Geopolitical potential for a game-changing gas shortage?

[cwerdna]

no matter what you call them, cwerdna is right. I know too many people who are complaining right now that their gas bill has gone up $100 a month (they are paying $500 so not really a large percentage jump) driving a Honda SUV (gets about 22-23) and a Ford 4X4 pickup (gets about 17 or so he says...) but these were BOTH cars bought last year when gas was nearing $3.15 a gallon.

But they got the cars because gas had just come down from $4 and all of a sudden they felt they had an extra $100 a month! (how does that logic work???)

The Honda SUV isn't a BRoD though. IIRC, they don't make anything quite in that class.

But, sigh... that is crazy "logic".

As a magazine column I read put it: Americans complain and also want fuel economy standards raised (e.g. to "54.5 (CAFE) mpg" (aka ~37 mpg combined on the window sticker)) when they don't need to wait to 2025 or whenever for that "54.5 mpg" and instead can go and buy more efficient vehicles now. The (current) Gen 3 Prius counts as having over "70 mpg" for CAFE purposes. The Gen 2 (04 to 09) Prius IIRC counted as having over "64 mpg" for CAFE purposes.

Battering Rams of Death

No need to use a pejorative.

The correct designation is SUV.

Slow Ugly Vehicle.

Yes, but not all SUVs are battering rams of death. I wouldn't lump small (e.g. Escape, CR-V) and medium sized (e.g. Highlander, Explorer, Lexus RX) ones into that category. BRoD to me == full-sized ones w/curb weights of 5200+ lbs (e.g. Tahoe, Yukon, Suburban, Escalade, Expedition, Navgiator, Sequoia, etc.) The uber-monstrosities would include 6400+ lb. beasts like the Hummer H2, Excursion (aka Ford Exxon Valdez), Hummer H1, etc.

From the above piece I linked to:

The Sierra Club awarded Ford Motor Company the "Exxon Valdez Award" for environmental destruction to recognize Ford's newest sport-utility vehicle (SUV), the Excursion. The Excursion is a four-ton "super duty" sport utility vehicle that guzzles enough gas to make Saddam Hussein smile. At a time of mounting concern over global warming, air pollution, and oil exploration in fragile wilderness areas, this gas-guzzling SUV is a rolling monument to environmental destruction.

The nine-passenger Excursion is a suburban supertanker, stretching more than 19 feet in length and slurping one gallon of gasoline for every 12 miles it travels. This "suburban assault vehicle" spews as much global warming pollution into the air as two average cars.

"The Excursion guzzles gas and pollutes the air," said Daniel Becker, Director of the Sierra Club's Global Warming and Energy Program. "It's basically a garbage truck that dumps its pollution into the sky."

The Excursion is so large that it won't be classified as a "light vehicle," the category for normal-sized cars, trucks and SUVs. ...

Vehicles like the Hummer H1, H2 and Excursion are not considered "light trucks" (because their GVWR was over 8500 lbs) and thus were exempt from fuel economy testing and hurting GM's and Ford's CAFE numbers.

It seems that money, like gas, comes from some mysterious, infinite reservoir, and its dispensation is not related to real world factors such as IQ, availability or environment.

Yep.

Yeah, if you or anyone end up in my neck of the woods (South Bay), you should come sit in the parking lot of a local Safeway and just count the insane # of BRoD-class SUVs that come and go. And, when you look inside, almost every single one of them is being driven solo or w/minimal cargo and passengers. Gee... a small woman driving alone really needs to be driving a Ford Expedition EL (extended length) or a Yukon XL/Suburban. :roll:

Examples of such vehicles if you don't look carefully at the badges:
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:01-06_GMC_Yukon_XL_Denali.jpg" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:07-Ford-Expedition-EL.jpg" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

I've become a big EV advocate at my place of work. I've noticed that people go out of their way to tell me I should have bought a ICE powered car, or how that an electric car will not work for them, and other ways of trying to prove to me how silly of an idea an electric car is. There is lots of resistance to the idea of an EV in mainstream america, most of it not based on logic at all. Not really sure people are going to adopt it into the mainstream until they have to.

Yep. My mother is an example of one making up excuses. Other than she is horrible w/technology (and thus she'd find the Leaf SV's and beyond telematics complex), she'd be the perfect candidate for a Leaf or EV w/similar range. She basically refuses to drive on the freeway ("too fast", "makes her dizzy") and almost all of her trips are short. But, she doesn't need a new car. Her 07 Altima Hybrid (bought as a leftover in early 08) is totally fine.

