Shale Oil Fiasco

[ronwagn + 6,290]

On 1/29/2020 at 9:35 AM, Anthony Okrongly said:

Here's a fun fact: 5% of Germany's electricity is provided by Solar power even though they have the same solar power potential as Alaska.

https://e360.yale.edu/digest/renewables-generated-a-record-65-percent-of-germanys-electricity-last-week

Even though their average renewables runs at about 40% of electricity generation.

Texas - with nearly twice the sunlight produced just 1% from Solar.

https://www.dallasobserver.com/news/what-does-it-mean-for-texas-to-have-produced-more-wind-than-coal-energy-11725090

The cheap natural gas (42% of electricity) certainly helps.  And Texas has gone more to wind than Solar (22% of electricity). 

Texas produced about 22% of it's electricity from renewable sources. 

The question is... as the shale plays out over the next (let's be generous and say) 7 years and the cheap natural gas goes the way of the shut down oil fracking rig will Texas go the same way as Germany? 40% renewable, mostly wind. 

What are the ramifications of the shale fiasco on National Electricity Production and costs?  In 2005 Coal was 50% of U.S. energy production.  Does anyone think we will go back to that case? It seems unlikely. Using Texas as a reference for both cheap natural gas and plentiful wind/solar, it seems like a pretty straight line replacement swap from 20% wind and 40% natural gas to 40% wind and 20% natural gas. 

We will always need natural gas, nuclear and coal to provide consistency of power. Renewables will fill the remaining role. 

Even though this discussion get into the weeds at times, I don't think anyone is saying fracking will be MORE or even nearly at the SAME level as today in 20 years... right?  Will the shale plays last 20 years in any significant way? No way.  OK, 10 years?  What's the case. Extremists are saying 2020 will see peak fracked energy.... consensus is 2-5 years to peak. Nobody is saying it isn't going to peak in this decade. So now we are just arranging the deck chairs on The Titanic. 

With declining fracking for oil we get declining natural gas (by-product) which takes us back to scarcity in the U.S. for both in THIS decade. Nobody arguing on this forum (I would guess) can't easily remember the turn of the millennium. Almost nobody arguing on this forum doesn't have children and grandchildren could potentially see the turn of the next millennium. With that in mind this decade will be over quickly. If you're job is in the fracking fields and you expect to have one in 10 years I think a large percentage of you are delusional. 

I would propose that this is one of the very few forums in the U.S. where energy issues are being discussed on BOTH sides on a daily basis. If you take the word "Fiasco" out of this discussion and turn it into "Bridge" it would probably be more appropriate, because I (again) say that no one thinks shale is a permanent solution. If 30 years ago someone told you that 40% of Germany's energy would be renewable you would have dismissed it out of hand. The middle of The NEXT 30 year transition is only 15 years from now.  

If we pretended (without much effort) that we are in the middle of the CURRENT 30 year transition... and that Shale Oi/Gas is the bridge... Then we can see the writing on the wall.  If you think Shale has another 5 years before it peaks then we are 10 years into the current 30 year transition. 

I think most agree that tight energy has dramatic decline rates per well, that there is a limit to the geology involved, that it has proven to require astronomical financial inputs to acquire, that environmental policy (particularly for pollution at the well site - see Colorado) is increasing yearly and that there is no indication that the trend to replace fossil energy with renewable energy is not going to change. 

That being said, the rest is just a matter of timing. When The Titanic hit the iceberg it didn't break apart, roll over and sink immediately. It took 2 hours and 40 minutes. For the first 2 hours it was obvious what was going to happen (that time has already played out in oil since 2000). During the next 30 minutes the criticality of it all became very real (our current state). The last 10 minutes were just a loud, dramatic postscript. You can go turn in an application for a job in The Permian, but only an idiot signs up for the retirement plan when they get it. 

---------------------------------------------------------

"Cheap Energy DECADE?" Not a chance. For this entire decade to be cheap energy it would require the drillers to have access to cheap money to drill.  That is already over. And it's not coming back. The only way drilling will get back underway and create the oil and natural gas to keep it cheap is for oil and gas prices to go so high that the money simply can't resist coming back. 

There is one caveat... if the Fed decides that cheap oil is required for the U.S. economy to not tank then all bets are off for how long fracking can continue.  IF the Fed decides that pouring hundreds of billions of dollars into the fracking fields is required then QE for Oil changes Everything.  Barring that, energy prices are going up enough to keep the fracking fields on life support, and they will stay at that higher level for the the remainder of the 2020's before even that price can't support the costs of operations.

