What if? What if oil ran out tomorrow?

[Banjobill]

One thought: when the oil does start to dry up, does anyone think that the Americans, Chinese, Russians, etc are just going to sit back and mildly accept it?
The 'Resource Wars' have already started with the invasion of Iraq.

Its not going to be a gentle return to a pre industrial society!

 

[crazyclimber]

Realistically if this were to happen I'd stay at home. Much though I love the idea of heading into the woods and building a shelter away from everyone, etc., I don't see many advantages and I see plenty of disadvantages. Priorities: shelter, fire, water, food...

Shelter: a house, a nice warm duvet (or 3), a comfortable bed

Fire: a good wood burner... I live in the country so I'd use dead fall first and cut wood as sustainably as possible if necessary to ensure a future supply... loads of matches, several firesteels... FBF if need be after that. Might find some good future bow drills and bring them indoors to thoroughly dry them in advance. Car battery is another option since it'd no longer be required

Water: Short term outdoor UV-style, would probably have to resort to filtration / boiling long term

Food: Short term use the supplies in the house (I'd guess a few weeks worth), medium term hunter gatherer. Don't forget that cattle / sheep would now be butchered locally, possibly in-house as they were in the not too distant past... Long term the garden would be improved and extended, possibly keep some animals too. Chickens, pigs maybe... turn it into more of a farm?

With a house full of electronics it would make sense to use them. Motor to improvise a hydroelectric generator in the river, run some cables up for lighting / kettle as priorities...
The internet and this computer could be a valuable resource, but of course the internet would be down so I'd rely more on the books I have here for information.
I think the sociological aspect is an interesting one. I'd obviously try to help the neighbors, and the idea 'two brains are better than one' would be valuable for innovation. On the other hand though there is the potential of disorder and looting, though around here I would think that'd be fairly limited. If any city folk manage to walk their way here I can't imagine there'd be many left in a fit state for a decent fight I would probably keep some kind of weapon around though for self defence just in case...!

Really interesting and thought provoking topic. In a way I'd almost like it to happen, just to see what it would be like!

 

[crazyclimber]

Its not going to be a gentle return to a pre industrial society!

PS that's something I've heard said a few times, and though predicting the future is obviously daft, I can't see that it's going to happen. We have alternative ways of storing and transfering energy at the moment, and as oil reserves fall the increasing price of what remains will make those technologies more and more economically competitive, and I would imagine the amount of research conducted into them will increase in proportion. Nuclear powerstations, solar / wind / wave energy, water / hydrogen / battery powered vehicles... in fact thinking about it, perhaps it might all be better for the world! Efficiency will play a big part, and energy conservation. In fact it's playing a part already... people opting to buy more fuel efficient cars, government advice to insulate our homes, campaigns to turn off our TVs from standby...

 

[commandocal]

Too right CC switched on you are! , and i would also in a way like it to happen, just like how after you watch 'dawn of the dead' you want zombies to attack and be trapped in a big shopping centre and see how you get on (no seriously i do)

 

[crazyclimber]

Haha commandocal, erm when you say "see how you get on" I think that should read "see how I get on", because there's no way on Earth I'd wish myself trapped in a creepy shopping centre with a bunch of walking dead people! You're fighting alone there!! lol

I see your point though!!

 

[Eric_Methven]

Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear. Listen guys, if the oil ran out tomorrow, we'd all be completely stuffed.

We as a species never mind a society are nowhere near ready to replace oil and it's myriad of by products with any other source of energy. Nuclear wouldn't happen simply because there are nowhere near enough power plants available to feed a fraction of the grid let alone everyone's demand for electricity.

Food production would stop because there would be no power to the factories.

Transportation would stop because any remaining fuel reserves would be immediately requisitioned by the government for government vehicles.

Finance would collapse and even if it didn't straight away, cash point machines wouldn't work without power.