I've heard her make statements along the lines of the range isn't enough, it'd be "scary" to have so little range, that one has to keep "worrying" about range, etc. I need to run some of what I her trip lengths are. For a typical trip that she might do say from home, to where I live, to a relative's house and then back home, it's less than 16 miles total! None of it is highway.

Sometimes she heads to some Asian supermarket in Cupertino. If she added that into the above trip, it's still only 40 miles total.

 

[donald]

... naysayer arguments are generally framed around comparisons of EVs to traditional ICE vehicles on the basis of cost and convenience ... but are we facing a near term potential for a disruption in oil supply?

If fossil/liquid fuels dry up, EVs are no solution whatsoever.

The issue is not whether the average commuter can get to work. That would become immaterial. A bunch of office workers not turning up for a few days at a time happens routinely in national holiday times, already.

What counts is whether trucks hauling food and other essentials will be able to move around. Lose that, and society collapses. The Western world is a couple of meal-times away from anarchy.

Last I hear, no-one's yet made, let alone bought, a 40 ton goods EV capable of nation-wide deliveries.

 

[thankyouOB]

the real risk is already here and too many are ignoring it.
gasoline and other petroleum products should be used for vehicles that cant be run on electricity -- planes, long-haul trucks, construction diesels -- so we can minimize GHG.
otherwise we are dooming our grandchildren and theirs.
that folks -- even smart folks -- dont see that or seem to care, and would rather point fingers and laugh at EVs, as described by our aerospace industry colleague, is sad and ignorant.

 

[klapauzius]

In the worst case, you can always liquefy coal.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fischer%E2%80%93Tropsch_process" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

I think this is economically feasible at ~ $140 per barrel. (http://www.ogj.com/articles/print/volume-106/issue-40/general-interest/economics-on-fischer-tropsch-coal-to-liquids-method-updated.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false
As a stop-gap measure to keep food and goods moving this should work. Germany ran significant parts of its wartime economy on this during WW2

And there is natural gas. It is easier to retrofit a truck to run on NG than to make it work with electricity.

So anarchy and food shortages are not really a problem if there is an oil-crunch, but it would amount to something like war-time situation, so would require a lot of top-down organization and discipline.

Anyway, long range transportation could be moved back to railroad and short range would probably work with electric.

 

[donald]

In the worst case, you can always liquefy coal.

As a stop-gap measure to keep food and goods moving this should work. Germany ran significant parts of its wartime economy on this during WW2

That's the sort of thing a politician would say - and only they would believe it!

In 2 days, haulage trucks start running out of fuel. In 4 days, most of the fleet is off the road. In 6 days, 98% of shops are completely empty of food. In 8 days, the government declares a state of emergency. In 10 days they start shooting looters. In 12 day, society collapses.

Worst case, 12 days - do you really think industrial quantities of haulage fuel could be delivered in that time by coal liquefaction to avoid the above consequences? No-one would be giving a flying hoot about environmental concerns at that point, let alone worrying if a Leaf could do 188 miles on a charge!

 

[klapauzius]

In the worst case, you can always liquefy coal.

As a stop-gap measure to keep food and goods moving this should work. Germany ran significant parts of its wartime economy on this during WW2

That's the sort of thing a politician would say - and only they would believe it!

In 2 days, haulage trucks start running out of fuel. In 4 days, most of the fleet is off the road. In 6 days, 98% of shops are completely empty of food. In 8 days, the government declares a state of emergency. In 10 days they start shooting looters. In 12 day, society collapses.

Worst case, 12 days - do you really think industrial quantities of haulage fuel could be delivered in that time by coal liquefaction to avoid the above consequences? No-one would be giving a flying hoot about environmental concerns at that point, let alone worrying if a Leaf could do 188 miles on a charge!

Why do you think that in only 2 days, trucks could run out of fuel? What event, other than a massive natural disaster (super volcano eruption, mega-asteroid strike etc.), would cause fuel supplies and production to go to zero in just 2 days???? No political event could cause a shortage on this scale.

If you think about current Geo-political events, there will be plenty of time to plan ahead.
Keep in mind that most of the oil the US uses comes from the western hemisphere (53% of all imports), not the middle east. Even if we had to run on domestic supplies alone, that would be 60% of what we use now. This could be prioritized to e.g. keep the food supply going.

 

[cwerdna]

It is hard for me to see a '70s-style shortage again. Very little of the oil used in the USA comes from the Persian Gulf or from OPEC countries in general.