Think about that... in the past if you found oil you got tons and tons of MONEY.  Now you need tons and tons of money to get some oil.  This is barely sustainable WITH government intervention in the form of rock bottom interest rates or direct QE to the financial institutions with a directive to spend it on "Clean Natural Gas... oh, and if some oil comes out of the hole too then I guess you can sell it."

You forget that there are vast new finds of natural gas all over the world and judging by that I think that there will be an amazing number of new large finds and producers all over the world. Fracking has not even been tried in much of the world, so that means that there is plenty of oil and natural gas to be had such as in South America, Iran, and the oceans. Meanwhile natural gas is being flared all over the world, where are the greenies when you need them?

You may not be aware that there are far more methane hydrates near the coasts of the oceans all around the world. They have more potential than all of the total land mass. 

https://geology.com/articles/methane-hydrates/

Edited February 2, 2020 by ronwagn
addition

[Gerry Maddoux + 3,627]

1 hour ago, ronwagn said:

My main objection to nuclear is we have the radioactive material scattered all over America and cannot agree on the plan to store it all in Nevada at Yucca Flats.

While Yucca Flats would be a pretty good storage place--as it is already radioactive--the place has a bad rep. You probably know about the Baneberry underground test that went kaput circa 1970: the earth opened up and about 90 NTS workers got rained on by hot material. Two of them eventually developed acute myeloid leukemia. Time Magazine called it the world's worst nuclear disaster. The radioactivity was carried in the airstream all the way to northern California. Maybe that's the reason there are so many weird people in that area. Anyway, nobody wants to go there. Nevada hates being stereotyped by nuclear waste and Las Vegas. 

You may remember: it wasn't that long ago that nuclear waste was being shipped from Los Alamos to Carlsbad. The WHIPP thing. It got stopped. Fast forward: now the area around Carlsbad is the biggest shale field in the world: the Delaware sub-basin of the Permian. If the nuclear waste had permeated the limestone caverns around the Delaware, we'd be unable to use that basin. There is no good place for nuclear waste--it's the world's biggest catch 22. 

[Gerry Maddoux + 3,627]

1 hour ago, ronwagn said:

You forget that there are vast new finds of natural gas all over the world and judging by that I think that there will be an amazing number of new large finds and producers all over the world. Fracking has not even been tried in much of the world, so that means that there is plenty of oil and natural gas to be had such as in South America, Iran, and the oceans. Meanwhile natural gas is being flared all over the world, where are the greenies when you need them?

You may not be aware that there are far more methane hydrates near the coasts of the oceans all around the world. They have more potential than all of the total land mass. 

https://geology.com/articles/methane-hydrates/

Correct in all regards.

[ronwagn + 6,290]

28 minutes ago, Gerry Maddoux said:

While Yucca Flats would be a pretty good storage place--as it is already radioactive--the place has a bad rep. You probably know about the Baneberry underground test that went kaput circa 1970: the earth opened up and about 90 NTS workers got rained on by hot material. Two of them eventually developed acute myeloid leukemia. Time Magazine called it the world's worst nuclear disaster. The radioactivity was carried in the airstream all the way to northern California. Maybe that's the reason there are so many weird people in that area. Anyway, nobody wants to go there. Nevada hates being stereotyped by nuclear waste and Las Vegas. 

You may remember: it wasn't that long ago that nuclear waste was being shipped from Los Alamos to Carlsbad. The WHIPP thing. It got stopped. Fast forward: now the area around Carlsbad is the biggest shale field in the world: the Delaware sub-basin of the Permian. If the nuclear waste had permeated the limestone caverns around the Delaware, we'd be unable to use that basin. There is no good place for nuclear waste--it's the world's biggest catch 22. 

I do remember it now. I wasn't familiar with the acronym and saw no follow up stories. That just goes to show what a bad job our media does of covering important topics. 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waste_Isolation_Pilot_Plant

Edited February 2, 2020 by ronwagn
reference

[Enthalpic + 1,496]

2 hours ago, ronwagn said:

 

You may not be aware that there are far more methane hydrates near the coasts of the oceans all around the world. They have more potential than all of the total land mass.

Those hydrates - if they become unstable - will be the death of us.

