We may be among the last generation of airline pilots

KAG · Post by **KAG** » Thu Apr 23, 2009 6:40 am

I've been reading a few books (the empty tank, the Long emergency) that I have to be honest are not only interesting reads, but are scarring the crap out of me. These books are about peak oil, future world wide oil shortages, and the aftermath of what happens when we run out - it's not going to be pretty, and (according to these books) will happen by mid this century.
According to both books I'm reading/read we have already reached peak oil - both of these books were written in 05, and predicted in a round about way the rise and crash of oil last year and this will happen more frequent and with higher price swings as supplies become harder to find, and more costly to access. It will get to a point where 2-3 barrels of oil energy will be required to extract and refine 1 barrel. Then the oil age is over.
These also get into the effects of climate change and pollution and the overall effect it may have on our survivability as a species, forget our current standard of living.

Anyway, they are interesting reads, and I recommend that everyone who has any concern about the planet we inhabit read and just ponder the “what if”…

xsbank · Post by **xsbank** » Thu Apr 23, 2009 7:03 am

"Doctor, it hurts when I eat bananas."

"Stop eating bananas."

Stop reading scary shit and you'll live happily ever after.

nookie201 · Post by **nookie201** » Thu Apr 23, 2009 7:05 am

Old news, the only way is Nuclear & we had to be building those 10 years ago.
There's not enough solar or wind to power todays demand, & trying to get people to have a Sh*t in the dark
to save energy won't work either.

I'm all for green, Nukes make more sense to me than burn toxic coal or waste natural gas on power.

Here's a Kicker, Honda had in 1993, Yes 1993!! the VX Civic, claimed 74 MPG, most people claimed
seeing 50MGP average. They can barely squeeze that out of a hydrid today 15 years later.
....makes you wonder what happened

-G

Hedley · Post by **Hedley** » Thu Apr 23, 2009 7:13 am

Old news

I'm far more concerned that ours may be the last generation of porn stars.

Long before you were born, the "Club of Rome" was bleating
out the same message:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Limits_to_Growth

predicted in a round about way the rise and crash of oil last year

uh, no, not really. That was a speculative bubble - like the
tech boom, or housing - that like all bubbles, burst. I'm not
sure anyone cares about the facts, but the price of oil was
rising as demand was falling. Hm.

pilotbzh · Post by **pilotbzh** » Thu Apr 23, 2009 8:43 am

http://greenweb.federatedmedia.net/archives/493

not over yet

iflyforpie · Post by **iflyforpie** » Thu Apr 23, 2009 8:57 am

Aircraft are one of the most fuel efficient ways of getting people over large distances.

Take the maximum fuel load of an A380 and divide it by the maximum range: you now have the aircraft fuel economy in miles per gallon (actually, worse than typical, since we assume we are burning the reserves). Now multiply by the number of passengers. I get over 60 MPG per passenger with 525 passengers and no reserves. An SUV carrying four people gets less (per person) and doesn't go Mach .85.

Now, ships and trains are even better, but they are materials and infrastructure intensive (which uses energy as well) and--excepting the bullet trains and hovercraft/hydrofoils--they are slow.

There is far more of an energy/environmental case against the personal automobile than the aircraft.

stopsquawk · Post by **stopsquawk** » Thu Apr 23, 2009 9:20 am

Totally agree KAG. I'm almost through "The Long Emergency" and I'm wondering whether I'll have a job in 5 years. When the oil tap starts to close, our lifestyle is going to drastically change. Look around you. Everything you see owes it's existence to cheap oil in one form or another, whether it was made from oil by-products, manufactured with energy that was generated or made available by oil, or transported by fossil fuel transportation from somewhere in the world where it was made cheaply in a factory constructed using oil burning equipment. It's a must read for sure. You can't fly or build an airplane without oil. Nor can you construct or operate an airport. Things are bound to change, but not overnight.

Don't think that some other source of energy is ready to take the place of the depleted oil stocks. There isn't a viable replacement for cheap oil on the horizon. Read the book if you disagree.

Just another canuck · Post by **Just another canuck** » Thu Apr 23, 2009 9:30 am

Guess someone should start to come up with a nuclear reactor that can hang off a wing.