If you click thru the links under the Supply column of http://www.eia.gov/energyexplained/index.cfm?page=oil_home#tab2" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;, you'l eventually get to http://www.eia.gov/dnav/pet/hist/LeafHandler.ashx?n=PET&s=MTTIMUSPG2&f=A" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; and http://www.eia.gov/dnav/pet/hist/LeafHandler.ashx?n=PET&s=MTTIMXX2&f=A" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;.

We currently import far more oil from the Persian gulf than we did in 1973 and it's about level w/the late 70s. For OPEC, same goes for 1973 but it is now down from late 70s levels, at ~4.2 million barrels/day instead of ~5 to ~6.x million barrels/day.

 

[LTLFTcomposite]

If fossil/liquid fuels dry up, EVs are no solution whatsoever.

The issue is not whether the average commuter can get to work. That would become immaterial. A bunch of office workers not turning up for a few days at a time happens routinely in national holiday times, already.

What counts is whether trucks hauling food and other essentials will be able to move around. Lose that, and society collapses. The Western world is a couple of meal-times away from anarchy.

Last I hear, no-one's yet made, let alone bought, a 40 ton goods EV capable of nation-wide deliveries.

I wasn't thinking about any long term situation, just a disruption of a few weeks maybe. More panic than substance.
Indeed our world runs in diesel fuel, not gasoline. Either way you'd see some sort of rationing or allocation, and priorities would be set.

 

[donald]

Why do you think that in only 2 days, trucks could run out of fuel? What event, other than a massive natural disaster (super volcano eruption, mega-asteroid strike etc.), would cause fuel supplies and production to go to zero in just 2 days???? No political event could cause a shortage on this scale.

... and at what point would people finally realise 'Ah! We are now inevitably going to run out of reserves in 2 days - better crank up those non-existent coal-to-liquid fuel factories'!!!! :?:

Your faith in human nature and their commitment to apply exactly the right solution, before it becomes obligatory for them to act, is a lot greater than mine!

I can assure you that the time taken between a final groan by the politicians/'those in charge' to commit to go ahead with implementing a multi-billion dollar solution of coal-to-liquid to a problem they are hoping will simply go away may be even less than two days to the fuel finally running out. More likely, several weeks after, which would have already meant riots in the streets.

The ideal that coal-to-liquid is a solution that could be implemented 'cold' is ridiculous. In fact, and 'solution' that requires a start-up period is a pointless suggestion. Unless it is a current process that can be quickly up-scaled, then it isn't a solution to what would happen if the tap gets turned off. And nor are EVs.

 

[cwerdna]

In the worst case, you can always liquefy coal.

As a stop-gap measure to keep food and goods moving this should work. Germany ran significant parts of its wartime economy on this during WW2

That's the sort of thing a politician would say - and only they would believe it!

In 2 days, haulage trucks start running out of fuel. In 4 days, most of the fleet is off the road. In 6 days, 98% of shops are completely empty of food. In 8 days, the government declares a state of emergency. In 10 days they start shooting looters. In 12 day, society collapses.

Worst case, 12 days - do you really think industrial quantities of haulage fuel could be delivered in that time by coal liquefaction to avoid the above consequences? No-one would be giving a flying hoot about environmental concerns at that point, let alone worrying if a Leaf could do 188 miles on a charge!

While I doubt coal liquefaction could suddenly occur, I think your 2, 4, etc. day scenarios are wrong. http://www.eia.gov/energyexplained/index.cfm?page=oil_home#tab2" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; lists the size of the Strategic Petroleum Reserve. Assuming we somehow had 0 domestic oil production and 0 imports, if we drew only the SPR and maintained current consumption rates, it'd last us 36-38 days. I'm sure there'd be panic coupled w/mandated rationing to stretch it out longer.

There are also other stocks. Click on U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve link at the above page for their sizes.

However, if refining all suddenly stopped too, then we'd have HUGE problems.

 

[donald]

While I doubt coal liquefaction could suddenly occur, I think your 2, 4, etc. day scenarios are wrong. http://www.eia.gov/energyexplained/index.cfm?page=oil_home#tab2" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; lists the size of the Strategic Petroleum Reserve.

You might well be right, but at the end of however long it is before the distribution trucks stop rolling, that's the timescale. Days or weeks, EVs are no solution.

And, besides, who is in control of petroleum reserves? The Gov would release the fuel for public use in moderation for the first few days, maybe a week or so. But if it was looking likely it was going to be months or years, than days, before the taps come back on then the Gov would keep it for themselves, not let it out to general public use because all that will do is stretch out when the inevitable happens, at which point they'd otherwise have little fuel left to police the resultant social collapse.

