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http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/EcoGeek/~3/esZwxxm8ZT0/3289-philadel

When a subway train pulls into a station, it produces two things:  a loud screeching sound and lots of kinetic energy.  The Philadelphia subway is putting that second thing to good use by capturing the kinetic energy produced when trains put on the brakes.

A 1.5-MW regenerative braking system will be installed along the Market-Frankford line, which has the highest ridership in the city.  A huge battery will capture the kinetic energy that will then be used by trains accelerating out of the stations, stored for future use or fed to the grid.  The Southeast Pennsylvania Transportation Authority will have the option to either use the power produced or sell it to the local utility.

The trains already use regenerative braking on a smaller scale but half of the energy is lost as heat.  This pilot program is aiming to dramatically increase the power captured.

The project should be completed by next spring and could save the transit authority $500,000 in energy costs.  If all Philadelphia stations were outfitted with the system, energy consumption could be cut by 40 percent.

via Wired Autopia

http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/theoildrum/~3/_PAt2Fm0PEU/6924

This is a guest post by GliderGuider. It was originally posted in May 2007. This post presents one model of what the future may look like. There are other, less dire, views as well.

At the root of all the converging crises of the World Problematique is the issue of human overpopulation. Each of the global problems we face today is the result of too many people using too much of our planet's finite, non-renewable resources and filling its waste repositories of land, water and air to overflowing. The true danger posed by our exploding population is not our absolute numbers but the inability of our environment to cope with so many of us doing what we do.

It is becoming clearer every day, as crises like global warming, water, soil and food depletion, biodiversity loss and the degradation of our oceans constantly worsen, that the human situation is not sustainable. Bringing about a sustainable balance between ourselves and the planet we depend on will require us, in very short order, to reduce our population, our level of activity, or both. One of the questions that comes up repeatedly in discussions of population is, "What level of human population is sustainable?" In this article I will give my analysis of that question, and offer a look at the human road map from our current situation to that level.

As I have mentioned elsewhere, the concepts of ecological science are the most effective tools for understanding this situation. The crucial concepts are sustainability, carrying capacity and overshoot. Considered together these can give us some clue as to what the true sustainable population of the earth might be, as well as the trajectory between our current numbers and the point of sustainability.

Sustainability

A sustainable population is one that can survive over the long term (thousands to tens of thousands of years) without either running out of resources or damaging its environmental niche (in our case the planet) in the process. This means that our numbers and level of activity must not generate more waste than natural processes can return to the biosphere, that the wastes we do generate do not harm the biosphere, and that most of the resources we use are either renewable through natural processes or are entirely recycled if they are not renewable. In addition a sustainable population must not grow past the point where those natural limits are breached. Using these criteria it is obvious that the current human population is not sustainable.

Carrying Capacity

In order to determine what a sustainable population level might be, we need to understand the ecological concept of carrying capacity. Carrying capacity is the population level of an organism that can be sustained given the quantity of life supporting infrastructure available to it. If the numbers of an organism are below the carrying capacity of its environment, its birth rate will increase. If the population exceeds the carrying capacity, the death rate will increase until the population numbers are stable. Carrying capacity can be increased by the discovery and exploitation of new resources (such as metals, oil or fertile uninhabited land) and it can be decreased by resource exhaustion and waste buildup, for example declining soil fertility and water pollution.

Note: "Carrying capacity" used in its strict sense means the sustainable level of population that can be supported. This implies that all the resources a population uses are renewable within a meaningful time frame. An environment can support a higher level of population for a shorter period of time if some amount of non-renewable resources are used. If the level of such finite resources in the environment is very high, the population can continue at high numbers for quite a long time. Though some ecologists may cringe, I tend to think in terms of "sustainable carrying capacity" and "temporary carrying capacity". In this article I just use the single term "carrying capacity" to indicate the population level that can be supported by the environment at any moment in time. While not strictly correct, this does simplify and clarify the discussion.

An increase in the carrying capacity of an environment can generally be inferred from a rise in the population inhabiting it. The stronger the rise, the more certain we can be that the carrying capacity has expanded. In our case a graph of world population makes it obvious that something has massively increased the world's carrying capacity in the last 150 years. During the first 1800 years of the Common Era, like the tens of thousands of years before, the population rose very gradually as humanity spread across the globe. Around 1800 this began to change, and by 1900 the human population was rising dramatically:

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Part of the early phase of this expansion was due to the settlement of the Americas, but the exploitation of this fertile land in the 16th to 19th centuries would not seem to be enough on its own to support the population explosion we have experienced. After all, humans had already spread to every corner of the globe by 1900. There is something else at work here.

The Role of Oil

That something is oil. Oil first entered general use around 1900 when the global population was about 1.6 billion. Since then the population has quadrupled. When we look at oil production overlaid on the population growth curve we can see a very suggestive correspondence:

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However, we have to ask whether this is merely a coincidental match. A closer look at the two curves from 1900 to the 2005 reinforces the impression of a close correlation:

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The Food Factor

Are there other factors besides oil that may have contributed to the growth of the Earth's carrying capacity?

The main one that is usually cited is the enormous world wide increase in food production created by the growth of industrial agribusiness. There is no question that it has caused a massive increase in both yields and the absolute quantities of food being grown worldwide. While it has been celebrated with the popular label "The Green Revolution", there is nothing terribly miraculous about the process. When you open up that so-called revolution, you find at its heart our friend petroleum

Here's how it works. Industrial agriculture as practiced in the 20th and 21st centuries is supported by three legs: mechanization, pesticides/fertilizers and genetic engineering. Of those three legs, the first two are directly dependent on petroleum to run the machines and natural gas to act as the chemical feedstock. The genetic engineering component of agribusiness generally pursues four goals: drought resistance, insect resistance, pesticide resistance and yield enhancement. Meeting that last goal invariably requires mechanical irrigation, which again depends on oil.

Even more than other oil-driven sectors of the global economy, food production is showing signs of strain as it struggles to maintain productivity in the face of rising population, flattening oil production and the depletion of essential resources such as soil fertility and fresh water. According to figures compiled by the Earth Policy Institute, world grain consumption has exceeded global production in six of the last seven years, falling over 60 million tonnes below consumption in 2006. Global grain reserves have fallen to 57 days from a high of 130 days in 1986. After keeping pace with population growth from 1960 until the late 1980s, per capita grain production has shown a distinct flattening and declining trend in the last 20 years.

At its heart the "Green Revolution" is yet another example of the enormous usefulness of oil. Without large quantities of cheap oil, this revolution could not have occurred. The simple fact published in a University of Michigan study in 2000 that every calorie of food energy consumed in the United States embodies over seven calories of non-food energy (and other studies that have placed the ratio at 10:1) make the linkage clear. (Update: A 2010 study by the USDA puts total food system energy use at 14.1 quadrillion Btu for the US, which is equivalent to 33,700 kilocalories per person per day--over 10 calories of energy per calorie of food.) The United States currently uses over 12% of its total oil consumption for the production and distribution of food. As the oil supply begins its inevitable decline, food production will be affected. While it is probable that most nations will preferentially allocate oil and natural gas resources to agriculture by one means or another, it is inevitable that over the next decades the food supply key to maintaining our burgeoning population will come under increasing pressure, and will be subject to its own inescapable decline.

Carrying Capacity: Conclusion

Oil and its companion natural gas together make up about 60% of humanity's primary energy. In addition, the energy of oil has been leveraged through its use in the extraction and transport of coal as well as the construction and maintenance of hydro and nuclear generating facilities. Oil is as the heart of humanity's enormous energy economy as well as at the heart of its food supply. The following conclusion seems reasonable:

Humanity's use of oil has quadrupled the Earth's carrying capacity since 1900.

Overshoot

In ecology, overshoot is said to have occurred when a population's consumption exceeds the carrying capacity of its environment, as illustrated in this graphic:

When a population rises beyond the carrying capacity of its environment, or conversely the carrying capacity of the environment falls, the existing population cannot be supported and must decline to match the carrying capacity. A population cannot stay in overshoot for long. The rapidity, extent and other characteristics of the decline depend on the degree of overshoot and whether the carrying capacity continues to be eroded during the decline, as shown in the figure above. William Catton's book "Overshoot" is recommended for a full treatment of the subject.

There are two ways a population can regain a balance with the carrying capacity of its environment. If the population stays constant or continues to rise, per capita consumption must fall. If per capita consumption stays constant, population numbers must decline. Where the balance is struck between these endpoints depends on how close the population is to a subsistence level of consumption. Those portions of the population that are operating close to subsistence will experience a reduction in numbers, while those portions of the population that have more than they need will experience a reduction in their level of consumption, but without a corresponding reduction in numbers.

