This was my newspaper column from May 1st, about peak oil:

http://www.cumberlink.com/articles/2008/05...

Got some peak oil in my tank
By Rich Lewis, Sentinel Columnist, May 1, 2008
Last updated: Wednesday, May 14, 2008 3:34 PM EDT

$1,091.72.

That was how much it cost to fill our home oil tanks this week in preparation for the next heating season — 280 gallons at $3.90 each.

That’s pretty shocking when you consider the price was about $2.50 a gallon one year ago, $1.40 in 2004 and under $1 in 2002.

And of course gasoline is now around $3.60 a gallon, up from about $2.60 a year ago and about $1.40 in 2002.

Depressing numbers, but not nearly as depressing as the picture painted about oil in an April 9 article in The Arizona Republic by Guy McPherson, a professor of conservation biology at the University of Arizona.

He predicts “the end of the world as we know it.” Soon.

McPherson’s argument rests on a much-debated concept known as “peak oil.” The term, first used in 1956 by petroleum geologist M. King Hubbert, describes the point at which oil production reaches its “peak” and then begins to decline. Some say we have reached the peak; others say it’s decades away.

The bottom line is that once the peak is reached, less and less oil will be available to those who want it and the price will rise, until there is none at all.

This seems obvious enough. Oil can be used up and, unlike, say, trees, you can’t plant oil seeds to grow a new crop.

The real debate is over the effects of peak oil — and specifically whether it means, in McPherson’s words, “the end of civilization.”

His case for that disturbing claim is that we have sufficient oil supply “to keep the world running for 30 years or so, at the current level of demand” (but, of course, demand is rising as countries like China and India push hard to grow their economies).

But, he says, that’s “irrelevant” because the United States “absolutely demands” not “oil” but “cheap oil.” He notes that 90 percent of the oil consumed in the United States is burned by airplanes, ships, trains and automobiles and so “our entire system of food production and delivery depends on cheap oil.”

And those days, he says, are gone forever. Nothing we can do will reverse the rise in oil prices.

“Within a decade,” he writes, “we’ll be staring down the barrel of a crisis” because oil, now running at a little more than $100 a barrel, will cost $400 a barrel in 10 years as we slide down from the peak.

“We have come to depend on cheap oil for the delivery of food, water, shelter and medicine,” McPherson writes. “Most of us are incapable of supplying these four key elements of personal survival, so trouble lies ahead when we are forced to develop means of acquiring them that don’t involve a quick trip to Wal-Mart.”

Many others have written about the consequences of “peak oil,” and some agree with McPherson and some don’t. Many experts dismiss the whole argument about the “end of civilization” as “garbage” and a “myth.” A Google search on “peak oil” returns almost three million hits — so it’s obvious the topic is being widely discussed even if the term hasn’t yet percolated down to our daily conversations.

But as you sift through the arguments against the idea that we are on the edge of a disaster, you don’t find quite enough to make you feel entirely comfortable.

One argument is that new, untapped oil reserves are being discovered all over the planet — but this fails to take into account the politics of oil and whether the countries sitting on top of that oil can produce it and will want to sell it — to us, cheaply.

Another argument is that new energy technologies will bail us out. But, as McPherson notes, no alternatives exist now that can be “scaled up” to serve the entire United States, let alone the world.

How many solar panels or windmills or hydrogen cars have you seen around Carlisle? Could these or any other alternatives be ready to shoulder the load in 10 years? Or 20 years?

Will the cost of the energy they produce be cheaper than oil? And don’t forget — all these new technologies require the use of oil to develop, produce and transport, a chicken-and-egg problem that’s seldom considered.

This is what makes the current political debate over high gas prices so laughable. The president wants to go after oil in Alaska that might keep our tanks filled for a few more years. Hillary Clinton and John McCain are pushing for elimination of the federal gas tax — a move that might save you a dime a gallon this summer. Both ideas will help as much as an umbrella in a tornado.

Let’s suppose the truth lies somewhere between the “end of civilization” and the “don’t worry, be happy” schools of thought. Let’s suppose that oil prices only, say, double in the next 10 years. Let’s suppose that new technologies begin to fill in more of the gaps. Let’s suppose that oil-rich countries remain willing to sell us their oil, and oil-hungry countries generously agree to stop demanding so much of it.

All of these are possible. None are guaranteed.

And none addresses McPherson’s main point, which is that we depend on cheap oil to maintain our current lifestyle.

McPherson urges us to start making “other arrangements.”

The oil bill sitting on my kitchen table says he might be right.

Rich Lewis’ e-mail address is: rlcolumn@comcast.net

This is my weekly newspaper column, published May 22 and also available online at:

http://cumberlink.com/articles/2008/05/22/...

