[extropy-chat] peak oil schmeak oil

[Hal Finney]

Spike writes:
> Woohooo!  Toyota has solved our peak oil problems.
> http://www.cnn.com/2005/AUTOS/06/17/toyota_fuel_cell.reut/index.html
>
> Unfortunately the car will cost 50k, but I see a lot
> of beemers and Mercedes and such buzzing around that
> cost more than that.  And of course they don't actually
> eliminate pollution, but they do move it elsewhere, such
> as the site where the hydrogen is being made, using 
> nuclear or coal-fired plants.  So who needs oil anyway?

The main problem is building the hydrogen distribution network.
But you're right, oil is not much used for electricity, mostly natural
gas, coal and nuclear.  Hydrogen can be made from electricity or from
natural gas.  However natural gas is showing some signs of running out
too and probably won't last a lot longer than oil.

> My contention is that before these kinds of solutions
> are widely implemented, we will plow up much of the
> American midwestern grasslands, divert rivers inland
> and plant it all in corn.

And we will use the corn to generate alcohol for vehicles.  I agree
that this makes more sense than switching to hydrogen.  Another good
approach is biodiesel.  Most of the car companies are going to come out
in a couple of years with diesel hybrids, which as we discussed here
make good engineering sense and will get 50-70 MPG.

The L.A. Times had an article Wednesday about Brazil's success with
alcohol fuels,
http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/la-fi-ethanol15jun15,1,6833300.story.
They have an advantage because of using sugar cane, which grows well in
that climate.  The article mentions the need in the U.S. for research into
creating ethanol from cellulose, so that agricultural waste and grasses
can be used directly.  If we could get that working then it might not
be necessary to do much replanting, we could be much more efficient in
using our existing agricultural byproducts.

I've seen the same kind of claims from biodiesel proponents, who envision
algae ponds fed by unused animal parts and such, with the algae dried
and pressed to produce vegetable oil that can be processed into diesel.
In principle you can convert a few percent of existing farm acreage and
replace all the oil currently being used.

All of these changes will require big infrastructure investments, but
hopefully if oil prices stay high we will start to see the motivation
to switch.  Brazil's ethanol fuels are supposedly cheaper than gasoline,
although it wasn't 100% clear whether that is a free market price.  But if
so then that should be a target for American investors.  They don't need
Congressional mandates, they need a technology that can undercut oil, and
the confidence that oil prices will stay high so that their investments
won't be wasted.  Hopefully after another year or two of high prices
the confidence will be there and we will see more movement in this area.

Hal