Communications as we know it would cease to exist, the internet might technically survive if telephone exchanges and their emergency power systems kept going, but the government again would keep communications for their own specified use only. We wouldn't be able to communicate like we are right now.

However that's all theoretical, because it wouldn't just run out overnight. Governments of the world would see it coming and do something. Now I'd like to see that something as a positive drive towards rapidly finding alternative fuel and energy supplies. However, looking at government actions in the past, I fear the kind of action they would take is military and invasive. You might say world war three for want of a better title.

Call me a doomsayer if you like, but my head isn't buried in the sand and I see nothing positive ahead as regards a peaceful future. As for those of you who wish armageddon upon us, and think you can just do away into the hills and use bushcraft skills to keep you and yours alive, I urge you to think again. What makes you think you can make it to the hills in the first place, and what makes you think anyone already living there will allow you to stay?

Unless you are already living there, and have adapted to a life totally off grid, are completely self sufficient in all you need and have a means to defend yourself from sustained and vicious attacks, you'd better find another alternative because if oil stops getting through, people will turn very nasty, very quickly.

Eric

 

[commandocal]

Aye i know it would be Military action look at Iraq, its already happening that was basically jsut for oil, and Eric thats what i have basically said in my waffled up posts hehe

 

[Graham_S]

Well, the oil is in no danger of running out any time soon.
There is plenty of it around, and we're finding more all the time.

 

[akabu]

http://www.opec.org/library/FAQs/CrudeOil/q4.htm
Uses for Oil
There's plenty of Oil in the USA it's just restricked form being taken out of th ground.
If it did get low thiers plenty of Coal and Shale oil to process.

 

[madrussian]

Well, the oil is in no danger of running out any time soon.
There is plenty of it around, and we're finding more all the time.

Thats what many said of the Buffalo. And I would think they said the same thing about the Dodo and many other now extinct animals. I hear hunters say, "There are plenty of deer out there, we'll never run out." And fishermen think the same way, that they will never run out of fish in the sea. How many plant and animal resources has man used up until extinction?

Man has a very bad habit of using their resources up until they are completely gone or are almost completely gone before stepping back and saying, WHAT HAVE WE DONE, WE HAVE TO DO SOMETHING. And then they want to hurry and enact some endangered species law to slow down the slaughter when usually its too late.

Do you REALLY think that it will be any different with oil consumption?

 

[gregorach]

Well, the oil is in no danger of running out any time soon.
There is plenty of it around, and we're finding more all the time.

It doesn't matter how much oil is in the ground - what matters is how quickly you can get it out. And we're finding far less than we're using.

Here's a fun peak oil fact - the highest world total liquids production (that's crude, condensate, and unconventional liquids) was in 86.13 million barrels per day, in June 2006. September 2007 total liquids production was only 85.10 million b/d.

It's not that oil is going to "run out" as such, it's just going to get increasingly expensive. And this is already having major impacts in the developing world... Those of us fortunate enough to be comparatively wealthy (ie everyone reading this) will be the last to feel the effects.

The big problem is agriculture. Our current agricultural systems require approximately 10 calories of fossil fuel inputs for every calorie of food produced.

 

[Mirius]

We'll use every last drop of oil as quickly as we can, and fight over those last drops too. But it won't happen overnight. I doubt governments will intervene too much in the sourcing of alternatives, but the oil companies will. Faced with a choice of corporate extinction or survival, they will be the ones muscling into alternative energy sources - and they will be serious about it too, which they aren't at the moment because they don't see oil running out just yet. I'm not saying that production won't drop, but prices will increase as that happens.

I guess one of the problems with posing this sort of question, your original question I mean is that what would happen in the US is very different to what would happen in the UK. In the US I can see isolated communities, far, far away from the cities managing to pull together and survive. But the population is just far too high here in the UK. Bear in mind we have a quarter of your population in a very much smaller land mass. Here there is nowhere to run, nowhere that would be outside of the reach of the masses. Hunter gatherer societies exist at much lower population densities than agricultural ones, and we have an advanced agriculture. I don't know what the survival rate in the UK would be considering that we don't have the natural resources that hunter gatherers would rely on - perhaps ten percent of the current population?

