German Academies of Science: Energytransition is an economical nightmare (Big hits!)

[Sakeoe]

Another thread in my series of big hits to the climatology church, today we will look at the the study titled ENERGIESYSTEME DER ZUKUNFT, a collaborative study by Leopoldina (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Academ...ces_Leopoldina), Acatech (https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deutsc...wissenschaften) and Union der Deutsche Akademien der Wissenschaften (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Union_...and_Humanities) and financed by the German government.

Authors:
Dr. Florian Ausfelder
Dr. Frank-Detlef Drake
Dr. Berit Erlach
Prof. Dr.-Ing. Manfred Fischedick (lmao strong name btw)
Prof. Dr. Hans-Martin Hennig
Dr. Christoph Kost
Prof. Dr. Wolfram Münch
Prof. Dr. Karen Pittel
Prof. Dr.-Ing. Christian Rehtanz
Prof. Dr. Jörg Sauer
Dr. Katharina Schätzler
Dr. Cyril Stephanos
Michael Themann
Prof. Dr. Eberhard Umbach
Prof. Dr. Kurt Wagemann
Prof. Dr.-Ing. Hermann-Josef Wagner
Prof. Dr. Ulrich Wagner

I advise all of you to read the analysis yourself (link at the bottom of the thread) but I'll give a very short summary ITT:
The study is an analysis of the costs and achievability of a energy transition that aims for a 95% co2 reduction by 2050 in Germany. While this study focusses on Germany, there are no unique challenges posed to Germany that other Western countries do not experience and as such this study is generalizable to pretty much the entire Western world.

The first conclusions are that in order to reach a 85% Co2 reduction by 2050 Germany needs to produce 1150 TWh per year, a doubling of electricity consumption of Germany today. The main reason for this increase in electricity consumption is because all heating and transport will have to be electrified instead. The study estimates that to produce this amount of electricity, Germany would need a increase of 7 times as many wind turbines and solar panels than it has today.

However that is not enough. To have a even remotely stable electric grid Germany would also need 100.000 GW worth of power plants based on synthetic fuels (methane, hydrogen, biogas). By comparison, that is the same amount as Germany's conventional power plants produce.

Even after achieving all this output, flexibility is expected of the end user. He can not charge his car, and heat his home at the same time. He needs to choose between what utilities he wants to use. The study also warns that battery stored electricity will only last a couple of hours so if there are weeks that are wind still and have little sunlight dystopian scenarios must be expected.

The costs of all this? The study estimates this at around 3300.000.000.000 euro for 85% Co2 reduction, 4600.000.000.000 euro for 90%. For our American friends, that is 5158.210.000.000 dollars. For comparisons sake, Germany is a country with 82 million inhabitants. America is at 327 million, so to achieve the same thing in the US it would likely cost around 20.569.935.000.000‬ dollars. For comparison, Germany's government budget is only roughly 300.000.000.000 euro. This means they would need to spent 50% of their current government budget over the next 30 years to achieve this sum. An economical disaster wouldn't begin to describe this scenario. The great American recession will look like a small economic speed bump in comparison to the recession this would cause.

However this isn't the climatology churches dream yet, as at this point Germany would have reduced its 1990 Co2 emissions by only 85%. We are still far from being climate neutral. As with all things in life however, diminishing returns mean that achieving the last steps are the hardest. In this case, the study estimates that in order to achieve a 95% Co2 reduction compared to 1990 by 2050 Germany would need to produce a staggering 3000 TWh of electricity per year, a tripling of the amount of electricity required to achieve 85%. The study doesn't even calculate the economic costs for achieving 95%, however since the step from 85% to 90% cost 1300.000.000.000 euro one can only imagine what the costs for 90-95% are.....

And this is all from a study that accepts climate change at face value. If these are the costs for a single country to go Co2 neutral, is it even worth to go through this transition to try and stop climate change, as opposed to simply accepting it will happen and adequately adapting to a changing world? Of course, the story becomes even more surreal when one realizes that not sufficient robust evidence for anthropogenic climate change exists.

Some predictions on what our local climatology church members will comment:
Numbersguy12 - Yeah but Nasa -> some random German dudes so I didn't even read any of this.
Ishingmodel - They're all retards who don't understand science. Also there is a consensus so none of this matters.
Wincel - We're running out of fossil fuels soon (TM) anyway so 4700.000.000.000 euro for a dysfunctional electrical grid is a bargain really.

Source:
https://energiesysteme-zukunft.de/fi...orkopplung.pdf

[Sakeoe]

Also an interesting related read, what is it like to live in a climate neutral neighbourhood. No warm water and insufficient heating.

https://www.destentor.nl/zutphen/vit...phen~a4ea8024/

[Shortfuze]

Also an interesting related read, what is it like to live in a climate neutral neighbourhood. No warm water and insufficient heating.

https://www.destentor.nl/zutphen/vit...phen~a4ea8024/

[semitope]

luckily the plan is not to take all that money and b urn it up in a furnace. Looks like economic stimulus to me. Better than trillions in tax cuts for the rich anyway.

