Thread: New source of oil in the middle east?

  1. #1
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    New source of oil in the middle east?

    Not likely!

    This is one side of the coin:
    http://www.lifeaftertheoilcrash.net/

    This is the other:
    http://www.energybulletin.net/12125.html

    The double whammy of both sides of this coin will be the end of America.

    If you prefer the watered-down CNN version:
    http://www.cnn.com/2006/US/03/16/bts...oil/index.html

    About the CNN version:
    The Brazilian official that comments "We've won" apparantly hasn't taken into account what happens to soil if you plant the same crop year after year after year (ie: Dust Bowl). He also apparantly didn't take into account what happens when countries Brazil depends on goes under because those countries depended too much on oil. The domino effect will drag "green" countries down too.

    Also, if you research the energy crisis (called "peak oil") on the internet you'll get tons of information about survival, etc. You'll also find some potential crisis scenarios described (this is the best one I've found):
    http://www.energybulletin.net/13200.html

    What you probably WON'T find is a serious attempt to describe how the American government will respond domestically to an energy crisis of this magnitude. Using Katrina as a model, I was thinking something more like this would occur:

    Despite reaching peak oil in America in the 1970's, America still produces a small amount of oil. This small production of oil will probably be rationed "for emergency uses". However, emergency uses will probably be defined as "domestic military manuvers". Texas (Alaska?) would probably become the military headquarters for America. The military's first job would probably be rounding up the survivors and putting them into concentration camps (oops! I meant to say "Astrodomes"). This means that if you install solar panels, hoard food, stock guns, etc it won't do any good because you'll either be 1) shot or 2) taken to the camps. If you have a family and children then the choice is obvious for typical Americans. However, this means that you'll be locked up with potentially hundreds/thousands of people that you don't know. Also remember that the IRS is headquartered in Texas. This means that the military will have access to records for everyone in the United States that's ever had a job. In this situation do you expect the IRS to protect the privacy of Americans?

    Personally, I don't think a government that faces its potential (probable) demise will respond rationally and benevolently to this level of crisis. Especially given the American government's apparant disregard for our civil liberties. And don't forget the torturing of prisoners in Iraq...

    Also, what happens if a resistance group is organized and overthrows the military locally? This means they have 1000's of prisoners they can either 1) let go, 2) leave to starve or 3) exploit as slaves. While most everyone would expect them to let the prisoners go just remember that it's going to be tough finding food/water as it is. Any resistance group is as likely to be criminals as they are freedom fighters.

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    California and Maine are already in the steps of creating legislation to increase the number of fuel efficient vehicles on the road within the decade (i.e, a certain percentage of cars must be hybrids, and they all must meet more strict requirements).



    I certainly hope that mankind can find a solution to this problem.
    I'm not immature, I'm refined in the opposite direction.

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    Especially given the American government's apparant disregard for our civil liberties. And don't forget the torturing of prisoners in Iraq...
    I supported going into Iraq after 9/11, and subsequently voted for Bush. For a multitude of reasons, including the govt ineptitude of Katrina and the ongoing situation in Iraq, my opinion of the bush administration has gradually declined. However, I believe the only thing worse than all of that is somebody like you that uses intellectualism to make one mindless extrapolation after another based off of well-known facts to arrive at some pretty ........ing stupid conclusions.
    I'm not immature, I'm refined in the opposite direction.

  4. #4
    Slave MadCow257's Avatar
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    Despite reaching peak oil in America in the 1970's
    Quite off, that was 2000

    One of those articles was 2005, and all the guesses about what's going to happen this year were wrong. I really hope the US takes some lessons from Brazil though. The first burden is probably on the auto makers though - They need to make the cars fuel flux, even if the alternate fuels aren't availible.

  5. #5
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    A society such as America or any other major player in the world scene is not just going to lay down and die as our resources are exhausted. We have the technology, it's putting it into place that is the problem. There is also the factor that if you suddenly change from an oil economoy to another resource-based economy overnight, you will bring the stockmarket to it's knees.

    You must change gradually. It's the same as the computer market. I'm sure AMD and Intel both have CPUs that can do far more than our current ones, yet they won't be released until much later. What's public and what's current technology are usually far apart and thankfully so.

    I believe we will switch to another resource in the within the next 20 years. No one is going to just let everything run dry and thus shut the world down. There are alternatives.

    I'm quite tired of seeing extremist viewpoints that claim gloom and doom all the time. Just because the guy in charge is not your main man does not mean the end of the world. And you can now see why we have a thing called 'term limits' in the United States system. It was known later that a President having been in charge for too long could lose touch with the goals of the country and/or could accomplish far too much towards his own agenda and/or gain too much power. So we limit them to two terms. Bush was re-elected so either Bush was the country's choice or the Dem's put up some moron that couldn't compete.

