Preface on accuracy:
No, this is not properly referenced. Yes, I did attempt to ascertain reliable values, expending considerable effort in research. Some of the numbers (the global cost of WWII, for example) are essentially WAG's, but by people who should be as qualified to make them as anyone. Many numbers are industry averages, some are from specific projects, where the age of the technology does not allow time proven averages.
Financial figures were adjusted to 2010 US dollars except where noted.
I would give +/- 15% (a 30% range) as a good estimate of the average accuracy of figures in this document, with certain historical parameters being much more accurate. Feel free to do exhaustive referenced research on any area represented, and I will gladly incorporate such data into future versions of this document.
If you find something to be grossly in error or misleading, please comment and provide counterpoint information and references. If you simply disagree, but do not have specific information, please find specific information supporting your point of view, if possible, prior to commenting.
First lets define some very basic concepts and their interrelations as they pertain to us in our current cultural context:
Labor
Labor is a transformational process performed using human, animal, or mechanically supplied energy. Wealth is a symbolic representation of labor, embodied in valuable goods or symbols representing valuable goods. It follows therefore, that wealth is a symbolic representation of applied energy (labor).
Energy
Nearly all energy on the earth is either derived from thermonuclear fusion or heavy nucleus fission, either directly or indirectly.
Most abundant are the various forms of solar energy, which is actually remote thermonuclear energy. It is expressed in sunlight, wind, and the non tidal movement of water. Sunlight can be chemically harvested as food or biofuels through photosynthesis, converted directly to electricity through photovoltaic processes, and used as a heat source for heating or motive power through thermal cycle engines. It is most widely used in it stored form, as coal, oil, or natural gas – all fossil biofuels.
Also available is energy from nuclear fission, as both nuclear energy in power plants and in geothermal energy sources, which rely in fission processes deep within the earth. There may have also been rare natural occurrences of nuclear fission reactions at the earth surface.
Tidal energy, which is residual kinetic energy left over from the formation of the solar system, can also be utilized as an energy source.
There may be other forms of energy available to us as our understanding of physics progresses.
Solar energy energy is of primary importance to man and most multicellular creatures as the motive power in sustaining life, either directly or indirectly, through photosynthesis.
Energy is further used by civilized man as a source of motive power (labor) in the production of food and goods. It can be used directly as heat in a transformational process (cooking, cooling, heating of metals or plastics, etc) , or in the form of mechanical labor which is provided through thermokinetic conversion by engines or motors. Other uses of energy are chemical and atomic processes, but these energy uses are of relatively minor significance today, though they may one day grow to become more important.
From a socioeconomic perspective, energy directly applied (solar, geothermal, etc) to a transformational process replaces the labor required to (a – perform the process without the additional energy) or (b – gather fuel to supply the energy to perform the process), and in this way can be represented as a form of mechanical labor.
Either way, energy is applied to raw materials as labor (human, animal, or mechanical) to perform a transformational process. Labor may be again applied to further transformations until the desired end product is produced.
I will refer to fossil fuels as free stored energy. This is due to the fact that no investment is required to produce them, only extraction as a raw material, transportation, and processing is required. The amount of energy available from fossil fuels is grossly out of proportion to the extraction investment when compared to other forms of real time energy harvesting, such as solar power and farming. This is due to the extreme time concentration inherent in their use – millions of years of biological energy harvesting is being extracted in a span of just a few years. Concentration exists in other energy sources as well, such as hydropower, where the evaporative solar energy of an entire region is funneled into a single point of a single river or stream.
Materials
Fundamentally, all raw materials are free (ownerless) under current social systems (licensing agreements for resource extraction is an exception from this paradigm, but is still relatively rare, and usually benefits another party who has not paid for these resources). Labor is required to extract minerals from the earth through mining or farming, but the minerals themselves are freely available. As coal, oil, and natural gas are physical resources, they fall into this category as well.