[Sakeoe]

luckily the plan is not to take all that money and b urn it up in a furnace. Looks like economic stimulus to me. Better than trillions in tax cuts for the rich anyway.

I mean, you are already known for not being too bright on this board but this is pushing it.

The plan is literally to burn it up in a furnace. 4200.000.000.000 to provide something that is already provided right now, energy. There is no economic benefit to it.

[anonymous]

Just eat the bugs and build the windmills, we can sweat the small stuff later.

I wonder if the woke environmentalists envison their future being more star trek like than the reality of commie blocks, restricted energy use and insane costs. These people were literally killing themselves over the reddit meme that net neutrality was going to slow down their netflix, how would they deal with the harsh grey reality of an energy rationed future??

[semitope]

I mean, you are already known for not being too bright on this board but this is pushing it.

The plan is literally to burn it up in a furnace. 4200.000.000.000 to provide something that is already provided right now, energy. There is no economic benefit to it.

silly caveman logic.

[gluon]

one thing ive never seen the climate shills and libtards mention is plastic.

99.9% of every single product produced on this planet uses some kind of polymer. With oil byproducs, common plastics are dirt cheap to produce. what the fuk do you think is going to happen if we stop using oil, cost of plastic would increase by ~1000000000%

people don't realize how important it is, they see it as just a cheap polluting item but really it has properties not found in any other material, thermal and electrical resistance, unsurpassed chemical resistance, does not corrode, easy to mold and shape, needed to make composites. our ability to afford almost anything depends ENTIRELY on access to cheap plastic.

combine this factor with OP's and you see how utterly absurd it is to stop using fossil fuels any time soon.

[Stizzel]

Is there an english version?

Edit: If it wasn't for the harm done by wasting this much money I would say it would be worth it just to see what they say when they get their carbon output to 0 and the climate keeps changing

[Sakeoe]

Is there an english version?

Edit: If it wasn't for the harm done by wasting this much money I would say it would be worth it just to see what they say when they get their carbon output to 0 and the climate keeps changing

No English version is available as far as I'm aware, after all it's made by German scientists for the German government.

[wincel]

This is why I've been screaming about investing in new energy sources.

Wincel's stance is that you cannot have it both ways. My friend, your economy will collapse when the decline comes. Wincel's stance is to take whatever money you can now and try to find a new energy source now because it will be hard to do so when your people are broke and starving. Denial is not a solution, soyboy.

[wincel]

one thing ive never seen the climate shills and libtards mention is plastic.

99.9% of every single product produced on this planet uses some kind of polymer. With oil byproducs, common plastics are dirt cheap to produce. what the fuk do you think is going to happen if we stop using oil, cost of plastic would increase by ~1000000000%

people don't realize how important it is, they see it as just a cheap polluting item but really it has properties not found in any other material, thermal and electrical resistance, unsurpassed chemical resistance, does not corrode, easy to mold and shape, needed to make composites. our ability to afford almost anything depends ENTIRELY on access to cheap plastic.

combine this factor with OP's and you see how utterly absurd it is to stop using fossil fuels any time soon.

Except for me literally saying repeatedly we need to figure our trash out. It's unsustainable. You guys think it is unrealistic to say we can't have these things. You don't get it. You're like a spoiled rich guy saying it is unrealistic to be homeless. It'a going to happen whether you like it or not. The numbers are fuking clear. At current rates, we have about 38 years of oil left. The rates must decline. When that happens, there will be an economic meltdown. You either take money and try to find solutions now or you take money later and try to find them with less time left. Your call. And if u accept what science says in the future u will be dealing with that much more warming as a result of the hydrocarbon combustion. Good luck bro.

[Stizzel]

No English version is available as far as I'm aware, after all it's made by German scientists for the German government.

I understand, just figured its worth a shot. My german is very rusty

[gluon]

Except for me literally saying repeatedly we need to figure our trash out. It's unsustainable. You guys think it is unrealistic to say we can't have these things. You don't get it. You're like a spoiled rich guy saying it is unrealistic to be homeless. It'a going to happen whether you like it or not. The numbers are fuking clear. At current rates, we have about 38 years of oil left. The rates must decline. When that happens, there will be an economic meltdown. You either take money and try to find solutions now or you take money later and try to find them with less time left. Your call. And if u accept what science says in the future u will be dealing with that much more warming as a result of the hydrocarbon combustion. Good luck bro.

we will eventual run out sure, 30 ,50, 100 years, thats not set in stone and the shift is something that has to be done very gradually but thats not my point. Im mainly addressing the people that want to completely stop using fossil fuels while we still have plenty, its absurd, ask them if they want to pay 10,000 for a basic refrigerator, or 60,000 for a base Honda civic and I guarantee they will suddenly change their minds.

