User Panel
User Panel
User Panel
|
Posted: 3/6/2006 8:29:26 PM EDT
[#1]
But....but....the sky is falling.
|
|
|
|
Posted: 3/6/2006 8:29:58 PM EDT
[#2]
Simply stated: It is a problem of technology, and technology will emerge to address the problem.
No, not magically. 
|
|
|
|
Posted: 3/6/2006 8:31:54 PM EDT
[#3]
Right, What happens when we go poke our finger in the eyes of the Iranians
|
|
|
|
Posted: 3/6/2006 8:33:06 PM EDT
[#4]
I read somewhere that we have the worlds largest oil deposits in the Wyoming Colorado area....shale oil.
|
|
|
|
Posted: 3/6/2006 8:36:50 PM EDT
[#5]
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: 3/6/2006 8:42:19 PM EDT
[#6]
Oh good. So if we can extract every drop of oil, without of course putting any back into the system, we have another 50 years.
Excuse me while I jump for joy at your wonderful revelation of "best case" numbers. |
|
|
|
Posted: 3/6/2006 8:42:59 PM EDT
[#7]
I prefer to live in a state of panic.
Its good exercise to run around in circles screaming at the top of your lungs. |
|
|
|
Posted: 3/6/2006 8:44:24 PM EDT
[#8]
+1  that’s my favorite too.
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: 3/6/2006 8:44:29 PM EDT
[#9]
YAY FOR OIL
|
|
|
|
Posted: 3/6/2006 8:53:47 PM EDT
[#10]
WHAT, this college kid from CA was was passing on the wisdom of his burnt out, ex-hippie proffessors, regurgetated, anti-capitalism carp about the we are at peak oil now and the end is in site......or.. we maybe near the peak oil production in a few years.......or blah, blah, blah.....
So I can quit digging the hole in the back year? So I don't run for the hills and start a hippie commuity? Living off the land ? waiting to diiiieeee! If we could just get the environuts and their regs out of the way we would could poke out their eyes and let them become camel loving dirt jockies just like we found them 100 years ago!! For instance: If you poured concrete  ETA: |
|
|
|
Posted: 3/6/2006 8:59:55 PM EDT
[#11]
9 tons of coal to produce 5 barrels of crude? Damn near a waste of time.
|
|
|
|
Posted: 3/6/2006 9:04:01 PM EDT
[#12]
Not really. 1 barrel of oil weighs about a metric ton. Oil is more energy dense than coal and some energy is lost in the conversion. |
|
|
|
|
Posted: 3/6/2006 9:09:24 PM EDT
[#13]
These aren't best case Specop, these are just extrapolations from current reserves. We've only found about half of the world's oil, so reality is we have probably closer to 100 years...at current consumption rates. Consumption will follow a curve, however, so we'll go alot longer than 100 years, and we'll have 50 GOOD years left before it gets dicey. 50 years is a long time. 50 years ago, the world's first nuclear power plant was 2 years old. A lot can change in 50 years. 50 years is long enough to where we could fully convert our electrical generation to nuclear power. We could completely rebuild our national transportation grid so it predominately used grid power instead of gasoline. We could put solar power satellites up in space and beam the power down. We could use the power to crack water into hydrogen. I'm all for planning for the worst, but short of a bunch of nuclear strikes taking out the major oil fields, oil depletion isn't something we have to worry about right now...but it something we need to plan for in the future. My original post was in response to Peak_Oil's assertion that the industrial economies of the world are going to collapse within 15 years. Ain't gonna happen. Not even close. |
|
|
|
|
Posted: 3/6/2006 9:12:27 PM EDT
[#14]
Where did you make that up? There are between 6 and 9 barrels of oil per metric ton, depending on the grade of oil. |
||
|
|
|
Posted: 3/6/2006 9:13:34 PM EDT
[#15]
thsi is just like that ammo availability chart..... we are not to "OH TEH NOES!!!1!" yet. there is still supply left that exceeds the demand. the problem is that not all the supply is held by some of our enemies.
