The End of the Oil Age

geekstreak quotes "'The Stone Age did not end for lack of stone, and the Oil Age will end long before the world runs out of oil.' Ways to break the tyranny of oil are coming into view. Governments need to promote them."

Comments

So it goes...

[Joe the Lesser]

Governments need to promote them.

And Oil Industries need to subdue them.

Re:So it goes...

[Alyeska]

As someone else on here said, there's no such thing as an "oil company" any more. People around here need to update their propaganda. The various energy companies I've worked for couldn't care less whether it's oil, gas, hydrogen, or twinkies, as long as the profit margin is high.

But then again, I'm an evil oil-man, and will be by his evening to collect all of your children and pets to torture. It's what we eeeeeevil people do. Stretches my credibility, what?

Hydrogen fuel cells

[Raul654]

The article mentions hydrogen fuel cells as a way to break big oil. But last I heard, the most effecient way to make hydrogen is from coal, which is a dirty nasty process. (Or so I hear). Am I wrong on this?

Re:Hydrogen fuel cells

[tiled_rainbows]

Yeah, that's what gets me, too. All this talk about "the hydrogen economy" yadda yaddda yadda tends to assume that people will be charging their fuel cell up from renewable energy sources. But surely, in a free market, they'll be charging it up from the cheapest energy source, which will be the same as the variety of (generally non-renewable) sources that drive today's power grids. So it won't make a blind bit of difference. And I bet that OPEC et al are looking into the most efficient way to convert oil into hydrogen - I mean, what else are they going to do with it once eveyone starts driving fuel-cell powered cars?

Anyway, point of this slightly incoherent post: Fuel cells are cool, but, unlike oil, they are not an energy source and therefore will not replace oil. Hopefully something will, though.

Re:Hydrogen fuel cells

[kfg]

And also energy intensive. That energy has to come from somewhere. See the second law. The hydrogen derived from the process cannot be used as the energy source for the process.

Catalytic cracking from methanol is another possibility. Energy must be used to refine and manufacture the catalysts( and those catalysts expire, requiring energy to dispose of), as well as to produce the methanol. See above reference to the second law. The quickest dodge around the outside of the second law in this case is to use some naturally occuring process to reduce the energy need. That's why 90% of the "wood alcohol" produced today is produced from. . .are you ready for it?

Oil!

Ah, but what about that bioethanol the article talks about, I hear you cry. That isn't made from petroleum oil.

No. It isn't. Then why is it so expensive? Because of the energy needed to grow the plants ( do you know how much fuel is used in farming?) and the energy needed to produce the ethanol from the plants. See the second law.

Effectively all hydrogen on earth is in a bound molecular compound. Energy must be added to free it. See the second law. Producing hydrogen will always be done at an energy loss.

From whence will we derive the energy to make up that loss?

Ummmmmmmmm, oil?

There's no such thing as a free lunch. You can't win. You can only break even. Oh yeah, and you can't break even.

There are many benefits to be derived from using hydrogen as a fuel. Saving energy from other sources isn't one of them. The big energy companies, even those specializing in oil and nuclear, are going to frikkin' love the "hydrogen economy."

It's going to allow them to sell us more oil for less benefit than ever before.

KFG

Re:Hydrogen fuel cells

[Sgt York]

OK, let's say that over the next 15-20 years we phase into hydrogen powered cars. I'm not predicting, I'm just pulling the number from my sphincter. Anyway, let's just say that 80-85% of the cars on the road in 2023 are hydrogen powered. No doubt: the hydrogen to power these cars will come from processes driven by hydrocarbon based fuel, provided there is any left. It's the cheapest, and readily available.

However, that is still a good thing. It may or may not improve current environmental condidtions (efficiency of scale, concentration of pollutants, etc), but it is still overall a good thing. In this scenario, cars are then ready for greener fuels.

Let's say that in 2050 we perfect cheap solar/wind/fusion/total conversion/cosmic ray harvesting/whatever as a "green" energy source. If cars are already set up to use hydrogen as a fuel, the general populace is all set to take full advantage of that new green source. Large companies will have incentive to shift to the new tech because it's cheaper and gives good PR. The general populace won't care, because it doesn't affect their daily activities. If cars are all set on gasoline, people will resist the shift. Get the resistance to the new tech out of the way now, because we can.

