CBS report: Earth's resources are running out.

[jmattbassplaya]

I have to disagree with you on this point. The Ford Excursion was shelved long ago and Hummer has gone the way of the Dodo. The big three have figured out how to make full size V-8 pickups that somehow get better milelage than my 10 year old 4 cylinder pickup. I'm seeing more and more mini cars (e.g. Smart Cars, Fiats, and Scion iQs, etc) on the streets and I can't pass a used car lot that doesn't have a couple of lifted diesel Super Duties for sale.

I honestly never thought I'd see these kinds of changes. I suppose gas breaking $4/gallon has something to do with it.

Gotta agree with this one. It's funny because it seems like the more those kinds of cars find themselves on the streets the less gas prices seem to go up. At least in my area, gas has actually gone done some/has remained pretty much the same. This time of the year it's usually skyrocketing in price.

 

[skychief]

And - hybrids are not the answer. They take more energy to develop, make and recycle than they save, and use plenty of energy to create the electricity. From an engineer's point of view they are a stupid detour.

Ermm... that was supposed to be our little secret.

 

[Shredder8]

This is why I don't want to have kids. What kind of planet will they inherit? Life's going to be too hard for them.

 

[nickbass79]

This is why I don't want to have kids. What kind of planet will they inherit? Life's going to be too hard for them.

This is my problem as well. :scowl:

 

[Simo98]

And - hybrids are not the answer. They take more energy to develop, make and recycle than they save, and use plenty of energy to create the electricity. From an engineer's point of view they are a stupid detour.

Depends what you are using them for. In general they are fairly backwards and not all that practical, but for things where a lot of kilometers are being covered they can be a fairly effective option. I know a guy who is a Cab franchisee, he changed two of his vehicles over to Priuses a while back, he said he nets about an extra 2-3 grand per quater per cab since making the change.

 

[BassyBill]

Depends what you are using them for. In general they are fairly backwards and not all that practical, but for things where a lot of kilometers are being covered they can be a fairly effective option. I know a guy who is a Cab franchisee, he changed two of his vehicles over to Priuses a while back, he said he nets about an extra 2-3 grand per quater per cab since making the change.

I'm sure that's true, but it doesn't make the point you respond to wrong in any way.

Hybrids might save some people money at present, but that doesn't change the fact that they are not and never can be a solution to energy resource depletion, as electricity is not a primary energy resource.

 

[Simo98]

I'm sure that's true, but it doesn't make the point you respond to wrong in any way.

Hybrids might save some people money at present, but that doesn't change the fact that they are not and never can be a solution to energy resource depletion, as electricity is not a primary energy resource.

I didn't really mean that he was wrong, rather just pointing out that they do serve a purpose. For the most part they are pretty useless outside of saving money (even this is debatable), but I think they certainly are a step in the right direction, more or less.

Electricity is not a primary energy source, but you convert other primary sources to electricity so that they can be utilised. You can't directly use solar power to power a car outside of something like a solar sail, which is not even remotely practical. I don't think using electricity has anything to do with why they are not a solution to energy resource depletion, but rather the fact that they are hybridised with something that consumes a resource that is difficult to sustain.

A completely electric car would be a fairly good solution to Energy resource depletion as far as transport is concerned. You collect the energy from a source, convert it to electricity, store it (the tricky part) and then utilise it to power the vehicle. So long as you converted the original energy from a "sustainable source" you are not "depleting" anything. Not that there is any truly sustainable source to my knowledge, hence you are always depleting something in a way, that being said this depletion is probably beyond our control currently.

The Prius and similar hybrids, in my opinion, are a good step to help transition towards having the infrastructure etc. to utilise a fully electric car. By having the technology in use and profitable it stimulates research and development, but it also generates and entire business and industry around electric cars. If we don't have vehicles using electricity on the road, the services they require will not be around the place, and thus nobody will want an impractical electric car.



