RE: [Biofuel] when will it run out
Hello Keith, When I get a few spare moments I will delve into the archives. As a closet historian I was aware of the german synfuel efforts during WWII. I was merely pointing out what the 1973 oil crisis spawned in the industry that I was working in. BTW two of the members of that synfuels project contacted cancer and died. Coal based synfuels have a really nasty bunch of wasteproducts that are difficult to deal with. I don«t believe it is a sustainable path at all. Tom -Original Message- From: Keith Addison To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: 31/03/05 14:37 Subject: RE: [Biofuel] when will it run out Hello Tom Hakan, I will read what you have sent. However, the oil industry already knows where the oil is. I don't have to tell them. They do not make public their major finds because there is still some competition among the big players. I also have no plans to get rich at the expense of my children and grandchildren's environment. It's immoral. Once Bush received his 52% mandate the Alaskan Wilderness was doomed. If I am wrong about oil, the industry will only shift to coal. It can be transformed to liquid fuel easily. The technology for that was developed in the 1980's by Air Products and Chemicals among many others. Um, you're a bit late. I was using high-quality gasoline produced from poor-quality coal 45 years ago. From three years ago: A member of this group tells this story: One of our oldest scientists, now 84 yrs. old, was responsible for going into Germany post WWII and uncovering the remains of Hitler's synthetic fuels machine which had been bombed out. I'm speaking of Fischer-Tropsch oily-based paraffins which are hydrocracked down into shorter chains for synthetic gasoline, jet fuel and diesel. He brought back some of the original German scientists who'd perfected this technology which utilized coarse, low-grade brown German coal as feedstock. Three times he tried to start-up an American version of synthetic hydrocarbon fuels in the GTL arena and was blocked. As the highest ranking American energy technologist post WWII, he couldn't figure this out. It was over 20 years later that he realized that the late John Rockefeller of Standard Oil [Exxon] had been the politic behind the scenes, making sure that his new, alternative fuel ideas did not materialize. This scientist then took his blueprints for the first major GTL project and gave them to Sasol who built his first coal gasification device back in 1953 and it is still operating today. Sasol from South Africa is the oldest synthetic fuels producer globally. There is lots in the archives about this, it is often discussed. It's strongly recommended that you make more use of the archives, listed at the end of each message you receive: Biofuel archives at Infoarchive.net (searchable): http://infoarchive.net/sgroup/biofuel/ Best wishes Keith Addison It's just waiting for the price of oil or the lack of it to make it profitable. snip ___ Biofuel mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://wwia.org/mailman/listinfo/biofuel Biofuel at Journey to Forever: http://journeytoforever.org/biofuel.html Biofuel archives at Infoarchive.net (searchable): http://infoarchive.net/sgroup/biofuel/ ___ Biofuel mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://wwia.org/mailman/listinfo/biofuel Biofuel at Journey to Forever: http://journeytoforever.org/biofuel.html Biofuel archives at Infoarchive.net (searchable): http://infoarchive.net/sgroup/biofuel/
RE: [Biofuel] when will it run out
Hello Keith, When I get a few spare moments I will delve into the archives. You should MAKE the time BEFORE you send new posts that just rehash old ground that's been gone over again and again and again. As advised in the List rules, which you were referred to in the Welcome message you were sent when you joined the group, and which you're obliged to read. The List rules are here: http://wwia.org/pipermail/biofuel/Week-of-Mon-20040906/05.html As a closet historian I was aware of the german synfuel efforts during WWII. I was merely pointing out what the 1973 oil crisis spawned in the industry that I was working in. BTW two of the members of that synfuels project contacted cancer and died. Coal based synfuels have a really nasty bunch of wasteproducts that are difficult to deal with. I don«t believe it is a sustainable path at all. Ask Sasol, they might have a different view, and have both the record and the production to prove it. It's still a fossil fuel and on those grounds it's not sustainable. Best wishes Keith Addison Journey to Forever KYOTO Pref., Japan http://journeytoforever.org/ Biofuel list owner Tom -Original Message- From: Keith Addison To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: 31/03/05 14:37 Subject: RE: [Biofuel] when will it run out Hello Tom Hakan, I will read what you have sent. However, the oil industry already knows where the oil is. I don't have to tell them. They do not make public their major finds because there is still some competition among the big