Populations in serious overshoot always decline. This is seen in wine vats when the yeast cells die after consuming all the sugar from the grapes and bathing themselves in their own poisonous alcoholic wastes. It's seen in predator-prey relations in the animal world, where the depletion of the prey species results in a die-back of the predators. Actually, it's a bit worse than that. The population may actually fall to a lower level than was sustainable before the overshoot. The reason is that unsustainable consumption while in overshoot allowed the species to use more non-renewable resources and to further poison their environment with excessive wastes. It is a common understanding of ecology that overshoot degrades the carrying capacity of the environment (as illustrated in the declining "Carrying Capacity" curve in the above figure). In the case of humanity, our use of oil has allowed us to perform prodigious feats of resource extraction and waste production that would simply have been inconceivable before the oil age. If our oil supply declined, the lower available energy might be insufficient to let us extract and use the lower grade resources that remain. A similar case can be made for a lessened ability to deal with wastes in our environment

It is important to recognize that humanity is not, overall, in a position of overshoot at the moment. Our numbers are still growing (though the rate of growth is declining). However, we are getting obvious signals from our environment that all is not well. These signals seem to be telling us we are approaching the maximum carrying capacity. If the carrying capacity were to be reduced as our numbers continued to grow we could find ourselves in overshoot rather suddenly. The consequences of that would be quite grave.

An Image of Overshoot

The predicament of a population entering overshoot is illustrated by a short scene from the children's cartoon series about Wile E. Coyote and the Road Runner.

As the scene opens, our hero, Wile E. Coyote, is zooming hungrily across the top of a mesa, propelled by the exuberant blast of his new Acme Rocket Roller Skates. Suddenly a sign flashes into view. It reads, "Danger: Cliff Ahead." The coyote tries desperately to change course, but his speed is too great and rocket roller skates are hard to control at the best of times. Just before the edge of the cliff the rocket fuel that was sustaining his incredible velocity runs out; the engines of his roller skates die with a little puff of smoke. The coyote begins to slow but it's too late, his inertia propels him onward. Suddenly the ground that moments before had ample capacity to carry him in his headlong flight falls away beneath him. As he overshoots the edge high above the canyon floor, he experiences a horrified moment of dawning realization before nature's impersonal forces take over.

Peak Oil

As we all know but are sometimes reluctant to contemplate, oil is a finite, non-renewable resource. This automatically means that its use is not sustainable. If the use of oil is not sustainable, then of course the added carrying capacity the oil has provided is likewise unsustainable. Carrying capacity has been added to the world in direct proportion to the use of oil, and the disturbing implication is that if our oil supply declines, the carrying capacity of the world will automatically fall with it.

These two observations (that oil has expanded the world's carrying capacity and oil use is unsustainable) combine to yield a further implication. While humanity has apparently not yet reached the carrying capacity of a world with oil, we are already in drastic overshoot when you consider a world without oil. In fact our population today is at least five times what it was before oil came on the scene, and it is still growing. If this sustaining resource were to be exhausted, our population would have no option but to decline to the level supportable by the world's lowered carrying capacity.

What are the chances that we will experience a decline in our global oil supply? Of course given that oil is a finite, non-renewable resource, such an occurrence is inevitable. The field of study known as Peak Oil has generated a vast amount of analysis that indicates this decline will happen soon, and may even be upon us right now.

Individual oil fields tend to show a more or less bell-shaped curve of production rates - rising, peaking and then falling. Once a field has entered decline it has been found that no amount of remedial drilling or new technology will raise its output back to the peak rate. The theory of Peak Oil says that the world's oil production can be modeled as a single, enormous oil field, and will therefore exhibit this same production curve. It is intuitive that if all the oil fields in the world enter decline, and insufficient replacement fields can be found and developed, the world's production will decline.

The signals of Peak Oil are all around for those who know what to look for: the continuing two-year-old plateau in the world's conventional crude oil production; the crash of Mexico's giant Cantarell oil field last year; the U.K. slipping from being an oil exporting nation to a net importer in 2005; the fact that three of the world's four largest oil fields are confirmed to be in decline; the analysis on The Oil Drum of Saudi Arabia's super-giant Ghawar field that indicates it may be teetering on the brink of a crash; the fact that over two thirds of the world's oil producing nations are experiencing declining production; delays and cost overruns in new projects in the Middle East, Kazakhstan and Canada's tar sands. To make matters worse, according to several analyses including a very thorough one (pdf warning) done by a PhD candidate in Sweden, the addition of new projects is unlikely to delay the terminal decline by more than a few years.

Understanding the role of oil in expanding the earth's carrying capacity brings a new urgency to the topic of Peak Oil. The decline in oil supply will reduce the planet's carrying capacity, thus forcing humanity into overshoot with the inevitable consequence of a population decline. The date of the peak will mark the point at which we should expect to see the first effects of overshoot. The rapidity of the decline following the peak will determine whether our descent will be a leisurely stroll down to the canyon floor or a headlong tumble carrying a little sign reading, "Help!"

Time Frame and Severity

The first questions everyone one asks when they accept the concept of Peak Oil is, "When is it going to happen?" and "How fast is the decline going to be?" Peak Oil predictions are hampered by the lack of data transparency by many oil producers. They are reluctant to publish verifiable reserve figures, field-by-field production numbers, or observations of the performance of individual oil fields. As a result the fully correct answer to both questions is, "We don't know yet." This isn't the whole answer, though. As with many predictions we can specify probable ranges based on the current evidence, observed trends over the last few years and published future development and production plans. The guesses are becoming more and more educated as time goes by.

Several "heavy hitters" in the Peak Oil field have said the peak has already happened. These include Dr. Kenneth Deffeyes (a colleague of Dr. M. King Hubbert), major energy investor T. Boone Pickens, energy investment banker Matthew Simmons (who first sounded the alarm about Saudi Arabia's impending depletion) and Samsam Bakhtiari, a retired senior expert with the National Iranian Oil Company.

The steepness of the post-peak decline is open to more debate than the timing of the peak itself. There seems to be general agreement that the decline will start off very slowly, and will increase gradually as more and more oil fields enter decline and fewer replacement fields are brought on line. The decline will eventually flatten out, due both to the difficulty of extracting the last oil from a field as well as the reduction in demand brought about by high prices and economic slowdown.

The post-peak decline rate could be flattened out if we discover new oil to replace the oil we're using. Unfortunately our consumption is outpacing our new discoveries by a rate of 5 to 1. to make matters worse, it appears that we have probably already discovered about 95% of all the conventional crude oil on the planet.

A full picture of the oil age is given in the graph below. This model incorporates actual production figures up to 2005 and my best estimate of a reasonable shape for the decline curve. It also incorporates my belief that the peak is happening as we speak.

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Maintaining Our Carrying Capacity

The consequences of overshoot might be avoided if we could find a way to maintain the Earth's carrying capacity as the oil goes away. To assess the probability of this, we need to examine the various roles oil plays in maintaining the carrying capacity and determine if there are available substitutes with the power to replace it in those roles. The critical roles oil and its companion natural gas play in our society include transportation, food production, space heating and industrial production of such things as plastics, synthetic fabrics and pharmaceuticals. Of these the first three are critical to maintaining human life.

Transportation

Peak Oil is fundamentally a liquid fuels crisis. We use 70% of the oil for transportation. Over 97% of all transportation depends on oil. Full substitutes for oil in this area are unlikely (I'd go so far as to say impossible). Biofuels are extremely problematic: their net energy is low, their production rates are also low, their environmental costs in soil fertility are too great. Crop based biofuels compete directly with food, while cellulosic technologies risk "strip mining the topsoil" at the production rates needed to offset the loss of oil. Electricity will be able to substitute in some applications such as trains, streetcars and perhaps battery powered personal vehicles, though at significant cost in terms of both flexibility and economics. There is no realistic substitute for jet fuel.

Food

Oil is used in tilling, planting, weeding, harvesting and transporting food, as well as in pumping water for crop irrigation. Natural gas is used to make the vast quantities of fertilizer required to support our industrial, monoculture agribusiness system. As oil and natural gas decline, global food output will fall. This will be offset to some degree by the adoption of more effective and less resource-intensive farming practices. However, it is not clear that such practices could maintain the enormous food production required, especially as much of the world's farmland has been decimated by long term monocropping and will require fertility remediation to produce adequate crops without fertilizer inputs.

Heat

In northern climates the fuel of choice for building heat is natural gas. Gas is on its own imminent "peak and decline" trajectory, made worse by the fact that it is harder to transport around the world than oil. The only realistic replacement for natural gas is electric heat. It is quite possible that the rapid adoption of electric resistance heating in cold climates could lead to a destabilization of under-maintained and over-used distribution grids, as well as localized shortages of generating capacity. While there are technologies that will allow us to increase the generation of electricity, they all have associated problems - coal produces greenhouse gases, nuclear power produces radioactive waste and is politically unpalatable in many countries and solar photovoltaic is still too expensive. Wind power is showing promise, but is still hampered by issues of scale and power variability.

