$300 oil, very soon?

[we_are_toast]

Re: $300 oil, very soon?

This made me stop and think about how much of an off-set my 5 years in the solar business have contributed. It's not a direct off-set because very little electricity is produced with oil. But here's how I broke it down:

I've sold between 35,000 and 40,000 solar panels in 5 years and these averaged 190 watts each. I'm assuming all of these panels are still in operation. Given their average installation latitude of 37 degrees they are producing about 29 MWh a day of energy or a barrel of oil equivalent, (BOE), of 17.

Another way of looking at this is that one average solar panel off-sets the energy equivalent of 2.5 oz of crude every day it's in operation, (more in summer and less in winter). If we really do move to electric vehicles, it will begin to make a difference but your point is well taken, it will take a long time.

I think you are being a bit pessimistic. Consider 10% of the energy value of a BOE is consumed in pumping it out of the ground, another 10% in transportation, another 10% in refining, then consider internal combustion engines operate at around 28% efficiency. Then consider an electric motor operating at 80% efficiency, with maybe a 25% loss in charging and using batteries.

Once the battery problem is solved, electric cars for daily commutes will be far more economically competitive than oil powered cars, and you'll be selling 35000-40000 panels a year.

[Starving Steve]

Re: $300 oil, very soon?

"Dream along with me; I'm on my way to the stars." ( song from Perry Como )

[sunskyfan]

Re: $300 oil, very soon?

The "Nuclear" option may come in a way none of us have been anticipating .... being in Albuquerque I saw this come up last fall ... it is hard to know what options are available until money is made avaiable.


http://www.allheadlinenews.com/articles/7012992976

[c1ue]

Re: $300 oil, very soon?

Mini nuclear plants are definitely feasible. The issue is still going to be operational.

If Japan which has only 55 nuclear power plants and has a society wide fetish for order can still wind up with a meltdown due to 2 workers 'speed shoveling' fuel into a critical mass, I can only imagine what managing hundreds of nuclear plants will entail in terms of just safe operation.

As for waste only the size of a softball, well, if that softball is 1% plutonium, it is still pretty damn dangerous.

I'm not saying 1000 nuclear plants cannot be built, or should not be built.

I am saying that the commitment to do so is something which the entire American nation must be committed to doing.

World War II is a good example of scaling up industrial processes. But keep in mind that we're not making fighter/bombers here. A defective fighter/bomber can be fixed - an nuclear accident will have major effects on the entire program if 3 mile island is any type of example.

[santafe2]

Re: $300 oil, very soon?

Unfortunately, the sun is a very weak source of energy because the sun's energy is dispersed over the entire Earth. Solar power yields a maximum of just two calaries per square centimetre per minute.

I'm sure we'll need every type of energy we can build over the next 50 years, including nuclear. Is your point really that 7,200,000 calories or 8+ kWh, per square meter per day is not worth pursuing? The above calc assumes a 6 hour sun day.

[Starving Steve]

Re: $300 oil, very soon?

All energy sources count. But some are better than others.

Do you throw-away pennies? I don't.

As for solar energy, the only way to get the full 2cal/sq.cm. per minute is to go to the top of the atmosphere at a point where the sun is 90 degrees overhead. Then you can pick-up your full solar energy output..... But remember, the sun doesn't stay 90 degrees overhead for very long, even at an optimal location because the Earth rotates. Also, there is night-time.

But I still pick-up pennies..... And if I lived in a desert where the dry air doesn't absorb much energy from the sun--- a place like Phoenix or Cairo or Riyad in Saudi Arabia--- I would think about solar energy as a supplement to conventional energy, especially for water heating.

Water is very hard to heat, but the sun can help bring the cost of heating water down a bit.

[Roughneck]

Re: $300 oil, very soon?

In case you can't tell from the handle, I've spent my life in the energy business. On the topic of renewable energy. If you talk to the guys who are advising the people with money to invest in energy they will tell you that with a lot of capital investment in 20 years we can double the amount of power we get from wind. But it will only be 2-3% of total energy supply. Solar is worse. You can maybe get to 1 %. This is with a LOT of capital investment. As you can see the outlook is not promising. Now I believe the government should be funding research into alternative technology(instead of global warming). But the fact remains, barring technological advancement, renewables will not be a major source of power generation in the next 20 years.Sorry Mr Obama.

[Guest]

Re: $300 oil, very soon?

Roughneck - I read you 4 x 4 and agree on all points. My post was 100% "tongue in cheek". If you looked up some of my posts on the viability of alternatives to petroleum going back a couple of years you'd note I've been a (explicit and persistent) proponent of exactly your views since April '07 here.

Thanks for your input. If you'd been around back then when a few of us were attempting to convince the many others here that there was indeed a "little problem" with providing any alternative technology or fuel to petroleum and hydrocarbons, we would have had a much easier time bringing a number of others around to this viewpoint. There was a time early back in '06 - early '07 when it seemed quite a lot of people were most definitely "not on board" with these notions and some "softening up" of preconceptions had to be done before this was more accepted by the collective opinion here.

