Tuesday, October 14, 2008

the day after - part three










At 12:35 AM, October 26, 2008, Blogger Phillip said...

I know what "peak oil" means, but what is meant by "peak energy?"

At 11:31 PM, October 27, 2008, Blogger monkeygrinder said...

It means peak oil was taken on blogger.

Also, industrial type useful energy for humans is likely to peak when oil peaks. There are ways around this but they involve sensible investments in energy producing schemes rather than energy laundering schemes,

At 5:57 AM, October 28, 2008, Blogger Phillip said...

So unless you can provide an actual definition, the term "Peak energy" is basically meaningless. Is that right? Please provide a reference.
Thanks, Phillip

At 3:26 PM, October 29, 2008, Blogger monkeygrinder said...

generally speaking it is branding,

I do have a peak energy hypothesis however,

which is that oil and natural gas raise all boats and after they peak, forms of energy which rely on oil and natural gas (everything else, including nucular) will decline in step. You can ask me anything you want to know, I am more conversant on this topic than I am on say, dimensional aggregation.

seperate out all the latent energy which we have no ability to use without infrastructure - solar, wind and wave collectors are irrelavent until you build the collectors. Building collectors implies an industrial economy which happens to be powered by oil and natural gas at present.

At 4:06 PM, October 29, 2008, Blogger Phillip said...

I was talking with a know-it-all Yale alumnus in my synagogue about the idea of "peak oil" which was promoted decades ago to explain that the price of oil was increasing because we had reached the limit of proven reserves and the supply was just drying up.

While discussing this with him I believe he mis-spoke and used the term "peak energy" when he meant "peak oil" again. I said "you mean 'peak oil'" and he said "no, there is a concept of 'peak energy'". He could not explain the concept however and began making even less sense than usual. (Imagine Obama without a teleprompter) I've been trying to find information on the internet on just what is meant by "peak energy" and I cannot find any thing that makes sense. Your admission that it is just "marketing" confirms to me that it is not a meaningful term.

At 8:26 PM, October 29, 2008, Blogger monkeygrinder said...

Gotcha. Yes, peak oil is controversial and misunderstood in and of itself. In fact, from your own out-of-date comment about "promotion" of same, I recommend a slim volume called "Hubbert's Peak [...]"
By Kenneth S. Deffeyes, which will quickly and painlessly introduce you to the science from this century.
Following this, basic criticism of peak oil is provided by a dude named Michael Lynch, so you can forearm yourself with both sides of the argument for the next time you run into your know-it-all alumn.

Peak Energy is basically a made up concept, a "Tom Friedmanism", which is why I am so flippant about it - I'm not attached to the concept because it could mean anything. I can't use it to support an argument. (I'm not T.F., whew).

Also - the phrase is "Palin" not "Obama without a teleprompter".

At 8:38 PM, October 29, 2008, Blogger Phillip said...

I'm sure it could be either Palin or Obama without a teleprompter, certainly not McCain. I don't think he knows what it is.

At 4:09 AM, October 31, 2008, Blogger Big Gav said...

McCain doesn't know what a teleprompter is ?

That wouldn't surprise me - the dude seems borderline senile (I know, I know - Ronald Reagan was senile, so it doesn't disqualify him for Prexy).

I define "peak energy" as the point where our energy production reaches its maximum.

However, unlike peak oil, I view this point as one which will be attained far in the future - and one we will level out at - an ever-undulating plateau of energy consumption.

Basically it will be the maximum necessary amount of energy we need to run an industrial society for about 10 billion people - all coming from renewables (at some point all the fossil stuff will be gone, and we'll ditch nuclear completely in our lifetimes on economic grounds alone).

At 9:29 PM, December 29, 2008, Blogger saidi said...

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