4 ms·

We're running out of most everything, in a very The Limits to Growth/World3 kinda of way.

WillAdams 2y ago
Isaac Asimov was an early writer on this, noting that if the earth's crust was converted into biomass the limiting element was phosphorous --- look at USDA photos of food crops grown w/ and w/o fertilizer including that element for a very sobering view. Currently, we expend up to 10 calories of petro-chemical energy to get 1 calorie of food energy (depending on food) --- peak oil is still worrisome given how much of the input for fertilizers is from oil. Sometime in the last century we crossed over from their being more weight in bony fish in the oceans than shipping tonnage to the latter predominating: https://what-if.xkcd.com/33/ https://what-if.xkcd.com/33/ My grandfather lived in a time when commercial hunting was outlawed --- I worry my children will live in a time when commercial fishing is no longer feasible.
- NoMoreNicksLeft 2y ago
  > I worry my children will live in a time when commercial fishing is no longer feasible. I worry that my parents lived in a time when commercial fishing was no longer feasible, but no one noticed and kept siphoning all the seafood anyway.
  - philipkglass 2y ago
    Indeed. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Collapse_of_the_Atlantic_northwest_cod_fishery#Mismanagement https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Collapse_of_the_Atlantic_north...
- citizenpaul 2y ago
  >I worry my children will live in a time when commercial fishing is no longer feasible. We are already well into it unfortunately. I've seen enough anecdotal evidence from old fishermen that we have already depleted and disrupted the sea biomass so much that it is already changed forever. - Old sushi chefs talking about how there are numerous fish they can no longer get at any price that were common when they were young. - Old fishing photos show smaller and smaller "prize" catches over time. - Old fisherman talking about how they used to fish by slapping oars at the bay then simply hand/net catching the fish types they wanted near shore. - Old whalers talking about how they could simply go out and pick what type of large catch they wanted and bring it back. Now they can go days or weeks without a single catch of anything.
- hinkley 2y ago
  The best solution we have so far is outlawing all fishing in certain areas of the ocean. Picked well, the fish are safe there to breed and recover population numbers, and you only harvest schools that leave the exclusion zone due to crowding.
- pfdietz 2y ago
  There is nothing special about petrochemical energy when it comes to growing food. We could run the agricultural system on other energy sources. In the US, the total fraction of energy used for agriculture is about 1%. We use more energy cooking food than growing it.
  - lazide 2y ago
    Hydrocarbons contain massive quantities of easily liberated energy and large quantities of easily liberated hydrogen. Which are then easily and economically converted to ammonia to power the largest single form of fertilizer used in the world - nitrogen fertilizer, in the form of ammonium nitrate and equivalents. [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haber_process https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haber_process] 10’s of millions of tons/year are produced right now. That process alone is responsible for likely at least 50% of the human population increase since it was invented, literally billions of people. It is much harder to get there with any other form of energy, albeit not impossible.
    - pfdietz 2y ago
      It's harder, but if one looks at the externalities from fossil fuel consumption, it's actually cheaper to use renewable energy now. Hydrogen for ammonia production is very cheaply storable (underground, like natural gas is stored) and would provide a large dispatchable demand to ease integration of renewables into the economy, smoothing over long timescale intermittency. In any case, because the energy used for agriculture is so relatively small, if the economy as a whole can get off fossil fuels, agriculture certainly can as well.
      - lazide 2y ago
        Since neither the general economy nor agriculture has gotten anywhere near getting off fossil fuels yet, that is assuming a lot isn’t it? Even if electrical grid needs are 100% renewable, that is just a couple percent of most economies energy usage.
        2y ago

Isaac Asimov was an early writer on this, noting that if the earth's crust was converted into biomass the limiting element was phosphorous --- look at USDA photos of food crops grown w/ and w/o fertilizer including that element for a very sobering view. Currently, we expend up to 10 calories of petro-chemical energy to get 1 calorie of food energy (depending on food) --- peak oil is still worrisome given how much of the input for fertilizers is from oil. Sometime in the last century we crossed over from their being more weight in bony fish in the oceans than shipping tonnage to the latter predominating: https://what-if.xkcd.com/33/ https://what-if.xkcd.com/33/ My grandfather lived in a time when commercial hunting was outlawed --- I worry my children will live in a time when commercial fishing is no longer feasible.

NoMoreNicksLeft 2y ago
> I worry my children will live in a time when commercial fishing is no longer feasible. I worry that my parents lived in a time when commercial fishing was no longer feasible, but no one noticed and kept siphoning all the seafood anyway.
- philipkglass 2y ago
  Indeed. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Collapse_of_the_Atlantic_northwest_cod_fishery#Mismanagement https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Collapse_of_the_Atlantic_north...
citizenpaul 2y ago
>I worry my children will live in a time when commercial fishing is no longer feasible. We are already well into it unfortunately. I've seen enough anecdotal evidence from old fishermen that we have already depleted and disrupted the sea biomass so much that it is already changed forever. - Old sushi chefs talking about how there are numerous fish they can no longer get at any price that were common when they were young. - Old fishing photos show smaller and smaller "prize" catches over time. - Old fisherman talking about how they used to fish by slapping oars at the bay then simply hand/net catching the fish types they wanted near shore. - Old whalers talking about how they could simply go out and pick what type of large catch they wanted and bring it back. Now they can go days or weeks without a single catch of anything.
hinkley 2y ago
The best solution we have so far is outlawing all fishing in certain areas of the ocean. Picked well, the fish are safe there to breed and recover population numbers, and you only harvest schools that leave the exclusion zone due to crowding.
pfdietz 2y ago
There is nothing special about petrochemical energy when it comes to growing food. We could run the agricultural system on other energy sources. In the US, the total fraction of energy used for agriculture is about 1%. We use more energy cooking food than growing it.
- lazide 2y ago
  Hydrocarbons contain massive quantities of easily liberated energy and large quantities of easily liberated hydrogen. Which are then easily and economically converted to ammonia to power the largest single form of fertilizer used in the world - nitrogen fertilizer, in the form of ammonium nitrate and equivalents. [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haber_process https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haber_process] 10’s of millions of tons/year are produced right now. That process alone is responsible for likely at least 50% of the human population increase since it was invented, literally billions of people. It is much harder to get there with any other form of energy, albeit not impossible.
  - pfdietz 2y ago
    It's harder, but if one looks at the externalities from fossil fuel consumption, it's actually cheaper to use renewable energy now. Hydrogen for ammonia production is very cheaply storable (underground, like natural gas is stored) and would provide a large dispatchable demand to ease integration of renewables into the economy, smoothing over long timescale intermittency. In any case, because the energy used for agriculture is so relatively small, if the economy as a whole can get off fossil fuels, agriculture certainly can as well.
    - lazide 2y ago
      Since neither the general economy nor agriculture has gotten anywhere near getting off fossil fuels yet, that is assuming a lot isn’t it? Even if electrical grid needs are 100% renewable, that is just a couple percent of most economies energy usage.
      - 2y ago