Louis · Post by **Louis** » Thu Apr 23, 2009 11:17 am

Just another canuck wrote:Guess someone should start to come up with a nuclear reactor that can hang off a wing.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_powered_aircraft

Just another canuck · Thu Apr 23, 2009 11:35 am

Louis wrote:
Just another canuck wrote:Guess someone should start to come up with a nuclear reactor that can hang off a wing.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_powered_aircraft

Cool... just need a civilian version. Problem solved.

2R · Post by 2R » Thu Apr 23, 2009 11:57 am

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ion_Engine

Ion engines are very close to atmospheric usage.Then they will not be able to give that dirty oil away

WetJet · Post by **WetJet** » Thu Apr 23, 2009 12:12 pm

Peak oil is a myth.

Who out there benefits from the peak oil hypothesis? Oil companies AND environmentalists.
Oil companies benefit because they can charge more per barrel if we believe it, and the environmentalists want us off oil in the first place. Peak oil is a great story for both groups because it forwards their agendas!

Redwine · Post by **Redwine** » Thu Apr 23, 2009 1:22 pm

There is huge money involved the oil business. As long as that is so, we will use oil. There are other alternatives algae etc etc, but as long as there is money in oil, we will continue to milk every ounce of it. Hope in technology scientists etc to get us out of this mess, sooner than later. I would not worry about it. Life goes on.

Chin up!

snaproll20 · Post by **snaproll20** » Thu Apr 23, 2009 1:58 pm

Peak Oil is definitely NOT a myth!
People who say so believe there is an unlimited amount of oil. It is not an infinite amount, folks. Many oil companies are pouring billions into green energy. Ask yourself why.
Pre-recession the world used about 85 million bbl per day. Lack of investment loans, too little return because of low prices have cancelled billions of dollars of projects, so no “new” oil is coming on-stream. The international agency responsible for data on oil has finally admitted the numbers are out of whack, virtually confirming Peak Oil. 10 trillion dollars are currently required to find, exploit and bring to market questionable supplies from Alaska/off-shore etc. These fields are not even proven and even if good, will barely meet increased demand because it will take 10 years to do it. What is the price per litre if that much money is invested? Incidentally, that agency does not promote the sale of oil shares.
Major fields, (none of which have been discovered in the past 30 years) are in severe decline. Mexico is forecast to be a dud in a handful of years and they are #3 suppliers to the U.S. “All the cheap oil has been found” …….CEO of a major oil company. Recovery enhancement is getting more expensive for diminishing returns and uses terrible amounts of water (incidentally, water is the next big problem.)
Should the recession come to an end, oil will go over $200 bbl. If you can imagine fuelling a jetliner with $5 per litre fuel, imagine where the fares will go. Flying will once again become the domain of the rich, just like it started out. Everyone else will take the train.
90% of oil reserves in the world belong to nations, (not Exxon, etc). They have their own developing industries and political agendas which do not include cheap exports to the West. When the recession ends, there will be crippling shortages of oil. That is why there are lots of tankerships berthed full of oil which will be sold at a profit in the (near) future.
Nuclear is not the answer, even though it is now “green”. It takes too much water. Also, the lag in coming on line is too long, falling way behind the effects of Peak Oil. Additionally, there are not enough experienced people to run them.
So, since aviation is one of the industries critically reliant upon oil, it will suffer, and like KAG said, jobs will be at risk. A new model experimental aircraft runs on solar energy, but we are light-years (ha-ha) away from any economical alternative to jet fuel.
There is much more to this, so I won’t bore everyone with facts. But, look them up for yourself. It is downright scary.

C-GGGQ · Post by **C-GGGQ** » Thu Apr 23, 2009 2:08 pm

No peak oil is not a myth but it hasn't been reached yet. You can read a hundred books and get a hundred different answers from last year to the 1950's to 2250 when peak oil will/ was reached. its bull.

