Ask HN: What happens to society if we run out of oil?
We won't. Over 80% of oil we pull out of the ground is burned for energy, and we are switching to alternatives at a rate that should have us fully transitioned before we run out.
And thank god, too. We can only pull up a quarter of our proven reserves before hitting 2 degrees warming (the Paris agreement). We hit 3 degrees warming (where the Pentagon says wars start over food) when we pull up a third of proven reserves.
I work in cleantech, and people used to wonder if oil would die at a high price (due to lack of supply) or low price (due to low demand). Nowadays everyone knows it will die at a low price. Also, here's my favorite climate change joke, "They say we won't act until it's too late...Luckily, it's too late!"
One thing people often forget when talking about petroleum is plastics and many other uses that have nothing to do with converting petrol into energy.
Is there a raw material that can be used to substitute for petrol to make plastics or is there an alternate to plastics for mass production and other uses?
I think we've developed many plastics alternatives, but they aren't in use because of high prices. I hear a lot about things like sugar for plastic bags and jellyfish for tampons and diapers.
When we do start running out of oil, the prices for this should rise quite a bit, making research into the alternative much more likely.
Tampons are made from cotton, not plastic. Maybe you're talking about the applicators (which are also sometimes made of cardboard instead of plastic)? Or maybe you're talking about menstrual pads, which - like diapers - have a plastic lining to protect against leaks.
To clarify, muzani mentioned jellyfish for tampons and sugar for plastics.
Not plastic for tampons.
Ah, I see.
Is cotton production significantly affected by oil shortages? I thought cotton was an issue mostly because farming it is water-intensive and too much of it is produced in dry regions.
>Is cotton production significantly affected by oil shortages?
I have no idea. I was just correcting your incorrect comprehension of the message you replied to.
I did mean plastic for tampons. I simply quoted it from a quick google search for plastic replacements.
Many older plastics were (and are) made from materials other than oil. For instance, Polyvinyl Chloride can be made from coal via acetylene chemistry.
From what I understand, only a tiny proportion of oil is used for plastics and other chemicals. Transportation is the overwhelming use.
A lot of things become much more expensive (likely gradually as supplies dwindle).
Electricity, until petroleum-burning plants are replaced with nuclear or renewable alternatives.
Travel and shipping, while we come up with alternative ways to fuel jets and ocean liners, and replace our car and truck fleets with electric ones. This cost trickles down to any goods not manufactured locally with locally-sourced materials.
Food, until we come up with alternatives to petroleum-derived fertilizers and retrofit our farm machinery to use electric motors.
Electric motors and batteries and the raw materials needed for the batteries, as demand for them rises.
Plastics (made from petroleum derivatives).
Food again, as some crops are diverted into use as combustion fuel or to produce plastics.
Some of this is already happening to a limited degree as we exhaust the least expensive sources of petroleum.
If the process were to accelerate - and especially if it were to outpace our capacity to substitute non-petroleum-dependent tooling and processes for petroleum-dependent ones - rising prices (especially of food) would presumably lead to social unrest and possibly even instability.
>Electricity, until petroleum-burning plants are replaced with nuclear or renewable alternatives.
Except for home generators and the like, no one uses oil for electricity generation. Coal and natural gas are used, since they are much cheaper.
Saudi Arabia as an oddity gets 2/3 of its electricity from oil power plants (the rest from natural gas and steam).
There is a quote from an OPEC meeting decades ago: The stone age didn't end because the world ran out of stones; the oil age will end long before the world runs out of oil. http://www.economist.com/node/2155717
And the implied corollary: Don't you worry your pretty little heads about climate change, fossil fuel pollution, or your societies being dangerously dependent on a volatile part of the world with autocratic leaders with a medieval mindset. Mankind will always invent its way out of whatever problem it finds itself in. In the mean time, fill up your tank, enjoy life and stop worrying!
It's not really implied, at least in the article:
"The best way to curb the demand for oil and promote innovation in oil alternatives is to tell the world's energy markets that the “externalities” of oil consumption—security considerations and environmental issues alike—really will influence policy from now on. And the way to do that is to impose a gradually rising gasoline tax."
Rather, the article assumes that people will worry their pretty little heads about climate change, fossil fuel pollution, or their societies being dangerously dependent on a volatile part of the world, and that will provide the political incentive to enact taxes that nudge the market to renewables. Or, if the political spark doesn't occur, the rising cost & instability of extracting that oil will provide the market incentive needed to switch over.
We already have invented our way out of this problem - solar, wind, hydro, geothermal, batteries, and electric motors exist already, as do fuel cells & electrolysis at a somewhat higher price point. It's just that those technologies are only recently competitive economically with fossil fuels. Raise the price of oil and suddenly there's no reason to use oil anymore.
I’m an exploration engineer at Saudi Armaco. It will be a long long time (hundreds of years) before we run out of oil; and each year we discover new kinds of crude reservoirs.
Most reservoirs are on land under earth, right?
Is oil from the ocean floor a big thing in the future?
Nearly 1/3 of global oil supply is from offshore.
First society will quickly transition to electric transportation. Second, society will start synthesizing the organic feedstock it needs for making plastic products.
We'll use other hydrocarbons assuming we haven't mostly (hopefully) transitioned off of hydrocarbons by then. Coal (which can be liquefied), natural gas, there is a lot of energy left in the ground.
But the dirtiness of burning hydrocarbons has become well recognized so it looks like we won't get to that point at all.
Oil? Can make essentially oil from coal, water, and electric power. We can get electric power from nukes, water from the oceans, and here in the US we've got lots of coal. E.g., last I heard, a major fraction of the state of Utah has a layer of coal about 30 feet thick.
Pretty sure you need fresh water rather than salt water for that. And desalination is an energy-expensive process.
Agree.
Elon Musk's group of companies are look for complete solutions to running society without oil, mainly because they can't take oil to other planets. Everything from transportation to power generation and storage.
So if we do run out of oil, Musk would probably achieve world domination.
Him or Bezos. Looks more like Bezos currently.
One less topic to argue about at holiday dinners.