Land is not free, but “land” is actually a license to use land, not the land itself. It is a payment for the labor involved in securing and maintaining stewardship, and for the potential value that that stewardship might bestow, in the form of resource collection, food (energy) production, or the collection of labor or goods or symbols representing labor (vassalage). Land value can also be speculative, in that the value may be derived from anticipated increase in value, but ultimately there must be resource extraction, energy harvesting (farming, geothermal, solar / wind / hydro power collection, etc), residency, or vassalage from the land to extract value.
In any rate, any value will ultimately be extracted in a symbolic representation of labor.
Now, for perspective, let us examine some rough estimates of our historical energy use:
Hunter gatherer
Per capita energy consumption limited to accessible environment, human food intake, and some animal food intake.
No significant excess production of food.
Social Structures following biological patterns – Clans, tribes
Toolmaking and physical technologies are our most powerful tool.
Significant hoarding of energy or energy symbols limited to nomadic raiders
Distribution of energy principally dependent on environmental factors
Human exploitation mainly limited to enslavement of captives
Average caloric use roughly 2000 - 5000 kcal / day
Primitive Agricultural society
Active collection and concentration of solar energy for food.
Energy consumption rises with animal husbandry and an increasing amount of animal motive power.
Refined and processed foods add to caloric cost of food production
Significant excess (food) energy production leads to a second class of humanity, those who derive their energy primarily from the energy gathered by others. This leads to the need for widespread symbolic representation of energy (wealth), which leads to the capability to hoard these symbols.
Collective effort (Government) becomes more critical to protect fixed assets and arable land, taxation begins. The need to keep records strengthens symbolic technologies, making further expansion of government practical.
Distribution of energy principally dependent on social factors
Average energy use 10,000 – 14,000 kcal / day
The dawn of empire
Social organization technologies become our most powerful tool
Significant amounts of animal, hydro, and wind energy used to process foods and transport goods.
The widespread acceptance of energy symbols (money) leads to the capability to govern, wage war, and exploit through vassalage. Nations, Empires, Global trade, and warfare as we understand it all result from this excess energy and its distribution.
Empires grow, and the technology of vassalage becomes refined. Significant portions of the energy consumed by most of humanity is confiscated to expand empires through conquest and to enrich the ruling class. Enormous energy is wielded by an elite few.
Global trade sows the seeds of financial rather than political empire....the East India trading company rises as the first significant corporakleptocracy.
Distribution of energy principally dependent on socio-economic factors
Average energy use 24,000 – 30,000 kcal / day
Steam – the mechanization of motive power
Science and technology become our most powerful tools.
Energy of combustion harnessed for motive power, per capita energy use rises sharply in the industrial world. Coal marks the beginning of significant stored carbon release from fossil fuels.
Mechanization begins to replace human and animal power as a primary motive power source.
The advent of mechanical labor creates a new social force – industry. The excess labor (energy) available from combustion is exploited to concentrate wealth for non-governmental entities. The rise of enterprise begins in earnest.
Demand for combustible materials quickly outstrips renewable supply in many areas. Vast reserves of coal are recognized as a more economical alternative to easily depleted forests. The transportation of energy rises as an industry unto itself. This huge source of stored energy, free for the taking, produces a paradigm shift in energy management.
The excess availability of stored free energy (labor) results in rising standards of living in many parts of the world.
Excess energy spills over from industry to domestic life in much of the civilized world. It becomes customary for enterprise to reap the entire primary benefit of free excess energy, with the population enjoying only the secondary effects with the exception of the industrial elite.
Using laws primarily drafted for public facilities (towns, bridges, etc), commercial entities begin to enjoy the rights of individuals, enabling them to transcend direct human ownership.
The meme of unlimited growth through the concentration of resources is widely accepted and idealized.
Population reaches 1 Billion, doubling in less than 1000 years.
Average energy use 70,000 – 90,000 kcal / day
Oil – concentrated chemical energy becomes nearly free.
