Archived material from historical editions of The Generator
In the aftermath of Hurricane Wilma, Miami Florida is still
struggling to return to normal, primarily due to interruptions to the
electricity supply. While most of the trendy restaraunts and hotels are
functioning as usual, according to CBS News, up to 40% of people have
no power and gas stations are only operating intermittently.
Energy officials warned it may take another three weeks to get the power supply fully operational.
Russian, Chinese firms battle for oil in Kazakhstan
Lucie Godeau, Daily Times (Pakistan)
A battle between Russian oil giant Lukoil and China’s CNPC for control
of key energy assets in Kazakhstan intensified last week with both
sides deploying lawyers to fight for holdings in the energy-rich
central Asian country.
Positioned midway between Russia and China, Kazakhstan has the highest
proven oil reserves anywhere in the Caspian Sea region and is regarded
as one of the most important potential sources of new crude oil
supplies to world markets.
The state-run CNPC, spurred by soaring Chinese demand for petroleum,
won a key victory when a court in Canada gave approval on Wednesday to
CNPC’s purchase of the Canada-registered firm PetroKazakhstan for a
price of 4.18 billion dollars. …
He [Valery Nesterov, energy analyst with the Troika Dialogue investment
firm in Moscow] noted however that while the government of Kazakhstan
is “politically and historically closer to Russia, and is wary of
China,†it nonetheless believes that “its interest lies in a
diversification of investments and export routes.â€Â
At present, the only pipeline that carries Kazakh crude to the world
market is that of the Caspian Pipeline Consortium (CPC), which transits
through Russia.
But the launch next year of the Atassu-Alashanku pipeline will reduce
this dependence by providing a route for export of Kazakh oil directly
to China. Kazakhstan currently produces around 1.3 million barrels per
day of crude and the government plans to raise that to 3.5 million
barrels per day by 2015. afp
(31 October 2005)
This best-selling real-life memoir has been the surprise hit of the northern summer.
Outlining
the adventures, concerns and fears of a loyal American as he goes about
destroying third world economies to extend the American empire, it has
the alarming ring of truth that comes as a wake up call as we commit
ourselves to supporting this system for the long-haul.
A
no-nonsense account of the role of the CIA (the jackals) in backing up
the subtle but deadly practices of these global economists, this book
was rejected by three publishers before the author found one brave
enough to go to press.
Click here to purchase.
SF Informatics and Global Public Media
urge members of U.S. Congress to join Rep. Roscoe Bartlett’s
broad-based effort to address the impending shortfall of global energy
resources.
The two groups applaud Rep. Bartlett’s plan, announced yesterday, to
distribute a new energy-information poster to members of the U.S. House
and Senate. Entitled The Oil Age, the poster was created by SF
Informatics and marketed through a partnership with Global Public
Media, a non-profit subsidiary of MetaFoundation.
The poster presents data from industry experts that indicate an
all-time peak in global oil production may be just a few years away.
With oil and gas prices surging to historic highs, this data-rich chart
offers a comprehensive framework for understanding the global energy
situation.
“The time has come for our elected leaders to confront the global
energy shortfall head on,†said Dave Menninger, co-creator of the
poster. “I am concerned that until recently only one member of
Congress–Rep. Bartlett–was publicly discussing global oil depletion
and working to address its impacts.â€Â
Julian Darley, director of Global Public Media, said that Bartlett’s
longstanding efforts to raise awareness of peak oil “begs the question
of other lawmakers: ‘What actions are you taking now to address and
mitigate the imminent global oil peak?’â€Â
Copies of The Oil Age poster can be viewed or purchased at www.oilposter.org.
Sales help fund the no-cost distribution of the poster to high schools,
universities and non-profit institutions worldwide. Proceeds will also
support the development of teaching guides and other educational tools
to be used in conjunction with the poster.
For more information about the Rep. Bartlett’s distribution to members of Congress, contact Lisa Wright at 202.225.2417.
