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Originally Posted by Frank Lee
I'd say it's more like 40 years.
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OK, I was being overly generous
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Quote:
Originally Posted by niky
Sooner or later, oil will become too expensive for consumption on a personal level. And eventually, both oil and coal will become too expensive for consumption at an industrial level. Before we get to that stage, the rising costs of oil will make other alternatives more palatable and affordable. While I still don't see wind or solar ever replacing coal, they will definitely be part of the post-oil mix.
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Perhaps I could put it like this: At the current time, in terms of direct costs, extracting and burning fossil fuels as energy sources is generally cheaper to do than it is to obtain the equivalent energy from renewable sources. That situation may or may not continue for long enough to allow the use of all the available fossil fuels. It doesn't matter though.
Consider if for every, say, 10 coal fired power stations or for every 10 000 gas tank fills a water desalination plant has to be built, someone has to rebuild their storm damaged home or relocate from areas that have become unacceptably flood prone (including whole island states), or pay the cost of fighting wildfires due to (what are currently) extreme weather conditions, increased A/C use or additional refrigeration work, and then ask: Will we still use fossil fuels?
That's a qualitative assessment and you can look for the exact numbers but at some point the answer is definitely: 'No'. That's because the cost of offsetting the consequences of fossil fuel use are very rapidly going to exceed the direct cost difference between doing so and paying for energy derived in a renewable, or at least non-emitting, way (if they haven't already).
At some point, it is irrelevant what it costs to extract them or the efficiency with which the energy they contain can be extracted and used. At a system level, the EROI is too low.
The inevitably higher cost of extraction will drive the shift from fossil fuels to renewables but won't drive it as fast as the requirement to avoid AGW consequences.