Energy Security

[Simon.D]

Hear hear. I think I could get on well with Mr Simmons...

He gave a very good lecture in UL yesterday.. Put things in perspective..

[St Disibod]

Supply fears as oil costs hit record $74 high
Warning over jobs as price of oil hits new high...
Warning of 'energy war' from former Bush aide...
Getting pumped up on plan to cut reliance on pricey oil...

SPN, you said you wanted a debate.

Lets have a debate on FACTS, and a debate based on good old fashioned LSD (Pounds, Shillings and Pence).

Could you break away from copying and pasting reports for just one second and answer the questions or engange in dialogue of any sort. I could respond in kind-

The International Energy Agency is, for the first time in its 30-year history, to support a study likely to make the case for greater reliance on nuclear power. The agency, which represents 26 developed countries, looks set to conclude that nuclear power also offers the best solution for governments wishing to meet their emissions targets.

But this does not achieve anything unless there is recognition from each side that the other said something. RTÉ will be running a drama soon that portrays Ireland both during and after a catastrophic accident at Sellafield- not in itself a bad thing, but in the context of a looming debate on energy it is risky). Balanced debate is being pushed off a cliff and you are doing nothing to stop its slipping off.

For the nth time, the question posed are:

Do you pay VAT & PSL on wind electricity ? What is the capital cost set up like vs earnings ? Are there grants available for set up ?

Tell me, where does your business source its electricity on a day with little or no wind? If it's the national grid- don't you think it would be remarkably foolish for it to rely on the precise same energy source that is not available that day?

a) What brand is your car?
b) What model is your car?
c) Where did you get the engine upgraded?
d) Which vegetable oil/oils does it run on?
e) Where do you get the vegetable oil that it runs on?

[SPN]

Sweden goes for green as Nordics mull energy future

"We have to transform into a non-oil economy," said Stefan Edman, who heads the Swedish government's oil dependency panel. "We have very high ambitions, although I don't think it is realistic that not a drop of oil will be used in 2020."

Sweden has already cut oil use in home heating by 70 percent in the last 20 years and has kept consumption flat in industry since 1994, despite a 70 percent increase in production.

The big challenge will be to do something about oil used in the transport sector, where it accounts for 98 percent of energy used, said Professor Christian Azar at Chalmers University of Technology in Gothenburg, also on the oil panel.

"If we could achieve a 50 percent reduction, that would be an enormous achievement."

While worries about oil prices and supply and climate change are major drivers, the government also hopes that environmental technology will be a money-spinner for Swedish companies.

"Sweden has a chance to be an international model and a successful actor in export markets for alternative solutions," said Mona Sahlin, minister for sustainable development.

"The aim is to break dependence on fossil fuels by 2020. By then, no home will need oil for heating. By then, no motorist will be obliged to use petrol as the sole option available. By then, there will be better alternatives to oil."

By way of contrast, here's the analysis you get when you ask an economist to look at the topic.

Challenge of energy security

IMPROVING the security of energy supplies has moved to the top of global political priorities, and Australia's gas industry stands to benefit.
It is not just the dark threats from Iran's Interior Minister Mustafa Pourmohammadi to use his nation's oil supplies and control of the Hormuz Strait as a weapon in its tussle with the United States over its nuclear ambitions that has world leaders on edge.

It was weather, not war, that propelled oil above $US70 a barrel in October last year as world markets counted the cost of hurricanes in the Gulf of Mexico.

There are many other threats. Nigeria's exports of 2.5 million barrels a day are jeopardised by ethnic conflict. The Italian oil firm ENI declaring force majeur on its Nigerian contracts last week pushed prices up $2 a barrel.

Two sharply different approaches have developed on how to deal with the gathering uncertainty.


.....

There are abundant alternative sources of oil if prices are sustained at levels above $US60 a barrel, including gas-to-liquids projects, Canada's Athabascar tar sands (with more contained oil than Saudi Arabia) and resources such as Queensland's oil shale.

He says the real nature of the oil market emerged at a recent conference.

"The oil majors were asking the Saudis what their target price was. The Saudis were asking the oil majors what their cost of alternative supply was. That is the kind of game that is being played.

"OPEC (Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries) is restricting supply. There is a lot of evidence they have some kind of target price, but they don't want to trigger the alternative substitutes."

The problem for the oil majors is that they don't want to make the big investments in these projects if the prices is going to fall back below their break-even.

