Someone cast Wolven Winter on New Orleans!

[chrispedersen]

The problem here is manifold.

- By the time your 10 year test is done, the world will be either destabilizing over direct supply/demand issues for oil, or will be near that point anyways, due to rate of oil field depletion, and increasing world population needs.

Why do you suppose the world doesn't destabilize over, say, platinum? Or paladium, or uranium? What is it specifically about oil that makes it so inherently destabilizing?

Secondly, while I do agree that a tipping point for total oil production has been reached, I don't agree with the concept of world population needs.

Demand for any commodity is elastic. As price goes up, other alternatives become more attractive. Spurring the development of other alternatives. Free market economy in action.

[AdmiralZhao]

Originally Posted by chrispedersen

Why do you suppose the world doesn't destabilize over, say, platinum? Or paladium, or uranium? What is it specifically about oil that makes it so inherently destabilizing?

Secondly, while I do agree that a tipping point for total oil production has been reached, I don't agree with the concept of world population needs.

Demand for any commodity is elastic. As price goes up, other alternatives become more attractive. Spurring the development of other alternatives. Free market economy in action.

After a certain point, the demand for oil is elastic only in the sense that the groups that cannot afford it will die off. Oil is vital to nearly every aspect of modern society, and in particular to the industrialized agriculture that America uses to feed our population. Without at least a baseline amount of oil, the truck which delivers food to the grocery store does not arrive, and I have go Hinnom-style on my next door neighbors.

We have many trillions of dollars of infrastructure which can only use oil. And because everything currently relies on oil, any effort to upgrade this infrastructure will also require large amounts of oil. The scenario that people are worried about is that the free market doesn't start responding until oil is scarce and difficult to acquire, and at that point we don't have the energy resources to both maintain our society, acquire new oil, and upgrade our infrastructure.

This is one of the reasons why oil is different from platinum, paladium, or uranium. Society does not need constant inputs of these metals to function, and we can develop alternatives to these metals without needing large new stocks of these metals.

This is also why people want to see early development of alternatives to oil. When oil starts running low, we want oil to be in the same category as platinum, paladium, and uranium, i.e. something that is not hugely vital, and that we can continue to phase out without needing large new inputs.

[Edi]

As promised, a reply addressing the article Licker linked:

I see several problems with the stuff in that article. Not about the sun cycles as such, I'll take his word at face value regarding the cycle lengths and on the cosmic radiation and cloud cover variation following that.

But the following things:

• The CO2 curves he says are of doubtful significance follow the sunspot cycles even if not at the same magnitude and curve shape, especially during the 1940s. At that point CO2 concentration increase from the 1800s is up roughly 10% and then starts to gain on the other curves. No mention of the IR trapping properties of CO2 anywhere, not addressed, though an increased sunspot cycle makes sense for the rest of it.
• Related to the above, there is no consideration whether there was an El Nino phenomenon in effect during the temperature spike in the early 1900s. IIRC, there has been research into the El Nino that indicated this would have been the case. It contributed significantly to the Dust Bowl phenomenon in the US and the droughts that followed the Great Depression. No mention at all.
• He then returns to the solar cycles and cosmic radiation argument and continues as if this was the only probable cause and the solar cycle graphics he has only show the 11 year cycles, which is a geologic eyeblink. Nothing to support the stuff about the longer cycles.
• The same research to El Nino I mention above (what I remember from a BBC TV documentary, so no links, sadly ) also talks about there being fairly strong evidence of El Nino effects causing certain events in the past that affected old human civilizations, for example the droughts that destroyed Ur in Babylonia and devastated some Meso- and South American civilizations. All of these events involved significant temperature increases due to strong El Nino effects (much stronger than the early 1990s).
• The section about water vapor being the most important greenhouse gas again neglects the fact that while some amount of greenhouse gases are necessary to maintain a habitable temperature and that water vapor is by volume the greatest one, it is nowhere near as effective at trapping infrared wavelengths as CO2 is. Much like methane is 20 times more effective than CO2 as a greenhouse gas (but much shorter lived before it degrades to CO2), CO2 is more effective weight for weight. If the difference is similar, even modest CO2 increases would show increased temperatures.
• The part about temperature graphs following CO2 graphs and spiking: As temperature increases, sources of CO2 that have been unavailable become available. There is a staggering amount of methane trapped in the permafrost in Siberia and the Canadian north. As temperature rises, the permafrost melts. The methane is no longer frozen in place and is released into the atmosphere, where it shortly degrades to CO2. A cyclical repetition would see temperature rises melt existing permafrost, then glaciation causing permafrost again. This is a very plausible explanation for those portions of his graphs. I do not know what mechanisms later cause the CO2 concentration to decline, but that is not relevant here.
• The article bounces back and forth between time periods of tens of thousands and millions and even hundreds of millions of years and uses the same arguments throughout. In some sense this seems deliberately dishonest, though it could be an honest oversight. Hundreds of millions of years ago the continents were not where they are now. This means the sea currents were different as well and their different interactions could have resulted in a significantly warmer or colder period of time due to various climate mechanisms not related to CO2, so even higher concentrations could allow for ice ages. I touched on that way back in my first post, but not in as much detail, though I mentioned the effect of an equatorial warm current counteracting the cold Antarctic currents.