[wincel]

we will eventual run out sure, 30 ,50, 100 years, thats not set in stone and the shift is something that has to be done very gradually but thats not my point. Im mainly addressing the people that want to completely stop using fossil fuels while we still have plenty, its absurd, ask them if they want to pay 10,000 for a basic refrigerator, or 60,000 for a base Honda civic and I guarantee they will suddenly change their minds.

Not 100. Do the math. Download the 2019 BP report and sum the geometric series. The rates must decline. Declining production rates for oil = declining economy unless the energy is replaced with some other source.It's simple math. It isn't open to any kind of partisan hacking.

We do need to shift, and people have been trying for years, but nobody wants to put the money up or see any hit to the economy. People like you will deny atmospheric physics in order to preserve the status quo. I get it. You're scared. You probably should be.

But people who think like you got us into this mess. We need to be finding solutions ASAP. There is really no time to fuk around and "have a debate". This debate was already done in the 90s. Everyone knows what needs to be done. Nobody wants to lose money is all it is. By preserving the status quo now, you are making things far harder down the road.

You have been misinformed by the efforts of Exxon and other oil companies. Go read something not sponsored by geophysicists and petroleum engineers, and you will see. It's easy and obvious to see that human activities are affecting the environment on a massive scale. The carbon dioxide produced from combustion has to go somewhere and only so much can be fixed organically. The rest is in the atmosphere. Ditto for methane "from cow farts", water vapor, etc.

Uneducated commoner filth like you seem to often underestimate the massive impact of human agriculture and industry on the environment.I encourage you to look at the biodiversity on this planet, take note of the algal blooms from things like fertilizer runoff and tell me we have minimal impact. LMAO! It's a real tragedy that scientists have to attempt to communicate with and convince idiots to do the right thing.

[gluon]

Not 100. Do the math. Download the 2019 BP report and sum the geometric series. The rates must decline. Declining production rates for oil = declining economy unless the energy is replaced with some other source.It's simple math. It isn't open to any kind of partisan hacking.

We do need to shift, and people have been trying for years, but nobody wants to put the money up or see any hit to the economy. People like you will deny atmospheric physics in order to preserve the status quo. I get it. You're scared. You probably should be.

But people who think like you got us into this mess. We need to be finding solutions ASAP. There is really no time to fuk around and "have a debate". This debate was already done in the 90s. Everyone knows what needs to be done. Nobody wants to lose money is all it is. By preserving the status quo now, you are making things far harder down the road.

You have been misinformed by the efforts of Exxon and other oil companies. Go read something not sponsored by geophysicists and petroleum engineers, and you will see. It's easy and obvious to see that human activities are affecting the environment on a massive scale. The carbon dioxide produced from combustion has to go somewhere and only so much can be fixed organically. The rest is in the atmosphere. Ditto for methane "from cow farts", water vapor, etc.

Uneducated commoner filth like you seem to often underestimate the massive impact of human agriculture and industry on the environment.I encourage you to look at the biodiversity on this planet, take note of the algal blooms from things like fertilizer runoff and tell me we have minimal impact. LMAO! It's a real tragedy that scientists have to attempt to communicate with and convince idiots to do the right thing.

yea and blowhard liberals like you dont take into account any practical matters. yet to see you address any economic or industrial matters, all you do is make general statements like "the world is ending blah blah blah" put your money where your mouth is and recycle everything made of plastic and never use it again, including your computer lmao

stay mad

[wincel]

yea and blowhard liberals like you dont take into account any practical matters. yet to see you address any economic or industrial matters, all you do is make general statements like "the world is ending blah blah blah"

stay mad

do the math urself soyo

-names himself after gluons
-cannot perform elementary geometric series computation

here's report:

https://www.bp.com/content/dam/bp/bu...ull-report.pdf

straight from the horse's ass

[gluon]

nah you answer my point first,

how is the world going to work without cheap polymers? can you even grasp how embedded and essential they are to the entire economy? and that's just once single facet of our dependence on the oil that you seem to think its so easy to stop using

[Sakeoe]

Not 100. Do the math. Download the 2019 BP report and sum the geometric series. The rates must decline. Declining production rates for oil = declining economy unless the energy is replaced with some other source.It's simple math. It isn't open to any kind of partisan hacking.

We do need to shift, and people have been trying for years, but nobody wants to put the money up or see any hit to the economy. People like you will deny atmospheric physics in order to preserve the status quo. I get it. You're scared. You probably should be.

But people who think like you got us into this mess. We need to be finding solutions ASAP. There is really no time to fuk around and "have a debate". This debate was already done in the 90s. Everyone knows what needs to be done. Nobody wants to lose money is all it is. By preserving the status quo now, you are making things far harder down the road.

You have been misinformed by the efforts of Exxon and other oil companies. Go read something not sponsored by geophysicists and petroleum engineers, and you will see. It's easy and obvious to see that human activities are affecting the environment on a massive scale. The carbon dioxide produced from combustion has to go somewhere and only so much can be fixed organically. The rest is in the atmosphere. Ditto for methane "from cow farts", water vapor, etc.