*1. Local Energy Farms*
*Post Carbon Forms Local Energy Farms Advisory Panel*
We are now ready to move the Local Energy Farms Initiative into
implementation. To make that happen as quickly and broadly as
possible, our Local Energy Farms Initiative took a big step forward
this month with the creation of an Advisory Panel. A marvelous group
of experts on renewable energy and how to get things done have agreed
to lend us their support!! The panel will advise Post Carbon Institute
and all those associated with us on how to set up the best combination
of renewable energies for a given locale in order to produce reliable
power and fuels.
The panel includes the famous German politician, Hermann Scheer, who
has worked for decades to bring renewable energies into the
mainstream, as well as Tony Marmont who founded and runs the energy
farm in Britain which has inspired our Local Energy Farms Initiative.
We also welcome Carol Werner, head of the Environmental and Energy
Study Institute in Washington - she has worked for over 25 years on
public policy and renewable energy. For the other distinguished panel
members please visit the Local Energy Farms Advisory Panel.
[http://www.postcarbon.org/relocalize/energyfarmpanel
{http://www.postcarbon.org/relocalize/energyfarmpanel}] .
*Local Energy Farm Business Plan*
Local Energy Farm Panel member Richard George, with years of finance
and business experience, has been commissioned to write a business
plan. This will be no ordinary business plan, since we are working on
novel ways of allowing community resources to flow into - and out of -
local energy farms without fuelling the debt-based, interest-bearing
money system. To facilitate this, we envisage setting up Community
Supported Energy (similar to Community Supported Manufacturing
[http://www.postcarbon.org/relocalize/manufacturing
{http://www.postcarbon.org/relocalize/manufacturing}], see also
Newsletter #7 [http:/ /www.postcarbon.org/news/newsletters/sept2005
{http:/ /www.postcarbon.org/news/newsletters/sept2005}] and linking
it to energy-backed local currencies as part of the hybrid solutions
we intend to pioneer.
*First Energy Farm and More Test Sites*
We are very pleased to report that an Outpost member has already
purchased land for an energy farm (see below - Post Carbon News In
Brief) and we hope to begin installations very shortly. With the
first energy farm about to come to fruition and the Business Plan
under way, we are actively looking for more energy farm sites and
would like to hear from those of you who may have land or resources
you would like to make available. Email us at
energyfarm@postcarbon.org {mailto:energyfarm@postcarbon.org}.
*2. Major Gift*
We are pleased to announce that we have recently received a major
grant for $75,000 from an anonymous donor. This grant will enable us
to make the critical shift from being completely volunteer-run to
working with several contract staff positions. In addition, we shall
use the funds to improve our websites and the systems to help the
Relocalization Network.
*3. Post Carbon News In Brief*
*Flathead Outpost member Peter Myers purchases property for local
energy farm.*
Peter Myers scouted a number of locations in Montana and Washington
State, before settling on land in Eastern Washington. "I'm focused on
making an energy farm and leading a sustainable lifestyle," Myers
says, adding that running a school and having a small post carbon
community associated with the energy farm are also important parts of
his goal. "I have two small children and I want them to grow up in a
sustainable way."
*Post Carbon Institute Director Julian Darley visits the Centre for
Alternative Technology (CAT) in Wales.*
CAT [http://www.cat.org.uk {http://www.cat.org.uk}] has been in
existence for 25 years and offers a fascinating chance to see
low-energy living in action. The centre has examples of sustainable
energy, organic growing, environmentally sound buildings and more.
CAT has helped the local community to buy, install and run mid-scale
wind turbines - a phenomenon common in Denmark, but unusual in the
English-speaking world, but one which we believe should be promoted
vigorously.
*4. Featured Outpost: The Titanic Lifeboat Academy*
In 2004, Caren Black and Christopher Paddon established a Post
Carbon Outpost called The Titanic Lifeboat Academy
[http://lifeboat.postcarbon.org {http://lifeboat.postcarbon.org}] in
Astoria, Oregon. They provide education and awareness about peak oil,
global climate change, population overshoot and environmental
degradation. Their main focus is on education and teaching
sustainable living. Black and Paddon held a successful conference
this summer called "Doing Something about Peak Oil." They have also
organized a series of three-part workshops to help people devise
workable plans to deal with the coming crises in energy supply.
