Can we survive without oil? Do we want to?

I'm starting this thread to continue a debate I was starting up with
IMAdamnALIEN in another thread. In that thread, the OP (correctly) pointed out that we were off topic. So, after we both apologized to the OP, I had the idea to start a thread where we can continue the discussion. I'm also looking forward to anyone else joining in, so don't anyone get the idea this is somehow a 'private' thread. (Come to think of it, is there even such a thing on ATS? )

The discussion is this: with all the alternative energy ideas floating around, we are still dependent on oil. Why? Is there really an alternative to oil just around the corner, or are we simply trapped in our dependency?

I think that we are literally hooked. Our entire transportation system, which is necessary to transport everything else in our economy, is based on petroleum products. There are gas stations on every corner, diesel pumps every few miles, and enough oil-based fuel vehicles on the road to accommodate this massive infrastructure. The costs to retool our fuel delivery industry to handle a different type of fuel would be astronomical and a very lengthy process. It would also be absolutely necessary to make ownership of alternative fueled vehicles practical.

Electricity has several options, but none are a complete answer in themselves. We are running short on rivers to dam. Nuclear power still has the problem of centuries of toxic waste remaining after the fuel is spent. Solar is very expensive and unreliable. Wind seems to be doing good so far, but the present turbines account for only 20% of our electric production. The only things left are fossil fuels, oil, coal, and natural gas.

In short, while I am all for alternative energy sources, I don't think it is realistic to expect a major breakthrough any time soon. In the meantime, we need to protect our oil.

TheRedneck

Edit: Mods, if this is not the appropriate area for this, please move it. It seemed appropriate to me.


[edit on 13-8-2008 by TheRedneck]

I don't think we can survive without oil, we've been addicted to it for too long, letting go now would be disastrous... I was thinking of a proposal... While some may find it objectionable, there is a still vast supply of untapped oil and we should consider going after it with all possible haste.

Whales, there are several barrels worth of oil in each of these massive mammalian sea animals... We should lift all bans on Whaling immediately, contract Haliburton to tap into this resource and alleviate the oil shortages and bring costs to the American consumers down.

I mean, I not all for the man-made global warming theory. I do not being oil is the problem. But. Oil is a source of pollution. Pollution=Bad. Well, oil in today's modern world is necessary. I think we need to continue using oil while we wait for alternative sources to be profitable and practical, then gradually phase out oil.

Oil is also used in plastic making, so it will be needed for a long time, and we will need to conserve, then research, then integrate.

Hey TheRedneck!

I am honored to share my thoughts on your thread

I will be concentrating on two incredibly viable alternative resources that can easily power our planet. Not only can they do that, they can be implemented anywhere, at any time. All it takes is money, and elite approval, both of which are incredibly difficult to obtain.

Before I begin, I would like to say that Big Oil has a strangle hold on small, independent AR developing companies. Basically a lot of rich and powerful people would be out a ton of dough if something like water can replace fossil fuel....

The focus of my post is intended to provide information about alternative resources(AR) that output zero emissions, and an AR that anyone in the world can tap into.

Lets begin.....

The easiest way for me to get my point across is this video
video.google.com...

If people do not have time to view it I can basically sum it up by saying......

A farmer has developed a way to split hydrogen from water, by use of an electronic device. The device (which is demonstrated) uses whats known as "zero point energy" to sustain itself. So after a quick jolt from a battery you have a real-time hydrogen splitter. The device is so versatile it can replace fuel injectors on any fuel injected vehicle. So, all anyone would have to do is replace a fuel tank with a water tank, and replace your fuel injectors with real-time hydrogen splitters. Thus making your car run from your garden hose (which is also demonstrated). Not to mention his power generators that run on water as well......

Secondly......

Geothermal Energy! and The Tesla “Total Flow” system
www.teslaengine.org...

