5 ms·

Expect financial fallout when the fossil fuel bubble bursts

11 points by thelastgallon 3y ago

engineer_22 3y ago
Fossil fuels aren't yet in danger of being replaced. Their power density and EROI is hard to replicate.
- toomuchtodo 3y ago
  https://electrek.co/2024/03/19/byd-nev-share-50-next-3-months-china/ https://electrek.co/2024/03/19/byd-nev-share-50-next-3-month... https://electrek.co/2024/03/11/byds-new-lower-cost-ev-platform-crush-gas-powered-car-sales/ https://electrek.co/2024/03/11/byds-new-lower-cost-ev-platfo... https://electrek.co/2024/03/02/1-in-5-new-car-sales-globally-in-were-evs-in-2023-oil-demand-iea/ https://electrek.co/2024/03/02/1-in-5-new-car-sales-globally... https://www.bloomberg.com/news/newsletters/2024-04-12/china-already-makes-as-many-batteries-as-the-entire-world-wants https://www.bloomberg.com/news/newsletters/2024-04-12/china-... | https://archive.today/8Dy4D https://archive.today/8Dy4D https://www.ft.com/content/b255d7b9-88f6-4481-a3a6-87542d2b728b https://www.ft.com/content/b255d7b9-88f6-4481-a3a6-87542d2b7... | https://archive.today/eC5Pp https://archive.today/eC5Pp
  - withinboredom 3y ago
    Battery tech is going to double in two years… every year since 1992 (and possibly before). Still hasn’t happened yet.
    - deleted 3y ago
      [deleted]
    - toomuchtodo 3y ago
      https://ourworldindata.org/images/published/Battery-cost-decline_850.png https://ourworldindata.org/images/published/Battery-cost-dec... https://ourworldindata.org/battery-price-decline https://ourworldindata.org/battery-price-decline https://about.bnef.com/blog/lithium-ion-battery-pack-prices-hit-record-low-of-139-kwh/ https://about.bnef.com/blog/lithium-ion-battery-pack-prices-...
      - withinboredom 3y ago
        Price != density Super important for things like vehicles (especially airplanes).
        toomuchtodo 3y ago
        Air travel is ~6% of global petroleum demand, they will switch to a non fossil liquid fuel. Vehicles are already solved for, as is utility scale energy storage, using existing battery cells and their density. Marine transport will use either ammonia or methanol, both produced through clean energy based processes. ~40% of the tonnage of ships traveling the world’s oceans and rivers is moving energy around [1] [2], which should decline as renewables, transmission, and battery storage scales up globally. There is no "silver bullet," but many solutions all converging (rapidly and effectively, from a preponderance of all available information) on deprecating fossil fuels for energy. [1] https://thelastdriverlicenseholder.com/2022/01/12/almost-40-of-all-ship-cargoes-are-oil-coal-and-gas/ https://thelastdriverlicenseholder.com/2022/01/12/almost-40-... [2] https://unctad.org/system/files/official-document/rmt2019_en.pdf https://unctad.org/system/files/official-document/rmt2019_en...
        withinboredom 3y ago
        Hmmm. I don’t think you understand how airplanes work. They have to take off and land. With petroleum, they consume the fuel and get lighter as they do so, thus extending their range. Plus, the energy density of petroleum is ridiculous. I don’t see this realistically changing any time soon. With batteries, they don’t get lighter and have to land heavy. It’s something you don’t want to do because modern airframes aren’t really built for it to reduce weight so they can fly longer. As for sustainable solutions… I’m not sure that’s something we necessarily want. I’m all for sustainable solutions, but we actually probably want certain pollutants to help cool the earth (like a volcano) and less of others that cause greenhouse effects. So, if that’s what you mean by sustainable solutions, then that’s something we agree on.