players. I also have no plans to get rich at the expense of my children and grandchildren's environment. It's immoral. Once Bush received his 52% mandate the Alaskan Wilderness was doomed. If I am wrong about oil, the industry will only shift to coal. It can be transformed to liquid fuel easily. The technology for that was developed in the 1980's by Air Products and Chemicals among many others. Um, you're a bit late. I was using high-quality gasoline produced from poor-quality coal 45 years ago. From three years ago: A member of this group tells this story: One of our oldest scientists, now 84 yrs. old, was responsible for going into Germany post WWII and uncovering the remains of Hitler's synthetic fuels machine which had been bombed out. I'm speaking of Fischer-Tropsch oily-based paraffins which are hydrocracked down into shorter chains for synthetic gasoline, jet fuel and diesel. He brought back some of the original German scientists who'd perfected this technology which utilized coarse, low-grade brown German coal as feedstock. Three times he tried to start-up an American version of synthetic hydrocarbon fuels in the GTL arena and was blocked. As the highest ranking American energy technologist post WWII, he couldn't figure this out. It was over 20 years later that he realized that the late John Rockefeller of Standard Oil [Exxon] had been the politic behind the scenes, making sure that his new, alternative fuel ideas did not materialize. This scientist then took his blueprints for the first major GTL project and gave them to Sasol who built his first coal gasification device back in 1953 and it is still operating today. Sasol from South Africa is the oldest synthetic fuels producer globally. There is lots in the archives about this, it is often discussed. It's strongly recommended that you make more use of the archives, listed at the end of each message you receive: Biofuel archives at Infoarchive.net (searchable): http://infoarchive.net/sgroup/biofuel/http://infoarchive.net/sgro up/biofuel/ Best wishes Keith Addison It's just waiting for the price of oil or the lack of it to make it profitable. snip ___ Biofuel mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://wwia.org/mailman/listinfo/biofuel Biofuel at Journey to Forever: http://journeytoforever.org/biofuel.html Biofuel archives at Infoarchive.net (searchable): http://infoarchive.net/sgroup/biofuel/
RE: [Biofuel] when will it run out
Hello, all I'm new to the list and am catching up on all the conspiracies so have withheld comment up to this point. However, I felt it necessary to jump in here... Tom, Your logic on the river flows is .. Well.. Not logical. If the rivers drop to 1/3 their current flow once the glaciers have melted, then the current flow is augmented by said glacier melt (2/3 of it, per your argument) and is not a normal flow based on average rainfall and retention time in aquifers. Conservation of mass dictates this. So really what these poor people downstream are currently facing is flood stage rivers due to glacier melt, to correct your argument. But the argument as a whole doesn't compute, especially if one accepts the theorem that global warming is a relatively new phenomena... Say 30 years since the start of a noticeable effect? I have no idea if that guess is correct. Another question, and maybe more to the point, is: Is the earth getting warmer than usual, or are we exiting a mini ice-age and the temp is returning to a more normal range when the last 100e6 or 100e5 years is considered? I sure don't know the answer, but do question when people cry doom because the ice is melting. FWIW, an ice-age can be self-feeding at a certain point as the albedo of the planet increases dramatically and thus the planet retains LOT less energy from the sun... But... A warm-stage ecosystem is self-limiting (within limits, say at temps below 451 F ;) ) as co2 in the atmosphere gets pulled into the biomass, thus increasing the radiation of energy off-planet. Either way, and I believe this may be the point you wanted to push, I agree that powerful countries will continue to exert more and more power in more and more (probably paranoid) ways to protect their interests. Too bad there is no global organization that perfomrs the same duties as the anti-monopoly laws require here in the US (yeah, I can't remember the gov't org's name who usually blesses the buyout of one behemoth by another) Oh, and your timeframe is BAD, too. To quote a random school web page The plankton that lived in the Jurassic period made our crude oil. This was the time of the dinosaurs. It was about 180,000,000 years ago. So you are off by a measly 800 million years. I do believe we have a decent idea of the continental configuration around that time, but am not sure as it outside my sphere of knowledge. Sincerely, Rob Hepler Dabbler in this-n-that -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Tom Irwin Sent: Wednesday, March 30, 2005 12:46 PM To: 'James Dontje '; '[EMAIL PROTECTED] ' Subject: RE: [Biofuel] when will it run out Haken and