Peak Oil

Coal can be made to burn clean.
...producing lots of sludge in the process. And where does that get put?

Nevertheless, coal is the number 1 energy fuel in the US today, and in some ways it's easier to easier to clean up at a central source (and dispose of byproducts) than to deal with more numerous small, scattered generating sources.
 
JustGeoff, are you going to provide a cite for your figure of 25 years of Uranium reserves?

The lowest estimate I could come up with was 50 years, and that assumes:

No new mines.
No new sources.
No reprocessing.
No breeder reactors.
No changes to reactor designs.

Other estimates, assuming all of the above, run as high as 5 billion years. Uranium is as common as dirt, and a very dense energy source.

We're not going to run out of Uranium.
 
PixyMisa said:
We're not going to run out of Uranium. [/B]

This may be true. What is also true is that we have no idea how to safely decommission the existing nuclear power plants, so building loads of new ones hardly seems like an inviting prospect.

This is an excellent site describing various transition plans. These website are multiplying like rats.

http://planetforlife.com/Transition.htm

The people of the United States will soon realize that the era of cheap oil is ending soon. They may learn of this from political leaders, journalists, scientists, the Web--the sooner the better. Once Americans accept the existence of the oil depletion problem, they can apply their intelligence and ingenuity toward a transition to sustainable energy
 
JustGeoff said:
The Ultimate "Peak Oil" resource!

This one is a search engine designed specifically for sorting through all of the websites dedicated to this topic, plus some opponents.

http://quasar.physik.unibas.ch/~fisker/401/oil/oilsearch.html

More garbage. I read the section on philosophy. The author idealizes the past and blames science for moving us away from the "wisdom of the ancients." Fine, but I doubt the author visits a shaman for his health care, and has to spend most of his time hunting for small animals and gathering roots, berries, etc. No, instead this brain dead pot smoker wrote this piece of trash while finishing the last slice of Dominoes the morning after waking up drunk in the campus center.
Also, once again, this is just the same non data with huge assumptions put in and huge amounts of data left out. Ask yourself why? A lot of bad data is the same as a small amount. I agree with the authors that oil production will decline, but because we have cheaper sources to replace it. The tin foil hat brigade of course will never look at all the data however.
Another funny snippet: "The population of world starts to decline due to universal empowerment of women. " Huh??? Talk about hillarious. All of the empowered women I know have jobs that let them take time off for their children and return later (also as per US federal law.) Finally, the most humorous is that the article predicts that in 100 years, oil will be gone, and the earth will cool. Anyone else see a huge problem with this scenario? When will it stop to cool? Do these people realize that cooling is actually worse than warming? Heheheheheeheh.
 
JustGeoff said:

This is an excellent site describing various transition plans. These website are multiplying like rats.[/b



So did 9-11 conspiracy pages after 'hunt the Boeing' made the email rounds. Doesn't make it reality.
 
I just wanted to point out a couple of things...

JustGeoff said:

I suppose you also believe the US invaded Iraq to rid the world of chemical weapons (the fact that Wolfowitz actually admitted it was really because "the entire country is swimming in oil" and "we had to agree on the WMD reason for bureaucratic reasons" obviously had nothing to do with it). :rolleyes:

I suggest you check your facts a little better. The above "swiming in oil" quote was taken out of context. He was not admitting that the US invaded Iraq to get their oil; instead, he was comparing the situation in Iraq with North Korea. (The idea being that sanctions for things like energy would work in North Korea, while they would not work in Iraq because it "floats on a sea of oil", and can get aroudn sanctions by either using its own resources, or selling oil to buy what it needs.)

I suggest better fact-checking in the future; mistakes such as that dimish any arguments you might have.

JustGeoff said:

Kyoto was about getting the western world, the biggest producer of greenhouse gases, to start trying to reduce those emissions. Every other major power was either already on-board or waiting for US assent before they agreed. No meaningful action could be taken without the US. The US deliberately and wantonly trashed the treaty out of pure self interest. Let's not re-write history, eh? Everyone in the west, especially in the environmental movement knows only too well how important kyoto was and how devastating it was that the US decided it was not going to take its responsibility for its own actions seriously. Your reason for why the treaty wasn't signed is pure fantasy/propaganda and if you believe it then you are a fool. The treary was not signed for ONE reason : It would have meant the US would have had to raise prices of gasoline to its own internal market, which would have been politically unacceptable to the US public. Please do not compound the irresponsibility with lies.


First of all, you are assuming the only reason that it was not signed because it would cause gas prices to rise. I believe that statement requires proof. Many experts felt that Kyoto would cause problems with the economy, and that is what would prove to be unpopular.

Secondly, there were many problems with Kyoto, for example:
- As others have pointed out, the idea of countries 'selling' credits is a scam, as corrupt countries would sell any credits and squander the money
- Even countries that supported Kyoto did not live up to its requirements. See: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/2996219.stm : The EU as a whole is committed to reducing emissions by 8% on their 1990 levels by between 2008 and 2012. On present trends, it appears to stand almost no chance of keeping its promise. (Now, while it is true that Kyoto did not get enough signitures to ratify it, it does seem strange that the champions of Kyoto could not follow its rules)
- Many countries got a 'head start' with Kyoto. Since the reductions were to be done relative to levels from several years ago, some countries didn't really have much to do. (For example, some countries have declining populations, while others such as Germany, benefited when the high-polution eastern-bloc industries shut down after reunification.)
- Ultimately, Kyoto would do nothing substantial to fix the problem. 3rd world countries (the ones that want more of the Western world's lifestyle) would be virtually untouched.
 

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