Glut? What Glut?

I read this Bloomberg piece about Calpine Corp. losing several top executives, and thereby losing the "resolve" to avoid bankruptcy. All this hinges on a sudden "glut" of electricity, leading me to ask: what glut?

Another Biodiesel Advance, From Japan

Via Slashdot, Japanese scientists have come up with a catalyst for producing biodiesel that's ten to fifty times cheaper than current methods.

Any vegetable oil can become fuel, but not until its fatty acids are converted to chemical compounds known as esters. Currently the acids used to convert the fatty acids are prohibitively expensive.

Michikazu Hara, of the Tokyo Institute of Technology in Yokohama, Japan, and his colleagues have used common, inexpensive sugars to form a recyclable solid acid that does the job on the cheap. Their research is reported in last week's issue of the journal Nature.

"We estimate the cost of the catalyst to be one-tenth to one-fiftieth that of conventional catalysts," Hara said.

The breakthrough could provide cost savings on a massive scale, he said, because the technique could fairly easily make the transition from the lab to the refinery—if interest warrants.

"We have developed this material for large-scale chemical production," Hara said. "Unfortunately, interest in biodiesel in Japan is not higher than in the U.S. and Europe."

Growing Biofuels

Interesting piece in Technology Review about a German company called Choren Industries that's found a way to use conventional agricultural waste to make biodiesel using the Fischer-Tropsch process. Previously, there were problems using such material because it tended to create tars that clogged the processing pipeline. By using a high-temperature preprocess, this eliminates that problem. Their calculations show that the process is better at re-using atmospheric carbon than conventional biodiesel, though the final result is a bit pricey at $3.10 a gallon.

Meta: Vacation

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone. Peak Oil Optimist will be going on vacation over the holiday, returning in December, most likely, though maybe earlier if my reading takes me somewhere interesting.

Wired: "Why $5 Gas Is Good For America"

The optimist's spin (well, why would you be reading this otherwise?) on peak oil is, "it's about time!" Teaser:

At the climax of his book Twilight in the Desert, Houston investment banker and energy guru Matthew Simmons describes a visit to the world's most powerful oil company, Saudi Aramco, in Dhahran. Simmons listens in horror as a senior manager reveals the kingdom's darkest secret. The old ways no longer suffice. To keep their aging wells productive, the Saudis now rely upon one information age prop after another: advanced analysis of rock cores, 3-D seismic imagery, software for diagnosing underground oil flows - all integrated using something called fuzzy logic. Fuzzy logic? The Aramco man tries to explain the science of complex systems and partial information, but Simmons hears only tidings of a bleak future. Obviously, the end of energy as we know it is nigh.

Simmons' techno-cluelessness would be funny - calling Jed Clampett with his 12-gauge! - if he weren't the spearhead of a whole hand-wringing school of petro-pessimism. The oil fields are running dry, the gas gauge is on empty, the American way of life is doomed - these ideas bob like plastic shark fins on the storm surge of current oil prices. But the history of energy innovation suggests something very different - and a lot less dire.

On The Effect Of Zombies On The Power Grid

Eric McErlain at NEI Nuclear Notes has a funny-but-interesting post up about an apocalyptic event: what if a Dawn Of The Dead type event struck and flesh-eating zombies took over? How long would the lights stay on? The answer is, it depends, with coal and gas-fired plants probably going offline first, followed by nuclear (after a year or so, depending on where they were in their fuel cycle), and then hydro. The moral: either move to Canada (where most electricity is generated by hydro), or get yourself a flatbed full of gasoline-powered generators and a couple tankers of gasoline, and sit tight.

Does The Hockey Stick Matter?

Roger Pielke, Jr. tries to answer, and essentially the answer comes back, "no", although it comes with so many qualifications you might as well give up. It's more like, "'no' if you're talking about the environment, but 'yes' if you're talking about politics", which is the principle focuse at the Hockey Team and Team Skeptic "clubhouses".

The Lithium Economy

Something the Engineer-Poet could no doubt sink his teeth into: Kevin Bullis at MIT Technology Review interviews Donald Sadoway of MIT. Sadoway thinks the hydrogen economy is a crock:

I don't believe in fuel cells for portable power. I think it's a dumb idea. The good news is: they burn hydrogen with oxygen to produce electricity, and only water vapor is the byproduct. The bad news is: you have to deal with molecular hydrogen gas, and that's what's stymieing the research and in my opinion is always going to stymie the research.

