4 ms·

There is an "easy" solution to this problem - introduce a new (preferably renewable) energy source that is an order of magnitude cheaper than oil.

by mr__y 7y ago

rcMgD2BwE72F 7y ago
It already exists in the form of Solar/Wind + batteries + EV. Also, as price decrease for this combo, tax fossil fuels for all the damages caused to the environment (taxes to be used to help people switch to renewable energy, and for this transition only otherwise they won't support that tax).
- cartoonworld 7y ago
  There another angle to this--USA provides vast sums of other monetary aid to oil production. Since it has been a (or perhaps the) strategic commodity, nationally, since WWI our foreign policy is in part directed at those supplies. We expend much military might in the effort to acquire and maintain the alliances and security of the transportation and production of the stuff. A lot of the geopolitical game in the middle east is about the oil. Not "We're gonna take over your country and take it it!" exactly, but the Suez Canal, the Straits of Hormuz, international shipping lanes, and current geopolitical need for a gas pipeline to supply natural gas to Europe drives a lot of jockeying, international conflict, and of course, US strategic military bases, of which there are many. Also I read in the news that some government official put boots are on the ground to protect a Saudi oil field (?...!) So my response to your comment is: "Yes!" however, there will be a long political battle with an absurdly well funded opposition for it.
  - shantly 7y ago
    Hm. That actually raises a good point—how long until militaries can operate without gasoline and diesel? Or even significantly reduce their use? Hard to imagine anything competing with petroleum there in the mid-term future, which mean subsidized production will continue to be necessary to any state that wants to be able to self-sufficiently field an army worth having at all. I mean I guess there's ethanol from plants. Maybe all that corn subsidy stuff actually makes sense in a long-term strategic sense, then. Though you can ramp that up inside a year if you need to and probably much faster by rationing food & feed use of existing corn to repurpose most of it for fuel, so that's probably not what they had in mind and it is just a form of corruption. Crazy, though, if arable land becomes directly correlated to ability to support armored divisions.
    - marcosdumay 7y ago
      Well, there exist carbon capture and artificial fuels. I imagine those will take over crop ethanol as soon as solar gets cheap, for no other reason than that one can extract 100 times more fuel from the same land and there is no upkeep of a biologic system.
    - cartoonworld 7y ago
      No chance in the short term, really. There's a lot of old hardware running around on reserve bases, and thats at least! All those turbines run avgas or something like diesel, not much of an aircraft person but I can't say for certain. It would certainly be a great challenge to replace all those turbines, and its not just the fuel. The synthetics have different properties, and it might be the case that all the rubber dissolves on your Sikorsky, fuel liners disappear out of the exhaust, and hopefully whatever whiz-bang alloys we've been producing hold up. Who's to say, it's probably classified. Imagine telling your people they're gonna lose the battle tested and well supplied turbines and power plants all over all the forces with something conceptually new. Large naval vessels and submarines can at least run nuclear, but there isn't yet a reactor small enough for a gunboat or a helicopter afiak. Plus, can you imagine the battlefield hazards that would create? Suddenly, it looks to my eyes like a lot fewer people getting rescued when your reactor takes some HEAT and goes supercritical. Luckily we can try the batteries or whatever out in out cars and lawnmowers first, as a handy side effect developing the currently-nonexistent alternative infrastructure. It wouldn't really be too unreasonable to consider EV and alternative fuels a national security priority, but good luck with that, I say to myself.
    - pm90 7y ago
      Military consumption pales in comparison to civilian consumption though. I can see most large armed forces being OK with using whatever Oil and Gas is produced domestically. Smaller nations without access to oil have a problem, but they probably have smaller armed forces too.

There is an "easy" solution to this problem - introduce a new (preferably renewable) energy source that is an order of magnitude cheaper than oil.

by mr__y 7y ago

There is an "easy" solution to this problem - introduce a new (preferably renewable) energy source that is an order of magnitude cheaper than oil.

rcMgD2BwE72F 7y ago

It already exists in the form of Solar/Wind + batteries + EV. Also, as price decrease for this combo, tax fossil fuels for all the damages caused to the environment (taxes to be used to help people switch to renewable energy, and for this transition only otherwise they won't support that tax).

cartoonworld 7y ago
There another angle to this--USA provides vast sums of other monetary aid to oil production. Since it has been a (or perhaps the) strategic commodity, nationally, since WWI our foreign policy is in part directed at those supplies. We expend much military might in the effort to acquire and maintain the alliances and security of the transportation and production of the stuff. A lot of the geopolitical game in the middle east is about the oil. Not "We're gonna take over your country and take it it!" exactly, but the Suez Canal, the Straits of Hormuz, international shipping lanes, and current geopolitical need for a gas pipeline to supply natural gas to Europe drives a lot of jockeying, international conflict, and of course, US strategic military bases, of which there are many. Also I read in the news that some government official put boots are on the ground to protect a Saudi oil field (?...!) So my response to your comment is: "Yes!" however, there will be a long political battle with an absurdly well funded opposition for it.
- shantly 7y ago
  Hm. That actually raises a good point—how long until militaries can operate without gasoline and diesel? Or even significantly reduce their use? Hard to imagine anything competing with petroleum there in the mid-term future, which mean subsidized production will continue to be necessary to any state that wants to be able to self-sufficiently field an army worth having at all. I mean I guess there's ethanol from plants. Maybe all that corn subsidy stuff actually makes sense in a long-term strategic sense, then. Though you can ramp that up inside a year if you need to and probably much faster by rationing food & feed use of existing corn to repurpose most of it for fuel, so that's probably not what they had in mind and it is just a form of corruption. Crazy, though, if arable land becomes directly correlated to ability to support armored divisions.
  - marcosdumay 7y ago
    Well, there exist carbon capture and artificial fuels. I imagine those will take over crop ethanol as soon as solar gets cheap, for no other reason than that one can extract 100 times more fuel from the same land and there is no upkeep of a biologic system.
  - cartoonworld 7y ago
    No chance in the short term, really. There's a lot of old hardware running around on reserve bases, and thats at least! All those turbines run avgas or something like diesel, not much of an aircraft person but I can't say for certain. It would certainly be a great challenge to replace all those turbines, and its not just the fuel. The synthetics have different properties, and it might be the case that all the rubber dissolves on your Sikorsky, fuel liners disappear out of the exhaust, and hopefully whatever whiz-bang alloys we've been producing hold up. Who's to say, it's probably classified. Imagine telling your people they're gonna lose the battle tested and well supplied turbines and power plants all over all the forces with something conceptually new. Large naval vessels and submarines can at least run nuclear, but there isn't yet a reactor small enough for a gunboat or a helicopter afiak. Plus, can you imagine the battlefield hazards that would create? Suddenly, it looks to my eyes like a lot fewer people getting rescued when your reactor takes some HEAT and goes supercritical. Luckily we can try the batteries or whatever out in out cars and lawnmowers first, as a handy side effect developing the currently-nonexistent alternative infrastructure. It wouldn't really be too unreasonable to consider EV and alternative fuels a national security priority, but good luck with that, I say to myself.
  - pm90 7y ago
    Military consumption pales in comparison to civilian consumption though. I can see most large armed forces being OK with using whatever Oil and Gas is produced domestically. Smaller nations without access to oil have a problem, but they probably have smaller armed forces too.