Human CO2 emissions will be nothing compared to the warming effect of all that methane.  I wish more people would invest in mining the least stable deposits (warmest, lowest pressure / shallow). 

They can also be used to partial desalinate seawater as the hydrate ice has a lower salt content. As you melt the hydrate it releases gas and lower density water.  As this mixture rises up the pipe it undergoes something similar to fraction distillation and at the top you end up with fairly desalinated water and of course natural gas. The fresh water bonus makes the gas recovery more economical.

https://pubs.acs.org/doi/full/10.1021/acssuschemeng.8b01616?src=recsys

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/259266834_DESALINATION_OF_SEAWATER_USING_GAS_HYDRATE_TECHNOLOGY_-_CURRENT_STATUS_AND_FUTURE_DIRECTION

[ronwagn + 6,290]

1 hour ago, Enthalpic said:

Those hydrates - if they become unstable - will be the death of us.

Human CO2 emissions will be nothing compared to the warming effect of all that methane.  I wish more people would invest in mining the least stable deposits (warmest, lowest pressure / shallow). 

They can also be used to partial desalinate seawater as the hydrate ice has a lower salt content. As you melt the hydrate it releases gas and lower density water.  As this mixture rises up the pipe it undergoes something similar to fraction distillation and at the top you end up with fairly desalinated water and of course natural gas. The fresh water bonus makes the gas recovery more economical.

https://pubs.acs.org/doi/full/10.1021/acssuschemeng.8b01616?src=recsys

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/259266834_DESALINATION_OF_SEAWATER_USING_GAS_HYDRATE_TECHNOLOGY_-_CURRENT_STATUS_AND_FUTURE_DIRECTION

Yes the methane release is a problem. The sources I can think of are flaring, coal mining, ocean vents, rotting of vegetation, animal waste, dead animals, human effluent, chemical pollution, peat bogs etc. 

Thanks for the links, I was not aware of the desalination possibilities. 

Any lake has bubbles of methane continuously coming to the surface. They often freeze during the winter. 

Edited February 2, 2020 by ronwagn
addition

[Gerry Maddoux + 3,627]

1 hour ago, Enthalpic said:

Human CO2 emissions will be nothing compared to the warming effect of all that methane.  I wish more people would invest in mining the least stable deposits (warmest, lowest pressure / shallow). 

That's where all of Putin's natural gas is coming from. The Yamal Peninsula is studded with methane mounds that have been buried under the permafrost for centuries . . . with methane hydrates holding the gas in check. As hydrate crystals turn loose of the methane, that's available gas. Methane can either bubble up freely--which is pretty much the same as venting natural gas in the Permian--or we can exploit the mounds for energy as they coalesce into giant pockets. 

In my amateurish view, such a hydrate release along with the formation of giant pockets of methane, is already happening. For example, a company like Exxon used to make a find and it was almost pure oil. Now--think Guyana--the oil comes with an enormous mix of natural gas. One theory would be that we've simply exploited all the pure oil basins. The other would be that methane hydrates are releasing methane gas at a much greater rate. Anthropocene worshippers will say that we have dirtied up the globe so much that methane hydrates are releasing gas because of an increase in temperatures. The rest of us will say that we're going through a normal metamorphic cycle in the planet. 

[Enthalpic + 1,496]

30 minutes ago, ronwagn said:

Yes the methane release is a problem. The sources I can think of are flaring, coal mining, ocean vents, rotting of vegetation, animal waste, dead animals, human effluent, chemical pollution, peat bogs etc. 

Thanks for the links, I was not aware of the desalination possibilities. 

Any lake has bubbles of methane continuously coming to the surface. They often freeze during the winter. 

That's Abraham lake, a common hiking spot in Alberta.  Its gas output is abnormally high.

Edited February 2, 2020 by Enthalpic

[Gerry Maddoux + 3,627]

Cow burps, utility plants, methane mounds expelling gas--they're in about equal proportions. 

During the great smallpox epidemics, whole farming communities in Siberia became infected and died. There weren't enough survivors to bury the dead. Eventually they were subsumed by the ice. 

Then we learned to vaccinate. The smallpox was divvied up and the USSR got half and the US got half. The US stored theirs at the CDC in Atlanta, and that's where it still is. The USSR built a new village, called Vector--if you can believe that--and that's where theirs is . . . ostensibly. How is it stored? Frozen, of course. It can exist forever in the frozen state.  

