The Earth Shift

Energy is a broadly used, widely oversimplified term that will become ground zero for human rhythms on Earth; in many ways today, it is already. As availability and use change, so will the pace, pulse and prodding of users’ lives.

Energy often means crude oil however it’s also electricity, from many sources such as coal, water and from the heat of nuclear fission. There are myriad sources and uses of heat; locomotion the most broadly recognized.

Imagine little crude oil available or difficult to refine in quantities current users expect. Imagine also circumstances where it can’t be transported to refineries; it’s available but for the bulk carriers – oceangoing tankers – to bring it to refineries.

60% of crude oil – about 3 parts in 5 - are used for industry, the other 2 of 5 for fuel. The immediate choice will be how much for industry or for transportation, as availability reduces. Of course, prices will increase and reduce consumption. Air travel will become sharply more costly in the short term and reduced passenger loads will see airlines vanish. Driving will drop off and higher mileage vehicles will take the market share of higher consumption ones; this will not help auto manufacturers, which make more money per vehicle on larger, higher consumption models. Reduced economic activity caused by higher fuel prices will cause high prices overall and result in the disappearance of many automobile manufacturers. Few cars cannot be fixed.

For industrial purposes, higher oil costs cause prices to increase for virtually everything that contains rubber or plastic. Many products will stop being produced. Car tires will become sharply more expensive however less tire wear could offset high prices and maintain costs over time; will tire manufacturers survive?

Discretionary driving will drop off acutely; business that depends on customers to arrive by vehicle will be affected, as trips are consolidated, some are eliminated and sales decrease.

Natural gas will be able to fill the gap somewhat, but it will not plug the gap. Many turbines, engines and other devices that burn gasoline or diesel fuel can be adapted or modified to use natural gas, but it’s expensive, takes time and the correct infrastructure and equipment must be manufactured and installed to allow safe use. Current production and supply cannot come close to replacing current use, so significant drilling is required.

With the reduction in crude oil supply and refined products, how will houses that now use fuel oil be heated ? If natural gas lines do not exist, what alternatives are available? Little, given current infrastructure and economic technology. See natural gas above.

Where employees can “telecommute” or work from home, that will rapidly become common but decreasing levels of economic activity will cause serious unemployment. The need to drive 30, 60 or 75 minutes to work and again back home will be “solved” by loss of employment, tele-commutation aside.

Electric cars use electricity currently generated by burning mostly coal. An electric car that uses less gasoline simply consumes more coal or natural gas in place of gasoline or "petrol". Coal must be mined and transported and this largely requires fuel, so the cost and availability of coal will change, both negatively. Hydroelectric power, the originally excellent “green” energy, only represents a minority portion of total generation - except Canada and Brazil, Colombia and a few other nations - and this method is not a viable global solution, as both insufficient hydrology and construction time required are unfavorable.

Wind farms and solar panels are unreliable base load generators and cannot supply sufficient, steady power to materially reduce current methods, much less supply new uses, such as cars.

A new source of power will have to be found; the good news is, it exists and will soon debut at a scientist near you. What is it? It’s clean, simple, reliable and local and just waiting for the energy gap to “generate” interest.

This new source of power could allow similar on-demand vehicular movement as today; a pickup truck or SUV is heavy and often uses nearly double the fuel a small car consumes. The limitation is battery capacity; similar range as gasoline would require a driver-only vehicle the same size as now, with no luggage space, essentially a waterproof motorcycle. How about a happy medium? Larger vehicle that consumes zero fuel; uses electricity that’s generated without burning or heating anything; not uranium, not coal, not anything. Now also imagine the space underneath the pickup bed and some engine compartment volume were used for batteries; this would be sufficient to provide 150-180 mile/240-290 km range. At 5% remaining, the driver stops at a recharge post and tops up the electric charge in 5 minutes, and continues the journey. These charge stations can be placed nearly anywhere a road is located, and the power produced is DC (direct current) the same as used in a vehicle’s electric system. It’s but a simple matter to step-up the voltage high enough to allow a 5 minute recharge. No fumes, no emissions, no pollution, zero effect on air quality.

Sounds too good to be true? It isn’t.