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Jack_Burton
10/28/09

In reply to Love Mad Max? You Could Be Living It Soon Enough

Ahem... Blood Car. #dystopia
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gigshaft
10/28/09

In reply to Love Mad Max? You Could Be Living It Soon Enough
Recently BP discovered a huge deposit of oil under the Gulf of Mexico containing tens of billions of barrels of oil. The catch? It's seven miles down. You'd have to develop new technology to create a seven-mile drill, but that's just what they've done.

The upside: to paraphrase one scientist on the project, "I don't believe in peak oil, only peak technology."

The downside: it's not cheap, and no, you can't make it viable for $1.50 a gallon.

The other upside: the fact that you can't do it cheap will (hopefully) make other forms of energy seem more attractive.

This idea that we'll wake up one morning to find the oil tap has run dry is an easy myth to scare ourselves into action, but reality will be much more complicated than Mad Max. (Though probably not as bad-ass.) #dystopia
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Klebert L. Hall
10/28/09

In reply to Love Mad Max? You Could Be Living It Soon Enough
Look folks, here's the thing. Anybody out there not think the oil companies are greedy? Anyone?

If peak oil was imminent, they'd be hoarding and price-gouging. You can really, really, count on it. The only reason not to hoard and price-gouge is if you think there's still too much lead-time before the prime hoard/gouge era, and you don't want to make alternatives economically feasible too soon.

Besides, Peak Oil being a "crisis" is pretty much 100% myth. It'll hurt the economy some, and that's about it. There's still plenty of coal around (no, really, centuries worth). Coal can not only be used for many of the fuel/energy purposes of petroleum, it can also be made into petroleum. The process become economically viable around $4-$5 per gallon. We already know that gasoline prices like that don't cause the end of civilization, since Europe pays a lot more, and all it means is that only rich people can have cars that aren't crappy little shitboxes.

So, no end of civilization, no end of plastics feedstocks, no need to worry, really.

If you're really desperate to worry about Peak Oil, about the only rational way is to worry about environmental impact. Regular oil is way cleaner than coal and synthetic oil.
-Kle. #dystopia
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Dr Emilio Lizardo
10/27/09

In reply to Love Mad Max? You Could Be Living It Soon Enough
Too expensive to drive? Here in the US, I bet you could get $10 a gallon for gas with no appreciable decrease in traffic. It's a big country and for all the noise about concentrated population, most people live far enough from the workplace that they are dependent on the automobile. My commute is 8 - 15 miles. Shorter than many, but not practical in the midwest winter.
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Edited by Dr Emilio Lizardo at 10/27/09 6:05 PM Dr Emilio Lizardo was starred

AusJeb
10/28/09

@Dr Emilio Lizardo: Considering the shifts in behavior that we saw last year with $4/gallon gas and $140 bbl oil, I'm certain that we'll see more dramatic and sustained shifts with $10 gas, such as: more fuel efficient cars and other vehicles, more use of public transit, more cycling, and living patterns and land use that support those behaviors. #dystopia
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Dr Emilio Lizardo
10/28/09

@AusJeb: Perhaps in the cities. Like most others in the suburbs, I can not live without my car. I can not earn a living without it. There is no bus that goes anywhere near my home or office. I live approximately 5 miles from the nearest grocery store - a long walk, especially with several bags of groceries or in 10 degree weather or in rain/snow. The traffic in my area has only increased in the 10 years I have been here. There were no changes in behaviour that I could see when gas was $4/gallon last year. I'll pay what they ask or I will have to move and it would have to get awfully bad for that to happen. If I had to move, I likely would not be the only one so I would take a substantial loss - possibly tens of thousands of dollars so I would have to derive a huge financial benefit in terms of gas savings to consider it. A more fuel efficient car only goes so far - cutting my gas consumption by 250 gallons a year (which would mean doubling my mpg) at $4 a gallon only saves $1000. The premium on a hybrid is more than that.

Tens of millions of suburbanites in this country are in the same situation. #dystopia
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Jeremy Tapsell
10/27/09

In reply to Love Mad Max? You Could Be Living It Soon Enough
Wait, wait.. Am I going to be living Mad Max, or Faranheit 451?

I is confus-ed. #dystopia
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vinylrake
10/27/09

@Jeremy Tapsell: Well either one is good news. If we are living our lives indoors addicted to watching entertainment on floor to ceiling monitors we won't need as much gas, and if there's enough gas to use it for burning books the shortage can't be that bad. On the other hand if it's a Mad Max future, there will be lots of books to read because if oil is that scarce no one is going to waste it burning books. #dystopia
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disatess
10/27/09

@Jeremy Tapsell: forgot 2012 . #dystopia
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lightninglouie
10/27/09

In reply to Love Mad Max? You Could Be Living It Soon Enough
I know Patton Oswalt made fun of his crummy hometown movie critic for pointing it out, but I always did wonder: If refined gasoline was so hard to come by in the Mad Max universe, then where did Humongous and his army find the wherewithal to go tear-assing around the place? #dystopia
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Pope John Peeps II
10/27/09

