Re: SC19

http://jameshowardkunstler.typepad.com/clusterfuck_nation/2006/07/the_twang_facto.html#comments

........And that's where we are with Peak Oil. In order to understand the Peak, you have to understand an array of simple principles that just aren't taught or discussed much in the mainstream.

1. Oil is finite in quantity. There's debate about this. People can't agree whether the Earth is flat or round.

2. The first half of the oil is of the best quality and can be pumped the fastest. There is confusion here in that many people don't understand how quality differs in fuels. Further, they confuse the maximum field potential with extraction rates. Huge tar sand deposits are often assumed to be a panacea, but because their extraction rate is low, they'll have no affect on the peak. It's like using a drip from a faucet to supply a home with all of it's water needs. The drip is an infinite water supply, but won't meet the needs in regards to rate of usage.

3. The second half of the oil is harder to get, slower to produce and costs more energy. When a field is first exploited, it's under pressure and the oil wants to come right out to relieve the pressure. The first oil to come out is often of high quality and and very cheap to produce. That pressure diminishes. Then we have to pump something into the earth to push the oil out. So we have engines running the pumps, burning oil to get oil. Finally we make various chemicals from oil to inject with water, to get the gummiest parts of the oil. The lowest quality and the most energy intensive to produce.

4. The faster you produce a field, the lower the total yield and the faster the decline. Consider a slurpee. As you first suck on it, you're getting the good quality sweet slurpee juice. If you suck on it real fast, you'll run out, before the ice has melted. Wait a while and you can drink the melting ice. But that isn't as sweet. There's a middle rate where ice is melting as you drink it, where the quality decline slower, but you're still getting flavor to the end of the drink.

Now oil is a bit like that, but it's more like trying to drink the slurpee syrup out of a cup filled with gravel and sand. It takes a bit more effort to get the syrup out and at some point, it's not at all worth getting out. You end up with a syrup sludge that you might as well leave in the cup.

5. Natural gas is worse. And it's about to be a crisis. It's like drinking from a cup with nothing but liquid. You can drink it easily all the way to empty... Then you're out. It goes from maximum production to zero very quickly.

6. The peak is the year of maximum oil production. By adding up all of the production rates, for all of the fields, you get a measure of how much the world is producing. Only a few fields, prop up the current production rates. Almost every country and every field is in decline now. So the few fields that are increasing, must increase as fast as the rest of the world is declining, to keep even. We're seeing that now. those fields are nearing the end of their life. We they start declining, we'll see a quick dip to a new low level of production. An infinitely large tar sand field won't help, because production is limite to a trickle from these fields. They may last forever, like the drip faucet, but they won't budge the peak.

7. Industrial growth requires energy growth. Economic growth requires industrial growth. We no longer have energy growth. We're flat now. Yet we keep producing money at increasing rates. So we have a fixed quantity of industry, being chased by increasing sums of money.

8. Investment is expensive. In a flat economy, we are in a zero sum game. Every sectors economic increase will be balanced by another sectors decrease. Investments in a flat economy mean sacrifices to the rest of the economy. what we invest in, should be chosen wisely. We're currently investing in wars to secure oil. The rest of the US economy must suffer to cover the costs.

9. In an energy decline, investment is probably impossible. Cannibalism of industry and economies becomes the norm and efficiency becomes a very short term growth sector. Eventually efficiency becomes a matter of turning off the lights and nailing the doors shut.

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I'm in the camp that believes our time as a society to prepare has come and gone. It's time now to individually prepare for our own perestroika.

Enjoy the show.