Coal is replaced by refined crude oil and natural gas as the favored source of free stored energy. Petrofuels make possible the internal combustion engine – a portable, potent source of mechanical labor.
Concentrated, portable, free energy combined with the internal combustion engine feeds an exponential increase in energy consumption - pervasive use of mechanized motive power in industry, transportation, and food production immediately follows.
Synthetic fertilizers boost food production by a factor of three per land unit. Irrigation of previously non arable land becomes pervasive – agriculture now largely dependent on non – solar energy sources for support. Population reaches 6 billion as a direct result of increased food availability, seeing a sixfold increase in only two hundred years.
Mechanization further decreases human involvement in food production. Food production surplus is met with spiraling populations in undeveloped nations, largely dependent on non indigenous agriculture.
Industry grows exponentially, fueled by the store of excess energy (labor) embodied in fossil fuels. Corporations now wield more power and wealth than most nations. Transnationalism erodes national and cultural loyalty of corporate entities. As stock prices, rather than sustainable business models, become the primary feedback mechanism for corporate governance, profit becomes a moral justification in itself.
Distribution of information becomes increasingly centralized, and is largely operated by corporate entities.
Universal ownership of natural resources re-emerges as a valid paradigm, but is largely ignored as corporate industrial interests continue to grow financially and in their political reach. Improvements in lifestyle, attributed to industry, placate the majority of the civilized world as a validation of the corporakleptocratic meme.
The obvious fact that finite resources cannot be infinitely amassed is ignored, even made heretic in working class social circles. The idea that resources could be finite is depreciated as a valid paradigm.
Society at large accepts these fallacious memes, and consumption grows unchecked, fueled by the illusion of unlimited abundance created by the availability of free stored energy. Indications that resources are in fact limited are largely ignored because they are not accommodated within the dominant paradigm.
Outright denial that infinite consumption is not sustainable becomes a social value in parts of the western world.
Environmental damage becomes pervasive, food supplies in the oceans begin to fail.
Excess CO2 release from fossil fuels, and methane from intensive agriculture thought to be a contributing factor in rapid global warming.
Deforestation and ocean sterilization progressively decrease the ability of the ecosystem to release oxygen from CO2 and to fix carbon back to the soil and oceans.
Average energy use 200,000 – 250,000 kcal / day – this means that in the industrialized world, each of us consumes enough energy on a daily basis to feed 100 men, women, and children.. A family of four depletes energy resources at a rate equal to a good sized early agricultural village.
Post Fossil fuels – the next step
As the excess energy available from fossil fuels decreases, where will the wealth of industry and nations come from? What source of labor will be employed? What will happen when industry cannot simply prosper based on free concentrated wealth (energy) that can be pumped from the ground and easily transported and used?
Based on what we have seen in recent economic shrinkages, the portion taken by the ruling class (industry or government) is not likely to decrease, right up until the point of collapse. If that is to be the case, from where will the labor / cost shortfall be filled?
Global food supply barely outstrips demand, and additional room for agriculture comes at the cost of forest depletion or energy intensive irrigation. Since 70% of our current food production capacity is dependent on fossil fuels which are quickly being depleted even as populations continue to grow sharply, how will we provide sufficient food in the near future?
2008, for reference
Daily Food energy available per capita globally – roughly 3300 kcal
Daily Non Food energy available per capita Globally 51750 kcal
Post oil energy availability based on present infrastructure
Daily Energy per capita available (current capacity) without fossil fuels (but including coal) : 21550 kcal
Daily food energy available per capita without the use of excess energy (fossil fuels): 970 kcal
Percent of the population required to be directly involved with food production without the use of fossil fuels to produce that amount of food: roughly 60%......this is a huge logistical problem, because much of the population is very distant from the most productive agricultural areas.
Sufficient hydrogen production for the manufacture of synfuels, either from electricity or IGCC coal plants would make this situation much better. In order to have an uninterrupted food supply, we need an uninterrupted fuel supply, and we need fuels that will work in existing infrastructure.
