I thought with the explosion of electric power and windmills and the electric vehicle boom, fossil fuels would not be required…
Yet, a lot of countries still generate coal and other fossil fuels, is it because there is still filthy amounts of profit there to be made? Maybe they are just so used to it they don’t wanna swap to another resource?
I thought with Solar panels being massively produced, it would sell like hot cakes and you’re literally having the power of the sun in your hand.
Also there are a lot of nation states that have little to no natural resources other than oil. So if there is ever a day that oil how’s bust. Those nations will be irrelevant and their whole economy and purchase power on imports goes back 200 years.
There was a quote that is sometimes attributed to Sheikh Rashid but most likely not a real quote but it speaks the truth about those petostates.
“My grandfather rode a camel, my father rode a camel, I drive a Mercedes, my son drives a Land Rover, his son will drive a Land Rover, but his son will ride a camel”
I don’t think the average person truly understands exactly how much of the stuff they use every single day is a byproduct of the petroleum industry.
The obvious ones are oils as lubricants and fuel to burn for vehicles, but it goes soooooooooc much further than that.
Here are some quick examples of things many people do not realize use petroleum byproducts in one way or another.
So while we very well may be able to stop using traditional fuel to run vehicles in the future we still have to find alternatives for a lot of other things. The industry is not going anywhere anytime soon.
Thing is, a lot of these aren’t that bad? Making an oxygen mask feels really different to just setting fire to the fossil fuel to shift a 3-ton vanity pickup truck half a mile to Starbucks. And lots of the others can readily be replaced. Clothes, for example: rayon from bamboo can replace a lot of polyester and nylon
Yeah we have stuff that can outright replace a lot of these things but for mist there is nothing else we have that can take over.
We are heavily dependent on oil even as we try to shift away from fuel as out primary means of transportation.
Because it is still the least expensive power source
Not accounting for externalities, but yes
$
= capitalism.
I recently set up some solar panels. Turned them on very close to noon. Well, look at that! So much power! Four hours later, i was getting 10 percent of that number.
I know that solar power levels change throughout the day. But when it’s put into concrete terms like “I can run my refrigerator on this … oh, only for 2 hours a day” it helped me really understand.
So to answer your question - we use fossil fuels in the grid to as a disposable battery to handle changes in demand and times when renewables aren’t available.
As for EVs - many train routes aren’t electrified. EV trucks are impractical for long-haul, and the infrastructure is nowhere to be seen. Even in EV friendly areas, it’s hard to find a charger that is easy to reach with a heavy-haul truck. That’s before we talk about whether there’s trucks to drive, and the cost of the truck. For individuals, an EV is simply beyond the finances of many people. Road trips are an edge case, but some people travel a lot for work and can’t afford to stop every 3 hrs for 30-60 min, if the charger is available, and twice as often in winter.
We are making progress on every front.
planes need oil, as do ships.
Ships can use sail.
Also, we don’t really need this much consumption.
You know how many ships are needed to transport the thousands of components in the vast supply chain of computer chips? its a lot
If shiping slows down, computer chips become more expensive. And the whole world relies on them for everything. That includes you.
i really doubt sail powered ships are as fast as oil powered ones
Good. I want less consumerism. I know it will effect me, but I already do my best to minimize my impact. Hearing the whines up materialistic shits will only make it better.
do you realize that if shiping became vastly more expensive then fertilizers will become more expensive and then so will food?? not to mention how much more expensive meds would get
the whole world relies on this, and its not just about consumerism
also no avocados if no shiping
Guess we better just ship fertilizers instead of tvs and phones.
Also, there are concepts for sailing cargo vessels
Also, we could make nuclear cargo vessels.
Saying we have to use bunker fuel to maintain our current life style or that we need to maintain current life style is just a lack of creativity and buys into the dogshit status quo that capitalism has trained into you. We’ve know about climate change for over a hundred years and every time anyone suggests doing anything about it, the cudgel of “whAT aBout tHe eCoNOmy!” gets brought up. I don’t care anymore. I don’t care about your pretty little life style. I don’t care about your 401k plan. I just don’t care.
well maybe you should care
You really want me to care about your convinces when you don’t care about the ecosystem?