James, First, Haken my information on oil reserves in the Azerbijan region comes from a management person high up in Chevron. I will not reveal that person to you as it might put that person in a bad place. As for oil being present under the ocean, well that is where it originally got made a billion or more years ago. Since we have only found most of the stuff on dry land it only makes sense that more should be found in the ocean depths. True, oil might only be found at mouths of great rivers but we have little idea what the land masses looked like a billion years ago let alone what river systems may have existed. Increasing production capacity is linked to oil prices which you must have noticed just jumped $20.00 per barrel this past year. Supply and demand or demand and supply, I'm not sure what drives what in these days of mass marketing. But you sure as heck can build a lot of production capacity at the current price of oil. I still firmly believe it will not be lack of oil that gets us but the climate change that will disrupt our food and water supplies. Think of this. All of the glaciers in the Himalayan mountains are receding at an incredible rate. They could all e gone in less than 20 years. This is in the highest mountain range in the world that this is occurring. Those glaciers feed at least seven major river systems. The ones that come to mind most quickly are the Indus, Brahmaputra, Salween, Mekong, Ganges, Yangtze and Huange He. They supply drinking water, water for agriculture, and for industry to close to a billion people directly. When the glaciers that feed these rivers are gone they will have only annual rainfall and normal snowmelt to feed them. Their flows to drop to 1/3 of their current values. How in the world are those folks going to survive? I have no answer. I don't think anyone does. I don't believe enough people are even remotely aware of the problem. Be sure to realize that it will not only effect them. It will effect everyone indirectly in terms of economy, disease, and even warfare. You don't think China just increased its military budget cause they were having a bad day? The dino fuels are the cause of a massive problem with enormous consequences not just for certain countries but for for our entire species. Ironically these dino
RE: [Biofuel] when will it run out
Tom, It is much research and many good specialists, I wrote a little bit about it, Fossil energy depletion and emission http://energysavingnow.com/depletion/ Association for the study of peak oil gas http://peakoil.net/ If you know so well where the oil fields are, why do not tell all the companies that are desperately drilling for oil and do not make any new discoveries of major size. It would be great if you and your friend's speculations have some merit, you can be awesome rich by guiding all the people that are spending so much money on drilling for oil, since they do not know anything. It would be great and you will be very famous also. If you are lucky, you might even single handed save the Alaska Wild Refuge and that would be great. If you are wrong, it will have very positive effects in reducing the Global Warming. Hakan At 10:45 PM 3/30/2005, you wrote: Haken and James, First, Haken my information on oil reserves in the Azerbijan region comes from a management person high up in Chevron. I will not reveal that person to you as it might put that person in a bad place. As for oil being present under the ocean, well that is where it originally got made a billion or more years ago. Since we have only found most of the stuff on dry land it only makes sense that more should be found in the ocean depths. True, oil might only be found at mouths of great rivers but we have little idea what the land masses looked like a billion years ago let alone what river systems may have existed. Increasing production capacity is linked to oil prices which you must have noticed just jumped $20.00 per barrel this past year. Supply and demand or demand and supply, I'm not sure what drives what in these days of mass marketing. But you sure as heck can build a lot of production capacity at the current price of oil. I still firmly believe it will not be lack of oil that gets us but the climate change that will disrupt our food and water supplies. Think of this. All of the glaciers in the Himalayan mountains are receding at an incredible rate. They could all e gone in less than 20 years. This is in the highest mountain range in the world that this is occurring. Those glaciers feed at least seven major river systems. The ones that come to mind most quickly are the Indus, Brahmaputra, Salween, Mekong, Ganges, Yangtze and Huange He. They supply drinking water, water for agriculture, and for industry to close to a billion people directly. When the glaciers that feed these rivers are gone they will have only annual rainfall and normal snowmelt to feed them. Their flows to drop to 1/3 of their current values. How in the world are those folks going to survive? I have no answer. I don't think anyone does. I don't believe