Fast forward: most of the world population isn't vaccinated or were vaccinated so long ago that it's no longer very effective. The polar ice caps are melting, enough to open up the Northern Sea Route, and certainly enough to release most of Siberia from its icy grasp. What happens when those villagers come shooting out of the ice full of smallpox? 

Here's the existential question: Did we humans cause that ice to melt or was it just part of the earth's cycle? Again, those in favor of the former belong to the Anthropocene Period. Those that think it's just part of the planetary cycle, well, they're in oil and gas. 😀

[wharfbanger + 4]

1 hour ago, Gerry Maddoux said:

Cow burps, utility plants, methane mounds expelling gas--they're in about equal proportions. 

During the great smallpox epidemics, whole farming communities in Siberia became infected and died. There weren't enough survivors to bury the dead. Eventually they were subsumed by the ice. 

Then we learned to vaccinate. The smallpox was divvied up and the USSR got half and the US got half. The US stored theirs at the CDC in Atlanta, and that's where it still is. The USSR built a new village, called Vector--if you can believe that--and that's where theirs is . . . ostensibly. How is it stored? Frozen, of course. It can exist forever in the frozen state.  

Fast forward: most of the world population isn't vaccinated or were vaccinated so long ago that it's no longer very effective. The polar ice caps are melting, enough to open up the Northern Sea Route, and certainly enough to release most of Siberia from its icy grasp. What happens when those villagers come shooting out of the ice full of smallpox? 

Here's the existential question: Did we humans cause that ice to melt or was it just part of the earth's cycle? Again, those in favor of the former belong to the Anthropocene Period. Those that think it's just part of the planetary cycle, well, they're in oil and gas. 😀

We are currently in an interglacial, not a glacial period.  Take humans out of the equation and the planet would be getting closer to another ice age.  Clearly that is not the case, and that is almost certainly because humans have in the blink of a geological eye mobilised 10’s of millions of years of stored carbon, from the lithosphere to the atmosphere.   

[Gerry Maddoux + 3,627]

12 minutes ago, wharfbanger said:

We are currently in an interglacial, not a glacial period.  Take humans out of the equation and the planet would be getting closer to another ice age.  Clearly that is not the case, and that is almost certainly because humans have in the blink of a geological eye mobilised 10’s of millions of years of stored carbon, from the lithosphere to the atmosphere.   

On what are you basing that!

[wharfbanger + 4]

23 minutes ago, Gerry Maddoux said:

On what are you basing that!

Gerry.  First please allow my to introduce myself. I have made my way through much of this thread over the past few weeks and have greatly enjoyed your generally balanced, intelligent and good natured writing. 

To answer your question (I think), Earth has gone though a bunch of ice ages during the Quaternary, and we are currently in an Interglacial:  https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quaternary_glaciation

[Gerry Maddoux + 3,627]

I get it. If you haven't yet read John McPhee's excellent tome: Annals of the Former World, do so. 

I fully subscribe to these climate changes. I just don't know how much mankind has contributed to this last one. I think the normal fluctuations of the planetary seas and carbonaceous release likely dwarfs our own contributions. 

Well, keep on with this. We can certainly use people who think and are willing to put it on the line. You will find here a great number of very pleasant people who are trying to sort out the vivid changes we are seeing, and also to balance them with the mighty need to feed and warm and clothe 8 billion souls on this old earth. 

[Enthalpic + 1,496]

1 hour ago, wharfbanger said:

Gerry.  First please allow my to introduce myself. I have made my way through much of this thread over the past few weeks and have greatly enjoyed your generally balanced, intelligent and good natured writing. 

To answer your question (I think), Earth has gone though a bunch of ice ages during the Quaternary, and we are currently in an Interglacial:  https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quaternary_glaciation

Welcome to Oil Price.  Have fun, and have a thick skin.

I get insulted constantly but it's like a gentle rain on the backside of a mountain.  I outlive every storm and win.

[wharfbanger + 4]

Thanks Gerry.  I am a scientist, my PhD was in CO2 gas release from magmatic systems.  My Masters thesis was published in world’s top geology journal: Geology.  
 

I think you would find it interesting:  https://www.abc.net.au/science/articles/2008/05/07/2238200.htm?site=science_dev&topic=latest

I’ll freely admit scientists don’t have all the answers, but I can promise many of us are honest, conservative with the facts,  and very dedicated.   In my profession there is practically total consensus on the subject of human induced climate change.

