Comments on: America is Running Out of Electricity

By: America is Running Out of Electricity | Skeptics Global Warming

America is Running Out of Electricity | Skeptics Global Warming — Thu, 14 Feb 2008 13:55:27 +0000

[...] http://www.intellectualconservative.com/2008/02/11/america-is-running-out-of-electricity/ [...]

By: Ogre’s Politics and Views » Out of Energy?

Ogre’s Politics and Views » Out of Energy? — Wed, 13 Feb 2008 14:03:22 +0000

[...] Alan Caruba points out that we're rapidly running out of energy. He certainly points out the obvious — that the greens are using their religion, not facts, and they're slowly destroying this country. Of course, if the greens have their way, we will return to a time before the industrial age when we were all hunters and gatherers. [...]

By: Jeff D.

Jeff D. — Tue, 12 Feb 2008 16:43:27 +0000

I work in the power industry as a plant operator and it is true that all the green energy sources cannot compete with coal or nuclear for industrial growth and sustainability but they do have their place in the world. They are good for community development and projects etc. Let's talk about shale oil for a moment. The United States is in possession of the world's largest shale oil reserve. It's located under the states of Colorado, Utah, and Wyoming. There is more shale oil there than there is crude oil in the Middle East. It is recoverable and refinable but the process is more technical requiring alot of water in the process which the "Greenies" are using to shoot down any chance of making this happen. If we were allowed to refine shale oil WE would be selling oil to the Middle East when their crude reserves ran out, that is how much we have. I think that "Greenies" live in a dream world and they don't realize what it would be like to live in a Third World country with out power. I also believe alot of them are just jumping on the trendy, current "Global Warming" band wagon. We need to invest in renewable resource technologies for use at an individual/community level(I WISH I could afford a PV panel/wind turbine system for my house) and loosen up regulation concerning refining of shale oil, and coal/nuke plant construction. It has to be a combined effort on several different fronts to break free from this Mid-Eastern stranglehold.
Oh yes…and DON't tell me what type of light bulb I should be allowed to burn in my house.

By: spencertk

spencertk — Tue, 12 Feb 2008 15:21:49 +0000

Mr. Caruba has his facts regarding US population growth hopelessly wrong (by more than an order of magnitude). It's actually slightly less than 1% per annum.

As for his comment that the laws of physics preclude us from EVER being able to meet our energy needs from renewables, Mr. Caruba needs to learn to never say "never".

Yes, the US uses about 100 quads/annum of energy (all of it supplied by "physics"). Here is an interesting chart filled analysis: http://www.eia.doe.gov/emeu/aer/eh/total.html The world overall uses somewhere over 400 quads and the rate of increase in annual consumption is quite rapid. Hence, world demand will dominate what are essentially globally priced energy commodities. Electricity is the exception and the biggest ace-in-the-hole that the US has.

The annual solar irradiance that falls on the US is enormous and capturing even a tiny fraction can easily meet our energy needs, including that of increased electrical demand for primary transportation. The limiting factors are no longer technological but are of course primarily economic. As cost competitive technologies appear, they will be utilized (unless inhibited by governments). The kinds of artificial shortages noted in the article only speed the process of investing in alternative technology.

Energy costs per unit are rising faster than the capital costs for advanced solar, wind and storage technologies. Ultimately, an economic crossover will occur where the ROI on invested capital will be sufficient to make it profitable to invest. We are very close to that point now and projected near term improvements in capital cost efficiency portend some major shifts in investment 3-10 years from now. Many are making the investment now and creating an advantage by being an early adopter.

By: Raymond Ingles

Raymond Ingles — Tue, 12 Feb 2008 13:38:31 +0000

Dean – You're right! I'm hopelessly naive… except for the tiny fact that I've been proposing major expansion of our use of nuclear power, over and over again, in the clearest terms humanly possible. Go ahead, read what I wrote, try to prove me wrong. I dare you.

I'm seriously starting to wonder here – is anyone actually reading what's being written, or are people just spouting pre-programmed boilerplate in a stimulus-response mode?

Maybe I just don't fit in the standard categories. I believe we're making ourselves spoiled and weak and terribly vulnerable by staying hooked on fossil fuels as our primary energy sources. But I'm not an anti-nuke whacko either. Can anyone here imagine that it's possible that our energy strategy can have more than one dimension?