In a tape distributed in late 2004, Osama bin Ladan said oil should be priced at more than $US100 a barrel. Professor Hartley says that in the nightmare scenario of forces friendly to al-Qa'ida toppling the Saudi regime, the market would be swamped by unconventional oil.

While they peddle their ideological w4nk, and are taken seriously by clueless politicians, the opportunities outlined in the Sweden article are being missed.

[St Disibod]

While they peddle their ideological w4nk

How's the business going SPN? Figment of your imagination? And your car- non-existent also?

Or are the details just top secret?

Once again:

Do you pay VAT & PSL on wind electricity ? What is the capital cost set up like vs earnings ? Are there grants available for set up ?

Tell me, where does your business source its electricity on a day with little or no wind? If it's the national grid- don't you think it would be remarkably foolish for it to rely on the precise same energy source that is not available that day?

a) What brand is your car?
b) What model is your car?
c) Where did you get the engine upgraded?
d) Which vegetable oil/oils does it run on?
e) Where do you get the vegetable oil that it runs on?

[SPN]

Irish farmers may hold the key to solving the country’s energy

Junior Finance Minister Tom Parlon told party colleagues the potential for farmers to grow energy crops in the Republic was significant if the government created the right framework.

.....

“I believe firmly that if the Irish Government creates the right market framework, that energy crops such as rape seed, elephant grass and willow offer farmers a new source of income and a solution to the challenges of energy security and meeting our Kyoto obligations.”

Mr Parlon, a former Irish Farmers Association president, said there would have to be a change in agricultural practices and thinking, with producers focussing on the energy market as well as the food market.

.....

If the 35,000 hectares of land traditionally used for sugar beet were switched to rape oil production, it would meet 1.5% to 2% of our diesel requirements,” he said.

“Expanding the area under rape to 70,000 hectares, which equates to 17.5% of the total tillage area, would permit us to achieve the EU Directive target for the introduction of bio-fuels in the transport sector by 2010.”

Note the most important line in that whole article:... if the government created the right framework ...

The only framework that will deliver the best quality, quantity and price is a guaranteed purchase scheme. Some tweaking to give priority to producer owned Co-Ops over multinationals would be a positive move from a Rural Development (and strategic infrastructure) perspective, but Multinationals have bigger Cost of Sales (and Brown Envelope) budgets.

It will be very interesting to see if Dempsey, Coughlan and, most importantly, Cowen, can pull together a medium term strategy and get it up and running.

[cyberianpan]

Irish farmers may hold the key to solving the country’s energy

Junior Finance Minister Tom Parlon told party colleagues the potential for farmers to grow energy crops in the Republic was significant if the government created the right framework.

.....

“I believe firmly that if the Irish Government creates the right market framework, that energy crops such as rape seed, elephant grass and willow offer farmers a new source of income and a solution to the challenges of energy security and meeting our Kyoto obligations.”

Mr Parlon, a former Irish Farmers Association president, said there would have to be a change in agricultural practices and thinking, with producers focussing on the energy market as well as the food market.

.....

If the 35,000 hectares of land traditionally used for sugar beet were switched to rape oil production, it would meet 1.5% to 2% of our diesel requirements,” he said.

“Expanding the area under rape to 70,000 hectares, which equates to 17.5% of the total tillage area, would permit us to achieve the EU Directive target for the introduction of bio-fuels in the transport sector by 2010.”

Note the most important line in that whole article:... if the government created the right framework ...

The only framework that will deliver the best quality, quantity and price is a guaranteed purchase scheme. Some tweaking to give priority to producer owned Co-Ops over multinationals would be a positive move from a Rural Development (and strategic infrastructure) perspective, but Multinationals have bigger Cost of Sales (and Brown Envelope) budgets.

It will be very interesting to see if Dempsey, Coughlan and, most importantly, Cowen, can pull together a medium term strategy and get it up and running.

Come on guys ! Get the centrally planned economy going !

[SPN]

Over-reacting to nuclear power after the oil light flickers

Nuclear power is very hard to price accurately, when decommissioning and storage costs are added (making secondhand stations more expensive). But, at $75 a barrel, nuclear may begin to save money. The same is true of wind and renewable resources. At these prices they can begin to compete, but they would not save as much as could be wrung from better conservation.

.....