So yes I am confused and frustrated by non-professionals that deny human culpability in climate change. Especially the ones that should know better.  If I want an opinion on an electrical issue with my truck I’ll happily accept the opinion of an auto electrician.

Gerry is it because you personally profit from oil and gas, and to acknowledge human involvement would be to implicate yourself in some perceived act of evil?  Perhaps you exist within a mostly conservative drilling subculture where public acceptance of human induced climate change would have negative impacts on your business or social relationships? These are honest questions.  

Why not accept all the facts?  I am prepared to accept that hydrocarbons have provided modern human civilisation, for all the good and bad that entails.  I have no problem, either personally or others, investing in the fossil carbon industry, because I understand fossil fuels are necessary for all of us to survive.  Let’s all just face reality; without higher oil prices there is little economic incentive to switch to electric transport.

Which brings me back to the topic of this thread, the light that burns twice as bright burns half as long, and IMHO our light starts dimming as soon as the US peaks, which may well be this month.   Once that happens human civilisation will surely decline in concert with M. King Hubbert’s curve.  Our population and emissions will drop, perhaps as quickly as they rose.  Key questions in my mind tonight are 1) whether positive feedbacks continue to heat the biosphere (e.g. destabilisation of methane hydrates), 2) if “islands” of civility and technology can be maintained in a desperate and declining global community, and 3) If this flu business is just China’s leadership having a dress rehearsal for the economic decoupling and mayhem to come?

 

Edited February 3, 2020 by wharfbanger
I’m

[Gerry Maddoux + 3,627]

Oh, I don't know many of the answers. I just know that without oil and gas, my generation would still be stuck somewhere in the backwaters of time. And that despite everything I've learned about renewables, if it weren't for oil and gas, my generation and yours would be freezing. 

Look, when I was your age, I had all the answers. Yes, my generation has screwed a lot of things up. But so will yours. It is important for you to push your agenda as you see it, but just as important to realize that without oil and gas, you really wouldn't have much at all. 

For forty years I have read John McPhee. John has no training as a geologist, but he has taken one along with him on his long journey. Every one of them has been able to show him--from the rock--that we have had 40 or so climate changes during the last 400 million years. Florida, as they say, has been under water more than under the sun. It strikes me as interesting that here we are, the only ones to have possibly contributed to a climate change, and yet there were 40 of them just as vicious that occurred without a single internal combustion engine. 

We'll see. I am a big cheerleader of the next generation, yet I don't really think you know much about the harsh reality of life. WE.WOULD.HAVE.FROZEN.TO.DEATH.HAD.WE.NOT.HAD.FOSSIL.FUELS. Not to mention surgical equipment, tires, winning the first and second world wars. Don't sell this short. Before you bury fossil fuels, get high on your poison of choice and try to seance exactly where you would be if you hadn't benefitted from them. That's all.

[ronwagn + 6,290]

6 hours ago, Enthalpic said:

That's Abraham lake, a common hiking spot in Alberta.  Its gas output is abnormally high.

It looks like one might be able to drill holes in the bubbles and light them. Very beautiful really. 

 

[0R0 + 6,251]

4 hours ago, wharfbanger said:

Thanks Gerry.  I am a scientist, my PhD was in CO2 gas release from magmatic systems.  My Masters thesis was published in world’s top geology journal: Geology.  
 

I think you would find it interesting:  https://www.abc.net.au/science/articles/2008/05/07/2238200.htm?site=science_dev&topic=latest

I’ll freely admit scientists don’t have all the answers, but I can promise many of us are honest, conservative with the facts,  and very dedicated.   In my profession there is practically total consensus on the subject of human induced climate change.

So yes I am confused and frustrated by non-professionals that deny human culpability in climate change. Especially the ones that should know better.  If I want an opinion on an electrical issue with my truck I’ll happily accept the opinion of an auto electrician.

Gerry is it because you personally profit from oil and gas, and to acknowledge human involvement would be to implicate yourself in some perceived act of evil?  Perhaps you exist within a mostly conservative drilling subculture where public acceptance of human induced climate change would have negative impacts on your business or social relationships? These are honest questions.  

