Peak Oil goes mainstream - Newsweek: CRUDE AWAKENING

[arcos]

Crude Awakening

A prominent physicist warns in a new book that the world is running out of oil and we’re not doing anything to stave off the coming crisis

WEB EXCLUSIVE
By Brian Braiker
Newsweek
Updated: 3:47 p.m. ET Feb. 17, 2004

Remember 1973? If you do, there are plenty of reasons to wish you didn’t. Chief among them (right after leisure suits) would be the oil crisis that began in October. The Middle Eastern OPEC nations stopped exports to the United States and other Western nations just as stateside oil production was peaking. The artificial shortage that followed had devastating effects: The price of gas quadrupled in the United States, climbing from 25 cents to more than a dollar, in a matter of months. The American Automobile Association reported that in one isolated week up to 20 percent of the country’s gas stations had no fuel; in some places motorists were forced to wait in line for two to three hours to gas up. The number of homes built with gas heat dropped.

<snip>

The prediction that it will peak—that is to say the crisis will come when we reach a peak when half the oil has been used up—that prediction quantitatively is unquestionably true. But the quantitative question of when the peak will occur depends on extremely undependable numbers. The so-called proven oil reserves as reported by various countries and companies around the world are often just guesses and they’re often not even honest guesses. Among those who would analyze those figures, some have predicted that it will come as early as this year; others, within this decade. It could possibly be in the next decade. But I think that’s about as far as you can push it.

<snip>

We had a peak once before—it was in 1973. The production in North American had reached its peak in 1970 and was declining. Supplies were not available in North America and the Arab countries embargoed the oil; they shut down the pipeline. We had an immediate, instantaneous panic, mile-long lines at gas stations and fear for the future of our way of life. That was an artificial, temporary peak. And it’s just a slight foretaste of what will happen when we reach the real peak and supplies start to decline and continue to decline forever.

<snip>

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4287300/

[Minstrel Boy]

1. When it starts to really hit home,

the White House won't need to hide behind fig leafs like "weapons of mass destruction" to justify its resource war. It's the oil, stupid will be enough.

[John_Shadows_1]

40. dude... `

I think the ramifications will be a little more serious than political ones.

[proud patriot]

2. :-(

:-(...Just a reminder ..bush's crawford ranch is set up
to be completey independent using alternative energy
methods .

http://www.tompaine.com/feature2.cfm/ID/9208

http://www.cnn.com/2001/ALLPOLITICS/04/12/press.column/

[KayLaw]

3. Oh, my!

I'd completely forgotten about that.

[proud patriot]

4. I added links in my post above

:-(

[derby378]

11. So, an oilman...

...used geothermal energy for his own home while pushing for increased oil acquisition overseas?

Does this joker know something he ain't telling us?

[DaBigJagov]

14. Time to start seriously..........

consider drilling in Alaska. That way, oil independence will assure we will never again be mired in another war for oil.

[mhr]

16. Alaska Is Not The Answer. Only Enough Oil For Six Months To Two Years!

The US uses roughly 20 million barrels of oil a day.

The ANWR reserve is estimated to have 3 to 16 billion barrels of oil.

Do the math:

16 billion / 20million/day = 800 days = 2.19 years

3 billion / 20 million/day = 150 days = 0.4 years

It makes no sense to despoil a wilderness for this paltry amount of oil.

Drilling in ANWR will not make the US energy independent.

And that is a fact Jack!

[Viking12]