    I think both sides are far beyond the reach of my vote and I'm in favor of a third party, which will never happen, but it is needed.

    Back in 1960 a video was released showing the earth in 1995 or something like that. It was showing what the earth would look like if we continued our current trend of exhausting resources. It was a planet full of volancoes, eruptions, craters, etc, etc. My point...extremist claims rarely come true. Moderation is required and please use some common sense. We all enjoy our standards of living and oil has given it to us. It is simply now time to change from oil to another resource. That is the plain simple fact and it will be done in due course.

    Also to take a quote from a movie,
    "....it doesn't do any good for the leader to go around waving his hands in the air saying oh ........ were all gonna die, now does it?"
    Last edited by VirtualAce; 03-25-2006 at 04:24 PM.

  6. #6
    aoeuhtns
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    Whenever you read something that predicts the economy will collapse when oil runs out, it's a pretty safe bet that the author does not know anything about economics (or game theory). Oil does not 'run out'. Its price increases and consumption decreases. There are many replacements for oil, and many replacements for oil replacements. Wind turbines will never go out of fashion (as long as the sun shines).

    When currently existing wells start drying up, it will be more expensive to pump oil from them, and the price will increase. For oil to dry up, the people producing and selling oil would have to deliberately take losses by selling at artificially low prices.
    There are 10 types of people in this world, those who cringed when reading the beginning of this sentence and those who salivated to how superior they are for understanding something as simple as binary.

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    Oil does not 'run out'. Its price increases and consumption decreases
    From an economics standpoint, what the hell is the difference? You're arguing a point that is totally and hopelessly moot, just to make yourself sound smarter.
    I'm not immature, I'm refined in the opposite direction.

  8. #8
    Registered User VirtualAce's Avatar
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    Actually, Bob, that's the theory of oil consumption in a nutshell. We don't run out because it is too costly to even use anymore, so alternate sources must be used and by then they will be because it won't be economically feasible to use oil.

    Or so that is how the theory goes. I think I read it as well on the dept of energy's website and some other oil-production websites.
    It sounds odd and I would have responded to that post the same way had I not run acrossed it previously. I think howstuffworks.com (I think that's it) has links to this very theory and may even discuss it at length.

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    Whether we say 'running out of oil' or we say 'it is not economically feasible to get at the remaining oil reserves because it's too hard to get at' is still a moot point though. Ultimately, technology is going to need to save the day, either via finding more reserves with new exploration techniques or another source of energy.
    I'm not immature, I'm refined in the opposite direction.

  10. #10
    S Sang-drax's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by MadCow257
    Quite off, that was 2000
    What? Take a look at this diagram from peakoil.net:
    http://www.grinningplanet.com/2005/06-14/2-peak-oil.gif
    Last edited by Sang-drax : Tomorrow at 02:21 AM. Reason: Time travelling

  11. #11
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    We should start burying the dead further in the earth so our descendants will have an adequate source of fossil fuels.

  12. #12
    Slave MadCow257's Avatar
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    What? Take a look at this diagram from peakoil.net:
    http://www.grinningplanet.com/2005/06-14/2-peak-oil.gif
    Before the post loss, I brought up a point that I think is of interest: Is 'peak' oil really when we peak production wise or if when peak in exploration? After 2000 new finds went drasitically down with no likely chance of going back up. Meanwhile, production is still increasing. That is where I based the 2000 figure from, and even the first link given by lionmane says that date. Normal scientists think it will be 2010 or so though

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    if al gore were president, we all would be driving cars that basically run from water (hydrogen) by now.
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  14. #14
    aoeuhtns
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    Quote Originally Posted by The Brain
    if al gore were president, we all would be driving cars that basically run from water (hydrogen) by now.
    That would be expensive and damaging to the economy.
    There are 10 types of people in this world, those who cringed when reading the beginning of this sentence and those who salivated to how superior they are for understanding something as simple as binary.

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    There are many replacements for oil, and many replacements for oil replacements. Wind turbines will never go out of fashion (as long as the sun shines).
    There are not replacements for oil. A true replacement for oil will need to be (nearly) as energy efficient as oil is. There are none. There are plenty of promising technologies but none of them are anywhere near ready to replace oil as the major source of energy (i doubt even enough to fill the gaps of need - supply).

    A society such as America or any other major player in the world scene is not just going to lay down and die as our resources are exhausted.
    Sure, we'll just go around the world picking off whats left :-)

    I believe we will switch to another resource in the within the next 20 years. No one is going to just let everything run dry and thus shut the world down. There are alternatives.
    What if the demand far outstrips supply before we're able to switch to a new form of energy? If there truely were a massive energy crisis on the brink and there was nothing we could do to mitigate it, do you think they would tell us?

    I'm usually not one to believe conspiracy theories or doomsay senarios, but the article was very convincing. If anyone has any actual refutations of the points made, I'd like to hear them.
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