NOT: Energy Giants To Bring Greener LNG To The Market

[Dan Clemmensen + 1,011]

3 minutes ago, Gerry Maddoux said:

Agree wholeheartedly with note directly above. 

If you want to get shocked out of your loafers go check out just hoe much energy goes into the production of "Green" energy. 

I'd be surprised if there is any net decrease in fossil fuel expenditure.

There.is.no.free.energy. And never will be. 

I think you forgot cement, which makes your argument even stronger. The amount of fossil fuel used to produce cement is huge. Even worse, converting CaC03 (lime) into CaO (quicklime, the main ingredient of cement), produces more fossil CO2 than all the world's airliners, and would even if the energy used (which is also more than all the world's airliners use)  was 100% "green". This means wind and solar will continue to produce fossil CO2 even if the input energy is 100% renewable. Basically all manufactured products currently consume energy during the manufacturing process, and capital installations consume energy during the transportation and construction. Right now, the bulk of that energy is fossil energy. As the percentage of "green" energy increases, the percentage of fossil energy that goes into this process will decrease. In some theoretical future when all energy is "green" the amount of fossil energy used to produce new "green" energy will drop to "zero". We still need to solve the cement problem, though.

By analogy, the amount of whale  oil consumed (in lighting) and the number of horses worked to death to produce the first kerosene  from fossil oil was enormous, but we don't use whale oil or horses to produce oil and NG any more.

Note that fossil fuel production, transportation, and use also require energy and cement, and this energy must also be counted against the cost of fossil energy. I think that this energy use is larger than the amount consumed by "green" energy production on an output-power basis, but I'm just guessing based on very little data. Many of the paper used to support your argument seem to be a decade or so old, and "green" energy has gotten dramatically cheaper since then.

Nope. There is no free energy, and won't be unless you count nuclear fusion.

[Dan Clemmensen + 1,011]

2 minutes ago, Wombat said:

That will take at least 100 years Dan. Your nuclear fusion dream is more likely to occur by then.

If the effective price of fossil NG continues to be zero (as a byproduct of oil production) Then it's harder for E==>CH4 to compete. But as EVs improve, oil become less attractive and gassy oil eventually becomes uneconomic, and NG prices rise. At that point, "free" E==>CH4 is competing with not-free NG, and things speed up quickly. This process is further enhanced if the world decides that we must stop burning fossil fuels to "save the planet" or whatever.

[Wombat + 1,028]

6 minutes ago, Dan Clemmensen said:

If the effective price of fossil NG continues to be zero (as a byproduct of oil production) Then it's harder for E==>CH4 to compete. But as EVs improve, oil become less attractive and gassy oil eventually becomes uneconomic, and NG prices rise. At that point, "free" E==>CH4 is competing with not-free NG, and things speed up quickly. This process is further enhanced if the world decides that we must stop burning fossil fuels to "save the planet" or whatever.

There is no such thing as a free lunch Dan. There will be demand for NG for heating for at least another century, and the oil will become the by-product and continue to be used for hydraulics, grease and other lubrication. Plastics too. They will not be displaced in a hurry. Sure, the oil & gas industry may be only a quarter of current size by 2035, but it will persist and be very profitable.

[Dan Clemmensen + 1,011]

3 minutes ago, Wombat said:

There is no such thing as a free lunch Dan. There will be demand for NG for heating for at least another century, and the oil will become the by-product and continue to be used for hydraulics, grease and other lubrication. Plastics too. They will not be displaced in a hurry. Sure, the oil & gas industry may be only a quarter of current size by 2035, but it will persist and be very profitable.

At some point, CH4 from wind and solar will be cheaper than NG. That is, the amount of capital to build a wind farm or solar field and associated E==>CH4 convertor will be less than the amount of capital needed to drill and frack an NG well with the same EUR. The same customers can use either type of CH4: it's the same stuff. As demand for oil contracts, only the lowest-cost producers will remain. I think that those are the older "conventional" fields, and those fields don't produce a lot of associated NG.