Sunk costs are sunk and don’t count. It doesn’t pay to build a coal power plant but is already there so you only pay for fuel to run it. This the ammortized costs and current costs are different and so it pays to run the old plants.
cheap and easy.
It’s many thousands of years of solar power , concentated in to a storable, portable and fairly accessible and transmutable form.
Countries don’t “generate” coal and oil, they suck it out of the ground. It was generated by thousands to millions of years of life and accumulated geological processes.
cheap and easy.
My Gen X ass is obligated to respond “like your mom?”
Fossil fuels are actually older than the dinosaurs. Oil and gas form from ancient algae type organisms. Coal is from ancient tree type organisms.
I say type because they only resemble those, and aren’t closely related.
Established supply chain, workforce knowledge. Energy density. Ease of use.
Energy density and entrenched profit structures are big ones for sure. :/
The cost of the raw material is low enough to make it a viable option for the time being. There are also costs associated with switching to renewable options, which makes the transition slower.
Think of it from the perspective of a coal plant owner. You’ve already spent millions into construction and maintenance, so you really want some return on that investment.
When the plant reaches its end of life, that’s usually the best time to start considering other options. If the running costs rise dramatically or you are required to modernize the plant, that could be another time to take a look at other options.
BTW this is the reason why environmental legislation is so important. Companies listen to money, and governments decide what makes economic sense and what doesn’t.
I don’t have the to write up a full explanation bc I am at the grocery store but this video covers it well Why Capitalism Loves Fossil Fuels
I think you’re under estimated how much fossil fuel are used and the electricity production from solar and wind farm.
It’s definitely possible to replace all fossil fuel by electricity, but it’s a massive shift involving multiple nuclear power plants (or the green equivalent which is even more expensive/complicated) , not a few windfarm and solar panel over the parking lot. And today there is no political will to do such massive investment, let alone the NIMBY
Money, They cornered the market and then they started yielding the profits from it to exert political influence. That’s why molten Salt Thorium Reactors were abandoned by american scientists in the 60s. With nuclear power it would mean the end of for profit energy consumption. That plus the surveillance network of the billionaire class is what’s fueling all of the political tensions and far-right (See Fascism) around the world. Denmark is already capable of producing over 140% of its daily energy usage through wind alone. The guardian wrote an article about it in 2015. Wind is still less than 1% of all global energy production. Alberta gets 300 days of sun a year, but have been brainwashed by big oil to invent and reflexively disavow any information otherwise. Then the fossil fuel industry and tech industry launched the Brexit disinformation campaign to weaken the EU that same year. With the advent of China as well as Copenhagen Atomics producing working prototype reactors capable of producing staggeringly vast amounts of energy with less than 1000x the nuclear waste of traditional light water reactors, the change is inevitable. That’s what all of this is for them the war in Ukraine, Trump, Italy, Romania. It’s the fossil fuel industry. With the advent of nuclear power, the obviousness of the effects of climate change and advanced battery technology, the only way they can ensure a continuous demand is war. There are no electric tanks. Russia is a petro state, Saudi Arabia is a petro state, trump is trying to turn the US into an authoritarian petro state. It’s oil, they are the reason for all of this bullshit. Coal power plants are the most dangerous form of energy production, they kill approximately 1,000,000 people a year. We’ve had the technology to move away from them for over 70 years. That’s 70,000,000 dead people. That is more people than died in the entire second world war and we aren’t even talking about it because we’d rather just fall into arguing about transgenderism online than actually stopping them. It all goes back to fossil fuels.
Capitalism and Lobbying
The correct answer.
Yes, yes, fossil fuel companies have a lot of political influence and are actively hindering the adoption of clean technology. But also, the world uses a lot of energy, and it takes time to build the capacity in renewables to make headway. More money would make things faster, but there is no real monetary incentive right now.
but there is no real monetary incentive right now.
dude, solar energy is literally the cheapest form of energy right now. there is a real monetary incentive.
I think you’re under estimated how much fossil fuel are used and the electricity production from solar and wind farm.
It’s definitely possible to replace all fossil fuel by electricity, but it’s a massive shift involving multiple nuclear power plants (or the green equivalent which is even more expensive/complicated) , not a few windfarm and solar panel over the parking lot. And today there is no political will to do such massive investment, let alone the NIMBY