Why not accept all the facts?  I am prepared to accept that hydrocarbons have provided modern human civilisation, for all the good and bad that entails.  I have no problem, either personally or others, investing in the fossil carbon industry, because I understand fossil fuels are necessary for all of us to survive.  Let’s all just face reality; without higher oil prices there is little economic incentive to switch to electric transport.

Which brings me back to the topic of this thread, the light that burns twice as bright burns half as long, and IMHO our light starts dimming as soon as the US peaks, which may well be this month.   Once that happens human civilisation will surely decline in concert with M. King Hubbert’s curve.  Our population and emissions will drop, perhaps as quickly as they rose.  Key questions in my mind tonight are 1) whether positive feedbacks continue to heat the biosphere (e.g. destabilisation of methane hydrates), 2) if “islands” of civility and technology can be maintained in a desperate and declining global community, and 3) If this flu business is just China’s leadership having a dress rehearsal for the economic decoupling and mayhem to come?

 

I don't believe the climate science is all that scientific.Just as I am skeptical about medicine and drugs. Just as I am certain that the social sciences are 50% dogma, 40% tradition and 10% deliberate misinterpretation. 

There is too much government and politics involved in post Al Gore climate science and too many opportunities to bend the scientific discussion to their funder's will. NOAA's use of fake data has actually raised the question of whether there is any climate change at all. The horrible predictive record of the older anthropogenic  CO2 global warming models makes me doubt the models have any useful value in predicting anything, not to speak of any sort of certainty in calamitous outcomes. 

The ice core and other historic deposition records of CO2 and temperature show a much stronger correlation to sunspot cycles than to CO2 - but they do show a correlation to CO2. Indeed, we are still cooler than at the times of Alexander the great and the Roman empire. When the Mediterranean was lush and rich rather than arid and poor.  The longest broad record of temperature readings is in N. America. If you look at the raw (unadjusted) continuous data for the entire record, there is no trend in it.

You can also see that there is a sharp rise in some stations in industrialized  zones starting around 1980 - not because of a greenhouse effect but because particulate cover was rapidly decreasing as clean air regulations were put in place in the West. Nearby areas outside the historic regional particulate cloud don't show that trend or don't show it as sharply..It is particularly strong in German data. You would be equally correct to say that environmental particulate emission regulations caused global warming, or at least higher readings at long established stations that are mostly clustered around industrial centers. This bias in the data is not addressed by any model. Not addressing it is scientific misconduct in my book..

If you  go through Pittsburgh today and compare it to the black cloud that marked it in 1973 as you approached it from the East and then receded as you left it to the West, you will understand what I am talking about. The climate concern of the day was global cooling due to particulate cover. If you want to solve global warming find a useful substitute for the particulate cover we lost to the same people who want us to die of exposure because of a future global warming calamity that we can prevent at will at little cost. E.g. use extra dirty fuel for jet engines. 

Due to a drop in N.Am and N.Eur temperature data collection since the 1970s by huge portions, the variance has increased and the inclusion of short recent data series from global sources has made the GHCN (NOAA) database a source of uncertainty to climate models. Their error bands increase as time goes on and continuous station data going back before 1900 becomes more diffuse.

https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/Delivery.cfm/SSRN_ID1653928_code237317.pdf?abstractid=1653928&mirid=1&type=2. 

There are benefits to warming though they seem to disappear when put in the hands of government sponsored researchers. E.g. second growing seasons for crops. China, for one, is worried that a global cooling cycle would knock out the winter crop in central China. The Mediterranean basin though, would really suffer badly with even more drought. 

So yes, there is a greenhouse effect. Yes, we probably contribute to it substantially.

As to what to do, spreading particulates selectively to obtain cooler subtropic winters would be one good way of approaching a deliberate engineering of global climate. Suppressing CO2 emissions is costly in human lives NOW,. So it is not moral to go there at all. You don't sacrifice living people for a possible future problem you can't accurately predict and you can solve ad hoc. 

Fortunately, we have a decade or two in which we can shut down most coal and displace oil for shipping with nat gas/LNG. And do so economically. Also, renewables are already cheaper than anything fossil fuel while they are operating and where they are near populations and industry. The problem now is storage and transmission. Both require time and lots of energy resources to be put in place. So restricting CO2 is one way to make sure you slow down the adoption of renewables. So you can retain the existing fossil fuel system operating it in a declining fill in role as renewables displace it.