Uneducated commoner filth like you seem to often underestimate the massive impact of human agriculture and industry on the environment.I encourage you to look at the biodiversity on this planet, take note of the algal blooms from things like fertilizer runoff and tell me we have minimal impact. LMAO! It's a real tragedy that scientists have to attempt to communicate with and convince idiots to do the right thing.

This might be an interesting read for you.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/judecle.../#73025d5d5b1f

[wincel]

nah you answer my point first,

how is the world going to work without cheap polymers? can you even grasp how embedded and essential they are to the entire economy? and that's just once single facet of our dependence on the oil that you seem to think its so easy to stop using

How are you going to get polymers without oil? Derp. When it's gone, it's fuking gone. You'll have to manage. Humanity would have to adopt a lower tech way of living. It won't be easy or comfortable. And whether you like it or not, you will face this problem. We could see a MINOR reduction now and start heavily funding research or u can exhaust chit, wait for the decline to inevitably come anyway, have no alternative solutions in your pocket and face a much worse problem down the road. Your choice is between some chit now or dying of sepsis later. You choose.

[wincel]

This might be an interesting read for you.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/judecle.../#73025d5d5b1f

I've read all of that. Again, the math is nonpartisan. Look at the BP energy report and sum the geometric series. I am saying at current rates, based on the amount of reserves we know about, we only have 34 years of oil left. This is simple to calculate. Hubbert Peak Oil theory suggests that we would eventually decline our oil production at some point. When that happens, we will see a huge economic decline because energy is required for the production of everything in our economy. If there is no decline, we run out in 34 years. If there is a decline, we see it within 34 years. That decline will hurt us. We might be able to buy ourselves some time by discovering more usable reserves, but this is very unlikely. There are diminishing returns on innovations in petroleum engineering and discovery of new reserves. These only buy you a little time too.

Again, you can take the word of some Forbes article poster or you can look at the math. At current rates and with current reserves, there simply isn't much left. Your optimism that technology will magically keep discovering more reserves and somehow prevent the rates from falling is nuts. Either they fall or they don't. If they don't, we run out sooner. If they do, we face a severe economic decline. The best decision we can make NOW is to allocate funds to research other sources of energy so that when there is an oil production decline, we will find a new source of energy to replace it with so that we don't see a huge economic decline. Most countries have been trying to reduce their oil production growth, but it is still too high. If it isn't negative, we ultimately have a problem. Any positive growth rate presents an exhaustion issue.

This is why so many economists are fuking morons. They do not tie their ideas into actual physical things. The notion that growth can continue indefinitely is fundamentally impossible. You are limited by the laws of physics. There is a hard barrier for the usable energy available in the universe within a given region and a hard barrier on how fast that energy can be converted. This ends the discussion as to whether there is a limit or not. There is one. This means constant growth is unsustainable indefinitely.

Now, in the case of oil, we face MUCH sharper, more realistic limits here. There is only so much usable, extractable oil in the ground. While technology can help that, there is only so much you can build. You can't just blindly believe technology will solve everything. Technology cannot violate the laws of physics and it cannot create useful energy for you. It took a lot of energy to make the oil we use. There is a finite supply of it, and once it is gone, that cheap source of energy will not be available to us.

https://www.bp.com/content/dam/bp/bu...ull-report.pdf

On page 22, you can see the total rate is about r = 1.5% annually currently. It has been about r = 1.2%. Let's just assume even just r = 1%. World consumed A = .0364 trillion barrels of oil the last year, and there are T= 1.73 trillion barrels of proven oil left.

That leaves you with ln(rT/A+1)/ln(1+r) - 1 = 38 total years left AT THOSE RATES. If the rates decline, we face the problems I am talking about with economic crises. If the rates do not, we will run out.

Suppose you get a bit lucky and discover new ways of getting more access to oil, upping the reserves to T=2.5 trillion barrels. That only gets you to 51 years, and that would be a remarkable discovery of increasing the available oil reserves by 44.5%. Think about that. This oil resource exhaustion issue IS an issue our generation will face in old age, and it is definitely one your children will face.

Some ITT are crying "but how will I live without plastic?" Buddy, plastic is the least of your issues here. You should really be asking "how will I live without food" because agriculture is economically the process of turning oil into food. It takes energy to do all that farming. Oil production decline = global recession unless there is a substitute form of energy. Oil consumption decline = ppl at first will find prices of everything going up. Eventually, when it gets really bad and where there are shortages, you will see famines.

AND I haven't even brought climate change into this situation. When you consider climate change, it is a truly stupid thing to not deal with the situation sooner rather than later because having to face this oil decline WHILE simultaneously dealing with the consequences of being irresponsible for another 3 decades or so is going to make things that much harder for us. Plus, finding this new energy solution would take a TON of research. If it's going to be fusion energy, we have NO idea how to build the fuking walls of a fusion reactor yet. So, that's fuked. If it's going to be solar, our PV cells aren't efficient enough to make them a viable replacement. If it's going to be nuclear fission, we have serious issues about what to do with the waste as well as existential risks if there are too many reactors on the planet and there are environmental disasters. And there isn't exactly a whole lot of Uranium left if we're going to meet the entire world's demands. It is a good supplement, but not a total replacement. Wind, hydroelectric, and geothermal are spotty and cannot act as total replacements.