I think that we will strive mightily to produce alternative energy sources to maintain the carrying capacity, but I am convinced we will ultimately fail. This is due to issues of scale (no alternatives we have come up with so far come within an order of magnitude of the energy required), issues of utility (oil is so multi-talented that it would take a large number of products and processes to fully replace it), issues of unintended consequences (as is currently being recognized with biofuels) and issues of human behaviour (a lack of international cooperation is predicted by The Prisoner’s Dilemma, and behaviours such comfort-seeking, competition for personal advantage and a hyperbolic discount function are planted deep in the human genome as explained in Reg Morrison’s “The Spirit in the Gene” and in my article on Hyperbolic Discount Functions).

We will be able to replace some small portion of the carrying capacity provided by oil, but in the absence of oil it is not clear how long such alternatives will remain available, relying as they do on highly technical infrastructure that currently runs on oil like everything else.

Conclusion

Given the fact that our world's carrying capacity is supported by oil, and that the oil is about to start going away, it seems that a population decline is inevitable. The form it will take, the factors that will precipitate it and the widely differing regional effects are all imponderables. Some questions that we might be able to answer (though with a great degree of uncertainty) are "When will it start?", "When will it end?", "How much control will we have?", "How bad will it be?" and "How many people will be left?" The rest of this article is devoted to a high-level population model that attempts to address these questions.

A Simple Model of Population Decline

To set the parameters of our model, we need to answer the four questions I posed above.

When Will The Decline Start?

This depends entirely on the timing of Peak Oil. My conclusion that the peak is occurring now makes it easy to pick a start date. The model starts this year, though a start date five or ten years from now would not affect the overall picture.

When Will it End?

Given that oil is a primary determinant of carrying capacity, the obvious answer is that the situation will stabilize when the oil is gone. The oil will never be completely gone of course, so we can modify that to read, "When oil is unavailable to most of humanity." We know that point will come, because oil is a finite, non-renewable resource, but when will that be?

Based on the model in the figure above I chose an end date of 2082, 75 years from now.

How Much Control Will We Have?

Will we be able to mitigate the population decline rate through voluntary actions such as reducing global fertility rates, and making the oil substitutions I mentioned above.

I have decided (perhaps arbitrarily) that the oil substitutions would not affect the course of the decline, but would be used to determine the sustainable number of people at the end of the simulation.

Fertility rates are an important consideration. The approach I've taken is to model the net birth rate, the combination of natural fertility and death rates that give us our current global population growth of 75 million per year. I modified that by having it decline by 0.015% per year. This reflects both a declining fertility rate due to environmental factors and some degree of women's education and empowerment, as well as a rising death rate due to a decline in the the global economy. I do not think that traditional humane models such as the Benign Demographic Transition theory will be able to influence events, given that the required economic growth is likely to be unavailable.

How Bad Will It Be?

This question comes from the assumption that the decline in net births alone will not be enough to solve the problem (and the simulation bears this out). This means that some level of excess deaths will result from a wide variety of circumstances. I postulate a rate of excess deaths that starts off quite low, rises over the decades to some maximum and then declines. The rise is driven by the worsening global situation as the overshoot takes effect, and the subsequent fall is due to human numbers and activities gradually coming back into balance with the resources available.

How Many People Will Be Left?

Taking the carrying capacity effects discussed above into account, I initially set the bar for a sustainable population at the population when we discovered oil in about 1850. This was about 1.2 billion people. Next I subtracted some number to account for the world's degraded carrying capacity, then added back a bit to account for our increased knowledge and the ameliorating effects of oil substitutes. This is a necessarily imprecise calculation, but I have settled on a round number of one billion people as the long-term sustainable population of the planet in the absence of oil.

Comments

The model is a simple arithmetical simulation that answers the following question: "Given the assumptions about birth and death rates listed above, how will human population numbers evolve to get from our current population of 6.6 billion to a sustainable population of 1 billion in 75 years?" It is not a predictive model. It is aggregated to a global level, and so can tell us nothing about regional effects. It also cannot address social outcomes. Its primary intent is to allow us to examine the roll that excess deaths will play in the next 75 years.

The Model

We will start by graphing the net birth rate over the period 2007 to 2082, incorporating a 0.015% annual decline: As you can see, the net birth rate declines to zero by 2082.

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Is it possible that this declining birth rate will get us closer to our sustainable population goal of one billion?

The following graph shows our population growth with the effects of the declining net birth rate shown above:

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As you can see, my assumption about declining birth rates leads to a stable population, but it's still 50% larger than today. In fact, this projection is remarkably similar to the one produced by the United Nations, which estimates a global population of 9.2 billion in 2050. The message of this graph is clear. If we need to reduce our population, simply adjusting the birth rate is insufficient. There will be excess deaths required to reach our target.

The following graph shows the excess death rate rising and then falling as described above. I will reiterate that the origin of these excess deaths is not considered in the model. It is sufficient to understand that these are not the result of old age or the various "natural causes" we have come to accept as a part of our modern life. These deaths may be due to such things as rising infant mortality rates, shorter adult life expectancies, famine, pandemics, wars etc. Some of these deaths will be from human agency, but most will not.

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Applying the above excess death rate to our current population yields the following curve. As you can see, the number of excess deaths per year increases quite rapidly (consistent with the effects of overshoot) and then falls off as the population comes back into balance with the resources available. The peak rate of deaths comes much earlier than the peak in the percentage death rate shown in the above graph because the population starts to decline rapidly. A lower percentage death rate acts on a larger population to produce a higher numerical death rate. As the population declines so does the numerical death rate, even when the percentage rate still increasing.

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The final graph is the outcome of the full simulation. It starts from our current population and shows the combined effects of a declining net birth rate and the excess death rate due to falling carrying capacity as described above. The goal of the model has been met: it has achieved a sustainable world population of one billion by the year 2082.

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The Cost

The human cost of such an involuntary population rebalancing is, of course, horrific. Based on this model we would experience an average excess death rate of 100 million per year every year for the next 75 years to achieve our target population of one billion by 2082. The peak excess death rate would happen in about 20 years, and would be about 200 million that year. To put this in perspective, WWII caused an excess death rate of only 10 million per year for only six years.

Given this, it's not hard to see why population control is the untouchable elephant in the room - the problem we're in is simply too big for humane or even rational solutions. It's also not hard to see why some people are beginning to grasp the inevitability of a human die-off.

Summation

One of the common accusations leveled at those who present analyses like this is that by doing so they are advocating or hoping for the massive population reductions they describe, and are encouraging draconian and inhumane measures to achieve them. Nothing could be further from the truth. I am personally quite attached to the world I've grown up in and the people that inhabit it, as is every other population commentator I am familiar with. However, in my ecological and Peak Oil research over the last several years I have begun to see the shape of a looming catastrophe that has absolutely nothing to do with human intentions, good or ill. It is the simple product of our species' continuing growth in both numbers and ability, an exponential growth that is taking place within the finite ecological niche of the entire world. Our recent effusive growth has been fueled by the draw-down of primordial stocks of petroleum which are about to deplete while our numbers and activities continue to grow. This is a simple, obvious recipe for disaster.

This model is intended to give some clarity to that premonition of trouble. It carries no judgment about what ought to be, it merely describes what might be. The model is likewise no crystal ball. It offers no predictions and no insights into the details of what will happen. It presents the simple arithmetic consequences of one set of assumptions, albeit assumptions that I personally feel have a reasonable probability of being fulfilled.

There are factors that will affect the course of events that have not been considered in the model. Readers may legitimately take me to task for not considering or summarily dismissing the various ways humanity is already trying to alleviate some of the foreseen dangers. For instance, my model does not mention global warming or carbon caps, and dismisses most alternative energy sources as ineffective. The model also does not address the regional differences that are bound to expand as the crisis unfolds. While such criticisms are justified and are well worth exploring in the context of oil decline, the purpose of this article is to take a high-level look at the global population situation, considering the entire planet as one ecological niche with a single aggregate carrying capacity supported by oil in its role as a facilitator of transportation and food production.

The model warns us that the involuntary decline of the human population in the aftermath of the Oil Age will not happen without overwhelming universal hardship. There are things we will be able to do as individuals to minimize the personal effects of such a decline, and we should all be deciding what those things need to be. It's never too early to prepare for a storm this big.

http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/theoildrum/~3/f-puKFPuO1I/6932

Update: Link to new BP report on results of internal investigation into the causes of the accident.

