ONE TOWN SQUARE: at the intersection of peak oil, climate change, and land use

An analysis of coal production by Tadeusz Patzek at The University of Texas at Austin and Gregory Croft at the University of California, Berkeley concludes that the global peak of coal production from existing coalfields will occur close to the year 2011. The study was published in Energy, the International Journal.

After 2011, the production rates of coal and CO₂ decline, reaching 1990 levels by the year 2037, and reaching 50% of the peak value in the year 2047. In other words, the peak of global coal production from the existing coalfields is imminent, and coal production from these areas will fall by 50% in the next 40 years.

The CO2 emission estimates used for government policy decisions assume unlimited coal and fossil fuel production for the next 100 years, an unrealistic premise that skews climate change models and proposed solutions. Co-author Tad Patzek observes:

The IPCC carbon estimates, which are used by all major decision makers, are based on economic and policy considerations that appear to be unconstrained by geophysics.

Gregor Macdonald has posted this chart at The Oil Drum which neatly shows the headwinds facing the U.S. “economy”.

It’s not going to get any prettier in the future. We’re going to have to figure out what prosperity could look like in an environment where energy is going to become an ever more precious commodity.

Last year governments world-wide provided $43 – $46 billion of support to renewable energy through subsidies such as tax credits, guaranteed electricity prices known as feed-in tariffs, and alternative energy credits.

Sounds pretty good, right?

But not so fast. In 2008, governments provided $557 billion in subsidies to fossil fuels.

An analysis by Bloomberg New Energy Finance shows that the global direct subsidy for fossil fuels is at least ten times the subsidy for renewables.

The July 2010 edition of Oilwatch Monthly reports that both crude oil and liquid fuels production continue their slow decline from peak levels. The charts below taken from the report are posted at The Oil Drum.

Oil consumption in the twenty-seven countries of the European Union peaked in 2006 and has since been declining at a rate of 3% per year. Oil consumption in the transport sector in the EU began to decline in 2008, dropping 1.4% from 2007. Oil consumption in road transport fell, offsetting a continuing but slowing rise in air transport consumption.

Using less oil than the U.S. does not mean the EU is less prosperous than the U.S. EU nations consume only 60% of the oil as does the U.S., but the gross domestic product of the combined 27 EU nations exceeds that of the U.S. by 15%.

China has overtaken the United States as the world’s largest consumer of energy, according to data from Paris-based International Energy Agency. The IEA said China consumed the equivalent of 2.25 billion tons of oil last year, slightly above U.S. consumption of 2.17 billion tons. The measure includes all types of energy: oil, nuclear, coal, natural gas and renewable energy sources.

This chart is posted at The Daily Reckoning:

As this chart posted at The Daily Reckoning shows, China has a long way to go to catch up with U.S. per capita energy consumption:

40% of the world’s population – China and India – uses two barrels of oil per person per day. In the US, we use 25.

China dismissed the IEA’s analysis, saying the IEA data on China’s energy use is unreliable. China’s National Bureau of Statistics said in a report in February that China’s energy consumption last year stood at 3.1 billion tons of standard coal equivalent, or 2.132 billion tons of oil equivalent. Even by China’s reckoning, China is fast approaching U.S. energy consumption levels.

In June, China consumed approximately 9.4 million barrels each and every day. Of this total, they imported 5.44 million barrels. Between them, China and India together now consume about 28 million barrels-per-day, nearly 33% of the world total.

But while China’s oil consumption is rising and China is busy locking up future oil supplies around the world, U.S. oil consumption is declining – and improved efficiency has nothing to do with it. Oil consumption has likely peaked in the United States because our economy is trashed and likely to remain so. In 2007, the last year before the crash, American oil consumption often exceeded 21 million barrels per day. Those days are over. U.S. consumption is now bouncing around 19 mbd, a decline of ~10%.

Rural life is extremely energy intense, especially in terms of oil. Exurban living – people living “consumer lives with prettier views” – depends on very long supply lines. Alex Stefan at Worldchanging explains why the exurban lifestyle is not only not “green”, it is at risk in an environment where energy prices can go nowhere but up.

[W]e know that big, dense cities are greener; that the energy used in shipping food is a small portion of its overall impact, that transit is more energy efficient than driving (and indeed, that cars are the largest contributor to climate change), and that the benefits of urban living in compact, walkable, wired communities can extend far beyond living in smaller homes, served by more efficient infrastructure and not owning a car, to include a dramatic overall drop in one’s environmental impact. What’s more, we know why these things are so[.]