 

[william#]

even with all the bushcraft skills you can imagine unless you had stored food and supplies you probably find yourself going down with disease shot by the military run state (state of emergency would of been announced pretty swiftly). mugged robbed left to starve.

if you got through the initial 6mths and left in a healthy state will probably because you banded together with a good strong group.
i wonder what role government will be playing by this point - i imagine the military will still be strong due to its stored resources.

 

[Dr Onion]

Do we honestly think that the worlds governments are going to allow oil to run out with out a viable alternative in place? Alternative fuels/energy sources are being developed all the time (sometimes even without the general public being told! GASP! Shock! Horror!!) and are gradually being phased in to replace our reliance on fossil fuels so that when oil does run out we won't even notice.

Sadly, we do need more power and the only viable option is to use nuclear until we can get proper return on wind/hydro/solar/wave/bio and Doc Browns Mr Fusion!

Materials aren't such a big deal - plastics can be made from practically any starchy substance (just long chain polymers) - indeed some is being made from potatoes right now and with good results (and they are biodegradable too!) Rubber is also being created from plants (basically anything with a high content of oil such as rice-bran) - granted this is a more laborious process and is nowhere near the commercial stage yet but the point is that it can be done - it's just easier (and cheaper at the moment) to use the byproducts from the oil refining process.

By the time oil is no longer a viable option for power and materials, we will have replaced it with something else (possibly quite a few things!).

Dr O

 

[stardust]

Oil isn't going to run out tommorrow. But it is going to run out.

I'm not worried about being here when that happens though. I think we'll all have been killed in the fighting for the last few drops. And if we're not killed in the fighting, then the starving marauding hordes from the cities will kill eachother for the remaining food then go out and kill all the people growing their own.

I think the only way to survive is to make yourself as adaptable and mobile as possible, to be able to find food anywhere and hide from all the starving people who are going to try and kill you for it.

As you can probably tell, I'm not very optimistic about the future for the human race, but it's probably a good thing if most of us die. Maybe the planet will get a bit of peace and the chance to rebuild.

 

[twisted firestarter]

To start with feel that I should point out that nuclear power is not the answer to the impending energy crisis. Nuclear currently generates 2.5% of the worlds electricity supply.
In industrialised countries the percentage rises to 17-20% which leaves over 80% coming from other sources.

With the growth of nuclear power stations accelerating at it's current rate uranium ore will have run out within 20 years anyway. It is the governments intention to build a new set of nuclear power stations which will not only cost unspeakable sums but will create even more spent uranium for future generations to deal with. Call me a huge cynic but is it coincidence that nuclear power stations are necessary for the production of weapons grade plutonium for nuclear bombs?

Renewables are the answer but only if we seriously reduce the amount of energy we use.

http://www.greenpeace.org.uk/blog/climate/the-convenient-solution-20070718

 

[gregorach]

Careful with those predictions of uranium running out - I've seen so many different takes, all equally well argued, that I don't think anybody really knows.

However, that doesn't change the fact that nuclear is extremely expensive and time-consuming to build, and that none of the reactor designs currently under consideration have ever been built before. It's worth bearing in mind that no previous reactor design has ever come close to being built on-schedule or on-budget, and that they seem to have a bit of a problem with outages...

 

[Banjobill]

Well, if Renewables are going to be the answer, then we should be seeing something major happening in their development and widespread use soon (say next 10 years).

At the moment, none of the current Renewable energy sources can substitute for oil in terms of ease of use, transport and storing.