Under Earth's crust, there is a layer of hot and molten rock called magma. Heat is continually produced there, mostly from the decay of naturally radioactive materials such as uranium and potassium. The amount of heat within 10,000 meters (about 33,000 feet) of Earth’s surface contains 50,000 times more energy than all the oil and natural gas resources in the world.

www.ucsusa.org...

Simple video
video.google.com...

Heat and cool your home with this!
video.google.com...

Just imagine how much energy can be saved!

Thanks for the chance to discuss this properly!

Great thread!

[edit on 14-8-2008 by IMAdamnALIEN]

I think it would be easier to wean ourselves off of "oil" (aboitic crude)by use of a similiar product. I like the the Algae to Oil technology using the Algae as the Hydrocarbon chain. It's basically Solar into oil.
Make that jump first then over time bring in a plug and play Hydrogen.
.02c

It will be a slow process but I think we can survive without oil. Technology will play a key roll in this process. We need to make airplanes and jetliners fly without jet fuel, so we will have to wait for technology to help us do that.. I mean we have alternatives but none that can fly you from New York to LA in a timely fashion. Truck drivers need to drive across country and back and the alternatives we have now is not good enough to do that. Electric car & trucks can only take you so far until you have to recharge and that's downtime. So we need better technology for batteries that can go the distance. Hydrogen fuel cells are much cleaner than our petroleum economy we have now and is a good alternative energy to use. Still technology is not up to par with it yet, but I love the idea and would love to see our oil dependency disappear. Next is Nuclear power and I know when I say nuclear some people are thinking of past disasters and bombs but our technology is there for it now.

So yes I do think we can survive or better word for it would be function in our economy without oil. Will we see an economy without oil in our life time? I really hope so but there are alot of hurdles to clear before it happens. One of those hurdles is the power of money that comes from a barrel of black gold.

reply to post by IMAdamnALIEN


I wholeheartedly agree. Our own government has hidden away many good ideas for cheap, renewable fuel for our cars and trucks. I am currently building the device described here:
offto.net...
The assembly is difficult, with all the parts and gluing and such, not to mention the coil windings which takes a lot of patience. I hope to have it installed in a month or so, and then bye bye gasoline. Brown's Gas is the answer, IMHO, and I am going to use it whether others do or not. For all you who think this does not work, we made hydrogen on the workbench before beginning construction of the reactor. It's just like the inventor says...it works!

reply to post by IMAdamnALIEN and others
Hey, read my intro post... it's OUR thread.

I can't seem to get the video to play (not unusual, this laptop is struggling with an advanced rash of overuse ), so until I do, I will assume it to be true. I do believe there are ways to do this.

Now, if this farmer has developed a way to split water, then he is making hydrogen and oxygen, along with some other chemicals from impurities found in all the water on the planet. That is an important point as far as the pollution-free claim is concerned, since the pollution form petroleum fuels comes from the same phenomena. It is rare to find anything in nature in a pure form, or even to be able to produce something in a totally pure form.

There will be salts of sulfur, halogens, nitrates, and trace amounts of various metal salts produced as these minor impurities are themselves broken down by the process. This will produce acids during combustion, which will eat away, slowly but surely, at the engine components over the years, leading to a decrease in engine life.

There is also the problem of using hydrogen as a fuel. Let's assume that we can use water as the energy carrier. That means that the fuel tanks use water, which will lead to rusting and decomposition of the metal firstly. this means that water tanks will have to be either glass-lined (easily broke, heavy, and expensive) or plastic/plastic-lined. Plastics still come from oil, so while we may have decreased our reliance to a huge degree, we have not created another use for oil.

Now the hydrogen has to be produced to be burned in the engine. Hydrogen is explosive under most conditions, which means that an accident (and trust you me, there are plenty of these) could turn from a fender-bender into a fireball express if there is more than a minute amount of H2 available. Hydrogen also has another problem with this, and that is the fact that it burns clear. It is completely possible to have a hydrogen fireball that is invisible to the naked eye. the reason you can see most hydrogen explosions is that the materials around the hydrogen are burning as well, and these materials alone give off a colored, visible flame. So if there was a fire from the hydrogen, it might be difficult to even realize the car were afire until you were afire as well. Not a pretty thought.