This IS the central problem of human existence right now. It's bigger than you, me, Exxon, Trump, the USA, and whatever else. Our ability to find a new form of energy within this next half century will determine our entire future as a species. If we fail at this, it is over. Our quest for glory will be left in ruin. There would be no grand legacy. We will be left a species that foolishly squandered its available resources and failed to plan ahead.

In the coming half of the century, there is going to be a real reevaluation of "scarcity economics". The glorification of consumption and production will end. The ability to make a new car every year, new houses, new everything will be destroyed. Our society will shift from one of abundance to one of poverty. It won't be pretty at all. In fact, it could mean the end of America as we know it. Anyone with a lick of sense could have told you what happens when you just keep making stuff. Eventually, you will run out of materials...

No politician wants to come out and say, "Hey guys, we need to tighten our belts. A bunch of you are going to lose your jobs, and we're going to stop making and producing useless chit. Stick with what you have. BTW, our economy is going to tank a few points, and we're going to have a little deflation here so you're all poor. Sorry. Also, we're raising taxes and taking a bunch of money to fund this research project that probably won't pan out, but we have to do it because otherwise your grandkids will be completely and utterly fuked. So, we're doing something now so that at least we have a shot later. I can't even ballpark it, but we're probably sub 5% chance of making it, but hey, we fuking tried, right guys?"

Kill your jobs, raise your taxes, and take away your nice things? Fuking lmao. Never gonna happen. Even though that is EXACTLY what HAS to happen if we have ANY fuking hope of survivng this. AND if we do nothing, the problem gets worse and sneaks up on you. You could conceivably just keep trucking on and growing the oil production, climate change be damned (let's assume there isn't some instability in the food web, and we are okay). You'll never see there is a problem. Everything will be thriving until you hit that bump and can't sustain that rate. Maybe you then shift resources to keep that rate up. Maybe it gets insane and we enslave people and chit to keep that rate up. Fine. Then you just keep exhausting things. Eventually, the time comes when one day old man physics comes along and bashes serendipitous economics over the head with reality. And then the economy crumbles to pieces, and you can't make your shinies anymore, and people start starving. And then there are riots and chaos. All while now you are sitting there crying about how you really need that alternative energy project right about now. Too bad you didn't fund it.

So what can we do?

- Reduce waste. Try to recycle as much as possible. We need to remove our dependence on plastics as much as possible.
- Restrict the production of useless chit. If it's not necessary and important to society, we should not prioritize it over other things. This, necessarily entails coming down hard on the very wealthy and also on many companies and the military. Wasteful projects, multiple homes, yachts, jets, etc...all of this needs to be made on a NECESSARY AND IMPORTANT basis, and not just to make a buck that year. Because every resource allocated to a brand new yacht is stuff that could have been used for something more important.
- Massively fund alternative energy projects. As I said, this is key to our (your) kids and grandkids having a shot at decent drinking water and food in the future.
- Reduce use of individual cars, luxury goods, etc. - Fuel efficient public transportation or biking should be widely adopted and used over car transport. Biking helps address the growing obesity issue and would reduce healthcare costs per person overall if it helps weight loss, and this would help a lot.
- Perhaps making some form of dietary switch off of meat. If possible, a good alternative is cricket protein.
- Set clear and specific benchmarks for actual reductions in the consumption and production of oil. Companies that fail to meet the targets should not just face a fine steeper than whatever they would make off their action, accounting for risk. Those involved in the decision should face jail time. This is the only way to keep those fukers from trying to circumvent the laws.

What happens if we do all this? Massive unemployment, huge loss of wealth, your society will basically look like a gray socialist nightmare, you'll have to eat garbage soy or cricket burgers (probably without the fuking bun) and bike to work like a queer.

That's what the BRIGHT side of your future looks like.

The dark side if you don't do these things is your grandkids will be eating each other and live in a post nuclear war world. Why? I'll let you imagine what the leaders of other nations 50 years from now would think if current energy usage trends continued. Seeing 4% of the population using 25% of the resources...They would start thinking "well, it's only 4%, and if we got rid of these asshoels, we'd have so much more to work with here...". And blam.

tldr: we fuked

[tecom]

I've read all of that. Again, the math is nonpartisan. Look at the BP energy report and sum the geometric series. I am saying at current rates, based on the amount of reserves we know about, we only have 34 years of oil left. This is simple to calculate. Hubbert Peak Oil theory suggests that we would eventually decline our oil production at some point. When that happens, we will see a huge economic decline because energy is required for the production of everything in our economy. If there is no decline, we run out in 34 years. If there is a decline, we see it within 34 years. That decline will hurt us. We might be able to buy ourselves some time by discovering more usable reserves, but this is very unlikely. There are diminishing returns on innovations in petroleum engineering and discovery of new reserves. These only buy you a little time too.