enough people are even remotely aware of the problem. Be sure to realize that it will not only effect them. It will effect everyone indirectly in terms of economy, disease, and even warfare. You don't think China just increased its military budget cause they were having a bad day? The dino fuels are the cause of a massive problem with enormous consequences not just for certain countries but for for our entire species. Ironically these dino fuels may cause our extiction. Tom Irwin -Original Message- From: James Dontje To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: 3/30/05 9:15 AM Subject: [Biofuel] when will it run out Tom and Hakan-- I was reminded recently of the power of compounding. At linear rates, if we have 100 units of oil and use it one unit per year, we can last 100 years. But if our usage grows five percent per year, we will run out in year 37. Every industrialized economy is built on the hope of perpetual growth. While the proportion changes as we gain efficiency, energy use tracks that growth. Hence, the compounding of growth is always shortening our horizon even as efficiency and new discoveries lengthen it. The problem, however, isn't running out. It is our collective reactions as we see the horizon get close. The recent postings on this list are describing a great game that is based on the powerful's reactions to a close horizon--a reaction based not simply on how to protect the future, but on how to protect the future and their own power in that future. Jim Date: Wed, 30 Mar 2005 04:58:44 +0200 From: Hakan Falk [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: RE: [Biofuel] Mapping The Oil Motive To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Message-ID: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii; format=flowed Tom, You are in the best case right, but I think that the crises is less than one generation (20 years) away. The statement you make have no support in known facts, especially since the usage growth rate seems to be grossly underestimated. The reserves from the Oil companies has already been proven to be over estimated, with almost a third for Shell only. Hakan At 09:59 PM 3/29/2005, you wrote: Hi All, I am an environmental scientist by education and my latest research is on sustainable development
RE: [Biofuel] when will it run out
Hakan, I will read what you have sent. However, the oil industry already knows where the oil is. I don't have to tell them. They do not make public their major finds because there is still some competition among the big players. I also have no plans to get rich at the expense of my children and grandchildren's environment. It's immoral. Once Bush received his 52% mandate the Alaskan Wilderness was doomed. If I am wrong about oil, the industry will only shift to coal. It can be transformed to liquid fuel easily. The technology for that was developed in the 1980's by Air Products and Chemicals among many others. Um, you're a bit late. I was using high-quality gasoline produced from poor-quality coal 45 years ago. From three years ago: A member of this group tells this story: One of our oldest scientists, now 84 yrs. old, was responsible for going into Germany post WWII and uncovering the remains of Hitler's synthetic fuels machine which had been bombed out. I'm speaking of Fischer-Tropsch oily-based paraffins which are hydrocracked down into shorter chains for synthetic gasoline, jet fuel and diesel. He brought back some of the original German scientists who'd perfected this technology which utilized coarse, low-grade brown German coal as feedstock. Three times he tried to start-up an American version of synthetic hydrocarbon fuels in the GTL arena and was blocked. As the highest ranking American energy technologist post WWII, he couldn't figure this out. It was over 20 years later that he realized that the late John Rockefeller of Standard Oil [Exxon] had been the politic behind the scenes, making sure that his new, alternative fuel ideas did not materialize. This scientist then took his blueprints for the first major GTL project and gave them to Sasol who built his first coal gasification device back in 1953 and it is still operating today. Sasol from South Africa is the oldest synthetic fuels producer globally. There is lots in the archives about this, it is often discussed. It's strongly recommended that you make more use of the archives, listed at the end of each message you receive: Biofuel archives at Infoarchive.net (searchable): http://infoarchive.net/sgroup/biofuel/ Best wishes Keith Addison It's just waiting for the price of oil or the lack of it to make it profitable. snip ___ Biofuel mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://wwia.org/mailman/listinfo/biofuel Biofuel at Journey to Forever: http://journeytoforever.org/biofuel.html Biofuel archives at Infoarchive.net (searchable): http://infoarchive.net/sgroup/biofuel/
RE: [Biofuel] when will it run out