I would also like to recall, that petroleum price pressures shortly after iTulip reappeared, were portrayed in this community without much argument or question as 100% a product of financial flows, so that the entire activity in commodities was understood by the broad readership to be purely a function of financial distortions. I believe iTulip put it forward in these terms, and so everyone just assumed it must be the whole story. Later, they modified this carefully to include emerging "problems" with growing global oil production sufficiently to meet growing demand but this was not the story from the get-go.

I believe there is still a little bit of controversy around that point. What certainly was the case, was that as recently as early 2007 there was *a lot* of comfortable assumption going around here, that "technology" and "alt-energy" could and would step in and fill 100% of any shortfall in petroleum production. Of course, as you point out with authority from many years within this industry, this notion was and is a crock, and a lot of people even today don't realise what a massive shortfall will occur between the sum total of "alt-energy" even under a crash development build-out in this area, and the receding global petroleum production.

Your input here will be quite valuable as people like you are a little more difficult to refute.

We've still got a few hold-outs, like that very clever but somewhat convoluted "symbols" guy, for whom the world is a complex swiss watch movement orchestrated purely by financial flows.

"whole lotta refutin' goin' on" meanwhile.

Some people here who are all over the topic:

GRG55 - ex oil Co. CEO and petroleum engineer.
Shakespear - petroleum engineer
Santafe2 - photovoltaics engineer

There are some others who've been petroleum engineers and techs with lots of years of experience and I apologise for not listing them but I can't remember all of them by name. That's all just to say that we've got some people scattered around in here who are in the energy industries and certainly well up to speed on the issues you note. My own comment above was strictly tongue in cheek.

In case you can't tell from the handle, I've spent my life in the energy business. On the topic of renewable energy. If you talk to the guys who are advising the people with money to invest in energy they will tell you that with a lot of capital investment in 20 years we can double the amount of power we get from wind. But it will only be 2-3% of total energy supply. Solar is worse. You can maybe get to 1 %. This is with a LOT of capital investment. As you can see the outlook is not promising. Now I believe the government should be funding research into alternative technology(instead of global warming). But the fact remains, barring technological advancement, renewables will not be a major source of power generation in the next 20 years.Sorry Mr Obama.

[Guest]

Re: $300 oil, very soon?

Perry Como? Mister, you are carbon 14 dated, straight back to the middle Jurassic age with this popular crooner (I swear, on my great grandmother's honor, I only "vaguely" remember him).

"Dream along with me; I'm on my way to the stars." ( song from Perry Como )

[reallife]

Re: $300 oil, very soon?

I think you are being a bit pessimistic. Consider 10% of the energy value of a BOE is consumed in pumping it out of the ground, another 10% in transportation, another 10% in refining, then consider internal combustion engines operate at around 28% efficiency. Then consider an electric motor operating at 80% efficiency, with maybe a 25% loss in charging and using batteries.

Once the battery problem is solved, electric cars for daily commutes will be far more economically competitive than oil powered cars, and you'll be selling 35000-40000 panels a year.

As long as we are internalizing the costs ($ and energy) of extracting, refining, transporting, and combusting oil, which is absolutely the first step in understanding the problem, we also need to apply the same logic to the solar energy panels described in the OP. Solar panels don't appear de novo, energy free for the plucking. Actually, PV panels are extremely energy intensive to produce, install, maintain, etc. The energy and economic costs associated with 'solar' energy are actually quite prohibitive and non-competitive. That is the real reason we all don't have them in our backyards, on our roofs, and powering our electric grid. It's too bad, but there is no such thing as a free lunch.

BTW, oil will continue as the foundation for industrial civilization for the foreseeable future. Expect oil costs to skyrocket as the world economy recovers. Then expect another recession/depression and a drop in oil prices. The economy will recover again, to a degree, and energy costs will skyrocket once again. The cycle will keep repeating. This ratcheting up and down will continue for 20-30 years. With each cycle the standard of living will decrease. Our grandchildren and great-grandchildren (I am 55) will 'enjoy' living standards on a par to the early 20th Century US, if they are lucky. JMHO ;)

[GRG55]

Re: $300 oil, very soon?

This made me stop and think about how much of an off-set my 5 years in the solar business have contributed. It's not a direct off-set because very little electricity is produced with oil. But here's how I broke it down:

I've sold between 35,000 and 40,000 solar panels in 5 years and these averaged 190 watts each. I'm assuming all of these panels are still in operation. Given their average installation latitude of 37 degrees they are producing about 29 MWh a day of energy or a barrel of oil equivalent, (BOE), of 17.

Another way of looking at this is that one average solar panel off-sets the energy equivalent of 2.5 oz of crude every day it's in operation, (more in summer and less in winter). If we really do move to electric vehicles, it will begin to make a difference but your point is well taken, it will take a long time.