By: ElKoz

ElKoz — Tue, 12 Feb 2008 11:41:59 +0000

Many in the public arena are working on the assumption that the greenies actually believe this nonsense that "alternative fuels" are a viable option. Only those at the bottom of their totem pole are true believers. The top of the totem pole merely use this as a ploy to hide their true agenda, which is irrational and misanthropic. As for oil supplies running out any time soon, we have to believe in the biotic theory of petroleum. If we had believed the estimates of the total amount of the world’s oil reserves in 1950 we would have run out of oil decades ago. By the 1960’s the estimates of what was left was substantially higher than the 1950 total estimate. Furthermore, we had already used amounts substantially higher than the 1950 estimates. Each decade the pattern repeated. I personally subscribe to the abyssal abiotic theory of petroleum. The fact of the matter is that the best, most reliable and apparently, most “sustainable” energy source was in the past, is now and will in the future be oil. I know geologists have battled for years over this, but I also think that time is proving that it is true. Will other technologies be developed and used in the future….of course….if those technologies can be financially viable on their own. Wind power, solar power, biofuels are not only financially un-viable, they are incapable of providing the world’s energy needs. The fact of the matter is, to quote Australia’s Viv Forbes, “The public has been misled on this issue by an unholy alliance of environmental scaremongers, funds-seeking academics, sensation-seeking media, vote-seeking politicians and profit-seeking vested interests.”

By: Dean

Dean — Tue, 12 Feb 2008 02:55:57 +0000

Either Ingles and his ilk or hopelessly naive or he lives on another world. There are no other alternatives to oil or coal or LNG or Nuclear energy. Simply, NONE! For small amounts of energy, yes you can maybe supplement a small home with some wind or solar. But for mass industrial economic growth, there is NO substitute for carbon or atom power. NONE, get it through fat dumb heads you idiots. The sooner you accept it, the sooner we can drill in ANWR, off CA and FL and the eastern seaboard. Mine the coal and tar sands and build safer nuke plants and tell the arab/persian inbred neanderthals to effoff!

By: Raymond Ingles

Raymond Ingles — Mon, 11 Feb 2008 19:31:41 +0000

Mickey G – can you give me some places to start my investigation of actual recoverable quantities of fuel? I was basing my figures on: http://www.mms.gov/revaldiv/RedNatAssessment.htm "These estimates represent the potential quantities of undiscovered hydrocarbons that can be conventionally produced using existing or reasonably foreseeable technology, without any consideration of economic feasibility."

I provided some other links myself, too – you may wish to read them before you classify any of my proposals as 'science fiction'. Prototypes for every item I mentioned were built and run with 1970s technology. We can do quite a bit better now.

I'm sure we can get very creative about finding "supplies… when the price makes extraction feasible." But that means that the price has to go up substantially from where it is now, and higher energy prices are already widely recognized to be a drag on the economy. Since I'm asking for cites, I'll give one, too: http://www.eia.doe.gov/oiaf/economy/energy_price.html

By: Mickey G

Mickey G — Mon, 11 Feb 2008 18:58:17 +0000

Raymond, please check your figures since they are out of date and incomplete. Among the things left out are shale, tar sands, coal (yes it can be turned into oil), and new discoveries. The actual "recoverable" amounts are an order of magnitude larger than your estimate without accounting for new discoveries.

Let's go a step further and look at alternate fuels beyond the ethanol hysteria. Butanol can be substituted for gasoline on a one to one basis. It can be made from corn but who wants to starve the world by using food stuffs to create an alternate fuel. Biomass like hemp grows without fertilizer and doesn't need to be on the most fertile farmlands. Hmmm, maybe there are some solutions insteand of inane hand wringing.

I am afraid you are reading too much science speculation or maybe science fiction. In regard to your comment about environmental regulation…yes, it is a major problem as politicians buy votes, however one thing we forget is that electricity is dramatically underpriced, as is oil and water. You will be amazed at the supplies that open up when the price makes extraction feasible.

By: Raymond Ingles

Raymond Ingles — Mon, 11 Feb 2008 18:10:03 +0000

Um, Mickey G – The 'short supply' is not just a function of environmental regulation. Let's say we repeal all of it – every environmental law and regulation is gone. We can go after all the oil in the Pacific, Atlantic, and Gulf of Mexico, for example. And we'll further assume that the current maximum estimates of what's technically recoverable are correct – we get 85 billion barrels of oil.

That would last us only 12 years at the current rate of usage… and, as you note, energy demand is not expected to decrease or just remain stable. I rather hope the United States continues for longer than that.

We need energy, yes. But we can get energy in other ways that don’t make us critically dependent on a resource that has a price and supply controlled, or at least strongly influenced, by powers not friendly to our interests. Nuclear power (and nuclear rockets enabling cheap solar power satellites) could drastically cut our need for oil. I find it funny that you're lumping me in with environmental activists when I am loudly calling out for a major expansion of our use of nuclear power.