KAG · Post by **KAG** » Thu Apr 23, 2009 3:05 pm

If peak oil hasn't been reached yet, it will be in the next few years.
Ask yourself, if oil companies are so sure about their reserves, then why hasn't there been any new refineries built in the last decade or so?
We are at the peak of "cheap oil" easily extracted, liquid based oil. The bulk of the world’s untapped/underdeveloped reserves are tar sands or shale form, or under thousands of feet of water - Added expense and environmental impact.

We are going to enter a cycle of price oil peaks and crashes that will be dictated by demand driven by recessions. You will also see the Worlds super powers using their military to control oil rich areas. You can already see it’s effects – our current economic state, and the Iraq war.
Every aspect of our modern lifestyle is oil driven. From food, to manufacture, transportation to the cloths on your back.
I really hope I’m wrong, but I think it would be prudent for our government and it’s people to pull their heads out of the sand and start to transition into a less oil dependant future.
Or wait and do nothing and watch our society crash.

It’s not if, it’s when. 50 years or 100 it's comming.

C-GGGQ · Post by **C-GGGQ** » Thu Apr 23, 2009 3:15 pm

THe oil refinery in my home town is tripling in size over the next 5 years. Huge contstruction underway, It was one of the biggest in canada already.

FICU · Post by **FICU** » Thu Apr 23, 2009 5:20 pm

Remember "Y2K"... the biggest scam of all time? People and companies made billions of dollars by scaring the world's population and making them believe there would be an electronic "crash" of epic proportions on January 1, 2000.

"Global warming"...

Bede · Post by **Bede** » Thu Apr 23, 2009 5:21 pm

snaproll20 wrote: Nuclear is not the answer, even though it is now “green”. It takes too much water.

Yes, that damn non-renewable resource, water. The water doesn't get contaminated, just put back into a lake at a different temperature.

There was a lot of research done in the 70's on micro nuclear plants. Basically, one town gets a plant which is the size of a big house. Unfortunately, 3 mile island killed that plan, but I think it was a good one - no waste in transmission.

Invertago · Post by **Invertago** » Thu Apr 23, 2009 5:43 pm

We'll never run out of oil as long as dinosaurs keep dying and replenishing the supply!

KAG · Post by **KAG** » Thu Apr 23, 2009 6:50 pm

FICU wrote:Remember "Y2K"... the biggest scam of all time? People and companies made billions of dollars by scaring the world's population and making them believe there would be an electronic "crash" of epic proportions on January 1, 2000.

"Global warming"...

Is this topic in the news every night? Is our Government making dire oil shortage warnings? How about the oil companies? Nope. Bad news is bad for business, bad for investors, bad for the stock market. No one wants bad news.

It’s Former big oil execs/geologists who have drawn their own conclusions based on their own information/research. No one (expect maybe a few authors) is trying to cash in on this.

Read the long emergency or the empty or the other titles. Draw your own conclusion.

frontside_air · Post by **frontside_air** » Thu Apr 23, 2009 7:43 pm

kunstler's polemical guttersniping is fun to listen to for about five minutes but he's a bit too much of a hack to take seriously. his critique of the second half of the 20th century is the same sophomoric, watered down malthusian/dialectical diatribe that fills spacing and adbusters but offers little praxis. he paints a neo-luddite vision of the future that looks like the lovehchild of taggart's(rand's) railways and walter benjamin's arcades. while this all sounds nice, i think we're in too deep to expect "context-appropriate development" to ever coalesce.

"welcome to the thunderdome!"

WetJet · Post by **WetJet** » Thu Apr 23, 2009 8:17 pm

It's a myth.

Not it isn't.

Yes it is.

No it insn't.

The one thing that is not debatable:

"If you don't have oil, you're screwed burtha"

Just another canuck · Post by **Just another canuck** » Thu Apr 23, 2009 8:23 pm

Guess we only have one choice then... man power.

scopiton · Post by **scopiton** » Thu Apr 23, 2009 8:44 pm

shield"

Just another canuck wrote:
Louis wrote:
Just another canuck wrote:Guess someone should start to come up with a nuclear reactor that can hang off a wing.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_powered_aircraft
Cool... just need a civilian version. Problem solved.

"To shield the flight crew, the nose section of the aircraft was modified to include a 12-ton lead and rubber shield
here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Convair_X-6

We may be among the last generation of airline pilots

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