Unfortunately for people living in rural areas, we know a lot more about how to live a prosperous-yet-low-impact urban life than we do about how to live a rural life of equal prosperity with a small ecological footprint. Rural areas are poorer than urban areas, and offer fewer opportunities. Envisioning how people rural areas  will be able to prosper and live decent lives  in an environment bereft of cheap and abundant energy is a challenge that has yet to be faced.

Luis de Souza at The Oil Drum: Europe writes that, rather than thinking of electricity generation load regimes as “base load” and “peak load”, it’s more accurate and useful to think in three categories: base load, intermediate load, and peak load. Electricity demand is not constant, but varies over the course of the day and over weeks and months. Variability of demand over time can be foreseen rather well: the daily, weekly, and seasonal fluctuations are very pronounced and predictable. Thus, the bulk of load-following can be planned long ahead, making it a scheduled form of operation. For the power plant operator, scheduled operation also means that the plant’s average load factor, even if well short of 100%, is rather stable and predictable.

The three-part scheme can be laid out as follows:

1. Base load: plants operated at constant power output, at maximum whenever possible
2. Intermediate load: plants operated with slow variation in power output on regular schedule to follow expected variation in demand, to cover the gap between expected demand and expected base load
3. Peak load: plants operated with fast variation, responding to minute peaks in demand above or below the pre-planned part of supply

. . . and is illustrated in this graph:

If the majority of the lifetime costs of a power plant are upfront investment costs, then the unit costs of electricity produced will be the lower the more the plant is operated and the operator will want to operate it at maximum whenever possible (the very definition of base load).

In the lifetime costs of both wind power and photovoltaics, fixed, up-front investment costs dominate, so these renewable sources operate as part of base load. But unlike conventional base load, wind and solar are intermittent sources: power output depends on weather, time of day, and season. Distributing these sources over a grid spread out over a larger geographical area can reduce weather-related intermittency, but can’t make it go away.

De Souza’s piece examines ways of de-carbonizing base load and intermediate load, including hydro and pumped hydro, biomass, demand management, natural balancing, solar thermal with storage, nuclear, stimulated geothermal, and distributed storage (including flywheels, batteries, capacitors, fuel cells, etc). His conclusion? None are completely satisfactory – and probably most will be needed.

Since peaking in 2006, world nuclear power generation has fallen each year, as shown in this graph posted at The Oil Drum.

Aging nuclear facilities in the developed countries could mean this pattern will continue. The only group of countries showing an increase in nuclear power generation in 2009 was the “Remainder” group, which includes China, India, and many developing nations.

Gail the Actuary suggests growth in nuclear generation may be limited to a few countries which are able to finance new reactors – perhaps China and some other Asian nations. As old reactors are taken off line elsewhere, total nuclear electric generation may continue to decline.

Would any nuclear power plant ever get financed and built in the U.S. without federally funded support and federal limits on industry liability in case of an accident?

The Land Institute near Salina, Kansas has been crossing selected strains of wild intermediate wheatgrass grain with annual wheat varieties to breed a commercially practical perennial grain. Gene Logsdon at OrganicToBe.org reports that pancakes made with flour (trademarked Kernza ™) from the resulting grain is pretty tasty.

The flour makes a light dough and the pancakes taste just a tad sweeter than ordinary wheat flour.  * * * It is exceptionally high in some nutrients known to be important to human health and deficient in many modern diets: Omega 3 fatty acids, calcium, lutein, and betaine. It is particularly high in folate, important for preventing stroke, cancer, heart disease and infertility. Folate is also believed to be important for maintaining good mental health in old age.  My mind generally glazes over when reading about nutrient values of various foods so that folate might come in handy. To me the important thing is that for once something that is good for me tastes good too. Kernza ™ does not have enough gluten in it to use alone for leavened breads, but as more and more crosses are made with it and regular wheat, all things are possible.

Being able to grow grain without plowing up millions of acres of soil every year would cut down on erosion and help build soil tilth while enabling farmers to cut way back on fuel and greenhouse gas emissions – saving farmers both time and money in the bargain.

But the search won’t be over until researchers come up with a good perennial bread flour.

Gail the Actuary (Gail Tverberg) has a thought-provoking post at The Oil Drum about the Energy Information Administration’s new Energy Outlook 2010.

