Defeating Depletion

Where should our focus be?
by Nick van der Leek

Solar and wind power are good alternatives. Denmark is the per-capita world leader when it comes to wind farming, with 18% of its power coming from wind power. But before we make an unqualified endorsement, bear in mind that the production of the components used to produce solar and wind power obviously does cause pollution. Still, while we have cheap fossil fuels at our disposal, we ought to be directing the energies that we have available from them towards massive worldwide investments in solar and wind power, but there is a catch. Entire farms will need to be dedicated to harnessing the power of the sun (which includes its ability to unevenly bake the Earth’s surface, creating the winds).

Even so, there will still not be enough power, in South Africa, even from maximal investment in these technologies, to replace that 70% generated from fossil fuels. We might be able to replace a sizable fraction of that amount, and we must set about doing so. Once more, the whole problem of finding an alternative to liquid fossil fuels remains unanswered. How on earth are we going to get around?

Synthetic fuel, for example, adding hydrogen to coal under high pressures and temperatures, and using a catalyst, is Sasol’s specialty. They have produced synthetic fuels, but in fairly mediocre quantities (in terms of barrels per day), and once again, at noticeable cost. Can Sasol provide South Africa with its liquid fuel requirements in an oil depleted world? It’s doubtful.

Hitler managed to produce synthetic fuel in large quantities, but under wartime conditions, and by employing slave labor and producing whatever the cost. His failure to secure Russia’s oil at Baku probably cost Germany the war. Synthetic fuels may afford valid reductions to shortfalls in supply. To achieve this in South Africa may mean quadrupling and then doubling their efforts to meet demand, and to the extent that they expand their capacity, so will the impact of massive pollution be felt everywhere in South Africa. It will be a large heavy blanket of soot and poisonous gas hanging over the entire country. The supply of Synfuels is unlikely, on its own, ever to meet current levels of demand here, or elsewhere, and even if it did, the price of fuel under these circumstances would still be extremely high.

I’m not going to discuss these headings: Methane Hydrates, Thermal Depolymerization, Fusion (as opposed to Fission) or Zero Point Energy. I only mention them so that a delusional public don’t write letters saying, “But, haven’t you thought of X?” or “What about Y, isn’t if possible if we…”
There is a crisis of thinking going on. Too many minds working on sticks and leaves, too few minds actually awake, and seeing the how much of the forest is on fire.

One of the concerns is of course that depletion kicks in before we are ‘ready’, meaning, before we’re far into the process of setting up ‘cushioning infrastructure’. If we enter a phase of squabbling over resources, and arguably, that phase has begun, then in time supply lines will disintegrate, and chaos will set in, which will be what Kunstler calls a ‘converging catastrophe’. Instability basically prevents us from building anything, or doing anything meaningful. We caught a glimpse of this in New Orleans, where lack of fuel soon leads to lack of food, dehydration and death. If the spare resources we have now aren’t used very soon to establish viable sets, installations and factories directed towards long term power production, when fossil fuels are unavailable, there will simply be nothing to run our technology on. We’ll have a lot of fancy machinery – including cars, computers and cell phones - that we can’t use. It’s easy to see that scenario as a virtual certainty, based on the current pace of investment and construction of alternative energy infrastructure. We’re simply taking too long, and doing too little, too late.

Finally we get to our last, best hope. Nuclear Power. It is an irony that countries like oil-rich Iran and oil-poor North Korea are both actively pursuing this energy process. Why is Iran looking for a nuclear power station when it is sitting on so much oil? Perhaps they know something we (well, most of us) don’t, for example, that their energy reserves (and the world’s) are fast approaching their sell by/depletion date. Iran’s investment now in nuclear energy tells us – perhaps – that we don’t have much more than 10 years of reliable energy left. Why? Because they don’t.

I’m not suggesting that in 10 years we’ll begin to struggle. Prices will go through the roof well before then. I am suggesting, like France, that we begin to base as much as 70% of our energy infrastructure on harnessing nuclear power. We need to start building nuclear power stations now. China is. We need to build 5, 10, as many as we can, as fast as we can. We’ve basically learned how to roll out nuclear energy just about as well as we roll out other franchises, like McDonalds and Shell Service Stations. We know the science, and can automate nuclear power plants well enough to have Homer Simpson’s in charge. Nevertheless, it’s complicated technology, and it requires huge start up costs. There are safety issues, and the issues of disposing of nuclear waste remain troublesome. Over the medium term, nuclear power is our best bet. A single nuclear power plant costs billions. It also takes many years to get going, but once it does, energy from nuclear power tends be cleaner, and more efficient, over the medium term, than almost all the other alternatives. And in time, the initial investment becomes reasonably cost effective.

Once more, the problem of a liquid fuel is not solved, but the possibility arises again of using hybrids and then only-electric cars. Only-electric cars don’t exist today that aren’t expensive. The problem is that the batteries don’t last. They have to be recharged, and after a few years, have to be replaced. Electric car batteries are currently prohibitively expensive. The technology of big car batteries hasn’t changed much in a number of years, and so far the technology behind lithium batteries (used in computers) doesn’t work on cars. But in time, perhaps, we’ll be able to find a way to make electric cars (using rechargeable batteries) work over the longer term. This obviously implies a total overhaul of combustion engines, but perhaps this will be phased in, to avoid unpleasant bumps. Perhaps, like computers, after sufficient market penetration, the costs will come down, and technologies and efficiencies will improve. It’s doubtful. It’s likely to shake everyone up, the changes that will happen in our lifetime. I don’t expect a smooth transition. Nothing suggested in this paragraph is a certainty in a future that is likely to be aggravated by wars and instability.

It is clear, whatever we do, that people are in store for massive adjustments. We will face a new period of austerity affecting both our everyday lifestyles, and our everyday thinking. How hard that transition is depends on how much we can get done now