With Labor Day weekend, and the recovery of the blowout preventer from the Deepwater Horizon well in the Gulf of Mexico, the remaining parts of the operation are going to be increasingly directed at plugging the well, so that it can be abandoned. Part of this operation will be to ensure that the bottom plugs at the reservoir end of the well have adequately sealed off the bottom of the well. To do this, the relief well will be used to intersect the top of the unlined section of the original well, and determine the condition and fluid content of the annulus surrounding the production casing at that point.

There was concern that when the relief well intersected this annulus and then injected fluid into it as part of a possible additional plugging process, that this would increase the fluid pressure in the annulus. This could have raised the fluid pressure to the point that it might have been able to flow past the top seal at the well head, that was separating the annulus fluid channel from the path through the production casing. It was along that second path that the cement travelled to plug the bottom end of the well. Now that a BOP has been installed that can handle 15,000 psi fluid pressure in the well, the concern that a leak in the seal could allow oil to flow into the Gulf is of less consequence. So the relief well can proceed.

At the same time, it is likely that work will continue to prepare the top of the well for additional plugging so that the well can then be abandoned, according to regulation.

One of the remaining issues that will be resolved when the relief well intersects the annulus is over what type of fluid is actually in that channel. In the original sequence of events, before the well failed, the well was full of mud, and then a cement plug was pumped down the center of the well, to the bottom, from where it flowed up the outside of the production casing, filling the lower section of the annulus. In the process, it pushed the mud that was already in the well, up the annulus ahead of the cement. As that cement started to set, and filled the annulus, there should have been no flow path up the annulus to the well head. Thus the fluid in the annulus should still be the original mud that was in the well ahead of that first cement injection.

In a large part of the early thinking of how the well failed, there was a preponderance of opinion that the fluid flow in the well developed up through the cement in the annulus, from the oil reservoir. This then flowed up the outside of the production casing, dislodged the hanger seal at the top of the well, and flowed on up into the BOP and on. But when the second set of cement was sent down the well, to seal it after it had stopped flowing the cement, apparently following the path that the oil had taken in leaving the well, only flowed down the production casing to the bottom of the well, and thence back up to the oil reservoir. This suggests that the early thinking which would leave the annulus full of oil and natural gas was not correct, and rather than oil, the annulus still holds mud.

We won’t know which is right until the well is intersected, but once the information is available, then it will make it easier to decide what steps to take to complete the final stages of plugging the well.

At present the DD2 is preparing for these plug and abandon procedures. It is also, given past problems, testing the new BOP to ensure that it is fully functional before the process restarts. With there being sensibly no further likelihood of oil from the well escaping into the Gulf, the pressure to complete the process has diminished, and there is no urgent need for the relief well to be completed (apart that is for such matters as the amount of money that both the drilling rigs are costing BP every day).

As the Admiral instructs, it will be interesting to see when, and what, the relief well finds as it completes its mission in the next week or so.

http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/theoildrum/~3/YHiWbNGv9-g/6933

EIA ups forecast for 2010 world oil demand growth

WASHINGTON, Sept 8 (Reuters) - The U.S. government on Wednesday raised its forecast for growth in world oil demand this year for the third month in a row, mainly due to thirst for fuel in China, the Middle East and Brazil.

In its latest monthly report, the Energy Information Administration boosted its forecast of growth in 2010 world oil consumption by 50,000 barrels per day from its prior estimate, projecting a rise of 1.62 million bpd to 85.95 million bpd.

FACTBOX - Iran's crude oil buyers in Europe, Asia

(Reuters) - The United Nations in June passed a
fourth round of sanctions on Iran in reaction to its uranium
enrichment programme. Tougher measures followed from the
European Union and the United States, specifically targeting oil
and gas.

A number of oil companies, trading houses and international
businesses have since stopped transactions with Iran, although
it is difficult to build up a picture of the country's crude
purchases because the information is not officially published.

OPEC Pumped 29.11 Mln Bbls Of Oil a Day In August

SAN FRANCISCO -- The 12-member Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) produced an average of 29.11 million barrels a day in August, 110,000 barrels less than an estimated 29.22 million barrels a day in July, according to a Platts survey released Wednesday.

Poland Wants Flexible Russian Gas Deal, Has Eyes on Shale Gas

Poland wants a flexible long-term agreement for natural gas deliveries from Russia in order to be able to reduce its gas imports from the east should it identify shale gas deposits or gain access to natural gas from other suppliers, Polish Treasury Minister Aleksander Grad said Wednesday.

U.S. Government Loaned Mexican Government More Than $1 Billion to Drill Oil in Gulf of Mexico Last Year; Has $1 Billion More Planned For This Year

(CNSNews.com) – The U.S. Export-Import Bank, an independent federal agency, loaned more than $1 billion to the Mexican state oil company PEMEX in 2009 to support the company’s oil drilling in the southern Gulf of Mexico. The bank has another $1 billion in loans in the pipeline for 2010, unless Congress objects.

Mexican refinery blast may help U.S. fuel exporters

(Reuters) - The explosion of a hydroprocessing unit at the northern Mexican Cadereyta refinery may bring export opportunities for U.S. refiners along the Gulf Coast and boost U.S. refined products prices, requiring Mexico to import more light fuels such as gasoline or diesel after the blast.

Mexico refinery repairs to take 2 wks-Pemex source

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - Mexico's state oil monopoly
Pemex should be able to quickly repair the hydrotreater at its
275,000 barrels-per-day Cadereyta refinery that was damaged in
an explosion on Tuesday, a company source said on Wednesday.

The repairs should be complete within 14 days, the source
said, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not
authorized to discuss the issue with the media.

Europe Gasoline/Naphtha-Up on crude, Mexico refinery fire

LONDON (Reuters) - European gasoline rose on
Wednesday, boosted by rebounding U.S. crude and an explosion at
a major refinery in Mexico the day before.

However, traders said support might be short lived as the
summer driving season in the Northern Hemisphere has ended.

Why is Canada obsessed with the Arctic?

Of all the Arctic coastal countries, Canada was the first to claim the Arctic, regarding the region as its "backyard." In recent years, as the area has become more valuable for economic and military interests, Canada began to expand its presence there. In 2007, after Russia dropped a flag to the ocean bottom of the North Pole, Canada took a series of actions – building a military training base and deepwater port, purchasing new patrol boats and establishing a cutting-edge Arctic research center – to protect its interests there.

China grants clearance to Sinopec-Kuwait refinery

China has granted environmental clearance and okayed a technical review of an $8.7bn refinery and petrochemical joint venture between Sinopec and Kuwait, paving the way for final state approval soon.

The venture, to be built in southern coastal city Zhanjiang, includes a 300,000 barrels-per-day (bpd) refinery and a 1 million tonnes-per-year ethylene complex, at a cost in line with previous estimates of around $9bn.

Duo set to develop Bolivia gas play

France's Total and Britain's BG Group will start production in 2011 at their Itau natural gas field in Bolivia, and most of its output will be exported to Argentina, state-run energy company YPFB said today.

Gas Shortage Hits Ghana

The country, especially Accra, has been hit by a devastating shortage of Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG), leading to many households resorting to the use of charcoal.

For automobiles which use LPG as fuel, these are terrible times as they have to wait in queues for hours at locations where gas is available.

In some instances, by the time it is their turn to be supplied, they are told that it is finished, making nonsense of the long wait.

Panic fuel buying in Christchurch

Panic buying of fuel has returned to Christchurch following rumours that stations are about to run out of petrol in the city.

Both Greenstone, which operates the Shell retail network, and BP, said sales had increased, but denied there was any problem with supply.

FACTBOX - Key findings of BP probe

(Reuters) - BP Plc's internal investigation blames a series of human and mechanical failures by BP and its contractors, Transocean Ltd and Halliburton Co , for the April 20 blowout at the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig in the Gulf of Mexico.

As the well owner, BP was responsible for the well design. Transocean owned and operated the rig, which it leased to BP, and Halliburton was the contractor in charge of cement operations.

Here are the report's eight key findings:

Transocean Says BP's Report on Macondo Well Oil Explosion `Self Serving'

Transocean Ltd., the owner of the rig that exploded in the Gulf of Mexico in April, said BP Plc’s report released today “is a self-serving report that attempts to conceal the critical factor that set the stage for the Macondo incident: BP’s fatally flawed well design.”

Transocean credit ratings cut by S&P

NEW YORK -- Transocean Ltd.’s credit ratings were cut by Standard & Poor’s on Wednesday due to potential liability stemming from its role in the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig the company leased to BP.

S&P cut Transocean’s rating by one notch to BBB, two levels above junk ratings, and placed the company’s rating on negative outlook, indicating it may cut the ratings again.

US Govt: New Gulf Drilling Regulations May Be Ready before Oct. 30

The U.S. Department of the Interior could decide before the end of October to modify the duration of a moratorium imposed on drilling in the Gulf of Mexico following the massive oil spill there, an official of the government agency overseeing offshore drilling said Tuesday.