17. Do you really beleive that

drilling in Alaska will lead to oil independence???? Not so according to the USGS (http://energy.usgs.gov/factsheets/ANWR/ANWR.):
Using the updated report and recent oil prices, the USGS estimated in 2000 that, assuming a price of $24 per barrel, there is a 95% chance of finding 1.9 billion barrels (BBO) of economically recoverable oil in the Arctic Refuge's 1002 Area; a 5% chance of finding 9.4 BBO; and a 50% chance of finding 5.3 BBO. (Present oil prices are ranging between $20 to $25 per barrel). Nearly 1 million barrels of oil a day are produced from the existing oil fields in areas west of the Arctic Refuge, and new production would compete with current production for space in the Alyeska Pipeline’s 1 million barrel per day carrying capacity.
Americans currently use 19 million barrels of oil each day. There is, therefore, a 50% chance of finding a 9-month's supply of oil in the 1002 Area, at $24 per barrel. The Department of Energy, estimates that daily consumption will rise to 24 million barrels per day. As of 1999, we imported roughly 11 million barrels per day or about 60% of our total daily oil. By 2020 that figure will rise to more than 17 million barrels per day or about 72% of our total daily oil. If the highest estimations were met, 11.8 billion barrels of ANWR oil were to be both technically & economically recoverable and transportable, oil production in ANWR could meet only 7 percent of the United State’s daily oil demand at projected 2020 consumption rates. The more probable production figures suggest that ANWR would generate a mere 1.5 percent of the nation’s daily oil needs by 2020. Even under the most optimistic ANWR scenario, the evidence shows that oil production in ANWR could not significantly reduce the United States dependence on foreign oil. The only way to reduce dependence on foreign oil is to reduce consumption in real figures.

[mhr]

18. Thanks Viking, See My Calculations Above

My numbers are generous.

The USGS estimates make the calculations even worse.

[Skittles]

23. READ THIS ARTILE AND GET EDUCATED

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4287300/

[Karenina]

36. Yup.

Heads up, kids. :kick:

[alittlelark]

43. How about we try to leave some for our kids and our grandchildren?

Plastics are essential in so many ways. There are alternative sources of energy, but how will they make plastics?

[OneTwentyoNine]

5. We could have nearly every car in the US running on E-85 in 10 years...

85% ethanol which can be produced from about every plant growing in the World. The other 15% would come from crude Oil. We could supply that small amount ourselves.

There are already about 20 vehicles which can run on this fuel,its also about 20 cents per gallon cheaper. High demand and actual competition from ethanol producers would keep the price lower. Its one hell of alot easier to make ethanol than drill a 3,000 foot hole in the ground half way around the World,or out in the Ocean.

David

[mhr]

8. Yes, But, We Cannot Grow Enough Crops To Meet The Demand

In other words, Ethanol is not a replacement for crude oil.

The following links will help educate on this issue.

These links are not for the faint of heart.

The looming truth hurts and will not go away.

Websites of interest include:

http://www.lifeaftertheoilcrash.net/Home.html
http://globalpublicmedia.com/
http://www.oilcrash.com/
http://www.wolfatthedoor.org.uk/
http://www.durangobill.com/Rollover.html
http://www.asponews.org
http://www.gulland.ca/depletion/depletion.htm
http://www.dieoff.org/
http://www.oilanalytics.org/
http://www.greatchange.org/
http://www.oilcrisis.com/
http://www.after-oil.co.uk/
http://www.hubbertpeak.com/
http://hubbert.mines.edu
http://www.museletter.com/archive/cia-oil.html

Energy Resources
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/energyresources/

Alas Babylon
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/AlasBabylon/

Running on Empty
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/RunningOnEmpty2/

[ignatius]

47. I visited an ethanol plant in Wisconsin last fall. I was told

that every acre of land in this country would have to be planted in corn just to meet U S demand. It is not a viable solution.

[stevedeshazer]

6. This is exactly why the fight for oil is on

Middle East and Caspian Sea.

Yes, I remember 1973 and the oil crisis. I was a college student commuting from my parents house. I used to park my Rambler in line at the service station the night before, pull my bike out of my trunk, and ride home, only to repeat the operation in reverse the next morning.

My state had a system based on your license plate number. Odd numbers could buy gas one day, even the next. No exceptions.

Those who remember might also recall that this was the new heyday of the previously unneeded locking gas cap. Gas prices tripled in short order.

It's a largely forgotten episode in the volume of stuff that brought Nixon down soon after. A lot of people at the time were plenty pissed that the Nixon administration didn't anticipate and plan for this.

[mhr]

13. The Caspian Sea Did Not Have The Expected Amount Of Oil, It's A Bust!

The Saudis are reported to be pumping flat out at maximum capacity.

Early reports from Iraq suggest that poor field management will reduce the amount of oil ultimately recoverable.