"Building Your Lifeboat" workshops will begin January 13-15, 2006.
Caren Black writes monthly columns about sustainable living in the
local magazine Hipfish.
[http://www.postcarbon.org/lifeboat/page6.html
{http://www.postcarbon.org/lifeboat/page6.html}] Christopher helps
Caren with articles for an on-line publication [called??] and a radio
show on KMUN 91.9 FM Community Radio [http://www.kmun.org/
{http://www.kmun.org/}] in Astoria. This media work goes a long way
toward increasing public awareness of peak oil and our unsustainable
energy-hogging lifestyles.
Black and Paddon practice what they preach. Their "Building Your
Lifeboat" workshops focus on community and individual actions. As
part of their personal outreach to their community, they have been
lobbying for wind energy in Astoria. Christopher reports that a group
he works with have recently got approval in principle from the
director of the Port of Astoria to build several wind turbines on
Pier 3 (part of the Astoria Port).
For more information go to: [http://lifeboat.postcarbon.org
{http://lifeboat.postcarbon.org}]
*5. Introducing Post Carbon Board Member: James Howard Kunstler*
James Howard Kunstler is one of America's great critics of suburbia
and its associated sprawling, energy-sucking infrastructure. He is
known for such biting phrases such as "drive- by architecture" -
describing the automobile-oriented, pedestrian-unfriendly design of
strip malls and development along suburban commercial roads - and the
"consensus trance" about the inertia of the American Dream.
Kunstler calls the development of suburbs and their associated
car-addicted infrastructure one of the greatest misallocations of
resources in the history of the world.
Born and raised in New York City, Kunstler now lives in Saratoga
Springs, NY. He started working as a newspaper reporter, leading to a
staff writing job with The Rolling Stone before quitting to work
full-time on books.
Kunstler is the author of four non-fiction works on cities and the
challenges facing American society. Geography of Nowhere is one of
the most powerful - and poignant - analyses of the problems of North
American settlement patterns, a theme he furthered developed in Home
>From Nowhere, and expanded in his comparative analysis of the urban
form in Cities In Mind.
His latest work, The Long Emergency
[https://secure.metafoundation.org/Merchant2/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&Store_Code=META&Product_Code=longemerg
{https://secure.metafoundation.org/Merchant2/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&Store_Code=META&Product_Code=longemerg}],
offers a powerful projection of the dawning global energy crisis and
its possible aftermaths.
Kunstler is featured in the documentary, The End of Suburbia: Oil
Decline and the Collapse of the American Dream.
[https://secure.metafoundation.org/Merchant2/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&Product_Code=EOS&Category_Code=Video
{https://secure.metafoundation.org/Merchant2/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&Product_Code=EOS&Category_Code=Video}]
See the whole Board [http://www.metafoundation.org/board.php
{http://www.metafoundation.org/board.php}]
*6. New Appointments*
We welcome three new additions to the Post Carbon team.
*Christina Olsen* joins us as Administration Manager in Vancouver to
oversee the day-to-day administration of MetaFoundation, Post Carbon
Institute and Global Public Media. She has a degree in environmental
studies and anthropology from the University of Victoria and has
worked for a variety of environmental organizations, including
Television for the Environment in London, England. You can contact
her at christina@postcarbon.org {mailto:christina@postcarbon.org}
*Liz McDowell* will be joining the fundraising effort as our new
Development Coordinator. She will be working in the Vancouver office
to help Celine implement Post Carbon's ambitious plans for the
future. Liz studied business and international development at McGill
University in Montreal and was the project coordinator for the
Sustainable McGill Project. She can be reached at liz@postcarbon.org
{mailto:liz@postcarbon.org}
*Shelby Tay*, a fourth year environmental science student at the
University of British Columbia, is joining our team as Program
Coordinator. She will be establishing a communication network amongst
new and existing Outpost groups and developing lines of communication
with all members of the Relocalization Network. You can reach her at
shelby@postcarbon.org {mailto:shelby@postcarbon.org}
*7. Global Public Media News*
*Ritawatch:* Post Carbon Institute and its sister organisation,
internet broadcast station Global Public Media, have offered both our
own special reports and other media reports on the progress and
immediate effects of Hurricane Rita, which hit the Gulf of Mexico in
September. Following the recent devastating US hurricanes, we are
currently producing feature radio reports on the new revelations
about the damage. We are particularly featuring natural gas - this is
the fuel which increasingly looks as if it will cause a crisis both in
North America and Europe, even as all eyes are on oil (which will be
problematic enough). Natural gas is very hard to transport to new
places - it takes years and billions of dollars (or pounds) to put in
a Liquefied Natural Gas chain (and is a bad idea anyway - see Julian
Darley's High Noon for Natural Gas [http://www.highnoon.ws/
{http://www.highnoon.ws/}] for explanation). This means that nations
have to rely on their existing gas sources and infrastructure. Thus,
if demand goes up and supply goes down, a crisis will almost
certainly ensue. That is exactly what is now happening in North
American and the British Isles.
