

How demand for oil will change by 2030 - sleepingbot
http://www.economist.com/daily/chartgallery/displaystory.cfm?story_id=14790202&fsrc=rss

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rsheridan6
Suppose self-driving cars are developed by then? A lot of car trips would be
rendered unnecessary. Instead of driving a 2 ton car to the grocery store to
get a carton of milk, the store would send a 100 pound driverless go-kart to
deliver it. And imagine if you had your walls covered with monitors streaming
HD video in real time. Video conferencing would be almost as good as face to
face contact, again rendering a lot of car and plane trips unnecessary.

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Retric
Let's get real, you can make oil for 80-100$ a barrel from coal, and around
200$ a barrel from air and nuclear power. There is nothing magic about long
chain hydrocarbons they are just really cheep right now. So we use them for
building roads, (Asphalt), lubricants, plastics, fertilizer, and fuel.
Something like 20% of our GDP depended on whale oil we found a cheaper
alternative. Once supply becomes expensive you will see oil demand fall like a
stone.

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manish
No one is saying any cause. Just prediction. Doesn't rising number of cars,
also include electric or other alternative energy?

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sleepingbot
Rising number of electric cars wouldn't be accounted here, since they don't
use fossil fuels.

What the graphic is telling us is, no matter how big the effort is to switch
to renewables+ev's, etc., the fast growth of emerging economies, less prone to
become green as fast as, say, EU, will lead to a sustainable and even
increasing use of fossil fuels.

The best scenario, in my opinion: fossil fuel prices skyrocketing + some
political agreements to boost smart subsidies where there are needed, to make
renewables cheaper than coal. As Google.org says, RE<C (where "RE" is
renewables and "C" is coal.)

60% of EU budget goes to farmers subsidies. USA subsidizes also monocrops such
as corn (leading to massive use of corn syrup, packaged food, boosting
obesity.)

So less subsidies to lobbies and more to renewables. And more electric cars on
the roads.

I've driven some cool EV's and I only say this: it's really fun. Waiting for
the 4 new Renaults to come in 2011-2012 and, specially, a smaller-cheaper
version of the Tesla Model S.

All that said, I don't own a car.

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Towle
Electric cars don't use fossil fuels, eh? Hrm...how do you suppose they get
the electricity into the batteries? Kittens running on treadmills?

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sleepingbot
They of course use fossil fuels if you are using fossil fuels to generate
electricity.

Which is why I explain the rest. Read the RE<C and be cool.

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Towle
Which would mean that an increase in number of electric cars _should_ be
accounted for by the graphic as an increase in fossil fuel consumption as
well. I don't have any stats on hand, but I would bet that a majority of
batteries are charged with fossil fuel energy, simply because it's the
cheapest energy around, and manufacturers need to make a profit.

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Towle
Please. We'll have hit peak oil long before then; there's no way that much oil
will be produced in 2030.

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sleepingbot
Peak oil is there. It depends on the data you are looking at, though. Sadly,
new sources are being discovered. Several new ones in Latin America, not to
say the dirty sources (the really dangerous ones.) Tar sands from Canada (dig
in there and then come back to talk to me) and yes, Alaska.

Tar sands are a huge issue in this picture. Just in there, north of your
border.

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Towle
It looks like we've hit global peak, yes, but it's hard to be sure. I went
with the phrasing "long before then" just to be on the safe side.

Sadly? We're in no position to be picky about where we get our energy. We
currently have no viable alternatives to oil. Combine all the different
renewable energy sources you want; they'll never fill the hole left by oil.

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sleepingbot
I completely disagree with you. I don't think your explanation needs even a
response. Oil needs to have alternatives this century. Oil is bad and doesn't
make sense. It's burning "old animal matter" into what we breath, while in 6
hours we get as much energy from the sun as we do need for 1 year.

Anyway. Go burn some gasoline, my friend.

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lionhearted
> It's burning "old animal matter" into what we breath,

Mate, we don't need that kind of rah-rah emotional imagery here at HN.
Penicillin is putting living fungus into your body - but we usually just call
it antibiotics.

Anyway, I agree with your other comment about nuclear power being a positive
solution to oil. If we can improve batteries, nuclear/better batteries can
probably hold us over to hydrogen, fusion, or whatever's post-oil/gas.

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sleepingbot
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