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They float through the air, use less gas
By Rich Lewis
Last updated: Thursday, May 22, 2008 10:15 AM EDT

A few weeks ago I wrote about “peak oil” — the idea that once worldwide oil production reaches its “peak” and begins to decline, the price will rise steadily and cause economic catastrophe for those industries and countries that rely on cheap oil.

And then last week I mentioned that one of the 250 recordings on the National Recording Registry is Herbert Morrison’s radio broadcast describing the 1937 crash of The Hindenburg.

This column brings those two topics together, and the subject that unites them is airplanes.

Oil, $60 a barrel a year ago, reached a new record high of $134 a barrel Thursday.

And while rising oil prices may be putting stress on your family budget, they are killing the airline industry.

Jet fuel now exceeds $3.20 a gallon — up 81 percent from a year ago.

Dave Emerson, the head of Bain & Co., an airline consulting firm, said recently, “The reality is that there’s no U.S. airline that has a sustainable business model if $117-a-barrel oil prices endure.” Much less $134 a barrel, or the $150 a barrel that corporate raider Boone Pickens, a former oilman, recently said we would hit this year.

The Washington Post reported on April 23 that, “Faced with skyrocketing fuel bills, major U.S. airlines have announced nearly $1 billion in losses for the first three months of the year.”

Already we are seeing bankruptcies, mergers, rising ticket prices, service cutbacks, safety compromises and fewer flights to fewer places. For example, American Airlines, the nation’s largest carrier, announced Thursday it will start charging $15 for the first checked bag, cut domestic flights and lay off thousands of workers — all because of fuel prices.

And there is no quick fix.

As airlines expert Patrick Smith wrote in Salon last week, “Airplanes, unlike cars, are already extremely (fuel) efficient,” so no savings are likely there.

Other transportation systems have been or can be powered with alternative energy sources. For example, cars and trucks can run on batteries, boats on wind or even nuclear power, boats and trains on steam.

But you can’t run a commercial jet airliner on batteries, wind, solar, nuclear or steam. So no help is coming from that direction.

No one is predicting the end of the airline industry (yet), but rising fuel prices might soon put air travel beyond the reach of all but the very rich and make jet planes a prohibitively expensive way to ship cargo. It would mean huge changes with respect to personal and business travel -- and consumer prices.

Which brings us to Manchester Township, N.J., on May, 6, 1937.

That was the day the German airship, The Hindenburg, built by the Zeppelin company, caught fire and exploded while landing at the Lakehurst Naval Air Station. Thirty-six people died in the accident. The event was recorded on the radio broadcast mentioned above, during which Morrison famously cried out, “Oh, the humanity!”

The tragedy ended the use of rigid airships in commercial air transportation. Airplanes soon relegated them to history and hobbyists.

But the deepening woes of the airline industry may bring them back.

In fact, they are here.

First, you have to realize that “airships” come in three types: rigid, semi-rigid and non-rigid. Non-Rigid models are just gas-filled bags with small compartments underneath (like the Goodyear Blimp). They aren’t good for much except surveillance and advertising.

Zeppelins (the company name is now a word for rigid airships in general) have complex skeletons that allow compartments large enough to hold hundreds of passengers or tons of cargo to be built inside the bag.

Zeppelins are much slower than jets. They can’t fly in severe winds.

But they are safe (the Hindenburg accident was easily avoidable), virtually silent, almost pollution-free, able to land on any reasonably flat surface (including water) — and vastly more fuel-efficient than jets.

My research turned up at least two companies betting that airships have a future.

Worldwide Aeros Corp., based in California (www.aerosml.com ), recently received preliminary FAA certification for its “Aeroscraft” — a ship 210 feet long, 118 feet wide and 56 feet tall that cruises at 138 miles per hour.

“The capabilities of the Aeroscraft ML866 create new prospects for all kinds of travel needs,” the Web site claims. “The interior cabin can be configured with amenities from private state rooms to a fully functional business and conference center.”

The Aeroscraft is “also intended for the cargo industry” and would “deliver products more efficiently with reduced cost.”

England’s World SkyCat Ltd. (www.worldskycat.com ) offers a complete line of airships, including the SkyShuttle for “highly economical mass passenger transport” and the SkyFreight for heavy freight.

Obviously, I can’t go into all the technical details of airships in a short column — nor discuss all the pros and cons. You can easily find a lot more about this on the Internet.

I am just suggesting that one of the “givens” of the modern world — jet airplanes — may not be a “sustainable” form of transportation if oil prices actually do continue to rise rapidly.

That would be pretty shocking.

But it may not mean the end of “flying” — but a return to an earlier technology made “obsolete” by those very same planes.

And that’s not mere gasbaggery.

Rich Lewis' e-mail address is: rlcolumn@comcast.net