For Global Public Media's regular and special energy reporting go to
[http://www.globalpublicmedia.com {http://www.globalpublicmedia.com}].
For Post Carbon's collection of sources on Hurricane Rita :
[http://www.postcarbon.org/features/rita
{http://www.postcarbon.org/features/rita}]
*8. Next Newsletter Preview*
The Oil Depletion Protocol: a far-sighted global and local policy
response to peak oil and gas. The Protocol has been created and
initiated by Colin Campbell, and is now being developed into a full
plan by Richard Heinberg. Post Carbon Institute is proud to be
assisting in this effort, which will become an international campaign
of extraordinary importance.
by Joel Bainerman
http://321energy.com/editorials/bainerman/bainerman083105.html
Are hydrocarbons “renewable”- and if so- what does such a conclusion
mean for the future of the world’s oil and natural gas supplies?
The question is critical due to the enormous amount of coverage the
issue of “Peak Oil” is receiving from the mainstream press. If the
supply of hydrocarbons is renewable- then the contrary to the
conventional wisdom being touted throughout the mainstream press today-
the world is NOT running out of oil.
Unbeknownst to Westerners, there have actually been for quite some time
now two competing theories concerning the origins of petroleum. One
theory claims that oil is an organic ‘fossil fuel’
deposited in finite quantities near the planet’s surface. The other
theory claims that oil is continuously generated by natural processes
in the Earth’s magma.
One of the world’s leading advocates for the theory that
hydrocarbons are renewable is Dr. Thomas Gold who contends that oil is
not a limited resource, and that oil, natural gas and coal, are not
so-called �fossil fuels.�
In his book, The Deep Hot Biosphere: The Myth of Fossil Fuels,
he explains that dinosaurs and plants and the fossils from those living
beings are not the origin of oil and natural gas, but rather generated
from a chemical substance in the crust of the Earth.
Dr. Gold: “Astronomers have been able to find that hydrocarbons, as
oil, gas and coal are called, occur on many other planetary bodies.
They are a common substance in the universe. You find it in the kind of
gas clouds that made systems like our solar system. You find large
quantities of hydrocarbons in them. Is it reasonable to think that our
little Earth, one of the planets, contains oil and gas for reasons that
are all its own and that these other bodies have it because it was
built into them when they were born? That question makes a lot of
sense. After all, they didn�t have dinosaurs and ferns on Jupiter to
produce oil and gas?”
He continues: “Human skull fossils have been found in anthracite
coal in Pennsylvania. The official theory of the development of coal
will not accept that reality, since human beings were not around when
anthracite coal was formed. Coal was formed millions of years ago.
However, you cannot mistake the fact that these are human fossils.”
“The coal we dig is hard, brittle stuff. It was once a liquid,
because we find embedded in the middle of a six-foot seam of coal such
things as a delicate wing of some animal or a leaf of a plant. They are
undestroyed, absolutely preserved; with every cell in that fossil
filled with exactly the same coal as all the coal on the outside. A
hard, brittle coal is not going to get into each cell of a delicate
leaf without destroying it. So obviously that stuff was a thin liquid
at one time which gradually hardened.”