"We are working very hard to assimilate the massive amount of information we have … but we expect to finish that before Oct. 30," Michael Bromwich, director of the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, Regulation, and Enforcement told reporters on the sidelines of a public meeting on offshore drilling. "It could be well before that," he said.

Stiffer Penalties Needed for Offshore Drilling, U.S. Board Says

(Bloomberg) -- The U.S. offshore-drilling regulator should consider stiffer penalties for companies that break safety rules, according to a report from a review board formed in response to the BP Plc oil spill.

BP Floats New Standards To Help Prevent Future Oil Spills

WASHINGTON -(Dow Jones)- BP PLC has developed a set of recommendations to help prevent future rig explosions and oil spills, making a case for the creation of new standards and training programs for key personnel.

The nearly forgotten Mariner explosion is just as bad as the BP oil spill

FORTUNE -- It's never a good time for an oil rig to blow up in the Gulf of Mexico, but Mariner Energy's Vermillion 380 platform couldn't have gone off at a worse time. The government and the media were already scrutinizing offshore drill production in an unprecedented way. Thirteen unlucky workers were ejected off of Vermillion into the water last week. And Mariner (ME) inadvertently became the latest part of a national political debate about the safety of offshore drilling.

But given that the explosion, according to reports, hasn't resulted oil leak, it would be surprising if the event had much of a political impact, even if it should. Oil spills are visual disasters that the public tends to forget once the crude is dispersed.

High winds fuel fires across Detroit

DETROIT, Mich. — At least two dozen buildings were ablaze across large sections of Detroit Tuesday night as winds knocked over power lines and fanned flames.

Electricity was knocked out to 113,000 Michigan homes and businesses, said DTE Energy and CMS Energy Corp.

FACTBOX - Kenya's planned energy generation projects to 2015

(Reuters) - Kenya's energy minister, Kiraitu Murungi,
commissioned a 5.1 megawatt wind power project on Wednesday and
expects installed capacity to more than double in the next three
years.

Lebanon goes thirsty as as municipalities fail to deliver on water supply promises

BEIRUT: Already plagued by electricity problems, the Lebanese are now struggling with another, equally serious problem: water shortage.

Cash-strapped Metro targets drivers' pay

After two years of tapping reserves, boosting fares, surviving on federal grants and postponing new routes, King County Metro Transit managers now are looking behind the wheel for savings.

Metro drivers rank third nationally in wages, with a top rate of $28.47 an hour, and the average yearly income, including overtime, is almost $61,000 a year, according to a Metro review that includes full- and part-time drivers.

Firm can't fire man for 1.8 cent theft

(Reuters) - A German company that fired a man for the theft of 1.8 euro cents (two U.S. cents) worth of electricity had no grounds for sacking him, a court ruled, dismissing the firm's appeal against his reinstatement.

Network administrator Oliver Beel lost his job after charging his Segway, a two-wheeled electric vehicle, at work in May 2009. After he connected the vehicle to the firm's power source for 1-1/2 hours, his boss asked him to remove it.

Twelve days later Beel found himself without a job.

KrisCan interviews energy analyst Chris Nelder

In this seven part KrisCan interview with energy analyst Chris Nelder, they cover topics ranging from the consequences of the moratorium from the Macondo well blowout in the Gulf of Mexico to the legitimacy of Cap and Trade; how U.S. offshore oil drilling will affect domestic oil supply in the coming decade and how policy in America curtails the incentivizing of an energy transition to more renewable sources.

Germany's Peak Oil Confession

Germany would have to cut a deal with Russia if it wants to secure Russian oil supplies. In short, Germany would have to kiss Moscow’s back end — even if doing so means damaging relationships with other Eastern European states...

Germany would also have to “not offend” Arab oil exporters in any way, meaning it may have to alter its relationship with Israel and change its stance on Israel’s right to exist, say the report’s authors.

And finally, there’s always the military option. If, for example, Iran took over Iraqi oil — constricting oil supply even more — would Germany and the EU attack Iran?

Harvest Fest to tackle issues like oil spill

The recent spill of an estimated one million gallons of oil right here in the Kalamazoo River watershed is a poignant reminder of our own region's heavy dependence on fossil fuels — and its drawbacks.

Michigan as a state ranks tenth in the nation in oil consumption, according to statistics. Southwest Michigan Community Harvest Fest will address this and other sustainability issues at its 8th Annual event on Sunday, September 19 at Tillers International in Scotts. Gates open at 11 a.m., and Harvest Fest offers a variety of activities from 11:30 a.m. to 6:30 p.m. Admission is $10 per carload, and $1 per bicycle or per person for a bus with 10 or more.

The No Effort Path to Energy Independence

Can you imagine our economy operating on less than a third of today’s transportation of people and goods within eight years? It may be time for us to get serious about our energy use.

As we have seen, our most pressing need is in the transportation sector. Let’s see how our actions can help.

Who Turned Out The Lights? Review

Who Turned Out The Lights?: Your Guided Tour To The Energy Crisis is super easy book to read, very well written and researched, and full of interesting facts. Perhaps most engaging are the explanations of the politics and economics behind many of the major energy resources being consumed in America, including oil, coal, gas, nuclear, solar, wind, hydro-electric and bio-fuels.

A road trip to the White House to reinstall Jimmy Carter's dream

It’s been almost a generation since solar panels President Carter installed on the White House roof were removed during renovations. Now, a group of climate activists armed with one of the original panels are on a road trip to the White House to get President Obama to put them back up.

Today, 350.org found Bill McKibben, City Year founder Alan Khazei and Boston energy chief Jim Hunt joined Unity College students from Maine who are driving the panel to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue in a bio-diesel van as part of a "Put Solar On It" campaign. The group met at the solar-powered Park Street School on Beacon Hill to show off the panel and launch the road trip.

U.S. Carbon Dioxide Output to Climb 3.6% This Year, 0.4% in 2011, EIA Says

U.S. carbon dioxide emissions from energy use will climb 3.6 percent this year, according to a forecast by the Energy Information Administration.

Carbon dioxide produced from burning coal, oil and natural gas will rise 0.4 percent in 2011 from 2010 levels, the EIA said in its September Short-Term Energy Outlook.

Steve LeVine - Foreign Policy: Algae Fuel Sparks Excitement

It's good to be J. Craig Venter right now. In May, Venter — who you may recall from his entrepreneurial work in genomics research — created a stir in scientific circles by creating the first cell with synthetic DNA; Exxon, meanwhile, has gone on the hook for up to $600 million in funding for Venter's ambitious synthetic algae fuel project. In a piece over the weekend, The New York Times' Andrew Pollack has added some James Dean brushstrokes to the portrait of this "scientific rebel." Shall we cut to the chase and start carving busts of the guy?

Solar power eyed as solution to Mindanao energy crisis

MANILA, Philippines - The Congressional Commission on Science, Technology and Engineering (COMSTE), chaired by Senator Edgardo J. Angara, believes solar energy can be the solution to the Mindanao power crisis.

In a statement, Angara said harnessing solar power in Mindanao can complement existing coal-fired plants and is applicable even in off-grid areas. “Mindanao has the highest percentage of un-electrified barangays in the country. If we are able to apply solar energy effectively, the potential for sustainable, clean energy is enormous,” he said.

What peak oil? Why an oil glut is ahead

FORTUNE -- In May, less than a month after the blowout of the Deepwater Horizon oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico, a key milestone was achieved with little notice: Total U.S. supplies of petroleum and products refined from it (including the Strategic Petroleum Reserve) surpassed 1.8 billion barrels, reaching the highest level in the last 20 years. Since then the total has continued to edge upward, hitting 1.87 billion barrels in the week ended August 27, according to the Energy Information Administration.

Despite the Iraq War and the resulting production disruptions, despite the moratorium on drilling in the Gulf, despite turmoil in Nigeria and ongoing cross-border transshipment quarrels in Central Asia and the multiple, repeated declarations that "peak oil" has arrived and supplies will inevitably dwindle, the United States has more petroleum on hand today than it has had since at least the beginning of the first Gulf War.

Oil Falls a Third Day on Speculation European Debt May Curb Global Growth

Oil declined for a third day as equity markets fell and traders bet a government report will show fuel inventories are rising as the peak driving season comes to an end.

Oil Contango Doubles in 2011 Recovery Betting With Frontline Ship Demand

Oil traders are showing increasing confidence that U.S. economic growth will rebound next year as they take advantage of the widening gap between current prices of crude and contracts for delivery six months from now.

Crude Oil Caught in a `Stalemate' Between $70 and $75

Oil in New York will trade in a $5 range in the short term as prices are locked in a “stalemate,” according to broker Newedge.