Those are the concerns and questions that I noticed on the first read-through and I'm certain I could get some more if I really went over it with a fine tooth comb. And that's outside my own professional field (computers) at that.

I am not saying that he is necessarily entirely wrong, but just based on that article, there are gaps in the solar radiation theory you can drive a tank division through. He makes the same mistake he accuses the CO2 crowd of making: He ignores a lot of other factors that have direct impact and then attributes the lot to his own theory. Or then that's a really dumbed down version of what he does.

[MaxWilson]

Originally Posted by Edi

I see several problems with the stuff in that article. *snip* I am not saying that he is necessarily entirely wrong, but just based on that article, there are gaps in the solar radiation theory you can drive a tank division through. He makes the same mistake he accuses the CO2 crowd of making: He ignores a lot of other factors that have direct impact and then attributes the lot to his own theory. Or then that's a really dumbed down version of what he does.

No quibbles here. Those graphs interpolations look overly-convenient, too.

The data do raise real questions though (is El Nino or increased sun activity responsible for the temperature spike in the 1940, or are they related? Where does the CO2 go during cooling?). I'm not saying those questions can't be answered, just that if AGW advocates want to be taken seriously they should supply answers instead of attacking strawmen. (I don't even care if the answers supplied are *wrong*, at least there will be something concrete to address.)

In any case, thanks for your thoughts. You have supplied your answers.

Edit: another set of 'real questions' is raised in Monckton's article here http://www.aps.org/units/fps/newslet...0807/index.cfm. ("GCMs make unphysical assumptions.") Feel free to critique Hafemeister and Schwartz too.

-Max

P.S. Hafemeister and Schwartz do a better job than I had remembered at addressing the sunspot issue. By which I mean at least they acknowledge it exists.

[chrispedersen]

Originally Posted by Edi

As promised, a reply addressing the article Licker linked:

[*]The section about water vapor being the most important greenhouse gas again neglects the fact that while some amount of greenhouse gases are necessary to maintain a habitable temperature and that water vapor is by volume the greatest one, it is nowhere near as effective at trapping infrared wavelengths as CO2 is. Much like methane is 20 times more effective than CO2 as a greenhouse gas (but much shorter lived before it degrades to CO2), CO2 is more effective weight for weight. If the difference is similar, even modest CO2 increases would show increased temperatures.

Hmmm.. First, I think all of these claims are hocum. I believe that CH4 is more like 50x than CO2 - and I have never heard this comment that Ch4 'degrades' into CO2. Especially in short periods of time.

Burn it, combust it .. sure.

And the claim that CO2 is more effective weight for weight is purely wrong.

[chrispedersen]

Originally Posted by AdmiralZhao

After a certain point, the demand for oil is elastic only in the sense that the groups that cannot afford it will die off. Oil is vital to nearly every aspect of modern society, and in particular to the industrialized agriculture that America uses to feed our population. Without at least a baseline amount of oil, the truck which delivers food to the grocery store does not arrive, and I have go Hinnom-style on my next door neighbors.

We have many trillions of dollars of infrastructure which can only use oil. And because everything currently relies on oil, any effort to upgrade this infrastructure will also require large amounts of oil. The scenario that people are worried about is that the free market doesn't start responding until oil is scarce and difficult to acquire, and at that point we don't have the energy resources to both maintain our society, acquire new oil, and upgrade our infrastructure.