Hakan, I will read what you have sent. However, the oil industry already knows where the oil is. I don't have to tell them. They do not make public their major finds because there is still some competition among the big players. I also have no plans to get rich at the expense of my children and grandchildren's environment. It's immoral. Once Bush received his 52% mandate the Alaskan Wilderness was doomed. If I am wrong about oil, the industry will only shift to coal. It can be transformed to liquid fuel easily. The technology for that was developed in the 1980's by Air Products and Chemicals among many others. It's just waiting for the price of oil or the lack of it to make it profitable. But consider this. Is it better for the oil industry to have low prices and sell large volumes, medium prices and sell large volumes or high prices and sell large volumes? You find the reserves, develop them as price and profit dictate. The most profitable wells are the shallow wells. Why go into the ocean depths when you get the American public to swallow some lies, fear monger a fake war on terrorism, and obtain the the shallow highly profitable oil in Iraq and Azerbijan for far less. Are you aware that the U.S. is building a huge military staging area near Azerbijan? Tell me how much money the oil companies (defense contractors, etc.)have lost in the current war in Iraq? Truth be told they're raking in huge profits. This will fund the deeper and deeper wells into the ocean depths later when the terrestial oil is depleted. Please don't take the following the wrong way. I mean it in a friendly way. When President Clinton ran against Bush the First his half hidden campaign slogan was It's the economy, stupid! Just in case anyone on the campaign staff thought that other messages were neccessary. I think our slogan should be It's the environment, stupid! Climate change is a fact. Burning fossil fuels has a lot to do with it and it has the potential to eliminate our species from the face of the Earth. Sustainable development is the key to maintaining our place on this little island of life in our universe. Tom -Original Message- From: Hakan Falk To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: 3/31/05 3:53 AM Subject: RE: [Biofuel] when will it run out Tom, It is much research and many good specialists, I wrote a little bit about it, Fossil energy depletion and emission http://energysavingnow.com/depletion/ Association for the study of peak oil gas http://peakoil.net/ If you know so well where the oil fields are, why do not tell all the companies that are desperately drilling for oil and do not make any new discoveries of major size. It would be great if you and your friend's speculations have some merit, you can be awesome rich by guiding all the people that are spending so much money on drilling for oil, since they do not know anything. It would be great and you will be very famous also. If you are lucky, you might even single handed save the Alaska Wild Refuge and that would be great. If you are wrong, it will have very positive effects in reducing the Global Warming. Hakan At 10:45 PM 3/30/2005, you wrote: Haken and James, First, Haken my information on oil reserves in the Azerbijan region comes from a management person high up in Chevron. I will not reveal that person to you as it might put that person in a bad place. As for oil being present under the ocean, well that is where it originally got made a billion or more years ago. Since we have only found most of the stuff on dry land it only makes sense that more should be found in the ocean depths. True, oil might only be found at mouths of great rivers but we have little idea what the land masses looked like a billion years ago let alone what river systems may have existed. Increasing production capacity is linked to oil prices which you must have noticed just jumped $20.00 per barrel this past year. Supply and demand or demand and supply, I'm not sure what drives what in these days of mass marketing. But you sure as heck can build a lot of production capacity at the current price of oil. I still firmly believe it will not be lack of oil that gets us but the climate change that will disrupt our food and water supplies. Think of this. All of the glaciers in the Himalayan mountains are receding at an incredible rate. They could all e gone in less than 20 years. This is in the highest mountain range in the world that this is occurring. Those glaciers feed at least seven major river systems. The ones that come to mind most quickly are the Indus, Brahmaputra, Salween, Mekong, Ganges, Yangtze and Huange He. They supply drinking water, water for agriculture, and for industry to close to a billion people directly. When the glaciers that feed these rivers are gone they will have only annual rainfall and normal snowmelt to feed them. Their flows to drop to 1/3 of their current values. How in the world are those folks going to survive? I have no answer. I don't
RE: [Biofuel] when will it run out
-Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: 3/30/05 11:38 PM Subject: RE: [Biofuel] when will it run out Hello, all I'm new to the list and am catching up on all the conspiracies so have withheld comment up to this point. However, I felt it necessary to jump in here... Tom, Your logic on the river flows is .. Well.. Not logical. If the rivers drop to 1/3 their current flow once the glaciers have melted, then the current flow is augmented by said glacier melt (2/3 of it, per your argument) and is not a normal flow based on average rainfall and retention time in aquifers. Conservation of mass dictates this. So really what these poor people downstream are currently facing is flood stage rivers due to glacier melt, to correct your argument. From Tom in response: You are correct, flooding is occurring and will be exacerbated at time continues until the glaciers are no more. Yep, those poor folks get flooded first the suffer lack of water thereafter. But the argument as a whole doesn't compute, especially if one accepts the theorem that global warming is a relatively new phenomena... Say 30 years since the start of a noticeable effect? I have no idea if that guess is correct. From Tom in response: Global warming if triggerred by increases in carbon dioxide levels and other heat trapping gases started at the beginning of the Industial Revolution with the burning of coal not 30 years ago. We talk a lot about the burning of petroleum but the world and the U.S. in particular burns enormous tonnages of coal to generate electricity. The question is still being researched as to whether the planet will gradually increase in average temperature by 1-4 degrees celcius or if a tipping point (like a canoe capsizing) will be reached and it goes much higher much faster. Another question, and maybe more to the point, is: Is the earth getting warmer than usual, or are we exiting a mini ice-age and the temp is returning to a more normal range when the last 100e6 or 100e5 years is considered? I sure don't know the answer, but do question when people cry doom because the ice is melting. FWIW, an ice-age can be self-feeding at a certain point as the albedo of the planet increases dramatically and thus the planet retains LOT less energy from the sun... But... A warm-stage ecosystem is self-limiting (within limits, say at temps below 451 F ;) ) as co2 in the atmosphere gets pulled into the biomass, thus increasing the radiation of energy off-planet. Response from Tom: I'd love to be able to tell you for sure but I can't. We're talking planetary wide science that is still in its infancy but growing with the internet. If you want to see what happenned 10,000 to 100,000 years ago I suggest reading the Petagon sponsored report, An Abrupt Climate Change Scenario and Its Implications for United States Security dated October 2003 by Peter Schwartz and Doug Randall. I can tell you that paradoxically global warming can lead to a speeding up of the next ice age. Why? More heat puts more water vapor (ie. clouds)in the air blocking sunlight from reaching the Earth's surface. Yes, I am definitely crying the ice is melting because it is. Although I played hockey in college many years ago I am no great lover of ice per se. But when so much freshwater gets dumped in the oceans you can screw up or completely destroy thermohaline based deep water currents. These effect not just climate but immediate weather conditions. Recall El Nino at this point for a minor effect. Either way, and I believe this may be the point you wanted to push, I agree that powerful countries will continue to exert more and more power in more and more (probably paranoid) ways to protect their interests. Too bad there is no global organization that perfomrs the same duties as the anti-monopoly laws require here in the US (yeah, I can't remember the gov't org's name who usually blesses the buyout of one behemoth by another) Oh, and your timeframe is BAD, too. To quote a random school web page The plankton that lived in the Jurassic period made our crude oil. This was the time of the dinosaurs. It was about 180,000,000 years ago. So you are off by a measly 800 million years. I do believe we have a decent idea of the continental configuration around that time, but am not sure as it outside my sphere of knowledge. From Tom in response: Kindly do not quote me random school web pages. I think I have the timeframe really clear. Deposition of phytoplankton has been occurring since algae has grown in the world's oceans well before even the most primative life crawled up or grew on land. It was that algae, yes, BILLIONs of years ago that provided the excess oxygen that grew our ozone protective layer. This permitting land life to survive. Until that ozone layer was in place to blocked the sun's ultraviolet radiation no life; plant, bacteria, fungal or animal existed on the land's surface unless it was in water greater
Re: [Biofuel] when will it run out
