Thoughts on energy
Thoughts by 124 based on the papers: SPRU Electronic Working Paper Number 185 ENERGY, GROWTH AND SUSTAINABILITY: FIVE PROPOSITIONS Steve Sorrell Senior Fellow, Sussex Energy Group SPRU -Science and Technology Policy Research, University of Sussex, Brighton …Preparing for Peak Oil – Local Authorities and the Energy Crisis prepared by the Oil Depletion Analysis Centre and the Post Carbon Institute.
Energy – The Rebound Effect… Simply put when an energy saving is made in one direction it is spent in another – e.g. a driver replaces a petrol car with a renewable resource car but actually ends up running it further due to the cheap running cost of the vehicle… or spends the money he saves on the car elsewhere – it still takes energy for the ‘elsewhere’ to be made or transported! Jevons Paradox – The Jevons Paradox has been used to argue that energy conservation is futile, as increased efficiency generally stimulates other energy uses for a net increase so we can relate to this above. Quantification of rebound effects is a mine field as we do not have the adequate correct information, variables and long term dynamics such as changing patterns of consumption. So if we look at how oil over the decades was a little like the car running on a so called energy efficient basis… what did society do? We used it – like water… in fact in the 1930’s oil was cheaper than water and as we look at the history of car we remember the big Cadillac’s which we would never dream of running now…
Energy consumption and economic growth Because of the crookedness of our debt based economic system, energy consumption has to be raised – Governments are always speaking of annual growth – we have to ‘grow’ the economics to cover the illusory money system that is no longer backed with gold but with an empty promise… I promise to pay the bearer… Consumers need to spend more to raise the economy – as Gordon Brown laughingly said ‘We will spend our way out of a recession’ If we did not have a corrupt monetary system we would not need to grow or expand our energy usage. Unless money changes we will either hit the wall at 100 miles an hour and crash (which is likely) or the debt will just be pile up and devalue the money supply, remember in the second world war when Germans were taking home their wages in wheel barrows as the money was worth nothing. If we did not grow the economy than the consequences for businesses/companies is serious e.g. unemployment, losses, cuts, bankruptcies – the country is in a catch 22 situation.
Improved energy efficiency complemented by ethic of sufficiency So with what has already been said so far, you can now see how the ambitious targets of carbon emissions set by Governments is going to be hard to achieve. If we take for example the act of recycling (which we looked into 8 years ago) the huge energy usage in converting the waste materials back into reusable materials was immense and certainly NOT energy saving. Let me give you a scenario: Glass bottles, plastic bottles are put into containers for recycling. You get in your car and drive to the nearest recycling unit. When the unit is full a large lorry drives to the unit and picks it up. It then drives to the nearest (we hope) recycling area and drops off the unit. It then has to be sorted, many people leave lids on their plastic bottles and jars so they have to be manually taken off by humans. They are then sorted into their prospective areas and bundled together. Another lorry comes and takes away the bundle to another area for processing – which is again energy intensive – they have to be cleaned and then processed to be safe before they become another container for the use of goods to go in the marketplace. I think you get my drift. The environmental impact associated with all goods or services need to be looked at from all areas. There is an energy impact with all goods we just choose to believe that we are ‘doing our best’ when we should be more aware of the outcome of excess packaging. There is no such thing as ‘greener packaging’ as it is all energy intensive. What we should be doing is looking at the ethics of this situation… give back our packaging to supermarkets, make them cut down on packaging by swamping them with the excess. When I was young we would collect coke bottles and get a small monetary return, these bottles were then simply washed and then used again by the Company that made them. They were not smashed and then reformed into something else. We have to look at the ethics of food wastage, consuming less and being happy with less choice.
Income and happiness The implications for individuals that higher income makes for increased happiness is a myth. Consuming less and having less can mean we have more leisure hours and time to spend with our family and furthermore reducing stress. There are a number of studies which show that reported levels of happiness are not increasing in line with income in developed countries. (Blanchflower and Oswald, 2004; Easterlin, 2001). AsnBinswanger (2006) observes: “…the economies of developed countries turn into big treadmills where people try to walk faster and faster in order to reach a higher level of happiness but in fact never get beyond their current position. On average, happiness always stays the same, no matter how fast people are walking on the treadmills”. It is possible that an ethic of sufficiency could provide a means of escaping from such treadmills while at the same time contributing to environmental sustainability. Although being realistic there are often constraints where people are ‘locked into’ patterns due to mortgages (another con) peer pressure and psychological needs. Sometimes we notice a release of stress when the electricity goes off and we cannot do the things we normally do – the candles come out and we have limitations… in fact it often means we have to STOP. This is an example of how much better we feel when the normal everyday pressures are no longer on us – we have no choice but relax and wait.