Finally, we are  well past peak births. Particularly in the Energy intensive OECD+China, where we are in a 2nd or 3rd generation of declining births (less so in the US). In the industrialized world, energy consumption will fall as the boomers retire in the this decade and are followed by much smaller incoming young generations. They have already shifted to savings and reducing consumption. That is part of the reason for Europe and Japan going into stagnation. It will get worse. China tilted to savings a decade ago and will now quickly morph into a faster shrinking version of Japan and Europe as its early retirement ages reduce consumption and incomes before they had to. What demographic decline means is that (necessary) infrastructure spending will fall off (but for renewables), construction will revert to replacement, and finally, energy consumption by 2050 will be down in OECD+China by at least 30%, and in China up to 50%. 

There is no need for any political intervention but to clear the way for easy permitting of renewables and their infrastructure and to stop fighting NG/LNG. Time to shut down all of the climate change organizations, particularly the UN ones. The intergovernmental space is a null set. They have nothing to contribute.

Therefore, there will not be a Hulbert Peak because NG will displace all of the consumption growth potential of oil, and renewables will displace NG, and overall energy consumption will drop by the end of this decade and shrink with demographics onwards. Civilization will only decline because of other reasons. The main one being a withdrawal of the US from the global role as provider of security for trade if it is not given the mercantile advantages and active military participation it is demanding from its trade partners. 

 

 

[Anthony Okrongly + 114]

21 hours ago, Gerry Maddoux said:

Well, sir, you've just defined the foibles in the system--the ones none of the renewables people have discussed. Reason? They're counting on giant lithium-ion batteries from Elon Musk's Gigafactory 1 to store energy during high-production days and weeks, then feeding it back into the system as needed during the low-production days. That's an awful lot of lithium, cobalt, nickel, manganese, and so forth to be aggregating into a giant battery. And they're not without danger: one of those battery dumps (that nobody knew was in their neighborhood) just burned in a place called Surprise, Arizona. 

I think this whole renewables gig is out of control. There's absolutely no doubt that in the wind corridors of Texas and Oklahoma, and from desert solar farms, there can be a whole lot of energy generated. But to depend on a battery seems a bit Buck Rogers to an aging guy like me.

 

I'll probably post this link a lot. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NiRrvxjrJ1U

The solution to grid level storage is liquid metal batteries. They have an 80% efficiency rate, they don't degrade at all which was shown in 5000 cycles of 100% charge, 100% discharge (this simulates 12 years of use with a 1% degradation over that time.) They are solid metal at room temperature and generate Zero volts which makes them safe to ship.  They are very heavy because they are all metal. At operating temperature the metal is liquid. But they can be deployed at grid level and operate for decades. 

So if there is a storage solution it will be this, not strapping together 25 million AA batteries and hoping they don't burn down. 

[Tom Kirkman + 8,860]

On 2/2/2020 at 8:37 AM, Anthony Okrongly said:

https://oilprice.com/Alternative-Energy/Renewable-Energy/Is-Germany-Too-Dependent-On-Renewable-Energy.html

Unintended consequences.  If there are ANY periods when renewables provide ZERO energy to the grid then that means you must maintain 100% generation capacity using conventional generation means. So, renewables don't actually displace ANY conventional generation. What they do is make conventional generation plants LESS economical and less viable as a capital investment, because on the days that renewables do generate power the conventional investment is being under-utilized. 

^

[Gerry Maddoux + 3,627]

40 minutes ago, Anthony Okrongly said:

The solution to grid level storage is liquid metal batteries.

The Sadoway battery at MIT, I presume. The guy is awfully smart, I'll give him that. The problem is, as with all batteries, scaling up. 

Have they finally solved the incredible heat-activation problem? The metals only work when they're molten, right? And to melt them requires an incredible temperature. I don't know, somehow I don't see a massive grid storage battery working at these incredible temperatures without causing some ambient alarm, if not damage. 

It sounds like you know a lot about them. You made the statement that they can be deployed at grid level. Has that actually been done? Thanks for the input.