Gold claims that the only thing we find now on the Earth that would
do that is petroleum, which gradually becomes stiffer and harder. That
is the only logical explanation for the origin of coal. So the fact
that coal contains fossils does not prove that it is a fossil fuel; it
proves exactly the opposite. Those fossils found in coal prove that
coal is not made from those fossils. Where then does the carbon base
come from that produces all of this?
Says Dr. Gold: “Petroleum and coal were made from materials in which
heavy hydrocarbons were common components. We know that because the
meteorites are the sort of debris left over from the formations of the
planets and those contain carbon in unoxidized form as hydrocarbons as
oil and coal-like particles. We find that in one large class of
meteorites and we find that equally on many of the other planetary
bodies in the solar system. So it�s pretty clear that when the Earth
formed it contained a lot of carbon material built into it.”
Dr. Gold’s ideas would lead us to believe that there is so much
natural gas in the earth that it is causing earthquakes in trying to
escape from the Earth. If you�ll drill deep enough anywhere, you will
find natural gas. It may not be in commercial quantities every time,
but more than likely it will be.
Is the oil and gas industry reconsidering things in light of his work?
Absolutely not.
“In many other countries they are listening to me: in Russia on a
very large scale, and in China also. It is just Western Europe and the
United States that are so stuck in the mud that they can�t look at
anything else.”
The roots of Dr. Gold’s theories are in Russia where scientists since
the end World War II have been researching what is referred to as the
“Modern Russian-Ukrainian Theory of Deep, Abiotic Petroleum Origins.”
Although the theory was first expounded upon by Professor Nikolai
Kudryavtsev in 1951 it is not the work of any one single man but has
been developed by hundreds of scientists in the (now former) U.S.S.R..
The theory of deep, abiotic petroleum origins is not a vague,
qualitative hypothesis, but stands as a rigorous analytic theory within
the mainstream of the modern physical sciences. In this respect, the
modern theory differs fundamentally not only from the previous
hypothesis of a biological origin of petroleum but also from all
traditional geological hypotheses.
Actually, since the nineteenth century, knowledgeable physicists,
chemists, thermodynamicists, and
chemical engineers have regarded with grave reservations (if not
outright disdain) the suggestion that highly reduced hydrocarbon
molecules of high free enthalpy (the constituents of crude oil) might
somehow evolve spontaneously from highly oxidized biogenic molecules of
low free enthalpy. Beginning in 1964, Soviet scientists carried out
extensive theoretical statistical thermodynamic analysis which
established explicitly that the hypothesis of evolution of hydrocarbon
molecules (except methane) from biogenic ones in the temperature and
pressure regime of the Earth’s near-surface crust was glaringly in
violation of the second law of thermodynamics.
The theory of deep, abiotic petroleum origins is presently applied
extensively throughout the former U.S.S.R. as the guiding perspective
for petroleum exploration and development projects. There are presently
more than 80 oil and gas fields in the Caspian district alone which
were explored and developed by applying the perspective of the modern
theory and which produce from the crystalline basement rock.
Similarly, such exploration in the western Siberia cratonic-rift
sedimentary basin has developed 90 petroleum fields of which 80 produce
either partly or entirely from the crystalline basement. The
exploration and discoveries of the 11 major and 1 giant fields on the
northern flank of the Dneiper-Donets basin have already been noted.
There are presently deep drilling exploration projects under way in
Azerbaijan, Tatarstan, and Asian Siberia directed to testing potential
oil and gas reservoirs in the crystalline basement.
So why is the western media being inundated with notions of the world running out of oil?
One could point a finger at the multinational oil companies and
their vested interest in having the price of a barrel of oil rise
substantially- to justify further exploration expenses- and of course-
to bolster their bottom line.
Says Dr. J.F. Kenney, a long-time research on the origins of hydrocarbons:
“For almost a century, various predictions have been made that the
human race was imminently going to run out of available petroleum. The
passing of time has proven all those predictions to have been utterly
wrong. It is pointed out here how all such predictions have depended
fundamentally upon an archaic hypothesis from the 18th century that
petroleum somehow (miraculously) evolved from biological detritus, and
was accordingly limited in abundance.”
