Can Civilization Reboot Without Fossil Fuels?

An anonymous reader writes: We often talk about our dependence on fossil fuels, and vigorously debate whether and how we should reduce that dependence. This article at Aeon sidesteps the political bickering and asks an interesting technological question: if we had to rebuild society, could we do it without all the fossil fuels we used to do it the first time? When people write about post-apocalyptic scenarios, the focus is usually on preserving information long enough for humanity to rebuild. But actually rebuilding turns out to be quite a challenge when all the easy oil has been bled from the planet.

It's not that we're running out, it's that the best spots for oil now require high tech machinery. This would create a sort of chicken-and-egg problem for a rebuilding society. Technological progress could still happen using other energy production methods. But it would be very slow — we'd never see the dramatic accelerations that marked the industrial age, and then the information age. "A slow-burn progression through the stages of mechanization, supported by a combination of renewable electricity and sustainably grown biomass, might be possible after all. Then again, it might not. We'd better hope we can secure the future of our own civilization, because we might have scuppered the chances of any society to follow in our wake."

Comments

Re:Olde-timey carbon fuel

[DerekLyons]

The classic multipurpose "biodeiesel" of old was charcoal, a renewable source of fuel for high-temperature furnaces suitable for making iron and high-quality steel.

Yes... and no. During the charcoal era, iron and steel were produced in very small quantities because the amount of fuel and labor needed to produce the charcoal was immense. (And resulted in massive deforestation.) What make iron and steel cheap and powered the industrial revolution wasn't charcoal, it was coke - a fossil fuel.
 

It [charcoal] doesn't require any process plant or chemicals to produce after all.

Yes... and no. Low tech methods of producing charcoal typically involve losing as much as 80% of the process material to produce mostly low quality (I.E. insufficient for iron and steel making) charcoal.
 

Lower-temperature needs such as locomotive and boiler steam could be met with simple logging of reforested areas without the extra step of turning wood into charcoal.

In a low population, charcoal powered scenario, you're unlikely to have locomotives and boilers - it would take literally decades and square miles of forest to produce sufficient iron and steel.

What most people don't grasp when they postulate post-apocalyptic scenarios is the synergistic nature of the advances that powered the industrial revolution - and that ultimately fossil fuels lay at the root of them all. Coke for cheap steel and coal for cheap long distance transportation in particular.

Re:We have already figured most of this out.

[Penguinisto]

This, right here.

Asphalt gets worn down by rain and sunlight (yes, UV radiation.) Plants and ice force cracks into it. temperatures make it shrink and grow, causing mini tidal actions of a sort that eventually breaks it down. Landslides, erosion, and slow-motion soil subsidence will cover or tear off bits of it in all but the most level of terrains. Trees and wind will cover it in dirt until plants take root in that dirt and do the rest. Out here in the Pacific Northwest, moss and lichens will, if not treated, cover the road in a carpet and allow seeds to take root in it.

You'd be amazed how fast a modern-built road goes to hell. I think only the Romans were able to build a road that lasted for any real length of time with little-to-no maintenance, but only because they really over-engineered the things (on the plus side, even today a couple of millennia later some stretches are still used and routinely ignored maintenance-wise).

Put it this way: The Chinese have a saying that a new road is good for ten years, but bad for the next ten thousand. ;)