Crude for October delivery is stuck between $70.76 and $75.59 a barrel as price movements illustrated by candlestick charts show a narrow gap between the daily opening level and closing for trading on Sept. 3 and Sept. 7, said Veronique Lashinski, a Chicago-based analyst at the brokerage. That means neither buyers with expectations of rising oil nor sellers expecting a decline are able to influence direction, she said.

China Third-Quarter Oil-Refining Margins to Widen, Standard Chartered Says

Chinese refiners led by China Petroleum & Chemical Corp. may boost profits from processing crude oil into fuels in the third quarter while margins in Singapore may decline, Standard Chartered Plc said.

“We have been highlighting the potentially high gross refining margins in China in the third quarter due to relatively lower in-tank costs and stable product prices,” Singapore-based analyst Han Pin Hsi said in a report today. “At the same time, we had projected Singapore margins to fall in line with seasonal trends and to continue to weaken through December.”

China blacks out towns to meet energy goal

Chinese steel mills and mobile phone factories are being idled and thousands of homes in one area are doing without electricity as local governments order power cuts to meet energy-saving targets set by Beijing.

Rolling blackouts and enforced power cuts are affecting key industrial areas. The prosperous eastern city of Taizhou turned off street lights and ordered hotels and shopping malls to cut power use. In Anping County southwest of Beijing, an area known as China's wire-manufacturing capital, thousands of factories and homes have endured daylong blackouts over the past two weeks.

“We can't meet deadlines for some orders and will have to pay penalties,” said Han Hongmai, general manager of Anping's Jintai Metal Wire Co. “At home we can't use the toilet” on blackout days due to lack of power for water pumps, he said.

State revenue at stake if south Sudan secedes

Khartoum is preparing to lose most of its state revenue if Sudan’s restive south votes to secede in an independence referendum early next year, taking with it most of the country’s oil resources.

“Frankly … we don’t know if Sudan is going to be split or united,” Abdel al Jailani, the Sudanese minerals minister, told Reuters. “If the south does secede – you know 60 per cent of our budget comes from [oil] – we have to sit and think of another alternative.”

Kuwait Plans Partial Shutdowns at Two Crude Oil Refineries in November

Kuwait is planning a partial shutdown at the Mina al Ahmadi refinery, its largest oil processing plant, for about one month starting in November to conduct work on a crude distillation unit, an official said.

Iraqi-Kurdish relations take a new hit

A new flashpoint in relations between Iraq’s minority Kurds and the country’s central government has emerged as US troops pull out.

Baghdad’s decision this week to halve supplies of Iraqi diesel and kerosene to the semi-autonomous Kurdistan region over alleged fuel smuggling has revived the festering resentment that Iraqi Kurds harbour over their treatment at the hands of Saddam Hussein.

South Korea to Ban New Oil, Gas Investments in Iran on Nuclear Program

South Korea said it will ban any new investments for Iranian oil, gas and construction projects, joining nations including the U.S. in imposing sanctions for the Middle Eastern country’s nuclear program.

Pemex 235,000-Barrel Mexican Refinery Hit by Explosion

Mexico imported 432,000 barrels a day of petroleum products from the U.S. in June, according to the U.S. Energy Department and is the second-largest supplier of oil to the U.S. Cadereyta processed 104,063 barrels a day in July, a 56 percent drop from December 2006 when the facility peaked at 239,388 barrels daily, according to the website of Mexico’s Energy Ministry.

34 rescued from China oil platform accident

BEIJING – Emergency teams with helicopters rescued 34 workers Wednesday from an oil drilling platform that was leaning dangerously in the East China Sea after a storm, and searched for two others still missing, officials said.

The No. 3 drilling platform in the Shengli oil field, operated by Sinopec, Asia's largest refiner by capacity, started tilting over Tuesday, causing four workers to fall into the water and trapping 32 of them on the platform, the Transport Ministry said in a statement on its website.

BP says Transocean missed danger signs on rig

LONDON (Reuters) – BP deflected much of the blame for a rig blast that led to the United States' worst-ever oil spill, releasing an internal report on Wednesday which said that drilling contractor Transocean had missed danger signs.

BP defended its much-criticized well design and said failures on the rig, operated by Transocean, led to gas swamping the platform and creating the conditions for the explosion.

"Over a 40-minute period, the Transocean rig crew failed to recognize and act on the influx of hydrocarbons into the well," BP said in a statement.

Oil sands to dominate agenda on Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Canada

One of the top officials in the U.S. government, Nancy Pelosi, will get a crash course this week on Canada’s oil sands in a series of private meetings quietly orchestrated by President Barack Obama’s point man in Ottawa.

The meetings will focus on climate change, the oil sands and the Canadian energy industry. They come at a crucial time in relations between the United States and Canada, its top energy supplier, and as Washington considers approval of a landmark cross-border pipeline project.

Obama Offers a Transit Plan to Create Jobs

The White House is proposing to offset the $50 billion by eliminating tax breaks and subsidies for the oil and gas industry.

China Supplants U.S. at Top of Ernst & Young Ranking for Renewable Energy

China overtook of the U.S. to lead a quarterly index of the most attractive countries for renewable energy projects for the first time, according to the global accounting firm Ernst & Young, which compiles the list.

China, which shared the lead with the U.S. in the first quarter, moved ahead of the world’s largest economy and ranked the most attractive for investment in wind and solar projects. The move followed the failure of a proposed energy bill in the U.S. to include a clean energy standard, the company said today.

Enbridge invests in geothermal project

Calgary-based energy transportation giant Enbridge Inc. has invested US$23.8-million in a geothermal project in eastern Oregon, U.S. Geothermal Inc. said Wednesday.

Fresh Capital in the Uranium Fuel Race

For decades, the business of enriching uranium for use in nuclear reactors was simple: companies bought the uranium and sent it to one of the plants built by the federal government as part of its nuclear weapons program. The government increased the proportion of uranium 235, the kind that splits easily in reactors.

But in the 1990s, the government sold the plants to the United States Enrichment Company, now called USEC. Meanwhile, other companies started looking at the American market.

South Africa: Car Industry Seeks Biofuels as Alternative to Oil

Johannesburg — WITH the introduction of the carbon tax for passenger cars this month, car makers are developing ways to lessen carbon dioxide emissions.

The government plans to extend the carbon emissions tax to light commercial vehicles as well as old vehicles next year in a bid to "green" SA's vehicles. This is in line with the Copenhagen Accord, in terms of which SA declared it intends to reduce greenhouse gas emissions 34% by 2020 and 42% by 2025.

Apart from hybrid vehicles, which have been in the South African market for years, car manufacturers are also assisting the research and development of biofuels for car engines.

Fueling Speculation

Leave aside, for the moment, the fact that the "Peak Oil" concept is highly controversial and riddled with uncertainties. To the western members of the global power elite--whose existence is fueled by oil and militarism--the very idea of peak oil is terrifying.

Russians Debunk Peak Oil Theory - as Bogus as Greenhouse Gas Scam

Russians prove ‘fossil’ fuel is junk science theory linked to global warming hype. Oil is shown to be mineral in origin-not from fossilized organisms. No more fears over shrinking reserves as experts say petroleum is naturally ‘renewable.’

A society in crude health

Each day in Bristol there are around 750 car trips made by community nurses to visit people in their homes, and a similar number of trips by the non-urgent patient transport service to get people to their appointments at hospital. Travel by staff, patients and visitors is taken for granted but the fact is nearly all of these journeys rely on oil.

Modern healthcare also uses a huge quantity of supplies, drugs and equipment, many of them manufactured using oil.

Sowing sustainability

Packets of local heirloom seeds from Sow True Seed are now being planted, and Hillcrest residents anticipate harvesting lots of greens and fall vegetables before the plot is cover-cropped in preparation for a vibrant spring garden. Several cold frames now in the works will trap heat from the sun's rays, enabling residents to grow several types of food through the coldest winter months.

Rearing carp: Dinner's in the pond

First it was fruit and veg. Then we turned our hands to keeping chickens and bees. Could the next thing be using the garden pond to grow our own edible carp? Is it time for Gordon the Goldfish to move over?

Green Living Festival Saturday at Lampe Park

A graduate of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Stein has appeared on numerous radio and television programs, Bates said. At noon, he will speak on “peak oil prep and making the shift to sustainability.” At 2 p.m., he will give a presentation on remodeling and retrofitting homes to create fire- and earthquake-resistant buildings.

“Peak oil prep is about when we run out of that easy-to-get oil, when what's left is hard to get and more damaging, more expensive, with a lot more competition,” Bates said. “People have been saying it since the 70s: we need to get off oil and start making the shift to sustainability.”

Australia's New Government a Brighter Shade of Green

Addressing the National Farmers' Federation Congress today, Australian Greens Deputy Leader Senator Christine Milne urged farmers to seize this "tremendous opportunity to shape their own future."