Re:Hydrogen fuel cells

[radtea]

Several other people have pointed out that hydrogen has value as a means of transmission of power that makes it a useful step in the transition toward complete reliance upon indefinitely sustainable energy sources. Hydrogen/solar and hydrogen/wind are natural combinations, as both sun and wind are abundant resources that often aren't co-located with high densities of energy consumers.

But it gets better.

Hydrogen as a transport medium has three big advantages over electricity: transmission is relatively lossless, hydrogen can be stored far more easily than electricity, and hydrogen is better suited to powering small mobile engines, such as those found in automobiles. On the first point, roughly 40% of electricity generated in Canada (admittedly a worst case) goes into line losses. The number in the U.S. isn't that much lower. Ergo, hydrogen production can be moderately inefficient compared to simple electricity generation and still break even on efficiency grounds.

Most importantly, however, cars that use hydrogen generated from burning coal, oil or gas would be far more energy-efficient and less poluting of the atmosphere than gasoline powered automobiles. The reason for this is simply that large stationary power-plants are much easier to load with all kinds of fancy efficiency-enhancing, polution-reducing technology than cars are. Small, mobile power plants suffer from all kinds of practical engineering constraints (weight, size, cycle-of-use,...) that don't affect big stationary power plants.

--Tom

Re:Hydrogen fuel cells

[kfg]

No. It isn't. That's why we have oil. It is in large part the stored solar energy (with a dash of geothermal) of millions of years.

That's why it will be the surest and cheapest source of hydrogen for many, many years to come. That's why the so called "hydrogen economy" will be an oil economy.

When the oil runs out it's back to the wood pile and other forms of solar energy. Or nuclear.

Now as it happens I can live on solar energy just fine. I already raise much of my own food. I ride a bicycle. I produce electricity with my bicycle and my food. My family has a 20 acre wood lot. I live this way because I enjoy living this way. Most look on my "lifestyle" with distaste.

NYC is going to be fucked though. Nevermind Las Vegas.

Can you produce enough solar energy to supply downstate NY with enough hydrogen to meet its current energy needs, and without starving them to death? 'Cause we already "sucked Niagra dry."

Doing it without striping the Catskills bare would be a plus. We tried that once. It wasn't pretty.

The world can live on solar power just fine. It did so for billions of years. It did so, however, without electric lights, automobiles, PCes and hydrogen fuel for them.

And without so damned many people.

Hydrogen fuels will not solve our oil crisis. It will only accelerate it. Once the oil is so far gone that it's too expensive the surest source of hydrogen is water, to which you must add energy.

Back to the wood pile.

KFG

I love the Economist.

[YanceyAI]

What is more, because hydrogen can be made in a geographically distributed fashion, by any producer anywhere, no OPEC cartel or would-be successor to it could ever manipulate the supplies or the price. There need never be another war over energy.

Nice sentiment, but I'm sure some big corporation, or perhaps some lobbying coalition of corporations will probably patent the technology, then lobby to make certain patents never expire. Even much of major university research is now funded by corporations and results in patents.

Think I'm paranoid? Ask the RIAA how long they think a copyright should be good for. So no wars, just draconian lawsuits that continue the inequitable distribution of energy, food, and wealth.

Middle East

[1000101]

You think the situation in the Middle East is bad now? Wait until the world no longer relies on them for their oil and their economies fall apart. It will be a complete disaster. I would like to not have to rely on oil as much as the next guy, but I think it's going to cause just as many social problems as it will solve environmental problems.

Oil isn't going away anytime soon.

[hedon_elite]

Technology has existed for some time to curb our need for oil, but our government won't promote this. The whole 'restucturing the Middle East' agenda is based around trying to procure our oil on the cheap, and many more of our armed forces are going to have to die (it will probably take a major, MAJOR conflict with heavy losses before the US government decides to start seriously looking for alternatives). I'm glad I didn't join the Air Force a few years ago when I was contemplating it. I went to MEPPS and everything. Lucky me.