The radiant energy from the sun is a huge, largely untapped resource. Will it displace oil any time soon? Not likely. Can it make a real contribution to moving us away from such a high dependence on hydrocarbons? Absolutely.

Blue water sailing is a great way for anyone to get a small taste of being "off the grid" if anyone here has never had that experience [except during a power outage].

[bill]

Re: $300 oil, very soon?

Nuclear is absolutely the only heavy lifting low carbon energy source available at the present time. If there is no other low carbon alternative energy developed and a carbon tax program is put in place, plan on paying a heavy carbon tax on oil, gas and coal forever.

http://www.itulip.com/forums/showthr...0187#post70187
http://www.itulip.com/forums/showthr...4741#post74741

[GRG55]

Re: $300 oil, very soon?

Nuclear is absolutely the only heavy lifting low carbon energy source available at the present time. If there is no other low carbon alternative energy developed and a carbon tax program is put in place, plan on paying a heavy carbon tax on oil, gas and coal forever.

http://www.itulip.com/forums/showthr...0187#post70187
http://www.itulip.com/forums/showthr...4741#post74741

bill, we all know you are correct that nuclear is the only large scale alternative at the moment.

But let's think through the possible ramifications of a carbon tax implementation. Let's assume that any such tax structure, regardless of the specifics, is motivated by a genuine desire by policy makers to discourage the use of high carbon fuels. That means that the tax has to ultimately be experienced in the retail price.


If people see their power and heating bills rising, might not this sequence happen:

1. People blame the utility company for the rising price [which suits the politicians just fine];
2. Ratepayers refuse to support the rate increases for installing new capacity including nuclear; after all who is going to support a utility that just keeps hiking your prices?
3. The desire to find a way to be independent of the utilities, already underway, accelerates further;
4. The prime beneficiaries are purveyors of microturbines, solar power systems, wood stoves, ground source heat pumps, energy conservation technologies, and so forth;
5. Nuclear continues to languish; after all who is going to support a utility that just keeps hiking your prices?

[bill]

Re: $300 oil, very soon?

If people see their power and heating bills rising, might not this sequence happen:

1. People blame the utility company for the rising price [which suits the politicians just fine];
2. Ratepayers refuse to support the rate increases for installing new capacity including nuclear; after all who is going to support a utility that just keeps hiking your prices?
3. The desire to find a way to be independent of the utilities, already underway, accelerates further;
4. The prime beneficiaries are purveyors of microturbines, solar power systems, wood stoves, ground source heat pumps, energy conservation technologies, and so forth;
5. Nuclear continues to languish; after all who is going to support a utility that just keeps hiking your prices?

I listen two days of committee members fire the same question to Geithner. His responds, we are in support of developing alternative/efficiency energy to create jobs developing low carbon industries saving the environment.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123607894012717911.html

MARCH 4, 2009
Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner testifies before the House Ways and Means Committee on Tuesday.
WASHINGTON -- Republicans opened a new front in their attack on the Obama administration's budget, charging that its ambitious climate-change plan would impose hefty costs on consumers and businesses.
Administration officials countered that their climate-change revenue wouldn't affect consumers until about 2012, well after the recession is expected to have lifted. They also pointed out that it would be designed to provide offsetting tax breaks for lower-income people, who tend to pay a higher percentage of their income in energy costs.
Still, administration officials said, addressing climate change -- along with the companion goal of making the U.S. more energy-independent -- requires making less-polluting alternative fuels become more attractive. That means imposing new costs on traditional energy sources.
"There is no way to try to get us on a path to energy independence and address the critical problems caused by climate change without changing the incentives," Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner said at the Ways and Means Committee hearing.
The administration said in its budget blueprint last week that climate-change legislation would raise nearly $646 billion for the government over the next decade. The budget suggested that the plan might raise more than that, however. It added that "all additional net proceeds will be used to further compensate the public."
Some Republicans believe the actual amount raised by climate-change legislation could be two to three times that amount. They cite research by the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, among other sources.



A person familiar with the administration's thinking emphasized that the discussions on designing climate-change legislation are just beginning and that the amount of money the plan raises will be determined in discussions with lawmakers of both parties. But, the person added, the $646 billion estimate was probably "conservative."

http://www.c-span.org/Watch/watch.as...aId=HP-R-16000
http://www.c-spanarchives.org/librar...ts_id=284395-1
http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/budget/
And
Mr Brown
23min
29min
low carbon recovery
http://www.c-span.org/Watch/watch.as...aId=HP-R-16011

[jtabeb]

Re: $300 oil, very soon?

Mini nuclear plants are definitely feasible. The issue is still going to be operational.

No, have you read about pebble bed reactors?

Know what happens when you have an accident?

They SHUT DOWN PASSIVELY, unless the laws of thermodynamics breaks down.

Thousands of distributed production facilities (each city of 100K+ has it's own or several plants)

That's cheap, safe, and redundant.

Heck, I'd want to have one of my own in a rural area, could feed the back into the grid and I bet the payback would be better than solar ;)