Hi Tom, (snip) If I am wrong about oil, the industry will only shift to coal. It can be transformed to liquid fuel easily. The technology for that was developed in the 1980's by Air Products and Chemicals among many others. It's just waiting for the price of oil or the lack of it to make it profitable. A minor correction just for sake of the archives: oil from coal as a process was not developed in the 1980s nor was it an American idea. It was already a reality in the early 1950s (from an original German idea) as a state-sponsored project by the South African government of those days. It was also a demonstration of what a nation can do when it has its back to the wall. Just by way of background: South Africa, as you may recall, was then regarded by the western world as a pariah state. As such it was facing the threat (eventually realised) of having fewer and fewer trading partners. It was not an oil-producing country so the South Africans moved to obviate that problem in the short term by using obsolete mines deep underground to store what eventually became a three-year cushion of oil. What the country did have in abundance was good quality coal. By the end of the Fifties this had became the feedstock for an advanced oil from coal process that eventually reached the stage of meeting all the country's fuel needs. In the Seventies, just to put the cherry on top, a nuclear power station - still the only functioning nuclear station in Africa - was built at the southern tip of the continent to ensure the stability of the electrical grid system. By the mid-70s South Africa was totally independent of world energy supplies while remaining a net exporter of coal. Regards, Bob. ___ Biofuel mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://wwia.org/mailman/listinfo/biofuel Biofuel at Journey to Forever: http://journeytoforever.org/biofuel.html Biofuel archives at Infoarchive.net (searchable): http://infoarchive.net/sgroup/biofuel/
[Biofuel] when will it run out
I was reminded recently of the power of compounding. At linear rates, if we have 100 units of oil and use it one unit per year, we can last 100 years. But if our usage grows five percent per year, we will run out in year 37. Every industrialized economy is built on the hope of perpetual growth. While the proportion changes as we gain efficiency, energy use tracks that growth. Hence, the compounding of growth is always shortening our horizon even as efficiency and new discoveries lengthen it. The problem, however, isn't running out. It is our collective reactions as we see the horizon get close. The recent postings on this list are describing a great game that is based on the powerful's reactions to a close horizon--a reaction based not simply on how to protect the future, but on how to protect the future and their own power in that future. Jim Date: Wed, 30 Mar 2005 04:58:44 +0200 From: Hakan Falk [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: RE: [Biofuel] Mapping The Oil Motive To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Message-ID: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii; format=flowed Tom, You are in the best case right, but I think that the crises is less than one generation (20 years) away. The statement you make have no support in known facts, especially since the usage growth rate seems to be grossly underestimated. The reserves from the Oil companies has already been proven to be over estimated, with almost a third for Shell only. Hakan At 09:59 PM 3/29/2005, you wrote: Hi All, I am an environmental scientist by education and my latest research is on sustainable development. As near as I can tell there is no shortage of oil. There may be shortages of production, shortages of distribution but for at least another generation there will be no shortage of oil due to lack of material. Here is the key reasoning. We still have not tapped all the available reserves on land. All the Gulf war stuff is about underdeveloped Iraqi oil and the as yet untouched and shallow (read highly profitable) oil in the Azerbijan region. Oil is produced under oceans. Although we have found most of the terrestrial based oil, it represents only 1/8 the planets surface area. That leaves 7/8 of the planet where we have hardly begun the search for new sources. A recent National Geographic article displayed new technology that was enabling drilling off the continental shelf in water 1500 feet deep. Now oil from that depth won't be cheap but it still will be available. With prices at $57/ barrel it becomes economically feasable to look even deeper. The point and the problem is that there will be no lack of oil. The problem will be from the climate change that is already here and will only worsen as we convert fossilized carbon from solid and liquid from into gaseous carbon dioxide. I recently rewrote a global warming headline, Hemingway turns in his grave as the Snows of Kilamanjaro dissappear from the Earth forever. That's the problem folks. Sincerely, Tom Irwin James Dontje Sustainability and Environmental Studies Berea College ___ Biofuel mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://wwia.org/mailman/listinfo/biofuel Biofuel at Journey to Forever: http://journeytoforever.org/biofuel.html Biofuel archives at Infoarchive.net (searchable): http://infoarchive.net/sgroup/biofuel/