But let's say we have plastic tanks and are producing barely the amount of H2 we need to power the car immediately. Hydrogen also burns much hotter then gasoline. A typical engine would require a much higher capacity cooling system, and quite probably a redesigned internal arrangement to allow for increased cooling. Also, the output of the hydrogen flame is water. Just water. What does water do to ferrous metals, even in vapour form? It decomposes them. So again we have the problem of shortened vehicle life, just as we had with metal fuel tanks.

Now all of these conditions are correctable with some work. We can use plastic tanks, adjust the hydrogen production to minimize the amount of hydrogen produced, and redesign the engines to allow for greater cooling abilities and non-ferrous combustion chambers. None of this even requires 'cutting-edge' technology. What it does require is money, for research and production of the cars.

Money is something a lot of people take for granted. We live in a society today where a good percentage of the population simply go to work, then buy what they want, without major regard to price. In that context, it is easy to forget that there are plenty of people who do not have ready funds available to them for technological upgrades. You also have a population that is habit-driven. While there are probably quite a few people who would state that they would gladly purchase one, the sad fact is that new technology is often viewed with skepticism from the general populace. It may not be logical, but there are plenty of potential customers who would hesitate to move away from gasoline at $20 a gallon, simply due to habit. This means that the potential customer base for a water-powered car is pretty low initially.

That is true for any new technology, not just this one. But it indicates something every developer knows: new technology takes a log time to become accepted in the general populace. Lasers have been around since 1960, with the development starting as early as the late 1920s. Yet they have only come into widespread use the late 1970s and are still finding new uses even today. And this is a technology that does not replace an older one.

Bottom line is, it will take decades for hydrogen to come into play in any major way in our economy, barring a sudden and complete removal of oil as a possible energy source, something I do not expect to see.

Now as to geothermal, it is a wonderful idea, but it is also plagued by the same societal resistance that the hydrogen car faced in the previous paragraphs. It is expensive, and takes much more to install than a heat pump or furnace. The heat transfer system must be located either in the ground well below the frost line (which can be up to 6 feet deep in more northern latitudes), or in large bodies of water. The transfer field also must be fairly large compared to the present alternatives, requiring access to land or water by the user of the geothermal energy. Not everyone has access to this much land area, especially those in the cities, where energy usage is being pressed the most.

If someone lives in a more rural setting, geothermal is definitely the way to go, even if only in combination with other technology. As an example, the typical heat pump (the type of climate control used most frequently around here) is efficient at temperatures above 40F. It is notoriously inefficient (and frost-prone) below that. Geothermal systems typically provide 60F air temperatures, which would result in a major increase in efficiency on those cold winter mornings.

So even with the advantages of geothermal, and assuming the possibility of hydrogen-from-water fuels, it will be a long time before these are a viable alternative for the general populace. In the meantime, while we wait, is it not smart to continue the search for more oil?

TheRedneck

reply to post by TheRedneck


*Hands TheRedneck award for most articulate redneck*


Anywho...

I am not the most technically minded person in the world. I cannot debate the logistics of the device. All I know is that it worked in the video, and he has been running a truck with water ever since the discovery. Any problems he's had regarding engine wear and overall breakdown of parts isn't mentioned.

I spent a good amount of time trying to find a Science Channel episode I saw a few days ago about using oceanic waves as energy, to no avail. Not only energy could be produced from the ocean, but a plethora of oceanic AR that can over time switch our dependence on oil.

They were using the temperature of the ocean to cool sea-side cities (which are many) and the reverse to heat cites. Saving energy there......

Harnessing wave energy is still a long way off, but at least its a clean renewable AR!

In the meantime, I am still steadfast against drilling.