Oil is the wave of the future

[tyler_larson]

Thanks to rapid advances in thermal depolymerization, oil will likely be the fuel of the future. Only, we won't be getting it out of the ground. Instead, we'll be manufacturing it the same way the earth does: heat and pressure. But instead of taking millions of years, it takes just a few minutes.

And what can you make oil out of? Pretty much anything. Sewage, yard waste, paper, plastic, road-kill...

Recycling at its best. And this isn't theoretically-possible technology. This is currently-profitable-and-expanding technology.

As Mr Burns once said:

[ellem]

Oooh, so Mother Nature needs a favor?! Well maybe she should have thought of that when she was besetting us with droughts and floods and poison monkeys! Nature started the fight for survival, and now she wants to quit because she's losing. Well I say, hard cheese.

Not likely

[onyxruby]

Oils are used as a base ingrediant in plastics. While we may someday move a hyrdogen economy, and we might even eventually get away from the internal combustion engine. Were not about to stop using plastics. Petroleum products go into a whole lot more than our gas tank, something many people are oblivious too.

Not only that but the oil companies are smart enough to realize there not in the oil business but the energy business. Point to example, BP/Amoco is the world's largest seller of Solar panels. Why anybody would think that these companies would stand by and not partake in new energy technology is beyond me.

Re:My car

[Alan Partridge]

Actually, as any sensible motorist will tell you, cars will last as long as you're willing to maintain them. What usually happens is that a) after 5 years, the car loan is paid off and you fancy a new one, so you sell the car and b) after 10 years, it costs more to service the car each year than the car is worth, thus making it prohibitively expensive to INSURE.

In fact, it's MUCH more economical to buy a high quality car that's 5 years old and maintain it until it gets damaged beyond economic repair, the maintenance costs do not even approach the level of depreciation you get on a new car.

The car industry knows this, and plays us accordingly (that's why it costs $200 to replace that door seal on your 10 year old Honda Accord with 150 000miles on the clock).

Re:And don't forget

[Valar]

11. Don't spend more money invading a country than actual value of the oil under said country, especially when there are better oil profit/cost relationships in the same region, and the production in question could easily be had from French, German, or Russian companies that actually owned many of the rigs for much less.

They tried that

[Dark Paladin]

Back in the 1970's - the fuel shortage.

About the same time, fuel efficiency jumped from 10 miles per gallon to 25.

For the last 30 years, nothing has changed for fuel efficiency (a little here and there, but let's face it, not on a huge scale).

Why? No economic incentive. But if another fuel crisis occured, you can bet that Necessity would mother quite a few inventions to increase fuel efficiency. Especially when car makers find they can make more money doing so.

And that's what it's all about: money. Cars won't be more fuel efficient, people won't buy more car efficient cars until they have a pocketbook reason to. Right now, even though gas is expensive, it's still "cheap" compared to what it should be for inflation's sake.

Re:They tried that

[TGK]

We say gas is expensive, but it's not -=that=- expensive. Consider that gallon of milk can run you twice what a gallon of gas costs.

Similarly, consider the price of a handle of vodka. Almost every refined product we purchase costs more per gallon than gasoline.

The real question should be this. At what level are US Citizen prepared to take drastic means to keep energy prices down? California seems to be tolerating relitively high gas prices in comparison to the rest of the US. Admittedly it's California, so there's a bit of inherent irrationality there, but they haven't done a whole lot more than lobby for their regulations to be implemented on the national level.

When push comes to shove I think it would take a massive shift in policy almost completely by suprise. If gas prices climb slowly you won't see a change. If they spike upward (like if the Mid East decides tomorow it doesn't want to sell oil to the US and we're stuck with no one but Vesesuela) suddenly however, I think you'll see a bunch of angry SUV driving soccer moms.

A slow rise in gas prices might lead to exploration of alternative energy sources. When gas hits $3.50 a gallon I think you'll see a real economic pressure to provide super fuel efficient cars etc. Similarly as electric bills rise you'll see more money going to alternate sources of electric energy as well.