Any clouds on the horizon? Not according to the EIA. This graph shows projected energy consumption out to 2035.

Peak oil? Not a chance.

The growth in liquid fuel supplies is to be spurred by increased demand. Ask, and it shall be yours.

Here’s the most amazing projection: after steady declines for nearly 40 years, U.S. oil production is going to resume a growth track!

The odds of this scenario actually coming to pass were about nil – even before the Deepwater Horizon fiasco. This is magical thinking at its most absurd.

If the EIA’s projections were to play out, what would that mean for efforts to stop global warming? Apparently, no one at EIA is even asking.

We ought to establish a new category here – for “fantasy” or maybe “fiction”.

Andrew Rivken at the New York Times asks, is last year’s drop in U.S. CO2 emissions a blip or a trend?

According to the EIA report U.S. Carbon Dioxide Emissions in 2009: A Retrospective Review, U.S. energy-related carbon dioxide emissions fell by 7.0% last year. The downturn of the economy was responsible for only 2.4% of that reduction.

Population, per capita GDP, energy intensity of the economy, and carbon intensity of the energy supply all contribute to emissions. The only factor that increased in 2009 was population, by 0.9%. The remaining three factors – GDP, energy intensity, and carbon intensity – combined in roughly equal proportions to cause emissions to fall by 7.0%

The financial crisis hit the industrial sector of the economy the hardest, and energy usage by industry correspondingly fell the most – by 9.9%. Output from energy-intensive industries such as primary metals (-33.9%) and nonmetallic minerals (-17.4%) fell much faster than total industrial production, reflecting the fact that we’re outsourcing such production at the same time the service sector has been growing relative to the industrial sector of the U.S. economy. Also, carbon intensity fell due to fuel switching as the price of coal rose 6.8% from 2008 to 2009 while the comparable price of natural gas fell 48% on a per Btu basis.

But where CO₂ emissions occur doesn’t matter to the climate system. The fact that U.S. emissions (or those of other developed nations) are falling doesn’t matter much if those emissions are merely being “exported” elsewhere, primarily to China. And we’re exporting more than industrial production – we’re exporting energy and carbon intensity, as well. The result? China has now overtaken the U.S. to become the world’s biggest emitter of greenhouse gases – and shows no sign of easing off. Coal is the basis of the Chinese economy, fueling over 80% of electricity generation. China’s already-enormous coal consumption – now three times U.S. consumption – is still growing, for example at an astonishing rate 28.1% from first quarter 2009 to first quarter 2010.

Even if falling U.S. emissions are a trend and not just a recession-related blip, falling U.S. emissions mean nothing if global emissions continue to rise.

As Gail the Actuary points out at The Oil Drum, what can’t happen, won’t:

Combine unprecedented consumption levels with furious growth rates and you quickly arrive at absurdities and impossibilities. As in, it won’t happen. The wheels will fall off the wagon first.

Reducing emissions will require reducing the production of “stuff” – and not only in the U.S., but also around the world. Global economic shrinkage is the only way out of our climate predicament, and our current focus on economic growth will have to be replaced by concern with economic justice.

Limited supplies of fossil fuels mean that “economic growth” as we know it will come to an end, sooner or later, whether we like it or not. The question that remains to be answered is, before the wheels do come off, will we have already set the world on a path to unstoppable warming? Or will we accept the inevitable and act in time to save the ecosystem that sustains us?

John Hofmeister, recently retired president of Shell Oil Company, told an audience at the Offshore Technology Conference that we face an “energy abyss”:

[D]espite the high oil price “wake up” call delivered to the US during the period 2005-2008, policymakers have been unable or unwilling to address the nation’s energy security, economic competitiveness that comes from affordable energy, and the potential jobs creation initiatives that a sound energy policy would and should deliver. Given the current trajectory of an aging infrastructure, decades of restrictions on drilling, failure to tackle the obstacles that prevent both more nuclear plant and clean coal plant projects, frittering at the edges of renewable energy, and avoidance of other energy “hard choices,” within the decade the nation faces an unprecedented energy abyss.

By 2020, there will be inadequate supplies of liquid fuels and electricity taking the nation toward inevitable gas lines, brown-outs, black-outs and extraordinary high prices.

The energy abyss will stick around for up to a full decade with all of the national insecurity, economic decline, joblessness and social malaise that accompanies energy shortages in third world countries.