Sustainability/well-being is incompatible with economic growth The key point is that the goal of economic development should not be to maximise GDP but to improve human well-being and quality of life. This is not possible when the economy HAS to grow. … Human well-being is not determined solely by the consumption of goods and services but also by ‘human capital’ (e.g. health, knowledge), ‘social capital’ (e.g. family, friends and social networks) and ‘natural capital’ (i.e. ecosystems and the services they provide) – none of which are necessarily correlated with GDP (Ekins, 1992). Attempts to value these contributions through the use of alternative measures of economic progress typically find that ‘well-being’ is not improving or even declining in rich countries, despite increases in GDP (Nourry, 2008; Victor, 2008). Hence, while growth in per capita income is likely to improve well-being in developing countries, the same may not be true for developed countries.
World Population … By 2050, the UN projects that the world’s population will be between 7.8 and 10.8 billion.Taking the mean estimate of nine billion (an average growth of 0.7%/year), this means that average per capita emissions in 2050 will need to be around 0.75 tCO2/year implying an average reduction of ~5.6%/year… This is another area that must be looked at – in fact far from discouraging people to have less children the Western Governments are encouraging it. Maternity care is well provided for and often necessary emergency units are cut back in favour of maternity units. When we think about the average pregnant woman, we often think of a picture of health, blooming, radiant – there is no reason why pregnant women, unless there are complications, need extensive units just for them. We must take into account all the energy required for bringing babies into the world and adjust the use of energy accordingly. We have an enormous requirement for mental health clinics in the UK but we are severely lacking…
Why we are looking at energy and Peak Oil in particular? Oil – we rely on for everything. Our food production relies on petrochemicals as we literally ‘eat’ oil – this is because of the growth in population due to the ‘Oil age’. All transportation relies on oil and all our clothes and household goods comes from the supply of oil. The Peaking of oil does not mean we are running out but consider it as a bell curve, it gets more expensive to get the oil out of the ground. Between 2005 and 2008 oil production ceased to grow, despite huge demand and high prices. Many oil fields are running flat out and with aging machinery that costs money to replace, the money required to produce oil is phenomenal. With growing economies, not just here but in developing countries like China, who is going to provide for that growth and supply energy (or oil) to these countries? Here are some alarming facts: IEA (International Energy Agency) predict a ‘supply crunch’ of 7 million barrels a day by 2015 – this is currently about 10% of the current world production. By 2012, surplus oil production capacity could entirely disappear, as early as 2015, shortfall in output could reach nearly 10 million barrels per day… from The Joint Operating Environment Report 2010 United States Joint Forces Command The presence of ‘Chinese Civilians’ in the Sudan, to guard oil pipelines underlines China’s concern for protecting its oil supplies and could portend a future in which other states intervene in Africa to protect scarce resources. The implications for future conflicts are ominous, if energy supplies cannot keep up with demand and should States see the need to militarily secure dwindling energy resources… from The Joint Operating Environment Report 2010 United States Joint Forces Command Overinflated IEA predictions coupled with ACTUAL discoveries of oil are a massive concern. …from the UK Taskforce on Peak Oil and Energy Security… ‘No net increases in oil production after 2011, even of all planned projects come on stream more or less on time, and achieve the anticipated production flows… The immediate conclusion from the analysis is that the peaking of oil supplies is imminent and will occur in the window 2011 – 2013.
So what will this mean for us? Inevitable wars over energy, price of fuel rocketing, more power cuts, food transportation becoming scanty or non-existent, medical supplies cut, expansion plans not going ahead of all these listed, food security should be our primary concern. Even if we do not hit the predicted peak in those time lines (which we will if not sooner) then we need to be looking at sustainability for the island, food production, water supplies, heating and housing. Some have said that the Global Warming Crisis has been used to mask the real events caused by the Peaking in World Oil supplies in the knowledge that the panic by the populace would be catastrophic.