The issue of EVs in all this is not whether EVs are able to keep commuters rolling around to their cubicle jobs, but whether EVs can adequately replace fossil-burning haulage. Passenger EVs are a first, and learning, step. That's good. That's the part they will play on this - the test bed by which the technology can be extended to commercial vehicles.

 

[DaveinOlyWA]

While I doubt coal liquefaction could suddenly occur, I think your 2, 4, etc. day scenarios are wrong. http://www.eia.gov/energyexplained/index.cfm?page=oil_home#tab2" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; lists the size of the Strategic Petroleum Reserve.

You might well be right, but at the end of however long it is before the distribution trucks stop rolling, that's the timescale. Days or weeks, EVs are no solution.

And, besides, who is in control of petroleum reserves? The Gov would release the fuel for public use in moderation for the first few days, maybe a week or so. But if it was looking likely it was going to be months or years, than days, before the taps come back on then the Gov would keep it for themselves, not let it out to general public use because all that will do is stretch out when the inevitable happens, at which point they'd otherwise have little fuel left to police the resultant social collapse.

The issue of EVs in all this is not whether EVs are able to keep commuters rolling around to their cubicle jobs, but whether EVs can adequately replace fossil-burning haulage. Passenger EVs are a first, and learning, step. That's good. That's the part they will play on this - the test bed by which the technology can be extended to commercial vehicles.

i think you have been watching too much "Revolution"

we are all under the illusion that countries cannot agree on anything and that is probably not far from the truth. what is true though is corporations can and do agree on basic tenets and that is "keep the oil flowing" and that agreement supercedes any governmental influence on the planet.

Nothing will happen in the Middle East or anywhere else for that matter until at least 3 alternative fuel sources are determined. a catastrophic failure of the oil delivery system is ONLY possible on TV...

 

[klapauzius]

... and at what point would people finally realise 'Ah! We are now inevitably going to run out of reserves in 2 days - better crank up those non-existent coal-to-liquid fuel factories'!!!! :?:

Your faith in human nature and their commitment to apply exactly the right solution, before it becomes obligatory for them to act, is a lot greater than mine!

I can assure you that the time taken between a final groan by the politicians/'those in charge' to commit to go ahead with implementing a multi-billion dollar solution of coal-to-liquid to a problem they are hoping will simply go away may be even less than two days to the fuel finally running out. More likely, several weeks after, which would have already meant riots in the streets.

The ideal that coal-to-liquid is a solution that could be implemented 'cold' is ridiculous. In fact, and 'solution' that requires a start-up period is a pointless suggestion. Unless it is a current process that can be quickly up-scaled, then it isn't a solution to what would happen if the tap gets turned off. And nor are EVs.

I am still curious which event you think would be stealthy, yet powerful enough to leave us in a "sudden" no-oil-and-gas scenario?
Also, there are several coal and gas liquefaction plants in operation world wide already, some even in the US.

I think people will clamor for a solution long before the situation becomes critical, when it is about individual mobility. Because that is something that is really, really,really important to people.

If the price of gas can be part of serious political debates in times, when no shortages are in sight, I am confident that considerable efforts would be made long before real shortages occur.

We will eventually run out of (cheap) gas , of course, but over a longer time period. Time enough to adapt and in the long run, EVs can and will be the solution.

For personal transportation, working technology is already in place and all that is needed is a bit more infrastructure and lower prices. The Tesla S can already go far enough I think to remove range anxiety completely, if only it weren't so expensive.
If we have a $30k EV that can go 200 -250 miles and QC infrastructure that allows for restoring that range in 10-20 minutes, then EVs could very well become mainstream.

Probably fuel cells could work for commercial transportation.

 

[donald]

I am still curious which event you think would be stealthy, yet powerful enough to leave us in a "sudden" no-oil-and-gas scenario?

Whatever caused the previous occasions, but that were nicely remedied by the taps turning back on again just in time.

The premise of the thread is that such occasions can and will happen, so I have no reason to justify an answer to you. That they have would appear to support they may again, and for much longer periods.

 

[dgpcolorado]

If you click thru the links under the Supply column of http://www.eia.gov/energyexplained/index.cfm?page=oil_home#tab2" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;, you'l eventually get to http://www.eia.gov/dnav/pet/hist/LeafHandler.ashx?n=PET&s=MTTIMUSPG2&f=A" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; and http://www.eia.gov/dnav/pet/hist/LeafHandler.ashx?n=PET&s=MTTIMXX2&f=A" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;.

