Gleaning Utopia from Peak Oil

[bigmacbear]

blackwingbear posted this essay ganked from AlterNet the other day, and it's got me to thinking. Essentially, the original author, James Howard Kunstler, is advocating rolling the clock back to the early 19th century, before the discovery of petroleum. The response "What's wrong with that?" makes me think that, although elements of the essay are spot-on, as a whole the proposed solution is akin to throwing the baby out with the bathwater.

I had given some thought in the past about what needs to happen as the supply of petroleum inevitably wanes, to keep the best possible standard of living for as much of the planet as possible. Here are some ideas I think suitable for the 21st Century instead of the 19th.

Make Stuff Closer To Where It Is Used

One point in which I am in complete agreement with Kunstler is we need to make more stuff closer to where it is used. This has implications not only in energy matters but other matters as well:

• For one, the global race to the bottom on wages and prices is only possible because shipping is cheap, which is only true as long as great behemoth ships can guzzle petroleum as if it were water.
• Making stuff close to where it is used means that you can pass along the savings from not shipping so much to hire local people and pay them enough to afford your product.
• Finally, it's a matter of national security that we don't make enough of our wants and needs within our own borders to defend ourselves against the threat of blockade.

Use The Right Energy Source For The Right Job

As petroleum becomes more and more scarce, we might be able to prioritize the remaining resources according to whether there are better sources of energy or material for a particular job. Petroleum is used for a number of things, but its chief uses are four: as a fuel for transportation, as a source of heat (including that used to generate electricity), as a base for the manufacture of plastic materials, and as a source of chemicals that go into fertilizers, food additives, pharmaceuticals, and other necessities.

Transportation

Absent a cheap alternative for gasoline, jet fuel, and diesel fuel, it looks like travel and shipping will become unaffordable. As no one has yet come up with a non-petroleum-based fuel with the energy density of jet fuel, air travel will eventually have to be abandoned without a major breakthrough. Most types of land vehicles and small boats can be built to be powered by electricity, though, and rail has been running on electricity for years.

Fortunately, though, the need for the speed that only air transportation provides can be mitigated by the use of the telecommunications infrastructure. Many professions and livelihoods can be carried on from home through the magic of telecommunications, which will reduce the need for lengthy commutes; other commutes can be reduced or eliminated through the rationalization of land use.

Of course, with so many uses for electric power, the question therefore is the source of that electricity, with wind, solar, biomass (waste incineration) and nuclear being the most sustainable. Large ocean-going ships can even be powered directly by small nuclear reactors, as proven by the nuclear submarine. Yes, there is a problem with sequestering spent fuel and other radioactive waste away from people and wildlife, but in the main this is not so much a technical problem as a political one.

Heat

Petroleum products, of course, are not the only substances that burn. We can gain heat from other fuel sources such as wood, coal, garbage, etc.; or we can turn over a good chunk of our heating processes to the generation of electricity (see above) and through efficient use of insulation, capture some portion of the waste heat from cooking and our ubiquitous electronics (which aren't going away) while making good use of any natural sources of heat such as solar and geothermal wells.

Plastics

With modern breakthroughs in chemical and materials engineering, many plastics can be replaced with similar materials not necessarily derived from petroleum sources (with the advent of digital photography we can certainly find other uses for good old cellulose acetate -- the base material for photographic film -- that might replace polyethylene in many applications, for example). Glass can be made less fragile, and is at once more durable and often more recyclable. The paper bag and wax paper will make a comeback as well. And those plastics that cannot be replaced outright can often be manufactured from other plastics coming back in the recycling stream.

Better Living Through Chemistry

First off, our health may in fact benefit from the demise of Big Pharma, which the loss of cheap petrochemicals may well bring about, as many nutrients and drugs are better and more potent when derived from their original natural sources than when synthesized in a lab.

As for fertilizers, we can still synthesize many of our necessary chemicals from what otherwise might be considered waste products (for example, we might want to use more manure and less pesticides, or we might actually synthesize more esthetically-pleasing fertilizers from manure rather than using it as is).