"What a great opportunity that our parliament is getting a renewed focus on rural and regional Australia just as the vital issues of climate change, peak oil and food security are triggering a global rethink," Senator Milne said.

But opposition National Party Leader MP Warren Truss said the formal alliance between Gillard Labor and the Brown Greens "will send a shiver down the spine of regional Australia."

Street Cred vs. Green Cred

Arizona's Green Party is not amused by a Republican operative's effort to recruit people from the streets to run as Green candidates on the November ballot.

Phasing out the incandescent
light bulb

The Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007 legislated a reduction of energy usage and greenhouse gas emissions. The law provides for phasing out today’s general service incandescent light bulbs in favor of lower-wattage, energy saving bulbs. Lighting accounts for about 15% of the electrical use in homes.

eBay to give away 100K green reusable shipping boxes

Online retailer eBay will soon be giving away 100,000 eco-friendly shipping boxes, each designed to be used repeatedly as it journeys from sellers to buyers and back.

The durable boxes, made with 100% recycled material and water-based inks, will start circulating next month. Sellers can place orders for the free boxes, available in three sizes, until supplies run out.

Jeff Rubin - Water: Canada’s most valuable resource

Canadians will never go thirsty. With over one million lakes, including part ownership of the Great Lakes, and massive ice fields, Canada is home to nearly nine per cent of the world’s supply of fresh water. But with a population of less than one per cent of the world’s total, Canada has a lot of room for water exports. In time, those exports might be more valuable than the 170 billion barrels of oil that are trapped in the country’s oil sands.

The notion of exporting water is still a taboo subject in Canadian policy circles; the country took great pains to keep water out of the North American Free Trade Agreement. But, like most things, acceptance may be a matter of price. And the price of water is rising steadily, making Canada’s freshwater bounty more valuable every day.

Kyoto Protocol to continue past 2012: UN climate chief

NEW DELHI: As hopes for any deal on global warming dims at the Cancun meet later this year, UN climate chief Christiana Figueres today made it clear that the Kyoto Protocol will continue post 2012 as a second protocol since it does not have a "sunset" clause.

CO2 Target Debate Is Irrelevant, Former UN Climate Chief Says

The greenhouse-gas targets pledged by nations after the United Nations climate talks in Copenhagen in December won’t change much before 2020 so there’s little point debating them, the man who stewarded the summit said.

International negotiations that are “painstakingly slow” are continuing, and non-binding cuts pledged by the U.S., Japan, China and European nations are “basically what we’ve got to work with for 2020,” said former UN climate chief Yvo de Boer, now an adviser for the accounting firm KPMG International.

President Obama is right to back lawsuit of carbon emissions

Setting aside the legal technicalities, these sorts of cases are not the best way to reduce America's carbon emissions. Pursuing separate torts against different emitters will result in a patchwork of judicial mandates in lieu of comprehensive regulation, the nature, scale and expense of which will no doubt depend on which judge hears each case. EPA regulation, too, has deficiencies, including the possibility that different presidents will apply it inconsistently. But it's more predictable, and it's universal.

Global warming may eliminate plague

While many climate experts and environmentalists explore the negative effects of global warming, a new study reveals a positive outcome of the warming of the planet: the potential elimination of the plague. Global warming affects temperatures and precipitation regimes that play a pivotal role in the lives of rodents and fleas; rodents and fleas are responsible for maintenance and spread of plague to human populations. Plague can be fatal if the symptoms are not recognized and treated within 24 hours.

Why Canada is looking hot

How often do you hear anyone make the obvious point global warming will be good for Canada?

Arctic scientist Laurence C. Smith makes this logical argument in his new book, The World in 2050: Four Forces Shaping Civilization’s Northern Future.

Climate Change May Add to Natural Disaster Death Tolls

Natural disasters are tending to kill fewer people but climate change may add to the toll by unleashing more extreme weather and causing after-effects such as disease and malnutrition, experts say.

Bees stung by 'climate change-linked' early pollination

Climate change may be causing flowers to open before bees emerge from hibernation leading to declines in pollination, new research suggests.

A deadly drought

The world’s first armed conflicts due to climate change may be just beginning. In a remote and arid part of northern Kenya, the Turkana nomadic community today brandish Kalashnikovs, ready to kill in defence of their depleting water sources. The district in which they live, herding goats, cattle and camels, borders Uganda, Sudan and Ethiopia. It is a landscape strewn with the carcasses of livestock following a prolonged and severe drought. With rains persistently failing to materialize, the traditional life of the Turkana stands threatened. While droughts are not a recent phenomenon, those that used to happen – and were anticipated – every decade or so have now started ravaging the land every two or three years, throwing the community’s migratory patterns into disarray.

Food Crisis Worsens in Central Africa

Torrential rains and flash floods that swept through cities and villages in Central Africa in late August have intensified a food crisis in the region, leaving upwards of 10 million people suffering from severe food shortages, the United Nations and relief organizations warned last week.

The floods, which destroyed crops and livestock, struck an area already on the brink of famine after successive years of drought and failed harvests.

Rising world grain prices, resulting partly from the heat wave and drought that destroyed wheat crops across Russia this summer, are compounding the crisis, relief organizations said.

 

 Shea with South Korea tiffany schmuck military exercises have been postponed at least until next week, held in Seoul, South Korea will hold bilateral ministerial-level meeting after.

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http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/EcoGeek/~3/Y55dwQWsbqk/3288-senate-l

Three U.S. senators have introduced a bill to promote electric grid energy storage projects. The Storage Technology of Renewable and Green Energy Act of 2010 ("STORAGE 2010 Act") would provide tax credits worth as much as $1.5 billion for grid storage projects.

In addition to providing credits for utility scale projects, the bill also has provisions for businesses and homeowners who want to have on-site energy storage, whether or not they also have on-site renewable energy generation of their own. Grid scale projects could qualify for a 20% tax credit of up to $30 million, and individual projects could qualify for a 30% tax credit of up to $1 million.

Projects would be selected by the Energy Secretary based on their commercial viability and would look to those that "provide the greatest increase of reliability or economic benefit, that enable the greatest improvement in integration of renewable energy resources with the grid, or that enable the greatest increase in efficiency in grid operation."

Encouraging increased grid storage capacity is meant to help further the adoption of intermittent renewable energy sources such as wind and solar power. Grid storage should also help in furthering a more reliable smart grid for national energy distribution.

image: CC 2.0 by -5m

http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/EcoGeek/~3/FOtUySXQpLE/3287-plant-mi

Scientists at MIT have created a breakthrough solution to one of the biggest problems facing solar cells by mimicking the world's best harvesters of solar energy:  plants.

Over time, sunlight breaks down the materials in solar cells, leading to a gradual degradation of devices aiming to harvest the energy in that light.  Plants don't have this problem because the chloroplasts in plant cells constantly breakdown and reassemble their light-capturing molecules -- essentially constantly creating brand new molecules.

The scientists have developed self-assembling solar cells that can be broken down and reassembled quickly by the subtraction or addition of a surfactant (similar to the dispersants used on the oil spill).  MIT News describe the system as being made up of:

"synthetic molecules called phospholipids that form disks; these disks provide structural support for other molecules that actually respond to light, in structures called reaction centers, which release electrons when struck by particles of light. The disks, carrying the reaction centers, are in a solution where they attach themselves spontaneously to carbon nanotubes. The nanotubes hold the phospholipid disks in a uniform alignment so that the reaction centers can all be exposed to sunlight at once and they also act as wires to collect and channel the flow of electrons..."

When the surfactant is added, all of the components come apart.  When it's removed, the components spontaneously reassemble into a "rejuvenated" photocell.  After repeated tests where the cell is dis- and reassembled, there was no loss of efficiency.  The individual molecules have an efficiency of about 40 percent, around double current solar cells, but testing has been at low concentrations of these molecules, so the overall efficiency of the device was also low.

The scientists think that the individual molecules could theoretically hit 100 percent efficiency.  They are currently working to increase the concentration of the device and up the overall efficiency to something much greater.

via  MIT News

http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/theoildrum/~3/pm5ZxrS9ghU/6891

In 1913, Lord Northcliffe, who owned the Daily Mail, offered £10,000 to the first men to fly the Atlantic from North America to Ireland or England in less than 72 hours. The prize was won by John Alcock and Arthur Brown, who flew non stop from Newfoundland to Ireland in June 1919 on a modified Vickers Vimy bomber. Later on, in 1927, Charles Lindbergh flew non stop from New York to Paris, collecting another prize for the result. Awarding prizes is a good way of stimulating technological development, with the added advantage that you pay for success and not for failures. Should we use the same strategy for renewable energy?