The reality is that the number and size of new discoveries has been declining for years. In other words as demand has risen steadily each year, new discoveries are not keeping pace. Petroleum geologists are saying that there is no easy oil left to find.

Time spent with the links posted above will illuminate the problem.

[stevedeshazer]

19. No shit?

I'll check it out, but did this happen about the time the US lost interest in Afghanistan?

No wonder we haven't invaded Kazakhstan yet! :-)

[reprehensor]

7. Hey all you NASCAR fans, wake up.

Turns out we don't have fuel to burn after all.

Imagine that.

[Taeger]

9. This could be a neo-con ploy

Pushing out all this peak oil stuff at a time like this could be a ploy to justify the Iraq invasion for the very reason that the President has denied - TAKING OIL!!!!

Of course, the White House will ALWAYS deny this. But their satellite agents could actively push the idea that America MUST colonize the Middle East in order to insure our own survival from a pre-mature "oil crash". Then, Bush will be seen as a hero who took this action to insure the "freedom and prosperity" of our oil chugging nation.

We here all know the solution is to invest in energy efficient technologies made right here in the US. Right wingers bash green policy as anti-growth and anti-business. In fact, Green policies create MORE jobs dedicated to using resources efficiently and recycling resources.

This leads to GREATER national security and more independence from foreign powers and international corporations that we depend on for "extracting" those resources from 3rd world nations. Instead, we can simply salvage the resources we ALREADY have instead of throwing them away.

We should tax the harvesting of RAW natural resources to encourage recycling. This will create LOTS of new jobs dedicated to recycling.

We should BAN clear-cutting. Contrary to timber industry claims, this isn't BAD for jobs ... it's GOOD for jobs. Environmentally aware methods of harvesting requires MORE labor. That's good for lumberjacks AND it's good for the environment. Furthermore, those areas will recover quicker and yield more lumber over the next 100 years.

We should items that COULD be made from recycled materials but AREN'T. Plastics, Paper and Glass. These are all materials that are 100% recyclable. Yet, we as a nation choose to SUBSIDIZE the harvesting of new resources instead of recovering those that we've already processed and disposed of. This taxation would provide a NATURAL market based solution that made recycling more profitable due to the higher price of non-recycled materials.

Landfill taxes. Tax landfill per-ton disposal more heavily. This will encourage local sanitation districts to REWARD citizens for diverting recyclable resources into economically PROFITABLE recycling instead of economic DRAINING landfilling. Currently, it's the other way around. Recycling is often a net drain on sanitation because they must PAY recyclers to take certain materials.

Of course, we must invest in the Apollo Alliance and generate MORE of our power from renewable (free) energy sources like solar and win. There are some promising technologies out their like wind collectors that our hoisted up into the jet stream where air currents are MUCH stronger. We should fund proof of concept deployment of these newer technologies.

We must DIRECTLY susidize grid-intertie electricity systems. This would allow a homeowner, business or government building to host it's own choices of energy renewable energy gathering equipment. They would allow power production by MILLIONS of consumers and thwart the energy trading Racket that has fleeced California of Billions.

Think about it. Peak energy usage is when everyone is using their air conditioners. At those times, solar output is the HIGHEST. It's a self scaling problem. Millions of solar collectors could generate excess capacity and avoid BILLIONS of dollars in cost from inflated "peak power" rates.

[hang a left]

32. I have been thinking about this for a few days now.

Why is peak oil sneaking in to the mainstream now? Then I foiled on it for a while. I came up with the idea that maybe they are gonna float the idea out there and see how the public is going to digest it. Then I was thinking that then they would try to rally the masses into agreeing to secure the remaining oil supplies. See if that would fly. Then I started thinking....It really gets scary when I do that. I break out the reynolds wrap and my family won't even come near me.

[aquart]

45. Public might wonder why conservation is NOT on the agenda.

Which is a question they don't want raised.

Because they sold us out to short term greed.

Rich old men who will be dead when the crisis comes. But they will have deluxe coffins.

[TennesseeWalker]

53. No. No ploy. It's real, and it will CHANGE EVERYTHING.

Not really enough time left to stave off the effects....

www.museletter.com

[proud patriot]

10. IMHO .. Our Government's foreign policy since 73 has been to hide this

from us .

