More Energy Speculation

[GliderGuider]

This post speculates on one out of many possible developments the global energy mix over the next 23 years.

I used the BP Statistical Review 2013 data as always. I started by doing some judicious curve fitting based on the last 17 years of actual global energy consumption. I say "judicious" because for each energy source I chose a different curve fit. For fossil fuels and nuclear power I chose fits that minimized probable consumption. For hydro and renewables I used fits that maximized their probable contribution.



As you can see, nuclear power disappears entirely in about 20 years. Renewable power increases by 1250% by 2035. Hydro goes up by 140%, coal and gas by about 50% each. Oil shows signs of peaking in about 2025, and ends up right where it is today.

In the case of coal it's worth noting that I used a linear fit that minimized the effect of the last 10 years of Chinese growth, in favour of a more moderate scenario that incorporates the 7 years of low growth from 1995 to 2002.

It's also worth noting that the only downward glitch in the recent fossil fuel consumption curves was caused by the 2008-2009 global recession.

The following pie charts show the changing percentages of the energy mix:



Renewables gain major shares, and oil loses out. Gas and coal stay in the race. Nuclear power is not in the picture for 2035.

The next column chart shows the relative performance of fossil fuels and low carbon energy:



Low carbon energy goes from 13% of the mix to 26%, and increases its absolute contribution by by 220% even with the loss of nuclear power.

Despite that impressive gain, and even with oil consumption peaking in the next decade or so, the consumption of fossil fuels overall increase by 30% between now and 2035.

I hasten to stress that this is just one of an infinite number of possible scenarios. It may be worth thinking about though, because it uses fairly optimistic assumptions regarding the relative growth rates of renewables and fossil fuels. It's also based on the realistic principles that the near future will probably look much like the recent past, and that human nature is fairly constant - especially where the desire for economic growth and the ability to deny consequences are concerned.

Concerns About Carbon

The worrying thing is what this scenario implies about CO2 emissions. Because those emissions would not be declining, atmospheric CO2 levels under this scenario would be at least 450 ppmv by 2035 (compared to a "supposedly safe" level of 350 or less), and would by rising by 3 ppmv/year compared to 2.25 ppmv/year today.

The big problem we (and all life on the planet) have is that once CO2 gets into the atmosphere, it stays there pretty much permanently, at least from the point of view of living organisms. Based on the ice core record, natural processes remove about 1 ppmv each millennium. Getting 450 ppmv back down to the "supposedly safe" level of 350 would take around 100,000 years. If the above scenario plays out, by 2035 that horizon could be receding by an additional 3,000 years each year.

And of course there are also the methane feedbacks to consider.

The floor is open for suggestions.

[hunter]

1. As they say in the ER, one way or another the bleeding always stops.

It's anyone's guess what will be written on this civilization's death certificate, but the root cause will be human population and economic growth fed by fossil fuels.

This kind of "productivity" is not a good thing.

[GliderGuider]

2. I've tried to guess at the energy future before

Last edited Thu Oct 17, 2013, 09:14 AM - Edit history (3)

Most notably six years ago in my early article World Energy and Population Trends to 2100. With six years of hindsight, that analysis was close in some ways but off in others, as is typical for such efforts. At that time I hadn't appreciated how much of a catastrophe climate change would turn out to be. I was mostly concentrating on Peak Oil - which is one of the things I miscalled. I also underestimated the growth of renewable energy by quite a lot.

One big question for me now is how much coal there is still available - I don't think the world is close to peak consumption yet. The other big one is whether we can find a way for low carbon energy to displace fossil fuel use, instead of just adding to it as is now the case. I'm deeply pessimistic about that.

I now think that the only thing that will drive a wholesale change in humanity's energy use patterns is a global economic crisis or collapse driven by climate change. Given how advanced climate change is already, we may not have enough time left before that happens for incremental adjustments to make much difference.

[CRH]

3. Hi Glider, just a comment on peak oil, ...

Many now believe that the peak oil theory has been disproven, but I disagree with this interpretation. Instead, I believe peak oil has been illustrated and confirmed. Peak oil theory always acknowledged non conventional forms of oil, and that there would be a period beyond peak that would try to adjust through the exploitation of non conventional oil.