RE: [Biofuel] when will it run out
Haken and James, First, Haken my information on oil reserves in the Azerbijan region comes from a management person high up in Chevron. I will not reveal that person to you as it might put that person in a bad place. As for oil being present under the ocean, well that is where it originally got made a billion or more years ago. Since we have only found most of the stuff on dry land it only makes sense that more should be found in the ocean depths. True, oil might only be found at mouths of great rivers but we have little idea what the land masses looked like a billion years ago let alone what river systems may have existed. Increasing production capacity is linked to oil prices which you must have noticed just jumped $20.00 per barrel this past year. Supply and demand or demand and supply, I'm not sure what drives what in these days of mass marketing. But you sure as heck can build a lot of production capacity at the current price of oil. I still firmly believe it will not be lack of oil that gets us but the climate change that will disrupt our food and water supplies. Think of this. All of the glaciers in the Himalayan mountains are receding at an incredible rate. They could all e gone in less than 20 years. This is in the highest mountain range in the world that this is occurring. Those glaciers feed at least seven major river systems. The ones that come to mind most quickly are the Indus, Brahmaputra, Salween, Mekong, Ganges, Yangtze and Huange He. They supply drinking water, water for agriculture, and for industry to close to a billion people directly. When the glaciers that feed these rivers are gone they will have only annual rainfall and normal snowmelt to feed them. Their flows to drop to 1/3 of their current values. How in the world are those folks going to survive? I have no answer. I don't think anyone does. I don't believe enough people are even remotely aware of the problem. Be sure to realize that it will not only effect them. It will effect everyone indirectly in terms of economy, disease, and even warfare. You don't think China just increased its military budget cause they were having a bad day? The dino fuels are the cause of a massive problem with enormous consequences not just for certain countries but for for our entire species. Ironically these dino fuels may cause our extiction. Tom Irwin -Original Message- From: James Dontje To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: 3/30/05 9:15 AM Subject: [Biofuel] when will it run out Tom and Hakan-- I was reminded recently of the power of compounding. At linear rates, if we have 100 units of oil and use it one unit per year, we can last 100 years. But if our usage grows five percent per year, we will run out in year 37. Every industrialized economy is built on the hope of perpetual growth. While the proportion changes as we gain efficiency, energy use tracks that growth. Hence, the compounding of growth is always shortening our horizon even as efficiency and new discoveries lengthen it. The problem, however, isn't running out. It is our collective reactions as we see the horizon get close. The recent postings on this list are describing a great game that is based on the powerful's reactions to a close horizon--a reaction based not simply on how to protect the future, but on how to protect the future and their own power in that future. Jim Date: Wed, 30 Mar 2005 04:58:44 +0200 From: Hakan Falk [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: RE: [Biofuel] Mapping The Oil Motive To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Message-ID: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii; format=flowed Tom, You are in the best case right, but I think that the crises is less than one generation (20 years) away. The statement you make have no support in known facts, especially since the usage growth rate seems to be grossly underestimated. The reserves from the Oil companies has already been proven to be over estimated, with almost a third for Shell only. Hakan At 09:59 PM 3/29/2005, you wrote: Hi All, I am an environmental scientist by education and my latest research is on sustainable development. As near as I can tell there is no shortage of oil. There may be shortages of production, shortages of distribution but for at least another generation there will be no shortage of oil due to lack of material. Here is the key reasoning. We still have not tapped all the available reserves on land. All the Gulf war stuff is about underdeveloped Iraqi oil and the as yet untouched and shallow (read highly profitable) oil in the Azerbijan region. Oil is produced under oceans. Although we have found most of the terrestrial based oil, it represents only 1/8 the planets surface area. That leaves 7/8 of the planet where we have hardly begun the search for new sources. A recent National Geographic article displayed new technology that was enabling drilling off the continental shelf in water 1500 feet deep. Now oil from that depth won't be cheap but it still will be available