as for using coal or other source to MAKE a oil alternative- you need to take the cost/benefit into consideration. if we figure the economy will collapse at sustained $3.50/gal for gas and the cost of a coal created gas is $4/gal, that solution doesnt work. |
|
|
|
Posted: 3/6/2006 9:14:14 PM EDT
[#16]
WTF has this message board become?
|
|
|
|
Posted: 3/6/2006 9:15:13 PM EDT
[#17]
I hope this site is still around in ten years so I can dig this shit out from the archives and make fun of someone. Hopefully, I'll be laughing at Peak_Oil...
|
|
|
|
Posted: 3/6/2006 9:15:41 PM EDT
[#18]
Heheheh. No kidding. Chicken Littles running around all the time crying wolf.... |
|
|
|
|
Posted: 3/6/2006 9:18:04 PM EDT
[#19]
AR15's are made of oil. It's relevant. 
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: 3/6/2006 9:18:48 PM EDT
[#20]
this is GD. this is where we are supposed to talk about stuff OTHER than AR's. if you want to talk about AR's, go to the AR discussion section
|
|
|
|
Posted: 3/6/2006 9:20:43 PM EDT
[#21]
Plus gas costs to go shooting, and the gas that the UPS trucks burn delivering ammo. |
||
|
|
|
Posted: 3/6/2006 9:31:00 PM EDT
[#22]
I hope so too. |
|
|
|
|
Posted: 3/6/2006 9:42:50 PM EDT
[#23]
Why not start early and make fun of someone now! |
||
|
|
|
Posted: 3/6/2006 9:54:07 PM EDT
[#24]
The US has at least 3,340,000,000,000 tons of oil shale. That is well over a trilion barrels of oil. It may not be economical now, but if we ran out of crude oil this recource could be exploited. Petroleum would be more expensive, but not unavailable.
|
|
|
|
Posted: 3/6/2006 9:57:31 PM EDT
[#25]
we're never NEVER NEVER NOT EVER going to run out of oil. there will NEVER be a day when someone walks into the last pumping station on earth and pumps out the last drop of oil out of the ground.
the reason we will stop using oil is that it will become more expensive to produce it than we gain from it's use. the same thing happened with coal. we dont use it as the primary source for energy anymore because there is a cheaper alternative (oil). when a cheaper alternative becomes available (or oil becomes more expensive than something else) oil will go the way of coal. |
|
|
|
Posted: 3/6/2006 10:04:21 PM EDT
[#26]
Extrapolations. Good, so those numbers are nothing more then guesses. As for finding half of the known reserves...If we havent found it, how do you know its there? Meaning we might have found 1%, 10% or 90% of known reserves. Hence, KNOWN reserves. As for reserves now in coal and shale, how much is truly recoverable? At what price point? How much goes back into the system? While shale is an oil bearing rock, it takes a good amount of processing and energy to get it out. If you tell me theres 1 million barrels of oil and I tell you it takes 1 barrel into the system to get 2 out...How much do we REALLY have? Additionally, can production of these sources ramp up to meet increasing demand as well as declining output from existing sources? Sure, there might be enough oil in them thar rocks for 600 years but if we just cant squeeze it out any faster then a million barrels a year it does us very little good. As for converting, we should already be converted! We learned NOTHING from the gas shortage of the 70's. We just kept using more and more. Do you think thats going to change until its too late? Nope. Because people, as a whole, do not want to do anything they dont have to until they have to do it. And by that time, it will be too late. I dont know whats going to happen, but I do know alot of this fantastic gee whiz save us stuff people like to point out isnt really all that hot when you get down and dirty and look at it. Most importantly is ramp up times to production. Lets assume we hit honest to God Peak Oil on current production fields. Do you think these other sources could be ramped up in time not only to offset the decline of existing fieldws but ALSO to meet increasing demand? I seriously doubt it. Lastly, none of this takes into account the damages to the environment. I'm not one to preach about living in villages and wearing robes, but we do have to be aware of the damage we do to the planet. One thing is for certain. Time will tell. And I surely do hope your right. |
