From: Peter Brunt (pbrunt@xtra.co.nz)
Date: Mon Nov 10 2003 - 23:51:58 EST
In response to Kenneth Piers @ Pier@calvin.edu
Let's look at Kenneth's views:
>The dream of replacing fossil fuel oil with oil from plants is very likely
just that - a dream. Two main problems. First of all if we farm plants to
produce oil it will require energy inputs -
>land preparation, sowing
Slash and burn followed by sowing would be all that these plants require.
>fertilizing,
Euphorbias grow in, arid, poor quality soild, fertilising was not viewed as
beng needed
>weed and pest control,
_Euphorbias_ are weeds
> harvesting,
OK
processing,
Same as required now!
>shipping,
No different from what is done now!
distributing, etc, etc. to produce the oil that we presumably will get from
the plants.
Like I said it is all a matter of economics!
The question here, as in all energy transfer systems, is: will we get more
energy out than we need to put in? Will there be a net energy gain? Since
our agricultural system runs on fossil fuel oil this question becomes very
urgent.
As far as I know no one has suggested that we are anywhere near energy
break-even in getting oil from plants.
That is the verey reason it is not being done yet!
When the economics suit it will be done.
>One flawed experiment we are now already engaged in is production of fuel
ethanol from corn. The Pimental's have shown that in this process we use
more oil input energy than we get back in the ethanol that is produced.
OK. but _Euphorbia_ "oil" is apparently capable of being cracked like
petroleum.
The second major issue in the oil from plants project is this. Even if this
were wise from an energy standpoint, to replace any significant amounts of
fossil fuel oil with oil from plants would require that virtually the entire
agricultural acreage of the US now in food production be devoted to growing
plants for oil. Unfortunately, we can not eat oil directly - most humans
prefer normal food materials for sustenance.
Ken, this is an interesting point. Can you back this up with facts and
figures? People have talked for decades of returning prodction to the
Sahara using purified seawater to growing plants.
As far as declining water is concerned, there is little cause for optimism
here either, especially if that optimism is based on the fact that the
oceans contain a lot of water. Once again, to render ocean water potable
requires very substantial energy inputs.
Maybe I am an optomist and Ken maybe the pesimist, but it has been
visualised that sea side nuclear plants could be devoted to this solution.
>If those energy inputs are primarily fossil fuel inputs and if oil
production goes into decline, producing fresh water from sea water becomes
an even more questionable project than it already is.
Sorry to sound so evangelical, but I believe there are answers to the crises
foreseen.
respectfully,
Peter Brunt
>>> "Peter Brunt" <pbrunt@xtra.co.nz> 11/10/2003 12:57:44 AM >>>
Darryl
Declinign water and oil sure are relevant issues.
But I can't help returning to Calvin - of photosynthesis fame - who wrote
for Scientific American shortly after the first oil shock. His view was that
once oil reserve exploration costs crossed over the line of growing plants
for oil then it would be economically feasible to lay aside vast areas of
land for that purpose. He may well have been rubbished since, but I am
unaware of any negative comments regarding this idea. If I remember
correctly he even identified a particular _Euphorbia_ species as a suitable
plant for the role. Such plants are able to grow well in fairly arid
climates so currently unsuitable land could be brought into production.
Do you, Glen or any else know if further research has been condusted on
Calvin's ideas?
As to water shortages. There are tonnes in the oceans and surely as the
need to produce water of irrigation quality matches the costs of
desalination plantrs then the matter will be done. Sure the problem will be
shifting the water to the right place. But that too will be a matter of
econics, won't it!!?
Perhaps I am too optomistic!
I would like to hear your and others repsonse.
Peter Brunt
While we have discussed the relationship between declining oil supplies and
its relationship to us as Christians, I don't think we have discussed the
parallel problem of declining water supplies.
http://www-geology.ucdavis.edu/~GEL115/115CH18miningwater.html is chapter
15 of a set of lecture notes by Dr. Richard Cowen of the Univercity of
California at Davis. The course is (and the notes) are on the relationships
between natural resources and history. Very good reading for those who are
not familiar with those relationships.
Perhaps some of you would like to discuss this topic. Living as I do in the
middle of the Texas High Plains which is facing this very problem, but not
being a farmer, or a rancher, or a business owner in the area, I don't have
much to say except life is going to get tough, some will loose their jobs,
some their companies, but hopefully we are past the shooting stage of the
1800's range wars.
A few weeks ago I was with two other geologists and as we drove by miles of
land that was once irrigated but is now being dryland farmed or grazed, one
of them made the analogy that we were driving over a depleated resevoir
except that instead of being an old oil field (all three of us started in
the oil business but only one still is and he is, by his on statement
"semi-retired" at 53) it is an old water field. Some of you may recognize
the name - the Ogallala. It isn't depleated everywhere but those folks had
given up trying to irrigate from it and slowly the big ranches are being
sold off. I don't know more than a half dozen people that own land around
here but last year a 6000 acre ranch was sold, then one partner of a 4000
acre ranch sold his half, and now a third place is for sale. I don't know
its size but I would guess around 10,000 acres more or less. I sure can't
blame the farmers for selling their water rights given the fluctuation in
commodity prices and the vagaries of crop yield but it is raising the
temperature of some people's tempers and I think it won't be long before it
starts stressing the control on their behavior that their religion exerted
over the past decades when times were good and there was a general consensus
about what was and was not the right thing to do with the water under your
land.
Maybe reaching a consensus on the young earth/old earth argument isn't as
important as praying that we figure out a way to stay civil with our
neighbors. This problem is already spreading and unless the climate changes
a lot for the wetter I think it will continue to spread and cause economic
hardships across the country.
Darryl
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