For those who feel that science will provide the answer with new discoveries or improved methods of extraction, it may be wise to look at the USA (mainland) as an example. They have been searching for and extracting oil for longer than anyone, since 1859, and have had more financial and technological muscle than anyone. If anyone could turn around oil declines, it would be that country. Yet looking at US oil production, oil peaked in 1971 and has fallen with barely a pause since then. Thirty years of money and research has neither slowed nor reversed the decline. Why then should the world fare any better?

 

[chem_doc]

Yet looking at US oil production, oil peaked in 1971 and has fallen with barely a pause since then. Thirty years of money and research has neither slowed nor reversed the decline. Why then should the world fare any better?

A cynic could say that the big oil companies have no interest in increasing output or allowing/funding research into alternative fuels.

If they keep the supplies low, their profits skyrocket... and they've had quite a few record breaking years of sales recently. In fact, OPEC limits their production all the time to keep profits healthy.

And given the infrastructure required to get the oil out of the ground and to the consumer, the big oil companies have a lot invested. To spend money to set up another scheme capable of getting energy around isn't in their best interests unless they absolutely have to.

Big oil has many, many people lobbying the US congress and a lot of the people there listen. It's not easy to change laws here in the states for things involving oil. Case in point: You'd think that laws requiring cars to have certain mileage/emissions standards would be a good thing... a no-brainer to pass, right? The auto makers cried foul, saying it would cost too much to adapt the plants and the oil companies don't necessarily want the cars to be more fuel efficient... But I digress.

Another thing to keep in mind is that there is plenty of oil available. The issue really is that the "easily obtained" oil isn't. Oil shale, oil sand, etc. are around in spades. But again, it will require a lot of money spent to recover, and unless the cost of the "sweet" crude oil skyrockets without hope of ever returning to lower levels, there is no reason that the oil companies will spend the money to setup refineries/mining equipment to get to those oil deposits.

*shrugs*

 

[gregorach]

If they keep the supplies low, their profits skyrocket... and they've had quite a few record breaking years of sales recently. In fact, OPEC limits their production all the time to keep profits healthy.

Well, there's a couple of problems with that... Firstly, there's what's called the "bootstrap problem" - you need to use a lot of oil in order to produce oil. So, as oil prices rise, so do production costs. Secondly, there's no point in raising the price of a commodity to the point where people start buying less off it - and we've seen quite a bit of "demand destruction" around the world in the last few years. If they could produce more oil, they could make more money by selling more at a slightly lower price. Finally, there seems to be quite a bit of evidence that OPEC are pulling out all the stops (for example, the 3-fold increase in the Saudi rig count in the last 2 years) without any noticeable production increase. A lot of people are very worried that the Ghawar super-giant field is now in decline, but Aramco are keeping their cards very close to their chests.(However, I should note that there's a heck of a lot of expert debate about exactly where the Saudis are on the depletion curve, with some arguing that they're in irreversible decline, and others arguing that they're limiting the production rate to avoid damaging their reservoirs. As far as I can tell, there are no experts arguing that they're limiting production to maximise price.)

Another thing to keep in mind is that there is plenty of oil available. The issue really is that the "easily obtained" oil isn't. Oil shale, oil sand, etc. are around in spades. But again, it will require a lot of money spent to recover, and unless the cost of the "sweet" crude oil skyrockets without hope of ever returning to lower levels, there is no reason that the oil companies will spend the money to setup refineries/mining equipment to get to those oil deposits.

*shrugs*

And the problem with shale oil and oil (or, more correctly tar) sands is that it's a rather marginal energy profit - it takes almost as much (if not more) energy to produce than it contains. While you can get away with that sort of thing if you're going from a low-quality energy input to a high-quality energy output, that's not the case with these approaches. You end up burning vast amounts of extremely valuable natural gas to produce a pretty low-grade crude which requires a lot of expensive refining. I've seen at least one experienced petro-geologist describe tar sands production as "like burning $100 bills to light candles."

If anyone is really interesting in this sort of thing, I can highly recommend The Oil Drum. They're not hardcore doomers, and they have a lot of very experienced and knowledgeable contributors.