        toomuchtodo 3y ago
  - usrusr 3y ago
    Yeah, cars do not have particularly high requirements in terms of energy density. In a pinch people have been able to substitute petrol with fuel as low density as wood: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wood_gas_generator https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wood_gas_generator But that's just the driving around use case, others are very far out of reach.
- CatWChainsaw 3y ago
  I doubt we'll ever find as great a fuel source among the various replacements. An energy-dense liquid fuel that burns off as you use it is incredible attractive for transport purposes and there isn't a good replacement for that.
  - dalyons 3y ago
    You can pretty easily replace it with synthetic liquid fuel, made with clean energy. That’s likely what will happen in the medium term (~10 years) with aviation and marine, because of density as you said.
- bryanlarsen 3y ago
  > Their power density and EROI is hard to replicate. The market is really good at replacing superior solutions if the inferior solution is cheaper.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
everforward 3y ago
These talking points seem a little disingenuous to me. They keep talking about a "climate Minsky moment" as if it will happen without warning or prompting, which doesn't seem true to me. The risk of a "climate Minsky moment" seems directly tied to government regulation, to me. I.e. it will be triggered by governments failing to act on the climate proactively, and then having to impose harsh restrictions to make up for the lack of earlier action. Is the theory that savvy investors aren't pricing climate change into their long term investment strategies? I'm not saying government regulation is a bad thing, but it strikes me as very dishonest to act like there are mysterious market forces behind this. There aren't. Current regulations just aren't sufficient, and instead of fixing that, we're getting vague warnings about calamitous market forces.
- ethbr1 3y ago
  >> Carney, when he was head of the Bank of England, first warned of a “climate Minsky Moment” in a speech to the directors of Lloyd’s of London in 2015, and he has repeatedly done so since. So, he's been wrong about a sudden shift for 10 years and counting? The piece's argument seems to be: 1. Climate change impacts are worsening 2. Decarbonization is needed to avoid 3. Ergo, decarbonization will accelerate Based on the last 20 years of government climate action, I'm not sure a sudden decarbonization is in the cards for any advanced economy.
  - bryanlarsen 3y ago
    Annual CO2 emissions are predicted to start going down in 2024. https://climateanalytics.org/comment/will-2024-be-the-year-emissions-start-falling https://climateanalytics.org/comment/will-2024-be-the-year-e...
underseacables 3y ago
We have been talking about peak oil since at the 90s. The energy density, the infrastructure, the governments, corporations, etc. that are involved in the production and sale of oil is just too great. The fossil fuel bubble is not in danger of bursting anytime soon.
readthenotes1 3y ago
Tldr: a fluffy opinion piece by biased authors
goalieca 3y ago
Personal Vehicles are just a fraction of all the uses of oil.
friend_and_foe 3y ago
Past a tipping point that could make earth uninhabitable is going to create a financial crisis as bad as the 2008 great recession, to paraphrase. If the end of the world is only as bad as the 2008 financial crisis I'd say we lucked out.