That's why I don't work on fuel cells. Where's the infrastructure? Where are we going to get hydrogen from? Hydrogen is a molecule, it's H₂. To break it apart, to get H+, you've got to go from H₂ to H, and that covalent bond is very strong. To break that bond you have to catalyze the reaction, and guess what the catalyst is? It's noble metals -- platinum and palladium. Have you seen the price of platinum? Lithium [for lithium ion batteries] is expensive. But it's not like platinum. Lithium right now is probably $40 a pound. Platinum is $500 an ounce. If I could give the fuel-cell guys platinum for $40 a pound, they would be carrying me around on their shoulders until the day I die.

So what's to replace it? Batteries!

TR: How good can batteries get?

DS: I think we could easily double [the energy capacity of] what we have right now. We have cells in the lab that, if you run the numbers for a thin-film cell of reasonable size, you end up with two to three times current lithium ion [batteries].

But there's more. The fantasy of all fantasies is chromium. If we could stabilize chromium [as a material for battery cathodes] and I could...give you a battery with 600–700 watts per kilogram [of energy capacity] with reasonable drain rate, that says good-bye hydrogen economy.

"I want these batteries so cheap you can give them away," he says, and they'd have to be for what he wants them to do. Interesting stuff, anyway.

OPEC: Oil Demand Starts Growing Again

In Rigzone, a story from OPEC in which they assess demand growth to be increasing once again, particularly in China.

Despite marginal revisions to its global growth forecasts, OPEC said "we were right to refute" talk of "demand destruction" fueled by U.S. hurricanes and surging crude and product prices.

There is, it added, "vigorous preliminary growth data from developing countries, a brighter outlook for the world economy particularly for the U.S.A and OECD Pacific countries, and a rebound in Chinese apparent demand."

On the last point, "there are indications that Chinese demand has started to pick up."

It cited Chinese government orders to rebuild oil stockpiles from as low as three days' cover to at least 10-15 days. The end of a products export rebate and a likely surge in imports ahead of the Chinese New Year likely herald a return to strong Chinese growth, it added.

Fool's Gold: An Abiotic Oil Dustup

Looks like Rigzone has pulled the plug on some abiotic oil theorists peddling a dubious potboiler of a book (Black Gold Stranglehold) following subscriber complaints. Not only that, but the principals involved appear to be leftovers from the Swift Boat Veterans gang, a bunch whose credibility is at the very least subject to some serious question. There is a very simple moral here, one that's worth repeating: if abiotic oil exists, where is it? Whoever discovers any commercially available petroleum based on this theory has a mint waiting. Yet, they do not, and so I conclude they have no leg to stand on -- yet. (Hat tip: peakoil.com.)

New IEA Report

Eric McErlain from NEI Nuclear Notes dropped me a line today pointing out this new International Energy Agency report (PDF). Nuclear energy plays an increasingly large role in the report, though they continue to believe that, absent any changes in energy use patterns, world oil production will be 115 Mbpd in 2030, a number I have a very hard time believing is possible. To arrive at that figure, increases in production for Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, and Iraq are all anticipated, interesting considering Kuwait may have peaked already.

Branson: All Boarding For Cellulosic Ethanol

Richard Branson's sick and tired of high fuel costs, so he's all over cellulosic ethanol as a fuel for his Virgin Airways.

“We are looking for alternative fuel sources. We are going to start building cellulosic ethanol plants (to make) fuel that is derived from the waste product of the plant,” he told Reuters in an interview in the oil-rich United Arab Emirates.

“It is 100 percent environmentally friendly and I believe it’s the future of fuel, and over the next 20 or 30 years I think it actually will replace the conventional fuel that you get out of the ground.”

Branson did not say where Virgin would build his factories or how economically viable cellulosic ethanol would prove. “We are in the early days,” he admitted.

Essentially, it's a "I'm sick and tired of paying high jet fuel prices and I'm not gonna take it anymore" PR move. Is cellulosic ethanol cost-effective? Stay tuned...