This is one of the reasons why oil is different from platinum, paladium, or uranium. Society does not need constant inputs of these metals to function, and we can develop alternatives to these metals without needing large new stocks of these metals.

This is also why people want to see early development of alternatives to oil. When oil starts running low, we want oil to be in the same category as platinum, paladium, and uranium, i.e. something that is not hugely vital, and that we can continue to phase out without needing large new inputs.

'Die off' is a bit melodramatic. We just absorbed a tripling spike in the price of oil, and as far as I know, no deaths have occured because of it.

In point of fact, you are quite incorrect about society needing constant inputs of these metals. These metals are essential to hydrocarbon cracking, to computers, to Grignard reagents.

Yes, the scale of need is smaller - but that has to do with price. which was sort of my point. As oil increases price its relative importance will diminish.

It is critical now, because it was easily exploitable.

We continue to try to exploit oil, because even at its current prices, it is *less* of an lifestyle change than the alternatives.

[chrispedersen]

Being generous with your *own* money?

There is absolutely nothing preventing global warming advocates from getting off their high horses and buying solar panels, buying a prius, etc.

In fact, I really think that those are the minimum qualifications before they attempt to inflict those lifestyle choices *involuntarily* on the rest of us. Put your money where your mouth is.

[AdmiralZhao]

Originally Posted by chrispedersen

'Die off' is a bit melodramatic. We just absorbed a tripling spike in the price of oil, and as far as I know, no deaths have occured because of it.

In point of fact, you are quite incorrect about society needing constant inputs of these metals. These metals are essential to hydrocarbon cracking, to computers, to Grignard reagents.

Yes, the scale of need is smaller - but that has to do with price. which was sort of my point. As oil increases price its relative importance will diminish.

It is critical now, because it was easily exploitable.

We continue to try to exploit oil, because even at its current prices, it is *less* of an lifestyle change than the alternatives.

No, I'll stand by my original statement. A die off would be an accurate description of what would happen to America if we could not procure a baseline amount of oil. This time around, please note that I am using a qualifier in my sentence. I am not saying that we will all die if we have to reduce our oil usage by 5%.

You do raise several interesting points in your response though. The price of oil did recently triple, due to minor variations in supply and demand. This is a good illustration of how inelastic the demand for oil is. If there were readily available alternatives, people would use them rather than paying through the nose for oil. Another interesting point is how no one died over the recent price increases. While I apologize in advance for mixing my flamewars, there is certainly an argument to be made that the primary reason America is in the Middle East, and has been for the last N decades, is to secure our access to oil. Many people have died because of oil prices, and to secure access to oil.

Again, I would say that there are critical differences between the metals that you list and oil. As an example, if we were to completely run out of Paladium, it would indeed interfere with the production of new computers. However, since we did not burn the old Paladium, it could be recycled from older computers to create new ones. Also, because the computers that we have will continue to play Dominions 3 without us pouring more Paladium into them, there would not be any immediate disruptions to my turn schedule. Running out of Paladium would certainly cause large problems in some segments of society, but it would not prevent us from developing and implementing solutions to those problems.

I agree that as the price of oil increases, the free market will act to develop alternatives. Again though, the worry is that the free market will begin to act too late. As Barak Obama put it, we need to stop hiring the mercenaries of cheap oil, and start investing in the Claws of Cocytos of alternative power for when the Tartarian Cyclops of peak oil teleports onto our capital.

[MaxWilson]

Originally Posted by AdmiralZhao

I agree that as the price of oil increases, the free market will act to develop alternatives. Again though, the worry is that the free market will begin to act too late. As Barak Obama put it, we need to stop hiring the mercenaries of cheap oil, and start investing in the Claws of Cocytos of alternative power for when the Tartarian Cyclops of peak oil teleports onto our capital.

[ontopic]

Heh. Measuring by the Elemental Royalty, 4 path levels is basically what it takes to be a god of that element. I therefore find it curious that so many Tartarian Cyclopses have 4E. There's basically a whole pantheon of Cyclopses that you yank out of Tartarus to serve your needs. You should name the first one "DeadHades," the next one "DeadPolyphemus," the one after that "DeadCronus," etc.

Tartarians should be treated with more respect: they're not just faceless pawns like flagellants, they're ancient dead gods in their own right!

[/ontopic]

-Max