That hypothesis has been replaced during the past forty years by the
modern Russian-Ukrainian theory of abyssal, abiotic petroleum origins
which has established that petroleum is a primordial material erupted
from great depth. Therefore, according to Kenney, petroleum abundances
are limited by little more than the quantities of its constituents as
were incorporated into the Earth at the time of its formation.
As far back as 1757, in his address at the Imperial Academy of
Sciences in St. Petersburg, Academician Mikhailo V. Lomonosov, stated:
“Rock oil originates as tiny bodies of animals buried in the sediments
which, under the influence of increased temperature and pressure acting
during an unimaginably long period of time, transform into rock oil
[petroleum , or crude oil]”
More than 200 years later, Professor Emmanuil Chekaliuk told the conference on Petroleum and Petroleum Geology in Moscow that:
“Statistical thermodynamic analysis has established clearly that
hydrocarbon molecules which comprise petroleum require very high
pressures for their spontaneous formation, comparable to the pressures
required for the same of diamond. In that sense, hydrocarbon molecules
are the high-pressure polymorphs of the reduced carbon system as is
diamond of elemental carbon. Any notion which might suggest that
hydrocarbon molecules spontaneously evolve in the regimes of
temperature and pressure characterized by the near-surface of the
Earth, which are the regimes of methane creation and hydrocarbon
destruction, does not even deserve consideration.”
Contrarily, the statistics of the international petroleum industry
establish that, far from diminishing, the net known recoverable
reserves of petroleum have been growing steadily for the past fifty
years. Those statistics show that, for every year since about 1946, the
international petroleum industry has discovered at least five new tons
of recoverable oil for every three which have been consumed.
As Professor P. Odell of the London School of Economics has put it,
instead of “running out of oil,” the human race by every measure seems
to be “running into oil”.
Says Dr. Kenney: “There stands no reason to worry about, and even
less to plan for, any predicted demise of the petroleum industry based
upon a vanishing of petroleum reserves. On the contrary, these
considerations compel additional investment and development in the
technology and skills of deep drilling, of deep seismic measurement and
interpretation, of the reservoir properties of crystalline rock, and of
the associated completion and production practices which should be
applied in such non-traditional reservoirs”
If Kenney is correct, not only are any predictions that the world is
“running out of oil” invalid, so also are suggestions that the
petroleum exploration and production industry is a “mature” or
“declining” one.
Much research remains to be done on “alternative” theories of the
how much hydrocarbons are left in the world- unfortunately- those
entities most able to do this research- the western multinational oil
conglomerates- have the least interest in arriving at any conclusion
other than those that are part of the “Peak Oil” stream of thought.
Today the mainstream press has accepted as a given that the world has
only a finite amount of oil and natural gas- and thus any decision
taken on how to deal with the world’s future needs are based on these
conclusions. If they are erroneous- then the world is about to embark
on a plan to provide for its energy needs for the coming century based
on a false notion.
Research geochemist Michael Lewan of the U.S.Geological Survey in
Denver, is one of the most knowledgeable advocates of the opposing
theory, that petroleum is a “fossil fuel”. Yet even Lewan admits:
“I don’t think anybody has ever doubted that there is an inorganic
source of hydrocarbons. The key question is, ‘Do they exist in
commercial quantities?’”
We might never know the answer to that question because both sides
of this debate are not being heard by the general public. If the
Russians have accepted the theory that hydrocarbons are renewable- and
over time they will become the leading exporters of oil and gas
worldwide- this fact alone requires these alternative theories of how
fossil fuels are created- is required.
It behooves western governments to begin taking these alternative
theories seriously- and design future energy policies based on
possibility that they are correct. Whatever strategies for meeting the
world’s ferocious appetite for energy are devised today- will impact
the planet for decades to come.
In this issue- we simply can’t afford to be wrong.
Joel Bainerman
Joel Bainerman has been a writer on economic and
Middle East issues since 1983. His published archive can be viewed on
his website at www.joelbainerman.com
His new online, multi-lingual alternative newsmagazine for Europeans can be viewed at www.theotherside.org.uk