Posted on 11/14/2010 4:20:08 PM PST by WebFocus
It seems the panic time for both green enthusiasts and peak oil pundits.
According to a new paper by two researchers at the University of California – Davis, it would take 131 years for replacement of gasoline and diesel given the current pace of research and development; however, world's oil could run dry almost a century before that.
The research was published on Nov. 8 at Environmental Science & Technology, which is based on the theory that market expectations are good predictors reflected in prices of publicly traded securities.
By incorporating market expectations into the model, the authors, Nataliya Malyshkina and Deb Niemeier, indicated that based on their calculation, the peak of oil production could occur between 2010 and 2030, before renewable replacement technologies become viable at around 2140.
The estimates not only delayed the alternative energy timeline, but also pushed up the peak oil deadline. The researchers suggest some previous estimates that pegged year 2040 as the time frame when alternatives would start to replace oil, could be “overly optimistic".
As I pointed out before, despite the excitement and hype surrounding a future of clean energy, a majority of the current technology simply does not make economic sense for regular consumers and lack the infrastructure for a mass deployment….even with government subsidies, tax breaks, and outright mandates.
In addition, the supply chain of renewable technologies is not as green as people might think. Most alternative technologies rely on rare earths for efficiency. However, the radioactive waste produced by rare earths mining process makes oil sands look like a green energy. This overlooked (or ignored) fact just now received some attention due to the sudden shortage caused by China’s embargo and export quotas on rare earths.
(Excerpt) Read more at businessinsider.com ...
Well, the liberals will tell us that coal is dirty and we’re blowing up mountains in West Virginia to get it and all that. And they will say that nuclear is bad because of nuclear waste and Chernobyl(sp?) and, even though nuclear produces no greenhouse gases, it’s just too risky.
The liberals only favor solar energy. They say they favor electric cars, but when they find out that the huge quantities of electricity needed to power millions of electric cars in this country will be generated in coal fired power plants, they will turn against electric cars.
The liberals will interrupt and interfere with any solutions to our energy problems.
Ping.
Absolute crap.
The US is sitting on very large reserves of oil and coal. Oil is a political problem, not a resource problem.
Time to start building a hundred or so coal-to-liquids plants. The USA has a 200 year supply of coal and the technology to turn coal into oil distillates has existed since before WWII.
Experts have been saying that oil will only last another ten years...since the 1920s.
Experts have been wrong since the 1920’s... Seems that they keep finding more oil or better ways to get at it...
Agreed. The people that make claims like this are either idiots or lying through their teeth.
Yep. That is my point. The “Oil is doomed” folks have been saying this almost from the moment someone figured out how to distill petroleum in the late 19th century.
Most of the articles from Business Insider are.
Someone at FR is really flogging 'em, though.
Generally, I don't even click-through anymore, but the headlines usually promise something interesting -- sooner or later, I'll learn.
Oil as a finite resource is nothing more than an urban myth.
Science has shown that myth is not true, but it is obtusely politicaly incorrect to mention the white oily elephant in the room.
Oil is created around 200 miles below the earths surface. Some of the radioative elements play a part in the process. Helium is given off as a by product. The chemical process is not fully understood, but the geophysics are understood.
Oil is being replaced with oil that has vastly different chemical signatures than the original sources.
I laugh at these little dweebs who cannot face the truth.
We have at least one coal gassification plant-in North Dakota.
We can build more. We have a 1000 years supply of lignite coal.
I think I heard something like this 20-30 years ago....
Heh...right on! Experts say...garbage...for so many years...
Dang, yesterday I thought the Earth was flat!
These guys get such a chubby when the term “peak oil” is mentioned. BTW - Hasn’t that term been used since the 1920’s?
We burn our food for fuel but won’t drill for massive quantities of oil under our own land. There is something seriously wrong with this picture.
“This article strikes me as intellectual masturbation is the extreme.”
Yeah, for sure. There’s enough hydrocarbon (oil, gas, coal) reserves just here in the U.S. to last at least another one hundred years.
California has hundreds of years of oil, all we have to do is eliminate the excessive taxes and kill off the environmentalists!!!!
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