11 points by thelastgallon 3y ago

engineer_22 3y ago

Fossil fuels aren't yet in danger of being replaced. Their power density and EROI is hard to replicate.

toomuchtodo 3y ago
https://electrek.co/2024/03/19/byd-nev-share-50-next-3-months-china/ https://electrek.co/2024/03/19/byd-nev-share-50-next-3-month... https://electrek.co/2024/03/11/byds-new-lower-cost-ev-platform-crush-gas-powered-car-sales/ https://electrek.co/2024/03/11/byds-new-lower-cost-ev-platfo... https://electrek.co/2024/03/02/1-in-5-new-car-sales-globally-in-were-evs-in-2023-oil-demand-iea/ https://electrek.co/2024/03/02/1-in-5-new-car-sales-globally... https://www.bloomberg.com/news/newsletters/2024-04-12/china-already-makes-as-many-batteries-as-the-entire-world-wants https://www.bloomberg.com/news/newsletters/2024-04-12/china-... | https://archive.today/8Dy4D https://archive.today/8Dy4D https://www.ft.com/content/b255d7b9-88f6-4481-a3a6-87542d2b728b https://www.ft.com/content/b255d7b9-88f6-4481-a3a6-87542d2b7... | https://archive.today/eC5Pp https://archive.today/eC5Pp
- withinboredom 3y ago
  Battery tech is going to double in two years… every year since 1992 (and possibly before). Still hasn’t happened yet.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
  - toomuchtodo 3y ago
    https://ourworldindata.org/images/published/Battery-cost-decline_850.png https://ourworldindata.org/images/published/Battery-cost-dec... https://ourworldindata.org/battery-price-decline https://ourworldindata.org/battery-price-decline https://about.bnef.com/blog/lithium-ion-battery-pack-prices-hit-record-low-of-139-kwh/ https://about.bnef.com/blog/lithium-ion-battery-pack-prices-...
    - withinboredom 3y ago
      Price != density Super important for things like vehicles (especially airplanes).
      - toomuchtodo 3y ago
        Air travel is ~6% of global petroleum demand, they will switch to a non fossil liquid fuel. Vehicles are already solved for, as is utility scale energy storage, using existing battery cells and their density. Marine transport will use either ammonia or methanol, both produced through clean energy based processes. ~40% of the tonnage of ships traveling the world’s oceans and rivers is moving energy around [1] [2], which should decline as renewables, transmission, and battery storage scales up globally. There is no "silver bullet," but many solutions all converging (rapidly and effectively, from a preponderance of all available information) on deprecating fossil fuels for energy. [1] https://thelastdriverlicenseholder.com/2022/01/12/almost-40-of-all-ship-cargoes-are-oil-coal-and-gas/ https://thelastdriverlicenseholder.com/2022/01/12/almost-40-... [2] https://unctad.org/system/files/official-document/rmt2019_en.pdf https://unctad.org/system/files/official-document/rmt2019_en...
        withinboredom 3y ago
        Hmmm. I don’t think you understand how airplanes work. They have to take off and land. With petroleum, they consume the fuel and get lighter as they do so, thus extending their range. Plus, the energy density of petroleum is ridiculous. I don’t see this realistically changing any time soon. With batteries, they don’t get lighter and have to land heavy. It’s something you don’t want to do because modern airframes aren’t really built for it to reduce weight so they can fly longer. As for sustainable solutions… I’m not sure that’s something we necessarily want. I’m all for sustainable solutions, but we actually probably want certain pollutants to help cool the earth (like a volcano) and less of others that cause greenhouse effects. So, if that’s what you mean by sustainable solutions, then that’s something we agree on.
        toomuchtodo 3y ago
- usrusr 3y ago
  Yeah, cars do not have particularly high requirements in terms of energy density. In a pinch people have been able to substitute petrol with fuel as low density as wood: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wood_gas_generator https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wood_gas_generator But that's just the driving around use case, others are very far out of reach.
CatWChainsaw 3y ago
I doubt we'll ever find as great a fuel source among the various replacements. An energy-dense liquid fuel that burns off as you use it is incredible attractive for transport purposes and there isn't a good replacement for that.
- dalyons 3y ago
  You can pretty easily replace it with synthetic liquid fuel, made with clean energy. That’s likely what will happen in the medium term (~10 years) with aviation and marine, because of density as you said.
bryanlarsen 3y ago
> Their power density and EROI is hard to replicate. The market is really good at replacing superior solutions if the inferior solution is cheaper.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]

everforward 3y ago

These talking points seem a little disingenuous to me. They keep talking about a "climate Minsky moment" as if it will happen without warning or prompting, which doesn't seem true to me. The risk of a "climate Minsky moment" seems directly tied to government regulation, to me. I.e. it will be triggered by governments failing to act on the climate proactively, and then having to impose harsh restrictions to make up for the lack of earlier action. Is the theory that savvy investors aren't pricing climate change into their long term investment strategies? I'm not saying government regulation is a bad thing, but it strikes me as very dishonest to act like there are mysterious market forces behind this. There aren't. Current regulations just aren't sufficient, and instead of fixing that, we're getting vague warnings about calamitous market forces.

ethbr1 3y ago
>> Carney, when he was head of the Bank of England, first warned of a “climate Minsky Moment” in a speech to the directors of Lloyd’s of London in 2015, and he has repeatedly done so since. So, he's been wrong about a sudden shift for 10 years and counting? The piece's argument seems to be: 1. Climate change impacts are worsening 2. Decarbonization is needed to avoid 3. Ergo, decarbonization will accelerate Based on the last 20 years of government climate action, I'm not sure a sudden decarbonization is in the cards for any advanced economy.
- bryanlarsen 3y ago
  Annual CO2 emissions are predicted to start going down in 2024. https://climateanalytics.org/comment/will-2024-be-the-year-emissions-start-falling https://climateanalytics.org/comment/will-2024-be-the-year-e...

underseacables 3y ago

We have been talking about peak oil since at the 90s. The energy density, the infrastructure, the governments, corporations, etc. that are involved in the production and sale of oil is just too great. The fossil fuel bubble is not in danger of bursting anytime soon.

readthenotes1 3y ago

Tldr: a fluffy opinion piece by biased authors

goalieca 3y ago

Personal Vehicles are just a fraction of all the uses of oil.

friend_and_foe 3y ago

Past a tipping point that could make earth uninhabitable is going to create a financial crisis as bad as the 2008 great recession, to paraphrase. If the end of the world is only as bad as the 2008 financial crisis I'd say we lucked out.