@lightninglouie: I take exception to Patton Oswalt making "fun" of anything. The most he's ever done for me is make "moderate boredom". #dystopia
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RepoMan84
10/27/09

@lightninglouie: What we didn't see is that when there wasn't anyone around to intimidate and steal fuel from, they were riding bicycles and maybe a moped here and there. Wez and his blonde buddy on a tandem or Humongous riding his favorite recumbent didn't quite have the same effect as roaring V8 musclecars, so when gas was at stake they rolled out the big machines.
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gigshaft
10/28/09

@lightninglouie: By stealing gas from rag-tag settlers with Oliva Netwon-John headbands, duh. #dystopia
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Turlough
10/27/09

In reply to Love Mad Max? You Could Be Living It Soon Enough
I am not in any way saying that we shouldn't worry about peak oil, but I will say that it won't be the end of civilization. This may sound like delaying the inevitable, but there's still lots of coal (where most of the U.S. electricity still comes from, not oil) and natural gas. The U.S. alone has recoverable natural gas resources to supply itself for 100 years at current levels of consumption. At the current extraction rate, the entire planet has about 132 years of coal. Assuming increased consumption, about 56 years. I'd hope that hitting peak oil would give us the kick in the pants to go after wind, solar, geothermal, tidal, and nuclear power options aggressively while coal and natural gas keep our civilization going. They're not the cleanest things in the world, but we're getting better in those areas, too. #dystopia
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Aidan_
10/27/09

@Turlough: The worry, to my mind, is not that we won't find alternate forms of fuel, but that we won't be able to produce abundant plastic material anymore. That's become extremely important for us here in the West, and I haven't heard a good alternative from any sector as of yet. #dystopia
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Franklin Harris
10/27/09

In reply to Love Mad Max? You Could Be Living It Soon Enough
The current rise in the price of oil has nothing to do with oil and everything to do with the dollar. Oil is priced in dollars internationally. The dollar is losing value because of the Obama administration's spending policies and the Federal Reserve's interest rate policies. Thus, the price of oil is going up because the value of the dollar is in free fall. #dystopia
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Pope John Peeps II
10/27/09

@Franklin Harris: That's idiotic. There's price fluctuations in a commodity, and then there's the basic availability of a commodity. Oil as a material will eventually run out. Maybe in 50 years, maybe in 250. But when it starts to, we have to be prepared. #dystopia
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Franklin Harris
11/02/09

@Pope John Peeps II: That has nothing to do with what is currently going on with the price of oil, which has nothing to do with supply and even nothing to do with speculation about future supply. This is a short-term spike that has everything to do with the devaluation of the dollar. It's exactly why there is a lot of talk (especially in China) of dropping the dollar as the world's reserve currency, however unlikely that is to actually happen anytime soon. #dystopia
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Strick
10/27/09

In reply to Love Mad Max? You Could Be Living It Soon Enough
Fortunately, we're discovering massive reserves of natural gas. Not quite as flexible as oil, but cleaner and usable it in cars, etc. with existing technology.

[www.technologyreview.com] (There's much more to be discovered offshore in the Gulf, BTW)

You may remember Boone Picken's proposal to switch to a natural gas economy last year. The US could be self-sufficient with a combination of natural gas, nuclear and renewable resources in fairly short order. Then, if you're willing to clean up coal...

Remind me of this energy provoked social break down again in 100 years or so.

(PS, oil prices are ticking up due to the dollar is taking it in the shorts -- those staggering deficits remember? -- rather than any sudden change in availability.) #dystopia
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Arryma
10/27/09

In reply to Love Mad Max? You Could Be Living It Soon Enough
I am gravely disappointed.

Again you have made me unleash my dogs of war.

Look at what remains of your gallant scouts. Why? Because you're selfish! You hoard your gasoline.

Now, my prisoners say you plan to take your gasoline out of the Wasteland. You sent them out this morning to find a vehicle. A rig big enough to haul that fat tank of gas.

What a puny plan! #dystopia
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OW-Holmes:Bringer of Fear
10/27/09

@Arryma: It is the Ayatollah of rock and rolla himself! #dystopia
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OW-Holmes:Bringer of Fear
10/27/09

In reply to Love Mad Max? You Could Be Living It Soon Enough
I told my wife raising our children to be feral, razor boomerang throwing crazies would come in handy. #dystopia
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OMG! Ponies!
10/27/09

In reply to Love Mad Max? You Could Be Living It Soon Enough
Umm, some of us have Honda Insights that get more than 50 mpg with 80,000 miles on them. I say bring on the $300/barrel oil. #dystopia
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OW-Holmes:Bringer of Fear
10/27/09

@OMG! Ponies!: I'll remember that after my gang of leather clad toughs steal it and rough you up. #dystopia
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OMG! Ponies!
10/27/09

@Srynerson: If so, that would be so wicked awesome. #dystopia
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KhaiJB
10/27/09

In reply to Love Mad Max? You Could Be Living It Soon Enough
about time.... #dystopia
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Chip Overclock
10/27/09

In reply to Love Mad Max? You Could Be Living It Soon Enough
Whether you believe we've reached Peak Oil or not (and no one can know for sure, except perhaps in retrospect), one thing for sure: there's a limited supply of oil in the ground, so eventually we'll run out. Whether it's in 2030 or 3030, who knows? But it's worth pondering the implications.