The energy industry, despite its technological, geological, chemical, physical, molecular, logistical, scientific and engineering expertise and capacity to deliver affordable energy in endless supply, given all of the natural sources of energy in this country, and the world, will be unable to supply the demand because of public policy constraints. Yet, it will bear the brunt of the blame for energy shortages. Today’s energy professionals will bear the reputational burden of our national decline and failure because who else is blameable? Are you prepared to accept that blame, or are there viable alternatives, things you can do, to change the nation’s current trajectory?

Understanding the scope and depth of the energy system’s problems requires careful understanding of just how entrenched the obstacles are to sound enabling public policy. What do we do about “political time” dominance in the political process, up against “energy time” requirements to get projects launched and completed? How do you respond to the dysfunctional structures that our three independent branches of government have created over the course of time? Is it really necessary to have 13 executive branch agencies govern energy and the environment? Do we need 26 congressional committees and subcommittees writing legislation on energy? Should every federal district court have authority to delay and ultimately prevent citizens from having the energy they need because of the power of the judicial bench? How long can you tolerate the paralysis of partisanship where right and left wing interest groups, demagogues and authority figures, elected as well as appointed, prohibit mainstream, centrist Americans, most likely the majority of citizens, from achieving needed policy objectives? Are you willing to accept zigzag efforts to move energy policy forward forever?

The nation has to come to grips with its energy future sooner, not later. The time is now not then. We can’t wait for a ninth president and 19th congress to promise us whatever it takes to get elected and then lead us down another failed path. We should have learned by now but we haven’t.

One could object that Hofmeister blames the upcoming “energy abyss” on “public policy constraints” rather than geophysical or ecosystem constraints. But the very fact that an energy industry insider sees an energy abyss as inevitable should make folks sit up and take notice.

Of course other industry insiders, such as Matt Simmons, have been saying the same thing for years, for example in this presentation at the AON Annual Energy Insurance Symposium, January 14, 2010.

Even as the disastrous consequences of our dependence on fossil fuels unfold in the Gulf, we will continue to go about our business as usual.

Even as the disastrous consequences of our dependence on fossil fuels unfold in the Gulf, we will continue to go about our business as usual.

At least until the next energy crisis, when it will be too late. Gail the Actuary at The Oil Drum states what should be obvious:

No one is really willing to look at what our energy future is really likely to look like, and plan and make regulations on that basis. In my view, we really should be planning for what industry and transportation will need to look like, with no (or very little) fossil fuels. We need to look at what kind of roads we can maintain, and what, if any, kinds of vehicles will be able to run on them. If we don’t look to see where we are really headed, it is hard to see that we can take steps that will get us in the right direction.

What are the energy and emissions consequences of continuing to allow rural sprawl – the proliferation of nonfarm dwellings throughout the rural landscape? That’s one of the questions currently being addressed in Lane County by a task force looking at the county’s land use policies.

Rural development patterns enabled by cheap and abundant fossil fuels have energy and climate consequences, as almost 40% of total U.S. carbon dioxide emissions are associated with residences and cars. Changing development and transportation patterns can significantly impact energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions.

Data that break down per capita CO2 emission rates along other important categories of the United States, such as by urban vs. suburban vs. rural, rich vs. poor, apartment dwellers vs. homeowners, or by ethnic/racial origin is hard to come by. But new studies are beginning to shed some light on the issue.

A 2008 report by the Brookings Institution found that the average American in a metropolitan area has a carbon footprint of 8.21 tons — 14% less than the average American living outside the city.

Edward L. Glaeser, an economics professor at Harvard, reached a similar conclusion in a study titled The Greenness of Cities:  Carbon Dioxide Emissions and Urban Development. Glaeser and co-author Matthew Kahn found that cities generally have significantly lower emissions than suburban areas. The city-suburb gap is particularly large in older areas, like New York, which developed prior to the dominance of the automobile.

A new study titled Cities produce surprisingly low carbon emissions per capita appearing in the April issue of the journal Environment and Urbanization looked at cities in a variety of countries and, for the most part, affirms these findings. Analyzing the per capita emissions from 12 major cities in Europe, Asia, North America and South America, the study’s author, David Dodman of the International Institute for Environment and Development found that per capita emissions from cities were typically smaller, and often far smaller, than their nation’s averages.