TANSTAAFL (there ain't no such thing as a free lunch) as my hero Robert Heinlein said. I believe my mental model makes economic sense. You appear to accept the need to move away from fossil  fuels as you speak of 70% renewables by 2035. I agree with you, but I'm trying to avoid that argument and stick with the economic argument.  Nearly free NG has killed coal, and I think lower-cost E==>CH4 will kill NG after the NG is no longer free.

[Wombat + 1,028]

9 minutes ago, Dan Clemmensen said:

At some point, CH4 from wind and solar will be cheaper than NG. That is, the amount of capital to build a wind farm or solar field and associated E==>CH4 convertor will be less than the amount of capital needed to drill and frack an NG well with the same EUR. The same customers can use either type of CH4: it's the same stuff. As demand for oil contracts, only the lowest-cost producers will remain. I think that those are the older "conventional" fields, and those fields don't produce a lot of associated NG.

TANSTAAFL (there ain't no such thing as a free lunch) as my hero Robert Heinlein said. I believe my mental model makes economic sense. You appear to accept the need to move away from fossil  fuels as you speak of 70% renewables by 2035. I agree with you, but I'm trying to avoid that argument and stick with the economic argument.  Nearly free NG has killed coal, and I think lower-cost E==>CH4 will kill NG after the NG is no longer free.

I simply disagree that CH4 from solar and wind will ever be cheaper than NG. I believe H2 will be, however. Also, there is a good reason that Saudi Arabia has developed a plan to stop flaring massive amounts of NG and actually use the stuff domestically (to produce electricity). No offence, but some of your comments are a little US-centric. It may make sense for USA to go for H2 as well as Europe, but China and India plan to use oil and NG for a very long time. Coal as well. It will cost them a fortune in the long run, but that is their problem. At the moment, everyone trying to dig up their fossil fuels ASAP coz they become "stranded assets" before too long. China and India will be only major markets for FF in 10 years time. It is already shaping up that way. I also disagree that less demand for oil will reduce the price significantly and mean that only the lowest-cost producers will remain. The Middle-East requires $70/bbl to fund the budget, so it is more likely that ALL producers will invest less as demand falls in order to protect their margins. The oil companies have seen the writing on the wall and are planning to milk as much out of existing assets as they can whilst minimising their capex. The smart ones, anyway. That includes Shell, Chevron, and BP. Only Exxon has failed to see the writing on the wall. Saudi Arabia is well aware of the fact that they need to "shrink their way to prosperity", which is why they have done the heavy lifting of the OPEC cuts. They are not waiting for the next crash in oil prices, or the one after that. They know that the price will fluctuate wildly over the coming decades and are making preparations for less demand. They will be laughing as other countries see their fortunes rise and fall every 3-4 years as oil prices oscillate wildly.

[Monk + 14]

6 hours ago, Wombat said:

We do not need a 100% renewable future, we just need 70-80% renewables, and we need it fast. By 2035 at the latest.

Can't emphasize enough!   We don't need a 100% renewable future in 2020 nor by 2030.  

With existing technologies,  we should be talking about getting to 60-65% renewable electricity by 2030.  A lot more, from all perspectives. 

Instead, going 80%->100% is all what everyone wants to argue about. People produce reams and reams of arguments, spend hours and hours talking about how do you go from 80% -> 100% with 2020's tech and costs constantly trolling each other. 

Argument for or against 80%->100% arguments are utterly unproductive and can absolutely wait until the 2030's.  On can easily see how much of utter hogwash these arguments can be, by revisiting their own expectations of 2020 from their views in 2010. 

Can these discussions boards produce anything productive by keeping things to arguments less than 65% renewable electricity?

and leave or not perpetuate any argument advocating for or against >80% renewable as mostly trolling each other  or probably may be tag such arguments.  What do you all think? 