Because of the high population, postindustrial man will have access to similar energy quantities as were used by early empire Man, but without the food availability, if we do not take drastic steps to change our energy conversion and consumption strategies.
Now lets look at some of the social issues associated with our present production – consumption paradigm:
Conservation
In the USA, nearly twice the energy per capita is used as in other industrialized nations with a similar standard of living (Japan, Germany). Clearly, there is room for progress. A 50% reduction in energy consumption in the USA would result in a 12% global reduction, a very significant gain.
While conservation has been a buzzword for a long time in western culture, it has been more about appearances than substance. Real progress has been made in energy efficiency of homes and vehicles, but much remains to be done.
Despite modest gains in energy efficiency, product consumption has continued to spiral upward, and there is substantial resistance to slowing this trend – it is inherently anti commercial. The culture of commerce has become parasitic in many aspects, encouraging wealth so that more can be harvested, effectively farming consumers to collect, and then spend, more energy, and enriching corporate coffers in the process - often with questionable benefit to the consumer themselves, and certainly at a detriment to the environment from which this energy and materials have been harvested.
If a true ethic of conservation can become a valid meme, or better yet, can be made to provide direct benefit to the conservator or a commercially interested second party, then we may begin to make significant strides in conservation.
Depreciating conspicuous consumption
It is easy to ignore that significant energy is tied up in the manufacture of goods – for example, medium technology density manufactured goods (appliances, cars) use approximately twice their weight in oil to manufacture, high tech goods much more (a cellphone requires nearly 20 lbs of oil to make).
As long as we continue to attach social value to the unmitigated acquisition of manufactured goods, it will be very difficult to mediate energy consumption and environmental impact. New memes of successful living need to be created and promoted, and unsustainable habits need to be reattached to negative social connotations, as these behaviors have a negative impact on us all.
Distributed energy production – the real benefit ?
Aside from the minuscule energy contribution that most home AE installations provide, there is an important social element. The homeowner comes to understand energy production and use, and gets a more accurate idea of the finiteness of an energy resource. It is hard to think of electrical energy as a finite resource when it comes from the wall in apparently unlimited quantities, even if you do have to pay for it. Neighbors are encouraged to think in terms of production and use, and awareness of energy as a resource increases.
The key factor - the tipping point, if you will – of distributed energy, will be when tangible quality of life improvements result from the application of renewable energy technologies. This could be in the form of subsidies, social aspects, or direct economic benefit.
Microagriculture
Perhaps the greatest potential benefit lies in microagriculture. It is low cost, energy saving, nutrition (or wealth) providing, and helps to secure the global food supply.
Microag has the potential to make people less dependent on the inefficient commercial food supply chain and reap the direct benefit of their access to solar energy without having to divide their earnings with corporate industrial interests.
Rather than put a solar panel on the roof for $5000, people all over the planet can put up a plant box and harness solar energy in the form of calories. 1000 Square feet of rooftop can create 1000kcal per day or more using strictly conventional growing techniques – and that can be doubled with advanced horticulture. Since traditional (industrial) food distribution averages 7 kcal / delivered kcalorie, 1000 square feet could yield 14000kcal / day in savings or – about 16KWH, almost exactly what a solar array of the same size would produce given a good sunny location – the main difference being that a 1000 square foot solar array costs close to 30 thousand dollars, and requires very little maintenance, where a 1000 square foot farm can be made for a few hundred dollars and will need daily TLC.
Additional annual benefits of 1000 square feet of intensive rooftop agriculture include : 250 - 500lbs of carbon fixing (a carbon free road trip!), 200 - 400lbs of oxygen released (enough for you to breathe for one or two months), and 30,000,000 BTU's of cooling, potentially decreasing the cooling load of the building itself by as much as 20%.