Again, you can take the word of some Forbes article poster or you can look at the math. At current rates and with current reserves, there simply isn't much left. Your optimism that technology will magically keep discovering more reserves and somehow prevent the rates from falling is nuts. Either they fall or they don't. If they don't, we run out sooner. If they do, we face a severe economic decline. The best decision we can make NOW is to allocate funds to research other sources of energy so that when there is an oil production decline, we will find a new source of energy to replace it with so that we don't see a huge economic decline. Most countries have been trying to reduce their oil production growth, but it is still too high. If it isn't negative, we ultimately have a problem. Any positive growth rate presents an exhaustion issue.

This is why so many economists are fuking morons. They do not tie their ideas into actual physical things. The notion that growth can continue indefinitely is fundamentally impossible. You are limited by the laws of physics. There is a hard barrier for the usable energy available in the universe within a given region and a hard barrier on how fast that energy can be converted. This ends the discussion as to whether there is a limit or not. There is one. This means constant growth is unsustainable indefinitely.

Now, in the case of oil, we face MUCH sharper, more realistic limits here. There is only so much usable, extractable oil in the ground. While technology can help that, there is only so much you can build. You can't just blindly believe technology will solve everything. Technology cannot violate the laws of physics and it cannot create useful energy for you. It took a lot of energy to make the oil we use. There is a finite supply of it, and once it is gone, that cheap source of energy will not be available to us.

https://www.bp.com/content/dam/bp/bu...ull-report.pdf

On page 22, you can see the total rate is about r = 1.5% annually currently. It has been about r = 1.2%. Let's just assume even just r = 1%. World consumed A = .0364 trillion barrels of oil the last year, and there are T= 1.73 trillion barrels of proven oil left.

That leaves you with ln(rT/A+1)/ln(1+r) - 1 = 38 total years left AT THOSE RATES. If the rates decline, we face the problems I am talking about with economic crises. If the rates do not, we will run out.

Suppose you get a bit lucky and discover new ways of getting more access to oil, upping the reserves to T=2.5 trillion barrels. That only gets you to 51 years, and that would be a remarkable discovery of increasing the available oil reserves by 44.5%. Think about that. This oil resource exhaustion issue IS an issue our generation will face in old age, and it is definitely one your children will face.

Some ITT are crying "but how will I live without plastic?" Buddy, plastic is the least of your issues here. You should really be asking "how will I live without food" because agriculture is economically the process of turning oil into food. It takes energy to do all that farming. Oil production decline = global recession unless there is a substitute form of energy. Oil consumption decline = ppl at first will find prices of everything going up. Eventually, when it gets really bad and where there are shortages, you will see famines.

AND I haven't even brought climate change into this situation. When you consider climate change, it is a truly stupid thing to not deal with the situation sooner rather than later because having to face this oil decline WHILE simultaneously dealing with the consequences of being irresponsible for another 3 decades or so is going to make things that much harder for us. Plus, finding this new energy solution would take a TON of research. If it's going to be fusion energy, we have NO idea how to build the fuking walls of a fusion reactor yet. So, that's fuked. If it's going to be solar, our PV cells aren't efficient enough to make them a viable replacement. If it's going to be nuclear fission, we have serious issues about what to do with the waste as well as existential risks if there are too many reactors on the planet and there are environmental disasters. And there isn't exactly a whole lot of Uranium left if we're going to meet the entire world's demands. It is a good supplement, but not a total replacement. Wind, hydroelectric, and geothermal are spotty and cannot act as total replacements.

This IS the central problem of human existence right now. It's bigger than you, me, Exxon, Trump, the USA, and whatever else. Our ability to find a new form of energy within this next half century will determine our entire future as a species. If we fail at this, it is over. Our quest for glory will be left in ruin. There would be no grand legacy. We will be left a species that foolishly squandered its available resources and failed to plan ahead.

In the coming half of the century, there is going to be a real reevaluation of "scarcity economics". The glorification of consumption and production will end. The ability to make a new car every year, new houses, new everything will be destroyed. Our society will shift from one of abundance to one of poverty. It won't be pretty at all. In fact, it could mean the end of America as we know it. Anyone with a lick of sense could have told you what happens when you just keep making stuff. Eventually, you will run out of materials...

No politician wants to come out and say, "Hey guys, we need to tighten our belts. A bunch of you are going to lose your jobs, and we're going to stop making and producing useless chit. Stick with what you have. BTW, our economy is going to tank a few points, and we're going to have a little deflation here so you're all poor. Sorry. Also, we're raising taxes and taking a bunch of money to fund this research project that probably won't pan out, but we have to do it because otherwise your grandkids will be completely and utterly fuked. So, we're doing something now so that at least we have a shot later. I can't even ballpark it, but we're probably sub 5% chance of making it, but hey, we fuking tried, right guys?"