All it really takes is cooperation from world governments. I know its impossible, but its a paradigm that must be altered.

I have hope......

Drilling is not the answer.

reply to post by autowrench


Definitely let us know how that comes out.

Looks like a scam to me

Thanks!

reply to post by IMAdamnALIEN
*plays with the award* Oooh, shiny...

I spent a good amount of time trying to find a Science Channel episode I saw a few days ago about using oceanic waves as energy, to no avail. Not only energy could be produced from the ocean, but a plethora of oceanic AR that can over time switch our dependence on oil.

No need to find it. This is one of the more exciting alternate energy sources (IMHO) that are under development. The problems so far (as I understand where things are now) is the corrosiveness of the oceanic waters and the possibility of damage by oceanic wildlife. I htink both can be overcome to a large degree, making this a very feasible way to provide electricity.

They were using the temperature of the ocean to cool sea-side cities (which are many) and the reverse to heat cites. Saving energy there......

Another great idea, but with a warning: every time you extract energy from a system, you leave less energy in that system. So, should this become too great a heat transfer for the ocean to dissipate quickly, it could affetc some of the wildlife. I do not think this should be abandoned due to this by any means, but I do think it should be closely monitored to prevent any such damage to the ocean's local ecosystem.

While the size of the oceans would appear to be sufficient to mitigate any such damage on a global scale, my concern is more along the lines of localized problems. You have to remember that the energy used by a city is astronomical in itself, and the majority of that is in heating/cooling.

Harnessing wave energy is still a long way off, but at least its a clean renewable AR!

Well, when you have something like electrical production, where the decisions are made by those in the industry and not the general public, the possibility of rapid change increases dramatically. If this new technology should prove to be profitable and practical, the change could happen over the course of years rather than decades.

In the meantime, I am still steadfast against drilling.

All it really takes is cooperation from world governments. I know its impossible, but its a paradigm that must be altered.

1) Oil production would still be necessary, even if al the world's electrical and heating/cooling needs were to be filled by other sources. The only place we have to get oil is from the ground. Ergo, the only solution that is practical at this point in time is to drill for more oil. Now if you can come up with something that would replace gasoline/diesel fuel, that would be available in a matter of months, and would be so inexpensive and proven reliable that there would be some mass migration toward it worldwide, then, sure, we could stop drilling. I don't see anything that meets that criteria on the horizon, however.

2) Cooperation from world governments is not the biggest obstacle. Personal preference is. The energy usage comes not just form governments, but from individuals driving their cars, buying goods which have to be shipped, and searching for cheaper power (as opposed to more renewable power). There is where a consensus must be reached, and history has declared that such a consensus takes a long time.

3) If you admit it is impossible, then why do you pursue it?

TheRedneck


[edit on 14-8-2008 by TheRedneck]

reply to post by autowrench
Now that's the way to promote change!

I am trying something similar for electrical production here (would love to tell the electrical company to come get your d&&n wires out of my way). I'm also looking at the possibility of making gasoline from renewable sources, but that's going to take a bit longer.

If you don't mind, I have a question posted on www.abovetopsecret.com... about handling hydrogen. Take a gander and see if you can help out?

TheRedneck

Originally posted by TheRedneck
1) Oil production would still be necessary, even if al the world's electrical and heating/cooling needs were to be filled by other sources. The only place we have to get oil is from the ground. Ergo, the only solution that is practical at this point in time is to drill for more oil. Now if you can come up with something that would replace gasoline/diesel fuel, that would be available in a matter of months, and would be so inexpensive and proven reliable that there would be some mass migration toward it worldwide, then, sure, we could stop drilling. I don't see anything that meets that criteria on the horizon, however.

You are 100% correct, I just won't agree! LOL

At least Ill admit it.....

2) Cooperation from world governments is not the biggest obstacle. Personal preference is. The energy usage comes not just form governments, but from individuals driving their cars, buying goods which have to be shipped, and searching for cheaper power (as opposed to more renewable power). There is where a consensus must be reached, and history has declared that such a consensus takes a long time.

