Sep 11
1

What would be your idea of a preferable future regarding oil and alternative resources?

5 Comments

I’m doing a project at school and just gathering opinions on what kind of a future people ‘want’ to have. Examples could be a future that utilizes electric cars; hence, replacing fossil fuel engines. Please be as specific about the context of your future as you can (and maybe about what we need to do to make it happen too). Thanks!

By the way, it does not have to be centered around just transportation. It can be much more broader that that.

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5 Responses to "What would be your idea of a preferable future regarding oil and alternative resources?"

  • darkjetknife says:
    September 1, 2011 at 9:30 pm

    In my opinion hydrogen fuel cells is defineteley the way to go. in california there is already some infrustructure to support it and the honda fcx clarity proves it works. in fact you can buy a remote controlled car called the h2go that runs on water using with a hydrogen fuel cell. i think it costs about £100.

  • Anonymous says:
    September 1, 2011 at 9:30 pm

    Realistically? A combination of fission, natural gas, and wind energy in the next decade or so, moving towards fusion around 2035. Eventually we’ll get working Casimir-effect generators.

  • mikk says:
    September 1, 2011 at 9:30 pm

    I’ve been thinking about this a lot (I am going into a career in Green Infrastructure and sustainable urban design), and I think this:

    - We are going to continue burning non-renewables until they run out; it’s simple market forces.
    - In order for us to be ready for the inevitable day when those non-renewables run out, we must make ourselves almost completely energy self-sufficient (ie. not requiring the use of centralised power sources, ie. coal-fired power stations, and others connected to the main grid).
    - In order to become self-sufficient, our power sources must become de-centralised, ie. not coming from the grid.

    I think that the best way for this to happen (and it may in the end only happen by absolute necessity, and with a lot of suffering in the meantime) is for communities to scale down to community-sized units (ie. no cities!) and to utilise solar panel, wind power, CHP (combined heat and power) and biogas technologies to create their own power on a local scale, whilst also creating the majority of their own food within the community.

    In addition, this could solve the problems we have with alienation in modern society – I believe that we do not have a community because we are not interdependent enough – if we were part of communities which must work together in order to ensure power and food supplies, then our communities would be very closely knit.

    In short, this represents the devolution of society into the pre-city age, with the added advantage of modern technology. In this scenario, virtually no centralised power or food sources would be needed, reducing the amount of pollution via transport or energy, goods and food.

  • oldtimer says:
    September 1, 2011 at 9:30 pm

    It’s good to not center on transportation as that will be the continuing use of hydrocarbon fuels for the longest time. The only renewables currently possible for heavy transportation are still carbon based (ethanol and bio-diesel).
    Other than that – let the market decide. Every run-up in the price of oil or natural gas causes more investment into alternate energy. Every new investment reduces the cost of the alternates. One day the costs of hydrocarbon will go up past the price of the alternate as it goes down. It’s greatly debatable when that will be but sooner or later it will. The people of the world will not ever burn up all the oil because the price will one day rise above their willingness to pay for it.

  • Attorney says:
    September 1, 2011 at 9:30 pm

    Some day the price of oil will go so high that the alternative energy resources will become economical. That is simply economics for non-renewable resources — as the supply runs out the price rises.

    So what I a "want" .. I really WANT (and I will bet everyone else also wants) a cheap, renewable (or at least plentiful), safe, high energy content fuel. (Think … this was oil.. a cheap, plentiful, relatively safe, high energy fuel — the problem is that it is getting so it is no longer cheap.) A fuel that can be used in our homes, cars, etc. However, that is a dream that is simply not feasible at this time with currently known technology.

    I BELIEVE that our future will be filled with renewable energy.. preferably non polluting and non radioactive energy. e.g. wind, solar and wave. Is that feasible? Unfortunately, I do not believe with today’s technology or energy needs we will get there easily.

    To get there.. first we need to "pick low hanging fruit", i.e., do the easy stuff first. I believe that the first fruit we need to pick will be centered on conservation .. so we use less energy as a society!

    Second.. renewable energy.. wind farms, solar arrays, wave energy.. all of them are great but we will need extensive infrastructure improvements (i.e., long distance electrical transmission wires) to fully utilize these energy sources. We also need to make them cheaper — right now they cost a lot of $$ to install and then they are cheap to run but we need to amortize the cost of installation. However, that will come with time, investment, and economies of scale as we use more and more of these types of power sources, etc.

    We also need a way to store power from these renewable sources.. at least temporarily so we can stablize the power supply. By that I mean that solar power only works when it is sunny, wind only when it is windy etc. We need to store the power produced so we can use it later. (Detroit Edison has one of the only "pumped water" electrical storage facilities in the world on Lake Michigan .. basically when power is plentiful they pump water up a hill into a lake. When power is needed they release the water back to Lake Michigan and produce electricity — so this concept is not new). I suspect that this will consist of batteries AND hydrogen production — unless an entirely new technology comes along.

    Then for our vehicles.. we will have electric cars, etc. we need batteries.. or hydrogen.. either will do…

    Beyond that?

    If we really get a cheap, renewable, plentiful, powerful, source (or sources) of energy.. the sky’s the limit!!

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