[Old and In the Way]

27. Since 1973, National energy policy = oil = national security

This has been the centerpiece of Republican politics for 30 years.

This should be the defining issue of the 2004 campaign....a new Democratic vision of our future which requires a completely new energy policy. The upside to this is that it also provides the answer to our struggling domestic economy: a new investment in jobs to develop the technology and infrastructure.

A Republican oil energy vision means wars of occupation for a dead-end non-answer to our long term energy needs.

[proud patriot]

51. I couldn't agree more n/t

[derby378]

12. Hydrogen

The most common element - and fuel source - in the universe.

Let's find a method of harvesting/extraction that's not too dependent on fossil fuel and get to work. It beats having U-235 rods power our little vehicles all over the place...

[mhr]

15. Do The Research, Hydrogen Is Not The Answer

Why? Primarily because it takes to much energy to produce the hydrogen for use. In other words, creating Hydrogen is a net loss of energy due to creation and conversion.

Many articles have been published in the last year that deal honestly with the strengths and weaknesses of Hydrogen. The National Academy of Sciences (if memory serves) says that Hydrogen will not solve our problems.

The only thing that will save us (the US) is massive changes in energy usage and conservation.

Don't believe that, start reading the links provided.

The truth is out there.

[arendt]

21. Have you seen the research on Titanium Dioxide cracking of H2O?

Experiments show that if you bake TiO2 with just
a little carbon, you get a substance which splits
water when exposed to sunlight at efficiencies
approaching 10%.

TiO2 is pretty common stuff. The manufacturing
process is dead nuts simple. You make grids of
the stuff, pour water on the grids, and collect
the H2 and O2 as they come off.

Nothing bad gets produced, no CO2, no CH4, no
CO. Its solar-powered electrolysis.

Don't write off the hydrogen economy because you've
only seen big oil's version of it. They are trying
to wreck the idea.

arendt

[mhr]

24. Once One Understands EROEI, Technology Arguments Become Mute.

EROEI - Energy Returned On Energy Invested.

Simple Idea. Take all the energy invested to produce a given amount of energy and then measure the energy created.

If it takes more energy to produce than is generated, that means you have a net loss of energy, or negative EROEI.

None of the alternatives developed so far produce more energy than was used to create the energy, including Hydrogen.

Technology only makes the process more efficient and possibly economically viable for a short period of time.

Then what about oil. When one investigates the oil industry one discovers that the amount of energy used to explore, drill, pump, refine, and distribute the gas was less than the energy contained in the final product.

In other words, the endowment of the worlds oil from dead dinosaurs represented a massive stored source of concentrated energy. So far we have NO technology that can recreate this amount of energy without consuming more energy than will be created.

Start reading the links provided and decide for yourself.

[porkrind]

39. Another interesting technology

that looks promising is the "plasma focus," basically a way of generating electricity directly from a pulse of fusion energy.

Evidently these already work and generate temperatures and X-ray emmisions that indicate true fusion is occuring. Clean. No nasty radioactive waste. Electricity is generated directly from the x-ray blast.

Looks like the oil industries worst nightmare. A 1MW power plant the size of a garage. ;)

http://www.focusfusion.org

[mhr]

44. Great If It Yields Net Energy, The Web Site Seems Long On Promise And

Short on specifics.

Please keep us abreast of results.

[ignatius]

48. What about windfarms? I read an article, I thought on the

government webpage, that there is enough wind to be harnessed in 3 states to supply the entire United States.

You seem well versed in conservation, do you know about this? Is that an accurate picture?

[treepig]

20. get ready for more pollution!

Dealing with the issue of dirty hydrogen


By Dave Neads

The Other Side of the Story

President George Bush has launched a hydrogen initiative as part of his administration’s Clean Air policy. Touted as the new fuel of the future because it is abundant and clean burning, hydrogen technology could be the way to solve the problems created by traditional fuels. The device that will be used for the conversion of hydrogen to energy will most likely be the fuel cell which could -- and should -- be produced in an environmentally sensitive manner. A look at the other side of the story shows how political machinations are subverting the process of fuel cell production and ultimately,the hydrogen dream.
One of the essential elements in the construction of hydrogen fuel cells is a group of palladium isotopes called palladium group metals or PGMs for short. These metals speed up the hydrogen oxygen reaction inside fuel cells while decreasing the amount of corrosion that occurs.