Kill your jobs, raise your taxes, and take away your nice things? Fuking lmao. Never gonna happen. Even though that is EXACTLY what HAS to happen if we have ANY fuking hope of survivng this. AND if we do nothing, the problem gets worse and sneaks up on you. You could conceivably just keep trucking on and growing the oil production, climate change be damned (let's assume there isn't some instability in the food web, and we are okay). You'll never see there is a problem. Everything will be thriving until you hit that bump and can't sustain that rate. Maybe you then shift resources to keep that rate up. Maybe it gets insane and we enslave people and chit to keep that rate up. Fine. Then you just keep exhausting things. Eventually, the time comes when one day old man physics comes along and bashes serendipitous economics over the head with reality. And then the economy crumbles to pieces, and you can't make your shinies anymore, and people start starving. And then there are riots and chaos. All while now you are sitting there crying about how you really need that alternative energy project right about now. Too bad you didn't fund it.

So what can we do?

- Reduce waste. Try to recycle as much as possible. We need to remove our dependence on plastics as much as possible.
- Restrict the production of useless chit. If it's not necessary and important to society, we should not prioritize it over other things. This, necessarily entails coming down hard on the very wealthy and also on many companies and the military. Wasteful projects, multiple homes, yachts, jets, etc...all of this needs to be made on a NECESSARY AND IMPORTANT basis, and not just to make a buck that year. Because every resource allocated to a brand new yacht is stuff that could have been used for something more important.
- Massively fund alternative energy projects. As I said, this is key to our (your) kids and grandkids having a shot at decent drinking water and food in the future.
- Reduce use of individual cars, luxury goods, etc. - Fuel efficient public transportation or biking should be widely adopted and used over car transport. Biking helps address the growing obesity issue and would reduce healthcare costs per person overall if it helps weight loss, and this would help a lot.
- Perhaps making some form of dietary switch off of meat. If possible, a good alternative is cricket protein.
- Set clear and specific benchmarks for actual reductions in the consumption and production of oil. Companies that fail to meet the targets should not just face a fine steeper than whatever they would make off their action, accounting for risk. Those involved in the decision should face jail time. This is the only way to keep those fukers from trying to circumvent the laws.

What happens if we do all this? Massive unemployment, huge loss of wealth, your society will basically look like a gray socialist nightmare, you'll have to eat garbage soy or cricket burgers (probably without the fuking bun) and bike to work like a queer.

That's what the BRIGHT side of your future looks like.

The dark side if you don't do these things is your grandkids will be eating each other and live in a post nuclear war world. Why? I'll let you imagine what the leaders of other nations 50 years from now would think if current energy usage trends continued. Seeing 4% of the population using 25% of the resources...They would start thinking "well, it's only 4%, and if we got rid of these asshoels, we'd have so much more to work with here...". And blam.

tldr: we fuked

son, get laid, son.

This will be my 2020 reply to all your posts and I will encourage the Misc to follow along until we've made you a Lifelong Man.

[WrestlingFan123]

There can be no 'Green New Deal' without heavy investment and building of nuclear power plants. Yang seems to be the only candidate that understands this fact.

[wincel]

There can be no 'Green New Deal' without heavy investment and building of nuclear power plants. Yang seems to be the only candidate that understands this fact.

Nuclear fission is good in the short term, but not viable as a total replacement. The risk of catastrophe increases dramatically as well. There is also the issue of waste.

[Weightaholic]

I mean, you are already known for not being too bright on this board but this is pushing it.

The plan is literally to burn it up in a furnace. 4200.000.000.000 to provide something that is already provided right now, energy. There is no economic benefit to it.

Have you been eating lead chips?

[krendan]

Another thread in my series of big hits to the climatology church, today we will look at the the study titled ENERGIESYSTEME DER ZUKUNFT, a collaborative study by Leopoldina (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Academ...ces_Leopoldina), Acatech (https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deutsc...wissenschaften) and Union der Deutsche Akademien der Wissenschaften (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Union_...and_Humanities) and financed by the German government.

Authors:
Dr. Florian Ausfelder
Dr. Frank-Detlef Drake
Dr. Berit Erlach
Prof. Dr.-Ing. Manfred Fischedick (lmao strong name btw)
Prof. Dr. Hans-Martin Hennig
Dr. Christoph Kost
Prof. Dr. Wolfram Münch
Prof. Dr. Karen Pittel
Prof. Dr.-Ing. Christian Rehtanz
Prof. Dr. Jörg Sauer
Dr. Katharina Schätzler
Dr. Cyril Stephanos
Michael Themann
Prof. Dr. Eberhard Umbach
Prof. Dr. Kurt Wagemann
Prof. Dr.-Ing. Hermann-Josef Wagner
Prof. Dr. Ulrich Wagner

I advise all of you to read the analysis yourself (link at the bottom of the thread) but I'll give a very short summary ITT:
The study is an analysis of the costs and achievability of a energy transition that aims for a 95% co2 reduction by 2050 in Germany. While this study focusses on Germany, there are no unique challenges posed to Germany that other Western countries do not experience and as such this study is generalizable to pretty much the entire Western world.