We currently import far more oil from the Persian gulf than we did in 1973 and it's about level w/the late 70s. For OPEC, same goes for 1973 but it is now down from late 70s levels, at ~4.2 million barrels/day instead of ~5 to ~6.x million barrels/day.

But it is a much smaller fraction of the total. Using your links:

USA consumption: 18.7 million bbl/day (2009, probably somewhat higher today)
Persian Gulf imports: 2.15 million bbl/day (2012), perhaps 11% if the numbers for different years are comparable.

A complete OPEC embargo seems unlikely and even the first one was somewhat "leaky" because most smaller countries in OPEC live hand-to-mouth from their oil revenue. But the proportion of oil used in the USA from OPEC in the '70s was large. (Hence, the creation of the Strategic Petroleum Reserve to smooth out temporary supply disruptions.)

Yes, gas lines could happen if Iran disrupts traffic through the Strait of Hormuz. But it strikes me as unlikely because the oil supply pattern has changed a lot since the '70s. However, once a panic develops sometimes events take on a momentum of their own (as was the case when everyone filled their gas tanks, thus depleting stocks of gasoline at gas stations and refineries).

 

[GRA]

It seems that money, like gas, comes from some mysterious, infinite reservoir, and its dispensation is not related to real world factors such as IQ, availability or environment.

Yep.

Yeah, if you or anyone end up in my neck of the woods (South Bay), you should come sit in the parking lot of a local Safeway and just count the insane # of BRoD-class SUVs that come and go. And, when you look inside, almost every single one of them is being driven solo or w/minimal cargo and passengers. Gee... a small woman driving alone really needs to be driving a Ford Expedition EL (extended length) or a Yukon XL/Suburban. :roll:

Examples of such vehicles if you don't look carefully at the badges:
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:01-06_GMC_Yukon_XL_Denali.jpg" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:07-Ford-Expedition-EL.jpg" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e4QgWRycd7I" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

 

[klapauzius]

I am still curious which event you think would be stealthy, yet powerful enough to leave us in a "sudden" no-oil-and-gas scenario?

Whatever caused the previous occasions, but that were nicely remedied by the taps turning back on again just in time.

The premise of the thread is that such occasions can and will happen, so I have no reason to justify an answer to you. That they have would appear to support they may again, and for much longer periods.

I think you missed the question mark in the title of the thread. This is more about possibility. No one postulated that they can and will happen and in fact, events like you describe, never have.
There was no anarchy nor food shortages in response to the oil crunch in the 70s.
But feel free to provide a likely doomsday scenario that would lead to chaos and anarchy....Not sure if it would still be good for a movie script (these ideas are after all somewhat stale already), but it could still be fun to read.

 

[donald]

I think you missed the question mark in the title of the thread. This is more about possibility. No one postulated that they can and will happen

errr ... I'm not going to get into a tit-for-tat with you, only to say that I think you've missed the words in the question!

The question I understood was "Will EVs make a difference, in the circumstances that oil supply is disrupted?" [and NOT "will oil supplies be disrupted", which seems to be what you want to discuss].

My answer is simply that if a disruption in oil supply [OP's words] is not enough to disrupt distribution networks, then no. The few EV owners will feel smug and gloat as they glide by the queues at the gas stations. But that's about it.

And if it is enough to disrupt distribution networks, then EVs currently present no solution to that problem although they may be a technological stepping stone to electric goods vehicles of the future.

...I've said my piece, now. It'd be rude to repeat myself.

 

[LTLFTcomposite]

Actually no, the original question wasn't whether EVs can somehow instantly eliminate the need for oil in US industry and transportation, of course that is silly. I was contemplating a gas supply hiccup at the retail level triggering a newfound appetite for EVs among a motoring public that by and large finds comfort in an unending, unquestioned attachment to the status quo. It doesn't even need to be a long term issue, just enough to cast a shadow of doubt in what most take for granted, that you'll always be able to pull up to a pump anywhere anytime and get whatever you desire.

 

[LTLFTcomposite]

To give the whole notion some plausibility, I recall it must have been about 1975 hearing about long waiting lists for the VW Rabbit diesel despite dealers gouging $12k for the car, which was a ton of money for the day. People can get whacky if their mobility is threatened. They will worry about how they will get to the store and won't think ahead to whether there will be anything there to buy when they get there.