Peak oil from conventional sources and methods, did indeed occur in 2006. Since passing peak NG near 2000, and without acknowledging the validity of the peak oil theory, TPTB allowed a long known method of NG extraction to be used. Simultaneously a conversion to NG for more electric generation, and a PR promotion that NG was the 'clean energy' of the future. These were all actions, some would say desperate, that tried to soften the economic reality of an unsustainable energy future using past methods and minerals.

How else could we allow our depleting ground water supplies to be compromised, and the environment be fouled, while employing methods of fracturing, shale oil extraction and tar sands? These actions are actions of desperation that to me, confirm the stresses of peak oil and peak North American NG. Futile actions of desperation to continue supplying cheap energy to an unsustainable global economy and model.

Where I feel peak oil theory missed the boat, was most of the consequence was thought to be an economic crises causing an eventual collapse of global social order and civilization. In retrospect we have learned the real peak hydro carbon level for the planet should have been calculated not on supply, demand and economy, but rather on the limits to the pollution from its use. How much hydrocarbon energy could human civilization use, without altering the climate that supported their activity?

Scientists have known about the problems associate with atmospheric carbon for over a century, and have known of rising global temperatures as long, and both were publicly acknowledged in the first years of television in the fifties. As well, the first MIT, Limits of Growth paper sponsored by the Club of Rome, indicated that environmental pollution would greatly effect the future capacity of growth. The BAU scenario inferred a collapse of economy and population after the first half of the twenty first century, and by gosh, the calculations appear to be right on schedule.

There has been a rather constant 'diversion of attention' from the known facts of the age and limitations of hydrocarbon use for energy, as well as the environmental consequences of accumulating atmospheric carbon. Peak oil exists and is being illustrated now, global carbon pollution exists and is being illustrated now. Both theories are proving themselves, daily.

[GliderGuider]

4. Yeah, I fell victim to the "economic collapse" view of PO as well.

I didn't understand that the global energy system would simply shift to lower-quality, higher-cost sources to keep the global exergy-degradation game running. The need to keep the system running has exacerbated the evolved human tendency to focus on short-term opportunities while ignoring long-term consequences.

I suspect this tendency is part and parcel of our evolved decision-making circuits. In order not to have to work out every problem logically (which is a high-cost activity in terms of time and mental processing), we evolved special-purpose neural circuits that help us make decisions in all kinds of areas - mate selection, solving status-related problems, various survival issues like finding food and shelter or seeking energy in general. In this case it's bitten us on the ass big time.

In the past, if an area became too polluted or resource-poor we could simply migrate away. Since that was always possible, we evolved to pay attention to the acquisition of the necessities of life, and not worry about the waste products. Lack of necessities can kill you in short order, but waste products were a lower-order problem. As a result we evolved an innate prioritization scheme in which waste products were ignored until they became a pressing issue. Because that prioritization happens at a deeply unconscious level (as it was evolved to do) it trumps most rational decision-making.

In the Pleistocene that evolutionary solution worked beautifully. In modern techno-circumstances where there is no "away" to move to it's proving to be deadly.

Only those few who really understand that we face an existential crisis are emotionally motivated to change their behavior. (As an aside, virtually all behavior changes are emotionally driven, reason is a very poor motivator.) Most people don't have the necessary visceral awareness, and as a result have no such motivation. Others see this sort of change as a threat to their current status, and as a result are emotionally motivated - by different neural circuits - to resist the change. The greater the threat to their status the greater the resistance.

As we've all seen, it's very easy for the high-status change-resisters to enlist the unmotivated (and ensure they remain unmotivated), because nobody wants to change if they don't have to. It's hard work. And since the change-resisters have the power that naturally accompanies high status, we get the Kochs, the Koch-suckers and the common man arrayed against the ecologists. Guess who wins?

This situation will change on a broad scale only when the situation becomes so dire, so visible, that it prompts that visceral awareness in those who are currently unmotivated. By then, of course, a lot of options will be closed to us. We can see and hear the doors closing already, as they have been for the last 50 years or more.