For example, greenhouse gas emissions for New Yorkers are less than a third of those of the national average for the USA. Those of Barcelona residents are half the average for Spain.  Londoners have little more than half the greenhouse gas emissions per person of the UK average. Brazil’s two largest cities, Sao Paulo and Rio de Janeiro have less than one-third of the greenhouse gas emissions per person of the average for Brazil.

Tokyo has considerably lower emissions per person than either Beijing or Shanghai, suggesting that prosperity need not inevitably result in greater emissions and that well designed and well governed cities can combine high living standards with much lower greenhouse gas emissions. However, the study cautions that emissions from manufacturing are currently allocated to the countries in which these greenhouse gases are produced, rather than to the locations in which the finished products are purchased and used.

The main driver of greenhouse gas emissions is unsustainable consumption, especially in the world’s more affluent countries.

A new study concludes that carbon sequestration is a pipe dream:

Published reports on the potential for sequestration fail to address the necessity of storing CO2 in a closed system. Our calculations suggest that the volume of liquid or supercritical CO2 to be disposed cannot exceed more than about 1% of pore space. This will require from 5 to 20 times more underground reservoir volume than has been envisioned by many, and it renders geologic sequestration of CO2 a profoundly non-feasible option for the management of CO2 emissions.

The study, titled “Sequestering carbon dioxide in a closed underground volume”  by Christene Ehlig-Economides, professor of energy engineering at Texas A&M, and Michael Economides, professor of chemical engineering at University of Houston, is published in the Journal of Petroleum Science and Engineering.

Total U.S. carbon dioxide emissions in 2007 were 6.02 billion metric tons (tonnes) including 2.16 billion tonnes from coal fired electric power generation, 2.6 billion tonnes from petroleum consumption mainly for transportation, and 1.2 billion tonnes from natural gas consumption. The EIA projects that US carbon dioxide emissions are forecast to reach 6.41 billion tonnes by 2030.

The Kyoto Protocol aims to keep the global temperatures from rising more than 2 degrees Celsius over pre-industrial levels and aims at stabilizing CO2 concentrations below 550 ppm – a target which scientists now believe is completely unrealistic.  Keeping CO2 levels below 350 ppm, perhaps far below, is necessary to maintain Earth’s climate as it has been during the time human civilization has developed.

If we’re to save Earth’s climate, the evidence is growing that our only hope is that oil runs out quickly and that we can muster the will to stop burning coal before we destroy ourselves.

Natural gas may not be nearly as “clean” as we thought. Here’s the opening paragraph from a new study by Cornell University Professor Robert W. Howarth titled Preliminary Assessment of the Greenhouse Gas Emissions from Natural Gas obtained by Hydraulic Fracturing.

Natural gas is being widely advertised and promoted as a clean burning fuel that produces less greenhouse gas emissions than coal when burned. While it is true that less carbon dioxide is emitted from burning natural gas than from burning coal per unit of energy generated, the combustion emissions are only part of story and the comparison is quite misleading. A complete consideration of all emissions from using natural gas seems likely to make natural gas far less attractive than oil and not significantly better than coal in terms of the consequences for global warming. [Bold in original.]

Considering the release during combustion alone, greenhouse gas emissions from burning natural gas average 13.7 g C of CO2 per million joules of energy compared to 18.6 for gasoline, 18.9 for diesel fuel, and 24.0 for bituminous coal. Additional emissions of greenhouse gas occur during the development, processing, and transport of natural gas (due to the use of fossil fuels to build pipelines, truck water, drill wells, make the compounds used in drilling and fracturing, and treat wastes, and the loss of carbon-trapping forests). Howarth estimates that such emissions are at least one third of those released during combustion, compared to about 8% for gasoline and diesel. But the leakage of methane gas during production, transport, processing, and use of natural gas is the major culprit. Methane is by the far the major component of natural gas, and it is a powerful greenhouse gas: 72-times more powerful than is CO2 per molecule in the atmosphere.

Hydrofracking (high-volume, slick water hydraulic fracturing) is much worse than conventional methods of extracting natural gas.

A first attempt at comparing the total emissions of greenhouse gas emissions from HVSWHF obtained natural gas suggests that they are 2.4-fold greater than are the emissions just from the combustion of the natural gas. This estimate is highly uncertain, but is likely conservative, with true emissions being even greater. When the total emissions of greenhouse gases are considered, Greenhouse gas emissions from HVSWHF-obtained natural gas are estimated to be 60% more than for diesel fuel and gasoline. HVSWHF-obtained natural gas and coal from mountain-top removal probably have similar releases.