Outside of the urban rooftop environment, microfarming can easily supply the dietary needs of an entire family in a small space. ¼ acre (roughly 10,000 square feet) is easily sufficient to provide the basic caloric intake for a family of four in a good growing environment, using conventional growing techniques. This is not only practical, it is a sustainable template for global food production – even at 13 billion people, we will still have more than two acres per person available.
Technological improvements to make microfarming less resource intensive, yield more and a higher quality or variety of usable foods, require less time, and be more resistant to failure would be very well invested. In most socioeconomic environments, effective microfarming should yield sufficient direct and social benefit to become a self sustaining paradigm, given effective initial education support and meme shaping.
The pervasive presence of microfarming could significantly bolster global security in a famine threatened environment, both by providing food resources directly and by providing a template to increase food supply.
What can be done to address the effects of diminishing reserves of oil? How will we produce the energy that we need to support our growing population base? What are some of the potential problems associated with different energy sources?
Currently only coal, wind, nuclear, and solar power generation are definitely capable of meeting global demands into the foreseeable future.
Hydropower could be developed to meet nearly 10% of 2008 global energy use, but with significant environmental and social impact.
Global coal reserves could provide for the next 100 – 200 years, but in the environmental costs may be unacceptable if not carefully managed.
Based on economically recoverable uranium reserves, nuclear power could sustain current global consumption for only 5 years without breeder reactors, or roughly 200 years with breeder type plants – but this would involve the processing of very large quantities of plutonium and other weaponizable products, and would present an ever present environmental threat.
Both coal and nuclear technologies might provide a bridge solution while more sustainable technologies are rolled out. A system of incentives and tariffs may be required to ensure that transition ensues.
Geothermal is a difficult topic to research, and the answers often change depending on who you ask. The earth’s heat content is estimated to be about 10^31 joules. This is conducted to the surface by at a rate of about 45 Terawatts (Tw) and is fueled by an estimated 30 Tw of natural nuclear decay. This is clearly more than the 15 Tw required to maintain current production, but much of the energy is too diffuse to provide a useful resource for power generation. It is estimated that 2 Tw of production might be possible with sufficient investment. On the other hand, an MIT study in 2006 indicated that, using enhanced geothermal technology that includes energy stored by heat pumps and solar heating of the earth, it might be possible to provide for the entirety of global energy consumption, although the cost of doing so is not clear.
Wind and solar power are both technically more than capable of meeting global energy demand. At this time wind power appears to be the more cost effective option – but still unrealistically expensive for a short term implementation, and wind and solar power both suffer from intermittent output, requiring significant investments and improvements in energy storage and distribution technologies.
Replacing local combustion engines with distantly generated electrical power will raise some infrastructure problems of its own, but with modern hydrides, fuel cells, and hydrogen based synthfuels, they need not be show stoppers.
Some basic numbers for a sense of scale
$194.5 trillion = Global personal wealth, 2009
8.3 trillion dollars = US money supply, 2009
$14.3 trillion = US GDP, 2009
4.8 billion ounces = global gold supply, 2009
$1.9 trillion = annual global oil production, 2009
$.88 trillion = Annual US military spending
(total military related expenses, DOD only is $.68T) , 2010
Global cost of WWII, 2010 dollars $27 trillion (US Cost $5 trillion)
Total US cost of the Cold War (over 43 Years) $21 trillion
An overview of possible Replacement energy sources
Wind power, the most likely renewable energy contender
Cost to deploy wind turbines in the USA – $1.4Million per Megawatt
global energy consumption 15,000,000 megawatts,
less coal output at about 5,000,000 megawatts
=10,000,000 Mw to generate in order to replace oil and gas
0.33 availability factor gives 30,000,000 megawatts of installed nameplate (rated 100% output) capacity, or 20 million large turbines
at 1.4 million per megawatt, installed (in the USA) = 42 trillion dollars
Current global nameplate capacity is 158,000 Mw.