Just reading your post on primary energy resources, how exactly does the categorisation work? The definition I have come across; "Primary energy is energy found in nature that has not been subjected to any conversion or transformation process.", doesn't seem to make a lot of sense. Surely biomass can't be a primary resource, it is stored chemical energy converted from solar power? Fossil fuels are again just converted solar energy, infact just about everything is (wind, waves to an extent, even geothermal). And then what is solar energy? Heat and light energy converted from nuclear energy?

Where exactly is the line between something being a "primary" energy resource and something not?

 

[scorpionldr]

Too Many people - population has to be controlled or there will be no future. The Pope has to realize that his continued Doctrine of no Birth control is killing millions of people, and others have to get in line with this as well.

The movie "Rampage" touched on the concept of overpopulation.

I definitely agree with you population needs to be curbed, mostly because of my perception on how the world functions. I think it impacts efficiency, service, and community integration/interaction. Don't believe me? Take a good look at the state of customer services from major corporations. You can't tell me it's just because "X is a really bad company".

 

[BassyBill]

Where exactly is the line between something being a "primary" energy resource and something not?

I'm just going to modify the definiton you quoted a little.

"A primary energy resource is an energy resource found in nature that has not been subjected to any conversion or transformation process instigated by people". As you say, they're mostly different manifestations of solar energy in one form or another, accumulated and/or exploited over different timescales.

A secondary energy resource like electricity or hydrogen gas (as a fuel) is just one that we then get by exploiting a primary energy resource, as defined above. Secondary energy resources are not alternatives to primary energy resources as using a secondary resource still requires use of a primary one, by definition. Also, to get Z units of energy from a secondary source requires extraction of MORE than Z units from a primary one. That's just physics. But secondary sources are useful for other reasons. It's hard to imagine a wind powered Internet unless the wind is used to generate electricity first, for example.

The problem we have we with energy is that our demand for it (often measured as barrels of oil equivalent per capita per annum for country-by-country comparisons) is very high, and this needs to be met by our use of primary resources for the reasons described above. Fossil fuels have been very useful historically as a primary energy resource, as they are a concentrated source of (until now) relatively low cost energy. The trouble is, they are obviously finite because we're using them a lot faster than they naturally get made in the ground (they are said to be "non-renewable" for this reason). Alternative primary energy sources are available (e.g. wave power) that we can convert to useful secondary resources in a number of ways (like electricity or hydrogen gas). Some of these alternative primary resources are renewable in that they won't run out as we use them, but compared to fossil fuels, they are nearly all relatively dilute - in other words, it's difficult or costly to collect the energy from them in a cheap and efficient way. A lot of people are working on this, and many would say we need to try even harder as the problem becomes more urgent.

I hope that helps.

 

[NWB]

The problem we have we with energy is that our demand for it (often measured as barrels of oil equivalent per capita per annum for country-by-country comparisons) is very high, and this needs to be met by our use of primary resources for the reasons described above. Fossil fuels have been very useful historically as a primary energy resource, as they are a concentrated source of (until now) relatively low cost energy. The trouble is, they are obviously finite because we're using them a lot faster than they naturally get made in the ground (they are said to be "non-renewable" for this reason). Alternative primary energy sources are available (e.g. wave power) that we can convert to useful secondary resources in a number of ways (like electricity or hydrogen gas). Some of these alternative primary resources are renewable in that they won't run out as we use them, but compared to fossil fuels, they are nearly all relatively dilute - in other words, it's difficult or costly to collect the energy from them in a cheap and efficient way. A lot of people are working on this, and many would say we need to try even harder as the problem becomes more urgent.

I hope that helps.

Thank you Bill. You've perfectly summed up the energy issue I was hacking away at piecemeal.

 

[MatticusMania]

This is why I don't want to have kids. What kind of planet will they inherit? Life's going to be too hard for them.

