561-439-6100
Fax: 561-439-6102
Email: crenlaw@aol.com