Turbine production would have to be ramped to 3,000,000 Nameplate Mw a year in a very short time frame. A 2x Cost expansion based on resource and production scarcity from accelerated schedule and remote location requirements can be expected. Large investments in additional power transmission and storage facilities would also be required.
Production / Demand timing is a limiting factor for wind power when it becomes more than 15% or so of the production capacity. Effective energy storage systems would have to be developed to utilize wind as a primary storage source. There could be very significant technological barriers to implementation, and costs could rise considerably from these estimates.
This project would directly employ approximately 5 million people for 10 years, including turbine manufacture.
Ongoing maintenance would require 500,000 employees to maintain the turbines.
$120 - $84 trillion
An overview of coal as an interim alternative
Approximately 3,000 each 4000 Mw Plants to be built to make up needed capacity
This would employ roughly 3 million people for 10 years in the direct construction of the plants, not including equipment suppliers. Global coal consumption would triple. Environmental damage would result from mining, but if carefully managed this could be mitigated down to short term effects.
Carbon release is potentially a more difficult problem, but carbon sequestering technologies could eliminate 90% of carbon emissions, potentially reducing CO2 releases to less than half of current global levels with the replacement of some of the oldest existing plants.
Coal Options
“Clean Coal” (IGCC 90% carbon sequestering), zero sulfur.
$6m per megawatt Capacity, 100% availability factor (this may drop considerably, even to below $3 per watt)
$96 – $33 trillion
“Clean Coal” IGCC , zero sulfur.
$2m per megawatt Capacity, 100% availability factor (this may drop considerably, even to below $1.5 per watt)
Atmospheric CO2 pollution would increase significantly.
$22 – $16 trillion
Conventional Coal
$1m per megawatt capacity, 100% availability factor, standard emissions scrubbing.
Atmospheric CO2 pollution would increase significantly, and other pollutants would likely create significant secondary effects.
$11 trillion
Nuclear power to the rescue?
Nuclear power generation costs are similar to coal, with a higher infrastructure cost. Breeder reactors would be mandatory for a long term solution. A very very rough estimate of initial infrastructure costs would be:
$20 - 30 trillion
On a global scale, providing effective security and defense of these operations (lots of weaponizable plutonium kicking around) would probably exceed the cost of power production and would present a very significant, ever present security and environmental threat.
Geothermal a possibility?
Primary geothermal production capacity is estimated to be about 2 Tw. Assuming that the other 8Tw required could be made up by secondary sources as suggested by the MIT study, then Geothermal might come in at
$34 - 75 Trillion
Depending largely on the cost of the secondary sources. Large investments in distribution systems would also likely be required.
Unprecedented global investment will likely be required to avert collapse of the current system
Obviously, a huge investment is required for all of the possible solutions to maintaining energy output levels. Investment on this scale, if even a realistic possibility, is probably not possible without severe widespread economic effects, and although I am not an economist, it seems to me that the likely effect would be extreme global inflation.
Where would this money come from?
Some ideas that could fractionally contribute:
1.A 100% tax on all oil – energy revenues, with a corresponding 100% tax credit for renewable or clean coal infrastructure investment by companies affected by this tax.
2.Tax reduction for investors, employees, and executives of companies which invest more than 70% of their revenues into renewable or clean coal infrastructure investment.
3.Tax free bond issues for renewable or clean coal infrastructure investment
3.Conferring overflow tax benefits for investors holding more than a certain percentage of their portfolio in RE/CC infrastructure
3.Provide a 100% tax credit, up to taxes owed, for all energy related businesses, credited for RE/CC infrastructure..
7.Place a tarriff on electrical power, funding a credit for micro AE installations. Balance this tarrif so that property owners who install effective AE systems will be tariff neutral.
8.Tax credits for agriculture – windfarm colocation, to provide an incentive for free siting of wind turbines.
9.Tax credits for microagriculture food production, reflecting the energy savings
More Ideas needed.... please comment!