In a deal recently brokered by presidents Bush and Putin, Norelisk Nickel, a major Russian producer of nickel, took over Stillwater Mining Co. which has major palladium mines in Nye, Montana. Immediately we’re off to a bad start -- Norelisk Nickel is known to be a notorious polluter in its home operations. Satellite imagery shows 100 mile long plumes spreading from Norelisk’s smelting operations in northern Siberia. Estimates are that two million acres of forest are affected or killed annually by the two million tons of sulphur dioxide the smelter releases into the atmosphere each year.
Meanwhile, in the U.S., Norelisk Nickel hired a law firm run by former Secretary of State and Bush family friend, James Baker, to obtain regulatory approval for the deal. With that in the bag, Norelisk named five new directors to Stillwater’s previous board. These new appointments are American and are pro-Bush friends and supporters.

Now that they control the primary production of palladium, Norelisk will be able to significantly influence the price of these precious metals. The potential for increased profits is huge. The brokering of this inside deal driven by political expediency is potentially the first of many such ‘arrangements’ to emerge under the Clean Air Policy based on the hydrogen dream.

U.S. domestic coal fields are expected to be part of the energy sources used to produce hydrogen. Big coal is expecting windfall profits from these deals. The nuclear industry has also been lining up to be involved in the hydrogen process. Coal and nuclear, both proven in the past to be very dirty and very harmful, have been the target of huge campaigns in the past decades. But now under the guise of being part of the clean, non-polluting hydrogen initiative they are receiving new life and opportunity. For example, the U.S. Senate recently passed a bill that will give an $8 billion subsidy to fossil fuel production, especially coal bed methane. This is twice the amount set aside for renewable energy sources such as wind, tidal and solar.

Forward thinking that cared about the health of the nation would use non-polluting energy sources to produce hydrogen. Instead, the push is to go back to yesterday’s fuels that have already created a plethora of unhealthy conditions from asthma to global warming. The promise of hydrogen-based energy is that these problems would be reduced; yet the reliance on traditional polluters in the implementation of these new technologies could destroy the hydrogen dream. The Clean Air Initiative may simply become another profit-making scam for the same old group of fossils.

http://www.wltribune.com/portals-code/list.cgi?paper=37&cat=48&id=184715&more=1

[Exgeneral]

22. El Paso (LNG/oil co) had to restate today

due to reserves being "40% less than projected"

Shell did the same last year

Do you see a pattern here?

[CaptainClark23]

28. I missed that, gotta link?

I've a colleague who is cataloging restated reserves.

thx

[hatrack]

35. There's a link to this story over on the Environment board

And some other interesting corporate restatements on oil & gas proven reserves - scroll down and look for posts by DU poster jcmcgowan.

[CaptainClark23]

46. thanks

alot of good stuff there, just what I was looking for.

damn, now there's another board I have to review daily.

[crissy71]

25. another good source is

a book called "The Party's Over" - i forget the author - it talks about all the different ways your family can prepare like organic farming, wind, solar. Also talks about some communities that are already developing strategies and systems off by themselves.

I first found out about this problem when I went to an event at Riverside Church in NYC that was sponsored by Families For Peaceful Tomorrows last Sept 11, 2003 (the same day that Cheney was there for a memorial service) - Ray McGovern was one of the guys on the panel, also the guy from fromthewilderness.com.

I'm an optimist and I think we can (as Kerry says) "invent our way out of this" - The first (and scariest) step is awareness.

[gold_bug]

41. Richard Heinberg, "The Party's Over"

here's a link:
http://www.museletter.com/partys-over.html

[arcos]

42. The Party's Over: Oil, War and the Fate of Industrial Societies

by Richard Heinberg

Amazon link: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0865714827/qid=1077174396//ref=pd_ka_1/103-0212933-7485447?v=glance&s=books&n=507846

[arcos]

26. Excellent links everyone!

Thanks!