Howarth cautions that society should be wary of claims that natural gas is a desirable fuel in terms of the consequences on global warming. He urges us instead to rapidly move towards an economy based on renewable fuels.

A recent post pointed out our actions belied any intention to actually do anything about global warming – we’re not really serious. Here’s another example.

First, Bloomberg reports Chinese president’s special envoy Xie Zhenhua vowing to “vigorously” fight “world scale climate destruction”:

The scale of economic destruction would be equivalent to that of the two world wars and the Great Depression combined” if global temperatures rise by 3 degrees (5.4 Fahrenheit) to 4 degrees Celsius, Xie said. “Human beings and the Earth cannot afford such disasters.

On the very same day, China Daily reports a huge jump in Chinese coal production:

China’s coal output grew 28.1 percent year-on-year to well over 751 million tons in the first quarter, the National Bureau of Statistics said Thursday. . . .

The report estimates China’s total coal production capacity has exceeded 3.6 billion tons.

Channeling Groucho Marx:  who are you to going to believe, Xie or your lying eyes?

A new report from Metro titled Regional greenhouse gas inventory concludes it’s our consumerism – our making or importing, buying, using, and throwing away of stuff – that’s most responsible for Portland’s greenhouse gas emissions and contributions to global warming (here’s the press release). The report finds 48% of emissions come from consumption, 27% from energy, 25% from transportation.

The graph above is from an article in The Oregonian. The Portland Tribune also has a story about the report.

“Transportation” includes vehicle miles traveled by passenger vehicles and light trucks and operation of public transportation system (TriMet). “Energy” includes natural gas consumption from residents and businesses and fossil fuel consumption from utilities’ imported electricity. “Materials” includes manufacture of products and food (from inside and outside the region) consumed by metro residents and businesses; freight movement of materials, goods and food (heavy truck, rail, air); and waste management and recycling system (collection, landfills).

Excluding the movement of goods and waste from “transportation” and including it instead in “materials” is an interesting Gedankenexperiment that could be extended even further. How much of the “transportation” we engage in is related to buying stuff, either working to make the money to do so or shopping? How much of the stuff we use is related to filling up and maintaining the oversized houses we live in? How many fewer business-related structures could we avoid having to power if we didn’t consume so much stuff?

All that aside, shifting the movement of goods and waste from one category to another doesn’t reduce our reliance on oil as a transportation fuel.

Let’s continue along this line of thought.

According to the EIA, oil is the biggest source of energy consumed in the U.S.

The U.S. Department of Defense, in a new report titled “The JOE 2010” (JOE = Joint Operating Environment) sees an oil shortage of ~10 million barrels a day developing by 2015. This excerpt is from p. 29 (highlighting added):

Energy Summary

To generate the energy required worldwide by the 2030s would require us to find an additional 1.4 MBD every year until then. During the next twenty-five years, coal, oil, and natural gas will remain indispensable to meet energy requirements. The discovery rate for new petroleum and gas fields over the past two decades (with the possible exception of Brazil) provides little reason for optimism that future efforts will find major new fields.

At present, investment in oil production is only beginning to pick up, with the result that production could reach a prolonged plateau. By 2030, the world will require production of 118 MBD, but energy producers may only be producing 100 MBD unless there are major changes in current investment and drilling capacity.

By 2012, surplus oil production capacity could entirely disappear, and as early as 2015, the shortfall in output could reach nearly 10 MBD.

Energy production and distribution infrastructure must see significant new investment if energy demand is to be satisfied at a cost compatible with economic growth and prosperity. Efficient hybrid, electric, and flex-fuel vehicles will likely dominate light-duty vehicle sales by 2035 and much of the growth in gasoline demand may be met through increases in biofuels production. Renewed interest in nuclear power and green energy sources such as solar power, wind, or geothermal may blunt rising prices for fossil fuels should business interest become actual investment. However, capital costs in some power-generation and distribution sectors are also rising, reflecting global demand for alternative energy sources and hindering their ability to compete effectively with relatively cheap fossil fuels. Fossil fuels will very likely remain the predominant energy source going forward.

