How to replace the petroleum energy supply

The thing a lot of people don't realize is that energy options are consumer driven. Why haven't we converted to alternatives to gasoline? The answer is simple: The price at the pump. When a viable alternative fuel can beat the price of gasoline, people will buy it. The problem is, it is difficult to beat the price of something you just have to pump out of the ground and refine. Renewable energy options have to be produced somehow. And that means they are inherently more expensive than petro products.

Carbon-neutral options are slowly being developed that will eventually compete with petroleum on price. Some of the most promising candidates for this are fuels derived from microalgae

For example

https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fenrg.2021.749968/full

Research on this by the DOE began in the 1970s.

A Look Back at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Aquatic Species Program: Biodiesel from Algae
https://www.nrel.gov/docs/legosti/fy98/24190.pdf

We have known about the viability for decades but the problem has always been price. When will fuels from algae compete with petro fuels at the pump, on price?

One strategy that strikes me as potentially viable is to subsidize the cost of fuel. In the US we use about 135 billion gallons of gasoline a year. If the government paid $2 for every gallon of alternative fuel, assuming a final price of $6 a gallon [$4 for the buyer], that is a $270 billion a year, or a little less than 7% of US revenues. That is about 1/3 of our military budget, which is primarily driven by the need for oil. The need for energy from oil is what has defined the geopolitical landscape for a century. End that and you change the world fundamentally. Alternative fuels can do that!

Even the attack on Pearl Harbor was driven by oil. By attacking our Pacific Fleet, the Japanese were protecting their oil supplies from the Dutch East Indies, IIRC. Energy supplies are critical in any war.

The prices of alternative fuels are getting close enough that they might be helped along for a limited time. By supplementing the supply by a couple of bucks a gallon, the new age of energy independence from renewable fuels can be ushered in.

And this isn't just about the environment. Now more than ever we see how vulnerable the US is to perturbations in the energy supply. Fuels produced domestically from algae, and possibly other 3rd-generation fuels, can eliminate this problem. Putin and his oil supplies will mean nothing. The world will be able to make it's own fuel.

Also, electric cars do little to help with this problem. You still have to produce the power. What's more, ships, aircraft, and heavy industry will not be all electric for many decades to come, at best. They need fuel. And you have to get the energy from something.

 

It is estimated that the cost of the Iraq war was about $2 trillion.

If we had spent that money building algae farms instead of attacking the wrong country, we could be free of petroleum products by now. How much would that have changed the current situation?

 

For two years I owned a company dedicated to producing fuel from algae. This was about 20 years ago.

I had assembled a great team of experts - biologists, a nationally renowned chemical engineer [the foremost expert on biodiesel], a land use expert, systems engineers and finance people. But it was too soon. Our research showed that we still needed hundreds of millions of dollars invested to develop new machines and processes. We could see how to do it but the costs were beyond us. This was a job for the Exxons and BPs of the world. And in fact they finally took it on.



So for the last 20 years the technologies have been under development and the biology studied.

But even then, I had models predicting that given the correct equipment, we could produce fuel from algae for just over $3 a gallon wholesale. Unfortunately the first profitable point predicted by the economy of scale was a 50,000 acre farm. In the end I came to believe that ocean farming is the way to go. Bioreactors in the ocean offer the ideal balance between the control needed to produce viable fuel crops, and the cost of producing those crops. One key factor is that ocean farming avoids land taxes. And perhaps most importantly, it limits the temperature of the algae free of charge.

 

2/3 of our oil consumption is for transportation - so that's a big deal.

Today EVs are cheaper to fuel than are gas cars.

Producing energy in cars by burning natural gas to create electricity is cleaner than making gasoline out of oil and burning it in automobiles. PLUS, one gets the advantages of far healthier and cleaner cities - so it's worth it for government to push movement in this direction even if you totally ignore climate.

But, I agree that natural gas is still not clean enough when considering greenhouse gas emissions. The answer there is going to need to include far more clean energy and nuclear power as well.

No matter what happens, the failure of our government to fix our electric distribution system is one of the most STUPID decisions congress continues to make.

 

Looking a bit lonely here.

How to replace the petroleum energy supply? A lot of guinea pigs on exercise wheels.

This all relates to electric vehicles. You need to generate power for them.

We can't get rid of oil altogether, as it is needed to make plastics and lubes/grease. As a fuel source, yes.
Wind farms = pfft. Too much for everything. From manufacture, transport and installation and maintenance.
Solar = a little better, but still, need a lot to generate sufficient outputs and area needed.
Nuclear = possibility, but very risky. Chernobyl, Fukashima.....
Natural gas = how long will it last?

Very good possibilities.

Geothermal vents
Teslas Electricity.



Ahh, bio

 

Ahhh, biogas/bio oil?

 

Hopefully they're on to something with this LG thing cuz that would be cool $3 a gallon is a lot more expensive than oil that's $126 a barrel gasoline's at 97 today I believe but that's pretty close.

 

Right. They are also driven by government regulations (effectively forcing people into a certain direction against their will).

Right. Outside of government regulations, oil is plentiful, cheap, and very efficient. It "does the job" better than other alternatives and does so at a cheaper price too.

Right. That's where the government steps in and introduces a bunch of stupid regulations in order to force the price of oil up in order to force the citizenry over to expensive piddle power alternatives. Politicians and their multinational corporate buddies get rich while the working class common man gets boned.