Bill Gates has recently stated in an interview that

The irony is that if you actually look at the amount of money that's been spent on feed-in tariffs and you properly account for it--tax credits, feed-in credits in Spain, solar photovoltaic stuff in Germany--the world has spent a massive amount of money which, in terms of creating both jobs and knowledge, would have been far better spent on energy research.

This opinion is fairly often heard when discussing renewable energy. But would it really be a good idea to spend public money financing research on renewables? Would it produce breakthroughs, jobs and new products, or would it just create more "welfare queens in white coats?"

The way scientific research is managed by governments is by means of "research grants." Governments decide the themes on which research should be performed and invite scientists from academia or private research centers to apply for funding by presenting proposals. In many cases, research grants contain provision that should insure that the results of the research are aimed at obtaining some kind of marketable product, which is also the way of creating jobs. But that is a very difficult task. Not that scientists are not good at what they do. They are - usually - hard working, competent and dedicated. The problem is that awarding grants to scientists is a little like voting for politicians: you pay for promises, not for results.

Scientists may not be so bad at maintaining their promises as some politicians are; but the way to be sure to keep a promise is not to make it or - at least - to word it in such a way that you can always say that you have kept it. In the case of research grants, that means that the objectives are always very conservative. That makes both awarders and awardees happy, since neither one wants failure. But it is not the best way to obtain breakthroughs or innovations of the marketable kind.

In addition, the mentality of scientists is not normally directed to market. They pay great attention to their internal pecking order; something that they establish by means of arcane procedures which have to do with "impact factors" "citation indexes" and the like. The scientific community is akin to those societies that anthropologists have termed as "gift-giving;" that is, societies where your social worth is determined by how much you give away for free. That's what scientists do all the time: they gain prestige by giving their papers for free to the community. But, in a world where there holds the "publish or perish" rule, you can see how difficult is to be a scientist and an entrepreneur at the same time. As a scientist, you are supposed to give away your results for free. As an entrepreneur, you want to keep them for yourself and make money from them. Intellectual property can be managed, but this contradiction can never be completely solved.

So, if you want to get something that works and that can be sold; well, creativity is not something that money can buy so easily. Think about the first plane; the one made by the Wright brothers in 1908. It was the work of a couple of inventive men who used their own money for the project. And that while university professors were still debating on whether planes could actually fly. Today we are seeing something similar with high altitude wind energy, which could be a real breakthrough in renewable energy. The researchers working at the kitegen project have applied several times for research grants from the European Commission. Their requests have been systematically turned down. The grant system is not just conservative; it is actually innovation-averse.

All that doesn't mean that public money spent on research on renewable energy would be wasted, it is just that it is hard to think that it would produce breakthroughs or really innovative new products in ways proportional to the effort. So, if we need, and we do need, better renewable technology, we should select appropriate ways to promote real innovation in this sector. So, why not learn from aviation? There was a period, during the first decades of the 20th century, when a lot of progress in aviation was made using the "prize" system. That is, some well meaning individual would offer money for the first one who would accomplish a specific task: crossing the Atlantic Ocean, fly non-stop from New York to Paris, and the like.

As far as I know, there are no quantitative studies about the efficiency of this system but, from what we can read, it did stimulate people to work very hard on getting the prize - Charles Lindbergh is a good example. Working for a prize stimulates people who are naturally competitive, and they can express themselves much better than when they have to follow the pre-laid Gannt chart of a typical government sponsored project. And, from the viewpoint of the awarders of the grant, there is the obvious advantage that they pay for results, not for promises. They pay only for success, not for failure. And success speaks for itself; you don't have to set up checks to see how the money has been spent.

So, it would be thinkable to organize research on innovation in renewables by offering prizes. Say, the government will award 10 million dollars to the first research lab which succeeds in developing a solar cell with a demonstrable EROEI = 50 (about the EROEI of petroleum in the golden days). Or it will award the same 10 million dollars for the first GWh consistently produced by a high altitude wind power system. Maybe the target is too high, and nobody will succeed in getting the prize, but if that happens, it is at no cost for taxpayers. And think how much money the governments could save dismantling the overblown bureaucracy needed for selecting grant applications and checking that the money is spent according to the promises.

Now, why is it not done? Well, I think the reason lies in those lines that I just wrote. The main purpose of all bureaucracies is to perpetuate (and enlarge) themselves, so a reform that would get rid of a large number of government bureaucrats is almost inconceivable. Maybe there are other reasons that make it difficult to stimulate research using prizes, but I do know that there are cases in which public money has been used to reward success: it is the case of feed-in tariffs for renewables.

In the early times of PV, governments would support renewables by paying a fraction of the cost of the plants. That was a mistake: if you give people money for the plant, that will be no incentive for the plant to be efficient. Actually, it will be an incentive to buy oversized plants and to pay too much for them. That period saw some considerable squandering or public money, at least for some cases I know of in Italy.

Instead, think about the feed-in tariff. The government pays you in proportion to what you produce; that's a tremendous enticement to be efficient, to use the best technology and to bargain to get the best prices for the plant. It is, in a way, a prize. The government pays for success - if your plant is no good it is bad for you, but not for the taxpayer. And success speaks for itself: the government doesn't need to pay people to check that your PV panels are real panels and not wood planks painted in blue.

So, I believe that the feed-in tariff, so much criticized by Gates and others, has been an excellent idea; a rare case, nowadays, on the part of governments. The rapid development of renewables - both in total power installed and efficiency - of the past years has been the result of this idea. Of course, the level of support has to be carefully weighted: if the tariff is too high then the market is distorted and plenty of problems arise, as it has happened in Spain. But, on the whole, we are doing very well and we should think twice before we try to fix something that works.

http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/theoildrum/~3/Ei4vWIn7AfE/6931

There is not much new to report, except that Tropical Storm Hermine has hit northern Mexico, so I will re-run yesterday's post.

The BOP has been brought to the surface and is being examined as forensic evidence at a NASA facility in Louisiana.

The next step two steps are

1. 
   Controlling the well at the source through the intersecting relief well, and


2. Putting the well into reserve status through a "plugging and abandonment" procedure, under the oversight of the Department of Interior and the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management.

This was the discussion of the timeline from Saturday's press conference. The relief well is to be started some time this week, at a time that has not yet been determined.

Question: When do you think drilling will resume on the relief well and do you have any concerns about the thunderstorms kicking up in the far southwest part of the Gulf?

Thad Allen: Well we're continuing to watch those thunderstorms. And I might add I just got a note that the capping stack is safely secured above on the Discoverer Enterprise. In response to your question, we need to reinstall the riser pipe to the Blow Out Preventer and at that point there are some diagnostics that will be attempted to further understand the condition of the well.

At that point BP will present a way forward. It will be renewed [reviewed?] by the science team in conjunction with the Bureau of Ocean and Energy Management. And we will make a decision on the next couple of steps.

We will be in a position as we go into the next week to begin the relief well. But we will make sure that any steps that are necessary before that will be taken and coordinated with BOEM. So, we're in a period here where we're kind of moving with two coordinating structures and making sure we both understand what's going on moving forward.

But we should be ready to move forward with the relief well again sometime this next week. What I would hope once we get the BOP on deck finish the riser installation. We will give you a firm timeline. But I'd like to hold off right now until we get all that information completed.

Berm Progress

You may remember the plans for sand berms off the coast of Louisiana to protect against spilt oil. We noticed this article yesterday, discussing their limited progress to date.

As Jindal attempts to get permits to expand the project — plus more funding to transform the sandy sections, called berms, into longer-term barrier islands — the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is collecting comments from environmentalists and federal agencies. Many of them questioned the idea when it was first proposed and continue to challenge the project even as it is well under way.

So far, the state has spent about a third of the money reserved for the project and has built about one-tenth of the berms, according to records from state and federal agencies. The state Department of Natural Resources reports that it has written slightly more than $120 million in checks as of Sept. 2 from the $360 million that oil giant BP set aside for the berms.

About 3.6 miles of berms have been built, leaving about 31 more miles to be done under the current permit, according to the Aug. 30 daily report to the corps by contractor Shaw Environmental and Infrastructure Group, which received the contract to manage the project and construct the berms.

So it sounds like the controversial project is barely started, now weeks after the oil has been contained, and way over budget.

Tropical Storm Hermine

Chuck Watson (on our staff) reports:

Tropical Storm Hermine has formed in the Bay of Campeche, and will be quickly moving north towards the Texas/Mexico border. Latest data shows tracks shifting to the north, so a landfall between Corpus Christi and Brownsville seems likely. It is probably not going to reach hurricane strength before landfall, but in today's cautious environment will undoubtably force a few evacuations and shutdowns. These are unlikely to exceed 15% of US Gulf of Mexico production, and will not persist much past the end of the week. The waves and winds are well within the design specifications for offshore assets, so no significant longer term damage or disruption is expected.