Eddie Hobbs: "We are now at Peak Oil"

[meriwether2]

Not to worry, we as a country shall retain our non-nuclear purity.

We will continue to invest in windfarms, while at the same time get around the energy inefficieny by importing nuclear generated energy from France and UK.

[Derek123]

To be fair to Hobbs he has been consistently writing in his magazine and in the national press for the past four years on this topic. He's also said that he has a book written on the subject so painting him as a Johnny come lately opportunist is a bit foolish. He mentioned the IEA study. If you read it you'll see that the game is up. As for peak property Hobbs was also consistent. He called the Irish market. Brendan Invts focus was on Germany, counter cyclical to the Irish situation which was in a bubble. AFAIK German prime property is in reasonable nick and if they're smart they'll be still in cash, so he got the timing right I'd say.

Hobbs takes a lot of stick from critics but if you look closely at his record he's been pretty accurate. The price war saving potentially 10% on grocery costs which he predicted and was criticised for doing so is now happening as consumers switch to price first behaviour. Whatever about his motives if he's prepared to take on the Greens on their own patch and stake his reputation on the analysis he's conducted that is not an unwelcome step in raising the issue nationally. Based on his record I'd venture that he's probably as well read as one can be on this complex subject. He's chaired an ASPO convention in Cork some years ago and is active on pursuing an interconnector to France based on his media interviews so give the guy some credit for intelligence.

[amblincork]

We'd actually have to build two Nukes, otherwise what would we do when one of them is down?

More importantly though, Nukes cost too much, take too long to build, wouldn't fit on our grid, are not commercially viable (would require massive taxpayer subsidies), and we would still be relying on foreign sources of Uranium (which will peak very quick if lots of new Nukes are built).

Someone else mentioned incineration: After peak oil, the amount of plastics we can produce will diminish, so the waste stream will decline massively in terms of energy content. Then what?

This is just the usual stereo type response from the Green Party's Propoganda Unit's 'Easy anwers to inconvenient Questions Leaflet'.
Notice the point regarding non production of plastic. The reality is that as transport initiatives such as electric cars become more successful and cheaper, more and more of the worlds stock of oil will go to production of industrial products.
One of the fallacies about the increasing change to renewable energy is the unspken suggestion that the words remaining massive oil supplies will not be used.
this is incorrect, all the worlds recoverable stocks of oil will be used for some products or other.

[amblincork]

Ps aother thread has shown that the world has ample supplies of uranium and that alternative materials are available.

[amblincork]

Ps aother thread has shown that the world has ample supplies of uranium and that alternative materials are available.

Here we are thearticle on uraniuim
number of members raised the limited supplies of uranium as an objection to the use of nuclear power so this letter from today's Irish Times offers reassurance on that point:
Madam, – Tom Kelly (June 16th) points out that supplies of uranium are limited. The Nuclear Energy Agency of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) recently published (June 2006) the latest edition of its Red Book, a publication which has reported on uranium resources, production and demand over decades. The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) of the United Nations also participates in the gathering of the data contained. The document states that the amount of uranium available today is 4.7 million tonnes, which is enough to fuel the present fleet of reactors for 85 years. However, it goes on to state that based on geological evidence some 35 million tonnes are available for exploitation.

By 2025 the world nuclear energy capacity is expected to grow to by between 22 per cent and 44 per cent, but the OECD believes the currently identified resources are adequate to meet this expansion.

In the longer term, continuing advances in nuclear technology will allow substantially better utilisation of these resources: reactors will be capable of extracting some 50 to 60 times as much energy from the uranium as present-day reactors do. There is sufficient uranium available to power nuclear reactors for the foreseeable future; also, it is expected that other elements such as thorium will be used to fuel fission reactors. In the long term fusion energy will provide virtually endless power. – Yours, etc,

DAVID SOWBY,

Now if the Greenies are willing to make silly statements on issues like uranium, ones that can be so easily refuted, how can they expect to be taken seriuousily about the real issues like global warming ?
I am becoming increasingly convinced that there are many in the Green Party who are actually damaging the environmental cause in the pursuit of political power.

[The OD]

Rain is one undertapped energy resource, not something that you hear about much, but it can be very beneficial for sporadic energy requirements. Work is already afoot in turning raindrops into kinetic energy and think of all the waste of energy when it is raining - we have guttering and drainage pipe, we could easily harness the energy release and turn it into power.

These ideas, of course, would only provide a small and intermittant supply of power, but every little decrease in carbon emitting energy sources is to be welcome. Between solar power, wind power, rain kinetic energy and possibly geo-thermal taps in areas where its viable, we could make a serious dent in our fossil fuel dependency. Add to that wave power, bio-fuels, cleaner burning of waste gases like methane from farm slurry etc.

What do we get from the department of the environment?

F*ckin' wood chip stove grants......FFS.....*

We need a serious look at energy security in this country, I am serverely disappointed with the Greens tenure in energy and the environment, even the programs they are working on are seriously short on vision and are just rejigged ideas borrowed from elsewhere.


(I'm posting the exact same post on the '' Rain - We cant even handle rain! - In Ireland' thread)

(I know there are many other schemes available, but I have highlighted this one for its plain old lack of imagination).

[SPN]

Whatever about his motives if he's prepared to take on the Greens on their own patch and stake his reputation on the analysis he's conducted that is not an unwelcome step in raising the issue nationally.