||
|
|
|
Posted: 3/6/2006 10:07:51 PM EDT
[#27]
Agggh. You are correct, of course, I need to rebase my numbers. |
|||
|
|
|
Posted: 3/6/2006 10:19:36 PM EDT
[#28]
I don't wish this on anyone, and I hope we get busy on a solution. Nevertheless, I remain pessimistic. Just look at the people on this thread. They'd rather do anything other than prepare. How many have food stored, or water stored, or even have their gas tanks full tonight? Guns are fun so that's easy to do. But how about having an extra set of keys made or duplicates of important documents at the safety deposit box, or a backup of their important data on their computers? Preparations like that aren't sexy and nobody brags about how many times they back up their files, you know. |
|||
|
|
|
Posted: 3/6/2006 10:20:59 PM EDT
[#29]
The historical record for guesses about the eminent collapse of the oil supplies have been going on since before Spindletop. Eventually the doomsayers will be right simply from a probability function. What they aren't right about is the peak oil / 10 years / death of industrialized world / 3.5 billion deaths from famine gloom and doom right around the corner scenario. Again, absent the use of about 250 nuclear weapons against the primary oil producing regions and world refineries, it isn't going to happen (US Gov did a study in 1979 of an 80 warhead attack against the primary refineries in the US which would've caused enough damage to make the next year's agriculture harvest and distribution dicey). 250 warheads on the world's infrastructre would probably be enough to produce that global famine.
Proven reserve numbers are generally those reserves which are presently economically recoverable using current technology. Actual reserves will go up with technology improvements.
Not if they are taken off the table by political edict, thats for sure.
We've stuck our collective heads in the sand for the last 30 years. The main reason was oil was just too damn cheap not to. The secondary reason was irrational fear of nuclear power, NIMBY syndrome (which applies to all electrical generation plants including wind, fuel oil, natural gas, and coal plants), and lawsuits.
I do. Look 50 years is far enough away that it means we don't have to head for the hills right now, but soon enough to where we need to start planning and building infrastructure now. And that means breeder reactors. With breeder reactors, we won't have to worry about running out of energy for a couple of billion years, and considering the sun will bake the earth in 900 million years or so, that's good enough for me.
Given the choice of starving to death, or killing the spotted owl, the spotted owl is going into the stewpot. |
||||||
|
|
|
Posted: 3/6/2006 10:22:05 PM EDT
[#30]
Dude...
He just wants to justify his survivalist stance, he doesn't actually believe the shit he's spouting..... right? 
|
|
|
|
Posted: 3/6/2006 10:22:58 PM EDT
[#31]
So even if they do ramp up production, whats to keep the companies from selling the oil on the open market? Crude is a worldwide commodity. We (the USA) dont own it. The companies paid royalties to mine it, they can sell it to who they see fit.
unless of course suddenly capitalism isnt such a good idea........ Lets be honest, what do you think Texaco would do if China came and said We'll give you 1.5 times the market price for all your production? |
|
|
|
Posted: 3/6/2006 10:24:03 PM EDT
[#32]
Napoleon is right. We are not and will not run out of oil. World oil reserves are the largest they've ever been and getting larger. Oil is NOT a fossil fuel. It is a by product of methane. The Russians have known this since the 1950s and written thousands of scientific papers on it. There has recently been at least one major book about it, and it was featured in a program on the Science Channel last summer. One of the reasons gas in particular keeps getting more costly in the States is there have been no new refineries built in years and years and there aren't enough refineries now to keep up with demand.