[Dan Clemmensen + 1,011]

1 hour ago, Monk said:

Can't emphasize enough!   We don't need a 100% renewable future in 2020 nor by 2030.  

Agreed. Some random consensus or other had developed for about 70% by about 2040, but a recent study asserts that the analyses behind that consensus are far out of date because wind and solar cost have dropped much faster than predicted. The newer analysis thinks 90% by 2035 is a realistic estimate based mostly on economics. look here:

       https://www.2035report.com/downloads/

I think we are making fairly good progress on this and no new magic is needed. I also think the report misses the two main elephants in the room: long-term storage and a transition plan to move smoothly away from NG, and that's why I'm pushing E==>CH4. No, we don't need to do it immediately. We don't really even need to do it before 2030, but in my opinion it's a good deal cheaper than stringing HVDC lines all over the place, so it will result in a simpler and faster transition.

 

[Ward Smith + 6,615]

On 6/16/2020 at 10:38 PM, Gerry Maddoux said:

I'm sorry but I find most of this talk about green energy one of the most ridiculous things in my life. Get real!

We are in the midst of a pandemic that is, in some way, a form of biological warfare. Lockdown caused global shutdown, which has put millions of people out of work all over the world. Federal reserve banks everywhere are frantically printing money in a new experiment under the guise of Modern Monetary Theory, which holds that no one really has to pay that back. But they do. So by the time the cephaloproptosis is cured, every currency is going to be horribly debased--especially the global reserve currency, which is of course the U.S. dollar. 

The digital yuan is a reality--it had its coming-out party while we were fighting the Wuhan flu. There is talk of backstopping it with gold on the old Bretton Woods ratio. If that happens, the gold-backed digital yuan will become the new reserve currency. China is ascending, the rest of the world descending . . . . . mostly because of a virus from China, merely the last of many.

I fear that a great depression is coming. I think that we're going to have to divert all the resources we can muster to food production and getting our people--all over the world--to the other side of this broad chasm. I suspect we're living in parallel universes, you and I. You're talking about converting the world to an energy form that we mostly don't need in order to satisfy a (probably false) idea that global weather changes are due to carbon dioxide while I think we have a perfectly good long-term and cheap energy supply in overwhelming abundance. 

I should have staying in my bunker (with Archie).

Don't have anything to add, just wanted to see your post again. 

Also, I think everyone has to learn about cephaloproptosis and it's cure, the cranial rectumectomy. 😏🤓

[Dan Clemmensen + 1,011]

55 minutes ago, Ward Smith said:

Don't have anything to add, just wanted to see your post again. 

Also, I think everyone has to learn about cephaloproptosis and it's cure, the cranial rectumectomy. 😏🤓

You also need to watch for proctonumerology, as applied to statistics. 🙂

 

[Gerry Maddoux + 3,627]

On 6/17/2020 at 11:38 AM, Wombat said:

Debts may be at record highs, but interest rates at record lows.

Always, in the history of money, that situation right there has been blended into some recipe of disaster. Interest rates are at a record low because the world economies are in trouble--and central banks have tried to stave off economic topsy-turvy by printing money and going to negative interest rates. 

When you print money you necessarily debase your currency. And if everyone prints money, or otherwise debases currency, it is a mad rush to the bottom of the barrel. At some point, unless one really does buy this trash known as the Modern Monetary Theory, every country has to pay back that money. We do. The UK does. The Eu, and so on. Or, alternatively, everyone could default. But to what? Land? Real estate? What?

Perhaps, with debt, a giant default would transfer title of real estate over to those who have not had it and want it badly. Or, guess what, maybe with all the money printing and debasement of currency, the interest rate actually begins to rise. The U.S. Federal Reserve would applaud that. But the president and others would not, because that means the U.S. would have to repay 25 trillion dollars at rising interest rates. And the world would have to repay 262 trillion dollars. At that point they won't be able to do it. 