Seriously?!?! Too hard?! As compared to what? The relative ease we have things in comparison to 100 years ago? How hard will it really be? People growing their own food, not spending all day watching TV, riding a bike to work? A lot of these finitie resources are really nothing more than a luxury. All one needs to survive is food, water, some shelter. We have the means to provide ourselves with everything we truly need without these resources. If people choose not to stop wasting them now, then we'll be forced to run out, and then we can no longer waste them, since we wont have them to waste.

 

[michael_atw]

Seriously?!?! Too hard?! As compared to what? The relative ease we have things in comparison to 100 years ago? How hard will it really be? People growing their own food, not spending all day watching TV, riding a bike to work? A lot of these finitie resources are really nothing more than a luxury. All one needs to survive is food, water, some shelter. We have the means to provide ourselves with everything we truly need without these resources. If people choose not to stop wasting them now, then we'll be forced to run out, and then we can no longer waste them, since we wont have them to waste.

LOL. I think it's a more a problem as we've had it wayyyyyy too easy for a little too long. Our complacent lifestyle is part of the problem.

 

[michael_atw]

Reboot.

That's a good discography to play in the midst of cataclysmic destruction.

 

[MatticusMania]

LOL. I think it's a more a problem as we've had it wayyyyyy too easy for a little too long. Our complacent lifestyle is part of the problem.

Yeah, way too easy for a little too long. We've really only had about what, 2 maybe 3 generations of complacency? That problem is only compounded by the exponential growth of technology and the convenience which it has provided.

Imagine if all of a sudden the power grid were to fail.

 

[kserg]

Can't wait. It's going to be fun...

 

[michael_atw]

That's just in the US though, or at least in countries with obesity rates as high as ours.

Yeah, but as I said in the second part, a fast-developing world will probably follow suit eventually.

 

[michael_atw]

Yeah, way too easy for a little too long. We've really only had about what, 2 maybe 3 generations of complacency? That problem is only compounded by the exponential growth of technology and the convenience which it has provided.

Imagine if all of a sudden the power grid were to fail.

That was just long enough I suppose.

I was talking about that stuff in another thread on this forum and another and in both was decried as a "Luddite". A critic of our approach to technology being equated to a hater of all technology. Thought it was humorous.


I think many people have the view that all progress is good, cost-effective, and has little or no downside. I find this most often in the medical world. Dump hundreds of billions of dollars into a cure for a disease that kills a few thousand people a year. I value life (although many would accuse me of not valuing it with such a criticism) but newsflash - we could dump hundreds of billions of dollars into feeding a million people for a year. Hmm...save a few thousand creating a pill...or save a million feeding others who are starving. Sort of a tangent from this specific topic but still interesting.

 

[Root 5]

There are many people who would cheerfully doom the entire human race if they could get another 30 years of living in luxury while they do it.

The most remarkable thing about this statement is that it's true.

 

[MatticusMania]

That was just long enough I suppose.

Yup. Complacenct quickly gave way to entitlement.

 

[Skitch it!]

"I do not want to end without mentioning another externality that is dismissed in market systems: the fate of the species. Systemic risk in the financial system can be remedied by the taxpayer, but no one will come to the rescue if the environment is destroyed. That it must be destroyed is close to an institutional imperative. Business leaders who are conducting propaganda campaigns to convince the population that anthropogenic global warming is a liberal hoax understand full well how grave is the threat, but they must maximize short-term profit and market share. If they don't, someone else will."

"As long as the general population is passive, apathetic, diverted to consumerism or hatred of the vulnerable, then the powerful can do as they please, and those who survive will be left to contemplate the outcome."

Quoted from Noam Chomsky's article: Is the world too big to fail?

This is what we are up against, IMO we reached the tipping point for global warming way back. Market systems being aware of the psychological time frame and the effects of this, which we are indeed already seeing, will push to maximize profits even more-so. To change anything you would have to start at the top. IMO YMMV and stuff.