An identical prediction of a gap of 10 MBD between supply and demand in 2015 appeared on page 8 in the Department of Energy (DoE) document that Matthieu Auzanneau blogged about recently at Le Monde. And of course the Pentagon is being incredibly optimistic in projecting production levels at 100 million bpd in 2030.

The Pentagon is blunt: cheap fossil fuels are key to “economic growth and prosperity”.

Jeff Rubin is less than sanguine about the odds of maintaining access to cheap oil.

There are no Spindletops waiting to be found anymore, neither in the mid-Atlantic nor in the Gulf of Mexico. There aren’t even Prudhoe Bays or North Seas—just ridiculously expensive stuff found miles below the ocean’s floor, like the recently discovered Tiber field. By the time any oil flows from these newly opened offshore areas, the American economy will have abandoned oil as a transport fuel—a change that will be dictated by a series of oil-induced recessions like the one we’ve just exited.

* * *

So baby, you can drill all you want, but what you’ll find won’t keep you on the road.

In Metro’s formulation, less oil means less “materials”, not just less transportation. What we call “economic growth and prosperity” is precisely the “consumption” that Metro has identified as the major cause of global warming.Then there’s the other big and nasty fossil fuel: coal. Coal is the biggest source of energy produced in the U.S.

And of course, as shown in the chart below, coal is the world’s biggest source of greenhouse gas emissions.

Energy-related carbon dioxide emissions from fossil fuels, 2008 (Million Metric Tons)

¹Includes combustion and flaring of natural gas.

As James Hansen points out, only a rapid phasing out of coal can avert the risk of passing “tipping points”, beyond which catastrophic climate change cannot be avoided.

There are no substitutes for fossil fuels. The EROI of alternatives simply isn’t adequate to maintain our industrial life style. Dave Murphy at The Oil Drum: Net Energy runs a rough calculation and concludes civilization, at a bare minimum, requires a 3:1 “extended EROI” – which includes not just the energy of getting the fuel, but also of transporting and using it – to allow only for energy to run transportation or related systems. This would leave little discretionary surplus for all the things we value about civilization: art, medicine, education and so on – things that use energy but do not contribute directly to getting more energy or other resources. This ratio would increase substantially if the energy cost of supporting labor (generally considered a consumption by economists although definitely part of production here) or compensating for environmental destruction were included. Any fuel with an EROI less than about 10:1 may in fact be subsidized by the general petroleum economy.

So here’s where this thought experiment leaves us. Petroleum, our biggest energy source, will soon be in short supply. That development in itself threatens to derail “economic growth and prosperity” – the whole project of consumerism. Coal is our second biggest source of energy. Averting climate catastrophe requires that we stop burning coal, and soon – yet another blow to “economic growth and prosperity”.

We’re between a rock and a hard place.

It’s past time to begin imagining a different kind of future, a different kind of prosperity, based on something other than “stuff”. We have no other choice.

Today the Federal Highway Administration reported travel on all roads and streets decreased by -1.6% (-3.7 billion vehicle miles) for January 2010 as compared with January 2009. Travel for the month is estimated to be 222.8 billion vehicle miles.

Vehicle miles traveled (VMT) in the 13 western states were off more than the national average – 2.8%.  VMT in Oregon were off 1.2%. Oregon VMT were up 12.8% in 2009 over 2008, but now appear to be dropping again.

The rural/urban split of the total VMT was about 1/3: 2/3 -  72.0 billion vehicle-miles on rural roads and 150.8 billion vehicle-miles on urban roads and streets.

VMT have declined 2.9% compared to January 2008, and are down 4.7% compared to January 2007. As gas prices have been rising again (as discussed here), it looks like VMT are once again dropping.

Gasoline prices are up, approaching $3/gal. across the U.S. and getting close to being a dollar more per gallon than a year ago.

Bill McBride at Calculated Risk has posted a chart showing the relationship between gas prices and vehicle miles traveled (VMT).

McBride explains:

Although vehicle miles driven are noisy month to month, it appears that miles driven responds to spikes in oil prices.

For the last few weeks, oil prices have been bouncing around $80/barrel, a price level last seen just before oil prices spiked in 2008. Will we once again begin to see demand destruction and a collapse in VMT, such as we saw in 2008?

For December 2009 – the last month of data – the DOT reported that miles driven were unchanged compared to December 2008 after increasing in 5 of the 6 previous months. The report for January should be out this next week.  Should be interesting.