As for jumps, I think we'd have to hit around $6 a gallon... maybe more before you saw a real unapologetic war for oil. Most of the US population isn't as bloodthirsty as the rest of the world belives us to be (complaicent yes, bloodthirsty no). To get the public to rally behind a war of conquest for a material good you'd have to see some pretty rough consequences from pasifism.

No difference for a long while, but...

[raygundan]

You are quite correct. The "Hydrogen Economy" buzzword-crap refers to the idea of using hydrogen as an energy distribution mechanism, like a battery. You "charge up" your hydrogen tank by using electricity to split H out of H2O, and the electricity has to come from somewhere. You are also correct that it will come from whatever's cheapest, and only the environmental nuts with rooftop PV panels will make hydrogen cleanly.

However-- that's not the point. At least not initially. The idea is to transition to an infrastructure that does not depend on any particular generation method. This opens the way for your car to be powered by anything-- not just gasoline. Once you can put hydrogen in, you're no longer tied to a single source. As more efficient generators and methods (nuclear, solar, excercise-club treadmills) come into play, your existing car will be able to immediately take advantage of them.

To sum up, you're right. It will still be gasoline and coal on the backend for a long while. But every time a more efficient nuke plant pops up, cars can instantly switch their power source by just sourcing hydrogen from somewhere else. Contrast that to our existing infrastructure, where to take advantage of a more efficient generation method or fuel source, you need a new car for each technology advance (say, hybrid vehicles or VW diesels) or non-gasoline-compatible fuel.

It's just a way to disconnect generation from distribution and usage, and it works a hell of a lot better than a stack of Li-ion batteries that weighs as much as your car.

Re:No difference for a long while, but...

[ThinWhiteDuke]

Not quite sure oil & coal are cheaper than nukes to produce energy. In France, 90% of our electricity comes from nuclear plants and it's reasonnably cheap. I gather that the investments were huge but they're paying off. We're actually exporting electricity to our neighbors which would hint that our cost is competitive.

Re:No difference for a long while, but...

[cens0r]

But burning coal actually releases as much radiation into the air as you get nuclear waste from a nuclear power plant. The upside to the nuclear power plant is that you can contain it... good luck containing all the polution coming out of the coal burning plant.

You'll keep wasting gas until you can't afford it.

[Medievalist]

Your attitude is the reason for this paragraph in the article:

By introducing a small but steadily rising tax on petrol, America would do far more to encourage innovation and improve energy security than all the drilling in Alaska's wilderness. Crucially, this need not be, and should not be, a matter of raising taxes in the aggregate. The proceeds from a gasoline tax ought to be used to finance cuts in other taxes--this, surely, is the way to present them to a sceptical electorate.

Myself, I already drive a car that gets over 40 mpg, and the government *did* give me a tax break for it. Not as good a deal as they give rich people for buying Humvees, but every time I see the price of gas go up a notch... I get a little chuckle.

I didn't buy mine for the fuel economy, exactly; I bought it to cut Saudi funding for terrorism, to undermine support for ill-considered US military adventuring, and because the Prius puts out 90% less pollution than the typical gas-hogging Detroit POS.

When the Oil Runs Out

[yintercept]

Yeah, what tripe...from the /. lead in:

Oil Age will end long before the world runs out of oil

Everyone knows that the oil age won't end when the oil runs out...it will end when the oxygen runs out. We will always find a way to make more carbon based fuels. Too much of the economic infrastructure is depedent on oil consumption. So we are likely to burn up the other end of the combustion equation first. Oxygen is a public commodity. It is the commons that is ripe for trashing. So I would expect to run out of it first.

Re:And don't forget

[Valar]

http://www.notinournames.org/iht/articles/vonspone ck-oil-revenues.html

From 1996-2001, the Iraqi oil revenue was a total of less than 51 billion. It will cost significantly more than $10 a year to maintain a 'colony' in Iraq. Even assuming upkeep was nothing, and there were no costs after today in Iraq for the US, it would take more than a decade to "pay off" the invasion costs. There are cheaper ways of acquiring the oil than that. Many other countries simply put money in Sadam's pocket, and leased rigs. This is much more cost effective. I think a lot of what the administration has said was bullshit, but I don't buy the blood for oil policy either. People should wisen up and realize that there ARE more important things to the administration than money (i.e. power).