[anarchy1999]

29. Michael Ruppert has been reporting on "Peak Oil" for years

One of the best sources we've found!

http://www.fromthewilderness.com/free/ww3/index.html#oil

Lots to read, to find these two gems, you have to scroll down the page, lots more has been added.

1-29-02

What Next. The Coming Oil Crisis Will be Worse Than You Expect. Scientific research material supports plausibility of a plan to murder 3-4 billion people.

Read Now

12-18-01
THE BACKGROUND IS OIL
A global oil crisis that cannot be postponed or evaded is upon us. Geologist Dale Allen Pfeiffer explains -- in layman's terms a context for recent events that makes the inexcusable actions of the Bush administration understandable. Some groups will do anything to avoid letting go of power, including killing millions of people. Whos next?
Read Now

[CityZen-X]

31. CopvsCIA

Michael has been on top this item for years! It's so amazing (or is it) that others are now beginning to let this "crude" surface.

[anarchy1999]

33. Ummm, it is copvcia.com

Or the link I provided in previous post. FromTheWilderness.

copvcia is mirror site.

And no, it is not amazing, just sad no one pays attention or listens.
Ruppert had advised his subscribers the week before 9/11 that something big was about to hit the stock market. He is on top of what is happening. Not much doubt here.

[CityZen-X]

34. I Know What Time It Is

and I know the address. CopvsCIA is what it means and was the title that I thought to be apropos for me message.

Mir.

[WhoCountsTheVotes]

30. Bah! Conspiracy Theorists!

Peak oil is just another conspiracy theory, like Skull & Bones being politically powerful or Bush knowing about 911 in advance! Oh, and those ballot-less voting machines!

If the Democrats want to be electable we must back away from these silly conspiracy theories! :eyes:

[kalian]

37. You're bsing, right?

[CityZen-X]

38. Either or.......

he or she, is a solid member of the "Mushroom Nation."

[Silverhair]

49. Check out Thermal Depolymerization.

Discover Magazine, May 2003 issue, "Anything Into Oil". Online by subscription only.

Or Changing World Technologies web site, www.changingworldtech.com

Or check out a recent DU thread on Peak Oil.

Peak Oil is a real problem, but it looks like TDP has that one solved. Not only that, but TDP is pollution free, produces cleaner oil, and helps lower global warming by reducing the amount of new CO2 that is put into the air.

It can convert any hydrocarbon substance, (Also called carbohydrates - same stuff.)such as paper, other plants, animal parts, sewage, old tires, old plastics, toxic carbon wastes etc into pure oil, carbon, and fertilizer minerals and pure water at 85% efficiency and produces NO POLLUTION of it's own.

It can also purify coal so that the sulfur is removed, but I don't know much about that part of it.

So far every attempt at scientific rebuttal to this has had holes in their science. One so called scientist ignores that the energy that is being gained from the plants is solar energy. Plants are superb solar collectors and air purifiers. The energy gained from the plants is their solar energy stored as carbon polymers.

Another so called scientist calculated the amount of energy from the carbon/oxygen reaction and said it wasn't enough. He left out the energy from the hydrogen/oxgyen reaction, and there are over twice the hydrogen atoms in a carbon polymer as there are carbon atoms.

[arcos]

50. very interesting... thanks! n/t

[JohnyCanuck]

54. I hope you are right Silverhair

but I just can't help shake off the lingering effects of one of the first lessons I learned at my mother's knee. I can still remember my Mom drilling this into my head, if something sounds too good to be true it probably is. That lesson has served me pretty well over the course of my 40+ years. When I hear the claims made for the thermal deploymerization process, it seems to come mighty close to being "too good to be true." However, I guess time will tell. It will be interesting to see the results from the CWT/ConAgra pilot plant and how closely they match their initial projections.

In the meantime I just found this story of a new more energy efficient way to produce on-board hydrogen for automotive fuel cells which seems to hold some promise.

The most common way of making industrial hydrogen today is by separating it from natural gas through a "steam reforming" process that requires very high temperatures, large furnaces, and a lot of energy.

By contrast, Schmidt's process used a simple fuel injector from an automobile engine inserted into a glass tube - a device about as big as an ear of corn. He and his colleagues sprayed an ethanol-water mix into a warm chamber to vaporize it. When the vapor passed through a porous ceramic plug embedded with the rhodium and ceria catalysts - voilà, hydrogen flowed out the other end. Lots of it.