The Peak Oil Contrarian: Another Day In The Desert

Via peakoil.com I discovered a fascinating article in the Canadian The Globe And Mail, regarding a new piece of research attempting to rebut Matt Simmons' Twilight In The Desert, called Another Day In The Desert:

Another Day is the most widely read piece of research ever put out by independent Calgary energy consultancy Ross Smith Energy Group Ltd. and the paper supports what many technical minds had suspected: That Twilight's attempt to assess the capacity of Saudi Arabia's oil reservoirs is flawed.

"The book posits a crisis where in our opinion none exists," wrote Jim Jarrell, president of Ross Smith and author of Another Day. "We believe Twilight attempts to turn benign technical matters into crisis-level evidence."

...

"I got a comfortable feeling that [Saudi Arabia has] an unprecedented record of reservoir operations and management," he said. In his paper, he concluded that Saudi reserves are likely not overstated, that production is unlikely to collapse and that the exploration potential of the kingdom is probably better than anywhere else on Earth.

Simmons responds, with an anecdote:

"He said: 'I'm the dean of the petroleum department at the University of Texas and I've got to tell you your book was stunning. I think it's the best textbook anybody's ever done on reservoir mechanics.' ..... I've had too many responses like that to have any doubt."

Mr. Simmons said Mr. Jarrell puts too much faith in things the Saudis have said about their oil fields, suggesting that the odds of a collapse are far higher than the kingdom's assertion that it can notably boost production rates.

Ross Smith's homepage has a link to a related review (PDF) of their report appearing in the Financial Times. Well: with both sides quite certain the other's wrong, it'll be an interesting read, no doubt....

Kuwait's Burgan Field Peaks

The second-largest oil field in the world, Kuwait's Burgan, has peaked. (Hat tip: Green Car Congress.) More at The Oil Drum.

Administrivia: On Personal Attacks In The Comments

I will not suffer personal attacks on my own blog. Such comments will be deleted. That is all.

Godwin's Law No Longer Applies

I suppose the Bush Administration can't handle the fact that people are openly calling their motives and practices into question, especially now that it's become an open secret that the government uses torture to advance its means. Bush's silly and transparent line that "we do not torture" is easily rebutted with the observation that the Administration has sought to get exemptions from bans on torture. As Andrew Sullivan put it,

... why threaten to veto a law that would simply codify what Bush alleges is already the current policy? If "we do not torture," how to account for the hundreds and hundreds of cases of abuse and torture by U.S. troops, documented by the government itself? If "we do not torture," why the memos that expanded exponentially the lee-way given to the military to abuse detainees in order to get intelligence? The president's only defense against being a liar is that he is defining "torture" in such a way that no other reasonable person on the planet, apart from Bush's own torture apologists (and they are now down to one who will say so publicly), would agree. The press must now ask the president: does he regard the repeated, forcible near-drowning of detainees to be torture? Does he believe that tying naked detainees up and leaving them outside all night to die of hypothermia is "torture"? Does he believe that beating the legs of a detainee until they are pulp and he dies is torture? Does he believe that beating detainees till they die is torture? Does he believe that using someone's religious faith against them in interrogations is "cruel, inhumane and degrading" treatment and thereby illegal? What is his definition of torture?

For the guy who showed up here the other day and remarked that Bush was a "conservative", the definition of that word must mean he holds to the set of values that Torquemada held dear. They can't afford for this to become any more public knowledge than already is the case, and so the Administration is damned interested in investigating and punishing those who've leaked it; public scrutiny of what goes on in the dungeons of faraway countries could have real implications.

At this point, surely, there is no longer any comprehensible defense of Bush policy on these matters.

The desperation grows in the White House, and among its legion defenders. Peggy Noonan, who once upon a time used to write speeches for the likes of Reagan, is now reduced to anxious self-pity, an apocalyptic self-doubt catalyzing her wheels-coming-off-the-trolley analogy that practically begs for a strongman dictator to come and right the troubles of a rudderless nation. Her discomfort with actual liberty, i.e., the idea that no central planner is running things, shows to me that she hasn't got the slightest of clues about how free societies actually work. In fact, she has been one of its chiefest enemies for a while now. In her column, "Why Are Our Politicians So Full Of Themselves", she asks of Barack Obama why he's such an impressive gasbag, while scarcely noting that Bush is so full of himself that he's has lied about damn near everything he ever said while in office: the weapons of mass destruction, the threat Iraq posed to the United States, and now, the existence, to our eternal shame, of an American gulag with torture as one of its underpinnings. Godwin's Law, the idea that the first online participant to start making Nazi analogies loses any discussion, ceases to apply if, in fact, the action is something that Nazis would have actually done.