This is only due to stupid government regulations.

When stupid government regulations force the price of petro fuels through the roof, which is happening as we speak.

Subsidizing fuels is picking winners and losers on the dime of the taxpayer. I thought that Democrats always complained about supposed "oil subsidies"??

This is what governments around the world are doing as we speak. Subsidizing "green energy" while implementing crushing regulations on oil companies, causing oil prices to skyrocket.

It's not about the environment at all. It is all about politicians and multinational corporations getting rich and lining their pockets while the common working man gets bent over furniture. There is no such thing as "climate emergency"; Nothing is happening besides weather (as it has always happened).

This is due to government.

Nope. They are piddle power compared to carbon based fuels. "Green energy" cannot produce enough power to run the US per today's energy consumption, let alone any increased energy consumption. "Green energy" is only regressing us back towards the days before carbon-based fuels were used.

Putin and his oil supplies will be used to enrich Russia and her economic allies (BRICS, and eventually BRICS+). Meanwhile, all of the WEF-allied countries (Canada, States of America, Australia, New Zealand, much of Europe, etc) will be poorer, struggling to keep the lights on.

Many countries across the world can already make their own fuel, if their governments would get out of the way and let them do so.

Precisely... and why the "green energy" agenda is a fool's errand, only harming the working class citizen while enriching the politicians and multinational corporations that are ramming the "6uild 6ack 6etter" "green energy" "green new deal" agenda through (unconstitutionally) via executive fiat.

 

What is so bad about petroleum products? They produce the most energy for the cheapest price.

 

No, they aren't, and once they are, that would only be because of government regulations and their war against carbon based fuels.

There is no such thing as "greenhouse gas emissions". Your government is lying to you, once again.

 

Sorry - you're just wrong on the cost of fuel.

Car and Driver analyzed that and reported their results here:

https://www.caranddriver.com/shopping-advice/a32494027/ev-vs-gas-cheaper-to-own/

They show it is CLEARLY cheaper to fuel and maintain an EV.

 

Funny how many look only at the problem and not a solution.

 

No, I'm not. They don't factor in all costs.

 

I gave you a breakdown by a reputable source.

If you have something to add, then add it.

 

Fossil fuels are the wave of the future.
Are Fossil Fuels the Wave of the Future? - City Journal
https://www.city-journal.org › are-fossil-fuels-the-wave...

May 25, 2022

Fossil Future: Why Human Flourishing Requires More Oil, Coal, and Natural Gas—Not Less, by Alex Epstein (Portfolio, 480 pp., $30)

Alex Epstein’s latest book makes a spirited case for continued industrial advancement through energy freedom. He argues convincingly that fossil fuels are and will remain the most attractive options to meet many energy needs while avoiding some of the stronger challenges to their unrestrained expansion. . . .

 

One of the brilliancies here is that the fossil fuel industry gets to enjoy ZERO responsibility for any of the types of damage caused - health, pollution, damage to the environment, climate change, etc.

As long as that is the case, burning fossil fuel will look good on paper.

 

Why then do world governments bang on about climate change, carbon emissions and pushing the Electric Vehicle agenda. rhetoric? Votes perhaps?

 

57% of electric generation in Iowa is from wind.

Clean energy is growing fast enough that it is producing more than the total growth in US consumption of electricity.

Nobody has proposed an energy plan for the USA that includes zero fossil fuel. That's not necessary in order to achieve serious clean energy objectives, including climate change.

It's time to create a serious energy plan.

And, the fact that Republican congressmen keep killing improvements to our electricity infrastructure system is CRIMINAL. We need that improvement REGARDLESS of the source of electricity. We need that improvement to solve disasters like Texas. We need that improvement to make it less easy for foreign adversaries to bring down our system. We need that improvement to protect against Carrington type events - solar events that have taken place in our time. As Earth heats, we can't afford brownouts.

Continuing to FAIL to protect America's electricity is NOT acceptable.

 

Umm, yes. Brandon shutting down the Keystone pipeline among other narratives, wasn't that a kick in the pants for Americans to go EV?

 

That article offers NO information on the externalized costs of fossil fuel in health care, pollution, environmental damage, climate, etc. Fossil fuel can look outstanding when one ignores the costs.

And, it says nothing about the opportunity that exists.

 

Power output : Costs of manufacture, transportation to site, erection & maintenance costs ratio is way over-balanced.

As for the rest that you quoted me on, it was solutions. Nothing more, nothing less.

 

That pipeline could not possibly change the price of oil

The reason is that the price of oil is set by the world commodities market. So, to change the price of oil would require meaningful increases in the total world supply of oil. Keystone had NO CHANCE of doing that.

The reason for these pipelines is to allow oil companies to get their oil to the coast so they cans sell it on the world market.

Remember that the price of oil in the central US was LOW when oil companies didn't have a way to get it to the coast. That meant that they had to sell it locally, NOT at the world price.

When the pipeline system was improved to move oil south through Oklahoma (instead of north to supply the central region with oil) the oil price in the US central region went back up to world market prices.

These pipelines are there to INCREASE the price of oil that oil companies get for their product. The are NOT there to benefit US consumers.

 

Iowa PROVES you are wrong on that.

No, you showed no rational solutions.

 

Another thread of insanity. And these are the guys running the country. Sheesh.

 

Show me then how this is incorrect?

And mine weren't?