Re: International Energy Agency accepts Peak Oil (sortof)

From: Geoff T (geofft_at_mail.com)
Date: 11/19/04 

Date: 18 Nov 2004 19:36:51 -0800

"Tim O'Flaherty" <pinwheelsfudge@gwi.net> wrote in message news:<IsWdnV-Ex-8rPQHcRVn-3w@gwi.net>...
> "Geoff T" <geofft@mail.com> wrote in message
> news:d433f9a7.0411171743.4a3e3353@posting.google.com...

> > 2: Population adjustment through starvation. Death on an unimagined
> > scale due to greatly reduced levels of food production, processing and

> This also seems likely, along with disease to which a weakened population
> will have less resistance and less (or no) reliable water, sewage and
> medical facilities. In this the third world may have advantages over the
> industrialised nations since they have been living without modern hygenic
> amenities all along.
>

I forgot to consider the amount of energy we have to put into water
purification and transport. Even here in New Zealand where water is
fairly plentiful, the majority of us would get sick pretty quickly if
it wasnt treated. Obviously/hopefully water supply would get priority
if power demand exceeded supply.

>
> El Presidente says "The American way of life is not negotiable." In fact
> the American way of life is not sustainable. Accepting that and planning
> for a sensible future with downsized expectations seems the logical choice
> but also an unlikely one. While I don't subscribe to biblical prophecy it
> sure looks like the four horsemen are saddling up for a ride.

I liken the situation to multiplying organisms in a closed environment
(eg: bacteria in a petri dish). If you have a fixed resource (food)
and a breeding population, then population grows exponentially until
the food runs out, then everyone dies.

If you supply food at a constant rate, then the population will
increase to the point at which demand for food exceeds supply. After
that starvation sets in to reduce the population to a sustainable
level.

If you decrease the food supply rate, then you get a period of
mass-starvation.

Barring some miracle, those are the situations we are heading towards
sometime in the future. The reason is that we are consuming a limited
resource (oil) in order to provide an elevated level of food
production, both as a fuel for transportation and farm equipment and
as a feedstock for fertilizers, pesticides and herbicides.

I did some quick modelling of a population consuming a finite
resource, where the maximum extraction rate of that resource declines
over time (ie: the Peak Oil scenario). The only way I could find to
avoid mass deaths by starvation is to set the birth rate based on the
amount of remaining resources. There are a couple of downsides to
this: The policy has to be set early in the picture, when resources
are plentiful (and thus little incentive to institute draconian
fertility policies), and a society with a slowly dwindling population
would be a sad one to live in.

The problem is that in large groups, we are very stupid and
shortsighted. It is too late to try to manage our population growth
rate (although in some developed countries it is now negative). It
should have been done a generation or two ago - but those were the
days of seemingly limitless oil.

So what do the alternatives mean for the world?

The leaders of the powerful countries around the world must know that
the time will come where demand for energy will exceed supply. Then
the price will be set by supply/demand instead of a cartel.
Competition for the resource will set in.

The people setting political/military strategy in the US must realise
this. By having a strong military presence in the Middle East, the US
can influence or outright control what happens to the oil produced in
the region, thus enabling an extension of the American Way-of-Life at
the expense of other nations (I'm guessing that'll be mainly "Old
Europe", Russia and China).

The interesting thing will be what the responses of the EU, Russia and
China will be to energy competition. To what ends will they go to
secure the energy resources they need to feed their people and drive
their economies? All players have nuclear arsenals. How desparate
would a nation have to get before using them?

(I know this post has drifted off topic for these newsgroups, I'll now
attempt to drag it back :) )

I'm no expert in the oil industry, but from where I'm sitting it looks
as if humanity has bred like rabbits on food production greatly
enhanced by petro-chemicals. If we cannot sustain the extraction rate
of the resource which maintains our food production, then our
population will adjust downwards in a very unpleasant manner.

Therefore any serious attempt to look for alternative energy sources
has to also incorporate a population-reduction programme.

- Geoff

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