How do you reckon he is "taking on the Greens"?

Do you not remember his endorsement of the Greens the week before the Election?

"In the coming age of scarcity the prosperity or ruin of the Irish economy pivots on the speed that we can become energy independent. The Greens get it. So does Obama. That’s why, even though facing the huge challenge of living with Fianna Fáil, the Greens continue to get my support."

The Greens have been warning about Peak Oil for years. The Greens are the only Party with an Energy Policy focused on Energy Security. Eamon Ryan chaired sessions at ASPO Conferences years ago, and was keynote speaker at one of them.

Here's a thread that I started back in 2006: Energy Security

We also have a long running thread debunking the myths about the suitability of Nukes on the Irish Grid: Nuclear Power


The IEA stated last November, after going back and completely revisiting their numbers, that oil production is going to drop at up to 8.7% per annum because new output will not compensate for output lost. That will lead to massive price increases, and spot shortages (like happened last year).


It is very difficult to get Uranium dug, refined and transported to where it is needed if there are shortages of fuel oil to power the diggers, trucks, crushers, graders, trains and ships.

[amblincork]

How do you reckon he is "taking on the Greens"?

Do.
Here's a thread that I started back in 2006: Energy Security

We also have a long running thread debunking the myths about the suitability of Nukes on the Irish Grid: Nuclear Power


.
It is very difficult to get Uranium dug, refined and transported to where it is needed if there are shortages of fuel oil to power the diggers, trucks, crushers, graders, trains and ships.

This is an example of SPN's posts of this thread that supposedly debunked the Nuclear issSPN
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Over on page 6 of the Energy Security Thread we see a couple of slow learners who are still swallowing the half baked talking points put out by the PR Department of some Nuke Manufacturer - deja vu all over again.

Time to resurrect this thread so we can help them see the light.


Here's a piece that gives us an insight into the reality of the Nuke Building situation, as opposed to the faffy illogical and easily refuted talking points put out by Areva's PR man, Robert Davies.



French nuclear "flagship" holed below the water line

Quote:
France — France’s nuclear safety agency today took the commendable step of ordering construction work to be halted on the concrete base slab of the new European Pressurised Reactor, Flamanville 3, in northern France. Over recent months, the agency’s inspectors have uncovered a string of chronic faults in construction -- which only began in December 2007.

Issues seem to have come to a head on 21 May. Maybe that explains why Anne Lauvergeon, Chief Executive Officer of AREVA, the French nuclear company aggressively backing the European Pressurised Reactor (EPR), ‘exploded’ when we handed her a copy of the Greenpeace ‘EPR Survival Kit’ during the European Nuclear Energy Forum on the 22nd.

Apparently, for nuclear regulators in France, enough is enough. We can only hope that their move is not merely a temporary setback to construction but the beginning of the end of a failed experiment in building the world’s largest nuclear reactors.


.... and here is a classic piece of PR Spin that is transparent enough that we can read between the lines and see that they are facing major financial and logistical problems that will probably prove insurmountable.

UK energy shortfall to be filled by gas-fired stations as nuclear reactors are built, says EDF chief

Quote:
Lack of capacity in the nuclear construction industry means that Britain will have to rely on imported natural gas to meet an emerging shortfall in power generation over the next decade, according to a senior executive of EDF, the French utility that has agreed to acquire British Energy, the nuclear power generator.

Bernard Dupraz, senior executive vice-president for power generation at EDF, said Europe did not have the engineering and construction capacity to build enough nuclear plant at sufficient speed to fill the gap left in Britain by the planned closure of elderly and obsolete power stations. “I think to fill this gap it will have to be gas-fired power stations,” he said.

.....

EDF’s preferred technology is the EPR, designed by Areva, the French utility, a nuclear reactor capable of 1.6 gigawatts of generating capacity. If four reactors are built by British Energy/EDF and perhaps a fifth plant by E.ON, the new nuclear contribution will fill less than half of the power gap forecast by the Government.

The likely solution will be the rapid construction of gas-fired power stations which could be built in a shorter time frame. Mr Dupraz said: “The problem will be solved with gas.”

However, more gas will leave Britain further exposed to energy price volatility and increase the country’s dependence on imports of fuel from Russia. It would also hamper efforts to reduce Britain’s carbon emissions.

.....

EDF’s first EPR is under construction at Flamanville in Brittany and Mr Dupraz expects it to be commissioned in 2012. The date is sensitive because Areva’s first EPR, in Olkiluoto in Finland, is two years behind schedule and suffering cost overruns. Given EDF’s commitment to a UK build programme and Britain’s anticipated power shortage, the French utility cannot afford problems at Flamanville.

.....

Thousands of British graduates will have to be trained to meet EDF’s ambition for an Anglo-French nuclear power assault on the world. Each new plant will create 2,000 jobs for the five-year construction period and require an operational staff of 300. Areva envisages a large nuclear supply chain created in the UK but indicated there was a huge task in educating and training workforces to meet the demanding standards of the nuclear industry.


These guys obviously live in a fantasy world

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"Always do right. This will gratify some people and astonish the rest." Mark Twain

To be honest I cant see how this debunks anything !

[SPN]

Is it too much to ask that you use proper quotations?

How is anybody supposed to be able to follow that post?

[EoinMn]

this is incorrect, all the worlds recoverable stocks of oil will be used for some products or other.

That's not an argument against renewable energy though, is it?