Non-fossil fuels are needed, not to make energy cheaper, but as security, in case supply is cut off, as also happened in the Seventies.

.....

This makes it all the more inexplicable that the Corrib gas field row is allowed to rumble on.

Either the plans are safe and the developers should get on with it, or they are not - in which case Shell should be sent to sea. If only there were someone to take charge, but that seems too much to ask these days.

Debate gravitates towards headlines, like wasps to jam, which is why there is so much talk about nuclear power and so little about wind, conservation, or even the scandal of Corrib. The world may well decide it must have more nuclear power, but we're a long way from the point where it is essential for Ireland.

Excellent Commentary!

[St Disibod]

What ever happened SPN? We used to talk.

Grow up you silly child!

That is a lie!...That is a lie!...That is BS...That is BS...Irrelevant...That is a lie...That is a lie, actually, two lies [one of those apperently being my suggestion that "there is a lot of room for bio-fuels in running our cars"] ...That is a lie...Is that three lies, or four?... I'm not rubbishing your arguments, I am pointing out your barefaced lies.

You aren't going to get a debate if all you can do is tell barefaced lies. You don't seriously expect me to indulge in a charade whereby I waste time and effort rebutting your obvious falsehoods do you?

If you want a debate, lets have a debate.

If you want to confuse and distract, prepare to be called on it.

:!:

Whether you are a knave or a fool is immaterial

Tell me, where does your business source its electricity on a day with little or no wind? If it's the national grid- don't you think it would be remarkably foolish for it to rely on the precise same energy source that is not available that day?

a) What brand is your car?
b) What model is your car?
c) Where did you get the engine upgraded?
d) Which vegetable oil/oils does it run on?
e) Where do you get the vegetable oil that it runs on?

And we never talked again. But sure, there must be a good reason why you don't answer these questions.

[SPN]

Oil prices: Are we staring down the barrel?

The oil crisis of 1979 - 1980 certainly had a dramatic impact on the global economy.

Indeed, it brought significant hardship to our own small, oil-dependent nation at the time. Growth slowed for five consecutive years (and even turned negative in 1983), redundancies increased fourfold over the same period, while prices increased by over 20 per cent in 1981. Not a healthy mix of indicators.

.....

Overall, taxes and duties account for over 50 per cent of the price of petrol at the pump. Could some of this be foregone to give drivers some leeway? While such a concept looks good in theory, in practice, the benefits in terms of price reductions could be quite modest. Given the price inelasticity of petrol - people tend to buy the same amount no matter what the price - the extra revenue could simply end up in the pocket of the garage owner instead.

Not a very satisfactory solution.

.....

Alternatives to oil have been mooted since the 1970s in the Western world. And it isn’t just the oil-importing nations that are aware that high energy prices could accelerate a shift into other resources.

Responding to the tripling of oil prices in 2000, the former Saudi oil minister, Sheik Yamani, commented that the ‘‘Stone Age came to an end, not because we had a lack of stones, and the Oil Age will come to an end, not because we have a lack of oil’’.

He also suggested at the time that other technologies would lead to an almost 100 per cent decline in gasoline consumption by the end of the decade. Will he be proved right on the first point?

.....

There are alternatives, but most of these look a long way off from being implemented and so will not help alleviate some of the pressure in the short-term.

First, given the antipathy that the Irish public has shown toward Sellafield, coupled with the extortionate cost of development, it is unlikely that Ireland will go down the nuclear route.

Second, while Ireland has a surplus of an invisible resource in the form of wind, investment in this area remains well below the level needed to eat into Ireland’s dependency on oil.

So oil’s importance is here to stay for the medium-term at least, and households and businesses will have to find away of dealing with it. For consumers, it is a long way off the mile-long queues at local petrol stations, which became familiar in earlier crises.

[St Disibod]

SPN, you have just written more opinionated, lengthy gobbledygook that completely ignores any challenges laid down to the substance of your claims. You have asked for "a debate," a "proper debate," and a "debate on facts," yet you have consistently steered away from such debate.

If you want to confuse and distract, prepare to be called on it.

I can keep badgering you on this for some time. You have accused me of lieing, stupidity and knavishness in the face of the fact that I provided links and footnotes to reputable sources for each of my claims.

Rather than responding in type, I shall continue to reiterate the questions already posted until you provide satisfactory answers. When I responded you unleashed a tirade of abuse. I assure you I will be more cordial.