Along come digital yuan, or some other cryptocurrency, backstopped by the only thing we know to be of value: gold. If you back up and read about the way Bretton Woods was set up, that gold is not worth somewhere around $50,000/ounce in today's dollars at today's debt--both U.S. and global. 

The world has a lot more to worry about than a virus that kills fewer people than heart attacks. I've not seen the data but we're up to 118,000 deaths in America at this writing--and I strongly suspect that we've had more deaths than that from heart attack, stroke, cirrhosis and manslaughter/murder. Yet we've printed money to take care of a manmade problem. 

I didn't apply for the title of harbinger of doom: it came to me naturally. It's called Covid-19. For those of you who haven't had it, it's a rough experience but survivable by all but the most vulnerable. We have printed money to protect the stock market and stave off ruin until we have absolutely nowhere to run. 

A depression isn't going to happen for another five years? How every comforting. 

[Wombat + 1,028]

15 hours ago, Gerry Maddoux said:

Always, in the history of money, that situation right there has been blended into some recipe of disaster. Interest rates are at a record low because the world economies are in trouble--and central banks have tried to stave off economic topsy-turvy by printing money and going to negative interest rates. 

When you print money you necessarily debase your currency. And if everyone prints money, or otherwise debases currency, it is a mad rush to the bottom of the barrel. At some point, unless one really does buy this trash known as the Modern Monetary Theory, every country has to pay back that money. We do. The UK does. The Eu, and so on. Or, alternatively, everyone could default. But to what? Land? Real estate? What?

Perhaps, with debt, a giant default would transfer title of real estate over to those who have not had it and want it badly. Or, guess what, maybe with all the money printing and debasement of currency, the interest rate actually begins to rise. The U.S. Federal Reserve would applaud that. But the president and others would not, because that means the U.S. would have to repay 25 trillion dollars at rising interest rates. And the world would have to repay 262 trillion dollars. At that point they won't be able to do it. 

Along come digital yuan, or some other cryptocurrency, backstopped by the only thing we know to be of value: gold. If you back up and read about the way Bretton Woods was set up, that gold is not worth somewhere around $50,000/ounce in today's dollars at today's debt--both U.S. and global. 

The world has a lot more to worry about than a virus that kills fewer people than heart attacks. I've not seen the data but we're up to 118,000 deaths in America at this writing--and I strongly suspect that we've had more deaths than that from heart attack, stroke, cirrhosis and manslaughter/murder. Yet we've printed money to take care of a manmade problem. 

I didn't apply for the title of harbinger of doom: it came to me naturally. It's called Covid-19. For those of you who haven't had it, it's a rough experience but survivable by all but the most vulnerable. We have printed money to protect the stock market and stave off ruin until we have absolutely nowhere to run. 

A depression isn't going to happen for another five years? How every comforting. 

I agree with much of what you say Gerry, but the collapse of the US dollar simply ain't gonna happen. The fact that gold would cost $50,000/ounce if we tried to go back to gold standard is precisely why that won't happen and gold will likely never even reach $2000/ounce. I agree that the world has a lot more to worry about than the virus, but I would suggest to you that the biggest threat is a Biden win. Then the stock market will really crash, leading to a severe and prolonged depression, and China will take over the planet. Only Trump can stop this.

[Gerry Maddoux + 3,627]

1 minute ago, Wombat said:

I would suggest to you that the biggest threat is a Biden win. Then the stock market will really crash, leading to a severe and prolonged depression, and China will take over the planet. Only Trump can stop this.

I agree with that. I would have liked for Mr. Trump to step up and call biological warfare by its name, and also to have let NOPEC go through, but I agree it's better to reelect a 74-year-old president with fleas and ticks than to elect a 77-year-old man who suffers from cognitive dysfunction and will soon default to an angry progressive woman who is intent on making the whole country into the Autonomous Zone of America. 😃