Friday, February 21, 2014

Arithmetic, Population and Energy, Part 6


Energy Policy

Arithmetic, Population and Energy, Part 6


For the love of the human race.

Friday, February 21, 2014

Our Thesis


We agree with Dr. Bartlett that any solution requires the education and participation of every single one of the earth’s seven billion plus residents.  The problem is of such complexity and magnitude that no one person can possibly see lasting solutions.  Moreover, the problem impinges on human freedom, so it is unreasonable to expect that lasting solutions can be achieved by human coercion of humans.

These obstacles can defeat us:  1.  Unwillingness to change in the face of the facts.  2.  Inadvertently or deliberately ignoring the facts.  3.  Failure to collect accurate, up-to-date data.  4.  Inability to find sufficient meaningful solutions.

This is not a game of blind chance.  This is not a game of fear mongering.  This is a zero-sum game of war: if rationality does not prevail in this war; we, our children, grandchildren, and great- grandchildren will lose.  Deciding not to play is a decision to lose.  If rationality does not prevail, the forces we call nature will make the necessary decisions for us: we will lose and be stranded without the necessary survival map and plan.  Nobody will like the solution.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=umFnrvcS6AQ

Arithmetic, Population and Energy, Part 6


http://www.albartlett.org/presentations/arithmetic_population_energy_video1.html  Better results were achieved by playing the video clip directly from this site, rather than by linking through YouTube.  Click on the arrow in the middle of the picture, rather than on the black bar at the top.  This is Part 6.

Dr. Bartlett discusses new discoveries further.  He shows decisively, that these discoveries deserve critical evaluation.  At the very least, the size of the discovery must be divided by the rate of consumption to arrive at the time it will last.  Most of these evaluations result in times of a few days.  Truly enormous volumes of oil, when compared to current consumption, turn out to be amazingly minuscule.  The problem is not that the discovery was not significantly gigantic.  The problem is that our consumption is horrendous and growing.  Dr. Bartlett claims that the necessary, but not sufficient cause is overpopulation.  We maintain that the necessary, but not sufficient cause is overconsumption.  We also believe that the conditions which are both necessary and sufficient causes, are the product of population and consumption.

Dr. Bartlett discusses ethanol fuels.  At the present time 10% ethanol and gasoline mixes have been a commercially available product for several years: but, not everybody uses them.  Many engines burn straight gasoline, avgas, jet-fuel, bunker C, and other oil based fuels which contain no ethanol.  Oil is also used in the production of asphalt pavement and some plastics, possibly even rubber.  When these other uses are factored in, we conclude that Dr. Bartlett’s 1% figure is about right.  We also concur with Dr. Bartlett’s observation that ethanol production is most likely endothermic, or so slightly exothermic as to not be worth the trouble of producing it.  I’m tired of paying $1,000 to replace my engine gaskets that were destroyed by ethanol.  One gallon of ethanol will not move a car as many miles as one gallon of gasoline: so the pump price is deceptive; it looks like a savings, when it is actually an increased cost.  Presently, the government is considering the license of E15, a 15% ethanol and gasoline mix: this can only make matters worse.

Dr. Bartlett emphasizes, “We cannot let other people do our thinking for us.”  We need to take this exhortation seriously.  Resolution of this problem requires the commitment of all of the earth’s seven billion plus population.  We remember in the joke about ham and egg breakfast that the pig is committed, while the chicken is only involved.

Dr. Bartlett’s examination of worldwide per-capita consumption of oil is around half a gallon per day and decreasing as it follows the Peak Oil curve.  In contrast to the worldwide average, American consumption is around two gallons per day.  Much of the world perceives this as unfair: we could tell them that they are better off walking, better off not becoming dependent on fossil fuels, but they probably wouldn’t hear us.  The false-glitter of American toys is often very attractive: it shouldn’t be, but it is.  There is some justification for our disproportionately high consumption of oil: we have built an economy where our lives depend on oil.  When oil is gone, vast numbers of our population will probably die.  The problem is not the oil, its use, or its depletion; it is our refusal to manage a life-sustaining resource.

Dr. Bartlett shows from one of Dr. Hubbert’s charts that in the 10,000 years or more of human existence, both historical and future, that the age of fossil fuels is little more than a pimple in the millennia of man.  In one hundred years or so, this discussion will no longer be important.  However, in adapting to the depletion of fossil fuels, human beings will suffer incredible tragedy.  This may not be Armageddon, but for a while it will certainly seem like it.