Update: The one thing that really set me off was the one thing I couldn't find until I dug it out of yesterday's browser cache, and that is this Norman Podhoretz howler of a column at Commentary, entitled "Who Is Lying About Iraq?" One of the most appalling attempts I've seen yet to keep Bush's string of big lies going; if there were a Hermann Goehring Propaganda Award, he'd take it with this piece in a heartbeat. How do these people sleep at night?

Sydney Morning Herald On Green Investments

Thanks to reader Kevin Bennewith in Oz for forwarding this Sydney Morning Herald story about rising fossil fuel prices driving up the stock prices of various and sundry renewable energy companies. Excerpt:

The recent bidding war over the renewable energy group Southern Hydro and the premium AGL was prepared to pay to knock out the competition were clear signs of the appeal of well-run, income-producing alternative energy stocks.

AGL paid $1.43 billion for the group, which owns 11 hydro power stations in NSW and Victoria as well as Australia's largest wind farm in South Australia, outbidding Babcock & Brown and Origin Energy.

At the smaller end of the market, Australian Ethanol, which produces ethanol from grains and sugar, leapt 14c cents to 47c last month on news that car manufacturers had accepted the use of ethanol-blended fuel.

Kevin Bullis On Small Nuclear

MIT Technology Review has an article by Kevin Bullis on building small nuclear as a way to get around the expense of building large ones, but this to me does seem like a potential proliferation problem, despite the hopeful rhetoric of cited expert and recent Nobel laureate Mohamed ElBaradei. But at least he's not one of those Pollyannas who refuse to see problems:

On the downside, building small reactors means losing out on the economy of scale that has driven a trend toward bigger and bigger reactors, says Wade. He hopes to make up for this by creating ways to mass-produce the reactors in modules that can be quickly assembled on site.

Where Those Hummers Are All Going

This is great.

Floating Windmills At Sea

OSEN is given to not a little hype, but I thought this floating offshore windmill farm idea was actually pretty cool.

Focus Fusion

I got an e-mail a few days ago from Aaron Blake at Focus Fusion, alerting me to their website and their proposed Focus Fusion reactor, which to me looks like just another inertial confinement fusion system. Of these, we know that unless they are very, very efficient at keeping the plasma contained, they will never approach breakeven, this thanks to Todd Rider's MIT graduate thesis. Moreover, their hydrogen-boron fusion appears to have a conflict with Bremsstrahlung radiation losses, inevitable energy losses that are inherent in the choice of fuel.

A distinct lack of scholarly footnotes, parenthetical rejections by the DOE, and the prominence of fundraising on their website leads to immediate questions as to the true nature of the endeavor; are they trying to build a reactor, or are they trying to fleece the public? Hyperbolic press releases add to my concerns.

Arriving Early To The Party

The Oil Drum NYC has a very pragmatic take on peak oil, something I've been pounding my shoes for for quite some time now. Citing a couple of stories from others who are approaching -- but in some ways, not quite yet getting to -- the position I arrived at when I first started this blog, it nonetheless represents a refreshing turn of mind from the homicidal lunatics who seem to infest the literature.

Peter Huber On EROEI

I thought I'd written about or at least posted a story about EROEI before, but maybe not. Here's one from Forbes by Peter Huber. Money quote:

The economic value of energy just doesn't depend very strongly on raw energy content as conventionally measured in British thermal units. Instead it's determined mainly by the distance between the BTUs and where you need them, and how densely the BTUs are packed into pounds of stuff you've got to move, and by the quality of the technology at hand to move, concentrate, refine and burn those BTUs, and by how your neighbors feel about carbon, uranium and windmills. In this entropic universe we occupy, the production of one unit of high-grade energy always requires more than one unit of low-grade energy at the outset. There are no exceptions. Put another way, Eroei--a sophomoric form of thermodynamic accounting--is always negative and always irrelevant. "Matter-energy" constraints count for nothing. The "monetary culture" still rules. Thermodynamics And Money.

(Hat tip: peakoil.com.)