And it's not enough for there to be oil in the ground. It has to be economically extractable: it has to take less energy than is in a barrel of oil to extract a barrel of oil. Otherwise, its a net loss energy-wise.

It's astounding the stuff we make from oil: not just fuel (and hence: virtually all transportation and heating), not just plastics (and hence: virtually all consumer goods and packaging), not just lubrication (and hence: virtually the entire manufacturing base), but commercial fertilizer and all other sorts of petrochemicals on which we've come to depend.

I sometimes wonder of running out of oil is one of the factors that explain the Fermi Paradox. #dystopia
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burlybax
10/27/09

@Chip Overclock: With the Fermi Paradox, I think it relates simply by comparing the ablility to manage and maintain natural resources to a simple task. And having the ability to detect and locate alien life as a complex task. If we cannot handle a simple task how can we handle a complex one. As a species we are irresponsible and no where near as advanced as we like to think. The impending energy crisis makes that an obvious point. IMO #dystopia
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Anekanta - Go Play!
10/27/09

@Chip Overclock: I'm sure it's an important factor--complex life (as we know it) can't evolve without an abundance of water and oxygen. Similarly, high technology (as we know it) can't be developed without an abundance of energy. #dystopia
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lazyeight
10/27/09

@Chip Overclock: This is something I've been thinking about. Where is the tipping point where the complex molecules in petroleum are worth more than the energy available from burning it? #dystopia
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Charlie Jane Anders
10/27/09

@Chip Overclock: My theory is that most civilizations in the universe use up all of their easily harnessed fuels on things like building shopping malls, before they can get around to exploring the stars. By the time they realize they have a limited window of opportunity to colonize space, it's already too late. #dystopia
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Chip Overclock
10/27/09

@Charlie Jane Anders: I've heard this compared to Easter Island: the Easter Islanders expended one of their most important natural resources, trees, in the building of those giant heads (as scaffolding, to roll the heads on, etc.) in something bizarrely like an arms race. When it was all said and done, they found themselves stuck on the island without the means to build a canoe. This is, IMO, yet another case of optimizing for the short term while ignoring long term. Unfortunately, Western Civilization has become very good at that.

Remember the Marshall Plan to rebuild Europe following WWII? I recall reading that the Plan was being formulated in the U.S. State Department long before we were involved directly in the war. That's the kind of long term thinking I'd like to see more of.

I was recently at a conference in Santa Fe New Mexico at which a representative from DARPA remarked that "we lost control of the hardware a long time ago, and now we're losing control of the software". By which he meant all the supercomputer manufacturers had gone out of business because all the money is in the commercial space. So now we have to figure out how to build supercomputers from commodity multicore whiteboxes. (Hint: unless your application is embarrassingly parallel -- like Google's MapReduce architecture -- and doesn't move a lot of data around, it doesn't map well to the Brave New Computational World.) This is another great example of how we've lost a possibly critical long term ability while succeeding marvelously in the short term.

(SOAPBOX MODE OFF) #dystopia
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Chip Overclock
10/27/09

@lazyeight: Excellent question. #dystopia
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Chip Overclock
10/27/09

@burlybax: I'd like to think you just rephrased my short term vs. long term optimization debate in clearer language.

But to be fair to those that may disagree with me (feel free, that's how I learn) it is _very_ hard to optimize for the long term, or to even know what the long term is. I see this in software product development all the time: how do you justify expending resources (e.g. developer time) to achieve a long term goal when you don't even know what the future holds? Better to do just enough to make the current iteration work, and worry about the future in the future, when presumably we'll have a better view of it.

Yeah, I'm perfectly capable of arguing both sides of that issue (and routinely do). #dystopia
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burlybax
10/27/09

@Chip Overclock: I agree, and especially when you talk about business and market trends.. But natural resources are something that should be considered in both long-term and short-term language. You have an immediate need, balanced with a desire to keep that need viable for as long as possible. We have flippantly disregarded our gluttonous use of oil and will end up paying the price. New and alternate energy sources will inevitably be used/discovered/created but the cycle will likely continue. But maybe this all another conversation for another place.. #dystopia
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Anekanta - Go Play!
10/27/09

In reply to Love Mad Max? You Could Be Living It Soon Enough
So, what you're saying is, I should open up a pig-farm to produce methane? #dystopia
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lazyeight
10/27/09

@Anekanta: We all should. What's not to like about fuel gas and bacon? #dystopia
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promet
10/27/09

@lazyeight: Mmmmm, dystopia bacon... #dystopia
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SpammerOvTheGods
10/27/09

@Anekanta: who runs Bartertown?

#@! #dystopia
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lightninglouie
10/27/09

@lazyeight: Mmmn. The future smells like southern Louisiana. #dystopia
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Anekanta - Go Play!
10/27/09

@SpammerOvTheGods: Master Blast... er, wait a minute... Anekanta Runs Barter Town! #dystopia
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