Re:Governments can save us by BUTTING OUT.

[mpthompson]

The transportation industry as a whole is massively subsidized through taxes. Americans only pay a small fraction of the true cost of driving our vehicles in the form of the gas tax. These subsidies go to build/maintain roads, fight wars to control/maintain/secure energy supplies, fix environmental damage, smog prevention, DMV operations, law enforcement, and a myriad of other costs associated with driving. The oil companies aren't paying for the war in Iraq, our taxes are.

If these subsidies were removed and the true cost of driving was more accurately reflected at the pump the free market could produce better alternatives much faster. As things are now, trying to develop alternatives that compete with an entrenched industry that is heavily subsidized by taxes is extremely difficult, if not foolish.

Re:My car

[GMontag]

BRAVO!

I find the biggest problem with vehicle longevity is the lack of proper care by the owner. Second problem, owners buying vehicles that they can not possibly maintain unless they are a professional mechanic.

One moment while I give the gratuitous link to my web-famous Hydrogen Powered Hacker Jeep. Seriously, it has 279,000+ miles, 1996 Cherokee, 2 Door, 4.0L I6, 5 speed manual trans, Command-Trac four wheel drive. Check journal for other posts about maintaining and modifying.

The success that I have with my vehicles (previous vehicle was a 1986 Dodge Dakota, V6, 220,000+ miles) is just changing the oil and using synthetic lubricants wherever/whenever conceivable. This is NOT a secret, but you would think that it is by talking to most vehicle owners.

Wal-Mart does synthetic oil changes for around $30, close to the retail price of the oil itself. I am pretty bad about flushing the radiator, and did have to replace one recently, probably due to my own neglect. I use Moble 1 gear oil in the trans and differentials, Moble 1 synthetic ATF fluid in transfer case.

I also use plastic-safe silicone spray on all exposed seals/rubber. Pretty bad about waxing and washing the paint, but the engine is always clean. Try to find a brushless carwash with an under-body sprayer to remove corrosives picked up from the road.

Under-coating promotes rust, so don't add any. Whenever a trim screw is removed, use silicone sealer on it before putting it back. Whenever a structural fastener is removed spray with penetrating oil a few days in advance, get the rust off, use anti-sieze on the threads, replace and paint over with Rustoleum if possible.

Anyway, if you start with a vehicle built on the "heavy duty" side of the range and you can turn a screwdriver, use a rag, and/or drive to Wal-Mart, you can take care of your own vehicle indefinately.

Now about this quip in the article: Ways to break the tyranny of oil are coming into view. Governments need to promote them. Replacing pseudo-tyranny with real tyranny is not much of a solution.

Energy Corp and Efficiency

[duck_prime]

They certainly don't care what KIND of fuel they have to sell you. What doesn't exist, however, is any incentive for them to encourage efficiency. In fact, quite the opposite is true. The more efficient stuff gets, the less people have to buy their products.

That's why the energy companies don't make cars and toasters. Someone else makes the energy-consuming devices, and that someone has a very large vested interest in efficiency, at least efficiency w.r.t. the competition's device.

The problem with the world going over to some alternate source of energy is twofold:

1). The first-mover problem. The first corp switching to methane/gerbil/whatever power on a large scale will make all the costly mistakes, much to the delight and edification of their competition, so I can imagine a ... reluctance ... to be the first one.

2). Don't forget that we need a source for PLASTIC. Right now our enormous chemical industries guzzle down oil like you wouldn't believe, and we still need to find an alternative for that. And with the way fractional distillation works, if you separate enough oil to get gloop to make plastic out of, you get as a side effect lots and lots of, well, gasoline. What are they supposed to do with it?

I do favor alternate energy sources (heck, alternate plastic sources too, if any) but let's not forget that it will take really hard work to cut over, and that it's not as simple as tossing up a couple of windmills. The energy corps today aren't using oil just because they like polluting. Here's some guy's take on the problem.