The first conclusions are that in order to reach a 85% Co2 reduction by 2050 Germany needs to produce 1150 TWh per year, a doubling of electricity consumption of Germany today. The main reason for this increase in electricity consumption is because all heating and transport will have to be electrified instead. The study estimates that to produce this amount of electricity, Germany would need a increase of 7 times as many wind turbines and solar panels than it has today.

However that is not enough. To have a even remotely stable electric grid Germany would also need 100.000 GW worth of power plants based on synthetic fuels (methane, hydrogen, biogas). By comparison, that is the same amount as Germany's conventional power plants produce.

Even after achieving all this output, flexibility is expected of the end user. He can not charge his car, and heat his home at the same time. He needs to choose between what utilities he wants to use. The study also warns that battery stored electricity will only last a couple of hours so if there are weeks that are wind still and have little sunlight dystopian scenarios must be expected.

The costs of all this? The study estimates this at around 3300.000.000.000 euro for 85% Co2 reduction, 4600.000.000.000 euro for 90%. For our American friends, that is 5158.210.000.000 dollars. For comparisons sake, Germany is a country with 82 million inhabitants. America is at 327 million, so to achieve the same thing in the US it would likely cost around 20.569.935.000.000‬ dollars. For comparison, Germany's government budget is only roughly 300.000.000.000 euro. This means they would need to spent 50% of their current government budget over the next 30 years to achieve this sum. An economical disaster wouldn't begin to describe this scenario. The great American recession will look like a small economic speed bump in comparison to the recession this would cause.

However this isn't the climatology churches dream yet, as at this point Germany would have reduced its 1990 Co2 emissions by only 85%. We are still far from being climate neutral. As with all things in life however, diminishing returns mean that achieving the last steps are the hardest. In this case, the study estimates that in order to achieve a 95% Co2 reduction compared to 1990 by 2050 Germany would need to produce a staggering 3000 TWh of electricity per year, a tripling of the amount of electricity required to achieve 85%. The study doesn't even calculate the economic costs for achieving 95%, however since the step from 85% to 90% cost 1300.000.000.000 euro one can only imagine what the costs for 90-95% are.....

And this is all from a study that accepts climate change at face value. If these are the costs for a single country to go Co2 neutral, is it even worth to go through this transition to try and stop climate change, as opposed to simply accepting it will happen and adequately adapting to a changing world? Of course, the story becomes even more surreal when one realizes that not sufficient robust evidence for anthropogenic climate change exists.

Some predictions on what our local climatology church members will comment:
Numbersguy12 - Yeah but Nasa -> some random German dudes so I didn't even read any of this.
Ishingmodel - They're all retards who don't understand science. Also there is a consensus so none of this matters.
Wincel - We're running out of fossil fuels soon (TM) anyway so 4700.000.000.000 euro for a dysfunctional electrical grid is a bargain really.

Source:
https://energiesysteme-zukunft.de/fi...orkopplung.pdf

So now Nuclear powerplants are not a solution anymore?

[wincel]

So now Nuclear powerplants are not a solution anymore?

not a good one...unless we figure out fusion

even then, it's not ideal

[isingmodel]

There can be no 'Green New Deal' without heavy investment and building of nuclear power plants. Yang seems to be the only candidate that understands this fact.

Yang is the best candidate by a country mile for good reason. However it's worth pointing out that nuclear is not a be all end all solution like some people think of it as. The problem is time - it takes well over a decade to build our existing nuclear fission plants (and that's if they don't go massively over-time and over-budget like they normally do). Add in experimental nuclear technology - such as building mini reactors which can be mass produced, or using thorium, or nuclear fusion, and you are talking many decades of heavy publicly funded research to reach a workable system.

It's a part of the solution in the long run, absolutely, but it has its pragmatic limitations at the moment so we will need to explore all of the available options without bias.

[wincel]

Yang is the best candidate by a country mile for good reason. However it's worth pointing out that nuclear is not a be all end all solution like some people think of it as. The problem is time - it takes well over a decade to build our existing nuclear fission plants (and that's if they don't go massively over-time and over-budget like they normally do). Add in experimental nuclear technology - such as building mini reactors which can be mass produced, or using thorium, or nuclear fusion, and you are talking many decades of heavy publicly funded research to reach a workable system.

It's a part of the solution in the long run, absolutely, but it has its pragmatic limitations at the moment so we will need to explore all of the available options without bias.

There are also existential risks with proliferation, natural disasters, etc, AND managing the waste. I'll need to check the numbers again, but I don't think there are a whole lot of Uranium reserves either. As you said, part of a solution. I think more short term than long run. A long run solution is something that can sustainably meet energy needs and be a replacement for oil. We don't really have a good long run solution.

[I3igAl]

So now Nuclear powerplants are not a solution anymore?

Sadly they are highly unpopular in Germany and were stopped way before other fossil energy.
Importing gas from Russia however is.