will oil run out when I Am alive?

[thinfourth2]

dvs_dave said:

Electric ships would be easy enough. Most modern ships these days are diesel-electric, so just replace the diesel bit with fuel cells or even batteries and away you go.
.

Firstly most ships are actually direct coupled 2 stroke diesels running at u to 120rpm

Also the energy density of heavy fuel oil is huge and the amount carried on a large ship is thousands of tons

We used about 150tons a day and carried enough fuel to run for a month roughly so you would need gigantic battery banks

Then look at the efficiency of a super long stroke diesel and the fact they run on basically a byproduct of oil refining and you will see why the diesel powered ship will be around for a very very long time

Actaully when i say diesel i don't mean they run on diesel as in the nice clean stuff that comes out of the diesel pump they are diesel engines and they run on HFO or number 6 oil according to this http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuel_oil

The nearest thing you will of seen to it is road tar, it you take a road and melt the tar down a ship engine can run on it.

[speedy_thrills]

If it was an airship wouldn't you just go nuclear?

[harryowl]

According to this website:
http://www.worldometers.info/
The answers 15,000 days(41 years)

[AJS-]

harryowl said:

According to this website:
http://www.worldometers.info/
The answers 15,000 days(41 years)

Data from BP, who despite trumpeting their green credentials a lot don't really give a fk, but would like to keep the oil price high. Presumably pessimistic estimate of projected consumption and current known and available reserves.

[Oakey]

speedy_thrills said:

If it was an airship wouldn't you just go nuclear?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W3n5cUaG5fg

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CKAyJ3zKTus&fea...

Edited by Oakey on Tuesday 6th March 10:33

[callyman]

We need to get all relevant scientists working on controlling nuclear fusion...problem solved.

As Brian Cox said in BBC's Horizon program "can we make a star on earth" we spend more on ringtones than on fusion research.

Unbelievable.........

Edit to add, I realise fusion would probably be never used in a car, but it would generate an endless supply of electricity and save all the oil being used for heating houses/factories etc.

Edited by callyman on Tuesday 6th March 12:54

[The Black Flash]

Famous Graham said:

Bedazzled said:

dvs_dave said:

Also an electric airliner is entirely possible once the battery energy storage density nut is cracked, however we may see fuel cell planes in the the interim.

I reckon airships might be making a comeback, there are some pretty cool designs for hybrid airships being tested at the moment. In the longer term, how about wireless electric for cars and aircraft? That would save them lugging all those heavy batteries about.

I believe that airships have been recently mooted for non- time critical freight. I say " believe" only because I just remember it vaguely rather than having a definitive source.

Been mooted for about the last 20 years, but not come to anything, alas. I'd love to see big airships again.

[R300will]

Not read every post so fogrive me if it has been answered already. does anybody actually know when we will run out? i expect our energy demands to carry on increasing as the years go on.

[Simpo Two]

Nobody knows. As the price goes up it becomes financially feasible to look harder. Before it 'runs out' it will be so prohibitively expensive that society will have been forced to change anyway.

[Halb]

Shaolin said:

Back in the '70's oil was due to run out by 2000, I don't think it did though.

It did, everything that happens is just a sham kept to make you believe we're still all OK.

[deeps]

hollydog said:

Running out of fuel is going to effect life massively if they have nothing to replace it with. Be saying this for years the human race would have to take a step back. Travel commuting and just basic logistics would have to be reduced or stopped. Fingers crossed for Hydrogen. I don't think we could grow enough crops for fuel at the moment. We can't grow enough to feed the world.Fringers crossed for a fuel replacement.

Does it really matter though? Personally I think they'll still be burning oil in 2000 years time, but if it runs out in 200 years who cares? Life will adapt. I'm happy to have been around in the era of the internal combustion engine, but future generations may look back at us in pity that we didn't have what they have, what ever that may be.

[Krikkit]

Airships will make a comeback once they can be made of solar cell-containing material with a high-density battery pack for night flying.

There should definitely be a plow of money sent into the fusion research - it's the golden goose of energy production that would solve a lot of problems... When you think how much is put into defence budgets and bailing out banks etc, even a small portion of that kind of funds would go a huge way.

[pfoe]

I'm interested to know whatever happened to a petrol fuel cell, that looked amazing.

Small cylinder lined with photovoltaic cells and a highly heat absorbent inner that converted heat to electricity.
It burnt the fuel in a jet and was apparently ridiculously efficient.

More of that please in the interim.

Hydrogen seems unlikely in the near future, it is such a PITA to store on a small scale.

As for air travel I can't see a move to anything other than avgas equivalents, modern high bypass engines aren't too bad.

It wouldn't surprise me to see ground station LASER based power start making an appearance on low level flight though

[davepoth]

R300will said:

Not read every post so fogrive me if it has been answered already. does anybody actually know when we will run out? i expect our energy demands to carry on increasing as the years go on.

Nobody knows when the oil will run out because we have no idea how much we will need and no idea how much we have. Best guess at the current price is that we have 30 years' worth, but if the oil price doubles it becomes worthwhile to extract oil that wasn't economically viable previously.

Added to that, unless you believe in gods and fairies and stuff, new oil is actually being produced all the time where the conditions are right.

[Halb]

The Black Flash said:

Been mooted for about the last 20 years, but not come to anything, alas. I'd love to see big airships again.

Again? Do you remember the Crimea as well?

[R300will]

davepoth said:

R300will said:

Not read every post so fogrive me if it has been answered already. does anybody actually know when we will run out? i expect our energy demands to carry on increasing as the years go on.

Nobody knows when the oil will run out because we have no idea how much we will need and no idea how much we have. Best guess at the current price is that we have 30 years' worth, but if the oil price doubles it becomes worthwhile to extract oil that wasn't economically viable previously.

Added to that, unless you believe in gods and fairies and stuff, new oil is actually being produced all the time where the conditions are right.

Yes but no where near at the same rate so i don't think it would make that much difference would it? maybe a couple of barrels a year at best?

[Lost_BMW]

callyman said:

We need to get all relevant scientists working on controlling nuclear fusion...problem solved.

As Brian Cox said in BBC's Horizon program "can we make a star on earth" we spend more on ringtones than on fusion research.

Unbelievable.........

Edit to add, I realise fusion would probably be never used in a car, but it would generate an endless supply of electricity and save all the oil being used for heating houses/factories etc.

Edited by callyman on Tuesday 6th March 12:54

Have you seen this article, listing some recent activity from various people including NASA, MIT and CERN?

Page 2 referes to some device I haven't heard of that is supposedly useable on a domestic level, soonish? Mmnn... I wonder!

http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2012-02/27/ros...

[ikarl]

andy_s said:

If we want to replace fossil fuel with other energy sources and we give ourselves 25 years to do it we need to build:

2 1/2 conventional nuclear reactors every week.
1 3gw wind turbine every 3 minutes.
250m2 of solar panelling every second.
4 olympic pools of bacteria for biofuel every second.

All this for the next 25 years, and not allowing for population growth.

This is slightly wrong.

These were the figures given in 2010 (I think that was when I first saw it) and it did account for population growth, being that the world currently consumes c.18Tw / year and the quote given for population growth would be 30Tw / year by 2035

you're also missing from the list -
25,000 thermal power stations - 3 per day for the next 25 years
1 tidal buoy in the water every 20 mins for the next 25 years

Horizon - how to build a star.

[iphonedyou]

z4chris99 said:

so we switch to electric/hydrogen etc cars

what do all the big boats switch to?

MSAR.