[notsonice + 1,255]

Shale Oil Fiasco?? followed this thread for some time. As far as the oil business not a real large scale disaster except for those who borrowed massive amounts of money to finance their leasing/exploration/drilling etc. The bankruptcies will accelerate on the heals of the virus and ensuing crash in prices. My guess is WTI will fall under $50 this week. Unless drastic cuts in production are made fast WTI can test $40 crude by summer. Unwinding the Virus related effects on the Chinese economy will not happen overnight. If crude falls to $40 it will devastate the share prices of the strong players and their budgets. The Virus in China is not going away fast as many here have mentioned it mostly is being downplayed (covered up in the extent???) by the Chinese. Demand in China has already dropped fast. $40 crude is the real  disaster to US oil shale players. Rig counts will plummet to half of what it is today? more than 50 percent? How much the market can adsorb in losses and the affect on the general economy? The virus will claim a lot more victims who never ever contract it. GDP growth will be hammered if WTI falls to $40. And remember elections are all about the economy. Good luck to those in China and to all those that rely on oil and gas for a living.

Edited February 3, 2020 by notsonice

[Enthalpic + 1,496]

3 hours ago, Gerry Maddoux said:

The Sadoway battery at MIT, I presume. The guy is awfully smart, I'll give him that. The problem is, as with all batteries, scaling up. 

Have they finally solved the incredible heat-activation problem? The metals only work when they're molten, right? And to melt them requires an incredible temperature. I don't know, somehow I don't see a massive grid storage battery working at these incredible temperatures without causing some ambient alarm, if not damage. 

It sounds like you know a lot about them. You made the statement that they can be deployed at grid level. Has that actually been done? Thanks for the input.

Flow / tank batteries are super easy to scale up (add another tank). 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vanadium_redox_battery

Yes, several are in operation.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vanadium_redox_battery#Largest_vanadium_grid_batteries

[wharfbanger + 4]

20 hours ago, Gerry Maddoux said:

Oh, I don't know many of the answers. I just know that without oil and gas, my generation would still be stuck somewhere in the backwaters of time. And that despite everything I've learned about renewables, if it weren't for oil and gas, my generation and yours would be freezing. 

Look, when I was your age, I had all the answers. Yes, my generation has screwed a lot of things up. But so will yours. It is important for you to push your agenda as you see it, but just as important to realize that without oil and gas, you really wouldn't have much at all. 

For forty years I have read John McPhee. John has no training as a geologist, but he has taken one along with him on his long journey. Every one of them has been able to show him--from the rock--that we have had 40 or so climate changes during the last 400 million years. Florida, as they say, has been under water more than under the sun. It strikes me as interesting that here we are, the only ones to have possibly contributed to a climate change, and yet there were 40 of them just as vicious that occurred without a single internal combustion engine. 

We'll see. I am a big cheerleader of the next generation, yet I don't really think you know much about the harsh reality of life. WE.WOULD.HAVE.FROZEN.TO.DEATH.HAD.WE.NOT.HAD.FOSSIL.FUELS. Not to mention surgical equipment, tires, winning the first and second world wars. Don't sell this short. Before you bury fossil fuels, get high on your poison of choice and try to seance exactly where you would be if you hadn't benefitted from them. That's all.

Gerry it sounds like you didn’t read all of my post.  We are mostly in agreement. 

[Gerry Maddoux + 3,627]

21 hours ago, wharfbanger said:

Gerry is it because you personally profit from oil and gas, and to acknowledge human involvement would be to implicate yourself in some perceived act of evil?

 

2 minutes ago, wharfbanger said:

Gerry it sounds like you didn’t read all of my post.  We are mostly in agreement. 

You've very perceptive. I think I quit when I got to the above (highest) question. And you're right in that I may be getting defensive. It's just that the younger generation can't have it both ways: benefit more than any other group from the wonders of petrochemical plants and staying warm, but also want to destroy that very entity without a second thought. 

To be fair, I'll read your thesis. I wrote one myself, way back in 1968. It was beautiful. Logical. Backed up by all sorts of scientific measurements and conclusions. And wrong. 

Like everyone, I have my personal views, and they're both emotional and unemotional. I think the IMO-2020 (MARPOL) mandate, for example, may actually "cure" a great deal of manmade climate change. I find it amazing that no one in the media has actually picked up on what a massive deal this is.

I actually do believe sulfur oxides wreak havoc on the environment, and the MARPOL will fix a lot of that. That's also one of the reasons I'm not so sure about the NCM811 batteries: to get pure, noncorrosive nickel in large quantities, the earth sulfide has to be put to immense heat as enriched oxygen is whistled in. The NCM811 battery may be clean in use, but the off-gases from the smelter ovens are a potpourri of sulfur oxides.

SOX, along with NOX, are the devil. CO2? I'm not so sure about that.