Personal preference is a giant issue, however, I think of it this way....

Pretend you were born into a world of flying cars and green thinking. You would buy products based on what is available to you. The government in this fantasy land are open minded and uncorrupted. New ideas flow, and are streamlined into viable products made readily available to the public. The planet is healthy and everyone has smiles on their faces, and clean fresh air to breath.

My point is, governments worldwide are slowing the evolution of AR.

If zero emission cars were the norm, who wouldn't buy one?

Government is by FAR the worst obstacle to overcome.

Which brings me to my next point you so humorlishously (yeah I said it) brought up.

Why do I pursue this if I know its impossible for governments to change the paradigm?

Its simple really......

I think majority rules.

The ants will rise up, force these new technologies into existence, thus shattering the AR evolutionary gap that has widened in the past century or so.

reply to post by IMAdamnALIEN

Pretend you were born into a world of flying cars and green thinking. You would buy products based on what is available to you. The government in this fantasy land are open minded and uncorrupted. New ideas flow, and are streamlined into viable products made readily available to the public. The planet is healthy and everyone has smiles on their faces, and clean fresh air to breath.

Oh, sure, interrupt my thought process with dreams like this. I wanna live in that world!

Seriously, your point is valid, and I will agree that the 'status quo' embraced by both governments and business is a major obstacle to the production of new technologies. But I honestly cannot think of any scenario in which this wouldn't be the case. People are accustomed to the things they find in the world around them. The majority of people would be shocked at another thread I just came across where rat neurons are transplanted into a robot for experimentation. But if we had existed in a world where such a thing was normal, it wouldn't raise a single eyebrow. This is the same point I made originally: people resist change, as a matter of tradition.

We do not live in that world you describe. We may be able to move toward it. But no journey has its beginning and end contained in a single step. If we tie this journey to misery and want, as we do when we deny the impact that a lack of oil would have on us as a society, we harm the cause because less people would wish to undertake a journey that arduous. No, to attract the populous, the journey must be a smooth one, a more gradual transition from oil-based to alternative fuels, so we can bring all people into it. Only that way can the journey be successful.

Government runs wild on the apathy of the people. It is controlled only by the demands of the people. The people are the true ruling force on the planet. It is the people you need to convince.

humorlishously? Gah, you realize Webster just spun so fast in his grave he created a sinkhole, right?

The ants will rise up, force these new technologies into existence, thus shattering the AR evolutionary gap that has widened in the past century or so.

Be careful raising up those ants. One dose of ant killer and you have no more to raise up...

TheRedneck

Originally posted by TheRedneck
Be careful raising up those ants. One dose of ant killer and you have no more to raise up...

Oh man.........Do we have to make another thread to discuss this too?

Can we derail a little?

"Quick mods, there's something shiny on the wall next to you, look at it for a second!"

*Mods attention diverted for few hours with dazzling shiny thing*

reply to post by IMAdamnALIEN
Derail to your heart's content as far as I am concerned.

I'm assuming you have an 'ant-killer' conspiracy... this should be interesting!

TheRedneck

reply to post by TheRedneck


what about ethanol, it is a renuable resouce incan be made from all kinds of plants. kelp, switchgrass, beets, potatoes, sugar cane, and the list goes on. this would kill our depenency.

reply to post by crawgator406
Ethanol is fine as a supplement, but it simply cannot keep up with the sheer volume of fuel needed by the country. It requires diesel fuel to produce (something has to run the tractors and harvesting equipment), it burns differently than gasoline and thereby can damage a 'standard' gasoline engine, and threatens our food supply as it is now produced.

I am on another thread with you about this same subject, www.abovetopsecret.com... if anyone is interested. A bit of duplicity, it seems, but I wanted to give a quick synopsis here in response.

TheRedneck