Rebuilding Mass Consumption – ContextPost World War II-fear another Great

Depression-demobilization-radicalized labor-power of Communist

parties

Answer: Consumption is the opiate of the masses

The World View“Our enormously productive economy …

demands that we make consumption our way of life, that we convert buying and selling of goods into a ritual, and that we seek our spiritual satisfaction, our ego satisfaction, in consumption. … We need things consumed, burned up, worn out, replaced and discarded at an ever increasing rate.”

Rebuilding Mass Consumption - Tools

Keynesian short-term demand management

- “consumption function” - contra cyclical policyFixation on Competitive Growth

(USSR)Maintain income, consumption

levels through - military spending - road building - subsidized housing and

suburbanization - consumer credit - low oil prices

Advantages of Oil1) Historically easy to

access2) Easily transported

(liquids easiest) 3) Energy density (40 kw

hrs per gal)4) Refineable into several

fuels5) Variety other uses -

chemicals, etc.6) Continuous flow

production methods

Demand for Gasoline• Number of cars

(wartime expansion)• Low mileage• Distances traveled

growing• Destruction of public

transport• Military demand

Refining Petroleum

The Petrochemical Revolution

Year % Petrochemical US Europe1920 0.01 0.01930 6.0 0.01940 21.0 0.01950 50.0 4.01960 88.0 58.01970 96.0 75.0Today? 99.7

Price Trends1947-59 traded commodities up 300% overall oil from $2.17 to 1.79 down 38%

1951-64 WPI up 4% inorganic chemicals up 20% synthetic organics down 15%1957-67 CPI up 13% Dupont Corp Sales Price Index down 15%

The Cost of Oil• Extraction

(financial cost)• Replacement

cost of natural capital

• Ecological cost of production & use

Greenhouse Gases: Since Industrial Age

Gas Sources Increase PowerCO2 fossil fuels 35% 1 burning jungleMethane agric., gas leaks 100% 30 deforest.NOx chem. fert. 12% 200 fossil fuels

CFCs refridgerants 4% p.a. 10,000

Acid Rain SO2 NOx Volcanoes 5-10% Swamps etc. Coal, petroleum (refining & use) 90-95% 100 m tons p.a.

Effects:Dead lakesStunted forests Falling crop yieldsPoisoned drinking waterCorroded buildingsDamage to automobiles

Ozone Depletion: Causes

Culprit Natural HumanMethane swamps gas leaks (T) rice paddies

(P) ruminants (A)

Nitrous oxide microbes fossil fuelHalons -- refridgerants

Chemical Toxification:Origins of Toxic Waste

Petroleum and offshoots – 70%+

Metal refiningPulp & PaperNuclearMilitary (chemical

and nuclear)

Nature and Toxic Waste

Normal breakdown process

-dissolution-evaporation-biodegradation-photo-degradation-natural acids

Synthetic OrganicsFeedstock: fossil fuelLimited water solubility, fat

affinityToxic, carcinogenic,

mutagenicVery slow to degrade sometimes impossible

always difficult

Breakdown products sometimes worse

The Core DilemmaMaintain the carbon

economy- more poisons- worse climate

disruption

Run out of oil?-economic and financial

catastrophe-famines, population

crash

End of Oil?oil as energy-mattersupply rising 1930s 2005,

2010, 2020?as energy-matter up, GNP upwhen oil supply stops

growing?

technological shifts energy substitutions economies in usewhat if they are not enough?Key factor: energy profit rate

Symptoms of Conventional Oil Crisis?1. Global discovery rate peaked in 1960s2. 90% conventional oil already found?3. Main producers (S.A., Russia, Mexico

etc.) near capacity or beyond4. Wave of industry mergers5. Global demand growth 2000-2040 est.

60%

Oil: Conventional v. Unconventional?

Stage IV: Synthetic Oil1) Shale Oil (kerogen)

Production- Mine kerogen- Transport to refineries- Heat to 900 F- Add H From where?- Coal, oil?- Elecrolysis water? where is electricity from?

Problems- Massive water use- Low net energy- Waste disposal more than original

groundwater pollution

Oil ShalesThe Raw Material The Process

2) Oil Sands (Est. Athabasca 1.7 t. bbls)Strip mining (75 metres overburden)Hot water, steam stips thin oil coat

from sandAdd naptha or natural gas

condensate to tar to upgrade to liquid

Oil Sands (continued)• Recoverable only 300 billion• Energy profit rate half conventional oil• Greenhouse emissions far more than conventional oil• Garbage enormous-2 tons sand per bbl oil-destroys hundreds of thousands of acres -displace native population & destroy forests, wildlife

habitat-huge water use 2-1/2 bbl liquid waste per bbl oil (tailings pond 22 sq km

circumference) To replace world conventional, 70 Syncrudes with

tailings pond = Lake Ontario

With this result

Stage V? Return to Coal?

Energy profit rate already < 1?Cost of liquefactionHuge cost to restore old productionPollution far greater than oil productionMuch dirtier in useBut massive subsidies, esp. US(US the “Saudi Arabia of coal”!)

A New Coal-Chemical Revolution?

World Coal Distribution

US: The “Saudi Arabia of Coal?”

90% burned to produce electricity

Pollution controls – taller chimneys!

Acid rain problem legislation, scrubbers

Only partly successful-still big problem certain areas-US soils so degraded no longer

neutralize-additional problem mercury (it cycles

up, down)

Switch to Western coal - lower S - open pit, surface mines - heavily mechanized (i.e.

no unions)BUT - younger coal, lower

energy per unit

Modern Deep Mine

West Virginia Mountain Top Removal Coal Mine

Wyoming Open Pit Coal Mine

US Coal Solution?-modern tech less SO2less NOxless mercury per

unitBUT more CO2!!!

Skyrocketing Price of Fossil Fuel - Impact:

-on GNP-on distribution of income and wealth-on stock market-on real estate market-on automobile culture-on agriculture

In The New Millennium:Techno Optimism

Energy: solar-hydrogen replace fossil fuel?

Matter: synthetic biochemicals replace petrochemicals?

i.e. a new hydrogen fuelled-bioengineering age?

In The New Millennium:Economic & Political

Reality?• Stuck with carbon economy• Some window dressing for PR• Slow motion disintegration at first climate disruption chemical pollution steadily climbing oil prices all well before oil runs out• Then precipitous drop oil production • With what consequences?

Petrochemical Age &Economic Growth

Based On:Human Ingenuity?Magic of the Market?Faith in God?No! Bio-Geo-Chemical

Fluke!Unsustainable, not

repeatable

The World in 2100?• A much smaller population• With much lower per

capita C• Far less mobile• In small communities• Using old solar flow

technologies• In a physically degraded

world • With much less biological

wealth