Dr. Bartlett is right.  We have embraced an idol.  Growth has replaced God in our vocabulary.  We worship growth, and we will certainly pay the price for doing that.

“We have evolved into what amounts to an exponential-growth culture.  I would say, it’s more than a culture: it’s our national religion, because we worship growth.  Pick up any newspaper; you’ll see headlines such as this: ‘State forecasts robust growth.’ ”

On a recent TV segment of less than an hour the word, growth, was repeated at least four times in similar contexts.

“So, what do we do?  In the words of Winston Churchill, ‘Sometimes we have to do what is required.’ ”  This applies whether we like it or not.  Medicine may taste bitter; but, it is still medicine and we must take it.  Today’s pop mantra is, “Don’t listen to negative people.”  When the truth is negative, we ignore it at our own peril.  The goddess of growth must be cast down and trampled underfoot.

Dr. Bartlett outlines some of the essential points for successful national and worldwide programs.

1.    we ought to have a big increase in the funding for research in the development and dispersion of renewable energy.”

2.    “We must educate all of our people to an understanding of the arithmetic and consequences of growth, especially in terms of the earth’s finite resources.”

3.    “We must educate people to recognize the fact that growth of populations and growth of rates of consumption of resources cannot be sustained.”

Dr. Bartlett quotes his own, “The First Law of Sustainability: Population growth and/or growth in the rates of consumption of resources cannot be sustained.”  He will develop twenty more laws of sustainability, with many corollaries.[1]  We shall have to visit these later.

Dr. Bartlett writes “It is intellectually dishonest to talk about sustainability without stressing the obvious fact that stopping population growth is a necessary condition for sustainability!”  “Population restraint is a necessary condition but it is not the sufficient condition.”

The other necessary, but not sufficient condition is restraint of consumption.  The two constraints are interrelated.  The necessary and sufficient condition is the product of the two interrelated conditions on a per capita basis.

The Law of Carrying Capacity


We introduce here our own law, The Law of Carrying Capacity (CC):
0  ≤  CCP * Cpc  ≤ 1
Where: P is the population at any time and place, and Cpc is the per capita consumption due to that same population.  One (1) is 100% of Carrying Capacity which cannot be exceeded.  Once conditions of 100% sustainability equilibrium are reached for any fixed location, further growth in CC cannot take place.  If P increases by a factor of u, Cpc must decrease by a factor of 1/u.  If Cpc increases by a factor of v, P must decrease by a factor of 1/v.

If individuals attempt to violate these equilibrium conditions, nature will restore them by force: people will die or they will experience uncontrollable shortages of resources.

If greedy individuals decide that it is necessary to consume more than their fair share, they are in effect committing murder.  Fair share is not a worldwide constant.  People living in the tropics have different needs than people in the polar regions.  Arid climates create different needs than humid climates.

Therefore, CC must be maintained in balance both globally and regionally: but CC must be tuned, region by region.  Moreover, sharing mechanisms must be in place to maintain CC under changing conditions.  For this reason it would be wise to incorporate a safety factor to accommodate unusual conditions.

We hope to develop this idea more completely in the future and compare it with Dr. Bartlett’s Twenty-one Laws of Sustainability.

Our Conclusion


A few objections to Dr. Bartlett’s and Dr. Hubbert’s studies were soundly refuted.  The principal corrective factor rests in not letting others do our thinking for us.  All new evidence and reports need to be carefully examined.  There are many gainsayers in high places.  The idolatrous religion of growth must and will be destroyed: but when and at what cost?  Will we be able to overcome the idol of growth in time to avoid the terrible costs that now overtake us?  Most of the resolution begins with honest education: if we know the truth, perhaps we will have time to combat the problem.  To accomplish this, we need to develop a culture of sustainability.  Most of the present sustainability discussion is just talk, hot air; some of the more important discussions are buried and clouded with irrelevant emotional issues, opinions, and human desires.  We need a science of sustainability based on nonnegotiable fact.  To develop such a science we need to discover sustainability laws.  The core of such laws already exists in the science of thermodynamics, and related fields, but it needs application.  We have begun by proposing The Law of Carrying Capacity.



[1] http://www.resilience.org/stories/2009-11-06/dr-albert-bartletts-laws-sustainability

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