|
|
|
|
Posted: 3/6/2006 10:39:39 PM EDT
[#33]
Three things caused the current spike in oil: - the war in Iraq took about 2 million barrels a day of production offline. - When the East Asian economies went into a tailspin in 1999, they took about 2 million barrels a day of demand off the table. These economies basically finished their recovery around the time we invaded Iraq. So, we got the double whammy of increased demand with lowered production. This was magnified by pretty rampant speculation in the markets. From a production standpoint, the world is current operating at near peak capacity. Easiest places to increase capacity would be Canada, Venezuela, and Iraq (minus the whole pipeline bombing thing). |
|
|
|
|
Posted: 3/6/2006 10:47:32 PM EDT
[#34]
I've heard a couple of people go after this angle. Let's just say that you're right. Oil is created abiogenically. So what? The reservoirs are not filling back up. The US peaked in production in the early 70's at 10.5MBD, and we're down to 5. And no, it's not the crazy liberals that are causing this to happen, it's because we're running out. I could care less whether oil is created by rotting algae or by rocks grinding against each other. There is a timetable to this thing. Unless oil is being created at a rate of 80 million barrels a day by whatever process you have in mind, then oil production will most certainly peak at some point. I would suggest you research the opinions of messrs. Kenneth Deffeyes and Matthew Simmons. They have volumes of material on the subject and are much more dignified than am I. |
|
|
|
|
Posted: 3/6/2006 10:48:21 PM EDT
[#35]
We just found some in Utah, and I invested in it.
|
|
|
|
Posted: 3/7/2006 11:11:40 AM EDT
[#36]
As brouhaha indicated, my numbers were off. So, here are some correct numbers with sources.
From: http://gcep.stanford.edu/pdfs/RxsY3908kaqwVPacX9DLcQ/malhotra_coal_mar05.pdf Yield of coal liquefaction is about 3 barrels of oil per ton of coal for bituminous coals, less for subbituminous and lignite varieties. . I'm assuming metric tons here. From http://www.eia.doe.gov/neic/infosheets/coalreserves.htm, bituminous coal makes up 53% of the coal reserves in the US. US has 273.7 billion short tons of total coal, or 248.3 billion metric tons. 53% of that is bituminous, so that gives us 131.6 billion metric tons of bituminous coal. Conversion is 3 barrels per oil per ton of bituminous coal, giving 394.8 billion barrels of oil of conversion capacity from the bituminous coal alone. At current oil consumption rates (7.4 billion barrels per year), that gives us 53 years worth of bituminous coal reserves. From http://www.eia.doe.gov/oiaf/ieo/world.html, annual energy consumption for mature market economies is expected to grow at 1.1% until 2025. I went ahead and carried this number forward. Using that estimate, if the US shifted from oil to coal for transportation tomorrow, we'd run out of bituminous coal in around 41 years. The US, however, also uses 965 million tons of coal per year for electricity generation, but the 41 years above is using only half the coal reserves. Of course, this doesn't count the US oil reserves, which are proven out at 22 billion barrels, not counting the 10 billion estimated barrels in ANWR, and not counting injecting carbon dioxide gas into depleted wells, which according to the DOE (link: http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20060304/sc_nm/energy_crude_injection_dc) could liberate another 89 billion barrels from existing wells. Again, the point of all this is to provide numbers to counter the current peak oil thesis that the industrial economies are going to collapse in 10-15 years. |
|
|
|
Posted: 3/7/2006 11:57:53 AM EDT
[#37]
Die you human bastards and let the planet go back to it's natural state! Maybe then the dinosaurs will come back and that God-awful man-made gully we call the "Grand Canyon' will heal up. Where's that fucking Uni-bomber when we really need him?
|
|
|
|
Posted: 3/7/2006 12:23:43 PM EDT
[#38]
You first, then I will go..........honest Trust me, go ahead.....we are waiting... |
|
|
|
|
Posted: 3/7/2006 12:24:44 PM EDT
[#39]
So what does that prove? Nothing-nada-zip-zero other than it's cheaper to get oil from countries that have cheaper labor and far less EPA / Greenie-Weenie issues. We could easily produce more if we wanted to. |
|
|
|
|
Posted: 3/7/2006 12:27:39 PM EDT
[#40]
It's not running out, it's how expensive it gets.