Schmidt's process is autothermal, meaning it supplies its own heat, he says. Because of that, the equipment is only a hundredth the size of steam- reforming systems and requires far less energy to extract hydrogen from ethanol.

<snip>

"If they can, indeed, produce hydrogen very efficiently from ethanol, that would be a significant breakthrough," says John DeCicco, a senior fellow at Environmental Defense, an environmental group in New York, who has written about fuel-cell technology in automobiles. "One of the biggest problems of fuel-cell-powered cars: storing hydrogen on the vehicle. This research suggests this technical barrier may be solvable."

http://www.csmonitor.com/2004/0219/p15s01-stss.html

Also the ethanol used in this process does not have to be very pure and can contain a relatively large quantity of water. Apparently most of the energy used in producing standard ethanol is used in extracting water from an initial impure ethanol/water mixture. However, they still don't make it clear whether this process is expected to return a positive EROEI (energy returned on energy invested).

Whatever methods, solutions and energy alternatives we use to meet the Peak Oil situation, I think it's still going to take a massive change in attitude by society and the adoption of a much more conservation oriented mindset than society as a whole seems to currently want to consider, two 14mpg type SUVs per family and single occupant 60 mile commutes to work from far flung suburbs just won't cut it any more.

[mhr]

52. Updated Reference List

Websites of interest include:

http://www.lifeaftertheoilcrash.net/Home.html
http://globalpublicmedia.com/
http://www.oilcrash.com/
http://www.wolfatthedoor.org.uk/
http://www.durangobill.com/Rollover.html
http://www.asponews.org
http://www.gulland.ca/depletion/depletion.htm
http://www.dieoff.org/
http://www.oilanalytics.org/
http://www.greatchange.org/
http://www.oilcrisis.com/
http://www.after-oil.co.uk/
http://www.hubbertpeak.com/
http://hubbert.mines.edu
http://www.museletter.com/archive/cia-oil.html

Books:

Out of Gas: The End of the Age of Oil
by David Goodstein

The Party's Over: Oil, War and the Fate of Industrial Societies
by Richard Heinberg

Hubbert's Peak : The Impending World Oil Shortage
by Kenneth S. Deffeyes

The Last Hours of Ancient Sunlight : Waking Up to Personal and Global Transformation
by Thom Hartmann

The Oil Factor: How Oil Controls the Economy and Your Financial Future
by Stephen Leeb, Donna Leeb

News Groups:

Energy Resources
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/energyresources/

Alas Babylon
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/AlasBabylon/

Running on Empty
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/RunningOnEmpty2/

[Dissenting_Prole]

55. Oil Depletion Documentary

COMING IN MARCH, 2004

THE END OF SUBURBIA: Oil Depletion and the Collapse of The American Dream

Since World War II, North Americans have invested much of their newfound wealth in suburbia. Suburbia has promised a sense of space, affordability, family life and upward mobility. As the population of suburban sprawl has exploded in the past 50 years, so too the suburban way of life has become embedded in the American consciousness. Suburbia, and all it promises, has become the American Dream.

But as we enter the 21st century, serious questions are beginning to emerge about the sustainability of this way of life. The End of Surburbia explores the prospects facing the American Way of Life as the planet approaches a critical era, as global demand for fossil fuels begins to outstrip supply. World Oil Peak and the inevitable decline of fossil fuels is upon us now, as some scientists and policy makers argue in this documentary. The consequences of inaction in the face of this global crisis are enormous. What does Oil Peak mean for North America? As energy prices skyrocket in the coming years, how will the populations of suburbia react to the collapse of their dream? Are today's suburbs destined to become the slums of tomorrow? And what can be done NOW, individually and collectively, to avoid The End of Suburbia?

Featuring James Howard Kunstler, Peter Calthorpe, Michael Klare, Richard Heinberg, Matthew Simmons, Mike Ruppert, Julian Darley, Colin Campbell, Kenneth Deffeyes, Ali Samsam Bakhtiari and Steve Andrews.

http://www.brant.net/gvmr/electric.htm