Also, for the most part, the chemistry behind our electronic gear (apart from plastic cases and insulation) is derived from metals and glasses (the silicon in Silicon Valley) rather than petroleum. While electronics manufacturing does use a lot of carbon, there are plenty of sources other than petroleum for that.

More as I think on it.

Comments

[ciddyguy.livejournal.com]

Don't forget the automobile and mass transit.

Right now, it's the automobile, that is, particularly the single occupancy vehicle, often a gas guzzling behemoth at that driving our freeways and roads on a daily basis - often because someone is too lazy or what have you to try and rely on the bus.

A lot of jobs can't rely on public transport and those are jobs like curioes, maintenance people etc that have to drive around with tools and such to fix that broken copier or elevator or hand deliver that package, but the bike currier is a good choice for the environment, and those are exceptions but a lot of jobs, such as retail make it difficult for someone to rely on public transportation to get too and from work so have to drive a vehicle of some sort.

One problem with cellulose is that it's fragile, Before the advent of polyester in the 1950's, both film and magnetic tape used cellulose and/or acetate for it's base were found to deteriorate at a much more rapid rate than a strip of film or tape made with polyester, yes, polyester is petrolium based, but it's proven to be a stable base. I'd like to see more uses for Phenolic resins and bakelite and it's counterpart, catalin are such resins as I believe both are not petrolium based. Linolium, is also made with natural/organic materials such as linseed oil and is naturally more sanitary than vinyl.

But the gist of what you are saying is very good and it's not always a good idea to totally disregard what's going on today technology wise, but modify them with older technologies to create new and better products that aren't as harmful to the environment during manufacter.

[thezzyzx.livejournal.com]

Hey, I'd love to take a bus. I even made a point of living in a place that has direct bus lines to downtown. However, my work place is in an outer suburb and it would take me three transfers and well over an hour each way to get there.

[ciddyguy.livejournal.com]

Hey, I took the bus from Seattle to Bellevue and it took 2 transfers, one from Sound Transit from Seattle to just outside Bellevue on the other side of Lk Washington and then a Metro Bus from there to the job site. $2.50 and it took I think 30 minutes or so of actual bus time, let alone the waits times at each point.

I can drive there in roughly 30 minutes but then had to pay for the parking which was not cheap so the bus was much more economical.

[thezzyzx.livejournal.com]

Here's the bus route from my house to work. I work a swing shift (6-2) so I can get there in under 20 minutes, but I suggested a 9 AM trip to make it easier to get buses:

Depart (IHOZ LABS LOCATION) At 09:07 AM On Route MT 72 Downtown Seattle Express
Arrive University Way NE & NE 43rd St At 09:20 AM
Walk 0.1 mile SE to
Depart 15th Ave NE & NE 43rd St At 09:32 AM On Route MT 43 Downtown Seattle
Arrive Montlake Blvd E & EB SR-520 ON RAMP At 09:39 AM
Transfer to
Depart SR 520 Ramp & Montlake Blvd E At 09:49 AM On Route ST 545 Redmond Express
Arrive Bear Creek P&R AcRd & 178th Pl NE At 10:25 AM
Walk 0.5 mile NE to 18400 NE UNION HILL RD


So we're talking 90 minutes to get to work. No thanks. Parking is free at work btw.

...I do own a Prius though, so that helps a little.

[ciddyguy.livejournal.com]

I would agree, that's not practical I am fortunate that I live on Cap Hill just above the freeway and took the ST bus from Bellevue way at City Market to the Eastern Highrise on 520 and transfered to the MT bus that went through Clyde Hill and then up NE 8th in Bellevue.

I worked an odd shift 12:30 to 9pm down at S. Dawson St and to take the bus there from my 'hood, I had to take the #14 to Beneroya Hall, drop down to 2nd Ave and it ultimately went up 4th all the way out to 4th and Dawson St and I had to then walk 3 blocks west to work. I drove and thankfully it was a temp assignment as I disliked the schedule and the job (data entry).