Cheap energy has allowed for a lot of extravagances and the energy might not be so cheap in the future. |
|
|
|
Posted: 3/7/2006 12:34:58 PM EDT
[#41]
IAMLEGEND should change his name to IAMUNDERSTANDING. It is not how much oil there is, it is how much it costs. We have an infrastructure dedicated to obtaining and refining crude oil. Any changes to that paradigm will require new expensive infrastructure. Whether it is coal or shale, the expense of gas will be much more than $2.50 per gallon. |
|
|
|
|
Posted: 3/7/2006 12:35:00 PM EDT
[#42]
+1 The Peak Oil Advocates NEVER said we were going to "run out" one day. We'll probably never run out completley. The problem is how much energy does it take ot extract and process oil from peaked oil fields and shale? A lot... which means higher prices...FOR EVERYTHING! Can you say "Depression"? Speed |
|
|
|
|
Posted: 3/7/2006 12:37:30 PM EDT
[#43]
Plus the supply, demand, price equation shows that as oil gets more expensive, three things happen. We buy less. We find more. And we subsitute.
|
|
|
|
Posted: 3/7/2006 12:38:08 PM EDT
[#44]
tag
|
|
|
|
Posted: 3/7/2006 12:42:34 PM EDT
[#45]
Yep. Look at all the energy wasted just on lighting. I've changed all the lights in my home to CFL bulbs. |
|
|
|
|
Posted: 3/7/2006 12:49:09 PM EDT
[#46]
Yeah, that's pretty much the deal. Also, do the math on the depletion numbers. If you figure 8% lower production year after year, then it's a nine-year halving time. So. Nine years after production begins to drop at 8% per year, we'll have half the amount coming out of the ground in a day. Nine years after that, you're down to 25%. Nine years later, 12.5%, and nine years after that a little over 6%. If you figure you're going to live 36 years after the peak, then you're going to have to figure out how to run your life on 6% of the oil that you use today. What a wonderful retirement to look forward to. If you have children, then their lives are going to be so very much different from the lives we lead today. I don't think that having 6% of the production we have today is going to be all that different than having 0% of the production we have today. Unless you are in the top 6% of the wealthiest people on the planet, you probably won't be driving an internal combustion engine car. But hey, maybe you will be. |
||
|
|
|
Posted: 3/7/2006 1:03:26 PM EDT
[#47]
Not even that. We know how to solve the problems - it's the cost of the solutions that stops the use of alternative sources. Simply put, oil is too cheap and easy right now. Why wouls anyone in their right mind pay $5/gallon for gas made from coal when you can go buy it made from oil for only $2.50? But your point is well taken. The higher the price of oil, the more technology will emerge to replace it. |
|
|
|
|
Posted: 3/7/2006 1:41:21 PM EDT
[#48]
We are in the top 6% or so of the wealthiest people in the world. Heck, I think that even our people on food stamps rank among the wealthiest in the world. |
|
|
|
|
Posted: 3/7/2006 2:37:25 PM EDT
[#49]
Yes it's true we're running out of oil at an alarming rate..................
Meanwhile- Oil companies post record profits You think maybe the oil co's have an interest in keeping this alarmism going? |
|
|
|
Posted: 3/7/2006 2:50:19 PM EDT
[#50]
There are a number of areas in the West with oil. There's supposedly an interesting anticline in Nevada, near a producing field. More advanced drilling and extraction technology will get that out. Many old fields, previously shut down because old technology couldn't extract the rest of the oil. Newer techniques will pull it out. In some ways I support the "we're running out" publicity. Get the impetus on research and development of new technologies. Certainly, at current usage levels we will run out; it doesn't matter whether it is 35 or 70 years. I would like to see new propulsion technology developed which would make oil and its derivatives more of a nuisance than even an expense issue. |
|
|
|
Win a FREE Membership!
Sign up for the ARFCOM weekly newsletter and be entered to win a free ARFCOM membership. One new winner* is announced every week!
You will receive an email every Friday morning featuring the latest chatter from the hottest topics, breaking news surrounding legislation, as well as exclusive deals only available to ARFCOM email subscribers.
AR15.COM is the world's largest firearm community and is a gathering place for firearm enthusiasts of all types.
From hunters and military members, to competition shooters and general firearm enthusiasts, we welcome anyone who values and respects the way of the firearm.
Subscribe to our monthly Newsletter to receive firearm news, product discounts from your favorite Industry Partners, and more.
Copyright © 1996-2024 AR15.COM LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Any use of this content without express written consent is prohibited.
AR15.Com reserves the right to overwrite or replace any affiliate, commercial, or monetizable links, posted by users, with our own.
